Life changes and I've been very busy lately. In March I started working at a new full-time job in mental health chaplaincy. There are three aspects of the work, The first focus is “service planning and strategic planning, identifying, consultating, networking with potential partnerships in education and service delivery areas as well as advocacy and promotion in networking with agencies, hospital networks and faith communities”. Second is “research and development of education materials and programmes relating to spirituality and mental health”. And finally some hands-on chaplaincy, working for a day a week in two settings: a forensic hospital and a private mental health hospital and clinic, both offering a broad spectrum of services.
It is a nice stretch for me, with a lot that draws on my work in tertiary chaplaincy as well as moving into some new skills and practices. It also takes me back twenty years to my original training in Clinical Pastoral Education, which took place on a mental ward outside of San Francisco, so there’s a bit of a circle here as well. I am working with an interesting team of chaplaincy types and am enjoying the staff at both hospitals. I am also doing a lot of reading/research on spirituality and mental health, so there’s a good learning curve as well.
And it’s pretty exciting. When I left RMIT last year, I was aware that I might have a tough time getting any job, let a alone a good one, so this new beginning is very good news as well as a chance to grow ministry and gifts in a new area. I am looking at doing a unit of CPE (part-time) and maybe another grad degree in the process. So, with all that, it's keeping me very busy.
Tuesday, April 21, 2009
Wednesday, March 18, 2009
Building your own Worship Place. Lent 3B 15 March 2009
On Friday mornings this semester I’m taking the 19 tram to the Theological School at Trinity College and teaching a class on Spirituality and Prayer. Last week I began our time by asking the 12 students in the class to check in and share a bit of their present situation by finishing the sentence, “if I were a plant, I’d be...’” The answers were wide and wonderful, with responses like a rose, a gardenia, a storm-tossed eucalyptus, and a bare branch with some promise of new growth. So next week I am going to begin by asking: “if you were a worship space, what would you look like?” Since I get to think about this early I already know my answer! If I were a worship space I would be a circular room with doors and some windows and four artifacts hanging on the wall, equally spaced, one in each direction, plus an altar placed square in the middle. Seven things in all
I’d start with some clear and simple windows - so we can see, light and air; both important things and a very scriptural way to begin with. Look at the first chapter of Genesis, starting at the creation, void, darkness and a wind from God, then God creates light and sees that it is good! We can lose sight of that: that breath and light, good in our sight, are prime vehicles of grace and spirit. So we can take a breath and see where ywe are, where we’re going, who we’re with, what’s good and bad, what matters and why. For all that we need God’s light and air from the very start. So room for the air to move and windows to let the light in. Probably some candles too, but most of the day I’d let the light come through the windows in this particular room.
Then on one wall, I’d have the Ten Commandments; maybe both the version from Exodus as well as the version from Deuteronomy we’ve heard today, plus a few more good laws from the Hebrew scripture. Since we’re talking personal preferences I might have the line from Micah, “Do justice, love mercy, walk humbly with your God; the speech in Deuteronomy that starts, “A wandering Aramean was my ancestor”, Plus some other lines from the Psalms, I am always surprised by “The river of God is full of water” and “In the temple of the Lord, all are crying glory”. I would also throw in a few inconvenient truths so I don’t get lazy: lines like “Do not lend money for usury, or lend food for a profit”. plus the big ten: “I am the Lord your God, don’t have others Gods, don’t use my name wrongly, keep the sabbath, honor your parents, don’t kill, no adultery, don’t steal, lie, covet or desire anyone or anything that belongs to your neighbor.” These are important truths, and we need them in prominent places! But we don’t need them to be a God in themselves. There’s a danger there. They are means of discernment and service, but not the thing itself, and to make these laws into little deities on their own is like honoring the dinnerware but not eating the meal!
So to balance it out, on the other side of this circular room, Jesus’ summary of the law from Matthew’s Gospel: "'You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.' This is the first and great commandment. And there is a second like it: ‘You shall love your neighbour as yourself.' The whole of the Law and the Prophets depends on these two commandments."
So the summary set right across from the other verses: lines and laws from scripture, so we can look back and forth, move from one side to the other: law and love, imperatives and incentives, what we need to do and why, but keeping them in close contact so that the law doesn’t get dead and rigid, and so love will keep fresh, won’t go all stale and sentimental; keeping a little tension between the two in that back and forth motion, while keeping room for light and grace in the middle because some important and deeply faithful questions can come up in that space, lively questions:
“If a marriage has gone dead, does it make sense to stay in it? Is divorce and remarriage in that case an instance of adultery? If parents are abusive, do they need to be honored, is it a sin to say good-bye? If a hungry child needs food on the Sabbath, can we gather food in the field, buy meat in the market, steal it if necessary? Would that be all right on the Sabbath? Is there room for a Sunday brunch with an old friend? And what about war, the line says don’t kill, but what about killing the guy that’s threatening to blow up the plane, the plan, the playing field, the schoolyard? Is this my neighbor? Is this someone loved by God, need this person be loved by me?
Moving back and forth between law and love in a life and death dance between God’s given grace and our taken necessities can be tough, and there are often not easy answers in the middle, but it can also means your questing and your questions and the quality of your answers are fresh in the air and light of the present day. It’ll keep you busy, and that’s no bad thing!
So two more things for rest and recreation; first, a crucifix. For the Lord of life died on that tree, and while I still don’t have all the answers as to why, I am convinced that this is the truest picture of how and where God’s love does not stop, but instead comes closest to the failure and ultimate loss of life for everyone. One big cross with Jesus right there, but maybe a place for others too; temporary pictures nearby as they come to mind: pictures of casualties of fire, flood, war and famine, of HIV and old age, of sagging heart and sad souls, bad drugs and gang wars, victims of powers and principalities, economics, lust, desire and greed. Pictures of the places where everybody gets lost! Right next to the crucifix.
For Jesus is there as a sign that God’s love, grace, wisdom is right there too, Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those who are the called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For God's foolishness is wiser than human wisdom, and God's weakness is stronger than human strength. That’s where Paul is right! Because the last place you’d want to look is where the greatest hope can be found.
And last, across the way an empty cross as well, maybe even a gold one. Because the crucifixion is not the last word on the way. We walk the way of the saviour, the tenuous road between the light of the law and the gravity of grace so that we may be surprised by the empty cross, the hope of resurrection, to be ever surprised that the world is this large, surpassing all we could ever understand: because standing beyond the crucified end is an open promise that God’s love is beyond death, has defeated death, shown it to be lie, points to the ultimate truth of love, this Jesus, who stands there for life, life for us.
And perhaps that’s one of the reasons why he went to cast out the money changers out of the forecourt of the temple in the Gospel reading for today. It was known to be an unjust system, where merchants, often in collusion with temple priests, making unfair profits from pilgrims, with overcharging as the norm. But (and this might be a more subtle issue) it was also a way to turn these transactions of temple tax and sacrifice into a theology of “you get what you pay for” instead of “all is yours by Grace”, and that makes the temple too narrow for this wide drama of love and redemption and death and life and love.
So Christ has given us another temple and another table in the middle of a sacred place, as well in the middle of our lives, where he meets us in the wide field between law and love and life and death, where we can take our questions and quandaries, and meet him in a enduring and surprising answer of light and grace. The altar in the heart of the church is one of those tables, and there are others. And I think that is why we are here.
Teachers can do terrible things sometimes, even give unannounced quizzes, so I will leave you with this one. “If you were a place of worship, what would you look like?” Because, of course, you are.
I’d start with some clear and simple windows - so we can see, light and air; both important things and a very scriptural way to begin with. Look at the first chapter of Genesis, starting at the creation, void, darkness and a wind from God, then God creates light and sees that it is good! We can lose sight of that: that breath and light, good in our sight, are prime vehicles of grace and spirit. So we can take a breath and see where ywe are, where we’re going, who we’re with, what’s good and bad, what matters and why. For all that we need God’s light and air from the very start. So room for the air to move and windows to let the light in. Probably some candles too, but most of the day I’d let the light come through the windows in this particular room.
Then on one wall, I’d have the Ten Commandments; maybe both the version from Exodus as well as the version from Deuteronomy we’ve heard today, plus a few more good laws from the Hebrew scripture. Since we’re talking personal preferences I might have the line from Micah, “Do justice, love mercy, walk humbly with your God; the speech in Deuteronomy that starts, “A wandering Aramean was my ancestor”, Plus some other lines from the Psalms, I am always surprised by “The river of God is full of water” and “In the temple of the Lord, all are crying glory”. I would also throw in a few inconvenient truths so I don’t get lazy: lines like “Do not lend money for usury, or lend food for a profit”. plus the big ten: “I am the Lord your God, don’t have others Gods, don’t use my name wrongly, keep the sabbath, honor your parents, don’t kill, no adultery, don’t steal, lie, covet or desire anyone or anything that belongs to your neighbor.” These are important truths, and we need them in prominent places! But we don’t need them to be a God in themselves. There’s a danger there. They are means of discernment and service, but not the thing itself, and to make these laws into little deities on their own is like honoring the dinnerware but not eating the meal!
So to balance it out, on the other side of this circular room, Jesus’ summary of the law from Matthew’s Gospel: "'You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.' This is the first and great commandment. And there is a second like it: ‘You shall love your neighbour as yourself.' The whole of the Law and the Prophets depends on these two commandments."
So the summary set right across from the other verses: lines and laws from scripture, so we can look back and forth, move from one side to the other: law and love, imperatives and incentives, what we need to do and why, but keeping them in close contact so that the law doesn’t get dead and rigid, and so love will keep fresh, won’t go all stale and sentimental; keeping a little tension between the two in that back and forth motion, while keeping room for light and grace in the middle because some important and deeply faithful questions can come up in that space, lively questions:
“If a marriage has gone dead, does it make sense to stay in it? Is divorce and remarriage in that case an instance of adultery? If parents are abusive, do they need to be honored, is it a sin to say good-bye? If a hungry child needs food on the Sabbath, can we gather food in the field, buy meat in the market, steal it if necessary? Would that be all right on the Sabbath? Is there room for a Sunday brunch with an old friend? And what about war, the line says don’t kill, but what about killing the guy that’s threatening to blow up the plane, the plan, the playing field, the schoolyard? Is this my neighbor? Is this someone loved by God, need this person be loved by me?
Moving back and forth between law and love in a life and death dance between God’s given grace and our taken necessities can be tough, and there are often not easy answers in the middle, but it can also means your questing and your questions and the quality of your answers are fresh in the air and light of the present day. It’ll keep you busy, and that’s no bad thing!
So two more things for rest and recreation; first, a crucifix. For the Lord of life died on that tree, and while I still don’t have all the answers as to why, I am convinced that this is the truest picture of how and where God’s love does not stop, but instead comes closest to the failure and ultimate loss of life for everyone. One big cross with Jesus right there, but maybe a place for others too; temporary pictures nearby as they come to mind: pictures of casualties of fire, flood, war and famine, of HIV and old age, of sagging heart and sad souls, bad drugs and gang wars, victims of powers and principalities, economics, lust, desire and greed. Pictures of the places where everybody gets lost! Right next to the crucifix.
For Jesus is there as a sign that God’s love, grace, wisdom is right there too, Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those who are the called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For God's foolishness is wiser than human wisdom, and God's weakness is stronger than human strength. That’s where Paul is right! Because the last place you’d want to look is where the greatest hope can be found.
And last, across the way an empty cross as well, maybe even a gold one. Because the crucifixion is not the last word on the way. We walk the way of the saviour, the tenuous road between the light of the law and the gravity of grace so that we may be surprised by the empty cross, the hope of resurrection, to be ever surprised that the world is this large, surpassing all we could ever understand: because standing beyond the crucified end is an open promise that God’s love is beyond death, has defeated death, shown it to be lie, points to the ultimate truth of love, this Jesus, who stands there for life, life for us.
And perhaps that’s one of the reasons why he went to cast out the money changers out of the forecourt of the temple in the Gospel reading for today. It was known to be an unjust system, where merchants, often in collusion with temple priests, making unfair profits from pilgrims, with overcharging as the norm. But (and this might be a more subtle issue) it was also a way to turn these transactions of temple tax and sacrifice into a theology of “you get what you pay for” instead of “all is yours by Grace”, and that makes the temple too narrow for this wide drama of love and redemption and death and life and love.
So Christ has given us another temple and another table in the middle of a sacred place, as well in the middle of our lives, where he meets us in the wide field between law and love and life and death, where we can take our questions and quandaries, and meet him in a enduring and surprising answer of light and grace. The altar in the heart of the church is one of those tables, and there are others. And I think that is why we are here.
Teachers can do terrible things sometimes, even give unannounced quizzes, so I will leave you with this one. “If you were a place of worship, what would you look like?” Because, of course, you are.
Thursday, February 05, 2009
On the way home
Currently at the Frankfurt airport on the way to Heathrow and then an overnight to Bangkok; three days there and home to Melbourne! It's been a wonderful trip, and I am happy to be returning down under again.
Here's a snowy day in Dresden, it will be different in Bangkok!
Friday, January 09, 2009
Wednesday, January 07, 2009
Tuesday, December 23, 2008
Getting ready to move!
In three days, right after the Christmas Day service, my best friend and I are heading out for an amazing trip! First stop is Singapore, then points north with a White Christmastide in Sussex. I will try to keep some photos and impressions online as the journey progresses. And it's usually not difficult to document endless pleasures and diversions.
But first, getting some cleaning done and preparing a major Christmas Eve Feast!
But first, getting some cleaning done and preparing a major Christmas Eve Feast!
Tuesday, December 16, 2008
Farewell from the Senior Chaplain
Dear Friends of the RMIT Chaplaincy,
The season of Advent is a time of great tension and creativity within the Christian community. Culminating with the birth of a new relationship between the most sacred and most mundane in a very surprising way and place, it is both an end and a beginning. It is also a time when new ways often come clear. This has been especially true for me this year.
I have decided that 2008 will be my last year as Senior Chaplain: there are several reasons. First, the job has changed remarkably as the number of chaplains has increased from 3 to 8, and while I have deeply enjoyed recruiting and coordinating a collegial community of professional religious volunteers who bring considerable gifts to RMIT, it has changed the focus and scope of the work. New rooms in the Spiritual Centre and increased relations with student clubs and societies embedded within faith, wisdom and justice traditions have also brought new responsibilities and duties. To juggle all these, along with increased and welcome requests and referrals for pastoral care from other University areas, within the existing and limiting structures and budget, has proved both difficult and frustrating. At this time I will likely request a year “on leave” as an Anglican Chaplain on this campus, but I will consider that option over the summer as I reconsider the priorities of my work at The Merton Centre and Trinity College, University of Melbourne.
There are so many people to thank: Chaplains Jo Dirks, Riad Galil, Rob Miller, Yvonne Poon, Simon Rande Tony Salisbury and Chaplain Soma (plus Linda Kent as our able assistant) have made the job a real pleasure. Working with Sergio Fabris as the Wellness manager was a privilege and joy, and I wish Kitty Vivekanda well in that interim position. Jane Stewart was remarkable in her oversight and we shared some happy moments. So many more should be thanked, but I must stop here.
“Opening Silence”, our regular meditation sessions, has been a bright spot for me in the last few years, and it might be good to gather one more time. I know it is late in the semester, but I will be sitting in the regular place at the regular time (Spiritual Centre, Thursday, starting at 12:30) I hope to see you there,
In any case, please know that the good people of RMIT, past and present, have given me much joy in this time, and to quote the American poet, e.e. cummings, “I will carry you in my heart.”
Peace,
Rob
PS - if you wish to keep up, check my website: themertoncentre.org or visit my blog, chaplinesque.blogspot.com
The season of Advent is a time of great tension and creativity within the Christian community. Culminating with the birth of a new relationship between the most sacred and most mundane in a very surprising way and place, it is both an end and a beginning. It is also a time when new ways often come clear. This has been especially true for me this year.
I have decided that 2008 will be my last year as Senior Chaplain: there are several reasons. First, the job has changed remarkably as the number of chaplains has increased from 3 to 8, and while I have deeply enjoyed recruiting and coordinating a collegial community of professional religious volunteers who bring considerable gifts to RMIT, it has changed the focus and scope of the work. New rooms in the Spiritual Centre and increased relations with student clubs and societies embedded within faith, wisdom and justice traditions have also brought new responsibilities and duties. To juggle all these, along with increased and welcome requests and referrals for pastoral care from other University areas, within the existing and limiting structures and budget, has proved both difficult and frustrating. At this time I will likely request a year “on leave” as an Anglican Chaplain on this campus, but I will consider that option over the summer as I reconsider the priorities of my work at The Merton Centre and Trinity College, University of Melbourne.
There are so many people to thank: Chaplains Jo Dirks, Riad Galil, Rob Miller, Yvonne Poon, Simon Rande Tony Salisbury and Chaplain Soma (plus Linda Kent as our able assistant) have made the job a real pleasure. Working with Sergio Fabris as the Wellness manager was a privilege and joy, and I wish Kitty Vivekanda well in that interim position. Jane Stewart was remarkable in her oversight and we shared some happy moments. So many more should be thanked, but I must stop here.
“Opening Silence”, our regular meditation sessions, has been a bright spot for me in the last few years, and it might be good to gather one more time. I know it is late in the semester, but I will be sitting in the regular place at the regular time (Spiritual Centre, Thursday, starting at 12:30) I hope to see you there,
In any case, please know that the good people of RMIT, past and present, have given me much joy in this time, and to quote the American poet, e.e. cummings, “I will carry you in my heart.”
Peace,
Rob
PS - if you wish to keep up, check my website: themertoncentre.org or visit my blog, chaplinesque.blogspot.com
Monday, December 15, 2008
POETRY AND THE OLD MAN - I just wrote this!
Poetry and the old man are friends,
Have been through many rooms and times,
Served a shared apprenticeship for all
The curved rhythms in the midst of words.
Poetry remembered many moments
Like sunlight coming through an open window
Or laughter down the hall. It loved to
Weave past and present towards some promised future.
Then things changed and even the silence begins to send its own message;
The spacious place between the beginning of breath and the start of speech
Breezed in and left packages not needing to be opened. Now
Poetry and the old man have less to say
But they listen more, with open ears
To growing things, moving light, silent addresses
That leap like the ocean spraying the sky, and
Suddenly make everything wonderfully wet.
Have been through many rooms and times,
Served a shared apprenticeship for all
The curved rhythms in the midst of words.
Poetry remembered many moments
Like sunlight coming through an open window
Or laughter down the hall. It loved to
Weave past and present towards some promised future.
Then things changed and even the silence begins to send its own message;
The spacious place between the beginning of breath and the start of speech
Breezed in and left packages not needing to be opened. Now
Poetry and the old man have less to say
But they listen more, with open ears
To growing things, moving light, silent addresses
That leap like the ocean spraying the sky, and
Suddenly make everything wonderfully wet.
Tuesday, December 09, 2008
An update from a previous post - published in this month's edition of The Melbourne Anglican
American-born Robert Whalley, now living in Melbourne, was jubilant at the news of Barack Obama’s election. He explains why.
I’ve cried more on the US Election Day than I have in the last eight years. But tears of joy this time, and hope that the land of my birth is opening a new door. For it seems a graceful sign that a man with the name of Barrack Hussein Obama, with a Kenyan father and a mother from Kansas, a youth spent in Indonesia and an education spanning the Pacific from Jakarta to Honolulu to Harvard, and married to a woman descended from Africans kidnapped as slaves into the American South hundred of years before; will soon be moving into the White House.
In a land where there has been much racism, much to say “Sorry” for, this may mark a surprising turnaround for the image and identity of the United States, one we might not have foreseen in recent times; and I pray it means an opening for mercy, compassion, hope and even a possibility for peace in the future for all of us.
I moved to Melbourne from Berkeley, California, shortly before 11 September 2001 and still remember the affection and support I got from my new neighbours, friends from church, that wonderful memorial service at St. Paul’s, and even one stranger on the Bourke Street Mall who heard my accent and wished me and my country well in that sad time. All showed affection for what the US stood for at its best. So it saddened me (and many others) to see what shortly felt like an avalanche of propaganda and piety, justifying incursions and invasions likely linked to industry and oil and the interests of the rich and mighty.
This grief came into sharper relief when Katrina swept over New Orleans like a parable of judgement.
I was in a local parish facilitating questions about University Chaplaincy the Sunday after the hurricane when one man noted the similarities of the Old Testament lesson for the day – the Israelites getting across the dry bed of the Red Sea while Pharaoh’s army gets mired in the mud – and the situation in Louisiana. As I responded to him I realised that while I had always seen America in a traditional line with biblical Israel, a small people getting past the old tyrannies, making towards the wilderness, to a new community of grace and justice, it could no longer claim that place. For America now was closer to Pharaoh’s army (whether in Iraq or Louisiana) protecting the mighty over the poor and fragile, with lower priorities for those who hunger and thirst. I recalled the words, known to every American, on the Statue of Liberty not far across the harbour from where the World Trade Centre used to stand: Give me your tired, your poor / Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free / The wretched refuse of your teaming shore, / I lift my lamp beside the golden door.
So when this election result came, it brought me tears of joy. If the country of my birth, that great ship of state, can turn around, make amends, repent and move towards being an agent of change and healing, mercy and justice for all colours and kinds, a light to the nations, it may be that the golden door is opening to a new beginning for us all.
Robert Whalley is Senior Chaplain at RMIT University, Director of The Merton Centre at St. Peter’s Eastern Hill, Melbourne, and an adjunct tutor at the Trinity College Theological School.
I’ve cried more on the US Election Day than I have in the last eight years. But tears of joy this time, and hope that the land of my birth is opening a new door. For it seems a graceful sign that a man with the name of Barrack Hussein Obama, with a Kenyan father and a mother from Kansas, a youth spent in Indonesia and an education spanning the Pacific from Jakarta to Honolulu to Harvard, and married to a woman descended from Africans kidnapped as slaves into the American South hundred of years before; will soon be moving into the White House.
In a land where there has been much racism, much to say “Sorry” for, this may mark a surprising turnaround for the image and identity of the United States, one we might not have foreseen in recent times; and I pray it means an opening for mercy, compassion, hope and even a possibility for peace in the future for all of us.
I moved to Melbourne from Berkeley, California, shortly before 11 September 2001 and still remember the affection and support I got from my new neighbours, friends from church, that wonderful memorial service at St. Paul’s, and even one stranger on the Bourke Street Mall who heard my accent and wished me and my country well in that sad time. All showed affection for what the US stood for at its best. So it saddened me (and many others) to see what shortly felt like an avalanche of propaganda and piety, justifying incursions and invasions likely linked to industry and oil and the interests of the rich and mighty.
This grief came into sharper relief when Katrina swept over New Orleans like a parable of judgement.
I was in a local parish facilitating questions about University Chaplaincy the Sunday after the hurricane when one man noted the similarities of the Old Testament lesson for the day – the Israelites getting across the dry bed of the Red Sea while Pharaoh’s army gets mired in the mud – and the situation in Louisiana. As I responded to him I realised that while I had always seen America in a traditional line with biblical Israel, a small people getting past the old tyrannies, making towards the wilderness, to a new community of grace and justice, it could no longer claim that place. For America now was closer to Pharaoh’s army (whether in Iraq or Louisiana) protecting the mighty over the poor and fragile, with lower priorities for those who hunger and thirst. I recalled the words, known to every American, on the Statue of Liberty not far across the harbour from where the World Trade Centre used to stand: Give me your tired, your poor / Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free / The wretched refuse of your teaming shore, / I lift my lamp beside the golden door.
So when this election result came, it brought me tears of joy. If the country of my birth, that great ship of state, can turn around, make amends, repent and move towards being an agent of change and healing, mercy and justice for all colours and kinds, a light to the nations, it may be that the golden door is opening to a new beginning for us all.
Robert Whalley is Senior Chaplain at RMIT University, Director of The Merton Centre at St. Peter’s Eastern Hill, Melbourne, and an adjunct tutor at the Trinity College Theological School.
Sunday, November 23, 2008
Sunday of Christ the King
It’s been almost a year since I’ve been up here preaching, and that’s because it’s been a busy year at the RMIT University Spiritual Centre and Chaplaincy. Since 2004 St. Peter’s and the Anglican Diocese of Melbourne have renewed their presence and support for the Chaplaincy at RMIT and it’s paying off nicely as our ministries of liturgy, education, pastoral care, prophesy and presence grow and mature. In the last year, my third as Senior Chaplain, our interfaith and ecumenical team has grown from three to nine ministers and it looks like we might grow to eleven or twelve in the coming year. This, as well as teaching an RMIT class on Religion, Globalization and Conflict and a class on Spirituality and Prayer at the Theological School at Trinity College, makes some new and exciting connections between our parish and nearby tertiary institutions to the benefit of all.
But one of the reasons I love working at RMIT came two weeks ago when I led a morning discussion on “Spirituality and Customer Service”. I will readily admit it sounds very California, even Byron Bay; but talking about how we can practice the present of the present moment in everything we do can be an important conversation that cuts across all kinds of spiritualities, religions or lack of religion, hinging on the common hope that there just might be the possibility or dimension of holiness, integrity, justice and love in the center of the universe; and if there is, how we can respond to it in the present moment, how we can make that moment a present. It’s always surprising to me to see how many people respond to that, as if almost everyone has a secret hunch that the world is lit from within, brought forth and enlightened by love, and that’s often where our chaplaincy meets the world at RMIT.
That’s also a good place to start this Sunday, when we celebrate the lay ministries that proceed from St. Peter’s Eastern Hill, while the church season curves from Pentecost into Advent, the Sunday of Christ the King, Christ the Good Shepherd, Christ the coming child, who will give birth to a new innocence and a new beginning in the very middle of our lives. It’s a good time too to consider why we’re here. Philip Larkin wrote that people come to church because they need a place to “to take themselves more seriously”, but I think there’s more to that; perhaps we’re also here to find a serious centre, a touchstone, a founding place and focus to take up our calling as the ministry of the laity, the people of God, taking us out again to a world made new by what we see here, do here, made new by what we take out of this place, bit by bit by bit.
Some years ago an English theologian wrote about “God shaped events” that happen in every human life: instances of creativity, redemption, blessed surprise, sparking in the middle of the larger community; when the world ignites with connection, compassion, wisdom, justice, love. We come here to see those consistent God-shaped events continuing over time, shining brightly in the life of Jesus, a moving pattern of the will and the love of God in the middle of our lives, lighting up the whole world; a kind of keynote address of the Word made Flesh, a cornerstone for our remembering, but we also come here to become what we see! We come to eat and drink, to take in the refreshment and renewal of Christ, in order to be recalled and reminded, in order to serve as Gods’ continuously renewed presence in the larger world.
It’s a two sided action, we come here to take it in, so that we can take it out there on the road and live it out. As Richard Holloway, the former Primate of Scotland, writes, it’s the difference between orthodoxy (right belief)and orthopraxy (right action). And trying to keep the two sides together is not easy, working to close the connection between what we say and what we do. Again, that’s why we’re here. In Jesus Christ, God does what he says. In the life, teachings, ministry, death, and resurrection of Jesus we see the word spoken, acted out, done to death and rising in glory - the full story of the shepherd giving his life for the sheep. And we are baptized and co-missioned to be shepherds as well, so that’s our path, to go on in our own way.
For the ministry of laypeople (those of us baptized as children or adults, who affirm those baptismal vows every time we receive communion), that ministry is - like Jesus’ - highly personal; has to do with being who we are and where we are in the present moment. Being a word made flesh here has to do with being a particular servant, a one of a kind friend, a contemporary shepherd, and a sign of God’s outpouring love in every field where we meet God’s people. Spirituality and Customer Service might be one model for that, but there are other ways as well.
Some 20 years a film called “Wings of Desire,” was set in Berlin before the wall had fallen. There were angels stationed all over the city doing errands and acts of mercy, spending their days touching people in trying times, sending encouraging messages, being secret signs of hope. Other times they would meet in unlikely places to recall what happened that day: once in a closed library, another time in an empty Mercedes showroom: sharing stories of holy, ordinary day to day encounters, seen clearly in light of their great hope, encouraging human beings, enlightening in love
That’s another definition of our ministry, as well as why we need both to have and to be church, be here together in the back of the Mercedes convertible, remembering the how and the who and the why of it. That’s why this place needs to be special, why the smells and bells, words and music all matter, so that we recall how to teach the world to sing, so we can help the world remember how well it’s made, and why, to what end, That’s both the gift we receive and the gift we give: the present of the present moment. enlightening God-shaped events and opportunities in the middle of everywhere.
But there’s a paradox, for just as this place, and what we do here, needs to be lofty, lifting the mind and heart high with high liturgy and appropriate ceremonial; so the way we practice out there needs to be casual, almost undercover angels in mufti,; no major heroic action, no stained-glass vocabulary, no Bible in the right hand or Prayer Book in the left; no special clothes, nothing particularly noteworthy: nothing really except loving the world as God loves it. As people in the American South put it, it’s a “down-home” thing, nicely homely, shepherding the people that God shepherds, people you meet in your own way, being that message in all that you say or do as an ongoing exercise of very small intentions and attentions, God-shaped events extending over time, small beginning, little advents, shepherding good news. In all this, nothing special, no smells and bells, sometimes boring, going by rote, working with no clear directionals, with sometimes boring sheep, unthankful flocks, noisy, lonely, hungry, undervalued, imprisoned people who might just be angels and messengers of grace as much as us.
So we come together this Sunday, as the Church turns a corner to a new beginning, to claim the ministries that happen where we meet the world, in all our lives: family, children, partners and parents and pets, employers, employees, enemies and friends, pains and pleasure, past and potential; our longest shadow and our deepest yearning. Absolutely everywhere we walk with God, shepherding with God, creating, redeeming, and sanctifying every moment in time, every instant of the present. That is why I think we are here.
So I now ask you to stand, and remain standing for a little while. We always stand for the Gospel, and today we respond to that Gospel by remembering where we stand, and what we stand for, in our daily life, the places where we represent Christ. So take a moment and remember, in your life and ministry, where you stand for Christ, and when the Vicar asks you to come forward for a blessing on that ministry, stand at the altar rail and present your lives as a reasonable and holy and living sacrifice to God: remembering that Gospel, and all that God gives you in the present of the present moment. Please give it all up as a right and take it back as a gift and as a ministry of God. Be the body of Christ that you are and take up your ministry today.
Amen.
But one of the reasons I love working at RMIT came two weeks ago when I led a morning discussion on “Spirituality and Customer Service”. I will readily admit it sounds very California, even Byron Bay; but talking about how we can practice the present of the present moment in everything we do can be an important conversation that cuts across all kinds of spiritualities, religions or lack of religion, hinging on the common hope that there just might be the possibility or dimension of holiness, integrity, justice and love in the center of the universe; and if there is, how we can respond to it in the present moment, how we can make that moment a present. It’s always surprising to me to see how many people respond to that, as if almost everyone has a secret hunch that the world is lit from within, brought forth and enlightened by love, and that’s often where our chaplaincy meets the world at RMIT.
That’s also a good place to start this Sunday, when we celebrate the lay ministries that proceed from St. Peter’s Eastern Hill, while the church season curves from Pentecost into Advent, the Sunday of Christ the King, Christ the Good Shepherd, Christ the coming child, who will give birth to a new innocence and a new beginning in the very middle of our lives. It’s a good time too to consider why we’re here. Philip Larkin wrote that people come to church because they need a place to “to take themselves more seriously”, but I think there’s more to that; perhaps we’re also here to find a serious centre, a touchstone, a founding place and focus to take up our calling as the ministry of the laity, the people of God, taking us out again to a world made new by what we see here, do here, made new by what we take out of this place, bit by bit by bit.
Some years ago an English theologian wrote about “God shaped events” that happen in every human life: instances of creativity, redemption, blessed surprise, sparking in the middle of the larger community; when the world ignites with connection, compassion, wisdom, justice, love. We come here to see those consistent God-shaped events continuing over time, shining brightly in the life of Jesus, a moving pattern of the will and the love of God in the middle of our lives, lighting up the whole world; a kind of keynote address of the Word made Flesh, a cornerstone for our remembering, but we also come here to become what we see! We come to eat and drink, to take in the refreshment and renewal of Christ, in order to be recalled and reminded, in order to serve as Gods’ continuously renewed presence in the larger world.
It’s a two sided action, we come here to take it in, so that we can take it out there on the road and live it out. As Richard Holloway, the former Primate of Scotland, writes, it’s the difference between orthodoxy (right belief)and orthopraxy (right action). And trying to keep the two sides together is not easy, working to close the connection between what we say and what we do. Again, that’s why we’re here. In Jesus Christ, God does what he says. In the life, teachings, ministry, death, and resurrection of Jesus we see the word spoken, acted out, done to death and rising in glory - the full story of the shepherd giving his life for the sheep. And we are baptized and co-missioned to be shepherds as well, so that’s our path, to go on in our own way.
For the ministry of laypeople (those of us baptized as children or adults, who affirm those baptismal vows every time we receive communion), that ministry is - like Jesus’ - highly personal; has to do with being who we are and where we are in the present moment. Being a word made flesh here has to do with being a particular servant, a one of a kind friend, a contemporary shepherd, and a sign of God’s outpouring love in every field where we meet God’s people. Spirituality and Customer Service might be one model for that, but there are other ways as well.
Some 20 years a film called “Wings of Desire,” was set in Berlin before the wall had fallen. There were angels stationed all over the city doing errands and acts of mercy, spending their days touching people in trying times, sending encouraging messages, being secret signs of hope. Other times they would meet in unlikely places to recall what happened that day: once in a closed library, another time in an empty Mercedes showroom: sharing stories of holy, ordinary day to day encounters, seen clearly in light of their great hope, encouraging human beings, enlightening in love
That’s another definition of our ministry, as well as why we need both to have and to be church, be here together in the back of the Mercedes convertible, remembering the how and the who and the why of it. That’s why this place needs to be special, why the smells and bells, words and music all matter, so that we recall how to teach the world to sing, so we can help the world remember how well it’s made, and why, to what end, That’s both the gift we receive and the gift we give: the present of the present moment. enlightening God-shaped events and opportunities in the middle of everywhere.
But there’s a paradox, for just as this place, and what we do here, needs to be lofty, lifting the mind and heart high with high liturgy and appropriate ceremonial; so the way we practice out there needs to be casual, almost undercover angels in mufti,; no major heroic action, no stained-glass vocabulary, no Bible in the right hand or Prayer Book in the left; no special clothes, nothing particularly noteworthy: nothing really except loving the world as God loves it. As people in the American South put it, it’s a “down-home” thing, nicely homely, shepherding the people that God shepherds, people you meet in your own way, being that message in all that you say or do as an ongoing exercise of very small intentions and attentions, God-shaped events extending over time, small beginning, little advents, shepherding good news. In all this, nothing special, no smells and bells, sometimes boring, going by rote, working with no clear directionals, with sometimes boring sheep, unthankful flocks, noisy, lonely, hungry, undervalued, imprisoned people who might just be angels and messengers of grace as much as us.
So we come together this Sunday, as the Church turns a corner to a new beginning, to claim the ministries that happen where we meet the world, in all our lives: family, children, partners and parents and pets, employers, employees, enemies and friends, pains and pleasure, past and potential; our longest shadow and our deepest yearning. Absolutely everywhere we walk with God, shepherding with God, creating, redeeming, and sanctifying every moment in time, every instant of the present. That is why I think we are here.
So I now ask you to stand, and remain standing for a little while. We always stand for the Gospel, and today we respond to that Gospel by remembering where we stand, and what we stand for, in our daily life, the places where we represent Christ. So take a moment and remember, in your life and ministry, where you stand for Christ, and when the Vicar asks you to come forward for a blessing on that ministry, stand at the altar rail and present your lives as a reasonable and holy and living sacrifice to God: remembering that Gospel, and all that God gives you in the present of the present moment. Please give it all up as a right and take it back as a gift and as a ministry of God. Be the body of Christ that you are and take up your ministry today.
Amen.
Thursday, November 06, 2008
It is a new thing...
I've cried more in the last 20 hours than I have in the last 8 years, but tears of joy this time, hope that we can - and will - begin again, in a more inclusive community of faith and justice, spirit and matter, working together for that new beginning.
This American-Australian has spent so much time since 2001 apologizing for America's narrow vision over these years, the loud parochial imperialism that's stealthily bedded down with the rich and mighty; and it's such a blessed relief that there now seems to be an opening for mercy, compassion, solidarity, even a possibility for peace in a vision of a new world. I am so proud that the country of my birth, that great ship of state, can turn around, make amends, repent and move towards a renewed vision of these United States as an agent of change and healing, a light to the nations; In this moment of time it seems the golden door is opening to a new beginning, and I am so proud!
This American-Australian has spent so much time since 2001 apologizing for America's narrow vision over these years, the loud parochial imperialism that's stealthily bedded down with the rich and mighty; and it's such a blessed relief that there now seems to be an opening for mercy, compassion, solidarity, even a possibility for peace in a vision of a new world. I am so proud that the country of my birth, that great ship of state, can turn around, make amends, repent and move towards a renewed vision of these United States as an agent of change and healing, a light to the nations; In this moment of time it seems the golden door is opening to a new beginning, and I am so proud!
Tuesday, June 24, 2008
to the Holy Spirit - James McAuley
Leaving your fragrant rest of the summit of morning calm,
Descend, Bird of paradise, from the high mountain:
And, plumed with glowing iris along each burning wire,
Visit in time our regions of eucalypt and palm.
Dance, prophetic bird, in rippling spectrums of fire,
Ray forth your incandescent ritual like a fountain;
Let your drab unearthly mate that watches in morning calm
Unseen, be filled with the nuptial splendours of your desire.
Engender upon our souls your sacred rhythm: inspire
The trembling breath of the flute, the exultant cosmic psalm,
The dance that breaks into flower beneath the storm-voiced mountain;
Array in your dazzling intricate plumage the swaying choir.
Descend, Bird of paradise, from the high mountain:
And, plumed with glowing iris along each burning wire,
Visit in time our regions of eucalypt and palm.
Dance, prophetic bird, in rippling spectrums of fire,
Ray forth your incandescent ritual like a fountain;
Let your drab unearthly mate that watches in morning calm
Unseen, be filled with the nuptial splendours of your desire.
Engender upon our souls your sacred rhythm: inspire
The trembling breath of the flute, the exultant cosmic psalm,
The dance that breaks into flower beneath the storm-voiced mountain;
Array in your dazzling intricate plumage the swaying choir.
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