I’m writing this on Wednesday afternoon, March 12^th.  This morning our much loved sister and friend Karen Beatty died, after a struggle with cancer.  Just last week her status was changed officially to ‘palliative care’ and this morning, today already, she died.  I’ve been sick this week with a bad cough, so I asked our Honorary Assistant, The Rev. Brian Ford, to stop by and anoint Karen and bless her.  He did that, gladly.  Thank you, Brian, thank you!

Some might argue, some do, in fact, that the LORD did not preserve Karen from all evil.  But I believe they are wrong.  Cancer took Karen’s life, took Karen, from her beloved husband, Wayne, and from all of us, and took her far too soon.  This was not God’s will.  It was cancer.  This is a miserable disease which is a real symbol, deadly, in fact, of the brokenness of creation itself:  The creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and will obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. We know that the whole creation has been groaning in labour pains until now.  (Romans 8:21-22)

But Karen, the beloved child of God, was and is preserved from all evil, and her life is safe forever, right where she placed her faith all that life long, in the presence of God, through Jesus Christ her Lord.

I visited her a couple of times her first week in hospital (she didn’t make it through the second week, that’s how fast it progressed), and both times, once with her dear sister Marlene, and once with her beloved Wayne, she eagerly received Holy Communion; she was hungry and thirsty for the body and blood of her Lord, hungry and thirsty for his healing presence and the power of his love.  But then, for the Karen I knew, that was not something different.  Her faith sustained her through life, and it sustained her in her dying.

Now we entrust her to God; ‘from this time forth and forevermore’ she is safe in the arms of Jesus, safe in the love of God which is stronger than death, stronger even than our grief, our sorrow, our pain at her death.  We mourn her dying; we will miss her.  But we entrust her with joyful thanksgiving to God, and we embrace her husband, our brother and friend, Wayne.  Sisters and brothers, this is what it’s all about.

Thanks be to God!

ASH WEDNESDAY, BEEN THERE, DONE THAT…

BUT WHY ASHES ANYWAY?

AS A SIGN OF REPENTANCE:  In the Hebrew Scriptures, what we call the Old Testament, ashes are used as a sign of humility and repentance.  People know that they have sinned before God and so they mark themselves with ashes.  Ashes, in Jewish and Christian contexts, suggest judgement and God’s condemnation of sin.

AS A REMINDER OF MORTALITY:  When we hear the words from Genesis 3, “Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return,” we are reminded forcefully of our mortality and the words of the committal in the burial service, “…earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust.”  One day those words will be said over us; that doesn’t need to be morbid, but it is a powerful reminder that we are not God, and so Lent is time to give up our idolatry, even, maybe especially, of ourselves.

AS A SYMBOL OF CLEANSING AND RENEWAL:  Ashes were once used as a cleansing agent in the absence of soap, and so they remind us that we need to be cleansed of our sin, as indeed we are in baptism.  A further example of death and renewal is the custom of burning fields so as to destroy the old and prepare the new, to clear away the clutter of the past and in doing so to enrich the ground for a new future.

AS A VISIBLE SIGN OF BAPTISM, A GRACEFUL REMINDER OF WHOSE WE ARE:  Baptism is a primary emphasis of Lent and ashes have sometimes been understood as penitential substitute for water as a sign of baptism; as water both stifles and refreshes, drowns and makes alive, so the ashes also tell of both death and renewal.  Perhaps more importantly, the cross of ashes reminds us vividly that in baptism we were signed with the cross of Christ, forever, and that we always bear that sign on our brows.  We belong to Christ, and so there is joy for the journey, not just of Lent, but of life.

NOW WE JOIN IN THE PILGRIMAGE OF LENT

LENT is from an Anglo-Saxon word meaning “springtime” and so is to be understood as the holy springtime of the soul, a time for preparation, planting, and growth.

Like the father of the prodigal son (this story is one of the Lenten gospel readings, last year), God invites us to return home.  Lent is a time for self-examination and repentance, but repentance always understood in its most graceful sense:  a turning away from death, and death-dealing habits and lifestyles, and a turning toward life, the abundant life given in Jesus Christ our Lord.

From a very early time in the history of the church of Christ, Lent was a time set aside for those people preparing for baptism (and originally they were almost all adults) to undergo instruction in the mysteries of the faith.  They were then baptized at the Great Vigil of Easter, the first service of Easter, after sunset on Holy Saturday – in the Jewish worldview the new day begins at sunset, and so for the earliest Christians, all of them Jewish, Easter actually began on Saturday night.

The season of Lent is a period of time set aside to help all Christians prepare to remember and celebrate the death and resurrection of our Lord.  Lent prepares us for the great events of Easter, the centre of our faith.  Lent is not so much a chunk of the calendar as it is an opportunity for pilgrimage, for all of us who are baptized into Christ to remember that baptism and examine closely its relationship to our lives, to journey together with Christ to the cross where our sin is put to death, and to the empty tomb, where we are given new life in the risen Christ.

Signposts on the journey include the disappearance of the Alleluia and the Gloria, to remind us of the solemnity of the season.  Traditionally, flowers are not included in worship spaces for the same reason.  The colour of the season is violet or purple, for repentance.  The season is 40 days long (excluding Sundays), even as Jesus spent 40 days in the wilderness preparing for his ministry, and the people of Israel wandered 40 years in the wilderness, preparing to enter the Promised Land.

 Much of this material is adapted from ‘Manual on the Liturgy: Lutheran Book of Worship’ Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1979

BAPTISM:  “This is my Son, the Beloved; with him I am well pleased.”  (Matthew 3:17)

TRANSFIGURATION:  While he was still speaking, suddenly a bright cloud overshadowed them, and from the cloud a voice said, “This is my Son, the Beloved; with him I am well pleased; listen to him!”  (Mt. 17:5)

Did you catch it?  The difference, I mean?

Same Gospel, same writer, different chapter and verse, but, more importantly, different stages of Jesus’ ministry.

Do we?  Listen to him, I mean.

Our liturgy contains that wonderful line after the readings, ‘Hear what the Spirit is saying to the church.’  In this passage, there is an even more authoritative voice for us, the very voice of God, speaking to us, to the church:  “Listen to him, listen to Jesus.”  When you hear him, you hear me; when you see him, you see me.  So, do we?  Listen to him, I mean?

Lent is a time for us to think about that, a gift of time, to listen.  Will we?  Use the gift, I mean.

We begin that journey again this week, March 5^th, at 7 p.m. with the Ash Wednesday worship, which includes   the Imposition of Ashes and the Holy Eucharist.  Why miss out?  Hope to see you there/here.

Thanks be to God!

VISION 2020: Red River Cathedral 200

I laid a foundation, and someone else is building on it. Each builder must choose with care how to build on it. For no one can lay any foundation other than the one that has been laid; that foundation is Jesus Christ.”(I Cor. 3:10-11)

On Sunday we hold our Annual General Meeting. Thanks be to God! Yes, it is a business meeting, for sure, but definitely not a ‘busy-ness’ meeting. We gather because we want to be good stewards of what God has entrusted to us, and of what others have passed on to us: Our beautiful and historic cathedral building, and, more importantly, our community of faith built on the foundation of Jesus Christ. He is the only sure foundation, who has brought us through these 194 years. If we “choose with care how to build on” that foundation we will not only celebrate 200 years in 2020, but our descendants will give thanks to God for 300 years of that sure foundation which is Jesus Christ, and the Christian community which can be built only on him.

“Do you (plural) not know that you (plural) are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you (plural)?”  (I Cor. 3:16)

Our future – as our present journey together – rests on the foundation of Christ, knowing that we journey together or not at all. In this verse (I Cor. 3:16) every instance of “you” is in the plural: “YOU TOGETHER are God’s temple”, and again, “God’s Spirit dwells in YOU TOGETHER”.

How do we give thanks for the past? Together.
How do we rejoice in the present? Together.
How do we plan for the future? Together!
How do we “choose with care” in building on the foundation which is Jesus Christ? Together!

“For all things are yours (plural)… and you (plural) belong to Christ, and Christ belongs to God.” (I Cor. 3:21,23)

Wow! Talk about a Gospel word. Talk about the Good News of God’s unfailing love in Jesus Christ. Talk about hope for our future. All things are YOURS TOGETHER! YOU TOGETHER belong to Christ! Christ belongs to God!

So, let’s do that, OK? Let’s talk about the Gospel, shall we? Let’s talk about the Good News, shall we? Let’s talk about our hopeful future, shall we? In morning worship, every Sunday – for sure. In our AGM, today – you bet. In our lives as disciples of the Lord Jesus, every day, most importantly!

Jesus calls us to follow in the Way of the Cross, in the new life which is ours in him. Our AGM is another opportunity, as is our worship always, to be about the business of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. After worship, come for lunch, stay for the meeting. See you there… And for each one of you I say,

Thanks be to God!

Choose life so that you and your descendants may live, loving the LORD your God, obeying him, and holding fast to him; for that means life to you and length of days, so that you may live in the land that the LORD swore to give to your ancestors, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob.          Deut. 30:19b-20

In the reading for Sunday from Deuteronomy, Moses gives his farewell address.  He’s gathered all the people of Israel around himself on the east side of the Jordan River, and he speaks at some length about their past – forty years in the wilderness – and then invites them to consider the future which God has in mind for them, across that river, in the Promised Land.  Yet, the shape of that future is not clear; there are uncertainties, fears, even.  Things will be different.  After all, forty years of doing things one way might even feel like that’s the only way, like that’s the way “we’ve always done it.”

It’s time for us to cross the Jordan River, again.  It seems to me that every generation of the church needs to cross the Jordan, and we’re no different.  I’ve been thinking now for awhile about October 14^th, 2020.  It may seem a long way off, and, of course, tomorrow is promised to no one, but the future belongs to God, and so do we.  Whether we live or whether we die, we are the Lord’s, as St. Paul puts it in his letter to the Romans.

So, then, what about October, 2020?  Well, I’m glad you asked.  That will be two hundred years since The Rev. John West, Church of England, Church Missionary Society, arrived in the still somewhat rough Red River settlement, having come down from Hudson’s Bay via river and lake.  We date this Cathedral Parish from his arrival.

How do we get to 2020?  It is, after all, still six years and nine months away, and we have yet to pass this year’s budget!  Well, we plan.  We pray.  We persist, as disciples of the crucified and risen one, Jesus Christ, to whom this Cathedral belongs, along with the whole church on earth.  We choose.

Together we choose to move into the future trusting in God’s call; we have to cross the Jordan again or we wither and die in the wilderness of our own self-satisfaction.  It’s important, vital, in fact, to celebrate the past, and to give thanks for God’s faithfulness through 194 years, but we can’t stop there.  If there is to be a river crossing, if there is to be the promised land of a future for this community of faith we call St. John’s Anglican Cathedral, we must, absolutely must, look beyond ourselves, and follow Jesus wherever he leads us, even – get ready for it – if it’s off ‘the Island’ between Main and the River, between St. John’s Park and Kildonan Park.

Let’s start thinking together about that bicentenary – it will come more quickly than you think – and how best to celebrate and give thanks to God.  Even more importantly than getting there, though, let’s think about the future into which God is calling all of us, a future of worship grounded in the presence of Christ, in Word and Sacrament, which then sends us out into service in Christ’s name!  You see, God is already there, on the other side of the Jordan, on the other side of Main Street, on the other side of the world.  Don’t you think it’s time we crossed too?

One place we can talk about our future together is at the Annual General Meeting.  I hope you will come and join us next Sunday, February 23^rd, at 1 p.m. in the John West Hall.  First, after worship, we’ll share some food, and then we’ll get to work, with joy and thanksgiving for all that God has done in and through this community for almost two centuries, and also through us, and for all that God promises in Christ, a future rich and full to the brim with hope.

Thanks be to God! 

[Jesus:]  You are the salt of the earth; but if salt has lost its taste, how can its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything, but is thrown out and trampled under foot.  You are the light of the world. A city built on a hill cannot be hid. No one after lighting a lamp puts it under the bushel basket, but on the lampstand, and it gives light to all in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven.  (Matthew 5:13-16)

For decades a terrible war raged in what was then called the Sudan, in what was then the largest country in Africa.  The Muslim, Arabic-speaking north with the government in Khartoum dominated and persecuted and exploited the African people of the south, most of whom are Christian, many of whom are Anglican.

In 2005 a peace accord was signed, and, only two years ago, the world’s newest country was born as South Sudan gained its independence, with much celebration and great hope.  The vast majority of Sudanese in Canada are from the south, refugees during all the terrible years of warfare with the north.

We have two Sudanese parishes in the Diocese of Rupert’s Land, both in Winnipeg:  St. Andrew’s Sudanese Mission (The Rev. Justin Laki) which gathers for worship on Sunday afternoons at All Saints, and Emmanuel Sudanese Mission, which worships on Sunday afternoons at St. Matthew’s, now part of West End Commons ( http://thewestendcommons.ca/ ).  The priest for this community is The Rev. Reuben Garang.  Reuben is Sudanese, and arrived in Canada many years ago as one of ‘the lost boys’.  He has an amazing story to tell.  Read a little bit here from 2011: http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/local/ex-child-soldier-overcame-hardship-to-earn-diploma-131910418.html

In December of 2013 he left to visit family and friends in South Sudan where he had not been since he left war-torn Sudan in January of 1987.  That was the plan at least: http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/local/lost-boy–going-home-233804651.html  We had Reuben here at the Cathedral not long before he left Canada, but just after the new conflict had broken out between the President and the loyal part of the army, and the Vice-President and his armed followers.  He joined us for the Dean’s Forum, along with The Rev. Deacon Abraham Kuol Chuol, also from Emmanuel.

But things changed on the ground in South Sudan, quickly, and Reuben was never even able to get into the country, much less travel to his home area, right in the middle of all the terrible violence.  He made a number of entries into his blog while he was in Uganda, first hoping to enter South Sudan, and then looking for ways to contact his family.  Read it here: http://goinghomesouthsudan.blogspot.ca/search?updated-min=2013-01-01T00:00:00-08:00&updated-max=2014-01-01T00:00:00-08:00&max-results=6

In speaking with Reuben, one of the most painful aspects of this tragic conflict for him is the fact that it is between groups who are, for the most part, Christians.  European Christians, only now recovering from centuries of slaughtering each other, can understand some of that pain, and know also that we must listen in humility to the experience of Christians from other places.

Reuben arrived back in Canada and Winnipeg just a few days ago; we thank God for his safe return home.  Abraham, with us also in December, received news that several of his family members had been killed in the recent violence, including his father, his stepmother, five uncles, and numerous other relatives as well.  Please uphold him and all his family in prayer in this time of frightful loss.

We are honoured to have Reuben with us again on Sunday, this time to preach, and are very grateful that he can join us also before worship at the Dean’s Forum (9 a.m. in the narthex) to share his story.  Thank you, very much, Reuben!  Thank you also for reminding us that we are part of a larger reality called the Body of Christ, including the Anglican Communion (http://www.anglicancommunion.org/ ).  We hold you and Abraham and your families and The Episcopal Church of Sudan and South Sudan all our sisters and brothers there in our prayer.

On January 30^th our Primate, The Most Rev. Fred Hiltz, issued a call for prayer for the people of South Sudan, and all of East Africa (http://news.anglican.ca/news/stories/2671 ).  In addition, the Primate has written a letter to our Prime Minister calling for the involvement of the Canadian Government in helping the people of South Sudan to achieve “a firm and lasting peace.”

As the Primate put it:  “Let us listen as one Anglican family in Canada to the concerns of Canadian Sudanese Anglican men and women seeking peace for their homeland and loved ones, and act together.”

Kyrie eleison!  Lord have mercy!

Monday, 23 December 2013

Pray for family members who are still missing in the war zone

Simeon took [Jesus] in his arms and praised God, saying,
‘Master, now you are dismissing your servant in peace,
according to your word;
for my eyes have seen your salvation,
which you have prepared in the presence of all peoples,
a light for revelation to the Gentiles
and for glory to your people Israel.’  (Luke 2:28-32)

In some ancient traditions, the season of Christmas was much longer than twelve days.  In fact, like other uses of the holy number, the season was 40 days long, and concluded with The Presentation of Our Lord, with the story of Mary and Joseph again fulfilling the Law of Moses, continuing St. Luke’s account of the incarnation of our Lord at its very beginning.  According to Exodus 13, all firstborn children are to be offered to the LORD; not sacrificed literally, as was done by many cultures in the time of ancient Israelites – the ancestors of Mary and Joseph – but, in contrast, they are consecrated to God’s service.  Leviticus 12 describes how a woman is to be purified ritually after the birth of a child, and for a son the total is 40 days.  So, 40 days after Christmas brings us to February 2^nd.  Four times in the Gospel for this day Luke reminds us that Joseph and Mary are faithful Jews, understanding themselves to be living in the Covenant of Moses, careful for the Law by which that covenant was established.  Jesus was a Jew.

Joseph and Mary were Jews.  Simeon and Anna were Jews.  All the first disciples, men and women, all of them, were Jews.  Jesus was a Jew.  How horrendously and hideously horrible, then, that in his name, in the name of Jesus, his followers, disciples of Jesus through the passage of agonizing centuries, persecuted and killed so many Jews.  One horror leading to another, until, in the last century, the most horrific time of all, the Shoah          ( השואה ), the Catastrophe, or, the Holocaust.

But even the greatest evil of all – and can such things be ‘ranked’? – cannot defeat the love of God.  As Christians we believe that this unquenchable love is most clearly revealed in the life, death, and resurrection of a Jewish man, Jesus of Nazareth in Galilee, who became Jesus the Christ, the Messiah, the healing (the Greek word used here for ‘salvation’ can also be translated as ‘healing’) of all peoples and the whole creation.  God’s love is so powerful and bright that it shines through in many ways, in many traditions, in the creation itself, but often – and don’t we know it – there is an element of uncertainty, of question, a dimness, or lack of clarity, until we come to Jesus.  Here, in him, in his life, in his death, and finally, in his resurrection, all is clear.

Here there is salvation, healing for all peoples, for the whole creation.

Here there is light enough to shine upon and for all the nations.

Here there is the glory of God’s love, handed down through the people of Israel and its own son Jesus/Joshua/Y’shua/ ישוע, but glory enough, healing enough, light enough, salvation enough, for all people and for the whole world, indeed, for the whole groaning creation.  What a word, what a Gospel word, a living Word of Light and Life, is Jesus, the Christ, the Messiah of God.

Thanks be to God!

But I, O Lord, cry out to you;
in the morning my prayer comes before you.
O Lord, why do you cast me off?
Why do you hide your face from me?
Wretched and close to death from my youth up,
I suffer your terrors; I am desperate.
Your wrath has swept over me;
your dread assaults destroy me.
They surround me like a flood all day long;
from all sides they close in on me.
You have caused friend and neighbour to shun me;
my companions are in darkness.  (Psalm 88:13-18)

Barely a week ago our Caretaker and Groundskeeper, Wallace Demarais, with his wife Bernice, discovered to their despair that their son Justin had died suddenly, unexpectedly, tragically, violently.  I cannot imagine how they must feel.  Horrible, terrible, to lose a child in any way, but I think the only thing worse would be to have your child taken from you like Justin was suddenly taken from Bernice and Wallace.

The words of Psalm 88 sound right here, since everything is so terrifyingly wrong about this situation.  It is the only Psalm that ends in darkness, with no word of praise to God at the end, unlike the sorrow/grief/anger expressed in other Psalms which end with a word of hope.

But it’s there, this dark and heartbreaking Psalm, because God knows that’s how we feel sometimes.  In Christ, God is present in our deepest darkness, our most horrifying sadness.  You see, God’s own Son was violently snatched away, in blood and horror and lonely death.  In Christ, through Christ, God understands.

Finally, in Christ, through Christ, the darkness can be overcome.  But it doesn’t just happen.  God works through us, through family, through friends.  Healing happens as we are patient, gentle, accepting, loving, whenever, however, it is needed.  And that’s happening, here at St. John’s, which doesn’t surprise me, and for which I am immensely thankful to God.

Thank you, one and all in this parish, who reached out in many ways to Wallace and Bernice and their family and friends, along with the women from Kildonan United Church, and other friends from The Anglican Parish of St. Francis.  Thanks, everyone, for helping with the service on Friday for Justin, in taking care of the place while Wallace is where he needs to be, for all you have done and all you will do in the days/weeks/months ahead to minister to this family in their terrible hurt.

God can heal; our loving Creator reaches out in grace and mercy and peace to give life even to a heart that seems dead with grief.

The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it.      (John 1:5)

And Justin?  We know J.D. is healed and whole forever, forgiven as we are, made new as we will be one day, reunited with all the ancestors who have gone before him, shining now with the Lord Jesus Christ in the light and love of God the Creator, forever.

Thanks be to God!

Justin’s parents are Wallace and Bernice Demarais. 
This year will mark 25 years since Wallace begin work at St. John’s Cathedral.
We hold you all in our prayers, Wallace and Bernice,
with Sherry, Darrick and Ashley (Heyden), and all who loved him.