Category: Announcements, Homilies, Sermons

1^st Reading:        Isaiah 60: 1-6

Gospel:                Matthew 2: 1 – 12

Intro:                   Mike Messinger

In our planning, we reflected on light, color and revelation in nature. Plants absorb light and convert (it) to energy through photosynthesis. Red flowers absorb green and blue light and reflect red light to attract pollinators.  Some Purple flowers have physical structures, thin layers and parallel lines, that diffract light with greater intensity. And what color is depends on us.   How our eyes perceive it. Our eyes only see visible light, a small fraction of the wide spectrum of radiant energy around us.  

Reflection:          Catherine Maresca

Light. This first image of God in creation is affirmed, deepened, repeated, and enriched throughout the books of the Bible, in our liturgical signs, our daily lives, and threaded today into our two readings. At the summer solstice light grabbed me once again in a short physics lesson – which Mike shared with us today.

What grabbed my attention was the dynamic interplay between light and plants. I’ve known about photosynthesis for years and years but never saw myself in that kind of dynamic with God, our light and life. But that summer day I began to imagine myself like cells of a plant responding to light, rather than like a mirror that reflects light, largely unaffected. And in that interplay between God, the light, and myself, God’s light became more than a guide, more than a comfort, more than a source of energy. God is not just changing what I do and where I go and how I feel. God is changing who I am. And I have come to long for and to give myself to the change in me God’s light can create. To sense throughout myself a response to God at my most basic level of being.

Part of this lesson is about color, which is one of my favorite things. The light that strikes the plant is uniform and complete, but the interaction between that light and the plant yields a specific color, one among millions of possibilities, for others to see. The gift that each of us becomes for one another, and for the world, is also specific to the interaction between God and each one of us. This reminds us that my being and yours is important to the whole community of life, both our human communities and our eco-communities.

As I prepared for this liturgy, I began to see that this exploration of the dynamic light between God and myself and others is also Eucharistic. Plants have the ability to make light a source of life, of food, of energy. Humans do this in a different way – in the breaking of the bread of the human family throughout the world. Jesus offers us bread not only to be with us, but to change us at our most basic level of being: to become his own, risen body for the world.

Let us take a breath or two together to imagine the life of God as light and bread and breath at work in us.

Shared Community Reflections:

  Turn toward the light;

  Shine, for your light has come;

  Rainbows and fractyls;

  Moving toward the light;

  Look up to see and receive;

  Halted, homage;

  We all absorb God’s light;

  Light in terms of humanity’s unity as Pope Francis says in his intention for January;

  Light gives life, God within us;

  Nations shall come to YOUR light;

  We spoke of being light for others…

the shammash candle in the menorah is such a light…;

  Unity;

  Delight;

  Just as the wise men went home by a different route and

were changed by the light, we absorb and change light;

The world is a rainbow of colors;

  Bleakness, delight, choice;

  Need the darkness to reflect, renew ourselves so we can appreciate the LIGHT;

  Lift your eyes – really see;

  We see but a small spectrum. Everything we do and say impacts

the energy of the universe in some way…;

      Light contrasts with darkness;

      Wisdom, Compassion is Reflecting the true inner light,

Divine Goodness, of all persons;

      Like plants, we absorb God’s light differently;

      Light is there, but one must reach for it;

  Light as a reflection and refraction;

  Pandemic may bring unity and light;

  We can each be a pixel;

  We can be like helper candles, Shammash;

Gifts and giving..what have we given this year?;

  Shine, for your light has come;

  See/Sea;

  Radiant, dawn;

  Everyday brings the opportunity to make new choices in our lives;

  Eucharist is fruit of the vine and work or human hands….

communion is chemistry and physics, light, food, energy, Transformation!;

In nature the relationship with light is uncomplicated and organic,  I need

reminders to be in that organic state of relationship to light (god’s love);

  Leslie shared light in abundance as she embraced her beautiful grandchild.

Meditation:

St Basil the Great (330-279) was a Byzantine bishop of Caesarea Mazaca in Cappadocia, Asia Minor (modern day Turkey).

“I want creation to penetrate you with so much admiration that everywhere, wherever you may be, the least plant may bring to you the clear remembrance of the Creator.  If you see the grass of the field, think of human nature, and remember the comparison of the wise Isaiah. All flesh is grass, and all goodliness thereof is as the flowering of the field.”

“A tree is known by its fruit; a person by their deeds. A good deed is never lost; one who sows courtesy reaps friendship, and one who plants kindness gathers love.”

“Words are truly the image of the soul.”

1^st Reading:        Isaiah 9: 2-7                             

Gospel:                 Luke 2: 1-14        

Homily:               Vince Cushing    (from notes taken)

As we gather tonight…in the Holy Spirit and deep heartfelt prayer, we do so in a world that is wounded (full of chaos and pain)…yet we know…Jesus came among us and brought the future, healing, freedom, and resurrection. Our minds turn to that evening many centuries ago in a distant land when the history of our world changed dramatically. A bright star, shepherds, a poor young couple praying for the safe delivery of their child…Little did they know that moment would be everlasting, reaching beyond time to tonight.

God entered our world.  We are forever God’s beloved people; God brings us life and life to the world – with all its beauty and pain.  As Christians, we are aware of all the gifts given to us.  First, Jesus is God’s gift to us as people – with a message he will bring new life.  Second, the birth of our Lord Jesus has radically changed the history of this world.  It’s important to say this: Jesus is both really human and really divine.  He’s God’s gift – the human face of God who brings us God’s life and mercy.  God’s message to us is written in the grammar of a human life.

The incarnation of Christ continues in us because we are “other Christs” – we have been baptized and anointed by the Holy Spirit with the life and mission of Jesus.  Because we are called to that mission and we are “other Christs,” we need to actively embrace the full ministry and mission of Christ.

We must look at Jesus’ impact on his world and day.  He brought new life – calling forth Lazarus who seemed to be dead.  Jesus also healed the sick which says to us – we are called to be a healing people.  Jesus helped the blind to see…the light of God guides and enlightens us to share the simple Gospel of a devoted life.  Jesus helped the mute to speak – and we can (do the same) because we are the spokespersons for God in the arenas in which we live.  We can be a people who change the atmosphere of the world we live in.

Pope Francis calls upon us in a new way not previously heard in our church.  Go among the blind, mute, dead, and bring them the Word and Life of Christ.  When Francis was the Archbishop of Buenos Aires, Argentina, he went out into the shantytowns and picked through the garbage with others who were doing the same.  Go among others so you can be open to their difficulties and pain. Francis also is concerned with the very poor and immigrants.  We are challenged to be Jesus’ presence in the broken world we live in.

In doing this – listening to Jesus and following the way of our Lord – we become more human: we care, listen, help, heal, redeem – another Christ born again in the history of our time.

St. Irinaeus of Lyon said the Glory of God is the human person fully alive.  Tonight, we celebrate the Gift: the Lord Jesus then, the Lord Jesus now.  We thank God we should have such a splendid friend in our lives.

Meditation: A Collection of Thoughts on the Joy and Promise of a Child

A new baby is like the beginning of all things – wonder, hope, a dream of possibilities.

I always loved being pregnant at Christmas time.  It made me feel the Bethlehem story in a special way – full of Mary’s joy, hopes, and fears and grateful for a loving, caring spouse traveling with me on my journey.  The fullness of pregnancy overwhelms with its unknowns, but the anticipation of bringing a new child into the world is Christmas gift extraordinaire!  Pregnant with hope, grateful for God’s loving gifts.

Sometimes, the smallest things take up the most room in your heart.

A baby is God’s opinion that life should go on.

How does this happen? A birthing room with the pregnant woman, some family and two medical staff – five in all.  Suddenly there appears an infant, breathing, crying, being wrapped up – Now there are six in the room. And life will never be the same.  What joy!

Babies are such a nice way to start people.

Every child born into the world is a new thought of God, an ever-fresh and radiant possibility.

Babies are like little suns that, in a magical way, bring warmth, happiness and light into our lives.

Introduction:              Paula Hillery

Good morning and welcome to PAX. Today we celebrate the fourth – and last – Sunday of Advent. This year we have been focused on the Synod that Pope Francis announced in October. The word “Synod” refers to a journey. It comes from two Greek words, “syn” (with) and “hodos” (road).  It means a “traveling together on the same road.”  Although Advent is ending soon, we are nowhere near the conclusion of the Synod – discussions are just starting to take place and the conversations will go on well into the new year.

In the first two weeks of Advent, we focused on listening, especially to those who are on the fringes. Last week we shifted toward a pregnant hope as we move forward. And today we chose Journeying in Hope as our theme, to reflect the journey that we will continue into the future.

Where will we go from here?  We look forward to the birth of a new child, and maybe even the birth of a new Church. As the song said many years ago, “we’ve only just begun.”

1^st Reading:                 Micah 5:1-4                    

2^nd Reading:               Hebrews 10: 5-10

Gospel:                         Luke 1: 39-45

Homily:                        Marie Dennis

“Blessed are you who believed that what was spoken to you by our God would be fulfilled.” (Luke 1)

This fourth Sunday of Advent leans in on a Promise: Mary – receiving, accepting, enfleshing a word, the Word that, as Micah says, “will be Peace.”  Mary, courageous and (for good reason) fearful, journeying nevertheless into hope. This beginning of her public story is about power (God will pull down the mighty from their throne and lift up the lowly; send the rich empty away and fill the hungry with good things …). It is also about promise and hope — such a fitting story for these days, this season, for this time in the long life of our Church.

I imagine that many of you joined NETWORK this week – as I did – to begin the celebration of their 50^th anniversary. Those were such fruitful years right after Vatican II – when Pax was founded, and NETWORK, the Center of Concern, Pax Christi USA, hundreds of justice and peace offices in religious communities and dioceses around the world. We knew that we were Church, the people of God, – that by the Gospel, we were called to work for justice, to participate in the transformation of the world — to build community. And we did. Then we held on – literally through thick and very thin as the institutional Church backtracked from Vatican II, closed many windows that the Council had opened, continued to exclude by gender and sexual orientation, continued to foster power-over relationships, and on and on.

Right before Pope Francis was elected in 2013, I was in Rome to lead a Pax Christi International retreat for religious communities.  I remember looking at the Vatican from the roof of the convent where we were meeting and thinking how angry and frustrated I was by the institution. But the People of God – you, the Pax Community and other People of God like you – held on.  Thanks be to God.

This past week, I have been thinking especially about the complexity of the journey – the highs and lows, the times I almost walked away, the times more recently when glimmers of hope began to seep back into my view of the institution – thanks most often to the servant leader we call pope who stands on a world stage with such authenticity and vision and who is beginning to midwife the birth a New Church.

I say that especially because I was in Rome all week for the first time in two years. And in spite of my well-worn cynicism, I saw incredible signs of hope – signs that a new Church could actually be born! Off the top of my head, I can name five really hopeful signs of the times in the Catholic Church. That in itself is a small miracle!

You all saw the first sign of hope in the last few days: the unprecedented apology from a Vatican official to the LGBTQ community and New Ways Ministry and Pope Francis’ letters to New Ways Ministry calling Jeanine Gramick a “valiant woman.” So long overdue, so well deserved!

The second sign is about women in the Church – a long, long struggle that is clearly not over. But I had a great opportunity this week to meet three powerful women who are in top positions in the institution:

• Nathalie Becquart, who is Under-Secretary of the Synod of Bishops and responsible for the Synod on Synodality. She is the first woman to have a vote in the synod of bishops.
• Alessandra Smerilli, interim Secretary of the Dicastery for IHD, which is responsible for everything from the Luadato Si Action Platform to the Vatican’s COVID19 Commission; from the migration of peoples to nuclear disarmament.
• Francesca Di Giovanni, Under-Secretary, Multilateral Affairs, Section for Relations with States, Secretariat of State, responsible for the Holy See diplomacy and participation in major multilateral engagements, for example, at the UN.

These woman are not window dressing. They are in some of the most powerful and interesting positions in the curia, which itself is being reformed by Pope Francis – radically, we hope. I expect the leadership of these women will make a significant difference.

The third sign of hope is the process itself aimed at implementation of Laudato Si. For the past two years we have been immersed in this process, building the Laudato Si Action Platform that is both creative and unique – and the first time in centuries that the Church has so fully opened up to grassroots organizations and the ideas of the “people of God”! The Vatican’s COVID19 Commission invited similar community-wide engagement.

The fourth sign of hope is a definitive shift in Catholic social teaching that is deep, interesting, and challenging, Church teaching on the death penalty, the “very possession” of nuclear weapons, and the just war tradition are all in a different place than they were a few years ago, thanks to Pope Francis. Last week in Rome we repeatedly experienced open and positive responses to the proposal of Pax Christi’s Catholic Nonviolence Initiative that the Church recommit to the centrality of Gospel nonviolence and that Pope Francis write an encyclical on nonviolence.

That seemed to be true whether we had known and worked with a person for many years or we were introducing them to our work for the first time. On several occasions we observed a real transformation in someone’s thinking, an “aha” moment. Sister Nathalie in the Synod of Bishops office was a great example. She said she never realized how important nonviolence is to the synod process itself. No one dismissed nonviolence as too idealistic or radical.

And finally, the Synod on Synodality. To meet with Sister Nathalie was a gift. I had not realized before how the Synod on Synodality was about the transformation of the institutional Church and our relationships with each other. Nathalie talked about the synod process as a renewal of the Church, especially of internal relationships, building on Vatican II. She said that the main focus would be on reconciliation and urged us to develop our thinking about synodality as an expression of nonviolence. She also asked us to participate in the synod process as much as possible through the local church – parishes, dioceses, etc. but also to send material directly to the Synod office as the Pax Christi International network, which we will do. I hope the Pax Community will do the same – perhaps in cooperation with other Eucharistic Communities in the US and beyond.

A final thought: we had the gift of staying at Domus Santa Marta where Pope Francis lives. We saw him in the lobby a number of times and at the evening meal on several occasions. He simply comes into the dining room, gets his salad, and sits down with his cronies. Simple. Beautiful. A prophet who smells like the sheep!

We have a Promise and are waiting for it to be fulfilled. Maybe a new Church birthing is a step in the right direction!

Prayer before Lighting Wreath:

Lord, God, we, your church, await the coming of our Savior, who enlightens our hearts and dispels the darkness of ignorance and sin. Pour forth your blessings upon us as we light the candle on this wreath. May the light reflect the splendor of Christ, who is Lord, for ever and ever. Amen

1^st Reading:        Baruch 5: 1-9                                    

2^nd Reading:        Philippians 1: 4-6, 8-11

Gospel:                Luke 3: 1-6

Homily:               Drew Christiansen

See your children gathered

from the west and east

at the word of the Holy One.

                                                          Baruch 5: 5

Our opening reading this morning from Baruch re-affirms the prophetic message of the post-Exilic prophets that God will gather his people, not only the exiled people of Israel, but all the peoples of the Earth. The most famous of these visions is found in chapter 2 of Isaiah:

“All the nations shall flow to [the mountain of the Lord],

And many peoples will come and say:

“Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord,

. . . that he may teach us his ways, And that we may walk in his paths.”

In the Isaiah’s vision, those who come to Mt. Zion are not just the returning Israelite exiles but “many peoples.” Psalm 87 is shockingly explicit about the inclusiveness of God’s Kingdom: Among those who know me I count Rahab and Babylon. Babylon the city of Israel’s exile, degradation and dispersion. The lament we know as Psalm 137, “By the waters of Babylon, we sat and wept/ On the aspens of the land, we hung up our harps,” ends with a note of uttermost hostility: “Happy the man who shall seize and smash your little ones against the rock.” Yet, in the divine dispensation, according to Ps. 87, Babylon belongs to God’s family and calls Jerusalem mother.  Behold, Philistia and Tyre, with Ethiopia—This one was born there, they say.

The boldness of Psalm 87’s rendering of the theme of universal salvation is exceptional. Philistia, that is Palestine, belongs to God’s family, so does Tyre, that is, southern Lebanon. To this day, Israel holds them as enemies. And Ethiopia represents the peoples of Africa and the far ends of the earth.  (Today’s Israel is uncertain about Ethiopians, sometimes giving them refuge and sometimes deporting them.) All nations are God’s children. In reminding the Israelites of God’s love for all peoples, the Psalmist anticipates our Advent theme: Discerning voices from the periphery.

The post-Exilic prophets attempted to give the Israelites a sense of the universality of God’s love that would overcome the hostilities and resentments of their tribal history. Israel, as Jewish theologians will tell you even today, was to be the school where others would come to know God with the intimacy Israel had known in the desert. Unfortunately, today the Middle East is still a center of rivalry, enmity, and combat between peoples and nations. The most obvious of these rivalries is manifest in the dispossession and persecution of the Palestinian people.

         In his recent writing, Massimo Faggioli has reminded readers that Pope Francis’ sense of mission to the peripheries has taken him to Iraq and Abu Dhabi. In the case of Iraq, he wanted to let the Iraqi people know that after 20 years of war they were not forgotten and also to affirm hard-pressed Shia Muslims of his solidarity with them.  In Abu Dhabi, he joined in a program of tolerance to alleviate the tensions between Christians and Muslims.

From Lampedeusa to Lesbos, to the U.S.-Mexican border, Francis has been an advocate for migrants and refugees. Thanks to his devotion to people on the periphery, Faggioli writes, “Rome is much closer to becoming a truly “holy city” that brings the Bishop of Rome closer to the immigrants and refugees, to prison inmates, and the marginalized.”

Writing of Pope Francis’ synodal way, Faggioli writes, the pope hopes to give the Church “a self-understanding more aware of the non-European and non-American Catholic churches and the richness and complexity of the one human family.”  Few Catholics know that besides the dominant Latin church we know…there are 24 Catholic churches. The Second Vatican Council affirmed that these communities that we used to call “rites,” singling out their distinctive liturgical traditions, are churches in the full sense.  Francis goes farther, however, teaching in Evangelii Gaudium that the beauty of the church lies in its diversity.  The Gospel, he teaches, takes a unique form in every culture, giving rise to distinctive forms of Christianity. This teaching has profound implications for Christian identity in the 21^st century.

In particular, it means we must become more accepting of diversity among Christians around the world. We must also anticipate more diversity still as long subject peoples, like Native Americans, enculturate the Gospel to their own culture and adapt their forms of piety to their own traditions. In 1999. I participated in the First Congress of Catholic Patriarchs of the Middle East. Each morning Mass was celebrated by a patriarch or bishop of a different tradition. There were different languages, different vestments, different rituals. Most were sung or chanted, not recited. I confess that what finally got to me as a westerner was the different sense of time. Each day the liturgies seemed to get longer, and by the end of the week I fled the featured Mass to the Latin Mass the Latin Patriarch celebrated early in the morning with the nuns. Though he celebrated in Latin, the Mass was in western time. It took only a half hour or a little more to be celebrated.

Walking the synodal path will tax us in ways we little expect. I would hope that after sharing Pope Francis’ vision of the Church, I would be more patient of a long liturgy in a very strange tongue.

Faggioli conceives of another demand in the pope’s appreciation for the global diversity of Christianity, namely, we must accept a diminished convergence between American values and interests and those of the universal church.

Of course, since the time of John XXIII and the Second Vatican Council, there have been many disparities between American interests and modern Catholic political values. But during the Cold War and post-Cold War periods, there was also much collaboration in the promotion of human rights, for example, in the liberation of Eastern Europe and on curbing the nuclear arms race. Since the invasion of Iraq and the War on Terror in 2003, however, there have been more obvious and growing divisions.

Faggioli believes, moreover, the U.S. Catholic Right has aggravated the divides and tensions not only between the Vatican and the U.S. but also within the American church by promoting its own version of social teaching that promotes American interests over against Francis’ love of the peripheries.

All of us as American Catholics will have to adjust ourselves for membership in the church of the peripheries, where the influence and dominance of the United States will be problematic, and where solidarity with the Earth’s poor, afflicted and stateless will mean sacrificing some of our privilege and enduring disagreements with our fellow citizens. “The ‘marginal Jew’ Jesus Christ and his relationship with the social and geographical peripheries of his time,” observes Faggioli, “have become more paradigmatic than before for the Roman papacy.” We can add, not just for the papacy but for the entire church.

I would like to suggest one group that especially needs our support because they are uniquely on the periphery, at the very edge of organized political life, I mean stateless people. They are refugees, most of them, but refugees in a very special way. They have no state of their own.  The Rohingya are the most egregious example.  Myanmar, where they have lived for hundreds of years, does not accept them. Bangladesh, where many now dwell, even though they are Muslims like the Bangladeshis, does not want them. 

Think of the Kurds, spread in a band across four countries: Syria, Turkey, Iraq and Iran. While they have a semi-autonomous region in northern Iraq, in Turkey they are persecuted. In Syria, they are subject to Turkish attack and remain as a bulwark against ISIS for the U.S. and others.  Even in Iraq they are subject to Turkish attack and raids by ISIS. Without a state of their own, the Kurds are without the forces and resources to uphold their rights, except in limited ways in a limited space in northern Iraq.

Then there are the Palestinians. In 1993, with the Oslo Accords it appeared the nationhood they had dreamed of and the UN had promised with the 1948 Partition Plan would finally be realized. But it wasn’t to be. The Final Status talks, scheduled for 1996, were delayed. Camp David II in 2000 failed to bring agreement on key issues, and the Clinton Administration’s last-minute initiative at Taba the same year failed to bring the two sides together. Since that time, we all have been witnesses to the depredations the Palestinians have suffered, most recent the expulsions from the East Jerusalem neighborhoods of Sheikh Jirrah and Silwan, the biblical Siloam.

The Israeli colonization of the West Bank, the remaining 22 per cent of the land intended for the Palestinians, continues unimpeded.  It proceeds for ultra-nationalist motives: to occupy all of biblical Palestine, what the Likud calls Judea and Samaria. Settlers also occupy the high ground, the Judean hills that are part of the West Bank, for environmental reasons.

The aquifers on which both people rely for water are found there.  I can offer you numerous stories about the inequitable distribution of water. Let me relate just one.

In 2000, for the Great Jubilee, the French Government built an aqueduct to carry water from newly opened West Bank wells to the city of Hebron. When the water failed to flow in the expected volume, the Palestinian authorities sent inspectors to determine the source of the trouble. There they found Israeli water rustlers diverting the water into tank trucks. When the inspectors returned with Palestinian police, the Israeli army was there to deny them access and tell them the well was off-limits in the future. 

This is what it is to be a stateless people, without a government to enforce and uphold your most fundamental rights, without the resources to defend against the greed and the power of your hostile neighbors.

So, as we walk the synodal way with people on the peripheries, I suggest we pay particular attention to stateless people, particularly those stateless people who are reduced to a marginal life by decades of U.S. policy. Let us witness with Pope Francis on their behalf, and as a faith community let us work for reparation, let us repair the injustice done in our names. Amen.

Spiritual Communion:

Anima Christe prayer from the beginning of Ignatius’ spiritual exercises

Soul of Christ, sanctify me.

Body of Christ, save me.

Blood of Christ, inebriate me.

Water from the side of Christ, wash me.

Passion of Christ, strengthen me.

O Good Jesus, hear me.

Within your wounds hide me.

Permit me not to be separated from you.

From the wicked foe, defend me.

At the hour of my death, call me

and bid me come to you

That with your saints I may praise you

For ever and ever. Amen.

Meditation:         Jerusalem, by Marylu Hill

A light will shine to all parts of the earth.  Many nations shall come to you from afar; and the inhabits of all the limits of the earth. They are drawn to you by the name of the Lord, bearing in their hands their gifts for the king. Every nation shall give joyful praise to you; they shall call you the chosen one through all the ages, forever.

1^st Reading:        I Kings 17: 10-16                                            

2^nd Reading:        Hebrews 9: 24-28       

Gospel:                Mark 12:38-44

Dialogue Homily:                 Myrtle Hendricks Corrales

In the first reading from Kings, because of years-long drought, there is a famine in Zarephath where God has instructed Elijah to go.    When Elijah instructs the widow to feed him, she explains she only has enough flour and oil to make a last serving of bread for her son and herself and that then after that meager meal, they will die.   Elijah reveals that God has other plans for her; she must stop being afraid and take care of Elijah’s needs before her own.  Once she does as Elijah commands, her flour and oil jars do not go empty, and God brings rain.  The reading shows how responses to human needs reveal divine activity in humanity.  The widow gives her all, she gives from her need.

In the gospel reading, the widow humbly drops in two very small coins.  She has given everything she had to live on.   Jesus points out that in religious giving, the cost of the gift to the donor is more important than its objective value.  The widow gives her all, she gives from her need.

The second reading states that while the high priests offered blood of animals as sacrifice, Jesus gave his all, for he gave his blood as sacrifice.  Before Vatican II, the Christology of the Church gave too much emphasis on the Christ of Faith, that is the divinity of Jesus.  Not intended, but this focus on Jesus’ divinity diminished his role and message.  It led some to believe that Jesus was God and could have taken himself off the cross at any time if he wished.  This one-dimensional divine Jesus put him out of our reach; it distracted from Jesus’ commitment to his mission and to his suffering of a terrible death. How can only a divine Jesus be a role model for us to be like?  Christology then turned to the humanity of Jesus – he was fully human like us and as the risen Christ he was fully divine.   Theologians use the terms Jesus of history for his humanity and the Christ of Faith for his divinity.  It is the Jesus of history, the humanity of Jesus that liberates us to emulate him, to walk the path of Jesus.  It is his humanity that compels us to be like Jesus, to give our all to work for justice, to aid the poor and disenfranchised.

Last Sunday, the planners asked the community to share how to love self and how to love neighbor.  This Sunday, we planners ask the community to share how to not think less of ourselves but to think of ourselves less.

The question for ourselves and the community is what does it mean to give of our all, to give from our need? That is, to not just give from our surplus, but in our lives and in what we have observed in others, what does it mean to give from what we think is our need in terms of our finances, our time and energy, our willingness to speak or stand up to an injustice. Can we trust, as the women in the readings, that all will be fine if we extend ourselves and give from our need?

A look at history demonstrates numerous individuals who have given their all, perhaps not in terms of finances but in terms of themselves. The fight for women’s suffrage was long and difficult.  Women toiled and demonstrated for years.  Some of the worse violence women faced was a 1917 march in Washington, DC, when they were pushed and hit by men while police either just watched or participated in this violence.  Some of the women were arrested and taken to the Lorton Women’s Workhouse. A few women, in response to the poor conditions, rough treatment, and two weeks on bread and water, went on a hunger strike. These women were force fed by a rubber tube up their nostrils and liquid pumped into their stomach.  Other suffragists were brutally treated, leaving some women beaten and unconscious.  Yet, the barbaric and dehumanizing treatment endured by these women did not deter them from their goal.  They continued to give their all until women gain the right to vote.

It was the same situation for the women textile workers in 1912 as they held strikes and marches.  These women endured arrests and beatings; yet they took their broken bodies back again and again to the demonstrations and strikes until working conditions improved.  Surely, they gave their all.

Then there is our own Lillian Bisson.  A woman from Brazil came to Northern Virginia and found work cleaning houses.  For about a year she came to Lil ‘s once or twice a week to take her shopping or to do other errands.  This woman was recovering from breast cancer and faced huge medical bills.   She told Lil she had asked several of her employers to be her sponsor for US citizenship.  Some agreed until they learned that the sponsorship included the sponsor agreeing to pay any debts that she might be unable to pay.  Well, Lil agreed to be her sponsor.  When Lil told me about this, I asked if she felt vulnerable knowing that she could be financially responsible for this woman.  Lil looked at me and responded:  “Yes, but….”   This woman is now a US citizen.   Lil gave out of her need in terms of taking a risk for this woman.

So, the question for us today as we reflect on the readings and the work and mission of Jesus is what does it mean in our own lives or what we have observed in others to give from what we think is our need in terms of our finances, our time and energy, our speaking or standing up to an injustice. 

Community Dialogue:          Reprinted with permission

(Marian) As a mass planner, I’ve had some time to think about this: giving from one’s need vs one’s surplus… I think our needs are many, especially for: Financial security; Physical comfort; Personal convenience; Satisfying relationships.  For me, “giving from one’s need” requires a willing- ness to be uncomfortable and inconvenienced, for example, to: Use less and share more; Understand privilege and work to secure the same opportunities for others; Restore right relationships; Channel time, talent, and – yes – money to support hope, truth and justice.  It’s about how we spend our lives.  It requires humility acknowledging every day is a challenge, but also an opportunity to be light for the world.  One of my favorite quotes – with its beautiful mathematical implications – is by Albert Einstein: “Everything that can be counted does not necessarily count; (While) everything that counts cannot necessarily be counted.” May we know the difference and spend our lives accordingly.

(Nellie) Some of the things we do in our daily lives are already very giving from our need.  When we give because we love someone, rather than because we tell ourselves “I have to give,” it is easier. Love is what let Lillian make a leap of faith when sponsoring the Brazilian woman for U.S. citizenship.  As people of faith, we already have a countercultural worldview of seeing everyone as connected and God in control. We can continue to build on that versus having to do something that feels like a complete break with what we do and who we are already.

(Rosa) I have known so many people in need and it is impossible to help everyone.  I have seen how Arlington Free Clinic helps people without health insurance.  On a personal note, there is a man who walks in front of my house on his way to work.  He has long hair and looks homeless, but he is not.  He rents a room nearby and works in construction.  He has no family here in the U.S.  I was talking with him one day and he thanked me for listening to him.  I think we must always listen to vulnerable people, rather than ignore them.

(Leslie) It’s pretty overwhelming to be aware of all the needs of the world. I try to be alert to whatever God sends my way – to be there and available, open to whoever comes to my doorstep.  And I try to take the help that comes my way: from a homeless man who gave me change to buy coffee when I didn’t have enough; from the man who stopped to change my tire when it blew out on I-495.

(Mike) In our culture we tend to focus on money.  The woman in today’s Gospel depended on God.  Once, in confession, I offered up the times I’ve fallen short on the social justice demands of the Gospel.  My confessor told me, “That’s not a sin you can confess.”  I’m not sure that’s right.  Nevertheless, walking with PAX continues to challenge me to live out the Gospel values.

(Charles) My thoughts, reflecting in part my Catholic guilt, is “whatever I’m doing, it’s not enough.”  God gave us what we need to build a just world.  We can only control ourselves and our actions and somehow we all need to try harder.

(Nellie) Charles, you are a saint.  I have dreams of you saving the world! I used to think that I “should” be doing so much more–but we have to abandon navel gazing and the tendency to think “I’m so bad.”  I’m reminded of the song “Ashes”:

We offer you our failures, we offer you attempts,

The gifts not fully given, the dreams not fully dreamt.

Give our stumblings direction; give our visions wider view,

An offering of ashes, an offering to You.

(Megan) One of my favorite quotes is, “Do what you can, with what you have, where you are today.”  I remember working with Journey to Adulthood (J2A) and Abbot Aiden Shea; we discussed with the teenagers what to do for a service project.  His advice was to make sure it was working with people (rather than things, e.g., stream clean up).  I admire Marilu MacCarthy and others who have worked with our Syrian families to become U.S. citizen.

(Nikolai) I often ask myself why John and Maria Chomeau helped me and my family. In the 1990’s we were having a rough time in Russia. I met John here in Alexandria just two months before the coup, when the USSR collapsed. We were on opposite sides. He and Maria visited us in Leningrad two times, and finally invited us to seek an opportunity in the U.S.  When I came here, I didn’t have an exact idea what I wanted to do. The Chomeaus, including their daughters, have been on our side all the way through our legal journey in the U.S.

I did reimburse John for all the legal expenses related to my work visa. Still, there is no way to repay John and Maria for their attention, hospitality, and I’m not afraid to say, love. I was a stranger to them, and yet they opened their hearts and home and created a new chance for me and my family. John was one of the most important people I met in my life, and Maria has always been like a godmother to us. We never knew what to expect in our life, and sometimes God sends special people to help us on our journey.

(Nellie) John Chomeau – he made things happen.  When Margaret Schwartz went to Ukraine to adopt two boys (Rupert and Nikki), John organized a work crew to get her house ready for them.  The Messingers (Amanda and Mike) worked with the Cyprus Friendship Program and made it happen.  It’s the story of “Stone Soup” where everyone adds something to the pot and everyone enjoys the results.

(Amanda) I don’t think the newer people in PAX know how John Chomeau and Nikolai Rudenko met.  It’s an amazing story. Or how Claire Cifaloglio and Rob Abbot connected with Najla Drooby who then connected us to “our” three Syrian refugee families (now one adult in each family is a U.S. citizen).  Or how Claire Cifaloglio met the Benjamin children and we started to support this refugee family from South Sudan. Or how Mike and I got involved with the Cyprus Friendship Program. Another most unlikely story. We need to record these stories and include this history on our website.

What has kept me at PAX is what everyone else is doing — how we are answering God’s call by responding to the needs we find. I remember feeling amazed hearing announcements, awed by the sheer amount of work being done—by so many people—when I first came in 1985, right out of college. This had not been my experience of church growing up.  Organizing with Center for New Creation, paying the rent for Emma Shirley, collecting food for El Rescate NoVa, supporting legislation for rights of the disabled, cooking and serving a meal to those without homes at Zaccheus kitchen, protesting the war on the people of El Salvador, creating embroidered panels to wrap the Pentagon with representations of what we’d miss most in the event of nuclear disaster — were some of what I remember on any given Sunday back then.  As a 22 year old, I wanted to be involved with these folk, who seemed to be living out the Gospel in their daily lives.

Meditation:        an excerpt from Kahlil Gibran on Giving

You give but little when you give of your possessions.

It is when you give of yourself that you truly give.

And what is fear of need but need itself?

Is not dread of thirst when your well is full, the thirst that is unquenchable?

There are those who give little of the much which they have

And there are those who have little and give it all.

These are the believers in life and the bounty of life,

and their coffer is never empty.

There are those who give with joy, and that joy is their reward.

And there are those who give with pain, and that pain is their baptism.

And there are those who give and know not pain in giving,

nor do they seek joy, nor give with mindfulness of virtue.  

Through the hands of such as these God speaks, and from behind their eyes. God smiles upon the earth.

Opening Prayer for the Season of Creation (adapted)

Creator of All, we are grateful that from your communion of love you created our planet to be a home for all. By your Holy Wisdom you made the Earth to bring forth a diversity of living beings that filled the soil, water and air. Each part of creation praises you in their being, and cares for one another from our place in the web of life. We wonder at the marvels of your creation which enrich our lives, nourish us, and stand as testimony to your loving gifts to all of us. With the Psalmist, we sing your praise that in your house “even the sparrow finds a home, and the swallow a nest for herself, where she may lay her young.” We remember that you call human beings to keep your garden in ways that honor the dignity of each creature and conserve their place in the abundance of life on Earth. In the name of the One who came to proclaim good news to all creation, Jesus Christ.

1^st Reading:                   Isaiah 35:4-37  

2^nd Reading:                  The Letter of James 2:1-5  

Gospel:                          Mark 7:31-37

Homily:                          John Hushon

Today’s Gospel describes one of the miracle stories (healing the deaf man), a story that Mark shares with Matthew.  First, a bit of context, as you have come to expect from me.

This story is early in Mark’s Gospel but is one of many miracle stories.  In all, according to John Meier, there are about 30 miracle stories spread over all the gospels.  They are described as “Mighty Deeds” in Mark, Matthew and Luke and “Signs” in John.  They are meant to show that Jesus, the God-man, either in his own right or by calling upon the God-Creator and Sustainer of all life, can change the ordinary, rational course of human events–often, but not always, by engaging human agency. 

Most biblical scholars divide the miracles into three categories

• Healing in body, mind or spirit—power over illness, disease and evil (illness was often associated with sin)
  • Power over the incidents of nature and the material world
  • Power to raise the dead

While the healing stories have parallels in the faith healers of the time of Jesus (most of whom seemed to be from “the East” or Egypt)—the other miracle stories have no parallels in literature of the time.  And the way Jesus performed his healing miracles was different from the techniques employed by the faith healers—they did not involve incantations or personal gain.

Miracle stories quickly became an important element in the conversion of many early Christians—proof that Jesus was either a God-man or had the extra-ordinary ability to call upon the power of God to do so.

Much later in the history of the Church, the miracle stories became a stumbling block in the faith journey of the Enlightenment philosophers and many of our own Founding Fathers—perhaps the first rationalists or scientists.  They could not understand the existence of evil in the world and therefore concluded that God did not intervene in the “ordinary” affairs of humans and nature.  They tried to explain them away as either the naïve beliefs of “poor peasants” or with rational explanations.  We have all heard many of these.

But there is an old/new way of thinking emerging.  We are beginning to accept that while we can explain many things, we cannot explain everything.  Wonder exists again.  St Augustine’s principle that we worship an infinite creating and SUSTAINING God seems true again.

About a dozen years ago, when I took the course in the Synoptic Gospels from a well-known Franciscan at Washington Theological Union, we were required to write a paper on a scene from one of the Gospels.  I chose a miracle story.  Why?  I was one of those “rationalists” who tried to explain every miracle with a plausible story.  I wanted my faith founded on reason: something St Augustine tells us over and over is impossible—it is the other way around.  I needed to confront this block to my faith journey.  I tried to explain away the miracle with a rational subtext, focusing on the literary elements of Mark’s Gospel style—but I knew I was missing the point.  Several years later, teaching the same Gospel, I tried that again with my class.  An older student, clearly of stronger faith than I, asked me, “Do you believe in the Resurrection?”  “Of course,” I answered.  “Then all the rest is easy.  End of story”

Quite simply, if we believe in the Resurrection, anything is possible with our God.  Put another way, if God gives us the gift of faith that the Resurrection happened, everything else is possible. 

Go forward a few years.  Elizabeth Johnson published her groundbreaking Theology 101 book.  In it she talks at length about the mystery and complexity of our God.  Every time we think we grasp who God is, or we are tempted to say, “I know God and….”, we must realize our attempt falls short of the wondrous mystery of our God. 

If we reject God or God’s work because we don’t understand how it fits into our constructed rational world, we substitute PRIDE (our belief that we can understand anything if we only try hard enough and have enough intelligence and education) for FAITH.

My problem was not the inability to understand the apparent inconsistency between a perfect all-powerful God and the existence of evil and suffering in the world—it was lack of faith.  It is time to once again marvel at the wonders of Creation as it reflects the love of our God.  And accept that miracles, big and small happen.

Let pride go.  Believe and marvel in the beneficence of our God—particularly when we experience it at important times in our life: the love and care of a spouse, the birth of a child or grandchild, the marriage of a daughter, the striving of an athlete to achieve what had never been done before, a sculpture or painting or music which conveys unbelievable beauty.  As both Hans Kung and Karl Rahner say, “The first step in faith is to be open to the possibility of the Divine.”  The wonder of our God will overwhelm us.  Put on childlike wonder.  Suspend disbelief.  Miracles happen every day.  How can we not believe?  Thank you, God, for those moments when we encounter You in the wonder and power and love of your creation.

Caridad I:

I am suggesting the circumstances surrounding the miracle are culturally supportive.  At Cana the water was changed to wine and the containers were there as the guests would expect. 

In the case of Our Lady of Guadalupe, she appeared as a dark-skinned young pregnant woman.  She spoke in the Indian language the messenger understood. She was dressed in a mantle and tunic of colors meaningful to the future messenger and the Indian population.  She was surrounded by the songs of birds and with flowers which indicated to Juan Diego she came from heaven, as he understood it. She responded to the request by the bishop for a sign by sending the picture of herself on Juan Diego’s mantle – the image now revered at the Basilica erected at her request. Millions of pilgrims visit the shrine every day and many of her devotees return to thank her for favors received and leave tokens of their gratitude – referred to as “milagritos.”

Judy H: A Scientist’s take on Miracles

The more we investigate the universe the more we understand and we realize there is so much more we don’t know.  It does seem like there is some overall guidance at work.  Yes, there are mutations that make life forms stronger and therefore are passed along to the betterment of that species. And this form of evolution is sort of hit or miss (or trial by fire).

But it is hard to imagine the lack of a creator when one looks at something as exotic as a passion flower or some of the truly unique reef fish.  It is also amazing that similar forms have evolved independently in different locations.  Yes, they are probably responding to pressures of a similar ecological niche, but it does seem amazing.  Maybe a creator also has a hand in making the beauty of sunsets and rainbows available to humans to appreciate and glory in.  Our world would be much duller without them.  Often science leads us to discern how something occurs, but not the why.  That is the miracle.

Diana K:

I’d like to relate a personal miracle from my childhood. I grew up as an only child in New York City (NYC) with my mother and maternal grandmother.  My father lived in Indiana with his new family.  I would visit them over the summer and it was a challenge accepting this new family: stepmother, stepbrother, and new baby.  I had a hard time and one night as I stood by a window, I prayed, “God, I need you.  I need your help with this.”  Upon returning to NYC for the start of third grade, I had a beloved teacher who pointed me to the God I needed.  She offered to take any of her interested students to church and teach them about the Catholic faith.  While my mother and grandmother were Catholic, they were not regular church-goers.  When I returned to Indiana the next summer, I had a different perspective on love and was able to accept and come to love my father’s new family.  My teacher came to me in my time of need and pointed the way to faith.

Post Liturgy sharing included a saving from drowning, an appendicitis attack leading to a colon cancer diagnosis and treatment, a transformed life thanks to a therapist’s care, a birth, a daughter being able to hold her father’s hand a day before he died.

Commitment in Community for Creation:

In this Season of Creation, we pray that the breath of your creative Word would move our hearts, as in the waters of our birth and baptism. Give us faith to follow Christ to our just place in the beloved community. Enlighten us with the grace to respond to your covenant and call to care for our common home. In our tilling and keeping, gladden our hearts to know that we participate with your Holy Spirit to renew the face of your Earth, and safeguard a home for all. Amen.

Lord’s Prayer: (adapted for the Season of Creation)

Eternal Spirit, Earth-maker, Pain-bearer, Life-giver, Source of all that is and shall be, Father and Mother of us all, Loving God, in whom is heaven: The hallowing of your name echoes through the universe! The way of your justice be followed by the peoples of the world! Your heavenly will be done by all created beings! Your beloved community of peace and freedom sustain our hope and come on earth. With the bread we need for today, feed us. In the hurts we absorb from one another, forgive us. In times of temptation and test, strengthen us. From trials too great to endure, spare us. From the grip of all that is evil, free us. For you reign in the glory of the power that is love, now and forever. Amen.

Community Declaration of Our Unity in Communion:

by Sylvia Diss, with inspiration from St. Augustine

We are the Body of Christ, called together into this community. We offer our gifts, our lives, our commitment in loving service to each other, the dedicated and joyful service that Jesus showed us, saying “Do this in memory of me”. We pray that our gifts and our energies be transformed into the true Bread of Life for our world in these difficult and troubled times. We pray this in the name of Jesus, who is always present to us. We are Christ for one another, through the power of the Holy Spirit where we live now and forever.

Meditation:  A hymn from the writings of Julian of Norwich

There is nothing created in the universe

Nothing great, nothing smaller than the finest grain of sand

That will spend a single moment of its life

Without being held by its Maker in the palm of His hand.

Be it something quite as simple as a hazelnut,

He will hold it in the palm of His hand.

There is no one created in the universe,

Not a king, not a beggar, not a woman, not a man

Who will spend a single moment of life

Without being loved by our Maker, and being guided by Her hand.

As a woman holds the life that grows within her,

We are held in the palm of Her hand.

And all shall be well.

And all shall be well.

Continued next page

And we will touch and we will know for ourselves

That all manner of things shall be well.

For there is nothing that can happen in the universe

From the start to the finish

In the sea or on the land

That is not within the vision of the father,

Of our mother, of our maker and of our lover.

And all shall be well.

And all shall be well.

Morning Prayer:            (adapted from traditional Jewish liturgy)

We gather to praise You, Eternal One, our God, Sovereign of the universe, Maker of light and Creator of darkness, Author of peace and Creator of all things. In Your mercy You give light to the earth and all who live on it, and in Your goodness You renew creation continually, day by day. How manifold are Your works, O God! With wisdom have you made them all; the world is full of Your creations. Your handiwork proclaims Your praise; the sun, the moon, and the stars bear witness to your glory. Praise to You, O God, Creator of lights.

Sermon:                         Rabbi Rosalind Gold

Good morning. I want to thank you for inviting me to speak this morning, especially as your assigned readings deal in one way or another with one of my favorite topics…..food!

Your reading from the Hebrew Scriptures deals with a stressful time in the life of the Israelites as they traveled through the desert. They are tired, they are scared, they don’t know where they are headed or how long it will take them to get there. And they’re hungry. They come down with a serious case of selective memory, recalling the garlic and leeks and watermelons they ate as enslaved people in Egypt. They yearn to return there, reasoning that at least in Egypt they knew where their next meal was coming from.

I could be wrong, but I have a feeling that they didn’t eat so well in Egypt, that the watermelons were not so plentiful in Goshen. But in the grip of their fear and anxiety as they trekked through the desert, they conjure memories of a life that was easier and more secure, a life where they knew what each day would bring, even if it wasn’t so great.

God hears their worry and fear, and causes the wonderous, mysterious manna to fall from heaven. Each morning they would go out to collect it. On Friday, a double portion would fall, so they would not be forced to violate the Sabbath and work to collect it on Saturday. Manna was pretty amazing stuff.

The Bible tells us that it settled on the ground like dew, and that it was white-ish stuff that tasted like bdellium – whatever that is. According to the midrash, a collection of ancient rabbinic musings on the Biblical text, manna tasted like whatever you wanted it to taste, whatever you needed it to be on any given day. Each weekday’s ration of manna fell right into the Israelites’ hands and, other than on Shabbat, was just enough to suffice for that day – God’s thoughtful gift to the people so that they didn’t have to schlep it along as they wandered through the desert. It also served the goal of training the people to trust in God, to trust that God would feed and nurture them each day; waiting for the manna to fall became an exercise in faith for the Israelites. There is even a messianic quality to manna. The midrash teaches that when the Temple was built in Jerusalem, a small plate of manna was stored there in the Holy Ark and was destroyed when the Temple fell. According to legend, when the Prophet Elijah comes to announce the coming of the messianic times, the vessel that contained the manna will be restored.

Most of today’s readings refer to the story of God giving manna or bread to people who are hungry. John recalls the story of Jesus reminding the people that God fed the people in the desert and continues to nurture us through our faith. The readings remind us that we do not live by bread alone, but rather by everything that comes out of the mouth of The Holy One. Bread is necessary, but it is not everything. Lives that are bereft of the spirit or lives that are numbed by alcohol or drugs or sex or too much food are empty, and only leave us hungering for meaning and fulfillment.

What do we need out of the mouth of God in addition to physical sustenance to live most fully and meaningfully? Rabbi Arthur Waskow, a contemporary progressive rabbi who lives and teaches in the Philadelphia area, suggests that the life God wants us to live contains certain elements, and among them is joy– that we allow ourselves to experience joy as a sacred activity, and create joy for others.  Jewish tradition teaches that when we die, we will be called to account for every permitted pleasure we did not partake of in life. We are not meant to be unhappy; we were created in love and sent out to enjoy the blessings we were given and share them with others. Joy is part of a fully religious life and something that God wants us to have.

Next is remembering that we were created in God’s image. If we remember that we are the image of God, that we are God’s hands and arms in the world, that our mouths should speak God’s teachings and that our feet should run to fulfill God’s vision of social justice in the world, then we come closer to a godly life. If we give bread to the hungry, we are recalling the act that, literally, sustained our lives in the wilderness. The rabbis taught ”im ayn kemach, ayn Torah, without bread, there is no Torah.” Without physical nourishment, we very literally cannot muster the strength to strive after our dreams, to participate in the fullness of life’s bounties. Human beings need physical sustenance in order to study and grow to become who God intends them to be – God fed us, we need to be the image of God and feed others. Just as we need spiritual sustenance to most fully connect with God and experience God’s love.

Another value that Rabbi Waskow says is essential to a fully religious life is what we call in Hebrew “Teshuva” – literally “returning.”  One of the Hebrew words for sin derives from archery, when the arrow cuts away off it’s intended direction and misses the target. Returning means that when, like the arrow, we have gone astray, veered off the path, we need to turn around and return to the point where we started going wrong, where we missed the target.  We return to God, to our values, to our ideals, to the communities that sustain us. Being able to take an honest look at ourselves, at our lives, at the impact our words and actions have had on those around us, is an essential part of a religious approach to life.  We pray that one of the ways God will nourish us is by giving us the wisdom to recognize when we have gone wrong, and the humility and strength to get ourselves right with others again.

In the Jewish world, we are entering the final weeks before the High Holy Days, when there is a particular focus on Teshuva and Atonement. In my tradition, God will not forgive us for sins we commit against another human being until we ask for and receive that person’s forgiveness. We are not permitted to avoid facing those we have hurt; God can’t fix it for us.  Doing teshuva is hard, hard work; it is sacred work that we are commanded to do. Doing it is part of what we have learned from the mouth of God.

God fed us manna in the wilderness when we were hungry. We needed it during our 40 years of wandering. And, as John taught us, God continues to feed us manna – spiritual manna, food that endures for eternal life. We each see and taste the manna differently, and we each call it by a different name. But it is the same precious gift from God that feeds our souls and blesses our lives, that gives meaning to our days.

Alden Solovey, a contemporary Jewish poet and liturgist, wrote in his most recent book “This Precious Life” these words about the miracle and wonder of manna:

                           Manna

                           Manna still flows from heaven,

                           Riding on beams of light,

                           Warmth and heat,

                           Awe and passion,

                           Wonder and glory,

                           Feeding this grateful heart.

                           Manna still flows from heaven,

                           Summoned with beams of prayer,

                           Mourning and jubilation,

                           Praise and thanksgiving,

                           Hope and yearning,

                           Praising God’s holy name.

                           Manna still flows from heaven,

                           To sustain this land,

                           To nourish this soul,

                           To enliven the days

                           And bless the nights

                           With the bread of life

                           From the God of compassion.*

May our days and nights be blessed, may our ears be open to hear the love and wisdom that God speaks to us, and may we feel embraced and nourished by God’s compassion.  AMEN

*This Precious Life©Alden Solovy, 2021

Prayer for Peace:              Yehudah Amichai (Israeli poet & peace activist)

Don’t stop after beating the swords

into ploughshares, don’t stop! Go on beating

and make musical instruments out of them.

Whoever wants to make war again

will have to turn them into ploughshares first.

Final Song:                    T’Filat Haderch (The Travelers’ Prayer), Debbie Friedman

Jesus Rivera

We have a choice today. To decide if I am/we are just a body or if I am/we are the Body of Christ. To say that I am just a body is limiting and tends to separate us from each other. To say that I am the Body of Christ connects us to one another. So, what does it mean to be the Body of Christ?

Both Moses and Jesus speak of an Everlasting Covenant. We are in intimate relationship with God/Love. We are not just what we see on the surface. We are as God/Love created us and God can only create Love. We are Created in God’s image. Christ tells us that this Love is our eternal inheritance. The awareness of Love’s presence. Look around and dare to see love everywhere and in everyone.

• Blocks to the awareness of Love’s presence – I hold grievances, I believe I am separate from God and from my brother/sister. I only see divisions. Not believing My brother/sister is created by God’s love just like I am and belongs to the Body of Christ.

• Jesus Christ invites us to see things differently. If the world tells me I am an individual body and the rugged individual is the hero, the image of the Body of Christ offers another choice. Jesus Christ proclaims he has come to take, bless, to break, and to give. This is the Body of Christ – participating experience. It is a phrase that expresses Oneness, Unity, Social Order. God is saving the whole.

The growth of the early church was due to the signs and wonders the people saw. 8 out 10 people in the Roman Empire were slaves. Women were chattel. Ignatius of Antioch. 106 A.D. Catholic/Universal – The authentic preaching of the Gospel so returned social dignity and social equality to the human race that they could not help but feel the LOVE: oneness with God and a world where we recognize our value and are not afraid to love and forgive one another. It is a positive anthropology. We are the Temple of God. We are the Body of Christ. 

• How do we be the Body of Christ?

From the perspective of being the Body of Christ, how do we return from the pandemic and go back into groups of people knowing how divided we are as a country? On a more personal note, how do I face my health challenges? [Jesus is scheduled for a bone marrow transplant in July/August after his aggressive cancer returned three times.]

Took, blessed, broke, and gave.

Take and bless – choose and love myself and my brother/sister.

Break and give – by giving – forgiving, letting go of grievances and judgement. Trust in Love.

Body of Christ – for the first 12-13 centuries You, the people of God were the Body of Christ, and the elements of bread and wine were considered the mystical body. In the 13^th century we reversed it. The bread and wine became the Body and Blood of Christ. Perhaps it is time to reclaim our identity of living as the Body of Christ.