In the midst of it all: Life
Christmas Eve Service 2008
Several years ago, when I was a seminarian, I was privileged to assist at a service at St. Paul’s Chapel in New York. St. Paul’s is a lovely old church – in fact, it was built 90 years before this one, and it has seen a lot of history. George Washington used to worship there as president, and in fact stopped there for prayer on his inauguration day in 1789.
Now, it is best remembered for its role in the attack on the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001. St. Paul’s is right next to Ground Zero, where the Trade Towers used to stand. Miraculously, it escaped serious damage. For eight months, it served as a respite station, offering Ground Zero workers food, medical care, and simply a place to rest.
Ash Wednesday always has been a big service at St. Paul’s, as it is right next to Wall Street and convenient to the hundreds and hundreds of Christians there who take time on that day to come in to be reminded that they are dust, and to dust they shall return.
The service begins in the morning and then the line never falters – hundreds come through for the rest of the day. It’s literally a daylong service.
Never, before or since, have I experienced a service like this. For two hours I stood, marking foreheads. “Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return.” And soon, I realized that some were coming forward with tears in their eyes. It struck me where I was and who they were. In their eyes I saw sadness and mourning, but also something strong. There perhaps was resignation in some, but in many of those eyes, I saw life.
These are people who lived through a great tragedy, They had seen their city, their nation under attack first-hand. They had lost friends and family and loved ones. And yet here they were. They got up out of bed. They faced the world. They walked into church and took on the markings of humility – for they knew that there is something in this world greater than themselves. They have made a decision. And they have chosen life.
Sometime later, a friend made the trip up from Alabama to visit and to see the sights. I took my friend to St. Paul’s, which now has a fabulous museum-quality exhibit on its role in 9/11.
They roll it all out when there are no services, and roll it all into storage before church begins. Very clever, and a wonderful exhibit.
But I had to trick her to go inside. “Oh, I just want to see one thing,” I said. I knew that she didn’t want to see what she thought was inside. She didn’t want to think about all those who died. She didn’t want to think about all that and cry all over again.
But afterwards, she said, “Thank you for making me go inside. It wasn’t about death. This was about life.”
That’s exactly what it was all about. It was about how even in the most difficult of circumstances, when there is chaos and destruction and death, there still is the opportunity to reach out to another. When all seems lost, we still can reach out to one another and soothe and heal. In a scene of chaos, in a culture of death, there amazingly remains something greater than ourselves. We can choose to live despite all. We can choose life.
The fact that this all took place in a church is no surprise. Every service we hold in an Episcopal Church, every sacrament in the church is about life.
Ash Wednesday, even with its ashes and its emphasis on humility, even Ash Wednesday points us to the Resurrection. A wedding points us to new life together. Unction, the rite of healing, is about seeking the healing power of Christ’s love in our lives. Even the rite of reconciliation – what we call confession – even confession is about life; about setting aside our sins so that we can grow into the fullness of life that Christ would have us enjoy.
They all point us to life, to life in Christ. To life as members of the Body of Christ. The holy church and the gospel it proclaims is, in fact, the one place we look to in this world that has as its one focus our lives – our lives on earth, our lives with one another, our life to come in Christ our Lord.
No organization or system made by mere humans can or will do that. No business plan or system will put your life at its center. Consider the shuttered factories, the empty bank accounts, the streets lined with shuttered houses. Consider a system that evicts a family for failure to meet debt obligations, and then boards up the house because there are no buyers. I am no economist, I am no businessman. But I do know that there is no economic system ever developed by humans that has ever put our individual lives at its center.
Consider our health care system. Consider our government, our colleges and schools. Consider any institution that ever has been put together and consider its aims, its goals. Consider, I ask you, its soul. Is the spirit of the institution animated by human ambitions, or is it animated by the Holy Spirit?
Mary and Joseph set out on a journey, Mary great with child and expecting a birth any day. Yet they had to make this journey from Nazareth to Bethlehem because of a human institution. The great Roman Empire needed to check its books. The government of what they considered all the civilized world needed to set its affairs in order. Who were the subjects and where did they live? How many live in this jurisdiction, and how many in that? How can these people best be ruled? How can these people best be taxed? How can these people best be made to serve the institution, the Roman Empire and its great leader and god, Augustus?
There was no question of hardship, no question of expense, no question of the lives involved in this great census. There only were questions of the system, the institution, of the benefits that would accrue to it. The people – well, the people and their little lives were only numbers in a list.
And yet, in the midst of all the traveling and sorting and counting, there were lives. There were the lives of Mary and Joseph, of course. But there were Peter and Andrew, Mary of Magdala, Matthew and Anne and Barabbas and so many others. Most did not know of one another yet – perhaps some of them not yet born. But they would know each other soon enough. Their lives would be brought together in that Greatest Story Ever Told. They would be brought together by Jesus, the baby about to be born in the stable.
In the midst of all that lifeless counting, there would come into the world that one great life. In that land of deep darkness, he would come as a light. The light of the star was but a guide. He was the light that would shine, greater than any light ever before. In the midst of injustice was born the one would establish and uphold justice.
In the midst of a great, sprawling Empire – full of hubris with its belief that every dit and dash on the ledger represented a taxpayer to be ruled – in the midst of Empire came a child who would be called Wonderful Counselor, Almighty God, Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace. Though other human institutions always would claim power, the true authority and government for our lives would forever rest upon his shoulders.
For unto us a child is born. Unto us, a child is given. On this night, amidst economic collapse and war and uncertainty, a child is born. To bring us together. To show us the true authority in our lives. To give us light and life.
To give us life.
Treasure these words and, like Mary, ponder them in your heart. On this night, the gift of life is being offered unto you – in the midst of everything, a gift. A gift of light and life. For you, forever.
Amen.
Several years ago, when I was a seminarian, I was privileged to assist at a service at St. Paul’s Chapel in New York. St. Paul’s is a lovely old church – in fact, it was built 90 years before this one, and it has seen a lot of history. George Washington used to worship there as president, and in fact stopped there for prayer on his inauguration day in 1789.
Now, it is best remembered for its role in the attack on the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001. St. Paul’s is right next to Ground Zero, where the Trade Towers used to stand. Miraculously, it escaped serious damage. For eight months, it served as a respite station, offering Ground Zero workers food, medical care, and simply a place to rest.
Ash Wednesday always has been a big service at St. Paul’s, as it is right next to Wall Street and convenient to the hundreds and hundreds of Christians there who take time on that day to come in to be reminded that they are dust, and to dust they shall return.
The service begins in the morning and then the line never falters – hundreds come through for the rest of the day. It’s literally a daylong service.
Never, before or since, have I experienced a service like this. For two hours I stood, marking foreheads. “Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return.” And soon, I realized that some were coming forward with tears in their eyes. It struck me where I was and who they were. In their eyes I saw sadness and mourning, but also something strong. There perhaps was resignation in some, but in many of those eyes, I saw life.
These are people who lived through a great tragedy, They had seen their city, their nation under attack first-hand. They had lost friends and family and loved ones. And yet here they were. They got up out of bed. They faced the world. They walked into church and took on the markings of humility – for they knew that there is something in this world greater than themselves. They have made a decision. And they have chosen life.
Sometime later, a friend made the trip up from Alabama to visit and to see the sights. I took my friend to St. Paul’s, which now has a fabulous museum-quality exhibit on its role in 9/11.
They roll it all out when there are no services, and roll it all into storage before church begins. Very clever, and a wonderful exhibit.
But I had to trick her to go inside. “Oh, I just want to see one thing,” I said. I knew that she didn’t want to see what she thought was inside. She didn’t want to think about all those who died. She didn’t want to think about all that and cry all over again.
But afterwards, she said, “Thank you for making me go inside. It wasn’t about death. This was about life.”
That’s exactly what it was all about. It was about how even in the most difficult of circumstances, when there is chaos and destruction and death, there still is the opportunity to reach out to another. When all seems lost, we still can reach out to one another and soothe and heal. In a scene of chaos, in a culture of death, there amazingly remains something greater than ourselves. We can choose to live despite all. We can choose life.
The fact that this all took place in a church is no surprise. Every service we hold in an Episcopal Church, every sacrament in the church is about life.
Ash Wednesday, even with its ashes and its emphasis on humility, even Ash Wednesday points us to the Resurrection. A wedding points us to new life together. Unction, the rite of healing, is about seeking the healing power of Christ’s love in our lives. Even the rite of reconciliation – what we call confession – even confession is about life; about setting aside our sins so that we can grow into the fullness of life that Christ would have us enjoy.
They all point us to life, to life in Christ. To life as members of the Body of Christ. The holy church and the gospel it proclaims is, in fact, the one place we look to in this world that has as its one focus our lives – our lives on earth, our lives with one another, our life to come in Christ our Lord.
No organization or system made by mere humans can or will do that. No business plan or system will put your life at its center. Consider the shuttered factories, the empty bank accounts, the streets lined with shuttered houses. Consider a system that evicts a family for failure to meet debt obligations, and then boards up the house because there are no buyers. I am no economist, I am no businessman. But I do know that there is no economic system ever developed by humans that has ever put our individual lives at its center.
Consider our health care system. Consider our government, our colleges and schools. Consider any institution that ever has been put together and consider its aims, its goals. Consider, I ask you, its soul. Is the spirit of the institution animated by human ambitions, or is it animated by the Holy Spirit?
Mary and Joseph set out on a journey, Mary great with child and expecting a birth any day. Yet they had to make this journey from Nazareth to Bethlehem because of a human institution. The great Roman Empire needed to check its books. The government of what they considered all the civilized world needed to set its affairs in order. Who were the subjects and where did they live? How many live in this jurisdiction, and how many in that? How can these people best be ruled? How can these people best be taxed? How can these people best be made to serve the institution, the Roman Empire and its great leader and god, Augustus?
There was no question of hardship, no question of expense, no question of the lives involved in this great census. There only were questions of the system, the institution, of the benefits that would accrue to it. The people – well, the people and their little lives were only numbers in a list.
And yet, in the midst of all the traveling and sorting and counting, there were lives. There were the lives of Mary and Joseph, of course. But there were Peter and Andrew, Mary of Magdala, Matthew and Anne and Barabbas and so many others. Most did not know of one another yet – perhaps some of them not yet born. But they would know each other soon enough. Their lives would be brought together in that Greatest Story Ever Told. They would be brought together by Jesus, the baby about to be born in the stable.
In the midst of all that lifeless counting, there would come into the world that one great life. In that land of deep darkness, he would come as a light. The light of the star was but a guide. He was the light that would shine, greater than any light ever before. In the midst of injustice was born the one would establish and uphold justice.
In the midst of a great, sprawling Empire – full of hubris with its belief that every dit and dash on the ledger represented a taxpayer to be ruled – in the midst of Empire came a child who would be called Wonderful Counselor, Almighty God, Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace. Though other human institutions always would claim power, the true authority and government for our lives would forever rest upon his shoulders.
For unto us a child is born. Unto us, a child is given. On this night, amidst economic collapse and war and uncertainty, a child is born. To bring us together. To show us the true authority in our lives. To give us light and life.
To give us life.
Treasure these words and, like Mary, ponder them in your heart. On this night, the gift of life is being offered unto you – in the midst of everything, a gift. A gift of light and life. For you, forever.
Amen.
posted by Michael+ at 1:34 AM
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