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General Convention and the Calming of the StormLast week, I thought about the thousands of Episcopal clergy, caught in the storm of our church’s General Convention, wondering what they would preach today. For they knew that in our readings for today we would be told that God’s ways are unknowable to mere humans, that Jesus stills the storms of life, that there is a new creation coming into being. In the context of our convention, these readings take on real vibrancy.
Back in Columbus, we took the historic step of electing the first woman as primate of a province of the Anglican Communion: Katharine Jefferts Schori will become our Presiding Bishop in November. Most were thrilled, a few warned that the sky was falling; but all agreed that this election will continue to rock the boat of our Anglican world.
We writhed in agony over various resolutions that attempted to respond to the Anglican Communion’s Windsor Report. For 10 days there were public hearings, endless debate, and finally, a dramatic showdown at the last minute: an extraordinary joint session of the House of Bishops and the House of Deputies on the last day, called by the Presiding Bishop.
In the end they asked dioceses to exercise restraint by not consenting to the consecration of any candidate to the episcopate [that is, the office of bishop] whose manner of life presents a challenge to the wider church and will lead to further strains on communion.
It only passed with great pain and turmoil after emotional pleas from both the Presiding Bishop and the Presiding Bishop-elect to approve it. I am told that they were pressured in a phone call from the Archbishop of Canterbury. Their prevailing argument was that this was a temporary step backward in order to make a step forward later, that if it were not passed, there would be no further dialog, that the new Presiding Bishop deserved a chance to engage in reconciliation, and that this was a time for generosity, humility, remaining in relationship, and waiting on the work of the Spirit.
I don’t like it. Many who voted for it didn’t like it. It was passed under pressure, in a spirit of political panic, not prayer. It didn’t seem honest, because it doesn’t really represent where we are. The great majority of us don’t believe that homosexual orientation is sinful or that we should never have consecrated Gene Robinson a bishop. Besides, it contradicts their enthusiastic election of our new Presiding Bishop, who, as the only female primate in all of Anglicanism, will certainly present a challenge to the wider church and will lead to further strains on communion. And how will we undo this in the future? When will this unrealistic moratorium end?
We only agreed to make this statement to keep a temporary peace. As some have said, it uses some of the members of the Body of Christ as bargaining chips in the game of Anglican politics. All I can say is that I hope it does what they intended, enabling us and our new Presiding Bishop to engage meaningfully in relationship and dialogue, and that this dialogue will further the acceptance of all God’s children.
And so it was quite a storm. And quietly in the background, all the time, overshadowed by the ecclesiastical sexual drama, was the much more important storm of the wide world around us: extreme poverty, hunger, disease, illiteracy, economic underdevelopment, and environmental destruction. But we managed to enter into this storm, too, in the middle of it all.
To respond to these realities, we set as our highest budget priority the funding of the United Nation’s Millennium Development Goals. Our new Presiding Bishop said that this kind of focus on mission is “for us and the world the royal road to reconciliation.” For she believes, as I do, that the sooner we stop bickering over sexuality and join together in the work of eradicating poverty and disease, the sooner we’ll be reconciled to one another in a truly gospel relationship of compassion and mercy.
So there was the storm of sexuality and the much bigger, more important background storm of the world’s poverty and suffering. Then there were the personal storms that inevitably go on. One day coming out of the convention hall a deputy was almost running, stumbling, moaning and crying inconsolably. It seemed far more personal than distress over whatever convention was debating, and I prayed for her. I myself had to return early because of two deaths in the parish. Life goes on, and it is often stormy. Perhaps you are in the midst of your own personal storm today.
Our readings today give us exactly the perspective we need on these storms of church conflict, suffering in the world, and in the trials of our personal lives. In the first reading, Job has already lost his family, his farm, his health, everything. Now all he has left is his question to God Why? Why? God replies Who is this that darkens counsel by words without knowledge? Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Have you seen the gates of deep darkness or comprehended the expanse of the earth? Declare, if you know all this.
And then in the gospel, the disciples are so afraid. A storm threatens to capsize their small boat, and Jesus is sleeping. They ask Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing? Jesus replies, much like God to Job, Why are you afraid? Have you still no faith? and he calms the waters.
What kind of answers are these? Innocent Job is suffering terribly and wondering why; the disciples are naturally terrified of drowning, the Episcopal Church is confused and afraid and may be on its way out of the Anglican Communion, millions of people are dying of disease and poverty all over the world, you and I have very real personal struggles, and all God can say is Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Why are you afraid? Have you still no faith?
And then St. Paul weighs in, in today’s second reading. He’s got the key. He says I regard no one from a human point of view, he says, because there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new!
Paul lifts up our eyes, beyond our conflicts in the church, beyond the suffering of this world, beyond our own difficulties, to regard everything from a divine
- not merely human - point of view, and see the new creation that is coming into being. God reminds us that we are not the Creator, and will never have the answers. Jesus calls us to drop our fear and have faith. All are saying In the midst of life’s storms, keep your eyes fixed on God’s reality of love, harmony, justice, and goodness. This is the truth, and it will come to be. Have no fear.
Now this does not mean that we won’t continue to have storms. Nor does it mean that we should ignore human suffering and go completely spiritual. We are called to be Christ’s hands and feet in this world, to help him bring his kingdom into being in the here and now.
But rather than wringing our hands over how bad everything is, we are to regard things no longer from a mere human point of view, and with Christ’s eyes strain to see the new creation that is coming into being. People are coming together to eradicate extreme poverty, hunger, and disease, and for the first time in human history we have the resources and the means to do it; we do have a gay bishop and a female Presiding Bishop, and we will not ultimately be constrained by the limited vision of other Anglicans; and by the grace of God you and I are being shaped every day to become freer, more loving, more Christly. No longer seeing things just from a human point of view, we perceive the world, the church, and our own lives from a divine point of view.
As we pray in the magnificent collect used at all ordinations in this church, Carry out in tranquility the plan of salvation; let the whole world see and know that things which were cast down are being raised up, and things which had grown old are being made new, and that all things are being brought to their perfection by him through whom all things were made, your Son Jesus Christ our Lord.
Seeing things from God’s perspective, we can actively work to heal the world, our church, and our lives, doing so not out of desperate anxiety, but in the calm assurance that St. Paul displayed when he said that All things work together for good for those who love God and are called according to his purpose (Romans 8:28).
So ride out the storms of your life, of your church, and your world. Go ahead and ask God, with Job, why these things must be and when they will end; but expect no easy answer. Regard things no longer from a human point of view, but a divine one, perceiving in the midst of it all the new creation that is coming into being. Have no fear; have faith. And, in peace, roll up your sleeves and get to work helping Christ build his kingdom.
End Document — St. Michael and All Angels Episcopal Church