Yr. B, Wk. 35: From Alpha to Omega

Mariel's worship page included a fantastic image of legions of guardian angels assembled in clouds looking down on earth. A theme of trust and protection emerged from the scripture selections and prayers, and she asked us for any images of God's protection in our lives recently. Among the answers were the gazebo in Marietta Square (where sometimes people go to eat meals given them at a nearby soup kitchen) and a family home in another state.

Class: Christine, first year; Mariel, Gene, second year; Erica, third year; Scott and Susan, co - mentors. Absent: Susan.

Erica started our discussion of the week's readings by telling us about the fight against Apartheid. "It was Anglicanism's time to shine after a century of mediocrity," she observed. We explored that thought, before picking up on these threads in her opening statement:

• Christine had read last week about Esther's "fight" for her people;
• the "fight" in heaven described in Revelation parallels the fight on earth, as the hierarchy in heaven mirrors the hierarchy on earth, said Mariel.
• "Hierarchy" of the sexes is a strong message in Hebrew Wisdom literature; Yee's book highlights some outliers in the wisdom literature and Psalms in the form of "Wisdom" embodied as a nearly co - equal to God the Creator. But the female voice in Song of Solomon presents as fully equal to her male lover in a celebration of carnal love -- that may also imply (1) an imagined pre - Fall Eve and Adam, or (2) analogy to God and His people
• Mariel expressed a theme that emerged from this week's readings across the board: when we think of male - female themes in our tradition, we should remember that God is always the bridegroom and we are all, male and female, the bride.

Theological Reflection
In keeping with the years' theme of multicultural experiences, Gene read to us from a book of sermons by a priest at Sewanee, who remembers in the 1960s taking a job at the same Dupont factory where his father worked. He, a white man, joined his trainer, a black man, at a table in the company cafeteria, between an all - black table and all - white table. Gene stopped reading at the point when the young man has been warned not to eat with the black man again.

We followed instructions for the "Dilemma" method, finding two positive goals: Preserving his dignity and self - respect, and preserving his physical well-being; or, as we came to think of it, saving face, or saving our face. From the Tradition source, we settled on Peter's denying his tie to Jesus three times, to be safe from suspicion. As we explored that story, we came to see it as part of a process in Peter's growth, to be followed by his telling Jesus three times "I love you," and eventually being crucified upside - down. We also thought of President Clinton's admission that his greatest regret was his decision not to use US power to halt horrific violence in Rwanda.

Our collect pulls together threads from the evening: wisdom, protection, "Alpha and Omega" in Revelation, "fighting," and the idea that Peter's denial was part of a process.

Collect when Facing a Threat O Lord, Alpha and Omega: though Peter, fearful for his life, denied you three times, you accepted his love three times and built your church on his apostleship; when we must choose between saving face and facing physical harm, may we remember how even moments of weakness can, in You, be steps toward greater strength, wisdom, and fulfillment of Your purpose. Amen.

Gene told us the rest of the story: The young man passed by his black friend the next night; but, in his shame, went on to become a participant in key civil rights battles of the next several years.

Our final prayer was for travelers, as we directed our thoughts towards Susan, en route to France as we met.

Next meeting will be May 28. We will meet 6:45 in the Choir for a short worship service. We'll walk to a year - end meal on the Square.

Interesting TR idea for next year: TR in Motion! See the RRG, p. 281.

Yr. B, Wk. 34: Wisdom, Jude, and Mixed Signals

Gene brought three sub sandwiches and three small pizzas from Newk's. It was a great meal for all! Christine brought a beautiful little copied version of an 1836 vintage Prayer Book for worship. [See Photo]

Class: Christine, first year; Mariel, Gene, second year; Erica, third year; Scott and Susan, co - mentors. Absent: Erica.

Gene kicked off discussion by saying "If John was the first Baptist, Jude was the first Southern Baptist," a fire - breathing polemicist. Jude rails against "innovators" and "intruders" who are "waterless clouds" and "irrational animals." Jude's letter is not clear about what these interlopers actually taught, just that they represent the Anti Christ.
Christine found much to enjoy in the readings from Ben Sirach (Ecclesiasticus) and the Wisdom of Solomon.
Theological Reflection Scott surprised himself by launching into a story different from the one he'd planned! It involved an invitation to a celebratory meal that turned into an bitter, even poisonous, accusation. Our group was able to "buy in" to the situation, and we arrived at the metaphor of an intersection after a storm with mixed signals: one side sees flashing yellow lights and the other, red.
Chistine took our notes and created this collect:

Collect at Crossroads
Lord, at the intersection of zeal for Law and the Light of Christ, you brought Saul of Tarsus to a new community; when we are tempted to travel both far and alone, remind us to travel together so we may go far traversing the crossroads of strife, hunger, hardship and love, spreading the joy and good news as Jesus did with and through his disciples. Amen.

Next week: Brown bag; worship by Mariel; TR by Gene; Susan will be in France! Our final meeting of the year will be May 28 when Susan returns. Look for info: we'll worship at St. James and eat out on the Square.

Yr. B, Wk. 33: Bread and Wonder

It was a brown bag night. Gene led worship, Mariel brought some original collages for a TR, and Erica led the reflection.

Class: Christine, first year; Mariel, Gene, second year; Erica, third year; Scott and Susan, co - mentors. Absent: Scott.

Theological Refection
I wasn't there, but I studied the board later. Aside from many Scriptural and Liturgical references to bread and desert, and cultural references such as to the obelisk in a wilderness from 2001: A Space Odyssey, the whole exercise seems to have generated many expressions of joy and surprise. (Has anyone read C. S. Lewis's memoir, Surprised by Joy?)

Collect for Bread
O Gladsome Light, O Risen Lord, You nourished the Hebrews with manna in the desert and fed the crowds in the countryside: Transform our hearts so that we see Christ in all our brothers and sisters, and join with them joyfully proclaiming the good news of salvation to a hungry world. Amen.

B: Erica is out; Gene brings our meal; Christine leads worship; TR is on the mentors!

Yr. B, Wk. 32: Ruth, Esther, Peter, Darwin and "Home"

Reading the chapter about the epistles 1 & 2 Peter, Mariel was reminded of a spiritual recorded in 1936 by Bill Monroe and the Bluegrass Boys, "This World is Not My Home." She designed a worship including that recording as a canticle. Discussing the worship afterwards, we were struck by the haunting beauty of the voices, and by a couple lines in the lyrics: "Many friends and kindred have gone on before / And I cain't feel at home in this world anymore!" and "Heaven's expectin' me that's one thing I know / I fixed it up with Jesus a long time ago."
While we ate our brown bag dinners, we responded to Mariel's question, "What would Heaven be for you?"

Class: Christine, first year; Mariel, Gene, second year; Erica, third year; Scott and Susan, co - mentors. Absent: Christine.

Susan read aloud from Christine's email responding to this week's readings for First Year. Christine liked the EfM Reflection Guide's suggestion to think of Esther and Ruth first as fictional stories, then as history. Suspenseful and entertaining, the strong women show courage, faith, and wisdom as they advance both their own interests and those of their Jewish community.
Mariel connected Christine's comments about the "perseverance" of "outcasts" in "no way out situations" to the second year readings. Mariel found helpful the quotation marks in one Bible that made clear how much in these letters is quoted from hymns and liturgy that early Christians already knew. Mariel has come to understand how those early Christians, not wanting to "rock the boat," bowed to prevailing customs regarding gender roles and slavery that we find objectionable today, because Christians were already considered to be "antisocial deviants" for not buying into the state religion.
With a smile, Gene said that he will give as good a summary of the epistles attributed to "John" next week, since he did the wrong reading.
Erica was intrigued by the reading in year three. She explained several different trends in Christianity during the century 1815 - 1914. Protestant women channeled religious fervor into social causes, fighting prostitution, drunkenness, and slavery; philosophers tried to figure out this new world that science was revealing about the origins of our planet (in geology) and of life (through Darwin); the reaction to Darwin et. al. was fundamentalism in Protestant circles, seances and spiritualism among many others, and ultra - Montanism among Catholics. Erica was surprised to realize that Papal Infallibility and Immaculate Conception are both recent tenets of Roman Catholic faith, dating from the late 1800s. In a world made frightening by science, Erica said, "fundamentalism put God in a box" for security's sake.
After a few minutes to read an excerpt from Paul Lakeland's book Constructive Theology, we bogged down quickly in discussion of how Lakeland's use of the word "universalism" apparently opposes what the rest of us mean by the same word.



Theological Reflection Erica read us A Ruined House by Mick Manning, a wonderfully - illustrated book that had charmed her two boys. As the author explored the 17th - century manor, now home to flora, fauna, insects and birds, we explored the aspects of the subject that struck us most. After awhile, we realized that the home itself was our metaphor, and that we had already explored its "world" for creation, brokenness, judgement, and redemption. We found many cultural analogs and scriptural connections, mostly from Ecclesiastes. In the end, we ran out of time, but Scott finished the collect at home, with quotations from Ecclesiastes 12 and from Isaiah.

Collect for Facing Ruins
Dear Lord, Ancient of Days: in the days when housekeepers tremble, when the strong are bent, when our windows are dimmed, comfort us with Your promise to raise up the temple from ruins in three days, and sustain us with your promise to send forth a shoot from the stump of Jesse, that, faced with ruin or decay, we may be inspired to take part in Your creation of a new heaven and a new earth. Amen.

Next week: Another brown bag night; Scott will be out, but Erica will lead the theological reflection; Gene will lead worship; Mariel will bring the source for the TR.

Looking ahead: May 7, Erica will be out of town. Susan goes to France (!); We'll have our final meeting in the nave of St. James May 28, followed by dinner on the Marietta Square.

Yr. B, Wk. 30 and 31: Wisdom, Mission, and The Lone Ranger

Our worship grew out of Psalm 136. Covering the whole story of creation and Israel's salvation in chronological order, the Psalm follows each act of God with the refrain, "His love endures forever." After a few verses of the original psalm, we added in thanks for God's influence in our own lives, in three chronological steps from childhood to the present.

We enjoyed white bean - and - tuna salad on arugala, with fresh fruit on angel food cake for dessert, prepared by Susan.

Class: Christine, first year; Mariel, Gene, second year; Erica, third year; Scott and Susan, co - mentors. Absent: Christine.

Themes of mission and wisdom seemed to run through the whole evening.

We discussed the short essay about mission in the RRG, agreeing that our tradition has revealed truth to offer people of other faiths. We can tell, we can show by example, but beyond that, it is not up to use whether they, in the words of the BCP, will "find and be found by God."  So our mission is more broadly what we do as the body of Jesus in the world, to continue his works of healing, feeding, and confronting self - centered, hierarchical views of justice.

We also discussed the readings for week 31. Scott and Susan made observations from Powell about the wisdom books of the Hebrew Scripture. Mariel commented on James, which seems to have been a sermon that was generalized into wisdom about how to live as a Christian in community. The "works" that James holds in opposition to "faith" are what we spoke of earlier as Jesus's mission, not the set of religious rituals that Paul dismissed as mere "works." Erica felt some affinity for the philosophers of the Enlightenment, although not all of them were so wise as they thought they were.

TR
For tonight's theological reflection, Scott brought a news story recorded for the NPR program RADIOLAB, aired May 12, 2017. Listen. We listened to the story of "Laura" between minutes 3 and 8.

Sitting on a jury, Laura had tried to persuade fellow jurors to acquit the defendant, guilty or not, on grounds that the crime of possessing two ounces of methamphetamine wasn't worth a two - to - six year sentence. We learned that such "jury nullification" of a law does have many precedents in England and America, going back hundreds of years, but that it can also be "a trap door to anarchy," punishable as contempt of court. We called this "The Case of the Clueless Revolutionary."



When we considered the thoughts and feelings that Laura must have had, we found buy - in, and came up with the metaphor of a vigilante, complete with story line: The Lone Ranger rides in to defend the farmer's widow and little son from the corrupt banker and sheriff who've come to foreclose on her farm. But what if he learns that the banker and sheriff have families of their own?
We agreed that Erica found a perfect analog in Saul of Tarsus: persecuting Christians, Saul suddenly doubts the premise of his mission. We reached an idea of how redemption can come in this kind of situation. At 9:17, we adjourned, leaving Scott to compose the collect for mission, to include these notes: Saul of Tarsus, "certainty runs counter to empathy," righteousness should include humility, and the restoration of community: "My work here is done." Hi - Ho Silver, away!

Collect for Mission
Dear Lord, you send us to continue your son's earthly ministry, to be a light to the world, preaching the gospel to every creature, bringing healing and reconciliation, standing for justice: let us not, like Saul, be so blinded by our own certainty and righteousness that we fail to appreciate those we encounter, but let us through empathy and humility be builders of community. Through Jesus we pray, amen. 

Next week: Holy Week, no class; resume on April 23 with week 32 readings.  Brown bag. Erica brings something for a TR, and Mariel leads worship.

Yr. B, Wk. 29: "Faithful Neighbors"

Gene brought a thoughtfully composed worship service before hurrying off to court. In keeping with the week's reading Faithful Neighbors, the service juxtaposed a prayer from the Qu'ran with Psalm 16, the BCP's confession and the Apostle's Creed. The closing prayer went along with a poem by Rumi, "The Darkness": "Be refreshed in the darkness. / Doesn't a moment of silence / restore beauty to the voice?"

(Class: Christine, Year One; Mariel and Gene, Year Two; Erica, Year Three; Susan and Scott, co - mentors, are reading Year Four. Absent: Gene.) 

While we partook of our brown bag meals, we answered a question from Forward Day by Day, inspired by Paul's lament in Romans that he struggles with doing the things he doesn't want to do, "What are you struggling with? How do you involve Jesus in your struggle?" Our sharing of observations about the reading connected like dominoes across the board. At the end of an hour, Erica's daughter was not the only one restless, and we adjourned with prayer and this collect from the BCP, printed with images of Islamic design in his worship packet:

Collect for Diversity
O God, who created all peoples in your image, we thank you for the wonderful diversity of races and cultures in this world. Enrich our lives by ever - widening circles of fellowship, and show us your presence in those who differ most from us, until our knowledge of your love is made perfect in our love for all your children; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Next week: We double up on readings for week 30 (a short essay in the RRG on "Vocation") and week 31. Susan will bring food; Scott will bring a TR and also the worship. Looking ahead, we plan to take Holy Week off, and to finish the final reading May 14. We will have a final meeting with worship and dinner on May 28.

Special request from Scott For worship on Tuesday, please jot down in your RRG examples of God's activity in your life from childhood, early adulthood, and recently, for a total of three times when God gave, taught, led, provoked, provided, or otherwise blessed you. Tuesday evening, I'll provide a framework for everyone to offer their thanksgivings aloud.

I'm taking a cue from FORWARD DAY BY DAY's March 30th meditation on Psalm 136, a chronological list of God's great acts on behalf of His people. The writer says that her own personal version would include thanks for God who "gave me a family in which I was loved... in which I was surrounded with music and art and books...."

Yr. B, Wk. 28: Mission

Erica led worship from the prayer service booklets that she created for us earlier in the year. Scott assembled chicken Caesar salads on the spot, while we answered Erica's question about how EfM has affected us. We also followed a tangential question from Mariel, why some people seem to "get" belief while others, who aren't even curious about belief, seem perfectly fine without it.

(Class: Christine, Year One; Mariel and Gene, Year Two; Erica, Year Three; Susan and Scott, co - mentors, are reading Year Four. Absent: Christine.

We followed the A - B - C - D format for sharing our thoughts about the reading in Faithful Neighbors.

• Amazed at the correlation between interfaith education and evangelism; the common thread of hospitality among different faiths.
• Bothered by the observation that interfaith interest seems contingent upon physical proximity to the place of worship for an unfamiliar faith community.
• Confused n/a
• Delighted by the observation that Jesus in his missionary work neither proselytized others nor dominated them (contrasted to world mission conference in 1910); that the word "missio" is used to describe the Trinity, i.e., the Father's sending forth Son and Spirit; God's "crossing boundaries"; while evangelism is our work, conversion is God's; "compete in goodness."

TR
Gene was inspired by a question in Faithful Neighbors about what "artifact" one might bring to an interfaith gathering. He brought for us an article from the 1930s at the formation of Alcoholics Anonymous, "We Agnostics." It concerns the uneasiness that some AA members have with acknowledging "a higher power," and asserts that even agnostics can experience the feeling of awe that opens them up to the possibility of a power greater than self.

Our reflection began with "buy in" from experience. We could attest to being drawn into faith through experiences outside of religious instruction. We agreed that the experiences all felt like emerging from a cave into an open starlit sky. We worked from that image, remembering right away Abraham's vision of the stars in the sky, and Job's being overwhelmed by the vastness of creation and the Creator's glory. [Photo comes from redmoonrising.com, a page that deals with both Abraham and Job].

We collaborated on a collect that really did pull together strands from the whole evening, from Erica's question to the reading to the end of the TR:

Collect for Mission
God, lover of souls, seeker of souls: lead us, push us, and call us outside the boundaries of our own making into the wide expanse that Job recognized when he looked up to your heavens, that we may fulfill the mission you've given us, to lead, nudge, and call others to You. Amen.

Next week: We finish reading Faithful Neighbors. It'll be a brown bag night. Gene brings worship. Scott will initiate the TR.