Kara

All Glory, Laud, and Honor

Did you notice the out-of-season hymn on Sunday? It was “All Glory, Laud and Honor,” one that we generally associate with Palm Sunday. It’s even prescribed by the rubrics of the Prayer Book for that day - one of only a few instances where the Prayer Book recommends a particular hymn. As Meg noted in her article last week, Bach’s church in Leipzig included Palm Sunday music in its Advent observances. Doing so marks the parallels between the coming of Christ into Jerusalem before he was crucified, the coming of Christ in his birth that we observe at Christmas, and the coming of Christ that we expect at the end of days. It also reminds us that Christ comes to us every time we receive the Eucharist. “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord,” we sing at the Sanctus during the Eucharistic Prayer, and in so doing we echo the song at Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem. 

Advent is a season when we try to think of past, present, and future at once - which is really hard for humans to do! But this is how God’s time works. One of my favorite illustrations of God’s time is in the TV comedy The Good Place, where Ted Danson’s character explains eternity as “Jeremy Bearimy.” He says, “Things in the afterlife don’t happen while things are happening here, because while time on Earth moves in a straight line — one thing happens, then the next, then the next — time in the afterlife moves in a ‘Jeremy Bearimy’.”

A “Jeremy Bearimy” loops and doubles back on itself, and the dot above the “i” is a pretty good representation of how Augustine describes eternity, where all time is present to God. 

This is where we live, especially in this season of Advent where past, present, future, and eternity loop around, double back on themselves, and where God beckons us onward in expectation of Christ’s coming. 

Come, Lord Jesus!

Kara+

P.S. I’m writing this from London, where I just saw part of a Roman wall that was built about 80 years after Jesus was raised from the dead. I also got to touch John Wesley’s pulpit at the church he founded. It reminded me in a very tangible way of the beautiful story we are caught up in, the story of God’s action for us in Jesus Christ. 

Anglican Communion Update

You may have read in the news that Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby has announced his resignation. He stepped down in response to a report on horrific abuses perpetrated over decades by a prominent layperson at a camp for elite boarding school students. The political situation surrounding his resignation is extremely complicated, and some believe he was made a scapegoat by people who disagreed with him over other issues in the Church of England. In any event, it has highlighted once again that the protection of vulnerable members of our community is of paramount importance.   

What happens now? In the Episcopal Church, the Presiding Bishop is elected by the House of Bishops and the election is ratified by the House of Deputies. But the Church of England appoints rather than elects bishops. The Crown Nominations Commission, a group selected as shown in the bafflingly complicated diagram below, will select Archbishop Justin’s successor. Along with officials from the Church of England, the Commission will also include five members of the broader Anglican Communion representing Asia, the Americas, Africa, Europe, and Oceania. It is theoretically possible, but very unlikely, that the Commission will choose a bishop from another part of the Communion. 

The CNC will interview candidates and provide one name to the Prime Minister. A second name will be kept “in reserve” in case there is an issue with the first candidate or if they decline the offer. The Prime Minister then conveys the final result to the King. You can read more about the details of the process here: How is a new Archbishop of Canterbury chosen?

As this process unfolds, I invite your prayers for Archbishop Justin and his family, for Archbishop of York Stephen Cottrell, and for the Crown Nominations Commission who will select the next Archbishop. If you have any questions about how the Anglican Communion works, send me an email! 

Kara

Christ the Cornerstone

Dear friends,

Last week, I gave some remarks at a meeting of the Theologies of Pastoral Ministry group in New York. I wanted to share a condensed version with you. 

Thus your fathers were made

Fellow citizens of the saints, of the household of GOD , being built upon the foundation

Of apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus Himself the chief cornerstone.

But you, have you built well, that you now sit helpless in a ruined house?

T.S. Eliot wrote these lines in his poetic cycle Choruses from the Rock. As a whole, it’s a meditation on what went wrong for the Church of England when the conditions of the modern world led people to abandon God, not for another God per se, but for the gods of reason, or faith in human progress, or just out of boredom and lassitude. The church, he writes is a ruined house that no one particularly wants in neighborhoods of “decent godless people, their only monument a thousand lost golf balls.”

It could have been written yesterday, but it was written in 1934. We aren’t in a unique situation as Christians in 2024. In fact, I would argue that there are perhaps no unique situations. Sins, heresies, divisions, and diversions may clothe themselves in new garments, but they are the same as they ever were. I would also argue that perhaps the church has always felt like something of a ruined house. If it didn't, there would be no need for reform.

But the church is made up of people, and the church is always rebuilding from what feels like a pile of rubble. The verses I quoted draw on Ephesians 2, where Paul is trying to argue this newborn church out of conflict over the relationship between Jews and Gentiles. He does so by reminding the Gentiles in Ephesus to keep the main thing the main thing, that “in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ.”

There’s an internet meme out there that says there are two main themes to all of Paul's epistles: First, we are heirs through unfathomable grace to unimaginable glory. And second, I am just asking you freaks to be normal for 5 minutes. Sometimes the being normal part is too much to ask in a church made up of fallen humans in need of a Savior! 

And yet, what is possible for the church is possible - not because of us, but because in God all things are possible. We are heirs through unfathomable grace to unimaginable glory. Our church is built on the one true foundation, as Paul writes in Ephesians: “In him the whole structure is joined together and grows into a holy temple in the Lord; in whom you also are built together spiritually into a dwelling-place for God.”

Here at Trinity Church, we are built together and held together in Christ; we are grafted into the Promise. We may be forever relighting the candle, forever tending the flame of which we are but stewards. But in Christ, and through Christ, we know that this house will never be ruined.

Yours in Christ, and in Christ alone,

Kara+

P.S. The photo is only peripherally related to my letter, but it’s such a beautiful room that I wanted you to see it. I don’t think I’ve ever “done my homework” in a place like this before! This is the library in the University Club, where we stayed for the meeting. 

On Being Good Stewards

I’m writing to you from the (tiny) airport in New Bern, NC, waiting to return from the Fall meeting of the General Board of Examining Chaplains of the Episcopal Church. I have the honor of serving as Vice-Chair of GBEC, the committee within the national church that writes, administers, and grades the week-long test that candidates for ordination take towards the end of seminary. It’s one of those jobs within the church that is decidedly less than glamorous: students wish they didn’t have to take the exams, and grading 160 papers right after Christmas is somewhat less than fun. 

But it’s a job that has to be done. The canons of the Episcopal Church require that each ordinand to the priesthood be certified as proficient in 6 areas: Scripture, Church History, Theology, Moral Theology, Liturgy, and the Practice of Ministry. The General Ordination Examination as it now exists was developed in the 1970’s to provide a fairer and more equitable measure of proficiency than what had previously been left up to individual dioceses and bishops. While it is a process that ordinands don’t enjoy, it’s the “least bad” system possible and we are constantly working to make it better than we inherited it. Behind the smiling photos at ordinations lies a lot of behind-the-scenes work, both by ordinands and by the church officials who shepherd them through that process. It isn’t glamorous, but we pray that the result glorifies God and makes it possible to pass the Episcopal Church on to the next generation. It’s an act of faith, and an act of stewardship.  

Our stewardship of Trinity Church works in similar ways. We all appreciate the powerful liturgy and music we experience every Sunday, especially the gifts that Meg, Joseph, and our choirs bring. We love our historic building that is meticulously maintained by Enrique, Roberto, the Buildings and Grounds Committee, and a cast of what seems like hundreds of contractors. Our staff is second to none: hard-working and a cohesive team that works for the good of Trinity Church and for the glory of God. Supporting the mission of Trinity Church by filling out a pledge card and writing a check (or setting up direct withdrawals) may not seem quite as exciting. But God is up to such exciting things at Trinity Church that it’s an honor for me to support it with my own pledge. I pray that we, too, can pass the parish on to the next generation even stronger than it is now. What a joy it is to participate in that work of stewarding what we have been given. 

Yours in Christ,

Kara

Help, Thanks, Wow

The well-known Christian author and speaker Anne Lamott often says that three simple words lie at the heart of the life of prayer: Help, Thanks, and Wow. This has been the case throughout Christian history, even though we might use different terms to talk about the ways we pray. There is a particular pattern of prayer that seems almost to transcend time. In its most basic shape, it has three simple, but essential parts: supplication (help), thanksgiving (thanks), and doxology or praise (wow).

 When we pray, our first instinct is usually to ask God for something. But on what possible basis might we dare to approach God in prayer? Because God is the Creator and we are creatures, what emboldens us to ask something of God? The answer is simple, and we can see it in the pattern of the Daily Office: we ask for God's help in prayer. We ask for God to draw near to us, so that we can be drawn nearer to God. "Lord, open our lips," we pray each morning in the Daily Office, asking God to make possible the prayers to follow. 

But our supplication - our prayers for ourselves and for others - are intertwined with our prayers of gratitude. We dare to approach God in supplication because we also recognize God's faithfulness to us. And so, we render our “humble thanks for all of God’s goodness and loving-kindness, to us and to all that God has made.” (BCP, 101) Thanksgiving and supplication go together. 

But we don’t stop there. Supplication and thanksgiving also draws us towards doxology, or praise. When we pray, we don’t seek guarantees so much as ask that God’s will be done. We place before God the hopes and needs of our hearts and minds, knowing that all we are or hope to be will be caught up in God’s desire for us. As we offer our supplications and then let go of them, allowing them to take their place in the larger story of God’s goodness and loving-kindness towards us, it leads us to praise. It is as if we have prayed and now say to God, “come what may we praise you, we bless you, and we give thanks to you, Lord our God.”

As you pray this month, both in church and in your own private devotions, I hope you will pay attention to this rhythm of prayer, all of which draws us into closer communion with the God who calls us to be his holy people. 

Yours in Christ,

Kara 

On Friendship Human And Divine

“Friendship is genuine only when you bind fast together people who cleave to you through the charity poured abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who is given to us.” - St. Augustine, Confessions, Book V

This has been a difficult week for me. We are approaching the first anniversary of our beloved Sonia Waters’ death. Then, my dear friend Fr. Everett Lees of the Diocese of Oklahoma died, only a couple of weeks after being diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. Everett leaves behind his wife Kristin and three young children, and I ask your prayers for them all. He was a loving husband and father, but I knew him as the kind of friend who helps everyone around him be a better Christian. It was true for his parishioners at Christ Church Tulsa, it was true in the Diocese of Oklahoma, and it was true in the Episcopal Church where he was a tireless advocate for evangelism. Christ Church has been one of the fastest-growing congregations in the Episcopal Church, in no small part because of Everett’s relentless focus on what Good News it is to be made a new creation in Christ. 

St. Augustine tells us that true friendship is found not when we love our friends for worldly reasons, to gain some kind of advantage or favor. Friendship, by which he means Christian friendship, is a model of the friendship between humans and God. We love our friends because we love God in them, and because we love each other towards God. Sonia and Everett were both the kind of priests, and the kind of friends, who loved people towards God - who drew out the best in everyone around them. 

This isn’t a grace that comes only to members of the clergy - far from it! I suspect that each one of us can name people in our lives who have loved us towards God. But it can take intentional action as well as prayer on our part to be that kind of friend to others. I hope that in the year ahead, Trinity Church will grow not only numerically (which, praise God, it is!), but in the kind of friendship that helps us grow in holiness, and in the love of God. It may not be the only way we can experience the truth of the Gospel, but it is one way. As Stanley Hauerwas writes,

“I do not think that questions concerning the truth of Christian convictions can be isolated from what is necessary to sustain friendships that are truthful. I am not suggesting that Christians can be friends only with other Christians. Some of my most cherished friends are with non-Christians. Rather I am suggesting that if what it means to be a Christian is compelling and true, then such truthfulness will be manifest and tested through friendship.”

Your friend in Christ,

Kara

P.S. This interview with Fr. Everett on what makes a good church is outstanding and I commend it to you:

https://bencrosby.substack.com/p/church-growth-discipleship-and-the.

Saying Yes to God

This week, the church calendar invites us to focus on Mary, the mother of our Lord. On Thursday, we observed the feast of Saint Mary with a wonderful Eucharist in the chancel. Forty-three (!) people came out to hear the story of Mary’s “yes” to God, to sing, and to pray. But on Wednesday, our focus was drawn to Mary as well. That’s because on August 14 each year, the Episcopal Church commemorates Jonathan Myrick Daniels, a young seminarian who became a martyr during the civil rights movement in Alabama. 

You can read more of his story here, and I hope you do. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jonathan_Daniels) He was valedictorian of his class at Virginia Military Institute, and after some struggles with his faith and sense of vocation, he began attending what was then called Episcopal Theological School in Cambridge, Massachusetts. During an Evensong service in Boston, he clearly heard God’s call to an active role in the civil rights movement. He writes, 

"My soul doth magnify the Lord, and my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour." I had come to Evening Prayer as usual that evening, and as usual I was singing the Magnificat with the special love and reverence I have always felt for Mary's glad song. "He hath showed strength with his arm." As the lovely hymn of the God-bearer continued, I found myself peculiarly alert, suddenly straining toward the decisive, luminous, Spirit-filled "moment" that would, in retrospect, remind me of others--particularly one at Easter three years ago. Then it came. "He hath put down the mighty from their seat, and hath exalted the humble and meek. He hath filled the hungry with good things." I knew then that I must go to Selma. The Virgin's song was to grow more and more dear in the weeks ahead.

Jonathan Daniels traveled to Selma to help register voters and stayed for a semester. He was shot on August 20, 1965, at Varner’s Cash Store in Hayneville, AL, while protecting an African-American teenager named Ruby Sales.  His murderer, Tom Coleman, was acquitted by an all-white jury. 

The lives of the saints, including martyrs like Jonathan Daniels, are stunning portraits of what a “yes” to God looks like. My friend Rob MacSwain OGS of Sewanee argues that the lives of the saints are a kind of proof of God’s existence, because these are the kind of lives that would not make sense otherwise. And Mary’s “yes” to God stands as the paramount example of saintly life. Without Mary’s “yes,” the incarnation of God in Jesus Christ and the salvation of the world would have been impossible. (Whether or not God had a backup candidate in mind is an interesting question best left to speculative theologians!) Her response to God is also a pattern for the Christian life. Former Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams writes, 

Only three human individuals are mentioned in the Nicene Creed, Jesus, Mary, and Pontius Pilate: Jesus; the one who says yes to him; and the one who says no to him. You could say that those three names map out the territory in which we all live. Through our lives, we swing towards one pole or the other, towards a deeper yes, or towards a deeper no. In the middle of it all stands the one who makes sense of it all, the one into whose life we must all try to grow, who can work with our yes, and can even overcome our no.

I pray that as the summer draws to a close, you will find new ways to say yes to God, as God’s invitation to us comes new every morning. 

Yours in Christ,

Kara

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