EcoPreacher Cohort

 During the last year I have been engaging in a monthly educational webinar with other pastors called the EcoPreacher Cohort. Through a variety of presenters, reflection, reading assignments, and small group discussions, we have explored how to integrate our concern for the environment with long-standing Christian theological beliefs, liturgical practices, and decisions that affect church life more generally. Before her life took a vastly different turn, Jennifer McCullough was in the cohort also, offering me a great local sounding board after our monthly webinars. It has been a very worthwhile commitment and next month will mark the end of the yearlong Cohort. 

 

The EcoPreacher Cohort is produced by a cooperation between The BTS Center and Creation Justice Ministries (CJM). The BTS Center was formerly a seminary, Bangor Theological Seminary, affiliated with the United Church of Christ, which closed in 2013. While it does not award degrees, the BTS Center provides ongoing Christian education and spiritual formation, like the webinar I took. Creation Justice Ministries was formerly the National Council of Churches Eco-Justice Program, and continues to work across many Christian denominations for racial, economic, and environmental justice. Together, the BTS Center and CJM have provided a marvelous reflective and educational opportunity for me to think and feel more deeply what it means to live responsibly on and in harmony with the earth, within a tradition that begins with a creation story that calls each part of creation “good.” 

 

“Thinking more deeply” about things is what I’m comfortable with, even though education is largely a process of challenging former certainties in order to live into new awareness. “Feeling more deeply” is not as easy for me, but when it comes to the environment is it absolutely essential. It has been widely recognized that “climate anxiety” can be a debilitating condition that people suffer when they look honestly at climate change, rising sea levels, losses of species and habitats, air quality, overstuffed landfills, toxic wastes, and so forth. For millennia, people imagined that the earth was simply capable of absorbing our habits and that there was always somewhere “out there” where we could store our leftovers. To some extent, “climate anxiety” is a step forward from “climate apathy,” which continues that presumption, as well as “climate arrogance,” which assumes that human ingenuity will solve the problem before it becomes too acute. The fragility of the eco-system on which we depend for living, as well as the awareness that other life forms are suffering because human ingenuity is typically anthropocentric, are behind much of our “climate anxiety.” At least “climate anxiety” acknowledges the problems we face and the severity of them.  

 

For the Christian believer, it matters how we encounter “climate anxiety” with, among other things, our doctrine of hope. For that reason, I want to share an opportunity with you that The BTS Center is co-creating. It is called Lament with Earth, five hour-long seasonal events beginning in November and ending in June 2024, each of which is on a Wednesday from 4:30-5:30pm. Drawing on the tradition of lament, these events will enable participants to name the loss and pain of environmental destruction honestly, within a context of hope. These events are hosted by The BTS Center as well as the creative and justice-building music group, The Many. You can find more information by visiting here. 

 

In peace, 

Mark of St. Mark

The Inadequacy of Words

Throughout this week, I have really felt the poverty, inadequacy, and potential emptiness of words. This is coming from someone who "proclaims the Word" for a living! I am sure that each of us have cherished or perhaps begrudgingly accepted silence as we have had occasion to sit with someone who is grieving. The events in Israel and Palestine have been one of those occasions where some of us are required to say something, yet anything we say leaves so much more unsaid. 

-       The PCUSA office of the stated clerk issued one statement - as they are expected to do - and almost immediately it evoked outrage from those who felt that it needed to be more full-throated. Still, it was an attempt to speak truthfully. 

-       Churches for Middle East Peace issued a statement, which some of my friends found too slanted in one direction. Still, it was an attempt to speak truthfully.

-       Presbyterian Peace Fellowship has issued a statement, which I would reckon would receive the same critiques. Still, it was an attempt to speak truthfully.

-       President Biden and others have issued statements, carefully crafted to appease as well as to express. Still, they are attempts to speak truthfully.

As one insightful writer said last weekend, finding a way to address an incident as well as its context is always hard. When there are atrocities involved – and the attacks and hostage-taking by Hamas are atrocious – it becomes pretty near impossible. 

 

One attempt to address the fullness of the context in Palestine and Israel, as well as the depth of horror of the moment, was a Facebook post by Ori Hanan Weisberg, which SueJeanne Koh and Susan Thornton (among others) shared on their page. It is long and it is pointed and nobody can come out of it feeling easy about their involvement in the Middle East. Even so, it could have been twice as long and still would not have addressed all the human nonsense and evil that has contributed to the horrors of this week. Words simply cannot get it done sometimes. 

 

So, for those of you who struggle to offer your condolences, to say your piece, to offer your perspective, to speak truth to power, to proclaim the Word, or even to voice your prayers - it's not you, it's life and death, which is often unspeakable. May you experience a still small voice that lets you know that it's okay if your words seem inadequate to the moment. 

 

I think the most profound text of scripture might be Revelation 8:1, "When the Lamb opened the seventh seal, there was silence in heaven for about half an hour." The next reference to sound comes when prayers are offered mixed with the smoke of the incense. Perhaps that is the best we can do. 

 

Mark of St. Mark

Isaiah 5:1-7 and Matthew 21:33-46 interwoven reading

Friends, 

The following is an attempt to weave the Song of the Vineyard from Isaiah with the Parable of the Vineyard from Matthew. See if it is helpful to read them side-by-side. I think the first influenced the second, but in any act of imitation/repetition/echoing a text, there is always new content that can bring out the best of both texts. 

 1. Let me sing for my beloved my love-song concerning his vineyard:

1. “Listen to another parable.

2. My beloved had a vineyard on a very fertile hill. He dug it and cleared it of stones, and planted it with choice vines; he built a watchtower in the midst of it, and hewed out a wine vat in it;
2. There was a landowner who planted a vineyard, put a fence around it, dug a wine press in it, and built a watchtower.

 

3. he expected it to yield grapes, but it yielded wild grapes. 

3. Then he leased it to tenants and went to another country. When the harvest time had come, he sent his slaves to the tenants to collect his produce.  But the tenants seized his slaves and beat one, killed another, and stoned another. Again he sent other slaves, more than the first; and they treated them in the same way. Finally he sent his son to them, saying, ‘They will respect my son.’ But when the tenants saw the son, they said to themselves, ‘This is the heir; come, let us kill him and get his inheritance.” So they seized him, threw him out of the vineyard, and killed him. 

 

4. And now, inhabitants of Jerusalem and people of Judah, judge between me and my vineyard. What more was there to do for my vineyard that I have not done in it?
When I expected it to yield grapes, why did it yield wild grapes? 

4. Now when the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those tenants?”

 

5. And now I will tell you what I will do to my vineyard. I will remove its hedge, and it shall be devoured; I will break down its wall, and it shall be trampled down. I will make it a waste; it shall not be pruned or hoed, and it shall be overgrown with briers and thorns; I will also command the clouds that they rain no rain upon it. 

5. They said to him, “He will put those wretches to a miserable death, and lease the vineyard to other tenants who will give him the produce at the harvest time.” Jesus said to them, “Have you never read in the scriptures: ‘The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone; this was the Lord’s doing, and it is amazing in our eyes’? Therefore I tell you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people that produces the fruits of the kingdom.

 

6. This ends the reading. 

6. Thanks be to God. 

Climate Change and All the Things

There have been many reports lately about Climate Change in local, regional, national, and worldwide news. Some reports have been passing references, where an unusual weather event is attributed to climate change. Some reports have been in reference to agricultural practices, with aquifers drying up or different groups contending over water rights. Some reports are focused on animal life, with different species disappearing or migrating to new places due to heat or melting ice. And some reports are about businesses, such as major insurance carriers moving away from insuring homes in areas endangered by wildfires or flooding. Referring to climate change as a reality with real, every day consequences is a relatively new phenomenon in some circles. By and large most sources of information are no longer speaking of climate change as a “theory” or a fringe idea, but simply as a reality, even if the precise relationship between human activity and climate activity continues to be understood differently. 

 

Years ago, I used to listen to a show on Iowa Public Radio with a bright radio host in conversation with a Political Science professor from one of the state universities. It was informative, but the show had one habit that bothered me to no end. They would offer, as a prize for whoever answered the week’s trivia question, a copy of The Worldwatch Institute’s annual State of the World publication. That, in itself, was fine, but they would speak of the publication dismissively, as being too alarmist, too pessimistic, and unrealistic. In fact, much of the language about climate change that is now taken for granted is precisely what the Worldwatch Institute said would result if we did not lessen our dependence on fossil fuels and reduce wasteful practices. The biblical proverb is “no prophet is accepted in one’s own country,” but it is equally true that “no prophet is accepted in one’s own time.” What the Worldwatch Institute foresaw is largely what we now hear every day as news. 

 

In our moment, there are some subtle nuances that I think we ought to be aware of. For example, we should be aware of the difference between prevention and reaction. We may be past the point of preventing humanly-exacerbated climate change. John Cobb is one of the few theologians willing to raise that possibility in his book, Is It Too Late (and he wrote that book initially in 1972!) Most of us hold to hopes that we can change our behaviors enough, and perhaps develop new technologies along the way, to lessen the effects of climate change enough to pull the world back from catastrophe. However, there is a shift taking place from preventing climate change to reacting to it. The decision by corporations to quit offering new home insurance in danger zones is one such reaction, as are building codes, raising seawalls, and requiring smart planting. It takes a fairly advanced economy for a country to take such reactionary measures. Poor island nations, like the ones described in this UN report, struggle against the twin challenges of climate change and poverty. I worry that climate change will ultimately cause us to lean into competition more than cooperation, “each nation for itself” thinking. We fall into competitive thinking over cooperative thinking when we feel threatened when things like water, crops, and energy are seen chiefly as matters of security. When that happens, we can expect that competitive penchant to kick in. As we move from trying to prevent climate change to reacting to climate change, we can expect our language to change from ‘world’ to ‘nation/state/community’ and from cooperation to competition. 

 

Another nuance of climate change was highlighted in a story entitled “Chilly Times for U.S. Climate Movement?” that was originally published in “Boiling Point,” an email newsletter about climate change and the environment in California and the American West. The story pointed toward the different visions of environmental activists and clean energy businesses over some aspects of the energy policies of the Inflation Reduction Act. Traditional environmentalists wanted to focus on reducing fossil fuels entirely, while some market-friendly approaches to environmental change wanted to focus on market competition that would ultimately help green technologies and squeeze out fossil fuels. It is something of a question of trusting legislation or the market to address climate change more effectively. A similar tension lies between technologies that produce green energy at the cost of upsetting the balance of flora and fauna, and whether the point is to reduce fossil fuels or to make the earth greener in a wider sense. One large challenge facing environmentalists is whether we are anthropocentric in our approach or whether flora, fauna, even the earth itself have value beyond the degree to which they benefit humans. 

 

When the psalmists say, “The earth is the Lord’s and all that is in it,” we hear a call to be environmentally invested in some way or another. We need each other in times like this, to bring clarity, encouragement, and some sense of community in days that can be frightening and disheartening. One benefit that you and I have is our trust that God’s love endures forever, as well as our joy of having one another as companions on this journey. 

 

Mark of St. Mark 

The Purpose and Meaning of Advent Liturgy

Annually observing the waiting and anticipation of Advent prior to celebrating Christmas is the burden of doing ministry in a liturgically minded church. The big mega-church down the street doesn’t give a fig about the season of Advent, the twelve days of Christmas – eleven of which follow Christmas day – or any of those things that one is taught and perhaps even believes for oneself are important for the celebration of the incarnation. No purple for them, no hesitation and discernment over whether to sing Christmas songs or to wait, no attempt to find our place alongside of the people of ancient Israel as they live under the spell and promise of the coming one. For the church down the street, it’s all red and green, lights upon lights, jolly now, merry now, Jesus now, Christmas now, with the décor coming down by New Years Day. They don’t need the liturgical calendar because they are following the most obvious calendar of them all – the countdown to Christmas while celebrating Christmas. 

This is not going to be a whinefest or a superiority declaration that we have it right and they have it wrong. I think they do have it wrong, but not for reasons that one might expect. Liturgically-minded churches often criticize others for having no respect for church tradition. So, they violate the church calendar or ignore the liturgical seasons. But, that criticism is a bit thin, if we remember how critical the Apostle Paul was about such observances. In truth, we observe seasons, times, and years, not because they have the authority of Scripture, but because we need seasons, times, and years. Paul could have thrown away his calendar because he anticipated the Second Coming to happen immediately. For those of us who exist many generations later – because it was not as immediate as Paul thought – seasons, times, and years resonate with the rhythm of life. At best, at least from a Pauline perspective, our observance of seasons is a concession to human weakness and need, not something inherent to the Christian message itself. (As long as we’re being honest, that seems to be Paul’s perspective toward marriage also.) 

 

In other words, people of faith are free to accept or reject the liturgical calendar as a human creation, in part to meet our rhythmic needs. And that is quite liberating, even for those of us who choose to follow the liturgical calendar. It is no great expose to argue that December 25^th is based less on the actual historical birth of Jesus than on its proximity to the Winter solstice. Nor is it particularly bothersome to argue that celebrations of the Winter solstice are rooted in long pagan traditions. One can grant all that, and grant it happily, because that is simply a way of saying that ancient pagans were as rhythmically human as modern Christians. There is nothing sacred about December 25^th and it is wasted effort to argue that Jesus was born on that exact date. What is sacred is that God was in Christ, really and historically immersing Godself into our story with radical vulnerability and solidarity. And, as people who need seasons, times, and years; as people who live among the rhythmic patterns of the universe; as people who do best with times of intense remembering as well as times of rest; observing the incarnation once a year can be a way of living faithfully. But, again, one can observe the incarnation faithfully apart from the liturgical calendar itself. 

 

My argument with the mega-church down the street that hosts Christmas all December long is not that they need to follow the fullness of the liturgical calendar. It is that the gospel stories themselves – Matthew and Luke, anyway – do not simply jump into the Christmas story with the journey to Bethlehem. They begin with longing, repeatedly citing the prophets from ages past. In doing so, they remember not only the promises under which God’s people live, but also the long periods of non-fulfillment, the in-between ages, when faith is hard to maintain. Those times of waiting are not ancillary, but germane to the story of the birth. Luke describes Zechariah and Elizabeth, an aging, repeatedly disappointed couple, whose frustrations over childbearing seem metaphorically representative of the people of Israel’s frustrations over the years. “We’re doing our part. Why isn’t God doing God’s part?” Likewise, Luke shows how young Mary’s hesitation and disbelief – similar in form but different in kind from Zechariah’s hesitation and disbelief – is transformed into a powerful, defiant song of conviction, even before the child is born. Surely Luke’s comment about how Mary “treasured these things in her heart” after the birth is part of the same thread of experience with Mary’s initial question “How can these things be?” and her defiant song of hope prior to the birth. The question and the Magnificat go together, as unfulfilled anticipation and joyful celebration go together. 

 

Matthew also gives attention to the long history of anticipation, constantly citing Old Testament texts in a way that most New Testament professors would describe as “proof-texting” if he were a first-year seminarian. Those texts are important for Matthew’s story, not because they prove anything but because they situate the reader into this tradition of longing, waiting, questioning, and wondering. And silent Joseph’s dilemma, then consent and obedience throughout Matthew’s story is probably more like the average person of faith than all of the heroic canticles combined. This coming of this Messiah is a happening thing, which fulfills all the longings of the past while it breaks all of the rules of our present order. What else is there to do but to go along and wonder at it all? 

 

Simply put, the Christmas story has a backstory. Without that backstory, it is just an ahistorical myth of God bursting into human life in a weirdly sentimental way. With the backstory, it is the God who – to many folks along the way – shows up quite a bit later than anticipated. With the backstory, the decree that went out from Caesar Augustus is more than just a contextual nuisance that moves the story from wherever to Bethlehem. It is part of the history of imperial aggression to which the people of Israel were subject while striving to believe in the promises. With the backstory, Zechariah’s expression of disbelief is in tension with the larger ongoing act of faith that kept priests like him lighting the candles in the first place. How many wicks must have been burnt in hopes that God would finally redeem God’s people from their captivity! The backstory gives those who “greet the new morn” the salience of having kept watch through the many and long darks nights.  

 

And that is why Advent is important. It is not because the church calendar is sacred, old and wise though it may be. It is not because we Protestants have suffered from liturgy envy and now fully embrace all things Latinate. It is not because we liturgical folk are addicted to suffering so we make sure that Advent is to Christmas what Lent is to Easter. It is because the story of Christmas has context, a backstory of longing, anticipating, being frustrated, and struggling to hold onto a shred of faith. To hear the second chapter of Luke well, one must read the first chapter of Luke and get with the flow. Or, to put it another way, to celebrate the red and green of the season, one must hold the purple for a while. The crèche must have an empty manger for a while. The songs must be anticipatory rather than declaratory for a while. That is how the story is given, so that is how it should be read, told, and lived. Even if the speakers in the malls are singing “Joy to the World” the day after Thanksgiving. 

On Preaching, pt.2

 Last week I said that I think the purpose of preaching is more about being than doing, more about identity than activity, more about “Who we are” than “What do we do now?” I think that’s an important distinction and I want to explain it. I also think it’s a fine distinction, because ‘doing’ and ‘being’ are so closely intertwined at every step. I need to repeat from last week that I’m not advocating quietism, a kind of ‘do nothing’ or ‘it doesn’t matter’ attitude. Part of who we’re called to be are those who do justice, practice compassion, visit the sick, pray for one another, and so forth. Sometimes our ‘doing’ shapes our ‘being,’ and our practices form our identity. It seems to me, however, that when doing flows from being, when identity leads to action, we are on better footing as children of God and disciples of Christ. Otherwise, I think we end up trying to earn our way into God’s favor by proving our worth, which leads to all manner of frustrations and problems. 

 

Let me illustrate with this: I have a friend from the past who recently started posting very strong messages on Facebook, like “What will it take for us to refuse to take it anymore?” and “When they come after our children, that’s when we act!” One might think she’s a mother of a trans child in Florida and think, “You go, sistah!” But she’s not. Her cisgender straight kids are grown. Nobody’s coming after them. Her posts indicate that she’s believes that if her public library has a story about a kid with two moms then it’s out to indoctrinate all the children of the world to be queer. So, she’s resisting it and waging holy war in Christian language. To be fair, I have another friend who takes the same tactics – sometimes almost word for word – to declare his determination to defend his gay son, so this is not something that is only found on one side or the other of our political spectrum.

 

I’ve never been sure how best to respond to holy warriors, especially those whom I have known and loved for many years. My first inclination – not a good one, I don’t think – is to joust word for word, perhaps even with snarky responses, which is the kind of damaging communication that gives social media a bad name. A better response, I think, would be to hug her/him/them and assure them that they are loved by God beyond their wildest imagination. And that this same God loves their children with that same kind of unimaginable love. And that nothing they say, do, or leave unsaid or undone will erase that love. They are beloved children of God, regardless of how they do or do not engage in this cultural conflict. 

 

I know, I know, we might be thinking, “Aw, that’s sweet. Why don’t you just sing Kum by yah” and see if the world sprouts flowers?” But let’s give it a second. What if my friend were convinced that she’s accepted and loved as she is – along with her cisgender straight kids, and the trans kid in Florida, and the kid with two moms, and the two moms and the gay kid whose dad wants to take her on? And what if she were convinced that she is loved because that’s simply how God is with us? What if she doesn’t have to prove her commitment by becoming God’s warrior, but gets to live her life and behold other people’s lives with the assurance that when we say “God is love,” we are also saying, “We are loved” and we are saying “They are loved”?  In some ways, this is the issue behind the old Reformation argument that we are “saved by grace through faith” rather than by “works righteousness.” Sure, we are called to “do” things. But we are called to “do” by the God who always already loves us for no good reason at all. And if that’s who God is, then God loves even those with whom we differ strongly with that same kind of inexplicable love. Our identity is important because it is grounded in who God is. We are loved because God is love.  

 

I suppose I’m going on and on about this because I cannot help but believe that a proper sense of who we are, grounded in a proper sense of who God is, changes everything. Our opposition does not have to be scorched earth, holy war on those who differ from us. And I’m trying to learn this lesson as much as anyone, believe me. The powerful part of leaning into our identity as beloved children of God is that it is animated by the hope that good overcomes evil and love overcomes hate. 

 

Mark of St. Mark

On Preaching

 For this week and next, I want to reflect a bit on the purpose and intent of preaching. I realize this is not something normal people think about often. Preaching is more or less part of what we have grown accustomed to expecting when we participate in worship. Even us preachers don’t give the purpose and intent of preaching that much thought, because we’re typically focused on weekly productivity. That said, here are some of my thoughts on it and I hope they make some sense. My thoughts are not terribly systematic, because I, too, spend less time engaging in homiletical naval-gazing and more time preparing for preaching most weeks. 

 

First, preaching is not a matter of going on and on about pet peeves. The process of preaching is a disciplined one, trying to hear the Word of the Lord as it is presented in the ancient Scriptures in order to proclaim the Word of the Lord in our present world. 

 

Second, the key connection between the ancient Scriptures and the current world is not the preacher’s cleverness or great books, but the salvific presence of God that permeates all time. What God was doing to conquer sin and save human life back then is important because God is present in our own world of sin, injustice, hatred. It’s the saving God that we’re endeavoring to hear in the ancient texts, because it’s the saving God we’re endeavoring to serve today. 

 

At the same time, we all have pet peeves. We all have deep convictions. Both the peeves and convictions come into play in how we hear the text, how we see them applying to the world, and how we feel called to proclaim them today. Most of the tools of discipline that preachers follow – translation, interpretation, commentaries, and like – are intended to help us distinguish between the peeves that come and go and those convictions that sustain us as God’s people. 

 

One place where I often differ with my preaching colleagues is in the relationship between the preacher and the congregation. Simply put, I always contend that we’re on the same team. Sometimes when preachers gather, we get our one and only chance to name some of the frustrations that come with preaching out loud. Often it comes out as “us against them” where the preacher is the one who is not mired in the past or hostile to the sharp edges of the gospel, trying valiantly to drag along the recalcitrant congregation. That’s especially how preaching is described when someone uses the adjective prophetic preaching. I heard someone say recently, “If they ain’t mad, you ain’t preaching.” That’s where I step off. 

 

The frustration of preaching is real, but it’s not the frustration of the preacher being ‘all in’ while the congregation is dragging its feet. None of us lives into the sharper edges of justice, compassion, loving enemies, giving away our possessions, befriending the prisoner, or proclaiming jubilee as we ought. Preacher, listener, faithful, unfaithful – it doesn’t matter, the call of the gospel is a call to take up our cross and none of us finds that degree of self-denying commitment to be easy. In fact, I know that every week I face people who are more ‘all in’ than I am, people who have climbed mountains I can only imagine, people whose act of getting out of bed in the morning takes more courage than I have ever had to exercise. The gospel is easy for none of us, but embraces all of us. That’s the frustration and joy of it. But it’s always “us.” 

 

Finally, let me say something, about which I may completely wrong. I don’t think the primary purpose of preaching is to fire up people to go out and do something. I think proclaiming the gospel is more about being than doing, identity than activity. I think the question is less, “What do we do now?” than “Who are we?” I’m not saying I believe we do nothing. Part, but only part,  of the answer to the question “Who are we?” is that we are those who are called to do justice. Doing is a responsive act, an ‘in the moment’ act, the specifics of which change over time and context. Identity, however, is something that stays with us, even as the context around us changes. That’s what I want to reflect on with you next week. 

 

In the meantime, I am honored to be,

Mark of St. Mark