That We All May Be One

Today, we begin the 2008 Week of Prayer for Christian Unity. Observed each year from the Confession of St. Peter (January 18) through the Conversion of St. Paul (January 25) the Week of Prayer celebrates its centennial this year. In 1908 the Franciscan Friars and Sisters of the Atonement held the first “Church Unity Octave” and have prayed “without ceasing” for Christian unity ever since!

Today, Christians around the world celebrate this week with the encouragement of the World Council of Churches’ Faith and Order Commission and the Vatican’s Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity. Why the Week of PRAYER (rather than, say, the week of “dialogue” or “documents”)? Because, in the words of Cardinal Walter Kasper:

“Ecumenical work is a spiritual task and can be nothing other than participation in the High Priestly Prayer of Jesus. This means prayer, especially common ecumenical prayer, for the unity of Christians. Prayer will always gather people, in the same way as Mary and the apostles gathered, to pray for the coming of the Spirit which will unite the peoples in one language, and to pray for a renewed Pentecost (Acts 1:13f)” [from “That They All Be One: The Call to Unity Today”]  

“…the people who sat in darkness have seen a great light, and for those who sat in the region of death light has dawned.” (Matthew 4:16) Yesterday, we concluded our celebration of the Christmas season with the Feast of the Epiphany.  Actually, Matthew is the only Gospel writer who tells the story of the Magi, making their long journey, following the light of a star, to find the new-born king.

The Archbishop of Canterbury has gotten himself into a bit of trouble recently by using the word ‘legend’ to refer to this story! (Although I think he was actually referring to the non-biblical details – such as the number of wise men, their ethnic origins, and the precise details of their visit).

We celebrate the feast 12 days after that of the birth of Christ to underscore the fact that the Bible does not say that they arrived on the night of his birth, but some time later. Even the text says, “On entering the house, they saw the child with Mary his mother, and they knelt down and paid him homage.” (Matthew 2:11) House, not stable. Perhaps they finally caught up with the Holy Family when they had returned to Nazareth before the flight to Egypt. Who knows?

The point of the story is clear and today’s Gospel text proclaims it: “…the people who sat in darkness have seen a great light, and for those who sat in the region of death light has dawned.” Gentiles, represented by these Persian astrologers, seekers after truth in a very different context than the Jewish people, found that light and that truth in One who was born to be king – but a very different kind of king than those known to Gentiles or Jews!

Today, one day after the Feast of Epiphany, the Roman Catholic Church celebrates the Baptism of Christ and, of course, we will observe that festival next Sunday. And there is a real continuity with Epiphany.  Jesus was apparently made known to shepherds and wise men and a number of others from his earliest days. But the beginning, the “epiphany” of his public ministry was his baptism.

At the Jordan River, he was anointed by the Spirit of God. And there he heard a voice from heaven saying, “This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.” (Matthew 3:17). Immediately after that he was led by that same Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted and only after surviving that ordeal did he begin to preach, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.” (Matthew 4:17)

I was writing about all this on this web log last week when a priest from Sweden named Anna wrote to ask if we believed that these events were only significant in Jesus’ life and ministry or if they were a “frame of reference for each and every person baptized in the Church today.” I said I thought they were both – but she makes an extremely important point.

When you and I were baptized, we too were given the gift of God’s Holy Spirit. We pray very specifically for that in the baptismal liturgy and Jesus says that God would never deny the Holy Spirit to those who ask! In our baptism, God says to us also that we are  “Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.” We too will face temptation, if not immediately after our baptisms as Jesus did, surely in the days and years that follow.

And we too are sent into the world to preach repentance precisely because the reign of God has come near in the Christ event.

That which has happened to Christ must also happen to us. To those who are baptized in his Name.

“…the people who sat in darkness have seen a great light.” That is the message of Epiphany.  But it will only come true if we, like our Lord, live into the implications of our baptismal covenant and hold high in our lives the Light of his Coming.       

As we move through the Twelve Days of Christmas, it’s interesting to see that we are still running across the great figure of John the Baptist. The season of Advent makes much of John and the two middle Sundays are largely devoted to his role as the one who ‘prepares the way for the Lord.’

Now, as we work our way through the first chapter of the 4^th Gospel – in fact, right after the elegant “Johannine Prologue” about the Word of God becoming flesh – here is John the Baptizer again! “The next day he saw Jesus coming toward him and declared, “Here is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.” (John 1:29)

And, once again, John shows his humility in the presence of the Nazarene, “This is he of whom I said, ‘after me comes a man who ranks ahead of me because he was before me.’” Well, Jesus’ reputation certainly did not precede John’s own so it’s clear that this text means more than it first seems. How could Jesus have “come before” his elder cousin?

The language John uses for Jesus gives us the clue. “The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world”…the one who would be “revealed to Israel”…the Spirit descending and remaining upon him…and, finally, “I myself have seen and have testified that this is the Son of God.”

Clearly, in this text, John is identifying Jesus with the Anointed One, the Christ, the long-awaited Messiah. The phrase “Lamb of God” is reflective of Isaiah’s language about the Suffering Servant being like “a lamb led to the slaughter and like a sheep before its shearers is silent” (Isaiah 53:7)

The language about God’s Spirit descending and remaining on Jesus is reminiscent of all the “anointed ones,” all the kings of Israel and especially the great King David, whose literal and figurative successor the Messiah was expected to be.

 And, of course, long before the title “Son of God” took on the qualities of Incarnation and divinity and the Second Person of the Trinity, it simply was one more way for the people of Israel to describe their Messiah and King. (Later, in this same chapter Nathaniel says to Jesus, “Rabbi, you are the Son of God. You are the king of Israel!” John 1:49)

Faithful, prophetic, humble John. He prepared the way for Jesus, he baptized Jesus and, in a sense, “introduced him” to the world. He worked alongside Jesus, constantly pointing beyond himself to the One he believed to “outrank him.”

Finally, John was martyred by King Herod not only because of his own prophetic ministry, but because – no doubt – of his association with the One whose Kingship was never really intended to rival Herod’s, but which certainly called all the empires of this world into question, and continues to do so today!

As we move toward our conclusion of the celebration of this Messiah’s birth and launch once more into a new year, we could do worse than listen again to John the Baptist as he says, “Behold the Lamb of God; behold Him who takes away the sins of the world!”     

While it is no secret that I support the full inclusion of faithful gay and lesbian Christians in the life of the Church, let there be no mistake about the costly nature of such decisions in the life of The Episcopal Church and beyond.

I write this post from Cairo, Egypt where I am attending the annual meeting of the Inter Anglican Standing Commission on Ecumenical and Interfaith Relations. This is a body which reports to the Anglican Consultative Council and monitors the activity and progress of the various Provinces of the Anglican Communion in matters ecumenical.

Since our General Convention decisions of 2003, these have been difficult meetings for The Episcopal Church’s representatives as well as our colleagues from the Anglican Church in Canada. Despite warm personal relations with our Church of England, Asian, African, South and West Indian colleagues, we are roundly criticised as Episcopalians for putting major stumbling blocks in the way of Anglican ecumenical relations.

Often cited are the writings of Bishop Spong, the confirmation of the Bishop of New Hamshire by General Convention 2003, and some bishops’ permission for the blessing of same sex unions in their dioceses despite the lack of an official liturgical rite in our church for such an event.

We were received by Pope Shenouda of the Coptic Orthodox Church here in Egypt one morning and subjected to nearly an hour of lecturing by His Holiness on the sins of the Anglican Communion and especially The Episcopal Church. This venerable monk and leader of his ancient church noted all the concerns I have mentioned above. He has actually read at least one of Bishop Spong’s books. And, is not impressed!

It would, of course, have been possible to take exception to much of Pope Shenouda’s hermeneutics, but “state occasions” like this are hardly the place for that. Particularly in a country where Christians are in the huge minority and undergo scrutiny and often severe criticism from their Muslim neighbors. We heard him out, acknowledged the difficulties we face, and asked for his prayers.

What would have been possible, however, had not the official dialogue with the Oriental Orthodox Churches been suspended over our actions, would have been to engage these issues together in a serious dialogue where our perspectives could be given a fair hearing rather than caricatured by the press or by voices from within our own church who wish the world to think that we are teaching some kind of “new faith.”

This is why I believe the Lambeth Conference must happen. No matter who is, or is not, invited and who chooses to come or not to come. Those of us who will be there must sit together, face to face, in the context of prayer, and both share and listen to one another deeply.

Only in this way can the wounds in our particular expression of the Body of Christ begin to be healed and a contribution perhaps made, by Anglicans, for healing the very Body of Christ of which we are a part.         

My wife and I love Advent above all the seasons of the  Church year. There is something about the chill in the air, the smell of greenery in the church, the great Advent hymns and lessons, and of course the approaching Christmas celebration which makes it all  so rich. Those  lessons from Scripture are filled with dire warnings, but also with hope.

Traditional interpretations of those passages would say that they are either literal or symbolic descriptions of “the end times” and warn us to “clean up our act” before impending judgment. Other scholars (even conservative ones like N.T. Wright) would hold that the prophets (and even Jesus) were warning of very real cataclysms which were about to occur — in Jesus’ case the likely destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans — if his people did not change their violent ways and follow him  toward a different kind of Kingdom.
Either way, it is clear that God cares about how individuals and nations conduct their affairs, that the future is even now rushing in upon our present, and that our actions have consequences — eternal ones. So, let us use this season of Advent, not only to prepare for the Christmas celebration, but to examine our lives and the life of our nation, in the light of this great Collect for Advent 1:

“Almighty God, give us grace to cast away the works of darkness, and put on the armor of light, now in the time of this mortal life in which your Son Jesus Christ came to visit us in great humility; that in the last day, when he shall come again in his glorious majesty to judge both the living and the dead, we may rise to the life immortal; through him who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, now and for ever.” Amen.