Tolerance is not my word

The past two weeks during our Education for Ministry (EFM) class, our lessons for the week and occurrences in the church and our community led us into a discussion of bigotry, its causes and roots. As we talked about such feelings and the problems in the Communion, I looked down at a trivet on our conference table and saw this: "Episcopalians embrace love, inclusion, tolerance and respect for everyone."

Do we? This word, tolerance, has been a thorn in my side. When I read this to the class and stated my dislike of the word tolerance, the reactions from my classmates were almost unilaterally negative. No one had a good feeling about the word.

I had the blessing to come into the church at All Saints, Indianapolis, a parish that is very open and affirming, where gay and straight could just as easily describe the weather or the way a road runs as a person's orientation; a parish where black and white more often describes the victory flag for the "500." I was fortunate to have a community teach me compassion and understanding for everyone.

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The Season of the Spirit

With the coming of Pentecost, the remembrance of our Lord's crucifixion, death, and resurrection become a part of the fabric of our humanity, for we have been invited into a reality that will transform our lives, the letting go of the old self and the embracing of a new self; the putting behind us those things that prevent us from living fully and embracing the abundance that comes only from God.

The Season after Pentecost is the longest season of the Christian Year, from Trinity Sunday until the Feast of Christ the King. This season carries us through the heat of summer into late fall, and in the midst of this ordinary time we celebrate major feasts that continue to recall us to the new milieu of our existence: The Transfiguration (August), The Veneration of Holy Cross (September), and All Saints Day (November). At the heart of our faith is the continual conversion of life that is asked of us as a baptized people, letting go more and more of the old and embracing the new. In the incarnation, God has brought humanity into God through Jesus Christ, and as a result of this mystery we are invited to live more deeply and truly into this reality of Divine Love.

You Will Be Missed!

I am troubled by the news today that Cindy Sheehan, the outspoken critic of the Iraq War, is withdrawing and returning to her native California after standing in the brink to hold before the American people an unpopular view. What is amazing to me is that she has been criticized and denounced by both Republicans and Democrats, from the right and from the left for her position on the war.

It is troubling that we, who hold a different view point, are deaf to those views that we wish to deny and go away. Why can't we listen and learn from one another? Do we really think that someone, or some group, holds all the answers to all the questions regarding the morality of war? Why can't we be open to opposing points of view and allow ourselves to be challenged by the diversity of opinions?

I am sorry that she is returning to "normal" life and departing the market place of ideas. She has contributed well to the ongoing debate, and I am grateful for her presence among us. She has been strong against those things she believes are wrong. Perhaps, as she departs, we may begin to raise our voices against the evils of our day.

The Rule of Saint Benedict

On Humility

As for self-will,
we are forbidden to do our own will
by the Scripture, which says to us,
"Turn away from your own will" (Eccles. 18:30),
and likewise by the prayer in which we ask God
that His will be done in us.
And rightly are we taught not to do our own will
when we take heed to the warning of Scripture:
"There are ways which seem right,
but the ends of them plunge into the depths of hell" (Prov. 16:25);
and also when we tremble at what is said of the careless:
"They are corrupt and have become abominable in their will."

And as for the desires of the flesh,
let us believe with the Prophet that God is ever present to us,
when he says to the Lord,
"Every desire of mine is before You" (Ps. 37:10).

REMEMBER ME

Of The Holy Spirit

Almighty and most merciful God, grant that by the indwelling of your Holy Spirit we may be enlightened and strengthened for your service; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one god, now and for ever. Amen.

The Rule of Saint Benedict

On Humility

Let a man consider
that God is always looking at him from heaven,
that his actions are everywhere visible to the divine eyes
and are constantly being reported to God by the Angels.
This is what the Prophet shows us
when he represents God as ever present within our thoughts,
in the words "Searcher of minds and hearts is God" (Ps. 7:10)
and again in the words "The Lord knows the thoughts of men" (Ps. 93:11).
Again he says,
"You have read my thoughts from afar" (Ps. 138:3)
and "The thoughts of people will confess to You" (Ps. 75:11).

In order that he may be careful
about his wrongful thoughts, therefore,
let the faithful brother say constantly in his heart,
"Then shall I be spotless before Him,
if I have kept myself from my iniquity" (Ps. 17:24).

The Feast of Pentecost

Almighty God, on this day you opened the way of eternal life to every race and nation by the promised gift of your Holy Spirit: Shed abroad this gift throughout the world by the preaching of the Gospel, that it may reach to the ends of the earth; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

O God, who on this day taught the hearts of your faithful people by sending to them the light of your Holy Spirit: Grant us by the same Spirit to have a right judgment in all things, and evermore to rejoice in his holy comfort; through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord, who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

Today, you are sealed by the Holy Spirit and marked as

Christ's own for ever. Amen.

Commentary:

The Spirit, however, does not accomplish His work in us if we remain completely passive and inert. If we are to enter fully into the mystery of his supernatural union in Christ, we must respond to God's gift of grace and consent to live as a child of God. Such consent must be elicited by our own free will ..... If we would live like sons of God, we must reproduce in our own lives the life and charity of His only begotten Son (Thomas Merton). It is the exercise of this new freedom as children of God that makes us capable of achieving our true likeness to God. And what is required of us to exercise this freedom in our life is an openness to the Spirit in faith and in love.

John J. Higgins SJ, Merton's Theology of Prayer
* italics, mine

The Rule of Saint Benedict

On Humility

The first degree of humility, then,
is that a person keep the fear of God before his eyes
and beware of ever forgetting it.
Let him be ever mindful of all that God has commanded;
let his thoughts constantly recur
to the hell-fire which will burn for their sins
those who despise God,
and to the life everlasting which is prepared
for those who fear Him.
Let him keep himself at every moment from sins and vices,
whether of the mind, the tongue, the hands, the feet,
or the self-will,
and check also the desires of the flesh.

The Eve of Pentecost / Whitsunday

Come, Holy Ghost our souls inspire,
and lighten with celestial fire.
Enable with perpetual light
the dullness of our blinded sight.

Thou the anointing Spirit art,
who does thy sevenfold gifts impart
Anointed and cheer our soiled face
with the abundance of thy grace.

Thy blessed unction from above
is comfort, life, and fire of love.
Teach us to know the Father, Son,
and thee, of both, to be but One.

that through the ages all alone,
this may be our endless song:
praise to thy eternal merit,
Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

Veni Creator Spiritus,
9th Century

Mystagogia #8

In the week following the Ascension, the Collects of the Day turn our hearts toward the coming of the Holy Spirit, the empowerment from on high. As disciples of Christ, we pray that with Jesus' ascent into heaven that we will not be left alone or comfortless, and beseech him to send us the strengthening presence of the Holy Spirit. It will be through the agape-love of the Holy Spirit that we will be raised to newness of life and continue to grow into the full maturity of our Lord and Savior. Through the Wind and the Fire, my the Spirit come now upon us with power distributing among us the gifts of the selfsame Spirit, that dedicating ourselves more and more to the service of God, and living more fully the riches of our faith,

The Feast of Augustine of Canterbury

O Lord our God, by your Son Jesus Christ you called your apostles and sent them forth to preach the Gospel to the nations: We bless your holy Name for your servant Augustine, first Archbishop of Canterbury, whose labors in propagating your Church among the English people we commemorate today; and we pray that all whom you call and send may do your will, and bide your time, and see your glory; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives, and reigns with ou, and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

The Rule of Saint Benedict

On Humility

Holy Scripture, brethren, cries out to us, saying,
"Everyone who exalts himself shall be humbled,
and he who humbles himself shall be exalted" (Luke 14:11).
In saying this it shows us
that all exaltation is a kind of pride,
against which the Prophet proves himself to be on guard
when he says,
"Lord, my heart is not exalted,
nor are mine eyes lifted up;
neither have I walked in great matters,
nor in wonders above me."
But how has he acted?
"Rather have I been of humble mind
than exalting myself;
as a weaned child on its mother's breast,
so You solace my soul" (Ps. 130:1-2).

Hence, brethren,
if we wish to reach the very highest point of humility
and to arrive speedily at that heavenly exaltation
to which ascent is made through the humility of this present life,
we must
by our ascending actions
erect the ladder Jacob saw in his dream,
on which Angels appeared to him descending and ascending.
By that descent and ascent
we must surely understand nothing else than this,
that we descend by self-exaltation and ascend by humility.
And the ladder thus set up is our life in the would,
which the Lord raises up to heaven if our heart is humbled.
For we call our body and soul the sides of the ladder,
and into these sides our divine vocation has inserted
the different steps of humility and discipline we must climb.

The Feast of Bede the Venerable

Heavenly Father, you called your servant Bede, while still a child, to devote his life to your service in the disciplines of religion and scholarship: Grant that as he labored in the Spirit to bring the riches of your truth to his generation, so we, in our various vocations, may strive to make you known in all the world; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

The Rule of Saint Benedict

On the Spirit of Silence

Let us do what the Prophet says:
"I said, 'I will guard my ways,
that I may not sin with my tongue.
I have set a guard to my mouth.'
I was mute and was humbled,
and kept silence even from good things" (Ps. 38:2-3).
Here the Prophet shows
that if the spirit of silence ought to lead us at times
to refrain even from good speech,
so much the more ought the punishment for sin
make us avoid evil words.

Therefore, since the spirit of silence is so important,
permission to speak should rarely be granted
even to perfect disciples,
even though it be for good, holy edifying conversation;
for it is written,
"In much speaking you will not escape sin" (Prov. 10:19),
and in another place,
"Death and life are in the power of the tongue" (Prov. 18:21).

For speaking and teaching belong to the master;
the disciple's part is to be silent and to listen.
And for that reason
if anything has to be asked of the Superior,
it should be asked
with all the humility and submission inspired by reverence.

But as for coarse jests and idle words
or words that move to laughter,
these we condemn everywhere with a perpetual ban,
and for such conversation
we do not permit a disciple to open her mouth.

On The Liturgy

Father Aidan Kavanagh, OSB reminds us of some first principles regarding the liturgy:

What this Word has always told those who celebrate the liturgy is that the Holy One in whose presence they stand is pleased to have them stand there precisely because of their sin, which merited so great a redeemer, and that because of this they have no abiding city. Their home is with God in Christ, who reveals his Father just as the Holy Spirit reveals him to them as the Christ of God. Their liturgical worship belongs to these three, who allow us to take our unmerited and gratuitously given part in it, and it discomforts us as it comforts. In no way must it confirm us in our illusions—that this liturgy belongs to us, or our social class, or our culture, or our world; that we are without sin; that our salvation is sure in spite of what we do; that our prognosis is only progress; that our city will abide; that our glands preside; that more education has all the answers. A “divine liturgy” is a countercultural tornado, and we do it not for ourselves, or the parish, or the Church, but for the life of the world.

Taddled from the online version of Commonweal: A Review of Religion, Politics and Culture, May 23, 2007

A Waiting Place

The season between Ascension Day and Pentecost is a time of "waiting" for the church. It is a mini-Advent but with a difference. Where Advent anticipates the coming of God in the midst of human history with the birth of Jesus. This season opens us to receive the strength and power of God for our lives and ministry. The Holy Spirit renews the face of the earth and quickens our hearts for the joy which is to come. This Gift forms faith and draws us into community, it quickens the hearer in his encounter with Holy Scripture, it enlivens our gifts of bread and wine transforming us into the Body of Christ, it forgives our sins and makes it possible for us risk ourselves in the proclamation of the Word. Indeed, we who are followers of Christ are intoxicated with the love that his given birth to creation and saved us in spite of ourselves. May we begin to see in the coming days the brightness of the flames that warm the hearts of all people and inflame our love for God.

The Forty-Sixth Day of Easter

Father, let your Spirit come upon us with power to fill us with his gifts. May he make our hearts pleasing to you, and ready to do your will, through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

The Rule of Saint Benedict

On Obedience

But this very obedience
will be acceptable to God and pleasing to all
only if what is commanded is done
without hesitation, delay, lukewarmness, grumbling, or objection.
For the obedience given to Superiors is given to God,
since He Himself has said,
"He who hears you, hears Me" (Luke 10:16).
And the disciples should offer their obedience with a good will,
for "God loves a cheerful giver" (2 Cor. 9:7).
For if the disciple obeys with an ill will
and murmurs,
not necessarily with his lips but simply in his heart,
then even though he fulfill the command
yet his work will not be acceptable to God,
who sees that his heart is murmuring.
And, far from gaining a reward for such work as this,
he will incur the punishment due to murmurers,
unless he amend and make satisfaction.

Mount Saviour Monastery

Mount Savior Monastery is a Roman Catholic Benedictine Community a few miles outside of Elmira, New York. The rector is an ecumenical oblate of this community and spent a month of his sabbatical with the monks in August of 2000.