|
|
Sermon
at The Church of The Holy Apostles, New York
April 17, 2003, Maundy Thursday
Year B
By Barry M. Signorelli
Lesson:
Exodus 12:1-14a; Psalm
78;
1 Corinthians 11:23-32;
Luke 22:14-30
I was chatting with Mother Liz last
evening about state of our respective upcoming sermons, and I noted that
I wasn’t quite sure whether my problem was that I had too many ideas, or
none at all….She wisely observed that they can often be the same thing….
But discerning clearly the image or
theme or concept — the kind that gives a sermon instant life and
structure — would be completely out of character for me this year, this
Lent; the events of our recent past have left me confused, fearful,
angry, relieved, proud, ashamed…the list could go on and on. Maybe some
of you have experienced something similar. I feel as though I am
walking around in a fog, not too sure of what’s ahead, but able to stay
reasonably safe as far as I know…but anything could come barreling out
of the darkness without warning.
Last night we celebrated our annual
service of Tenebrae, which is of course all about darkness. If you’re
not familiar with it, the service is a series of chanted psalms,
readings, and musical responsories evocative of the emotions of Holy
Week. Its chief characteristic is the gradual extinguishing of light
until the church is left in darkness. One of the pieces sung so
beautifully by our choir (and especially soloist Cynthia Shaw) was Frank
Santo’s piece, Darkness Covered the Whole Earth. Frank was, of
course, our director of music for many years, and he wrote this piece
for Holy Apostles. It begins with a soprano voice repeating the single
word, “darkness” over and over, climbing up and down the scale,
revealing the breadth and depth and height of the reality it names; and
suddenly I realized that the darkness in which I wandered was not an
obstacle to get over, it was the womb of what was to be. I was, in a
sense, waiting to be born out of this Lent; I was lost in the darkness,
and I wanted to find a way out. I was looking for the light at the end
of the tunnel.
As most of you know, my partner and I
raise pet chinchillas. (If you don’t know what they are, picture a very
cute cross between a guinea pig and a squirrel.) They live quite a long
time, and our oldest male, Julian, has been around for about 13 years –
making him a true chinchilla altercocker. Many years ago, he
began to develop cataracts on both his eyes; it’s not uncommon in older
chins, but we took him to the vet, and found that there wasn’t really
anything that could be done for him. I was dismayed at the prospect of
Julian losing his sight, but the vet assured me it wouldn’t be so bad
for him; the way their consciousness works, and the slow progression of
the symptoms, would permit Julian to gradually acclimate himself to his
changing condition — essentially, he would learn how to be blind. He
would rely more and more on his other senses, probably without even
realizing it, so that by the time his sight was gone, he really wouldn’t
miss it.
And that seems to be the case: Julian
knows when someone walks past, comes over to greet you when his door is
opened, he can immediately find a new dish of food, and is still first
in line when raisons are being handed out. And when he comes out of the
cage for a run around the room, he can dodge obstacles and explore with
the best of them. He is in no way held back – he has learned how to
live in the darkness.
I wonder if the same kind of thing can
happen to us. Can it be that, when the encroachment of evil is gradual
enough, we can fail to notice its approach? What if we become slowly
inured to the subtle shift in the values and behavior of the world
around us, and unwittingly start to reflect those changes in ourselves –
every day becoming a little less charitable, a little less loving, a
little less discerning, a little less willing to think of others before
ourselves – so that eventually we move a world away from God while
thinking we were standing still? Oh, like Julian, we can still function
– we can make our way about, and can certainly find any treats that
might be had – but we won’t be aware of our growing isolation and the
stunting of our psychic and spiritual growth. I’ll go out on a limb
here and confess my addiction to CNN – I am a recovering news junkie,
and I’m embarrassed to admit that I sometimes followed the war coverage
like a mini-series; lured in by the siren song of modern broadcast
marketing, I have been tempted into callousness and unthinking
consumerist-viewing. Now, thanks to my partner, and National Public
Radio, and the BBC World Service, I’m happy to say that darkness
of mine is slowly lifting.
But if this sort of thing can happen
to us as individuals, what about our collective thought and
action? I was stunned to see polls before the war that showed some 60%
of Americans surveyed thought Sadaam Hussein was responsible for 9/11 –
an historical redux worthy of Big Brother. We are susceptible as a
society to falling into darkness, too. Indeed, it is that very flaw of
humanity that makes war and all its attendant evils possible. The fact
that we accept violence and war as inevitable means that we as a world
have learned to live in darkness.
Holy Week is all about darkness. It’s
as if Palm Sunday dawns bright with golden sunshine, a perfect day for a
parade of triumph and celebration; but as soon as things break up, the
sky clouds over, and the weather is dark and threatening for days. It’s
like the tension you can feel before a huge thunderstorm, the kind where
you feel the atmospheric pressure changing, and the little hairs on the
back of your neck stand up from the static electricity building up in
the air. More and more it builds, making you think you can’t take it
anymore, building until it finally breaks tomorrow with all the fury of
hell on Calvary.…But tonight, there is a respite. Jesus and his
disciples gather and rest for one last evening together, a celebratory
meal, a feast of love and fellowship. A final rest before the last
great sprint – and time for one final lesson, perhaps the most important
of all. For this night, when outside the sky is as dark as the night of
the Passover in Egypt, on this night there glows a dim, warm light from
the One Who bears the light of life; and he stoops and washes the feet
of those who call him Master. All the table are turned, the high
brought low, the lowly exalted as the great; distinctions of class and
rank mean nothing, for true meaning is found only in humble, loving
service. “The kings of the Gentiles lord it over them; and those in
authority over them are called benefactors. But not so with you; rather
the greatest among you must become like the youngest, and the leader
like one who serves.” For such is what Jesus does to them.
That is the way through the darkness –
by service in love to others. Notice I did not say it was the way
out of the darkness — there is no way out, but only through. If we
take Jesus at his word, and follow his example as he bids us, it will
take us down a road that leads to sacrifice and hardship, to the death
of our own greedy and selfish desires. It will take us down a road that
often offers few rewards as the world would mark them, but promises
infinite satisfaction in fulfilling our destiny as children of our
Creator. If we walk with Jesus down this road, it will lead us into
death and cast us in the tomb, the place of utter and unconquerable
darkness. Yet even here he gives us his unfailing example of selfless
love, entering that tomb to save us from it. And we follow him there,
still obedient to his command, loving one another even in the valley of
the shadow of death, hoping to prove that love indeed is stronger than
the grave.
Our alternative, of course, is to
continue functioning in our darkness, getting along for now and never
worrying about what lies beyond the sphere of our own consciousness and
well-being. We will get along fine, of course; we’ll dodge the
obstacles and find our treats, and we might never suspect that anything
was wrong. But we will eventually become stillborn in the womb of
creation, never emerging into the new life promised by the Lord of
light. Our souls can slip ever-so gradually into a comfortable,
unknowing sleep, unwilling to wake save by the call of the final
trumpet. We are allowed to make that choice.
But if we choose otherwise, if we
trust the upside-down and inside-out logic of God’s will for the world,
then we will barrel headlong into the deepest part of the darkness of
death, will taste the emptiness and desolation of the abyss – and know
that God is there with us. And finally there will come a light, the
light at the end of the tunnel: far off and faint, yet beckoning us
onward – the dawn that streams through the open door of an empty tomb.
Amen.
.
|
