|
Sermon at The Church of the
Holy Apostles, New York City,
January 26, 2003,
The Third Sunday after the Epiphany
Year B
by Reverend William A. Greenlaw, Ph. D.
Lection:
Jeremiah
3:21-4:2; Psalm 130
1 Corinthians 7:17-23; Mark 1:14-20
Psalm 130 is often referred to by its Latin name, De
Profundis. “Out of the depths have I called to you. Lord hear my
voice.” This is our Psalm, appointed for this day, and we have it
to an Anglican chant by our own David Hurd—which we all sing. And
then we hear it again as our offertory anthem, again, in a setting
by our own David Hurd.
We have as our communion hymn, a wonderful hymn-tune, St. Andrew,
by, you guessed it, our own Dr. Hurd. But today it is more the
words than the music which gets to me: “Jesus calls us o’er the
tumult, of our life’s wild restless sea.”
“Out of the depths,” “o’er the tumult.” “A wild restless sea”
indeed! Images that are so very apt. I have tried hard to think of
an Annual Meeting Sunday when I felt more disquieted, more deeply
uncertain, more filled with foreboding than I feel this morning.
Those of you who know me well know that sermons for me generally
start really coming together only on Saturday afternoon—and
Saturday evening—and Saturday night. Often, with a final reworking
even Sunday morning. Yesterday, when I finally sat down to get
serious about just what I was going to say this morning, I first
had a look at my email—and there I found the Episcopal News
Service story that you find in your bulletins this morning [a link
to the article is at the end of this sermon text]: the story about
a Gaza Anglican church and hospital sustaining a direct hit from a
guided missile on Friday. A hospital and church complex rebuilt
and rededicated only in 1996 in the presence of the Archbishop of
Canterbury of the time, George Carey, our then Presiding Bishop
Edmond Browning, and no fewer than 34 other primates of the
Anglican Communion. This was that important a place.
And I wept. Sadly. And bitterly.
This article so neatly sums up the horror of war and conflict and
terrorism and violence gone horribly awry, gone horribly
out-of-control with little prospect for the future except for more
death and destruction. Of the US putting the hugely important
Arab-Israeli conflict on a back-burner while we concentrate on a
war which we seem hell-bent on pursuing no matter what the United
Nations, nearly all of our allies, and an overwhelming number of
church leaders around the world might say. And we are prepared to
unleash horrors beyond imagining on an innocent people subjugated
by a despicable-beyond-words dictator—but without any real proof,
any real smoking-gun to suggest that such action is necessary or
defensible by any theory of collective security to which the UN or
at least our allies might agree or just-war theory to which our
religious leaders could find some room for discussion.
It seems for all the world like the UN be damned, our allies be
damned, our church leaders be damned—and it may be too bad about
the casualties we will inflict and suffer ourselves. But that is
just the way it is and has to be.
And, almost as galling as the impending reign of death we are
preparing to unleash, there is nothing else on the agenda of our
present administration where the cost of getting the job done
almost doesn’t matter. We can be expansive beyond imagining when
it comes to war. We can be Scrooge-like to a fault when it comes
to working for peace, for relieving human suffering at home and
abroad. Of our poorest taking it yet again. Of state and local
governments across the land with staggering deficits and financial
markets reeling. Yet still, we are undeterred.
The prophets of the Old Testament saw so clearly that arrogance on
the part of leaders who will not and cannot hear any other word
beyond what they want to hear leads to bad things happening and a
worse end. How long can we believe ourselves to be exempt?
My own theological guiding-light, Reinhold Niebuhr, spent his
career preaching and warning against the very thing we are
watching unfold before our very eyes.
God knows where it will end, and where we as a people, a nation,
and a world are headed.
It is such a commonplace and even a throw-away line to say that
9/11 and its continuing aftermath has changed everything, at least
for Americans. But, Lord knows, I certainly believe that it did.
And yet, having said that, here we are, in this community right
here and now. And one of the things we are needing to learn to
live with is that our life does go on, changed though we may be.
And one of our challenges is learning how to somehow manage all
that is before us without becoming either schizoid or completely
compartmentalized.
I knew that on this Annual Meeting day, I could not simply talk of
our life and times here over the past year—without setting that in
the context of the events taking place around us. But I am going
to switch gears now, knowing that many of us have heavy hearts
just beneath the surface of whatever else we may say or do on this
day.
One of the strange paradoxes of our life is that given all that is
going on in our world, there is so much that is so positive to say
about where the Church of the Holy Apostles has been and where we
are headed Sarah Stevenson edited and a great many of you
contributed to a wonderful Annual Report. That report is a most
impressive document.
This past October 22 marked the 20th anniversary of the Holy
Apostles Soup Kitchen, with no fewer than 4.6 million meals having
been served over those 20 years. Far from hunger winding down in
our midst, 2002 was the biggest year in our history. We served
more than 293,000 meals, held 4313 counseling sessions, had 256
groups come to volunteer—that’s one for nearly every serving day
of the year! We logged 53,262 volunteer hours.
Dear friends, all this is simply staggering! There is nothing like
it anywhere. And we have been made the stewards of this ministry
and witness. It is an awesome responsibility as well as an
incredible joy. Our wonderful staff have once again done
heroically, aided by hundreds of volunteers whose devotion is the
stuff of legend.
And I need to say it once again. Were it not for the Holy Apostles
Soup Kitchen, this parish might well have been closed by now, so
dubious were its prospects not that long ago. Our commitment to
this mission and ministry has given us our life back in a greater
abundance than we could have ever asked for or imagined. And Holy
Apostles is known across this land and church because of this
ministry.
In terms of our parish life, we have had the Reverend Canon Hannah
Anderson of our diocesan staff come to meet with our vestry and an
expanded Heads of Groups gathering to talk about our own
“Congregational Development.” Canon Anderson will be preaching for
us in two weeks, and she will be attending our vestry retreat for
a full weekend in Lent.
Although we have been growing in terms of gaining new members, in
city parishes in particular, there is always a large turnover of
active members each year. Our Sunday attendance has actually been
relatively constant, at about 100 on most Sundays, for a number of
years. We have been consistently blessed with large numbers of
visitors, many from out-of-town who have heard both of the soup
kitchen and of our wonderful music program directed by David Hurd.
An issue has been how to be as welcoming to our first-timers as
possible so that those who are locally based might wish to return.
One of our challenges is how we do this so that visitors who wish
to be welcomed with outstretched arms can sense that kind of
welcome, while at the same time recognizing that some need to get
a sense of this place much more slowly and tentatively. And that
is okay too!
A special area of concern is how we can be more welcoming to
families with young children. We are working to develop a more
child- and parent-friendly environment, where among other things,
our church school and nursery care efforts are friendly,
accessible, well-equipped, and known. You will be hearing more
about this from our new Director of Children’s Ministries, Ellen
Knudsen, at our meeting.
We have an active website and advertising committee that is doing
good work. A growing number of visitors tell us they found us on
the web, and seeing that we are both findable and have a
welcoming, attractive, and informative website is key. Father
Barry, in particular, has been involved in every aspect of this
work.
The downside to all this that we are also discussing with Canon
Anderson is that this parish has an enormous program relative to
the number of active members and leaders of the congregation. We
tend to ask a lot of our members. We not only want you to find God
and Christ and to worship regularly and be involved in the issues
of our time, we also want you to help make everything that happens
here happen. And that is a lot. Burnout? It is all too common, all
too threatening. We need to find ways, I need to find ways, of not
persuading each one of you to get involved in ever more activities
and taking on greater and greater responsibilities—which instead
of being life-giving can all too easily become draining and
onerous.
And yet, there is precious little in the way of programming and
the work that makes this parish happen that we can imagine giving
up. Our challenge in our work with Canon Anderson is how we grow
to share both our joys and the burdens—while at the same time
recognizing that we are all human and so often stretched
altogether too thinly. We need to be reasonable in what we
undertake. Yet we also need to grow to sustain and develop all
that we have become and that we treasure.
To put it mildly, in the days ahead we have our work cut out for
us!
Several things I would like to share with you almost by title, and
then I will be finished.
The last truly major project of our church restoration is finally
underway. Several workers from Vermont have braved the cold and
wind working on the tower. By the end of March, our tower should
both have its copper cladding in place and also finally be
weatherproof and secure for close to one hundred years. And the
scaffolding can come down. Ed Kamper, will be on hand at our
meeting to answer any questions about our restoration efforts.
Another small miracle in these economically uncertain times is
that this parish is debt- free for the first time in many years.
We made the last payment on the organ in December.
I want to pay tribute to two persons who stepped down from major
leadership positions for many years and are taking a well-deserved
break. They are two of our Masters of Ceremonies, Dan Mitchell and
Jay Swardenski. They have given countless hours to making our
liturgy all that it is. Happily, they will both remain in our
acolyte corps.
We have with us today two of our senior lay staff members without
whom we could not do all that we do. Our Director of
Administration, Janet Gracey, is in effect the chief operating
officer of all that goes on here during the week. She is
responsible for the soup kitchen food program, the buildings and
grounds, much of the lay staff, and all of the finances of this
most complex organization. Janet does a great deal here, and I
cannot imagine being without her.
You have heard us say many times that this congregation is
responsible for much of our parish budget. That is absolutely
true. But for the soup kitchen and building, we need to raise
about 2 ½ million dollars each and every year. And Neville Hughes
carries much of that burden with unassuming grace. When
practically every non-profit was hurting and cutting back this
past year, we have more than met all of our goals. And that is
truly remarkable.
If you do not know Janet and Neville, seek them out, say hello—and
thank you.
Each year at this time we also recognize our retiring warden and
vestry members. This year both John Grammer and Betsy Farren have
served for six years and are taking a well-deserved break. Both
been most faithful and hard-working.
And then there is Muriel Moore. Muriel has spent five years on the
vestry and then six more years as warden. Muriel is simply a
phenomenon. She has been a working, caring, present, available
warden. She has been a wise counselor and a wonderful support. We
have been through thick and thin together. Thankfully, she may
give up being in office, but she will still be here just as much.
Thank you, and God bless you, Muriel.
Finally, I want to acknowledge my clergy colleagues. Peter Carey
has continued to bring his wonderful presence, wit, and depth and
range of experience to all he does here. We have welcomed in our
midst Deacon Tim Morehouse this past year, and I am happy to tell
you that not only will Tim be ordained a priest in late
spring—with details to come—but that he will also be remaining
with us as a priest associate while continuing to head the
Religion Department at the Trinity School on the Upper West Side.
Tim has been a wonderful addition to our clergy team. I look
forward to his being a priest among us. Father Barry has been
giving leadership in several areas, and we will be hearing from
him at our meeting about new initiative. And of Mother Liz, what
can I say? Going on 14 years here, and all the time getting better
and better. She is a joy to work with and be with. All of us are
blessed by her presence among us.
This past December marked my 18th year as your rector, and this is
my 19 Annual Meeting. Holy Apostles continues to ask for a lot,
but it continues to give far more. I count it one of the greatest
blessings of my life to serve with all of you here. May God
continue to bless us and keep us, today and always. Amen.
(Link to the Episcopal News Service Article, “Gaza Anglican Church
and Hospital Sustains Direct Hit by Guided Missile:
http://www.dfms.org/ens/2003-017.html.
)
Back to Sermon Selections
|
