Come and share in a short (10 minute) liturgy with Rev. Victoria. Arrive any time between noon and 1:30pm or between 5pm and 6pm and make your way upstairs into the sanctuary. If Rev. Victoria is already sharing in the liturgy with others you’re invited to sit in meditative quiet, and she’ll be with you shortly.
Preacher: The Right Reverend Shane Parker
Here we are again at the beginning of a new liturgical year. As many of you will know, the Church calendar begins its new year not on January 1, but on the First Sunday of Advent – which is always four Sundays before Christmas (December 25) and the Sunday closest to St. Andrew’s Day (November 30). Our word “advent” comes from the Latin “adventus”, which means “coming”.This is a season of waiting, expectation and preparation as we look both to the celebrating the birth of Jesus, and also to his second coming.
Each year, we celebrate the birth of Jesus, and we hold the past close to our hearts as we remember that night when God came to be with us, in Jesus. We also look to the future, yearning for his second coming, and God’s kingdom on earth as it is in heaven. When will that be? What will it look like? No one knows. This leaves us with the question “What are we doing in the present?” Advent becomes an opportunity to root ourselves in the present, and in God’s presence.
Last Sunday I shared with you Parker Palmer’s invitation to us as followers of Jesus to stand in the “tragic gap”. On one side of the gap we look at the hard realities around us: poverty, anger, hatred, greed, despair, conflict, violence. We see all of that, everywhere. On the other side of where we’re standing are those things we know to be possible: hope, peace, joy, love. We’ve seen greed, but we’ve also seen generosity. We’ve seen rampant and competitive individualism, but we’ve also seen collaboration and community. What we need to do to “stay in the action” is to stand in the tragic gap without flipping onto one side or the other: too much of the hard realities and we become cynical. Too much of the other side and we’re into irrelevant idealism. These two sides sound very different, but they’re actually the same. They take us out of the action, and leave us doing nothing. To stay “in the action” we have to stand in the “tragic gap”.
Advent invites us to hold the past close to our hearts and to acknowledge what we long for in the future. We have an opportunity this Advent season to stand in the tragic gap, holding the suffering in our lives and in our world along with the hope, peace, joy and love that we know are possible. We have an opportunity to remind ourselves that God came to be with us in all of it: that God is with us in the tragic gap. This grounds us, holds us in our in our longing, infusing it with hope, with peace, with joy and with love.
Last year we shared in a WordCloud exercise each week in Advent. We’ll do that again this year. We’ll acknowledge our longings, and we’ll name the signs of hope, peace, joy and love that we see in the world as a way of entering more deeply into the present in this Advent season.
These questions will guide us in that:
What hope (peace, joy, love) am I longing for?
What signs of hope (peace, joy, love) do I see now?
We’ll all contribute to the WordCloud on Sunday mornings, or you can add to it in the newsletter.
Wishing you all a blessed Advent season,
Victoria+
It’s just about six weeks ago that I wrote to you and borrowed Bruce Epperly’s phrase “living a holy adventure”, expressing hope and excitement that our journeys had been linked and that we were embarking on a “holy adventure” together.
Today, as we approach Thanksgiving weekend, I write to express gratitude for the unfolding of our “holy adventure” so far. I give thanks for the ways that you have all welcomed me with such openness and warmth. I give thanks for our worship together, and for the ways we have navigated the change in the pattern of our Sunday morning worship, moving from a morning of both Zoom and in-person worship, to one service at 10 a.m. I give thanks that we were able to respond to volunteer fatigue with this change, and I am grateful for the understanding of those for whom Zoom was meeting a need on a Sunday morning. Part of living a “holy adventure” is living with eyes, ears, hearts and minds open to opportunities to move with God already at work, and we will continue to do that with all things, including being open to opportunities to connect on Zoom. I give thanks for the ways we are getting to know one another in community, in meetings, and one-on-one as our
“holy adventure” continues.
Last Sunday, I preached about “and”, suggesting that it is one of the most important words we have as human beings. Life is full of “ands”: joy and sorrow, praise and lament, faith and doubt, celebration and conflict. “And” frees us from striving for either/or and helps us to move between these things. We are both ourselves and an interconnected collective. We live both inner and outer lives. We are each uniquely and wonderfully made, and we are inextricably linked in the great collective of creation. “And” helps us to be in the midst of difference and diversity. I give thanks for “and”!
It is “and” that makes community – all of you, and me – and community includes both “being”and “doing”. We’re going to stay after the 10 a.m. service next Sunday (October 16th) for a Volunteer Fair. We will celebrate the dedicated group of volunteers who are already “doing” on a Sunday morning: taking on the roles and responsibilities that combine to make our Sunday morning worship what it is. Heartfelt thanks to them! We also need to do some rebuilding and expanding of our volunteer groups. I invite you to do some discerning about what you are “doing” at Ascension. Please do plan to stay after church next week. There will be lots of space for questions, and for “demystifying” what you’ll be getting into if the Spirit moves you to take on more “doing” on a Sunday morning.
This Thanksgiving, I give thanks that Ascension is a place where we can meet one another and feel all the “ands”, together. I give thanks that it is a place where we tend to both our inner and our outer lives, balancing being and doing. I give thanks that God is with us and we are with each other in the “ands”, on this “holy adventure”.
Blessings to you and yours this Thanksgiving, and always,
Victoria+