Moving Diagonally

Today was about evangelism. Presiding Bishop Michael Curry has been clear from the beginning of his tenure that evangelism and racial reconciliation were going to be the touchstones of his ministry, and he has remained true to his word.  We began the day with a celebration of the Eucharist at which Bishop Curry was the preacher. He emphasized the need for the work of evangelism to be rooted in Christian formation, and also got into the fray around the use of the word "Lord," about which many in the church are sensitive because of perceived patriarchal overtones. He acknowledged the difficulty, but basically said, "Get used to it. The earliest Christian creed was 'Jesus is Lord.' It's part of our vocabulary." He suggested reclaiming the work away from connotations of oppression or exploitation, remembering the important corollary: If Jesus is Lord, then Caesar is not Lord--whoever or whatever "Caesar" may be to it. It was an encouraging homi...

A day of travel and getting settled ahead of the spring meeting of the House of Bishops. Left the house in time to board the 7:09am American Eagle departure to Dallas, where there was just enough time to get to my connecting gate and board a flight to Houston. Successfully navigated to the designated place to meet the shuttle to Camp Allen, along with three other bishops (on this run). Got into my room, unpacked, snacked a little, then attacked the 39 emails that had arrived while I was in transit. Relaxed time just hanging out with colleagues. The work begins tomorrow.

Got to hang out this morning where I know I have a guaranteed seat--the Cathedral Church of St Paul in Springfield. Preached at 8:00; presided and preached at 10:30. One of the idiosyncrasies of St Paul's is the distribution of attendance between the two services: It's essentially even. There are actually more families with children at the earlier celebration than at the "main" one. This certainly bucks the general trend. At any rate, the Third Sunday in Lent was duly observe on both occasions.

Springfield Cathedral -- John 2:13-22 Today’s gospel story is a familiar one. Jesus enters the Temple in Jerusalem, the most sacred piece of real estate in Judaism, and completely makes a scene. He improvises a whip and drives out merchants whose business it is to sell small birds for people to offer to the priests for sacrifice, as well as those who changed out Roman currency, which was unacceptable in the temple because it had the graven image of Caesar on it. He sternly rebukes everyone involved in these activities and even throws some table over. This incident is known as the “cleansing” of the Temple. It’s a hard story to interpret. It looks for all the world like Jesus is having a temper tantrum, that he’s just “losing it,” causing damage to property and livelihood, and physically assaulting people. The difficulties arise from two places. First, it’s not at all clear precisely what anyone was doing wrong. The objects of Jesus’ apparent anger were actually helping people keep ...

Task planning at home, Morning Prayer in the cathedral. Took care of a small administrative chore that was waiting for me on my desk. Debriefed with the Archdeacon on a range of ongoing issues. Edited, refined, formatted, printed, and scheduled for internet publication my homily for Lent III, this Sunday at Springfield Cathedral. Kept a scheduled appointment with a Hindu leader from Nevada who was in town to open both houses of the Illinois legislature with a Hindu prayer earlier in the morning. It was essentially a meet-and-greet. He seemed interested in my assessment of the state of "religion" in the country and the world. Drove the few blocks up to St John's hospital to look in on Fr John Henry, who had spent the night there as a cardiac patient. He was in good spirits, and looked forward to the installation of a pacemaker later in the day. Prayed and anointed. Stopped by Taco Gringo for lunch and took it home to eat. While in line at the drive-thru, took a subst...

Whenever air travel is involved, there are so many things that can go wrong--and have gone wrong for me from time to time--that I am immensely grateful when everything proceeds as planned. Having gotten multiple email warnings from United Airlines last night about weather in Chicago potentially messing with my itinerary, I was apprehensive. But it all went like clockwork. I left Camp Weed at 0845 and was turning the rental car in at Alamo around 10:30. Bag check and security went smoothly. We pushed back right on time at 11:45. I had a seat with plenty of legroom and got some good reading done during the flight. There was a long enough layover at O'Hare to allow me to use the United Club wifi to keep on top of incoming email, and the flight to Springfield, which is always the weakest link in the chain, boarded and departed on schedule. United didn't lose my luggage, and I was home just a bit past 5:00. Home is always good.

Another substantive and occasionally intense day with "Communion Partners & Friends." We discussed a number of aspects of the issues that will come before General Convention in July, along with ramifications for and perspectives from the Church of England, the Anglican Church of Canada, and, via educated speculation, the Global South and GAFCON. We are motivated by a desire to speak gospel truth, uphold the received faith and order of the Church Catholic, and maintain the highest possible degree of communion with all who name Jesus Christ as Lord. Personally, I am a mixed bag of apprehension, fatigue, and hope. It has been a fruitful couple of days. If the weather and airline gods smile on me, I shall be home before sunset tomorrow.