"Forward from Nebo" - The Rev. Dr. Kurt Gerhard, October 23, 2011

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Matthew 22.34-46 and Deuteronomy 34.1-12

The story of Moses began when he was put in a basket on the River Nile. He was picked up by the Pharaoh’s daughter and raised in her house. As an adult, Moses rebelled against the injustice of Pharaoh and led his people from Egypt back to their homeland in Palestine.  Moses’ story is an epic; it ends in the thirty-fourth chapter of Deuteronomy with Moses peering at the land of promise from the peak of Mount Nebo just before he dies. In this final book of the Torah, Moses recalls his long journey, the ups and downs of his legendary life as he sets in place new leadership and mission for the next generation. 

In preparing for next week’s centennial celebration, I have had the opportunity to hear stories about St. Patrick’s. Some of them are on our website or the timeline (and over the next year I look forward to hearing more of them). These testimonies force me to reflect on what St. Patrick’s is doing to fulfill God’s mission in the world, today. Let’s just say, we have much to live up to. On Friday, we received a letter from St. Patrick’s 4th Rector, the Rev. Tom Bowers, who served St. Patrick’s from 1961-1971.
An article in our archives announcing his call in the summer of 1961 mentioned that a few months later the church would be celebrating 50 years of service in Washington. Tom Bowers served here during an interesting era in American history, a period marked with racial tension and gender equality, what we call the heart of the civil rights movement.

One of the pivotal moments that Bowers recalled was announcing a new assistant rector one Sunday morning in 1966. When he introduced him, fifty families left the church, many of them stood up and walked, all because the Rev. Jesse Anderson was black. Tom Bowers discovered that Washington D.C. was a “southern city” and that the changes facing the country were painful and difficult for many of them. In looking back on the departure of the parishioners on that day, he wrote, “New people began to pour into our church with a different view of what the church should be and our life together was changed forever.”

WOW! The Church at that time was also very male centered, but these new people thinking in new ways opened the doors to something revolutionary. Father Bowers recalls that St. Patrick’s was the first church he knew of, and almost certainly the first church in the Diocese of Washington, to welcome girls and women to serve as acolytes and crucifers. St. Patrick’s was in the forefront of the women’s movement. An article from our archives tells the story of two women seminarians who served this Parish in the early 1970’s before women’s ordination was approved by the Episcopal Church’s General Convention of 1976. Those two seminarians, Blanche Powell and Mary Belfry, were two of the first women ordained in the Episcopal Church in the United States (see article).

Tom Bowers recalled celebrating the Eucharist at St. Stephen’s and the Incarnation Episcopal Church on the day that Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated and how he went with a group of St. Patrick’s parishioners to hear King deliver the “I have a Dream Speech” in 1963. He remembers the tension of the Cuban Missile Crisis and John F. Kennedy’s assassination especially how our church opened her doors to sooth grieved and frightened souls.

This is amazing history, but I hope that it isn’t just history.  How is this church responding to the movements and changes of 2011? What should the church say about human justice in today’s world? A professor of mine warned me to tread carefully in politics (and in a city like Washington, I know that politics can ostracize and divide people). As a religious person, I am wary of any politician who makes policy decisions for this country based on a personal faith. I’m not saying this because I believe one can separate faith from daily action. But if the only reason one should enact a certain policy is due to a specific religious belief, then how does that honor the diversity that this country envisioned in its founding. This is not a theocracy, but a country where people of any faith are free to practice it. It shouldn’t be our elected officials dictating our religious adherence with a majority rule ethic, but each individual and each church, synagogue, mosque, vihara, and temple. All of these religious communities should speak out about justice and seek to bring equality to everyone. This is the role of faithful prophetic voices calling the world to change for good. We need to find those things that we can agree on as truth.

Our political system cannot be relied upon to be our religious and our moral governor. We are asking for trouble if we do. But as Christians we are called to serve the needs of the poor, the sick, the oppressed, the hungry, and the marginalized. Who is that? For one, we can find the poor in every neighborhood and every city. With all the human advancement and modern civilization, the poor still exist in our neighborhoods. They are our physical neighbors. What are we, as a church, doing to help the poor? St. Patrick’s provides resources to organizations that serve the poor, like Samaritan Ministries, and we take part in awareness marches like the Help the Homeless mini-walk here on November 6th (sign up today). How about the hungry? Well, often those same poverty stricken people also can’t afford to feed themselves. There are many things we do like purchasing extra food when we go to the store and bringing it to St. Patrick’s for the St. Phillip’s Food Pantry (we also have a small pantry here that provides food for those who come to St. Patrick’s looking for something to eat). Our relationship with St. Phillip’s finds its roots in the ministry of the Rev. Jesse Anderson’s Southeast Enrichment Center over 40 years ago (the same priest who Tom Bowers called to St. Patrick’s in 1966).

How about the oppressed? We could all say that we are oppressed in some way, but our oppression is overshadowed with unjust regimes that subjugate their people for personal gain or because their government has been lost to corruption or mismanagement. This summer, we sent money to help Somalian refugees through Episcopal Relief and Development and for over thirty years we have partnered with St. Etienne Church and School in Haiti. There are many other things that we have done to serve the oppressed, but not enough.

Who is marginalized in our society? You could say that blacks and women are still trying to find their way from the margins, but today the marginalized are those immigrants to this country who are not fluent English speakers and who work hard for jobs that pay little. The Diocese of Washington has started several mission congregations for the Latino populations where worship and education is provided in Spanish. St. Patrick’s contributions to the Diocese of Washington help maintain these important outreach ministries that we could never support on our own.

In the 1960’s, the civil rights movement focused on equality and opportunity for women and blacks. Things have improved but there are still groups today whose rights are suppressed, including people who identify as homosexual. St. Patrick's has a history of welcoming and supporting them, though we did it more intentionally 20-30 years ago than we have recently. A little over a year ago, the St. Patrick’s Vestry took a strong position supported by the Parish on marriage equality and inclusion for homosexual couples in this parish. But are we doing enough?

Ghandi taught that one can judge a society by how it treats its weakest members.

We can’t let our politicians tell us what faith says about justice, we have to take a stand for what we know is right. Where real change takes place is not when a government makes laws, but when people gather together to bring about change at the grass roots level. Can we erase the margin, alone? Certainly not, but we can be a prophetic voice on these issues, we can make a stand for the rights of people whose voices go unheard. There are some within Christianity, and in other religious traditions, who point to scripture to justify marginalization, just as there were some 50 years ago who quoted scripture to persecute women and blacks.

The Bible and tradition could be used to subjugate every person, but I feel (and St. Patrick’s has spoken out strongly) that the Bible’s foundational theme is that of inclusion, not of exclusion. Our table is not open to just a few; it is open to all. Everyone is welcome and accepted in God’s world and they should also be welcomed in our spiritual home. Jesus preached love and acceptance, and even the people who heard him, firsthand, tried to defend exclusionary behaviors (for those who were unlike them).

Consider our Gospel lesson today from Matthew. The story centers around Pharisees who are trying to corner Jesus on controversial issues. They wanted, like some of our politicians (and maybe even us), to twist Jesus’ answers in a way that would destroy his public popularity. They ask the kind of questions that always baffle me. Which is your favorite? What is the best? Which is the greatest? The problem is that when you are talking about the 10 Commandments, they are all important.

Instead of picking one, Jesus summarizes their meaning, “Love God and Love your neighbor.” There were no exceptions there. Don’t hate, Don’t let anger take control, just love.

Ok. That didn’t work as they expected. See the Pharisees wanted to trick Jesus, but Jesus turned the tables. Instead of seeking his own power, Jesus loved and knew God, he sought justice, and looked out for those who were often forgotten. That is exactly what the Pharisees didn’t want. They wanted power and control for themselves. They didn’t want to change, instead they wanted it to be comfortable.

As we mark 100 years of mission and ministry in the Diocese of Washington, I hope to spend this centennial year growing together in mission. We can’t be satisfied with the status quo, we have to seek to put our faith into action. We have to stand up for what we believe, so that we can continue to bear fruit in God’s kingdom.

I am going to tell you that this is going to take commitment and it is going to take time. It is about being active in the world around us and to want to bring justice to all people. I know that everyone is busy and I know that this building is overscheduled, but we must vision our next steps. I learned something from my mom when I was growing up. She was busy taking care of me and extended relatives, and working, and attending church. She was on the move. But I learned a lot from her when she forced me to attend functions for the Urban League of Omaha, a board on which she served. I learned that to be a citizen, one had to carve out time to serve the community. Her active modeling demonstrated to me the importance of putting the gospel, our faith, into action. It was important to be in a community of faith, but even more important to be a force for change in the community.

A centenary of service and mission and change and growth will be celebrated next week, but I want to hear from you about some of the ministry we should engage in as we begin the next 100 years. What prophetic message should we cry out? Where should we dedicate our energy to make a difference in this city?

Send me emails, letters, phone messages, tweets, text messages, faxes, or just tell me what we can do as St. Patrick’s community. You are the eyes and ears on the ground. St. Patrick’s has a Social Concerns Committee that needs your help. The more people willing to dedicate time to important missions outside the walls of this church building, the better we will be able to respond to Jesus’ call to love God and love our neighbors. In 50 years, we want to look back and see a transformation in ourselves and in the world. We don’t want to look back and see ourselves as bystanders, the Pharisees of the 21^st century, who make excuses for not doing more, who are scared of asking questions, and who seek justice only for ourselves. We want to transform our lives in ways that make the world a better place.

St. Patrick’s is steeped in a history of mission and ministry. We are active in ministries right now including St. Phillip’s, SOME, Samaritan Ministry, Haiti, and many others. What else should we do as we enter the 2^nd century of service at St. Patrick’s? Let’s make sure it is something worthwhile, and something we can do together; a project or projects that call for our time and talent rather than our treasure; something that many of us can participate in over an extended period of time.

In your program today is a picture I took from Mount Nebo last December. It was hazy that day, but the sign that is perched on the peak points to distant places (Bethlehem, Jericho, Nablus, Jerusalem, Hebron, and Qumran). Places that Moses only dreamed about. He told his people to fulfill their dream by stepping forward, not looking back. That is where we are. As we celebrate our first 100 years, we’ve got to keep an eye on the next century of service. There is still much work ahead of us in fulfilling God’s mission in the world. If we press ahead, new people will pour into our church with a different view of what the church should be and our life together will change forever.

The Rev. Dr. Kurt Gerhard (kurt@stpatrickschurchdc.org)

St. Patrick’s Episcopal Church (www.stpatrickschurchdc.org)

Washington, D.C.

October 23, 2011

Proper 25A

The week prior to St. Patrick’s Centennial Celebration