Jesus said, “No slave can serve two masters; for a slave will either hate the one and love the other, or be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and wealth.” (Luke 16.13)
By Tom Ehrich http://www.onajourney.org/oaj/home/index.jsp
CORPUS CHRISTI, TEXAS - It has been a while since I donned vestments for Sunday worship. I find that cassock, surplice and stole feel fine. Forming the procession feels familiar, too.
Suddenly, the usual ends. Before we process, the choir leads everyone in a Taize chant: “In the Lord I’ll be Ever Thankful.” It is both pensive and uplifting. I am brought out of decades of Episcopal wrangling and into the here and now.
The music director launches into the processional hymn, only to discover that a wind off the bay has flipped her hymnal’s page and landed her in the wrong hymn. She throws up her hands, and everyone laughs. The sky doesn’t fall.
The service music was composed by a member of the congregation named John Otto. It is so much better than the usual fare. The Psalm is a flowing translation from outside the Prayer Book.
I preach from the crossing and find a rapt audience. People are accustomed to excellent preaching here, and they pay attention. I appreciate silence after the sermon, rather than an immediate burying of today’s word in the Creed. Prayers of the People incorporate an opening and closing written by the prayer leader, picking up on my themes from yesterday’s workshop. An atmosphere of freedom does wonders for creativity.
After a well performed anthem, we return to Taize. At the table, the celebrant inserts some deft and poignant turns of phrase, bringing in just a bit more of the feminine.
None of the additions is showy or self-indulgent. Each is just right - on message, as they say - a fine instance of allowing people to fashion corporate worship to the actual nature of the corpus. The effect is stunning. “Have you ever felt such power?” a vestry member says afterward.
At a group meeting, someone wonders what will happen if the Anglican Communion evicts the American Episcopal Church for its election of a gay bishop. I figure some will try to use it as a wedge to get their way, but in most places and for most people, life will go on. As this parish in South Texas is demonstrating, when you pay attention to the needs of your people and the surrounding community, you are busy with planning prayer vigils for a cancer victim, packaging food for the poor, singing hymns that touch actual lives, encouraging freedom of _expression, preaching with power, hugging people nearby, and laughing at the humorous. Who has time for the heavy hand of the institution? Who cares what the Bishop of Uganda thinks about this?
I wish hot-blooded warriors of church controversy could see what faithful worship looks like. It looks like this. Or it looks like a hundred other formats. But it doesn’t look like angry people fussing over details for fear of offending tradition. It doesn’t look like a monolithic institution demanding fealty to yesterday. It doesn’t look all-male, all-straight, all-yesterday or all-safe. God is too dynamic for that. Our needs are too pressing. These times are too urgent. As the rector says, “Who cares about minutiae when people are dying?”
We cannot make a god of control, and we cannot make our God a controlling God. No matter how fervently we label our fights a search for “truth,” God will still be leading new songs for people who need to sing. If those throwing spears of scripture and theology at each other want to take a stab at plowshares, fine. God’s choir always has room for more. As for myself, I will be singing with the weeping and joyful - even when the Spirit blows the page and suggests a new song.
© Tom Ehrich 2004