Category Archives: From the Rector

Weekly articles from our Rector published in the News & Notes newsletter.

Life Together

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Some of you may know that I’m only at St. John’s part-time. Some of you may even wonder what I do with the rest of my time! This week was a typical one for me: a weekday spent working on a ‘virtual pilgrimage’ app for a church in Florida; an early-morning Zoom with a canon from the Anglican cathedral in Singapore about creating digital prayer resources for the Church of the Province of South East Asia (well, for him it was a late-night Zoom, given the 12-hour time difference!); and, most locally and, for the moment, most relevantly, joining the Life Together community as a Prayer Partner.

Life Together is the Episcopal Service Corps program in the Diocese of Massachusetts, a kind of “church AmeriCorps” in which young adult volunteers live together in an intentional community, serve in year-long placements at local parishes and non-profits, and receive training in prophetic leadership, contemplative practices, and community building. It’s a pretty awesome program—and one with which you’re all indirectly connected, since I was a Life Together fellow in 2013-14!

This is my first year as a “Prayer Partner.” Prayer Partners accompany the fellows for a year, meeting with them twice a month as a group to pray for and with them, listen to them, and support them in their life as a community and as individuals.  

It was a huge gift to me to spend Monday afternoon with the fellows at their home in the rectory of St. Mark’s Episcopal Church in Dorchester, to get to know them and to begin a relationship with them. They’ve dedicated a year or two of their lives to becoming more connected to God, one another, and themselves, and to serving the common good—and they are passionate about the work they are setting out to do.

You can click here to read more about this year’s Life Together fellows. (N.B.: “Micah Fellow” means first-year fellow, “Emmaus Fellow” means a second-year fellow.) I hope you’ll join me in praying for them and for their life together as they begin this new year.

Avoiding the Unavoidable

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I couldn’t help but laugh during this week’s press conference about the upcoming, month-long closure of the Orange Line. State officials shared a map of the area expected to see “severe congestion” on the roads, with Charlestown right at the center of the scary pink blob. “If possible,” added the state’s highway administrator, “avoid the region altogether until the diversion period has ended.”

So long, folks! I’ll see you in October!

“Avoiding the region” is something not so easily done for those of us who live or work or go to school or go to church within couple miles of the Orange Line or I-93. And in fact, it’s not so easily done in life in general.

There are times when we desperately want to avoid something, or someone, but we can’t. Some of the time, of course, it’s a matter of health or safety; the thing we are trying to avoid really is dangerous, and we really ought to try to avoid it, and to seek others’ help. Other times, it’s a matter of prejudice or phobia; we want to avoid something, but we’re actually better off if we encounter it, and find that we’re safe, and our anxiety or prejudice or phobia will diminish over time. And sometimes, it’s relatively easy to “avoid the region,” which I suppose is what the advice was really meant to suggest: if you live in the suburbs, this is not a good time to drive into the city to visit a museum or eat at a restaurant!

But most of the time, most unpleasant experiences are simply there to be endured. Whether twenty minutes of a particularly long and dreadful sermon, or an hour in the dentist’s chair for a particularly uncomfortable procedure, or a month without public transit and our streets full of irate commuters, some experiences simply cannot be avoided.

So what are we to do?

At times like this, it’s no surprise that the Serenity Prayer written by Reinhold Niebuhr in the 1930s is so popular. It circulates in various forms, but it’s always something like:

“God, give us grace to accept with serenity the things that cannot be changed, the courage to change the things that should be changed, and the wisdom to distinguish the one from the other.”

It’s sage advice for any situation. There are some things over which we simply have no control (the weather, the words that come out of another person’s mouth, the inner workings of the MBTA). But there are other things over which we have… not control, maybe, but at least some influence: our own words, our own actions, the focus of our own attention. And throughout our lives, in situations of frustration or anger, God invites us again and again to turn away from feeding the flames of our rage and set our minds on something else in prayer.

You may not be able to “avoid the region altogether,” whatever that congested region may be. But maybe, just maybe, you can take a moment to pray for the grace to accept what cannot be changed, the courage to change what can and should, and the wisdom to know the difference.

“A Palace in Time”

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The great rabbi and writer Abraham Joshua Heschel (1907-1972) called the Sabbath “a palace in time, which we build…made of soul, of joy and reticence.” “What is so luminous about a day?” he asks. The “seventh day”—Saturday, the Sabbath, Shabbat—is “a mine where spirit’s precious metal can be found with which the construct the palace in time, a dimension in which the human is at home with the divine.” (The Sabbath, 1951)

The Christian tradition has never observed the Sabbath in quite the same way as our Jewish cousins—and indeed the Episcopal Church has never observed Sunday “Sabbath” regulations with the strictness of Scottish Presbyterians or New England Puritans!—but we are just as deeply committed, at least in theory, to obeying the Fourth Commandment: “Remember the Sabbath day and keep it holy.” And to “keep it holy” isn’t just a list of negative prohibitions (“Don’t work, don’t shop, don’t play sports”) but a list of positive invitations (“Do spend time with family, or friends; do spend time with God”).

“The Sabbath” has always been reused as a metaphor in addition to being a literal day. Even in the Bible, there’s a “sabbath year” in which the land itself is allowed to rest, lying fallow, and all debts are forgiven. You’re probably familiar with the more recent concept of a “sabbatical,” a time of rest and refreshment between periods of work.

But whether it’s one day out of seven, or one year out of seven, or simply the scattered pockets of time you find in which you can laid down your work and your worries, the Sabbath is vital. And as work and news have colonized more and more of our lives—as the latest email and the latest tragedy have moved from our desks to our homes to our pockets—Sabbath is harder and harder to find, which makes it, ironically, even more urgent!

I’m happy to say that I’ve just returned from a wonderful vacation, which was a real Sabbath, of rest and time to spend with family and with friends. Perhaps you’re enjoying your own Sabbath right now. But even if your day-to-day schedule is more or less the same as usual, I want to invite you to look for the places of rest within it, and to “mine” the “precious metal” there, to take a little time just to fully rest, to be “at home with the divine.”

All the cares and occupations of the world will stay be there when you return, waiting for you. But bit by bit you might build up that palace, which you can enter any time.

I’ll leave you with the collect our Book of Common Prayer offers for Morning Prayer on Saturday, the Sabbath day. It’s one of my favorite prayers in the book. (You can find it, if you’d like, on page 99.)

A Collect for Saturdays

Almighty God, who after the creation of the world rested from all your works and sanctified a day of rest for all your creatures: Grant that we, putting away all earthly anxieties, may be duly prepared for the service of your sanctuary, and that our rest here upon earth may be a preparation for the eternal rest promised to your people in heaven; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Church and State

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During my seminary years, I served at a parish whose founding families had famously been thrown into jail in the early 18th century for refusing to pay taxes to support the local Congregational church, which was—and remained until 1818—the official, established church of Connecticut. This week’s events have reminded me of those early struggles over the relationship between church and state. First came Friday’s decision in which five Catholic justices voted to overturn Roe v. Wade, then Monday’s decision allowing a public-school football coach to lead players in prayer after games at the fifty yard line, then the Wednesday-morning quote from Rep. Lauren Boebert of Colorado, who—speaking at a church service on Sunday—said: “The church is supposed to direct the government. The government is not supposed to direct the church… I’m tired of this separation of church and state junk.”

It’s one thing to declare that “the church is supposed to direct the government.” The question is—as it has always been—“Which church?”

You know as well as I do that “The Church” doesn’t agree on much, let alone enough to “direct the government.” Boebert’s own religious views are… idiosyncratic, to say the least. (Only last week, for example, she joked that Jesus “didn’t have enough [AR-15s] to keep his government from killing him.” I’m not one to accuse people of heresy willy-nilly, but… yikes.) If my church directed the government, I imagine Lauren Boebert would hate it. Kids would learn in school that God makes some people queer, and loves them as they are. Coach Kennedy would be out there chanting Evensong after the Big Game. City Hall would be full of stained glass windows, and not one of them would show Jesus holding a gun! And if Lauren Boebert’s church directed the government, I’m thinking I would probably hate it, too. And that’s exactly why the First Amendment prohibits Congress from establishing a religion: because in a world in which no church can direct the government, many churches can flourish.

I found it particularly ironic that she made her remarks while speaking at Cornerstone Christian Center, which describes itself somewhat generically as a non-denominational Christian church. Like most non-denominational churches, it’s part of the broad tradition of Baptist and evangelical free churches with little structure or hierarchy beyond the local congregation. In other words: it’s exactly the kind of church that the New England Puritans would’ve banned, back when the church really did “direct the government” in these parts. (If you don’t believe me, just ask Roger Williams!)

We Episcopalians exist in a very funny place regarding the separation of church and state. On the one hand, we’re the close spiritual cousins of the still-established Church of England, whose Supreme Governor is Queen Elizabeth II, whose bishops sit in the House of Lords, and whose Book of Common Prayer can only be amended by an Act of Parliament. On the other hand, we are explicitly not the Church of England — our distinctive church structures of elected vestries and bishops and representative Diocesan and General Conventions originate from the post-Revolutionary effort to find some way of organizing a non-established church in an independent state. While disproportionately represented among the roster of presidents and the 20th-century social elite, we are and have always been a minority religion in America.

The Church of England remains established. But even by the time of the Revolution, it had significantly scaled back its understanding of what its establishment meant. Religious dissent, at first punished, had become tolerated, and this was not a warm-hearted decision to embrace religious pluralism. It was the inevitable result of more than fifty years of civil war and strife, during which the English government was overthrown multiple times in multiple different religious conflicts between different groups of Christians struggle to exert their power over the government. A Puritan Parliament overthrew and executed King Charles I. Episcopalian royalists succeeded in restoring Charles II. A “Glorious Revolution” overthrew his Catholic son James II in favor of the Protestant William and Mary.

Even in a uniformly-Christian country, which ours is not, when “the Church” can’t agree on its own business, it has no business trying to exert its power over the government. And the attempt by one faction of Christians to codify their theology through the law can only end in violence and persecution.

Just go back to the Massachusetts Bay Colony and ask those Baptists what they thought.

Race & History

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Like many organizations, the Church has been grappling with its history over the last few years, particularly with regard to race. Our diocese has invited parishes to investigate their own history to try to learn more about our complicated relationships with racism in America: the ways in which we have been complicit in, benefited from, and fought against the sin of racism.

Our neighborhood, too, has been engaging in these conversations, including a monthly dialogue on race and equity hosted by the Charlestown Coalition in the Peace Park on Tuesday evenings. (If you’re ever available, I’d strongly recommend attending at least once!) During one recent conversation, I was fascinated to hear the very different childhood stories being shared by two parts of our community: middle-aged adults (all white) who had grown up as white students during “the busing,” and current high-school students (all people of color) telling stories of police encounters and sidewalk slurs today.

So I was fascinated to come across the following reflection on busing from the Rev. Neil Hastie, who served as Rector of St. John’s from 1973-1981, as part of a much longer (and really fun!) reflection on his ministry. It features several characters who’ll be familiar to many of you—and is a really thoughtful reflection on the difficult challenges and beautiful opportunities that the racial diversity of our city provides. I’ll simply present Mr. Hastie’s words here:

I did not approve of the 1973 federal court decision to integrate only Boston schools, and ignore Greater Boston. I envisioned what in fact happened. White flight to the suburbs—with which I was already only too familiar in Roxbury—intensified. White students became a small minority in Boston. It rankled the working class—black and white alike—to have affluent suburban judicial authorities demand of our low-income communities what they had no intention of demanding of their own well-to-do enclaves. I was reminded of the old racial policies of the Deep South: the pitting by upper class whites of lower class whites against the blacks. But I was proud of St. John’s congregation’s response to the school-busing crisis…

On the second Sunday morning in September, all the women of St. John’s were huddled in conversation in the center aisle of the church when I arrived. I walked up to them and said that I knew what was on their minds. The same thing was on the minds of all Boston parents that day: the busing of children next morning into unfamiliar neighborhoods, to effect the racial integration of the public schools. I said, ‘I have never spoken to you about race. But you know my family lives in Roxbury [i.e., in the black community], and we come here every Sunday morning with no bruises or broken bones.’ Ruth Sherwood replied, ‘I think of that all the time!’

Marion and Winkie Wood’s younger soon Randy got assigned to an elementary school in lower Roxbury, only two blocks from St. Cyprian’s Church, where Marion had attended Episcopal district meetings with me. In August, Marion and Winkie attended the parents’ orientation meeting at the school. When they said they were from Charlestown, there was a gasp of surprise. The first day of school, only one other child from their neighborhood attended, along with Randy. Marion went door to door to reassure her neighbors about safety issues. By Friday they all went. Middle school Charlestown students in Florence Johnson’s neighborhood were assigned to the Timilty School at Eliot Square, across the street from Roxbury’s ‘Missionary to the Indians’ John Eliot’s historic First Parish Church. Florence said, ‘We are not going to send our children to a place we have never even seen.’ She led a group of her neighbors on a thorough inspection tour; then they consented to their children’s attendance.

I was safer living with my family in mostly-black Roxbury than in all-white, angry Charlestown. It had not made sense for us to move into St. John’s handsome, spacious Monument Square rectory. John’s and Beth’s school, and my weekday work [Greg’s note: Mr. Hastie was only 1/3 time at St. John’s], were all in Roxbury, where we owned our house. In my stead, Marie Hubbard moved with her family into the rectory, and experienced the three a.m. random firebombing of her parked automobile…

I had a black pre-seminary year-long full-time assistant, J. C. Woods, who grew up in Memphis and attended a predominantly white college in the mid-west. His college chaplain, Robert Gamble, my former seminarian, referred him to me…

I took J. C. with me to visit Goldie Graffam. In the project parking lot, several teen-age boys confronted us, still in my van. The leader, who carried a baseball bat, demanded, ‘What’s he doing here?’ ‘He’s my student assistant at St. John’s Episcopal Church.” ‘Hmmph!’ They walked away. ‘Remember, J.C., ‘the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church.’ In huge black letters on the wall by the project door, we saw, ‘KILL N—RS.’ [Greg: I’ve chosen to censor the slur, here.] ‘J. C., it’s a good thing you’re not a n—r!’ I reminded J. C. that he was in Charlestown only one day per week, where I was in Roxbury at least six days per week. He knew that I knew the difference.”