This was a rescheduled visitation—brought forward by five
months to accommodate the fact that the Dean of the Cathedral, Cathleen Bascom,
was leaving her position on June 1. The celebration for her time with the Cathedral congregation was planned for that date, and so it was appropriate to undergo a
formal “leave-taking” liturgy as part of my visit. I was also honored to make
Cathleen an Honorary Canon of the Cathedral, which took her by surprise and moved her to tears. I chose
also to make my sermon a reference to this occasion and the lectionary readings were amazingly fitting. My focus, though,
was on the unexpected journey God takes us on, and I was drawn once again to
Paul’s story whose processes have tweaked my imagination in recent months. I
adapted Peter’s words, “Always be ready to give an account to the hope that is
within you,” to apply to a community which will be asked precisely what they
stand for by prospective candidates for Dean in the near future.
I think the Cathedral is “in process” on a strong forward-looking
platform for mission and ministry. Its three-fold vision of serving City,
Diocese and Congregation provides as good a framework as any into the future,
and its recent launching of Good Shepherd groups, informal fellowship
gatherings based on interests and geography, is a sign of a community which
will be inviting someone to “come and join us” rather than hanging back to
depend on new leadership in that go, stop, restart pattern that often dictates
clergy leadership searches and somehow negates the reality that the constant of
congregational life is the ongoing ministry of the congregation itself.
Music and liturgy remain powerful attractions of the
Cathedral. The chapter has a strategic plan to work with over the next few years.
A diverse group of young adults are finding their spiritual homes there,
including the two young women I confirmed. They have been friends from their
early years in Ankeny where they attended an evangelical and conservative
congregation. One began life as an Episcopalian and so this has been a coming
home experience for her. It was as they searched for a place where their
Christian commitment would not be questioned as they raised their own
questions, that they found St Paul’s. I believe the Saturday evening service
was helpful in that introduction.
The cloister concept for organizing ministry was another innovation of the Dean. These are not fixed in stone but carry flexibility in their creation according to the perceived needs of the community. One such new cloister includes within its purview the building of that sector of the vision which involves the Diocese as a whole. We have made a lot of progress in this regard in recent years, but we have not moved along very far from those early days of the Bishop election when I was asked, “What is the purpose of a cathedral?” and, “What are my expectations of a Cathedral?” My answer then and now was and is, “What are yours?” It is a question we are living into, and is an important one in the conversations to come with new Dean candidates. Pastoral concerns have essentially guided previous searches. I feel that the healthier environment of the cathedral today affords us a broader and freer inquiry. One of the reasons for the hope that is within us today is the years of hard work on building trust and loving relationships especially between clergy and leadership that has marked Cathleen’s time. I am grateful for that, and was glad to spend my visitation time in celebration for it.
The cloister concept for organizing ministry was another innovation of the Dean. These are not fixed in stone but carry flexibility in their creation according to the perceived needs of the community. One such new cloister includes within its purview the building of that sector of the vision which involves the Diocese as a whole. We have made a lot of progress in this regard in recent years, but we have not moved along very far from those early days of the Bishop election when I was asked, “What is the purpose of a cathedral?” and, “What are my expectations of a Cathedral?” My answer then and now was and is, “What are yours?” It is a question we are living into, and is an important one in the conversations to come with new Dean candidates. Pastoral concerns have essentially guided previous searches. I feel that the healthier environment of the cathedral today affords us a broader and freer inquiry. One of the reasons for the hope that is within us today is the years of hard work on building trust and loving relationships especially between clergy and leadership that has marked Cathleen’s time. I am grateful for that, and was glad to spend my visitation time in celebration for it.
Sermon at Cathedral Church of St Paul, Des Moines—25 May
2014
Have this mind in you, which was in Cathleen Bascom, who
though being Dean of St Paul’s Cathedral did not think it something to hold
onto, but emptied herself and took upon herself the form of a writing graduate
fellow, and a companion wife. Through which she could become a servant of this
fragile planet, our island home, and a partner with her husband Tim for the
wider church. Thus God (I believe) will greatly use her and give her a name
known in far-flung places for making us aware of our responsibility as stewards
of this life and creation; and for the acknowledging of our primary significant
relationships.
We live with a God who cannot be tied down to the limits of
our own understanding of how things should be. Nor can we ever fully predict
our next steps when we give ourselves to God’s purposes. It is how the Reign of
God is built.
The Apostle Paul probably never saw himself crossing the
seas and walking among the strange statues and temples of Greece’s Athens.
Certainly a few years earlier he would have never foreseen himself preaching
about the man Jesus whom he had considered at one time to be a blasphemer. This
same Jesus he was now declaring amidst the skeptics of Athens as risen from the
dead.
I suspect that Paul—the Jewish savant, the Pharisee of
Pharisees—may have dreamed of engaging with the finest Greek Philosophers. He
could, after all, quote their poets, and thought he had a good enough angle on
their virtues yet limitations of their religiosity. He could have held his own
in debate like our own Murphy Burke. But here he was, finally at that pinnacle
of academic esteem, but no longer on his own terms, but on the terms given to
him by God.
“This man Jesus, God raised from the dead.” His message was
without precedence and it was without logic. It was crazy talk to such a
sophisticated crowd, and if you read on you find out that they laughed him out of town. This was one of the most
extensive narratives of Paul the evangelist at action with a new people (those
without a Hebraic foundation) and he failed miserably.
Paul emptied himself of his own message—one that could have
been crafted of his own cleverness and imagination—and he refused to hold on to
his reputation—even to himself—as a teacher and a potentially world-renowned
philosopher, and took upon himself the form of a messenger of the Gospel of
Jesus Christ. (He became, by the way, the most famous theologian in history). I
am sure he suffered because of his stance—humiliation certainly, rejection and
scorn (which could only have hurt his self esteem) and eventually he endured
physical threats and injury. We know he ultimately lost his freedom and his
life.
And all of this was for a message that did not stand up to
reason, that did not come from his cleverness. Later he would see in this, God
with us, reconciling the world unto God’s self.
We are all invited to walk down this path as followers of
Jesus Christ. We are all invited to become messengers of a Gospel that
scandalizes and brings scorn. Soon I will pray for confirmands to be
strengthened for the service God has for them. The key word is God, and it is implied in that very
prayer that they are willing to look for and be open to that work—to discern
the avenue of service and to empty themselves to make room for it. We all have
to decide how to find the energy and the time and space to bring God’s purposes
into our lives, and to let our lives assume their form.
Yesterday we lay to rest the ashes of a beloved priest of
this Diocese and the Diocese of NW Texas. Bob Hedges was the founding
vicar of St Timothy’s WestDes Moines—there from 1956 -1981. And from
where was he sent forth to West Des Moines? That’s right—from his curacy at the
then parish of St Paul’s Des Moines! So let Jonathan know what you expect of
your curates! Twenty-five years planting a church in Waukee when he is finished
here!
Time and time again—by family members, by friends, it was
said of Fr Bob that he didn’t know how to retire. And so at 88 years of age, he
succumbed to cancer, but never gave up his calling as a priest. We never do,
nor do we cease from being servants of Jesus Christ whether ordained or non-ordained.
Fr Bob’s church in Texas went over to the breakaway Episcopalians, but that never stopped him from continuing to meet with the leaders he had
known. He was an active reconciler his entire life. He followed the message of
Jesus that, “I and the Father are one, and so are you.” Or in today’s Gospel, “On
that day you will know that I am in the Father, and you in me and I in you.
Those who love me will be loved by my Father, and I will love them and reveal
myself to them.”
Paul did not have his own message. He preached what he was
given—what was revealed to him. Fr Bob did the same, and so it is for us all.
There really is never any retirement from this nor any
resignation. There are just different places to bring the message and different
methods in different contexts. This is true not only for us as individuals, but
also as communities. And this is a challenge for you as the people of the Cathedral
Church of St Paul in your search for a new Dean. For over the next few months, you are going
to be visited by a number of potential candidates who are going to ask you
point-blank about your message to this world. Peter the Apostle in his epistle,
which also makes up today’s readings, puts it this way: “Always be ready to
give an account for the hope that is within you.” What is the hope you are
offering the world, and what is it based on?
Peter’s focus is on a hope that is surrounded by
difficulties. The early church had none of the comforts and protection that we
receive. There was no Church pension in those days. The good news they proclaimed
was for a people who lived in dark times. And it has to be said this good news
of light is intended to shine more brightly in such places. It turns error into
truth, sin into righteousness and even death into life. And as such, this very
characteristic of the good news allows us to become people of risk and of
courage. We can leave the safety of following a God we make sure we know or
think we know—and even dare to imagine we control—to following a God who keeps
revealing new things about Himself as we go along. Now don’t get me wrong—God
gives us the freedom to limit God as we put our own needs first, and often we
get what we ask for when we don’t make room for what God reveals to us. But our
real foundation for hope comes from having the boldness to follow God as openly
as possible.
Jesus says that it is love that makes such boldness
possible. Love is the driving force of our entire mission. “If you love me, you
will keep my commandments. And I will ask the Father and He will give you
another Advocate to be with you forever. You know Him because He abides in you
and He will be in you. I will not leave you orphaned.”
As one commentator puts it, “Orphans are bereft of their
natural supporter. That is how the disciples would feel when Jesus was no
longer with them in the form to which they had grown accustomed. But they need
not feel that way. He would come back to them.”
No—not in the form to which they had grown accustomed; but
yes—to that form which they would come to describe as the Holy Spirit; a form
which we, centuries later, would equally be able to discern and describe.
The truth is that we all come and go, attached to those
forms to which we have grown accustomed. But how does the Church remain? How
does it continue to give an account of the hope that is within it? It does so,
and we do so, through the abiding presence of the Spirit of God—Jesus and God
in an unaccustomed form. The Spirit pours the love of God into our hearts, and
that connects the people of God—connects us—to that hope and truth down the
ages. Can we make room for the life and message and purpose God has for us? Can
we grow beyond the form to which we have grown accustomed? To that same Spirit
who now resides within you all, I entrust you and I invite you to entrust
yourselves.
Amen
