From the Baptismal Covenant: Will you strive for justice and peace and respect the dignity of every human being?

Every human being? Really?

When I was 17, I traveled to India on a student exchange program, where I encountered a depth and breadth of poverty I had not witnessed before as a sheltered, suburban kid. That was a few years ago, but one indelible memory lingers, a moment as I passed through a crowded train station. A boy about my age was lying face down on a dolly with four wheels, pulling his way along the platform at breakneck speed, asking for money. His misshapen legs were nothing but bones, clearly unable to support his body. I wondered about his journey. I found myself thinking about our connection, our brotherhood. Why were his circumstances so different from mine? As you can tell, I still think about that.

Years later, I accompanied my daughter as she began work at a school in Tanzania. It was a five hour drive from the airport to the school, a trip through desolate terrain. As we bumped along a rugged two-lane road in the desert, I saw a herd of sheep led by a young boy, maybe ten years old. He was out in the middle of nowhere. No village, no parent in sight. Why wasn't he in school? Did God have his eye on this young man as much as God had his eye on my own son?

Last Thursday, an editorial appeared in the N.Y.Times written by Elizabeth Bruenig, discussing ways that the American Catholic church is responding to the current crisis in race relations. The column quoted Gloria Purvis, who hosts a popular Catholic radio show. Her show recently featured episodes devoted to saints who resisted racism, and the reality of systemic racism itself. Her comments set off a wave of recrimination from indignant listeners. Those attacks caused her to say: Racism makes a liar of God. It says not everyone is made in his image. What a horrible lie from the pit of hell.

Nkose Johnson died of AIDS at age 12 in South Africa. Before he died, he spoke to an AIDS conference of thousands, sharing the wisdom of John Wesley who said: Do all you can with what you have in the time you have in the place you are. The experience of this young boy was chronicled in a book by journalist Jim Wooten. The title of the book: We Are All The Same.

I'm not sure why all these images came to me this past week. I'm not entirely clear on the message behind them.  But we are experiencing so much division in our world. Tribalism of the worst sort. The church at its best hears words of scripture that we are in this together. We are all the same, if for no other reason than the one articulated by St. Paul: All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. The gospel invites us to another way, reflected in biblical passages above.

Our Prayer Book speaks of the bonds of our common humanity. In the baptismal covenant, we not only promise to respect the dignity of every human being. We also claim to see Christ in all persons, reflecting Gloria Purvis' creed that says everyone is made in God's image. Everyone. We are all the same. Or as Dr. King said, we are "caught in an inescapable network of mutuality" and "tied together in the single garment of destiny."

Think about the expansiveness of that vision this week. In your mind, and in your practice, how do you see the dignity born by every human being? Is it hard to believe? Is there anyone outside of that window? Is it someone in your family, your church, your workplace? Is it someone with a different religious or political point of view? Is it someone who looks different than you? How might you grow just a bit this week in respecting the dignity of every human being? Every one.

I guess what I want to share this morning is that it's a growth edge for me. Maybe it is for you, too.

I carried that wisdom with me throughout ministry. It's been important over the years as I have come to hear too many stories of folks wounded by organized religion (or disorganized religion in the case of the Episcopal Church). Maybe you are one of them. If so, I pray you will know healing and blessing.

As a representative of organized religion (i.e., clergy), I am haunted by this verse in the psalms: Let not those who hope in you be put to shame through me. (Psalm 69:7) I confess that I've done that.

"Do no harm." In subsequent years, I would apply that wisdom with teenagers when we participated in work trips. Small groups of teenagers would be sent to do home repairs. Very few had construction experience. Many had short attention spans. Some were more interested in, how shall I say, social life. There was no way I was qualified to serve as foreman. So as we would begin our work, I prayed with fear and trembling for the safety of our young people. I prayed for the well-being of the residents. I implored the teenagers, as we were given opportunity to enter these residents' lives, to work on their homes: "Do no harm."

Over the years, that didn't seem quite enough. I added a related bit of guidance. I offered a simple challenge for our efforts: "Let's leave the place better than we found it." It was reassuring to me when I heard that same instruction from a wise guide, Cookie Cantwell, who does amazing work with young people at our church. Again and again, as she gathers, leads and inspires our youth, she teaches them that they don't have to do anything super-human. They simply have to take a step toward something better. They are called to make a difference, even if it's a small one.

That challenge applies to our own journeys of faith, in our homes and churches, in our culture. As we have celebrated the life, ministry and witness of John Lewis, I came across words he addressed to a group of young people: "We must use our time and our space on this little planet that we call Earth to make a lasting contribution, to leave it a little better than we found it, and now that need is greater than ever before." Leave it a little better than we found it. John Lewis did that. In the face of daunting challenges, this wisdom provides accessible steps forward. You don't have to do everything. But you can do something. Progress not perfection.

It's wisdom expressed by St. Paul in the letter to the Philippians, an excerpt printed above. Paul reflected on his own spiritual journey. There were things about his past that he regretted, ways he had done damage. He had fallen short. But giving up the hope of a better past, he instead strained forward to what lies ahead, keeping his eyes on the prize. For us, it's the same, keeping our eyes on the prize, language from the New Testament that animated the movement for civil rights in this nation. It can help us take the next steps in our own journey.

I don't know if you're feeling this way, but as I think about our broken world, about the considerable coincidental crises we face, crises of health, economics and race relations, the enormity of these challenges seems daunting. That's precisely the moment to ask the Holy Spirit to guide us this week to maybe just that one thing, perhaps a very small thing, that we can do to make things better, more healthy, more holy, more whole.

Back in the day, I did a fair amount of traveling for RenewalWorks, often meeting in churches in towns I'd never visited before. I loved the adventure, the exploration, the learning. With the help of Google, I'd find my way, but I was always glad to see signs that confirmed I was on the right track. The signs read: The Episcopal Church welcomes you. I could spot them a mile away. I'm grateful for them. Good branding. As far as it goes.

In recent days, I've had occasion to think about what it means to be welcoming. Our church is putting together a parish profile. I'm reminded that every profile I ever read describes the church as welcoming. My experience of church visits can suggest otherwise. The folks who craft those profiles are usually folks at the core of those communities, folks who feel the welcome, which is wonderful. I contrast that with the young woman I met on the steps of a church in a big city. She looked up at the imposing façade and asked: Am I allowed to go in there?

Last week, Scott Gunn, Executive Director of Forward Movement, smart guy, faithful disciple, creative Christian, wrote a reflection after nine years as leader of that ministry. He's done an amazing job, and we are all grateful to him for his leadership. His reflection included comments about the state of the wider church. He explored the quality of our welcome.  He wrote: "We need a new slogan. 'The Episcopal Church welcomes you,' sets up a dynamic of a club to which new members of many kinds will be admitted, rather than a mission-focused, outward facing movement in which we seek to make disciples of all nations. It isn't enough to be nice to people who show up in our churches. We need to get out there and invite people to know the transforming grace of Jesus Christ. We need an active urgent slogan - because we need to be urgently active in the world."

I've played around with supplemental slogans over the years, as I've sensed what Scott more ably articulated. Our slogan has been plenty nice. It's key. But it may not go far enough. Our church in Chicago embraced the following vision: If you come here, you will grow. That helps get at the transforming quality we seek in church, the challenge of the gospel we need in our culture these days. But I'm not sure it says enough about how we connect with the world, or how in the language of RenewalWorks, how we pastor the wider community.

I was thinking about this in morning reflection time last week, as I read from the final chapters of Paul's letter to the Romans. The passages represent his summing up comments, his so-what factor for this church in a culture not unlike our own. Among other things, he offers this instruction, which might not be a bad slogan: "Welcome one another as Christ has welcomed you." (Romans 15)

I like this, because it is rooted not in our own benevolence but in belief about God's action in Christ, the ways we have been welcomed. It is rooted in a doctrine of grace, of love from which we can never be separated. Think about ways that you in your spiritual journey have been welcomed by Christ. How would you describe that experience? (Maybe you want to journal a bit about that this week.)

Think about how Christ welcomed those he met. By going outside his comfort zone, emptying himself as the letter to the Philippians describes it (included above). By crossing religious, ethnic, social, gender boundaries of his day. By meeting with people he shouldn't have met with. By offering them a path to transformation, a new way of life. By finding what God was up to in the neighborhood, among Samaritans and other foreigners, criminals, outcasts, scary people possessed by demons, lepers, pariahs, Pharisees, tax collectors, soldiers, rebels, rich people, poor people, and marvel of marvels, good, religiously observant people. Each one of us fits in there somewhere. Each one of us has had grace extended to us. A sign that we really know that grace will be our ability to show that grace to others.

And once we've reflected on how we have been welcomed, perhaps we can explore ways to welcome others in that spirit. What would that look like?

Don't get me wrong. I'm grateful for those signs of welcome on street corners. Maybe they just need to say more, something like "The Episcopal Church welcomes you as Christ has welcomed all of us."

We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly.                        

-Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

The story is told of Mayor Laguardia (airport namesake...not necessarily an honor, but that's another column). He showed up at a night-time courtroom in 1935. An older woman was on trial for stealing a loaf of bread. The Mayor had taken the place of the judge, as mayors were permitted to do. The woman explained that she stole the food because her unemployed daughter (a single mother) and children were hungry, presumably victims of the Great Depression. The woman admitted her guilt. The Mayor sentenced her to a $10 fine or 10 days in prison. The woman noted that if she had $10 she wouldn't have stolen bread. She agreed to be imprisoned, but wondered who would care for her family. The Mayor pulled out $10 and paid the fine. Then he addressed the whole group gathered in the courtroom. He said that he was charging everyone in the room 50 cents for living in a city where an old woman has to steal bread to feed her family. They collected almost $500 and gave it to the woman.

These days, I'm feeling like someone in that courtroom. That may be why I love this story, so much so that I've probably included it in this column before. Scanning the internet, some doubt its veracity. I'll simply say that if it's not true it ought to be. If nothing else, it's a parable shedding light on what systemic challenges are all about.

This story came to mind as I thought about the community in which I now reside. A wonderful place. In the middle of the night last week, without fanfare, protest, or violence, several Confederate memorials were taken down by the city. They weren't destroyed. It's yet to be decided where they'll be placed (A museum? A cemetery?), but for me, it showed wisdom, courage and initiative from our civic leaders. In the very same week, three policemen in our city made national news, caught on tape making vile, racist comments about violent intentions toward local African-Americans. I've been thinking of how, as citizen of this fine town, I'm part of both these developments.

We've just celebrated Independence Day. We give thanks for exceptional freedoms many have enjoyed over the years. The day is one of few secular/national holidays (Labor Day and Thanksgiving are the others) that have made it into the church calendar, with readings and prayers to inform our celebration. It is a holy day, set apart to recognize that our common life is both gift and responsibility. It's interesting to me that the word "independence" does not appear in the Bible but the word "freedom" is all over the place. And that freedom has a purpose. It is meant for service, for life in community. St. Augustine spoke about this responsibility by talking about the God in whose service is perfect freedom.

In the news, there's debate about whether challenges we face are systemic or just the result of individual, rogue actors. It's convenient to attribute the brokenness to a few bad apples. It's more challenging to ask: What's my part?

Our baptismal covenant calls us each to strive for justice and peace. That's a call to connect with our community, to recognize our participation or complicity or indifference to systems that are not just, to seize opportunity to change those systems. We see injustice in those systems: our courts, workplaces, families, schools, neighborhoods, churches.

We are called to work for a world marked by respect for the dignity of every human being. We are the body of Christ, connected to all God's children. Maybe this week, we'll find opportunity to grow in that, to pastor the community, to see what God is up to in the neighborhood, to share good news in word and action, even if it's just a small step. Maybe.

The results I want to report are anecdotal. Hear them with that in mind, but invariably the most common answer I get is that growth came through some kind of crisis or challenge, hardship or suffering. In that crucible, folks got a clearer idea of what mattered, about how resources of faith could help them through tough times.

Our nation now faces three major crises at the same time. Any one of them could have thrown us for a collective loop, crises of health, economics, race relations and justice. So I'm thinking, this may be a time for real spiritual growth. I actually see some of that happening. The hunger for community deepens. Prayer life is enriched. Stories of scripture (many having to do with crisis) speak with more meaning. People of faith take action for equity. Reliance on the power of the Holy One becomes a necessity, as people recognize a need for God. In many ways, the season draws us back to the center, to the basics, to the heart of the matter.

Today is the feast day of Evelyn Underhill, who lived in England (and France) in the first half of the 20^th century. She probably got most attention during the 1930's, a time of striking economic and political challenges. As an aside, it was also during the 1930's that Forward Movement started, in response to economic and spiritual depression, a movement focused on spiritual growth.

But back to Evelyn. A mystic, she was a person who seemed to know not only about God. She seemed to know God. That connection has drawn people of faith to her ever since. I talk about her a lot because early in my work with RenewalWorks, a colleague shared a letter Ms. Underhill wrote to the Archbishop of Canterbury in the 1930's, with her observations of the challenges facing the Church of England in her day. Her pointed comments are aimed squarely at the clergy. In my humble opinion, she could have written it last week to all of us, clergy or not.

In that letter, she said that we look to the church to give us an experience of God, mystery, holiness and prayer. We look to clergy to help and direct our spiritual growth. To put it mildly, she confessed disappointment with what was being offered. She said: "In public worship they often fail to evoke the spirit of adoration because they do not possess it themselves. Hence the dreary character of many church services and the result in the increasing alienation of the laity from institutional forms." Ouch. She goes on to remind the Archbishop (why did he need reminding?) that God is the interesting thing about religion, and that people are hungry for God. In her mind, care for the interior spirit is the first duty of every priest. (Substitute: every person of faith).

You can read the whole letter yourself--it would be worth your while. Here's a link to it. In a time of crisis, she saw opportunity for spiritual growth, and it had everything to do with a return to basics. I don't know about you, but sheltering in place has helped me realize with greater clarity what is important and what is not. I sense these crises are prompting such realizations for our churches. May we never forget that God is the interesting thing about religion, and that people are hungry for God. So hungry.

What would Evelyn Underhill have to say about your spiritual life, and mine? How can the crises with which we all contend prompt our own spiritual growth? What are you learning? How are you growing? What lessons might unfold this week?                                                                              

It's come to this. I'm doing jigsaw puzzles. I've never been that interested. I didn't get the point. But sheltering in place has brought change. I've been presented with challenging puzzles, lots of pieces looking exactly the same. And I'm hooked. I just have to find one more piece. Just one more. One reason I've never done these puzzles is that you spend all this time and end up with some beautiful picture and then you rip it up and put it back in the box. Done.

Reminds me of the book of Ecclesiastes, which we've been reading on a daily basis lately. The key word: vanity. You work hard all life and then it's done and who knows what happens to the work you did. Some jerk follows who undoes it, does it a different way, doesn't get what you've done, doesn't care. If I was in charge of the final edit, I'm not sure I would have included Ecclesiastes in the Bible. But thanks be to God, no one appointed me editor. There it is and here we are, taking in its sometimes puzzling message, which actually may have a word for us this morning.

I grew up the child of an ad-guy, okay a mad man (as in Madison Avenue). My memories were that my father and colleagues were enviably fun and successful, witty and attractive, not to mention well-compensated. Glory days. As decades have passed, as my father has passed, many of those colleagues have ended their lives in isolation, often debilitated, sometimes broke in all kinds of ways that humans break, festive life an ancient memory. Maybe you know similar stories. As I visit nursing homes, I always want to know the stories of men and women who live there. Too often those stories are forgotten. They can't remember. They can no longer speak of them. The stuff of Ecclesiastes.

When I'm leading worship, the blessing I often offer at the end begins: "Life is short, and we do not have too much time to gladden the hearts of those who travel with us." Many people use and love this blessing. It touches people unlike others. I think it's because we all know that life is indeed short. Just blink. The prayer invites us to use the time we've been given for good. The advent of Covid and the tragic death of George Floyd sharpen our attention with pain and urgency. The times in which we live pose this stewardship question: What do we do with the gift of the time we've been given? This day?

Let me tell you about Neva, who came to our 7:30 service every Sunday. She was in her nineties. Nothing could get in the way of attendance. I believe if an earthquake was followed by a blizzard by a blackout by a tornado by a bomb scare by a pandemic, she would still be in church. On the few occasions she wasn't there, I'd phone her. There aren't many parishioners I could do that with in a culture where regular church attendance no longer means weekly. Every Sunday, as she left the church, she would remind me: "Yesterday is history. Tomorrow is a mystery. Today is a gift. That's why we call it the present."

Thanks be to God, in the symphony of scripture, in the choir of biblical voices some of which are dissonant, Ecclesiastes is not the only message. A message of hope in God's future is at the core of scripture, for sure. But let's just listen this morning to Ecclesiastes and ask: What will we do with the gift of this day?

Start by giving thanks for the gift of today, the present. Then maybe ask how to be of service in this day, a day marked by health crisis, economic challenge, racial injustice. Ask how to love God and neighbor more deeply. How to live into values held dear just that one day. Maybe at the end of that day, check-in and see if you were able to live into those values. In our own lives, in our families, in our churches, in our denomination, in our nation, we can give thanks for good things in the past. But we need not focus on former glory days, but on what God asks of us now. As St. Paul said, now is the accepted time. Now is the day of salvation.

Okay, back to the puzzle.

How to remember and honor all those who have died from this virus? 100,000+ names on a wall? Where would you build something so big? 100,000+ stones forming an altar of remembrance? A skyscraper? 100,000+ names read annually? It would take a long time. 100,000+ trees planted to be a forest of new life? I like this idea.

Wiser folks have called for this day to be a day of mourning and lament. On this day, June 1 in 1865, another national day of mourning and lament was declared. The specific focus was response to the assassination of Abraham Lincoln. That one act of violence reflected a deeper brokenness in millions of racist acts. The designated day responded to the wounded character of a divided nation, the great loss of life brought with that struggle.

165 years later, religious and political leaders set aside today as another national day of mourning and lament. It was offered as a response to the milestone reached last week: 100,000 brothers and sisters who died of the coronavirus. Along with that deep wound, we've been reminded of the great racial divide, brought to our attention by video filmed in Minnesota.

It makes us think about the long tradition of lament, a spiritual practice which I'm sure precedes the psalms, some of them perhaps 3,000 years old. But the psalms (the only book of the Bible found in its entirety in the Book of Common Prayer) guide us in this ancient spiritual practice. Lord knows, we need it now.

Consider with me this Monday what it means to lament. There is individual lament, something we can all recognize because suffering is the promise life always keeps, as one of my mentors says. There is communal lament, perhaps the focus for today. Taking psalms as a guide , a prayer of lament consists of four parts, which I offer for your consideration and reflection on this holy day.

Lament begins by addressing God, on some level recognizing a higher power and purpose. Lament, no matter how angry or sad, confused or disheartened, involves a statement of faith, the amazing grace that we often take for granted. When we call, God is listening. So where do you see God in these moments? Can you believe God is listening?

Then claiming God's attention, a prayer of lament articulates a complaint, a grievance, which says a lot about prayer. It says God can handle our anger or grief, our confusion and despair, our pain. I suspect that our feelings are not a surprise to the Holy One. We need not hold back. The Bible tells us so. Read the psalms. Read the book of Job. Hear the words of Jesus on the cross: My God, why have you forsaken me? What would be the complaint, the concern, the pain you bring to your prayers this week? Put it into words today, silently or aloud. And as you ask that question, note that sometimes lament is simply our reflection in a mirror. It includes confession, a complaint of complicity, recognition of our part in the problem, through sins of commission or omission, through our actions or our inaction, through our misguided passions and our stultifying indifference. As Pogo said: We have seen the enemy and the enemy is us. What if anything is your part and mine? Confess that this day.

A prayer of lament involves a request: What do we ask God to do in the midst of this all? What would we hope for? How would you articulate a prayer in these days of pandemic, simultaneously marked by the wound of racism and injustice? How might God use you in fulfilling that request?

Finally, a prayer of lament hangs on to hope, even if it makes little sense. As Jurgen Moltmann said: To live without hope is to cease to live. Hell is hopelessness. It is no accident that above the entrance to Dante's hell is the inscription: "Leave behind all hope, you who enter here." Jim Wallis said: Hope is believing in spite of the evidence and watching the evidence change. With all that in mind, I'm wondering where you can find a glimmer of hope, in your individual and communal prayers of lament? What kind of better world can you imagine?