Sometimes, when we are in the thick of a struggle or crisis, we lose perspective. That is perfectly normal. When we are able, stepping back can help us find new eyes to see. This can be a great gift of sabbath time. This is my prayer.
My son and I were awed as we drove through miles and miles of redwoods, and as we visited Muir Woods. Daron is pictured here at the foot of a tree that has lived more than 1,000 years. It is not possible (at least not with my iPhone camera) to capture the full height of this beauty or of countless trees as we made our way through forests, winding our way north toward Oregon.
I am moved to silent reverence as I contemplate the difference between the limited perspective of my son’s short life (and mine for that matter) versus the wisdom of a tree that has lived a millennium, that has witnessed so much.
It is easy to become the effect of our immediate life experience, to get highjacked by it whether we perceive our circumstances as positive or negative, or as a source of hope or of despair. It is important to remember that while we have our experience we are not our experience. Though it may not seem so in the moment, we are simply beloved creatures made in the image of the One who has created everything that is. Though it may not seem so, we are held tenderly in the Heart of all hearts.
Recently my son and I went on a 3-day pilgrimage to Selma and Montgomery. We were part of a small, diverse group of clergy leaders from Jacksonville. This gracious group welcomed my son, who joined us everywhere, including in the sacred circle of listening and sharing we formed upon arrival and which we returned to throughout our journey.
This was a time of challenge, discomfort, grief, and angst. It was also a time of great hope as we committed to one another to continue meeting, sharing, and growing. As one participant stated: “For me this is not a ‘one and done’.”
Pictured here is my son in a park at the edge of the National Memorial for Peace and Justice, which memorializes victims of lynching. Ida B. Wells has described lynching as our national crime. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, she reported courageously on crimes of lynching, providing essential documentation for executions that might not otherwise be traceable.
My hometown of Jacksonville, FL continues to do the work of identifying, researching and memorializing victims locally that also are remembered at this site in Montgomery. I will continue processing and leaning into this work. I know in many ways I am just at the beginning. Discomfort is a given. Discomfort is a small price to pay as we acknowledge and begin healing from these collective crimes and the residual continuing impact of racism on all of us regardless of the color of our skin or our “social location.”
Imagine the discomfort of one who was lynched for the supposed crime of vagrancy. Or of those pursued by angry mobs who participated in — and witnessed by the thousands — their vicious torture and executions.
If this topic makes you uncomfortable, I say Hallelujah! Join us in this messy, awkward journey of collective healing. Join us as we uncover and discover the deep roots and legacy of racism and oppression in our midst. We must persist.
Tomorrow marks three weeks of this sabbatical season. Entering into this space has been incremental and will continue to be so; it wasn’t until two weeks in that I began to feel I’d arrived at the beginning of this journey.
Rest, prayer and an embrace of slowing down and practicing presence are the fruits so far. No amazing insights. However, I will share a special verse from Nan Merrill’s contemplative translation of Psalm 119, prayed yesterday with a beloved friend, the mother guardian of the Little Sisters of St. Clare:
Recognize your anger as unfulfilled desire, and lift your thoughts to higher planes; For those who act out of anger separate themselves from Love; While those who live in harmony shall know peace, assurance, gratitude, and love.
Anger is an emotion we are given as part of our creation. It can be a teacher. A useful tool, inspiring us to take stock and at times to take action. It helps to remember that while we have anger, hold anger, even sometimes feed anger, we are not our anger. We are beloved children of God, designed to radiate Love. When we allow ourselves ultimately (in God’s perfect timing) to make room for this reality, we become complete.
This morning I watched the sun rise over the Atlantic. The first full morning of my sabbatical time — a much needed respite and time for exploring with my son. He is in film camp while I am left to enjoy the beautiful salt air. “The first step to learning to respond well and appropriately to others is to learn to respond well to yourself,” a friend aptly shared. The theme I am bringing into this season involves renewing, refueling and putting the oxygen mask on myself first. It is about coming to know self in a deeper way, with compassion and love.
This summer’s journey will entail a road trip to see dear friends in Savannah, precious time with Cousin Fred on Beech Mountain and with cousins Don and Ben in Virginia. I’ll also spend time in Birmingham, AL, deepening my understanding of the deep roots and pervasive sin of institutional racism. My son and I will watch the San Francisco Giants play ball and take a road trip up the coast to Washington State, where I’ll spend time playing, praying and worshipping with my beloved Little Sisters of St. Clare. As the summer unfolds, I will share photos, art and a few words when inspired. In the meantime, may we be awash with this blessing from St. Clare:
Live without fear. Your creator has made you whole, always walks with you, and loves you as a mother. So follow the good road in peace. And may the blessing of God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, be with us this day and forevermore. Amen.
(Photo taken at Lake Logan near Canton, North Carolina.)
After the Christmas break, my son began attending a new elementary school. The decision to move was not made lightly but transitions can be challenging. As we moved through the first few weeks, I prayed a lot and there were tears all around. And yet the staff of this school have been outstanding: supportive, compassionate, firm when necessary – but always loving. As my son and I found our way, I never once doubted that the teachers and staff had his best interest at heart. Within two weeks, we knew the head of security, the nurse, the counselor, the front office staff, the bus driver and the teachers: A village of support and care.
Just yesterday, I picked my son up early from school for an appointment. It was great to see Mr. B and Miss G. They shared my excitement at my son’s progress in adjusting to a new environment and routine. Just that morning he’d told me “I don’t go to school because I have to. I go because I want to.” I shared that with Mr. B, and he was filled with a palpable joy. He said “I love your words! I don’t know what it is, but I always love your words.”
I was surprised and grateful, considering that at the beginning of term, I was often frustrated by the time we got to school. Transitions are challenging and can bring up all sorts of fears and anxiety. Yet it is a relief to imagine that I had shared hopeful words even on those days. Not because I am some spiritual giant. But because I move in a community of the faithful. And the willingness of Mr. B and others to meet us where we are was life-giving to me – and in turn must have evoked a life-giving response from my tired, frazzled self.
Words always have an impact. They are informed by the company we keep and the community in which we move. My congregants and our outreach volunteers will attest that I am fond of saying “All ministry is mutual.” In these challenging times, we are all pandemic weary. This weariness, combined with an already highly divisive political and social environment, has resulted in a perfect storm. We needn’t look far to find folks who will welcome another with whom to commiserate. We needn’t look far to find platforms for venting frustration and anger, for tearing down rather than building up.
Still, if we are intentional about it, we need not look far to find dialogue that is uplifting, that generates a sense of welcome and care. That is life-giving.
Where and with whom we choose to spend our time and energy is important. There is a ripple effect, and it is mutual. Words do matter – and they are informed by our choices.
We enter a New Year with a sense of caution but also with great hope.
Recently someone asked me what title I might give the year 2020. The first thing that came to mind was “holy grit.” Many of us have learned in a new way what it means to dig deep to mine the dregs of our spiritual and emotional reserve. It is messy, exhausting, and at times desperate.
I have watched friends walk through painful events – things that, under more ordinary circumstances would be extremely trying: loss of loved ones to cancer, to COVID, to alcoholism and addiction. Loss of jobs, delay of opportunities that this time last year had been within reach. In June a man in our pantry line shared that he was next to be rehired at his company – just as soon as the pandemic is behind us.
The tragedies and challenges have at times seemed unjustly harsh and relentless, wreaking havoc, one after another. In moments of utter exhaustion and emotional depletion, when it can seem that the universe is unnecessarily cruel, how do I explain to someone in the midst of their suffering that God loves them? That Christ is with them?
At this writing I just learned of two friends who had to say goodbye to a cherished adult son, who was on life support following a sudden cardiac event. Life can be so cruel. Surrender is the only way through. To trust that somehow God will make a way for us. Somehow there will be enough to sustain us. An old friend long gone used to say “You always get what you need but never five minutes too soon. Never a nickel more.”
A stable with a manger: definitely not a nickel more for Mary, for Joseph. Yet they surrendered though the circumstances were not ideal, were not what they imagined or dreamed. When the angel Gabriel visited Mary, marking the beginning of a series of events that would forever change her life, forever change the world, she responded May it be with me according to your word. Even as she agreed, Mary surely could not imagine how all that she was told would come to pass, how events would unfold over the years. If she could, she may not have said yes.
We will always have questions, many unanswered at least in the ways we’d like them answered, especially when the heat is on. For me this requires daily – sometimes moment-by-moment – surrender. It requires digging deep, leaning on prayer and an inner reserve of grit to keep going, to focus on what I can affect rather than being victim to those things outside my control.
We must dare to believe that the light shines most brightly in the darkness and the darkness did not overcome it. Sometimes, as we peer into the night of our lives, all we can find is the faintest glimmer, and sometimes only after much waiting, much seeking. But that glimmer is enough.
(Photo taken in Philadelphia in October at a retreat for those engaged in street ministry)
The following sermon was offered at St. Mary’s Episcopal Church, Jacksonville, Fl, on the Day of Pentecost, Sunday, May 31, 2020, by The Rev. Canon Beth Tjoflat.
Numbers 11:24-30 Psalm 104:25-35, 37 1 Corinthians 12:3b-13 John 20:19-23
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May I speak in the name of God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen.
We live in challenging times. Today we celebrate the gift of the Holy Spirit,
A gift that is intended to equip us for times and circumstances such as these.
Just over a week ago I was
chatting over the fence with some of
the people lining our block, waiting their turn
to receive groceries from the pantry.
When someone asked, “What’s new, pastor?”
I mentioned that the Feast of Pentecost was coming up.
Someone else responded “Penta-what? What’s that?”
Before I could respond, a man a few squares ahead of him,
one of our Church Without Walls regulars,
announced with conviction, “the Comforter!”
He was right.
Only the Holy Spirit is more than that.
It empowers us, gives us courage,
strength and wisdom.
This spirit within us gives us the very
power and authority of Jesus.
This is good news.
Still, this can also be perplexing and quite daunting to ponder. Even so, it is Good News!
This past week the pain and brokenness
in our communities spilled over with
the senseless killing on Monday of George Floyd –
and African American man who died when
an arresting officer knelt on his neck.
Floyd said he couldn’t breathe but none of
the officers looked out for him.
Somehow their duty to serve and protect
in their minds didn’t apply to this man.
Floyd lay on the pavement, handcuffed,
cruelly pinned, until he was dead.
Some weeks before that, another senseless killing
of a black man Ahmaud Arbery – just up
the highway from here, near Brunswick –
left us stunned.
We were grieved and confused to hear about
Breonna Taylor who was shot 8 times by
officers who entered her home with a no-knock search warrant. The man they were looking for had already
been apprehended.
These tragic events seem to keep coming,
tearing at our collective souls – yet especially
they create a sense of fear and righteous anger
in people of color – people who suffer from
a breadth and depth of inequality
that seems to increase not decrease.
They suffer from the sin of racism that infects us all,
whether or not we are conscious of it,
whether or not we are willing to name it.
My friend Dee – a white woman and resident
of our Springfield neighborhood –
was interviewed at the protest yesterday
here in downtown Jacksonville.
She said she decided to participate after asking
some black friends what she could do to make
a small difference.
Dee’s advice to us: Be in the conversation.
Be willing to explore racism in our community.
Don’t let fear of saying the wrong thing
stop you from engaging in the dialogue.
These are wise words that deserve
our consideration and response as members
of the body of Christ.
They are a call to action.
We may feel powerless or unsure of what
we could possibly do.
The Holy Spirit is a gift given
for times such as these.
The power and authority of Jesus rests
upon each one of us.
These incidents — and the protests and unrest
manifesting in their wake — come to us as
we are reeling from a pandemic that
continues to unfold around us.
As followers of Jesus we are called to
make wise choices, to consider the vulnerable
and most at risk.
“Will I wear a mask?
Must I continue to practice social distancing?”
Until there is a vaccine widely available to all,
the answer for followers of Jesus is a resounding “Yes!”
Yes, these are challenging times.
Most people I speak with report that they
are have been riding an emotional rollercoaster since the onset of the pandemic. I know I have.
These waves of emotion are unpredictable
– they just come.
Along with this, many of us are experiencing a sense
of exhaustion –and wonder how this can be.
For some – especially those of us who still have jobs,
who have a roof over heads and food to eat –
there is a sense that we should just be grateful,
that we shouldn’t feel pain or fear.
And yet these are very human responses,
Responses for which we can make room.
As horrible as Covid-19 is, we know it is
not the only global pandemic we face.
A spirit of divisiveness continues to infect
our world and our country.
This is not unique to this moment in time
but it has been amplified of late.
It is amplified by so-called leaders,
by TV personalities on the left and the right
and by people who at the heart of it are
shot through with fear.
An internal fear that is not explored over time
will be covered over, only to be turned outward
as hate.
We must pray and work toward instilling
the spirit of unity that has made
our country great in past times of crisis.
The Pentecost was made for times such as these.
Jesus breathes his spirit upon us so that
we can do the very hard work of loving our
neighbors as ourselves.
We can do the hard work of standing with
those who are oppressed and marginalized.
The challenging work of calling out racism
and prejudice when it visits our communities,
our homes and our hearts.
In recent weeks, during Morning Prayer
worship on Zoom, we have been praying a
moving litany for the pandemic.
In a prayer for frontline workers, we ask God to
give them strength beyond their strength,
to give them courage beyond their courage.
These same words we can pray for one another,
for our families, friends and the wider community.
We live in challenging times.
But we belong to the One who
always has our back.
He asks us to stand with those most vulnerable.
To have the backs of all our brothers and sisters.
As we confront our sin and the sin within
our community, within long-standing institutions,
we will no longer be stuck.
We will be set free.
In these turbulent and uncertain times,
Jesus gives us his peace.
He gives us the power and grace to love Him
with all our strength and might.
He gives us the power and grace to love
all our neighbors – to love them as ourselves.
Amen.
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If you would like to make a gift to support our outreach, you may do so online at: St. Mary’s.
In this week’s Gospel reading (John 10:1-10), we encounter Jesus, the good shepherd. And yet in this passage he does not refer to himself explicitly as the good shepherd. Instead he tells his followers, I am the gate. I am the gate for the sheep.
In my last post, I made peace with the wall that separates St. Mary’s from the rest of the world. This week I find myself thinking about our gate. As we continue operating our food pantry, we do so without opening our campus as we did in more carefree days. Instead, people distance themselves safely from one another as they wait along our sidewalk in a quick-moving line that brings them ultimately to the wrought iron gate that stands in front of our sanctuary steps.
I pray for all who are facing food insecurity, but especially this day for those who never in a million years thought they’d find themselves in a food line. It is a foreign experience for them, jarring, humbling, maybe even embarrassing. This kind of suffering may be new to them. It is also equalizing. We all are just “slobs on the bus, trying to find our way home.” Being forced to let go of the self-image we may have cherished, having the scaffolding of a life carefully constructed, suddenly damaged or ripped away — this is not something for which most of us would ever hope. But still, when it happens, when we find ourselves in an untenable position, we can find hope there. We can find something so sure and true, something that maybe we never knew we had, something we secretly feared would not be there to carry us.
In his beautiful Sabbath poem, Wendell Berry asks, Why must the gate be narrow? Because you cannot pass beyond it burdened. To come in among these trees you must leave behind the six days’ world, all of it, all of its plans and hopes. You must come without weapon or tool, alone, expecting nothing, remembering nothing, into the ease of sight, the brotherhood of eye and leaf.
At times I have used this poem as part of a graveside liturgy but find that it works for any kind of loss. It speaks so beautifully of the blessing of letting go, of the deep discovery that is possible only when we surrender everything we know and everything we are. Even then, we can’t know what the next step might look like. But if we can manage to let go – if we can at least loosen our grip — the gatekeeper will open the gate. And we will hear his voice. We will find our way.
If you are able to, please support food ministries in your community. If you would like to support St. Mary’s, you may do so here:Giving to St. Mary’s.
In this week’s Gospel reading (John 10:1-10), we encounter Jesus, the good shepherd. And yet in this passage he does not refer to himself explicitly as the good shepherd. Instead he tells his followers, I am the gate. I am the gate for the sheep.
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