Celebrating Australia Day, January 26th

Street Art

Art on the streets of Melbourne.

Miracles

I am reading Peter Jensen’s book “The Future of Jesus”. Last year Jensen, the Anglican Archbishop of Sydney, gave a series of lectures on Australian national radio examining whether Jesus has a future in a secular west. Clever cover, mimicking the iPod ad silhouettes.

For Jensen God is "He" and "in the heavens." We are sinners and Jesus is our saviour. He claims for Jesus basic Australian values of “a fair go” for everyone and everyone is “our mate.” He seems unaware that these are basic older testament values that Jesus lifts up from his birth tradition. While Jensen claims a very modern religious perspective he writes from a very traditional theistic understanding of God. His chapter on miracles, in particular, tested me.

Jensen describes the miracles of Jesus as testimony to Jesus’ command of God’s divine powers to intervene in our human realm. If one does not believe in miracles then one does not believe in the divinity of Jesus. He states that God always has the capacity to intervene, if He chooses, though mostly He does not choose.

This, of course, presumes that God is “out there”, an entity that exists remote from our being, reaching down to alter the ways of this realm as He is so moved to do.

I don’t discount miracles. I believe in miracles. I’ve witnessed a few. I’ve been party to a couple (Janer, are you reading?). I know that there is far more than I know or that we can explain. But I don’t accept Jensen’s concept that miracles are the work of God in heaven reaching down to alter otherwise ordained results.

I put the experience of miracle in quite a different realm. It is not God reaching down from “up there” and more the inexorable power of Life, which is God, breaking free of the constraints of this realm and accomplishing that which our rules and ways cannot. Ever play Red Rover? I think of miracle as “Life” breaking through the opposing line and laying claim to more life.

Surely there are times when bodies are broken, or riddled with disease, when circumstances are so bent and twisted that life as we know it can no longer be held, be nurtured, or be sustained. Passing from this realm is the only outcome.

But for reasons we cannot see and cannot know, over which we have no control, that Will for Life (which is God) is so pervasive and persistent, so insistent and intense, that it finds a crack, slips through it, and defies all of our odds, all of the circumstances as we know them, to perpetuate, accomplish, and extend Life here.

Is this because God chose to have mercy on one and not another? Is it because you were better than some one else? Is it because there was more prayer for him than for her? Is it the luck of the draw? Is it because God liked me better than God liked you?

I don’t believe it is about God consciously choosing one course of action over another, or being swayed by prayer to affect one result instead of another, but a matter of God’s Will for Life being so strong and so persistent that if it is at all possible to sustain life here, it will. And does. Perhaps Jesus encourages or enables this Will for Life in those who encounter him, affecting miracles which defy the logic.

Jensen equates Jesus’ resurrection with the miraculous. I don’t consider resurrection miraculous. I consider Jesus’ resurrection to be a glimpse across the realms, through the veil, of life as it continues beyond this place. It is an insight into the ongoing persistence of God, of Life, when life can no longer be sustained in this realm.

Push back. Tell me what you think, what you have experienced. Is there a place for miracles if we do not see God theistically? If so, then how? If not, then do we have to go back to “Our Father who art in heaven”?

I welcome your thoughts. Post them in the comments sections, including your name so that I know who is writing!

41°

I arrived at my brother’s in Adelaide earlier this week after a wonderful 2,100 km drive along the Pacific and Southern Ocean coasts.

What a treat!



I ventured along unmarked tracks (don’t tell the car rental company),





hiked into rain forests,









and climbed down to secluded beaches.

Wonderful!


Adelaide is a quiet, slow paced city, the fourth largest in Australia. Barry and Kay live 10 km from downtown in the seaside suburb of Semaphore.

They’ve put me up in a self-contained pool-side unit at the apartment building they own. It is a bit like “Melrose Place” here with all the tenants gathering around the pool after work for drinks and a swim and not uncommonly sharing a meal.

The beach, with a ten km boardwalk and broad, fine sand, is a three-minute walk away. Fellow tenants have cautioned me about swimming in the ocean, however, because there have been three shark deaths on this stretch of beach over the last year. I figure the Aussies are pulling my Canadian leg but I’ll abide by their advice. I've swum with enough sharks over the last few years and feel no compelling need to do so in the Southern Ocean.

I’ve been doing some reading but generally am having a bit of a problem not having an agenda guiding my every waking moment . . . . Barry assures me I will get over this!

I've added to the list of links on the right of this page two Australian newspapers -- "The Australian" is the equivalent of our "Globe and Mail", "The Advertiser" is a cross between "The Sun" and "The Star."

By the way, it reached 41° here today. Trust me, 41° is hot! Even the Aussies admit that it! Stopped for a short black (espresso) and the guy behind the counter said, "Hey ya mate, hot, no?" Photos of surviving the heat in South Australia with my brother Barry, his wife Kay, their dog QT, and extended family . . .

Startling Contrasts

Sunday in Melbourne I went to St. Michael’s Uniting Church. It is a congregation of the Uniting Church of Australia, formed in 1977 of the Methodist, Presbyterian and Congregational churches, much as The United Church of Canada was formed in 1925. The “Executive Minister”, the Rev. Dr. Frances McNab, is a scholar of the Jesus Seminar. I met him in 2004 at meetings of the Seminar in California. The preacher on Sunday was the Rev. Dr. Louise Harms. Her manner as a liturgist was respectful and honourable.

The organ, while plodding for the hymns (are there no organists out there who can play with vivre????) was wonderful. I know all of the church development gurus say that the organ is history, but I love a pipe organ!!! The hymns were from a 1977 Australian hymnbook and not inclusive in either its language about God or about people. The liturgy seemed disjointed, not integrated, something important to me as a liturgist.


Louise’s sermon was about soul-enhancing and soul-depleting experiences. She worked primarily with the older testament reading of the two mothers with new-born children (1 Kings 3). The first mishappenly rolls onto and smothers her child in their sleep. What a horror! In her grief she takes the living new born of another mother and places her dead child in its place. A dispute arises over the parentage of the living child. The king is asked to resolve the matter. Instead he decrees that it be cut in two. When the birth mother of the child says, “No! Give her the child.” he declares her the mother.

The soul-depleting experience of the first woman spiraled her into further soul-depleting actions. The second woman acted to preserve life, regardless. She enhances life, even if it is not as she would have had it be.

Exhaustion, grief, trauma can so deplete the soul that one can no longer hold life. One often is led to actions that actually destroy life. It is a spiral. How often does an abused become an abuser? Soul-enhancing decisions and actions have a very different impact upon us. And upon others. They build up life and instill in us capacities to live.

After the service at St. Michael’s I made my way to Federation Square, an architecturally hostile environment ala the Libeskin design for the Royal Ontario Museum. The doors to St. Paul’s Anglican Cathedral, opposite the Square, were open so I went in. The morning liturgy was in progress.

I love Gothic cathedrals. I love organ music. I love classical English choral music soaring up into the stone-arched heights (a few alterations at St. Mark’s and . . . )


I arrived just as the Eucharistic (Communion) liturgy was beginning. Vested priests behind railings at the high altar were intoning the traditional words of institution . . . “Lamb of God who takest away the sins of the world . . . . Lord, I am not worthy to receive you . . . . Lamb of God have mercy upon us . . . .“ We sang, “Let all mortal flesh keep silence and with fear and trembling stand . . . . “

The language and symbol of the liturgy spoke of subjugation and supplication. It lauded suffering and implied the necessity of fear of the Lord and sacrifice to appease this One.

As the early Church institutionalized and developed its dogmas around Paul’s focus on Jesus’ death and resurrection, orthodox Christian practice evolved much more into a memorial feast focused upon suffering and death. This traditional liturgy at St. Paul’s struck me as blatantly soul-depleting, demeaning us and our place in God’s realm, insisting that we are worthless beings unto ourselves, unworthy but for the sacrifice of Christ’s body and blood.

Contrast this with the word and gesture at St. Michael’s which opened to worshippers the opportunity for and privilege of enhancing life and soul. It affirmed life, our life, lived in gracious and generous ways as we have seen in Jesus’ life.

Over the last two years, through conversations with St. Mark’s leaders and Faith Formation participants, in discussions with Fellows of The Jesus Seminar, and with readings of progressive Christian thought, I have moved our Communion liturgies towards a more life-enhancing affirmation and away from the orthodox death memorial language and symbol. I’ve seen this as a subtle evolution until Sunday. Experiencing the two traditions side by side I felt smacked by the stark contrast.

I’d welcome your thoughts on this. Have you noticed the change in emphasis? How have you experienced it? How does this shape our evolution as a worshipping community? If it is not about Jesus dying to save us from our sins, is it Christian?

Melbourne

1,100 km later, I arrived in Melbourne late on Saturday.

Dinner at a café on Brunswick Street in the historic North Yarra neighbourhood – photo compliments of my waitress who thought my “accent” was “cute”.

I had planned just one night here but I’ve been so impressed with the what I have seen of the city today I’ll stay through Sunday and start out for Adelaide on Monday.

Trust

The approach to Sydney’s Kingsford Airport last Monday was anything but smooth.

Rocking and rolling, just as we skirted the runway the pilot accelerated and lifted off for a go around. Images of Air France flew through my mind. Other images flew through the tummy of the little girl in the row ahead of me. As we tossed to and fro lifting off, I reached around the seats and said to the young Mom, “Give me the baby.” She was traveling with a toddler and a six-month old. It was the toddler who’d been sick.

Without a moment’s hesitation she handed the infant to me.

Full of grins and funny noises the little girl was not the least bit put off at being handed off. My glasses held endless fascination for her and my Kiwi aisle mate entertained her with weird facial expressions.

Meanwhile the aircraft continued to lurch to and fro as we circled for a second attempt at landing. I drew her close in a firm embrace, supporting her head and neck, not wanting to have her pulled from my arms if anything more happened.

With a dramatic thud, bounce, and thud again, we were on the ground.

My Kiwi mate said quietly over the roar of the engines, “She’s asleep.”

She was, face pressed into my neck, breathing smoothly.

Later as I reflected on this experience I marveled at the total trust this infant accorded me, a total stranger. She feared nothing and trusted everything. I thought, too, about the total trust with which 200 passengers accorded to the Air Canada crew flying that 767 and our trust in the technology that had brought has half way around the world. Life is fragile and filled with vulnerabilities. This is true. But trust allows us to live with both. Trust allows us to live.


There was a time when I would have said that this experience was a gift from God. I don’t think of God any longer as an entity “out there” dispensing blessings. Instead, post-conventional, progressive religious thought thinks of God as Life itself. What I experienced was God. As I was trusted and as I trusted I became a part of the Holy Being.

That was a gift.

Still in Sydney

I’ve enjoyed a couple days here in Sydney. It has been stinking hot and I love it, Mary Ethel! Wednesday hiked the 10 km Sydney Harbour National Park Trail at Manly. Certainly not for the weak at heart – frightful cliffside passages – nor for the weak of heart – steep treks down into and steeper out of tropical forest ravines. Welcomed the tamer jungle of Pitt Street when I returned!

Today, Thursday, I pick up a rental car and head south on coastal roads to Melbourne. It is an 1,100 km drive. I plan to be by Saturday. From Melbourne it is another 1,200 km coastal drive to Adelaide where I will be spending most of my Australia time.

Sydney

Sydney

Arrived safely after a very long time strapped in an airplane seat.

Only mid 20's in Sydney today but the sunshine sure is nice!

Time to catch some sleep. Will post some photos mid week . . .

The first photograph is of sunrise over the Pacific earlier this morning.


The second one proves that I AM here!

Vancouver

Vancouver.

Or is that Fogcouver or Rancover?

18.5 hour flight ahead of me tonight . . .

Notify List up and operating

What a dismal day in Toronto today! Rain. Fog. Grey. Dirt. Sydney's 44° could not look more appealing ! ! ! !

The notify list feature is now operational. Just type your email address into the field to the right, submit, and you will receive an email each time I post to this blog.

On-sabbatical

Ah, the first day of my sabbatical leave!

This leave was first proposed to the Church Board of St. Mark's in March of 2003. It was offered as one of two parts to the conclusion of a three-year faith formation programme that would provide members with an opportunity to explore, test, and push our understandings of Christian faith, building a common foundation upon which to claim our faith. The two concluding parts would be an extensive mission assessment (Joint Needs Assessment) of goals and objectives to which the congregation is called in light of our faith and a four month sabbatical leave for me.

The objective of the leave is to provide me with some space after nearly twenty years of pastoral ministry at St. Mark's to step back, breathe, rest and restore. I've found the word "restoration" particularly informative when I think of this time: re - store - ation. After twenty years of preaching, pastoral care, and Christian education I feel a bit like the stores after Boxing Day sales -- the shelves empty, the remaining product strewn about, and the staff weary. This sabbatical leave is a time to restock the shelves, test some new products, and rebuild the inventory!

So, objectives are rest, restoration and reflection as I travel round the world.

My first stop is Australia where I will spend time with my brother, read, and connect with a senior Fellow of the Jesus Seminar, an association of cutting-edge biblical scholars, and leaders of the emerging world-wide progressive Christian movement.

Bali, in Indonesia, will provide me with a chance to engage both Asian and Hindu cultures for the first time while I enjoy the splendour of what I am told is an utterly beautiful land.

I will spend Lent, Passover, and Easter in Jerusalem. During this time I will focus on spiritual alertness as I soak up the sights, sounds, and spirit of this centre of Judaism, Christianity and Islam. It will be interesting to bring the emerging Christian perspectives explored while in Australia to this land of religious orthodoxy! The box of books I’ve shipped to Jerusalem all focus on progressive biblical study.

The final two weeks of my leave will be spent in Paris and London. Paris is my favourite place on the planet. It is always good for my soul when I am there. And in London I will have time to visit with our St. Mark's friends the Naylors.

The phograph of an Indian woman refreshing herself with the sacred waters of the river is symbolic for me of this time.


Stay tuned to this blog. I will post reflections and accounts as I travel. Join the "Notify List" linked to the right and you'll receive notification of when I've added a posting. I welcome your comments and thoughts, too! Post as you will!

OK, time to start packing and getting myself together . . . I have only a couple days before I leave . . .