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46-13th Ave. S Cranbrook, B.C. V1C 2V3

In October, I wrote a column about thoughts and prayers, in which I suggested that if you’re going to say that you are praying, you really ought to be praying.

Today, I want to say something different. It has become increasingly obvious that “thoughts and prayers” are not nearly enough. It’s not enough to pray. I am grateful to those students of Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, who are saying this with an inspiring passion and a holy anger. Thoughts and prayers won’t fix the problem. It’s time for action.

Miroslav Volf, founder and director of the Yale Center for Faith & Culture, agrees. “There is something deeply hypocritical,” he says, “about praying for a problem you’re unwilling to resolve.”

These courageous, inspiring, angry young people are speaking with a gospel voice. They stand against a rampant evil in their country, an evil which has affected their lives for as long as they live.

This evil is not a passive thing. It has recruited thousands of co–conspirators who are busy trying to discredit these courageous young people. “They’re just kids. What do they know?” Or tweeting and re–tweeting false reports with cyber–bots. Or falsely identifying some of these young people as “tragedy actors”. Make no mistake. Evil is alive in our world, and there are thousands of people who are willing to work with that evil to secure their own power and prestige and influence.

Thankfully, these young people continue to speak out. As Emma Gonzalez repeated again and again the day after the horrific massacre, “We call BS” on anyone and anything which tries to say this wasn’t the fault of the gun lobby, “We call BS” on those politicians who feather their nest and seek re–election with the help of the NRA, “We call BS” on anyone who gets in the way of gun reform.

Thoughts and prayers are not enough. But there are some courageous words spoken in the wake of this tragedy which may inspire further action.

I was struck deeply by the opening prayer offered by Rabbi Joe Black at the Colorado State House in the aftermath of the tragedy. It is a powerful lament which speak with brutal honesty about our failure.

“Our God and God of all people; God of the rich and God of the poor; God of the teacher and God of the student; God of the families who wait in horror; God of the dispatcher who hears screams of terror from under bloodied desks; God of the first responder who bravely creeps through ravaged hallways; God of the doctor who treats the wounded; God of the rabbi, pastor, imam or priest who seeks words of comfort but comes up empty; God of the young boy who sees his classmates die in front of him; God of the weeping, raging, inconsolable mother who screams at the sight of her child’s lifeless body; God of the shattered communities torn apart by senseless violence; God of the legislators paralyzed by fear, partisanship, money and undue influence; God of the Right; God of the Left.

“God who hears our prayers. God who does not answer.

“On this tragic day when we confront the aftermath of the 18th School shooting in our nation on the 46th day of this year, I do not feel like praying.

“Our prayers have not stopped the bullets. Our prayers have changed nothing.

“Once again, a disturbed man with easy access to guns has squinted through the sights of a weapon, aimed, squeezed a trigger and taken out his depraved anger, pain and frustration on innocents: pure souls. Students and teachers. Brothers and sisters. Mothers and fathers- cut down in an instant by the power of hatred and technology.

“We are guilty, O God. We are guilty of inaction. We are guilty of complacency. We are guilty of allowing ourselves to be paralyzed by politics.

“The blood of our children cries out from the ground. The blood of police officers cut down in the line of duty flows through our streets.

“I do not appeal to You on this terrible morning to change us. We can only do that ourselves.

“Our enemies do not come only from far away places. The monsters we fear live among us.

“May those in this room who have the power to to make change find the courage to seek a pathway to sanity and hope.

“May we hold ourselves and our leaders accountable.

“Only then will our prayers be worthy of an answer. Amen.”

This is not just an issue for the USA. It is also our issue. A week ago, there was a shooting in Kerrisdale, one of the toniest neighbourhoods in Vancouver, near two elementary schools. There are shootings in the lower mainland, in Calgary and other major cities in Canada. Violence is all–pervasive, including right here in Cranbrook. No one is immune.

One of the tragic ironies in this story is that a week before the shooting, Parkland was named the 15th safest city in the USA, based on FBI crime statistics. It’s a small city, a little larger than Cranbrook. It has a median income which is 2½ times higher than the national average.

In the midst of the hell of Parkland, a gospel word was spoken by young people who are saying, “Enough is enough. No more! We call BS!” That gospel word is also being translated into gospel acts as these courageous young people organize a National School Walk Out on March 14, and the March for our Lives on March 24.

They’re right. Thoughts and prayers are not enough. It’s time to act. As Edmund Burke said in the 18th century, “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good people to do nothing.”

Rev. Yme Woensdregt

 

There’s an old joke about a police officer following a car being driven by a most impatient woman. She honked angrily at some drivers, flipped other people the finger, yelled at pedestrians and other drivers. Finally, the officer pulled her over, and asked for her driver’s license and registration. Perplexed, she asked, “What did I do wrong? Why did you pull me over?”

He responded, “I saw your bumper sticker, ‘Honk if you love Jesus!’, and I saw all your rude behaviour while you were driving. It didn’t match up, so I figured the car must be stolen.”

A friend of mine recently wrote a column with a similar theme. Trevor is an Anglican priest who serves in Kelowna. He writes, “There are times when I don’t want to call myself a Christian. Not because I’m ashamed of my faith, but because the people who use that label are often people with whom I don’t want to be associated.”

I know the feeling. Pardon the language, but the thing I can’t understand is how you can call yourself a Christian and act like an asshole. It happens all the time, and it just blows my mind.

How can you call yourself a Christian and treat other people like trash? How can you claim to follow Jesus, yet treat others unkindly, aggressively, rudely, or roughly? How can you follow the one who calls us to love our neighbours as ourselves and belittle or dismiss those who disagree with us and try to intimidate and bully them?

Trevor continues by writing that to be a Christian means to be a “follower of Christ, and I want to be a follower of Christ. Christ loved when it was painful and called out the powerful for their abuse of those without power. He put away the gun and was executed. He showed that there are no boundaries to God’s love.

“‘Christian’ is a word that this world still needs. What it means is something this world desperately still needs. I don’t want this word to lose all its meaning. I don’t want to cede it to people whose primary agenda is resisting social change or reinforcing existing power structures.”

I can’t say it any better.

I understand all the debates about what’s wrong with Christianity. I get it! But seriously, isn’t this the biggest one? Isn’t the biggest problem with Christians today this disconnected sense between what Christians say and what they do?

I’ve written before about the terrible witness Christians make when we are stained with a reputation for being against everything—against the LGBTQ community; against women exercising free choice over their bodies; against women in leadership; against sex or dancing or drinking; against … well you name it. That’s not what Christianity is about.

Trevor reminds us that “following Christ means imitating Jesus. It transcends ideology, political party, ethnicity, or anything else. It means believing that God is at the centre of all things, and that the best expression of God’s love is the self–giving of Christ. It means that I’m called to act as the servant of all.”

Trevor begins a list:

It’s a good start. What would you add to the list?

Like Trevor, I know that “I don’t follow as faithfully as I should. But my failures don’t change what it means to follow Christ.” Indeed, my failures spur me to confess, repent, and seek grace and strength to begin again.

And that, dear reader, is part of the reason I’m grateful for the opportunity and gift of Lent. I’ll have more to say about that next week.

Rev. Yme Woensdregt

Next week, the church will celebrate a couple of special days in its calendar—Shrove Tuesday, followed by Ash Wednesday.

Shrove Tuesday is better known these days as either Mardi Gras or Pancake Tuesday. It originated as a day of feasting and partying before the discipline of the season of Lent, which begins the following day.

Shrove Tuesday gets its name from the ritual of “shriving”—an ancient word for making confession and receiving forgiveness. Over 1000 years ago, a monk wrote, “In the week immediately before Lent everyone shall go to his confessor and confess his deeds and the confessor shall so shrive him.” (Anglo–Saxon Ecclesiastical Institutes).

From earliest times, Lent was a time to engage in spiritual disciplines. It is still common for many people to ask, “What are you giving up for Lent?” It comes as no surprise that people would want to take the opportunity to celebrate on this Tuesday before the discipline of Lent begins.

The tradition of “Pancake Tuesday” has its roots in the Lenten discipline of fasting. During Lent, people would avoid certain rich foods such as meat, fish, fats, eggs, and milky foods. In past centuries, before refrigeration and pasteurization, such foods could not be preserved. So the community would hold a feast on the “shriving Tuesday” and bake pancakes to use up all the eggs, fats and milk in the house. Churches today still hold suppers on Pancake Tuesday as a relic of this tradition—including Christ Church, so join us at 5:30 pm if you love pancakes!

Mardi Gras has its roots in the same practice. It literally means “fat Tuesday”. In centuries past, thrifty housewives would use up all the fats in the house so that they wouldn’t spoil. These days, of course, it has become a huge party in places like New Orleans and Rio de Janeiro, with parades and costumes and general celebration.

Lent begins the following day, which the church calls Ash Wednesday. While Lent has gotten a bad rep as a joyless season, it is not really so. Lent is a time for Christians to reflect more deeply and more intentionally about our loyalty to God.

In the ancient church, Lent was a time to prepare for the great festival of baptism at Easter. When a person is baptized, they are initiated into the church. We receive the gift of God’s presence in our lives, and in turn we promise to live faithfully as God’s people in the world, “God being our helper.”

On Ash Wednesday, many Christians attend special services at their churches. Worshippers are marked with the sign of the cross on their foreheads with ashes. The ashes are a symbol of mourning, repentance and mortality. It echoes ancient Biblical traditions of covering one’s head with ashes as a sign of sorrow.

In one of the traditional Ash Wednesday prayers, we pray, “Almighty God, from the dust of the earth you have created us. May these ashes be for us a sign of our mortality and penitence.” On Ash Wednesday, we are reminded of our mortality, of the frailty and uncertainty of human life. Despite all our best efforts, we cannot secure our lives on this earth.

It is a day to acknowledge our brokenness as human beings, and our failure to be the best people we can be. To say that we are sinful is not a matter of beating ourselves up. I know there are many whose memories are that the church emphasizes what I call “worm theology” — you  know what I mean: “We’re no good, we’re lower than worms, so forgive us.”

But repentance and confession are not about making ourselves feel bad. When we confess, we’re not saying that there is no good in us. Rather, we acknowledge that we are broken and we need to be healed. We admit that we are lost, and need help finding our way home. We have imprisoned ourselves or been imprisoned, and we need to be set free again. We stop denying that we are often in despair, that we need to be delivered and we can’t do it for ourselves.

Confession seeks healing. We ask to be led home to our truest self, our best self. We seek freedom and liberation.

We come forward to have our foreheads marked with the sign of the cross. We hear the words, “Remember that you are dust, and to dust you will return. Repent, and believe the gospel.” We hear again that we need to evaluate our lives. Are we living as God’s faithful people in the world? Do our lives make a difference for good in the world? Do we attract others to walk in the way of Christ with us?

Then, a few moments later, we come forward again, this time for Communion. We receive the life–giving nourishment of God’s love for us. We are fed, nurtured by Christ’s body within us. We are strengthened and made whole again, ready to proclaim God’s goodness for the world.

Do you want to take some time to re-evaluate your priorities and loyalties? Do you need healing in your life? Do you need to take time to reflect on what’s truly important?

Then I invite you to join us at Christ Church on Ash Wednesday, February 14 at 7 pm.

Rev. Yme Woensdregt

 

 

In Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus calls his disciples by an affectionate name, oligopistoi. The first half of the word means “a little” or “a few”; the second half comes from pistis, the word for trust, or faith. So Jesus called his closest followers “people of little faith”.

Sometimes that word is a rebuke, almost an insult. But the first time Jesus uses the word, it seems to be more affectionate. Early in Matthew’s story, in the middle of the so–called Sermon on the Mount, Jesus poses a rhetorical question: “If God so clothes the grass of the field, which is alive today and tomor­row is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you — you of little faith?” (Matthew 6:30)

The disciples are just listening to Jesus. They have done noth­ing worthy of a rebuke (yet), and the context suggests that this might have been simply an affectionate nickname which Jesus used for his fol­lowers.

In Matthew’s gospel, Jesus does identify at least two people as having great faith. Both of them are outsiders, and both immediately disappear from the story, never to be heard from again. One of them is a Canaanite woman who pes­ters Jesus to heal her daughter. The other is a Roman centurion who insists that Jesus can heal his slave without even going to see him. Jesus commends them for their faith, but as far as the story goes, neither of them became followers.

“You of little faith” seems to have been reserved for his most intimate friends. There’s almost a bantering, teasing quality to it. To be sure, Jesus does use this word in some places as a rebuke. In the story of the stilling of the storm (Matthew 8), it’s quite clearly a reprimand: “Why are you afraid, you of little faith?”

The other time Jesus calls the whole group “you of little faith” oc­curs in a story when the religious leaders of the day ask Jesus for a sign. The disciples don’t get it, and with some irritation, Jesus asks, “Do you still not perceive, you of little faith?” He seems irritated because the disciples fail to understand what Jesus is all about. People of little faith need constant reminding that they are not to take religious teaching literally but to look for the symbolic meaning, but they can learn. In fact, Matthew seems to suggest that the people of little faith are the only ones worth teaching.

But in the Sermon on the Mount, the first time Jesus uses this affectionate for his followers, it is more a gentle nickname, not a rebuke. Jesus seemed to like people for whom doubt was a more characteristic response than faith.

Only once in Matthew does Jesus call an individual “you of little faith”. That was none other than Peter, whom Matthew considers to be the leader of the community after the death of Jesus. It happens when Peter tries to imitate Jesus by walking on water. Jesus invites him to do so, and Peter steps out on the water. When he noticed the strong wind, he became frightened and started to sink. Jesus reached out his hand and caught him, saying “You of little faith, why did you doubt?”

The key insight here is that Jesus entrusted the mission to those of little faith. We are not called to huge tasks, such as winning the city or the country or the world for God. We are called to simple acts of little faith — loving our neighbours; doing good in our everyday lives; seeking peace and justice; working for the healing of our community; living in shalom with all the world.

Later on in Matthew, Jesus tells the disciples, “If you have faith the size of a mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move”, and it will move.” In Luke’s way of telling the story, that is Jesus’ response to the disciples when they ask, “Lord, increase our faith” (Luke 17). A little faith, it seems, is enough.

It’s not about acquiring more faith. It’s about learning to trust God to act in and through us, through our ordinary, everyday, little deeds of faith.

Apparently Jesus did not care to spend much time with people of great faith. He surrounded himself with those of little faith. He was so fond of little faith people that he discouraged them from try­ing to acquire more faith. At least that is the way the gospels present Jesus.

We have a lot to learn from Jesus if we can see him as a friend to those who do not have much faith.

Rev. Yme Woensdregt

Rev. Yme Woensdregt

This is the third column about how we worship at Christ Church. This series came about as the result of a question asked by someone who wanted to know what we do on Sunday mornings, and why we worship in the way we do.

In my first column, I identified Holy Communion or the Eucharist (which is the Greek word for “giving thanks”) as the centre of worship for us. Last week, I talked about being a covenant community, a people gathered together through baptism. Baptism is our initiation; it is also our commitment to live according to God’s gospel values.

This column focusses on two seemingly contradictory elements which nevertheless are closely related: we speak, and we listen in silence.

One of the regular features of worship in almost every tradition of Christian worship is what we call the sermon. For Anglicans, the sermon seeks to comment on the Scripture readings which we have read.

There are normally three readings and a Psalm in Anglican worship. The first reading is taken from the Old Testament. That’s followed by a Psalm, one of the songs which we find in the Bible which is usually a song of praise or a lament. The Psalm is most often chosen as a response to the first reading, and we normally read it together, either in unison or responsively. Then the second reading is read, normally from one of the letters in the New Testament. Finally, we read a snippet from one of the gospels, which are stories from the life of Jesus.

The sermon, as I mentioned, seeks to comment on one or more of those readings. We try to apply ancient literature to contemporary life.

Now, let me be clear. The sermon is not a talk about how to be nicer people, or how to be a better father or mother, or how to make family values part of our life. The sermon is certainly not about becoming more prosperous. It is not a motivational speech, although some may be motivated to live differently as a result of listening to a sermon.

A sermon is intended to help people grow in their faith. A sermon tries to point to those places where God is present in human life. A sermon helps people name their experience in the light of God’s gift of life. A sermon gives us insight so we can discern where we can work in partnership with God for the healing of the world.

We try to get to the heart of what the Bible is saying, and learn how to live as more faithful people of God.

But the sermon is not the only time we speak. We also speak in what we call the Prayers of the People. We bring our concerns for other people into God’s presence. We pray for the world and its trouble spots. We pray for people who are sick or struggling in other ways. We pray for our church, and for other churches in town and around the world.

We entrust the world to God’s care. We make ourselves aware of the world’s ills so that we can discern those places and times where we need to work with God for the world’s healing.

The other element in worship is silence. It is not enough for us only to speak. We must also make time to listen. In the silence, we deliberately and consciously slow down so that we can hear the promptings of the Spirit in our hearts and minds.

Silence is not just about reverence. It is also about combatting all the noise in our world. It is a hard thing for many of us because we live in a world filled with noise—radios, televisions, car audio systems, computers, smartphones, tablets, and so on. In worship, we work hard at building in some silence—moments of silence, really—in which we can listen to the promptings of our hearts and minds. We need silence so that we can listen, so that we can pay attention. So much of the sound in our world is intended as a distraction to avoid this very important task of listening.

We begin with a few moments of silence. There is a brief time of silence following the sermon. There are snatches of silence at various points in worship between various parts of our service. This is a conscious, counter–cultural choice which we make.

Some people say that worship is boring. I suppose that’s so. We are so used to all the distractions around us. But when we learn to listen, really listen, in the midst of that silence, it is no longer a matter of being bored. It’s about seeking to take advantage of an opportunity to practice something different in worship.

We do a few other things in worship as well: we sing (where else do we actually sing these days?), visit with friends as we gather week by week, and check into how others are doing in their lives. We seek to encourage one another in faith.

But these four activities which I have described in these columns—Holy Communion; Baptism; Speaking; and Listening—they are the heart of our weekly practice.

You can learn more here. You could also learn more by joining with us in worship. You would be most welcome.

Last week, I wrote a column about Holy Communion being at the centre of our worship at Christ Church. It was part of my response to a woman who asked me what we did on Sunday mornings in church.

Another conversation this week reinforced for me that there is a whole generation, or perhaps even two, of people who have no memory at all of church. They are completely un–churched. They never went to church as children. They rarely go as adults. They might occasionally go for a special event: a wedding or funeral—but when they do set foot in the church, it feels as if they have stepped into a foreign land. That’s not a judgment; it’s a description of our world today.

Let me continue with this series about what we do in worship at Christ Church. Last week, I began with Holy Communion. This week, let me focus on Holy Baptism. Baptism is the ritual by which people become part of the church. In this rite, they make a commitment to living out God’s gospel values in the world.

Some churches practice baptism by immersion—a person is literally dunked under the water and then lifted up to new life. It is a deep and powerful symbol of dying to an old way of living and rising to a new way. Other churches, including most Anglican churches, practice baptism by sprinkling water over the head of a person. At Christ Church, we use a middle way—a person stands in a tub, and I pour the water over them.

Another difference between traditions is that some churches practice “believer’s baptism”. The understand that baptism is for an adult (or young adult) who has come to believe in Jesus Christ and chosen to walk in the way of Jesus.

Other churches, including Anglican churches, will baptize infants as well as adults. This is rooted in a different understanding of baptism. For us, baptism is not rooted in our individual choice. Rather, it is rooted in the concept of covenant. We are not isolated individuals, making individual choices for or against God. Instead of us choosing God, we believe God chooses us and incorporates us as members of a covenant community. We are all chosen by God as beloved and treasured sons and daughters.

When we baptize infants, we are saying that we trust a God who is calling a covenantal community into being. As you become part of the church in baptism, you are joined to a family. Like a human family, all you need to do is to be born. You are part of a community which promises to pray for you and celebrate with you and hold you in love as you grow.

When we baptize, we also promise to pray for each other, and to work together for the healing of the world. As infants grow up in a faithful community, they learn to live faithfully as God’s people by being part of such a community of faith.

When we think of baptism in this way, it is one of the most profoundly counter–cultural statements we make. I like to call this a “covenantal imagination”. It is the antithesis of the consumeristic and individualistic identity which is held by most North Americans, Christians included.

Baptism tells us that we are not isolated individuals, doing our own thing, and being accountable only to the way we happen to see things. Baptism tells us that we are bound together in community. We make promises to God and to each other. We gradually grow into the kind of community God desires, with indissoluble links to one another, to all who have come before us, and to all who will come after us.

We are baptized only once in our lives. The promises we make, and the community to which we are bound, is for life.

Therefore, we regularly renew our baptismal covenant. From time to time, we fire up our covenantal imagination. We need to remind ourselves of what we have promised. We need to remind ourselves that we are part of a community of people bound together by God’s love. And, like any family, we are accountable to each other under God for how we live. We support, encourage, and pray for one another so that we might all live and work together in partnership for the healing of the world.

We promise to honour God. We promise to resist evil. We promise to proclaim the good news of Christ in everything we do and say. We promise to seek and serve Christ in all persons. We promise to strive for justice and peace. We promise to respect the dignity of every human being. We promise to care for the earth and its environment.

As you can see, these are huge promises. We will never keep the promises completely. As Luther once said, “This life is not righteousness, it is growth in righteousness; not health, but healing; not being, but becoming; not rest, but exercise. We are not yet what we shall be, but we are growing toward it. The process is not yet finished, but it is going on.”

When we are baptized, we are engaged on that kind of journey in which we support and encourage each other as we live with covenantal imagination.

Rev. Yme Woensdregt

Last week, I suggested in my column that people gather as the church for different reasons. Many of us gather because of what we believe and, more importantly, Whom we trust. But we also gather for fellowship, for building community, for being challenged to be the best person we can be. For many people, a church community is a place of belonging. I used the example of the “Sunday Assembly”, the so–called “atheist church” to make my point.

I received many comments about that column, all of them favourable. People appreciated being able to think about why we are part of a church in a different way. So often, we stay stuck in one way of thinking, and when someone points out another way, it opens our minds to different possibilities. I’m grateful for the way my words can help people gain a new perspective.

A woman who read the column called me to ask, “So what do you do in church at the Anglican church?” She wanted to know what we did on Sunday morning, because she honestly didn’t know. As a result, I thought I’d take the next column or two to describe our Sunday morning ritual.

Please remember that I’m describing our practice at Christ Church in Cranbrook. While there are some common elements shared by Anglican churches in worship, there is also a lot of room for local options in the way different churches actually worship.

One more introductory note: the word we use for worship is “liturgy”. It comes from two Greek words which mean “the work of the people”. In other words, worship is something we do together. It is not just the work of the person up front (minister or priest or pastor or MC). At the same time, what we do on Sunday mornings isn’t entertainment. We work together to worship the one in whom we trust.

At the heart of our worship at Christ Church is Holy Communion. It is known by different names in different traditions—the Lord’s Supper or Eucharist. We gather around the Table (also called an Altar) for a meal in which we celebrate the heart of our faith.

This is the central act of worship for us. We tell the story of our faith in our prayer. That story finds its culmination in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus. We give thanks to God for the love which finds us and makes our lives whole. With few exceptions, we gather every week to “eat and drink, remembering that Christ is with us” in every part of our lives.

This is the primary reason we gather—to eat together. We celebrate the goodness of God in a meal consisting of bread or a wafer and a sip of wine. It’s very much like a family gathering, which often involves food.

What that also means is that we don’t gather primarily to hear a sermon or to sing or to listen to a praise band. We gather because Jesus welcomes us to the table where all are one, and where all human distinctions are erased. Around the table, we are equal—equally loved, equally valued, equally worthy.

Everything else we do in worship leads to the Table and flows from it. It is the centre of our worship. We begin by gathering as a community. Then we listen to the Scriptures (usually 3 readings plus reading a Psalm together) and a sermon which seeks to relate the Scriptures to our life today. Then we pray together and sing or say a Creed. Then we get to the heart of our worship, which is Holy Communion. At the end of worship, we are sent into the world to live as God’s faithful people.

As a result, when you walk into Christ Church, you will notice the Table as the most visible symbol in our worship space. Not an organ. Not a pulpit. Not a set of microphones or music stands. Not a display of flowers. A Table.

On the table, you will see a cup (known as a chalice), which we share together. We share heavenly food which is given to us as a gift. As we eat and drink together, we are building the community which has also been given to us as a gift. We welcome all who come. Some people choose not to eat or drink, and ask for a blessing instead. We are happy to bless people in that way as well.

As we eat, the person giving out the bread or wafer will say the words, “The body of Christ, given for you in love.” As we drink from the cup, we hear the words, “The blood of Christ, the cup of salvation.” These are words of grace, words of invitation, words of life.

This is why we gather to worship at Christ Church. This is the Lord’s Table. All are welcome.

You can find more about Christ Church … and then come meet us. We work hard at building a community where all are welcomed.

 

 

Rev. Yme Woensdregt

Have you heard about the atheist church? The formal name is “Sunday Assembly”. It was begun in 2013 by a couple of standup comedians in North London, England, who decided they wanted to do “something like church, but without God.” The purpose of the Sunday Assembly is so that non–religious people who want a similar communal experience to a religious church can gather.

The movement has taken off. There are similar gatherings all around the world, including Calgary, Halifax, Toronto, Vancouver and other Canadians cities. People gather together because they long for a sense of community and guidance which comes from being part of a church.

Korey Peters was an organizing force behind The Calgary Secular Church. In an interview with HuffPost, he said, “I began to miss the church experience, and I thought, ‘Oh it would be a good idea to have a church for the non–religious.’” And so they began to meet.

Groups meet in pastry shops, coffee bars, theatres—wherever they can find a welcoming space. They sing songs which affirm the power of life. They read from various readings which are also life–affirming. There are moments of silence for contemplation. They explore different themes about the miracle of life, or the power of compassion, or the wonder of the world in which we live. They promote virtues such as resilience and humour.

The mantra of the Sunday Assembly in north London is “live better, help often, wonder more.” Since they started five or so years ago, the movement is growing. The really interesting thing it, however, is to see where new Sunday Assemblies are forming. They are all, with one exception, to be found in the western world—western Europe, North America, Australia and New Zealand. The exception is Cape Town, South Africa.

What this suggests to me is that people who live in places which are well–developed are more likely to jettison any religious beliefs. They still hunger for community, an opportunity to gather with others and be inspired. They still need to celebrate, and to wonder. But the answers of traditional religion no longer make sense to them.

All of this got me to thinking.

Most people who go to church do so because they subscribe to the beliefs of that church. I, for example, go because of my trust in God, who is revealed to us in Jesus Christ.

But at the same time, many people who go to church generally accept the doctrine of the church they attend, but don’t necessarily believe it all. Some of them, for example, recite the Creed with their fingers crossed. I myself recite the Creed, and while I have problems with almost every phrase in the Creed, I still want to belong to a community which accepts this way of formulating our Christian faith.

But what about people who can’t believe what any of the churches out there teach? There are increasing numbers of them, mostly because there is no longer any social pressure to be part of a church. There were always atheists … but these days, it’s ok to be one. No one looks at you sideways if you don’t go to church. In fact, they might look at you sideways if you DO go.

But how can you meet basic human needs for community which the church used to fulfill? Where else can you gather these days to talk about virtue, about doing good, about being good?

Where else can you gather these days to form community? I wrote a few months ago about Alain de Botton’s book, Religion for Atheists, in which he names community as the most important element of religious life which the church used to mediate, but no longer does for many people. Where else do you gather with people who share different views of life, and yet form a community which is able to celebrate together, which gathers precisely to wonder at the presence of mystery in human life?

Where else do you gather with people who are different than you are, and who end up becoming friends simply by the act of gathering? Where else do you spend time in your life meeting with different folks who challenge your way of thinking and help you to view life from another perspective?

Where else do you build some space in your life for contemplation and silence, where you can retreat for an hour from the noise and busy pace of this life. Where else can you build in some time for peace and reflection?

Where else are you supported by people who love you and care for you, with whom you can share your sadness and your joys?

Some churches insist that you must believe as they do in order to belong. At Christ Church, however, we welcome you as someone who belongs first. If you come to believe as we do, wonderful! If you never come to believe as we do, that is also wonderful! You belong. You are part of a community of healing and grace.

Let me invite you to check us out. There is a church in town which advertises that if you want reverence, go somewhere else. They offer informality and celebration. At Christ Church, we offer both reverence and celebration.

Check us out at Christ Church … and then come meet us. We work hard at building a community of grace.

I have a friend who tells a story about one of his friends. He once asked his friend, “How are you doing?” To which the friend replies, “I’m grateful.” It caught my friend by surprise the first time…and the second and third as well.

As I reflect on that, what strikes me is the simplicity and power of it—I’m grateful. Gratitude is a choice. This is the way I choose to see the world. I choose to see the blessings in my life, to name them, and to express my gratitude for all those blessings. I choose to live my life this way, and not another.

It is entirely possible for us to choose other ways to see the world. We can, like many who scan the headlines, choose to see the world as a scary place. Some people want to protect themselves and feel more secure, because they see the world as a place of danger—so they live in gated communities and fill their houses with security measures designed to keep others out. Some people see the world as a place of scarcity—life is a zero–sum game, so we have to get everything we can while we can, and hoard it for ourselves.

On the other hand, there are many people for whom life truly is very difficult—refugees, poor and homeless people, people with mental health issues, people who are bullied because they are different, people who are subject to panic attacks or filled with anxiety. For people like these, life truly is very difficult and painful. I’m not writing this column about them.

But there are many of us who have a choice about who we look at the world. We choose to see the world in a certain way. I choose to be grateful. Others don’t. They choose to be afraid … or insecure … or angry … or overly careful. And it’s true that we can find all kinds of reasons to be angry or frustrated with life. We can find all kinds of reasons to view the world as a place of regret and pain. Many of us have been hurt by others, hurt by life, and we think we have good reason to be careful.

There are good reasons for those emotions.

But I believe that to live in such a way that we weave a hard shell around our lives limits us. I believe we can choose how much time we give each of those emotions on the stages of our lives. We choose how much energy and time we give to those emotions.

As we face a new year in our lives and in the life of the world, I can honestly say, “I am grateful.” In some ways, 2017 was a difficult year for me. Some people I loved have died. I have had some losses. I’m alone now after the death of my wife two years ago, and I’ve had to learn new ways of living. I’m getting older, which brings its own set of challenges (as many of you know).

Nevertheless, I enter a new year with a deep sense of gratitude. That doesn’t mean that everything is going to be peaches and cream. I have some worries about the future. Even so, I choose to face the world with confidence and hope. Above all, I come into 2018 able to say, “I am grateful.”

There are so many things for which I am grateful:

For all of this, and more … I am grateful. As I enter 2018, it strikes me that this feels immensely good. And my response, my very personal response to this is, “Thanks be to God.”

Rev. Yme Woensdregt

 

 

 

 

 

 

Rev. Yme Woensdregt

Last week, I suggested that most of the traditions of Christmas which we celebrate at this time come from pagan origins. Most of what we do—from trimming the tree to decorating our houses to giving gifts to feasting—have nothing to do with the Christian festival of Christmas.

That doesn’t mean I’m a grump. It’s not a judgment. It’s merely a statement of fact. I love the lights, the feasting, the gifts. I love the activity and thinking about special people in my life as I buy gifts for them. I love smiling at people in the stores and on the streets, and getting a smile back from them. We’re busy and tired … but there is an undercurrent of good will underneath it all.

But the Christmas which Christians celebrate is about something different than all that. It’s not about family values or people getting together or even about celebrating a festival of joy.

For us, Christmas is about God crashing into our world and shining with the light of love and compassion. It’s about inspiring us with hope that this world, dark as it may be, is not what God intended. It’s about firing us with joy so that we might commit ourselves to being beacons of light in the world, and living with the same love and compassion.

Let me tell you a story.

A grungy–looking young couple are hitch–hiking on a lonely road. She looks to be about grade 11, and he is unshaven and disheveled. They may be gypsies or street people or refugees. The young woman is very pregnant and in obvious distress; the young man holds her protectively as they trudge along the side of the road.

A long–haul trucker stops to pick them up. He’s overweight, has a 4–day shadow on his face, and chomps on nuts and snacks as he drives. The young woman moans occasionally as the young man cradles her. The trucker, named Cioban, looks at the young couple with some concern. (An interesting side note is that the name Cioban also means “shepherd” in Romanian.)

They pull into a truckers’ rest stop at the side of the highway. The young man leads the girl to the washroom. Another truck pulls in, and a hooker comes out to flirt with the younger truck driver, hoping for some business. The lights outside the washroom flicker and go out with a pop. We are left in darkness.

You know something’s going on … but what? In the stillness of the night, we hear a baby’s cry. Cioban peers in through the open door of the washroom, and his face is wreathed in a miraculous smile as he sees the young woman holding her newborn baby to her chest. He takes out his phone and snaps pictures. The other truck driver and hooker come in, staring in wonder at what has happened. The hooker covers the baby and shivering young mother with her coat.

They set up a small camp outside the washroom facility around a small fire pit. A couple of cops stop to check things out; the truck driver shows them his phone with a goofy smile on his face, “It’s a boy! It’s a boy!” The lights on the washroom facility flicker on again.

That story is told in a beautiful video prepared by the Reformed Church in Hungary and available online. The video is called “Real Christmas”. I encourage you not only to watch the short video, but to check further on the same website for some of the interactive features you can find there.

The heart of the story is found in one of those interactive features, which shows the wall of the bathroom with this graffiti on it: “‘Wrapped him in swaddling cloths and laid him in a manger.’ He shows himself in a simple place free from pathos and romance. If God is present, even a restroom can be a church.”

There’s the heart of a Christian understanding. It’s not only Christmas—it’s our whole lives. If God is present, then all of life is holy.

To be a Christian in this understanding means not so much that we are to become good people, or holy people, or moral people. To be a Christian is to learn to see God in the ordinary moments of our days. It is to see God in the homeless people. It is to see God embracing members of the LGBTQ community. It is to see God in the vacant eyes of those who are addicted. It is to see God at work in every moment and movement which seeks to promote justice and peace, reconciliation and hope. It is to see God at work all around us.

Christmas is not just a momentary stop in the history of the world to gorge ourselves. Christmas is a reminder to learn to see, to be mindful, to discern God in the lives of “the least of these, my brothers and sisters.” (Matthew 25)

This is Christmas for a real world. This is the Christmas I wish you, whether you are a follower of Jesus or not. This kind of Christmas is a reminder that we can all join hands to make life more whole, more complete, more just, more compassionate, more peaceful, and more loving.

Merry Christmas to all.