**ILLUMINATIONS 1998**
                      Meditations for Lent

                         by Chris Glaser

  Copyright 1998 (c) by Chris R. Glaser.  All rights reserved.


[BOX: Early this year, Chris Glaser's second book will be 
republished with five new chapters by Chi Rho Press: *Come Home!  
Reclaiming Spirituality and Community as Gay Men and Lesbians*.  
A new book, *Coming Out as Sacrament*, will appear in the fall 
from Westminster John Knox Press.  (These books will be available 
from THE OTHER SIDE, 1-800-700-9280, www.theotherside.org)

Chris continues to serve as a speaker, preacher, workshop and 
retreat leader based in Atlanta.  Contact him at 991 Berne 
St. SE, Atlanta  GA  30316-1859; phone/fax 404/622-4222, email 
chrsglaser@aol.com (No 'i' in Chris!).

Since the response to the two Nouwen gatherings in 1997 was 
so very positive, Chris will again be leading two retreats on 
spiritual writer Henri J. M. Nouwen this year, Nov. 1-7 at 
Ghost Ranch, New Mexico (505/685-4333) and Nov. 20-22 at 
Kirkridge Retreat Center near Bangor, Pennsylvania (610/588- 
1793).]


                          INTRODUCTION
                  The Reformation of the Heart

Unless we reform ourselves, we cannot hope to reform the 
church.  And in the act of reforming ourselves, we reform the 
church.  Prayer is the place where reformation begins.

We are often busy people, and do not take the time for 
daily prayer.  But if Jesus needed to pray, how much more do 
we!  The first chapter of the gospel according to Mark 
reveals Jesus' busyness.  No sooner is he baptized than he is 
tempted by the worldly concerns of mere survival, proving 
himself, and securing power -- all of which he resists.  Then 
he calls his disciples, teaches in the synagogue, casts out 
an unclean spirit, engages in controversy, and heals Simon's 
mother-in-law.  After all this, Mark reports, "That evening, 
at sundown, they brought to him all who were sick or 
possessed with demons.  And the whole city was gathered 
around the door" (1:32).  He meets everyone's needs, yet "in 
the morning, while it was still very dark, he got up and went 
out to a deserted place, and there he prayed" (1:35).  Later, 
in another deserted place, he would feed 5,000 people with a 
mere five loaves and two fishes.  The deserted place of 
prayer led to a rich harvest of souls and sustenance for all.

Prayer for many is an additive for meetings, a reaction 
to crises, and a refueling station.  But prayer for the 
Desert Fathers and Mothers was a place of conversion.  As 
Christianity became trendy in the 4th and 5th centuries C.E. 
and the Roman emperor Constantine embraced Christianity, 
hermit monks went into the desert of the Middle East to pray.

According to Thomas Merton in *The Wisdom of the 
Desert*, these early monastics saw human culture -- even one 
baptized as Cchristian" -- as a "shipwreck" from which each 
person "had to swim for her and his life. ...  These were 
those who believed that to let oneself drift along, passively 
accepting the tenets and values of what they knew as society, 
was purely and simply a disaster" (p. 3).  Yet, Merton 
reminds us, their intent was not only to save themselves: 
"They knew that they were helpless to do any good for others 
as long as they floundered about in the wreckage.  But once 
they got a foothold on solid ground, things were different. 
Then they had not only the power but even the obligation to 
pull the whole world to safety after them" (p 23).

The two retreats I led last fall on Henri Nouwen, my 
spiritual mentor and friend, has prompted my writing again of 
prayer.  Henri advised his readers in *The Way of the 
Heart* to shape a desert for themselves in which to pray. 
We too need a deserted place to be in communion with the God 
who creates us, blesses us, delivers us, tabernacles with us, 
leads us, redeems us, sustains us, loves us.  Only then can 
we survive the shipwreck that is the Presbyterian Church, 
broken by racism, sexism, heterosexism, ableism, and so on. 
Once we gain a foothold ourselves as Jesus did in communion 
with God in prayer, then we may reach our hand to others 
seeking freedom and reformation.

There are many characteristics and expressions of 
prayer.  In this brief introduction I focus on three that are 
close to my heart and my experience.  Prayer is a place of 
conversion, of solidarity, and of ecstasy.


A Place of Conversion

The desert hermits found short, simple, and repeated 
prayers the best for descending with their minds into their 
hearts, that is to say, to pray with their intellect (minds) 
and their integrity (heart).  The heart was not merely 
considered the seat of emotions as we think of it, but the 
integration of all that we are: body, reason, will, emotion, 
and moral compass.

Blind Bartimaeus of Mark 10:46-52 comes to mind as an 
example of one who gives short, simple prayers.  His cry to 
Jesus was simply, "Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!" 
Though he was told to shut up, he shouted louder, "Son of 
David, have mercy on me." When Jesus calls him to come near, 
Bartimaeus was told by others to "take heart" and asked by 
Jesus what he wishes.  "My teacher, let me see again," 
another short prayer.  Jesus told him, "Go; your faith has 
made you well." Bartimaeus receives his sight and follows 
Jesus "on the way."

Bartimaeus offers us a spiritual path in our loss of 
spiritual vision and clarity.  We cry for mercy from our God. 
We ask for spiritual discernment.  Jesus reminds us that our 
own faith is a source of healing.  We are thus enabled to 
follow Jesus as people of the Way, what the first Christians 
were called.


A Place of Solidarity

Henri Nouwen wrote of the minister (and by that, he 
meant *every* Christian) as *The Wounded Healer*, 
that is, as one who understands human vulnerability and 
woundedness because of her/his own wounds.  The epistle to 
the Hebrews describes Jesus as the wounded healer *par 
excellence*: "For we do not have a high priest who is 
unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who 
in every respect has been tested as we are ...." (4:15).  Thus 
we are encouraged, "Let us therefore approach the throne of 
grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find 
grace to help those in need ...." (4:16).

Many of us who are lesbian, gay, bisexual, and 
transgendered and many of our allies have been spiritually 
wounded, spiritually abused, made to feel as if we were not 
made in the image of God, persuaded that we are not among 
God's beloved.  We are often tempted to -- to rearrange Jesus' 
ordering of the following words -- give the judgment we have 
gotten.  Like other forms of abuse, those who have been 
spiritually abused may be tempted to spiritually abuse 
others.

But when we approach the realm ruled by grace, we begin 
to experience a healing.  As we allow our lover God to touch 
us ever so gently, we learn how to touch others who have been 
spiritually wounded, others who have been spiritually abused. 
Indeed, it's because of this divine encounter that so many of 
us already serve in ministry with those victimized by the 
church as well as society.  To avoid burnout, we need to 
return again and again to the Source of all grace and of all 
love.  Our solidarity with others is possible because of 
God's solidarity (or intimacy) with us.


Prayer as the Place of Ecstasy

Nouwen loved to play with the origin of words.  He 
explained that *ecstasy* is derived from words that 
literally mean "out of stasis."  Prayer takes us outside 
our selves, beyond a static place, releasing us from inertia. 
This is the profound spiritual joy the hermits and mystics 
experienced.  It did not necessarily include happiness or 
craziness, though it could include them both.  It meant 
releasing fear and power and competitiveness, becoming 
detached from all those measures of failure and success that 
the world employs.  This is the poverty of heart the ancients 
sought, one that allowed mindfulness of others and 
attentiveness to God.

After the debacle of the 1978 General Assembly, which set the 
Presbyterian Church's anti-gay policy for the next two decades, I 
climbed a mountain.  As I did, I sensed my identities falling off 
me like unwanted garments.  I was no longer Presbyterian.  I was 
no longer Christian.  I was no longer gay.  I was no longer male.  
At the top of my ascent I found an aspen-lined meadow, a 
sanctuary of beauty where I literally jumped and danced for joy.  
I had not "arrived," since the top of the mountain still rose 
above me.  But I had let go of much grief and anger and 
debilitating fatigue, ready to move on.  I felt my belovedness in 
God's realm.

"O taste and see that God is good; happy are those who take 
refuge in God," the Psalmist cries (34:8) at the end of a litany 
of praising, seeking, and trusting God.  Prayer *moves* us.  
That's ecstasy.


Conclusion

Lent in particular is an invitation to pray, as Jesus 
did during his forty days in the wilderness: to be attentive 
to God's word, to trust God, to worship God alone.  The 
following meditations include scriptures derived from the 
Presbyterian calendar proposed texts and those from Cycle C 
of the Inclusive Language Lectionary.  No prayer is offered. 
Rather, each entry is an invitation to you to find your own 
words, silences, and acts of prayer.

During the Nouwen retreat at Kirkridge, a woman who is a physical 
therapist pointed out that "a wound must heal from the inside 
out."  And at Ghost Ranch, a ceramic artist told us that the 
shape of the inside of a bowl on a potter's wheel determines the 
shape of the outside.

Prayer is an invitation to reform our hearts even as we 
call our church to a new reformation.  Prayer heals our 
wounds from the inside out, and shapes us inwardly to 
determine the form of the church.  Prayer welcomes Jesus as 
healer and God as creator as the Spirit reforms our hearts 
and our church.


                           DEDICATION

As I look back on all who have shaped my faith and my 
spirituality, I acknowledge one whose influence has touched 
me and grown within me far more than any other theologian, 
minister, and spiritual director.  She has blessed me with a 
sense of belovedness, grace, forgiveness, faith, doubt, and 
humor.  She taught me to read and encouraged my discovery of 
the world through books.  She opened my mind to writers that 
did not fit our narrow definitions of those who were "saved," 
but in whose words she saw truth and value and meaning.  She 
opened my heart to "strangers," listening intently to a 
lonely waitress recently divorced, inviting a man asking for 
money at our door into our home for bacon and eggs, crying at 
the pain and suffering she witnessed in books and in films 
and in the news.

She also taught me how to serve.  She's the reason I 
enjoy fixing a meal for Mark or guests, she's the reason I 
enjoy being a "domestic engineer" as much as a writer and 
teacher, she's the reason I enjoy being there for someone who 
needs to talk.  Her own sacrificial service modeled for me 
how to make personal sacrifices to serve.

She's also the reason I love adventure and pushing 
beyond boundaries.  I have traveled where she has only 
dreamed, I have rebelled with the same spunk with which she 
resisted the narrowness of the fundamentalist school at which 
she taught first grade most of her career.

Not until I reached adulthood and after I had expressed 
my belief that I was called to ministry did she tell me that 
she had dedicated me in the womb to God and chosen my name 
(Christopher means "Christ-bearer") to reflect that commitment.

Together with my father, who died seven years ago, my 
mother has inspired my faith, along with an appropriate touch 
of skepticism and doubt -- not so much of God, but of all human 
attempts to capture God.  I'm glad they believed in Jesus, 
but their greater gift to me is that they believed in me, and 
taught me that God believed in me too.

So I dedicate this small gathering of Lenten meditations to 
Mom.  Thanks, Mom!  Thanks be to God for you!  Happy 83rd 
birthday! -- Love, Chris



Ash Wednesday, February 25

"Rend your hearts and not your garments."  -- Joel 2:13.

"We are so damn proud of our humility!"  The mother of my 
childhood best friend said this, though not to me.  She had 
muttered it under her breath at church one Sunday in my mother's 
presence, and my mother mentioned it approvingly in a family 
conversation.  I don't remember the context, but there are so 
many churchly occasions for which it would be appropriate that it 
doesn't really matter.

Today many of us will attend, even lead, Ash Wednesday services.  
Pious sentiment will be running high, a flash flood in the 
spiritual desert.  It will make us feel good to feel so humble.  
Some of us will have the opportunity to proudly display ashes on 
our foreheads.  People will speak in hushed, gloomy, somber tones 
as clear evidence of their reverence.  Oh, how godly we will be.

I wonder if a more godly sign of penitence for Presbyterians 
might be to rip up and burn our *Book of Order*.  It could be a 
way of saying that, as useful an instrument as it is, it is 
merely a human attempt to order God's grace, which spills all 
over the place like rain and sunlight on the just and the unjust.

Some of us will respond that the *Book of Order* is a good thing, 
it just needs reforming.  I would think the prophet Joel 
considered the heart a good thing, too, but he heard God calling 
us to rend it, to tear it asunder, to demonstrate our repentance.  
Rending the *Book of Order* might remind us that we need to 
repent of our "decency and order" that has denied the supposed 
"indecent and disorderly" access to Jesus.  Jesus didn't get 
along too well with the lawyers of his day, who brokered the 
grace of God according to their own "Book of Order."


February 26

Restore to me the joy of your salvation .... -- Psalm 51:12.

We are better at attending to the *duties* of our salvation.  
It's part of our Reformed heritage.  Our personal salvation is 
subordinate to the salvation of the world, the transformation 
needed by which all may share the commonwealth of God.

That's why Lent is such a good time for Presbyterians.  It 
justifies our frequently somber preoccupation with everyone 
else's salvation, whether it's the church conservative's concern 
for the soul of the Presbyterian Church or the church liberal's 
concern for the soul of American society.  Nothing wrong with 
these concerns, but they distract us from plucking out the two-
by-four that blocks introspection.

Many who pick up this devotional will not have made it to this 
second day.  Fewer still will make it all the way to Holy Week 
and Easter.  Though my clumsy or debatable insights will prevent 
some from continuing, for many it will just come down to a 
resistance to devoting time to introspection.

But we can't look to God to restore the joy of our salvation if 
we don't look within ourselves and our schedules to make time to 
consider our cause for joy.  This time of Lent could be an 
opportunity to, at least for a time, repent of our own plans for 
the salvation of the church and world, and reflect on the wonder 
that God would save *us*.


February 27

We are treated as ... having nothing, and yet possessing 
everything. -- 2 Corinthians 6:9-10.

The apostle Paul's lament may be our own.  We are treated as if 
we have nothing to offer the church, and yet we possess 
everything.  We have been given the gospel, an inheritance we 
share with the church and the world.  We have been given the 
church, though parts of the church and parts of our gay community 
do not know it yet.  We have been given a calling, though 
confirmed in ordination only by More Light churches.

Being "in" but not "of" the church has given us what those among 
the "in" crowd don't have: an outsider's perspective. It is from 
the outside that we may better discern what's missing in the 
church: integrity of sexuality and spirituality; honesty in all 
relationships, not just sexual ones; and, of course, a multitude 
of people.

Often we forget we have everything already.  We do not *need* the 
Presbyterian Church.  We *are* the Presbyterian Church.  As Paul 
would later say of the other apostles regarding their 
confirmation of his call fourteen years after the fact (Galatians 
2:6), the institutional church will add nothing to us or to the 
calling we are already fulfilling.  In fact, our full acceptance 
may lose us the invaluable resource of an outsider's perspective. 
Hopefully, when that happens, we'll listen to other outcasts.


February 28

"For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also."
-- Matthew 6:21.

If we limit our vision merely to what's achievable rather than 
full justice, then we begin and end compromised.  We will be 
satisfied with the crumbs that fall from our Master's table.  Or, 
if we finally get "our place at the table" we may be complacent 
to receive simply *our* piece of the pie.

Many in our community who preach "gradualism" mistake the goal 
for the strategy.  "Gradualism" only happens when those 
impassioned for justice push for full justice.

We need to learn how to negotiate.  In a market in the Middle 
East, a seller offers an inflated price, a buyer a deflated 
price, until they settle closer to an agreed upon worth of the 
item of purchase.  In labor contract negotiations, unions know to 
ask for more than they expect from an employer so they have a 
fallback position that is satisfactory.

Our heart must be set on all that we expect of the church, not 
merely what we think the church will offer at this time.


First Sunday in Lent, March 1

You shall rejoice in all the good which the Sovereign your God 
has given to you. -- Deuteronomy 26:11.

Sundays in Lent are set apart from the forty day fasting period 
because Sunday was the day of Jesus' Resurrection, thus an 
occasion for celebrating his presence among us. So this scripture 
is appropriate.

Of late my personal prayer life has been characterized mostly of 
thanksgiving.  Instead of praying for people, I thank God for 
them.  And I include those who have died.  In place of praying 
for things like our home, our families, neighborhood, church, 
work, marriage, and dog, I thank God for them.  This shift has 
appeared spontaneous to me, but perhaps it's the Spirit inspiring 
some new and fresh way to think of prayer. We all have much to be 
thankful for, if only we take the time to consider "all the good 
which the Sovereign [our] God has given [us]."

What's particularly puzzling is that I sometimes even thank God 
for our opposition, though not for their opposition. (After all, 
don't they tell us we're to hate the sin but love the sinner!?) 
This may very well sound patronizing, but I have come to 
genuinely *feel* for them and their distress.  What's going on in 
their lives that they feel such need to be so rigid when it comes 
to our acceptance?  I think if only we could laugh together, give 
thanks together, that our opposition would relax and relish a God 
gracious enough to love even those with whom they disagree.

Our opposition might say the same of us, but our positions are 
not equal.  When we relax with them, we're kicked out of the 
church.  When they relax with us, all of us will be able to stay 
in the church.  It's easy to guess which Jesus would prefer.


March 2

Whoever clings to me in love, I will deliver. -- Psalm 91:14.

Psychologists tell us we're not to cling in love and avoid 
those who do.  That fits well with our American individualism 
that tells us each person must find fulfillment separately on 
her/his own terms.  But I wonder if it's true.

There's some element of clinging in every love.  We want 
someone to need us, to want us around, to hang on our words, 
to feel what we feel.  And when we love, most of us find in 
the expression of that love elements of needing, wanting, 
hanging, feeling.  Some, wanting to maintain a declaration of 
independence, call that "interdependence," continuing the 
myth that we are each autonomous, self-sufficient, and 
separate beings.

I don't believe that we're ever separate from those we love. 
They are always part of us, we are always part of them.

Funny that God should want us to cling to her, to him.  Why 
should God need us?  Maybe to acknowledge that we can't make 
it alone -- look, we haven't thus far: our very creation 
occurred because of God's initiative.  Our Creator wants to 
be needed, wants us to hang around, hanging on every divine 
word, feeling divine feelings of love and compassion.  That 
delivers us from thinking of ourselves as islands.


March 3

The scripture says, "No one who believes in Jesus will be put 
to shame." -- Romans 10:11.

It struck me odd that Paul would be quoting a scripture that 
would specifically name Jesus.  His scriptures were Hebrew 
texts.  So I checked it out, and here the *Inclusive 
Language Lectionary* presumptuously inserts "Jesus" for 
"him," intended as a reference to God.  I'm surprised a 
politically correct text would be so culturally insensitive.

I also looked up the allusion, and the NRSV translates Isaiah 
28:16 as: "See, I am laying in Zion a foundation stone, a 
tested stone, a precious cornerstone, a sure foundation: 'One 
who trusts will not panic.'"  Quite a different translation 
than what the apostle Paul uses!

Our opposition claims that we are "revisioning" scripture in 
our attempt to gain acceptance.  Wasn't that exactly what 
Christians did from earliest times, illustrated here by the 
apostle Paul?  And what's wrong with bringing a little vision 
to biblical interpretation?

Our opposition claims that gay priests and gay marriage are 
never mentioned in scripture.  Well, in Paul's day, Jesus 
wasn't mentioned in scripture either, yet early Christians 
found all kinds of scriptural reasons for preaching his 
acceptance!  Recently I heard a woman mock our opposition's 
scriptural viewpoint by saying that they seemed to require 
her own name be personally mentioned in scripture to justify 
her existence!

We who believe in Jesus will never be put to shame.  Paul 
affirmed this and then proceeded in the next verse to say, 
"For there is no distinction between straight and gay ...."  At 
least, that's how I read it in my Bible.  Those who trust God 
will not panic at such an understanding.


March 4

And the devil, having ended every temptation, departed from 
Jesus until an opportune time. -- Luke 4:13.

Nikos Kazantzakis' *Last Temptation of Christ* takes its 
premise from this verse.  In the book, the opportune time 
came just before the crucifixion, when the temptation was to 
lead a "normal" life like everyone else's.

I remember my own temptation to lead a normal life.  Get 
married, have children, take a job like my dad's, delivering 
bread, live in the suburbs.  Most people wouldn't think this 
an evil temptation, let alone one offered by the devil. 
Sounds to most people responsible, level-headed, even 
generous.  And it surely is.  I'm grateful my mom and dad 
made these choices, giving me and my sister and brother a 
stable home life.

But the Spirit didn't lead me there.  One person's temptation 
is another's calling.  One person's calling is another's 
temptation.

The Spirit led Jesus into the wilderness where he would be 
tempted.  The temptations honed his discernment of his 
calling: it wasn't simply to survive, to control things, or 
even to prove himself.  It was to feed on God's word, to 
worship God alone, and resist testing God.  How Jesus worked 
that out in practical terms was by praying, teaching, 
healing, rebuking the self-righteous and comforting the 
spiritually abused.

The final temptation perhaps was one of compromise.  If Jesus 
had compromised with religious and political authorities, he 
could have lived a long life, enjoyed the respect of his 
peers, been given accolades for his service.

But then, we probably would not be thinking about him today.


March 5

"Look toward heaven, and number the stars ....  So shall your 
descendants be." -- Genesis 15:5.

God said this to Abram, whose faith is "reckoned to him as 
righteousness" one verse later.

Our descendants will also be innumerable, those whose lives 
we will make a little easier by modeling to them and to an 
unfriendly church and culture what it means to be lesbian, 
gay, bisexual, and transgendered.

Abraham and Sarah's descendants, however, have never had an 
easy time of it.  Neither will ours.  In many ways it's just 
as difficult to come out as a youth today as it was twenty 
years ago.  That's why programs are needed for our young 
people.

Homes are also needed for them -- our homes, places of 
occasional retreat from pressure: emotional, spiritual, 
sexual.  The more we can open our homes and our hearts 
without expectations to lesbian, gay, bisexual, and 
transgendered youth and young adults, the more blessed our 
future generations will be.


March 6

One thing I asked of the Lord ... to behold the beauty of the 
Lord ... -- Psalm 27:4.

This may be a mistake of the 1997-1998 Presbyterian Planning 
Calendar, because the Inclusive Language Lectionary assigns 
Psalm 127, not Psalm 27.  But what a providential error!

What does it mean to behold the beauty of God?  That's one of 
those questions which, if you have to ask, there's no 
answering it.

Most of us could list limitless instances: love in a lover's 
eyes, the blooming of an iris, a reflection of trees in a 
still crystal lake, stroking the fur of a favorite pet.

But there is beauty that is not so obvious: the frail smile 
of one who is dying, the job we lost that set us in another 
direction, the bus we missed so we had a delightful walk, the 
conversation with a stranger while enduring an interminable 
wait.

Though verse four of Psalm 27 seems to place the beauty of 
the Lord in God's house, the Psalmist clearly has the bigger 
picture of God's cosmos at heart.  The beauty of God can no 
more be limited to a church than our beauty can be limited to 
a closet.


March 7

Brothers and sisters, join in imitating me .... -- Philippians 
3:17.

Arrogance knows no bounds!  How can Paul or anyone but Christ 
suggest we imitate them?  Yet, if we look at the verses prior 
to Paul's admonition we discover that the apostle explains he 
has not yet reached his goal imitating Christ, but 
"forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what 
lies ahead, I press on toward the prize of the upward call of 
God in Christ Jesus" (3:13-14).  This is what we are to 
imitate, this pressing on.

Seems to me we too often look around to check out others' 
imitations of Christ, to make sure they're doing it right, 
rather than straining forward ourselves.

Our opposition wants to make sure we're all running 
*straight* (as if we even know which way Christ ran in 
matters of sexuality!).  Our uptight friends want to make 
sure we're all running "normal," not being "too gay"  --  
whatever that means.  Our politically active friends want to 
make sure we're all out and running to every rally and march.

Seems to me we too often look back, too, living out of past 
hurts and wounds and mistakes and failures.  As a runner, I 
know that looking back rather than where I'm going may mean 
more hurts and wounds, mistakes and failures.  It's more 
helpful to *remember* our mistakes and learn from them as 
we press forward than to *relive* them by obsessing on 
what's behind us.


Second Sunday in Lent, March 8

"You will not see me until you say, 'Blessed is the one who 
comes in the name of the Lord!'" -- Luke 13:35.

Jesus says this in the context of the way prophets, including 
himself, are usually treated.

Last fall, Mother Teresa died.  She spoke of "the least of 
these" with whom she worked as "Christ in a distressing 
disguise."

Christ has more masks than the gay community on Halloween! 
Who was that masked man?  Probably Christ.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.  The church doesn't see that we are Christ. 
We already know that.  But whom don't *we* see as Christ? 
Men?  Women?  The transgendered?  The bisexual?  The 
Presbyterian Lay Committee?

The Hindus use the greeting "namustai," which means the 
sacred in me greets the sacred in you.  Maybe we could have 
meaningful conversations with those we greet with "Blessed 
are you who come in the name of the Lord."


March 9

"Master, it is well that we are here; let us make three 
booths, one for you and one for Moses and one for Elijah." 
-- Luke 9:33.

Peter says this just after he and John and James witness the 
Transfiguration, a mountaintop experience in which the 
divinity of Christ is revealed through his glow-in-the-dark 
appearance and his association with Moses the lawgiver and 
Elijah the prophet par excellence, not to mention the booming 
voice of God.

Seems like a stupid thing for Peter to say.  But then, what 
is there to say in such awesome company?

Yet it serves as a useful metaphor of how we try to box up 
and box in the sacred in our midst, especially God.  We want 
to hold onto God, to place limits on God, to keep God boxed 
in convenient units, to keep God in the closet.

And we want to keep boxed up the imago dei, the image of God, 
within us, too.  Stay in the closet as a beloved gay child of 
God -- in the church, and in the gay community.

The sacred is one more victim of overpackaging.


March 10

And Moses said, "I will turn aside and see this great sight, 
why the bush is not burnt." -- Exodus 3:3.

Seems curious to me that Moses wouldn't have turned aside to 
see *any* bush afire in the wilderness, whether it was 
being consumed or not.  Surely a burning bush would have been 
unusual way out in the middle of nowhere!

But it gets me to thinking about those who are "burning 
bushes" for the church.  Much talk these days among do-
gooders about "burnout."  Maybe there's a lesson here. 
Moses' curiosity was piqued because the bush was *not* a 
victim of burnout.  Doesn't that suggest that today's human 
"burning bushes" might do well to work on their stamina 
rather than their drama, sustaining their spirit while 
illumining the path for others?


March 11

For my thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways my 
ways, says the Lord. -- Isaiah 55:8.

God, through the prophet Isaiah, has the audacity to go on to 
say that God's thoughts and ways are higher than ours!  How 
dare God put us in our place!

I guess it's fair, though.  We've been putting God in our 
place for a long time.  Domesticating God, like a pet.  God 
is our buddy, Jesus as our brother -- oh how egalitarian we've 
become at God's expense and our elevation.  In some ways, 
those things are true.  But like any buddy or sibling, 
there's an unknowable mystery within the persona of God.  And 
unlike any buddy or sibling, God's far beyond our capacity to 
even know God, even if God were fully revealed.

That's why we need everybody in the theological game, around 
the world, at all levels, all races and cultures, along the 
sexual spectrum and gender continuum.  But, even together, 
even with the witness of Jesus and the inspiration of the 
Holy Spirit, what we come up with is going to look like a 
child's drawing of God.  (No offense to children intended.)

As I look out at the old, magnificent trees behind our 
property or up at the stars far above those trees, I stretch 
my imagination to consider the God beyond human knowledge, 
the infinite beyond the finite.  But I can't even imagine it. 


March 12

O God ... my soul thirsts for you; my flesh faints for you, as 
in a dry and weary land where there is no water. -- Psalm 63:1.

What a needy, desperate character this Psalmist is!  Doesn't 
he have any friends?  Can't she get a life?

It may be hard to imagine someone so centrally focused on God 
in a society in which God serves us like an additive in our 
fuel, a vitamin enrichment for our cereal, or one more friend 
to call on.

We who have been in the wilderness betwixt liberation and the 
Promised Land may enjoy a keener sense of our thirsty need 
for God, but we have a lot of distractions in our wilderness. 
Can we really trust Moses?  Is it appropriate for Miriam to 
dance?  How will we have enough manna for retirement when we 
barely get enough to last us a day?  Will we find another 
watering hole before our water jars are empty?

God is more than an added attraction at life's amusement 
park.  More than getting a life, we need to get God.


March 13

God works vindication and justice for all who are oppressed. 
-- Psalm 103:6.

Hard to believe that's true.  Especially when God's 
*people* neither vindicate us nor give us justice.

Presbyterians are better with every other justice issue than 
the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgendered one.  Many 
conservative Presbyterians actually feel pious and holy when 
they batter us.  Many liberal Presbyterians actually feel 
pious and holy when they don't.  I'd trade in all such 
liberal Presbyterian friends for those who would risk their 
vocations and their church for our vindication and justice. 
As it is, the only ones willing to risk our church's life to 
save it are those who oppose us.


March 14

Nevertheless with most of them God was not pleased; for they 
were overthrown in the wilderness. -- 1 Corinthians 10:5.

Paul reminds the church at Corinth of the temptations the 
Hebrews endured in the wilderness after liberation from 
Egypt.  He puts the Corinthians' griping in perspective: "No 
temptation has overtaken you that is not common to every one. 
God is faithful, and will not let you be tempted beyond your 
strength; but with the temptation God will also provide the 
way of escape, so that you may be able to endure it" (10:13).

All kinds of temptations bombard us in the wilderness of 
heterosexism.  The temptation to give up.  The temptation to 
go back to Egypt, perhaps not to slavery, but to security of 
one kind or another.  The temptation to make the wilderness 
our way of life, to forever live with a survivor's mentality. 
The temptation to accept a theology of scarcity when it comes 
to God's grace.  The temptation to stay at an oasis rather 
than proceed to the Promised Land.  The temptation to worship 
something other than God to make life easier: drugs, alcohol, 
sex, a lover, even deprivation.  The temptation to compete 
with others regarding how much we've suffered.

The spiritual life requires a wilderness, I believe -- an 
opportunity to rely wholly on God and discern who God calls 
us to be.  But wilderness is to God's realm what strategy is 
to goal and what discipline is to accomplishment.  Those who 
fall in the wilderness may lose touch with their purpose, for 
anticipating the result of our efforts makes even the 
wilderness blossom.


March 15

And if it bears fruit next year, well and good; but if not, 
you can cut it down. -- Luke 13:9.

Jesus told this parable about the General Assembly of the 
Presbyterian Church.

Well, *why not?*

Jesus tells the parable of an unfruitful fig tree that its 
owner wants toppled.  But the vinedresser (Jesus?) basically 
says, "Let me work with it some more, put some more manure on 
it, and see if next year it bears fruit.  If not, then we'll 
cut it down."

Seems like the General Assembly gets steeped in manure every 
year, and yet it holds onto a fruitless policy.  And we're 
such *good* fruit!

The policy is fruitless for another reason: it has a broader 
message.  No, our church says, we're not going to behave like 
Jesus did, embracing those who have been spiritually abused 
and socially outcast.  If we don't welcome gay people, then 
you might not be welcome either because you're divorced, 
disabled, different, single, poor, uneducated, whatever.

These days, the Magic Kingdom is closer to the commonwealth 
of God.


March 16

And Jesus laid his hands upon her, and immediately she was 
made straight, and she praised God. -- Luke 13:13.

Since our opposition often takes the Bible so literally, it's 
a wonder they haven't used this text in their arguments for 
"healing" homosexuals!

The Inclusive Language Lectionary offers this alternative 
gospel lesson from Luke.  Once again, Jesus raises a ruckus 
by healing on the sabbath day, this time a woman with an 
eighteen-year-infirmity that bent her back.

Bernadette Brooten, author of an extremely well-written, 
scholarly, landmark book entitled *Love Between Women*, 
co-led a Stony Point conference with Janie Spahr and me last 
September.  As a Catholic teaching Christianity at a largely 
Jewish university (Brandeis), she commented to me how 
interesting it is to get her Jewish students' viewpoints on 
Jesus.  "Why didn't Jesus just heal the people on the next 
day," some of them have questioned, "Rather than causing 
controversy by doing it on the sabbath?"

Makes sense.  But he healed on other days as well.  He just 
happened to see her on the sabbath.  What if another 
opportunity never arose?

Our own sacred day of Sunday is frequently an opportunity to 
heal those whose backs have been bent by unseen spiritual 
burdens, by homophobia, by racism, by fundamentalism, by 
biblical literalism, by economic injustice, by gender 
expectations, by sexism.  Think how ministers are regarded 
who follow Jesus' lead and attempt to heal these folk on our 
own sabbath through sermons and liturgies and church school 
classes!  Troublemakers, all.  Like Jesus.


March 17  St. Patrick's Day

And God said to Joshua, "This day I have rolled away the 
reproach of Egypt from you." -- Joshua 5:9.

Having arrived in the Promised Land and tasted the 
firstfruits of their victory, the produce of the land of 
Canaan, scripture tells us "the people of Israel had manna no 
more."  Kinda makes me sad.

Having never lived on "manna," whatever it was, I can afford 
some nostalgia for it.  The Hebrews, in reality, were 
probably sick to death of it!

In our wilderness, I wonder what our "manna" is.  Whatever it 
is, I believe our menu is more varied.  Scripture. 
Encouraging sermons.  More Light churches.  Visits from 
Janie.  Phone calls from Howard, and of course, his comedy 
routine.  The More Light Update.  *Called Out*. 
*Called Out With*.  The Shower of Stoles.

We'd like to live to the day when we can be nostalgic for all 
these things.  To see Janie, Howard, Jim Anderson, Martha and 
Tammy, Scott and Laurene, me, and all the PLGC leadership in 
some Presbyterian retirement community laughing and crying 
about the way things were.  (Yes, Howard will be there, since 
he ages backwards like Merlin!)

But what will it mean to have the "reproach" of the closet or 
the PC(USA) rolled away from us?  God, I'd sure like to enjoy 
that feeling.  You may have to tie a kite string on me.


March 18

While I kept silence, my body wasted away
    through my groaning all day long.
For day and night your hand was heavy upon me;
    my strength was dried up as by the heat of summer.
    -- Psalm 32:3-4.

The Psalmist continues, writing that all this changed when 
acknowledging the Psalmist's sin.  All of this began to 
change for us when we acknowledged our sin of silence, our 
sin of accepting others' prejudice, our sin of refusing to 
embrace the sacred nature of our love.

The broader church wonders why it groans in controversy, its 
membership wasting away, feeling the weight of the hand of 
God on its heart, often enervated in our mission of 
proclaiming the gospel.

As we, the whole church, acknowledge our sin, the sin of 
silence at injustice, the sin of adopting society's 
prejudice, the sin of refusing to embrace and celebrate the 
sacred nature of gay love -- then we all may "shout for joy" 
and "be glad in the Lord" (32:11).


March 19

All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to 
God's self and gave us the ministry of reconciliation.
-- 2 Corinthians 5:18.

The theme of reconciliation in our Confession of 1967 is what 
clinched it for me that I belonged in the Presbyterian 
Church.  I had been searching for a more open church than the 
fundamentalist, biblical literalist one in which I'd been 
reared.  I wanted a church which took the authority of 
scripture to heart by utilizing biblical scholarship as well 
as personal reflection to discover its truths.  I hoped for a 
church that promoted equality and reconciliation in the local 
and global community.  I had not yet accepted my sexuality, 
but my sense of being different undoubtedly enhanced my view 
that reconciliation is central to the gospel message.

Many Presbyterians will be aghast, but the Presbyterian 
Church helped me reconcile my sexuality and my spirituality.

Presbyterians for Lesbian & Gay Concerns has lived out a 
ministry of reconciliation.  Founder David Sindt quoted the 
Confession of '67 in his early writings regarding the mission of 
our group. It has grieved us that our own ministry of 
reconciliation has prompted others to engage in harsh rhetoric 
and acts of separation, division, and condemnation.


March 20

But while he was yet at a distance, his father saw him and 
had compassion, and ran and embraced him and kissed him. 
-- Luke 15:20.

When Henri Nouwen contemplated this parable of the prodigal 
in Rembrandt's painting "The Return of the Prodigal Son," he 
first thought of himself as the younger son, who had run far 
from the family home in Holland to find himself and his 
ministry largely in North America.  He was aware of his own 
deep need for forgiveness, and the gracious, loving arms of a 
father God who would welcome him home.

But as he contemplated, he realized that he was also the 
elder brother, literally the eldest in his family who had 
done everything that was expected of him, becoming a priest, 
and sometimes resenting the freedom of his younger siblings. 
He became aware of his own unforgivingness, and the 
resentment he felt for the grace shown even those who hadn't 
turned out as expected.

In conversation with a nun in his community, however, he 
experienced another startling revelation as he described 
himself as both prodigal and elder brother to her.  She said 
to him, "But Henri, we need you to be our father!"  In other 
words, he now was called to assume the role of the forgiver, 
welcoming other "prodigals" home, urging the elder brother to 
join the celebration.

This may parallel our own reception of the story.  Many of us 
felt we had to leave home to become ourselves, to acknowledge 
our identities.  Others of us were the very responsible elder 
siblings who remained behind, caring for our parents or our 
families.  But many of us fail to think of ourselves becoming 
the forgiving father and mother that reaches out with a hug 
and a kiss to both younger and older siblings, to both those 
outside and within the church.

Yet, if we are to imitate Jesus as the forgiving parent, we 
are called not simply as the ones who need forgiveness nor 
the ones who resist mercy, but also, we are called as the 
ones who are to offer forgiveness.

Let's run down that road, let's go out to entreat, and 
welcome our children home.


March 21

I will make a way in the wilderness .... -- Isaiah 43:19c.

I think we forget that the wilderness *is* the way. 
Since first being tossed on our ear out of Eden and having to 
make it on our own by laboring in the soil of the wilderness, 
we've discovered more about ourselves than the forbidden tree 
could ever teach us.  And one of the things we've discerned 
is that God was right: the harmony and communion of the 
Garden is the better way to live.  No wonder that the 
prophets talk about the blossoming of the desert as the 
fulfillment of God's time.

The wilderness is the way toward discovering what's truly 
vital to life.  Communion.  Community.  Calling.

Our world tries to tell us that the mystical experience is 
possible without discipline, that human solidarity is 
accessible without suffering, that one's true vocation is 
materially rewarded.

But the desert teaches us that we must marshall our energies 
to continue the trek, that reaching to help a fallen 
companion means risk, and that vocation may mean sacrificing 
everything we have.


March 22

When God restored the fortunes of Zion,
    we were like those who dream. -- Psalm 126:1.

With what relish the Psalmist celebrates the good turn of 
events for the people of Israel!  But wait.  The final verses 
of the Psalm reveal that this is a memory, not a present 
reality.  The Psalmist in effect prays to God, "Do it again!"

Most of us have a memory of God answering our prayers in a 
way that was life-giving, love-restoring, like a dream.  If 
we do not, our collective memory stored in scripture has many 
such instances.  Drawing on such recollections forms the 
basis for our faith.  The God who has realized our dreams, as 
individuals or as community, may give us what we hope for 
now.

God has realized dreams a lot more difficult than the 
acceptance and affirmation of lesbian, gay, bisexual and 
transgendered people!  So let's begin, even in the desert, to 
fill our mouths with laughter and our tongues with shouts of 
joy!


March 23

If anyone else has reason to be confident in the flesh, I 
have more .... -- Philippians 3:4b.

The apostle Paul thus begins a description of how he has all 
the fleshly credentials to recommend him to God: he is 
heterosexual, a Presbyterian cradle to grave and of many 
generations, a member of the Presbyterian Lay Committee, a 
zealous persecutor of PLGC, and one who has never broken a 
rule in the Book of Order.

And yet he counts that as sewage (a better translation) when 
compared to "knowing Christ Jesus my Lord."  He knows that 
nothing can save him except the grace of God manifested in 
Christ Jesus.

There are books called *The Joy of Lesbian Sex* and 
*The Joy of Gay Sex* and, for straight people, *The Joy 
of Sex*.  These books offer techniques for lovemaking.

The Bible could very well be called *The Joy of Jewish 
Spirituality* or *The Joy of Christian Spirituality*. 
The Bible offers techniques for loving God.

What's important in any of these manuals, however, is not to 
confuse the techniques with the love.  The love, as Paul 
points out, supersedes any skills for expressing that love. 
The love is what saves us in any relationship, not the 
techniques -- whether with another person or with God.


March 24

Mary took a pound of costly ointment of pure nard and 
anointed the feet of Jesus and wiped them with her hair; and 
the house was filled with the fragrance of the ointment. 
-- John 12:3.

In this reminiscence of the story, the villain Judas is given 
the role of decrying Mary's action.  In other versions, the 
critical comments are more general among Jesus' disciples.

I can't help but think of Presbyterians in this scene.  The 
sensual nature of Mary's adoration would drive most 
Presbyterians to distraction, but they would instead comment 
on the waste of money that could have been better used in 
evangelism or feeding the poor.  Safer.

During a few of the retreats I've led, I've invited people to 
pair up and wash one another's feet.  The intimacy of doing 
so made a *married* couple extremely uncomfortable, while 
two single people ended up in a passionate relationship!

Imagine being that intimate with the savior of humanity! 
Stroking his feet, cleaning his toenails with our fingertips, 
putting our face to the floor to rub the soles of his feet 
with our heads.  Moreover, imagine Jesus allowing us to touch 
him so intimately.

One doesn't have to "re-imagine" God to disconcert the 
spiritually prudish.  One has only to enter the story of the 
Bible in which God has already been imaged as a vulnerable, 
lovesick Creator and Messiah, hungry for our love, thirsty 
for our friendship, pleasuring in our touch.


March 25

The Lord God has given me the tongue of a teacher,
      that I may know how to sustain the weary with a word.
                                    -- Isaiah 50:4a.

Think about a letter you received when you were feeling down-
and-out from someone who cares for you.  Or a phone call from 
a really good friend during a difficult period.  Or an issue 
of *The More Light Update* just when you weren't feeling 
confident of your Presbyterian connection.

Words are a way of being there for someone, a way of 
intimacy, that often goes far beyond mere physical presence. 
Haven't you sometimes felt closer to a friend when writing 
her a letter, or when lifting him in the words of a prayer?

Beyond "giving up" for Lent the time required to read these 
meditations, consider giving up a few words to someone in a 
letter, call, e-mail, or prayer -- today, and the remaining 
days of Lent.  And consider writing a story, article, 
reflection, or prayer for *The More Light Update.*


March 26

O give thanks to the Lord, for God is good;
    God's steadfast love endures forever!
Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord.
    We bless you from the house of God. -- Psalm 118:1, 26.

Henri Nouwen wrote of the minister (every Christian) as 
*The Living Reminder* of Christ, as one who re-presents 
God's steadfast love.  It reflects how *mis*represented 
God's steadfast love has become when we find ourselves 
suspicious of many "who come in the name of the Lord" and we 
doubt that the house of God will bless us.

We must not assume that clergy and other Christians come in 
the name of God.  Some do represent and incarnate God's 
steadfast love.  But many are too busy representing 
themselves, or the institution they serve, or interests that 
counter or contradict Christ's steadfast love.

We must also be attentive to those who come in the name of 
God "unofficially," proclaiming God's steadfast love for us 
without benefit of training, ordination, church membership, 
or commitment to Christian dogma.  Sometimes the living 
reminder of Christ comes as a stranger, as a pet, as a 
flower, as a lover.

Remember, Christ came first as a stranger, then as a teacher, 
then as a friend, and finally, as a sacrificial lover willing 
to lay down his life.  So certain were those he met that he 
had come in the name of the Lord that they called him "Child 
of God."

People of the Rainbow first seemed a stranger to the church, 
but have quickly become a teacher, been revealed as a 
friend, and risked life out of love for the church.  We have 
tried to serve as living reminders of Christ.  May the church 
come to say of us, too, "Blessed is the one who comes in the 
name of the Lord."


March 27

I am the Lord, that is my name;
          my glory I give to no other,
          nor my praise to idols. -- Isaiah 42:8.

The Inclusive Language Lectionary changes *Lord* to 
*Sovereign*.  The connotations for me in *Lord* are 
softer than the connotations of *Sovereign*. 
*Sovereign* sounds severe.  Wish there were another word 
altogether.

But the truth of the matter is that God is Sovereign.  Jesus 
was coming to terms with that in his forty day fast in the 
wilderness.  I don't believe most of us have come to terms 
with this understanding of God.  We like our images of a 
softer, gentler God.  But God is a fierce mother who will 
defend her progeny to the death.  And without her, we would 
not have been born, we would have no breasts on which to 
suckle, we would have no spiritual lap in which to rest. 
She's in charge, perhaps no longer the punitive father ready 
to beat us with a stick, but one whose stern and just look 
reprimands our unloving behavior nonetheless.

Perhaps we've needed the image of God as our friend to 
overcome the spiritually abusive, punitive parent image.  But 
God is not simply our friend.  God is our soul friend, that 
is, our spiritual director.  There is no equality to be had 
with God.  God is above us, beyond us, outside of us, and 
deeper inside of us than we can ever go on our own.  We are a 
part of God, but only a part.

Lent is a good time to get over ourselves and into God.


March 28

[All people may] feast on the abundance of your house,
    and you give them drink from the river of your delights.
                                             -- Psalm 36:8.

In most houses of God, feasting and abundance, drinking and 
delight, are rarely a part of the worship of God.  Especially 
during the period of Lent, sober, somber, and even dismal 
attitudes are considered a reverent and proper response to 
God.

But anyone who has fasted more than three days knows that one 
can get downright giddy going without food that long.  Much 
longer can bring on hallucinations as powerful as a trip on 
peyote for Native Americans.  At the least, other sensations 
come to the fore, and one may forget one's hunger in amnesiac 
bliss.  (Though one may also go "postal" out of hunger!)

Near-death experiences may be the result of a similar 
euphoria as the brain is deprived of oxygen and other 
nutrients needed to transact the business of life.

Many religions practice forms of deprivation or suffering to 
locate or discern the spiritual realm.  If these forms of 
fasting, deprivation, and suffering become ends in 
themselves, such a religion forgets the pleasure that God 
offers.  One who has not known pleasure in at least some 
small way has not known God.  Our call as evangelicals is to 
make pleasure more widely available to all -- the poor, the 
marginalized, the oppressed -- though often we find *they* 
are the ones to teach *us* pleasure!


March 29

Do not cast me off in the time of old age;
    forsake me not when my strength is spent. -- Psalm 71:9.

We like old people who "don't act their age."  But old people 
who are tired, alone, and/or face disabilities and 
immobilities acquired as the body ages are often forgotten, 
abandoned, ignored.

We see this ourselves when the new generation "takes charge" 
of things in which we've been involved.  Younger people may 
act as if we never existed, as if we never prepared the way 
for them, as if our collective history began with them, as if 
we are no longer a part of "their" community.

This gives us the opportunity to enter a new wilderness, 
letting go of our earlier existence, involvements, history, 
and community and, like the desert hermits of the ancient 
church, discovering a new relationship with God.

How foolish we will be, however, if we fail to notice that 
this new wilderness is already populated with wise, old sages 
who offer insights as well as laughter, pleasure as well as 
spiritual guidance.


March 30

Consider your own call, brothers and sisters ....
-- 1 Corinthians 1:26a.

The Inclusive Language Lectionary substitutes "my friends" 
for brothers and sisters.  Translation-wise and theologically 
the phrase *brothers and sisters* is more appropriate. 
The family of Christian faith, following Jesus' lead, began 
early on to call one another sister and brother.  It 
indicated our *permanent* place in the spiritual family, 
whereas the status of a "friend" may change, being dependent 
on mere feelings or mere agreement of belief and behavior.

Usually when we read this verse we revel in what follows: 
"not many of you were wise ... powerful ... noble."  But rather 
than think of ourselves as stupid, weak, hated, and nothing, 
I think that -- without assigning any worth or value to 
ourselves based on worldly competition -- we should simply 
consider our call.

Collectively, our unique position in the world and the church 
qualifies us to add much to the life of the church, restoring 
eros (the passion for intimacy [thus honesty and integrity] 
with God and with others) to the disembodied milquetoast 
spirituality that prefers ignorance for the sake of 
institutional survival, rejects inclusivity for the sake of 
individual comfort, and denies justice for the sake of ritual 
purity.

Eros has mistakenly been separated from agape in our thinking 
and the two have even been treated as opposites.  But agape 
without eros is an effete caricature of the love that Jesus 
practiced, otherwise he would never have given up his body in 
his Passion, nor would he have been required to do so by the 
political and religious authorities of his time.  Eros puts 
our body on the line in the service of agape.  When the 
church does likewise, together we can move on to other 
issues.


March 31

Let those be put to shame and confusion
    who seek my life. -- Psalm 70:2.

Years ago a Presbyterian told me that she thought 
Presbyterians resisted giving justice to gays and lesbians 
because they had not been adequately shamed for their 
injustice.  I accepted her intent and insight, but inwardly I 
doubted both the concept and wisdom of a shame-based system 
of correction.

The Psalmist entertained no such qualms.  The Psalmist also 
did not exercise the restraint of Gandhi and King in 
referring to *enemies* as *the opposition*, a 
practice I have imitated intended to avoid dehumanizing or 
demonizing the opponent.

Opening a gay support group with a devotion based on Psalm 
69, a seminarian said she never understood what the Psalmist 
meant by *enemies* until she came out as lesbian in the 
church.

We have people who have made themselves our enemies.  They 
seek our life in the Body of Christ and in the body politic. 
They are already working from confusion and shame about 
sexuality -- theirs and ours.  Since I firmly believe that some 
reconciliation will never occur on this side of the 
commonwealth of God, we can only pray with the Psalmist that 
others will see their shame and that their strategy will 
continue to be confused.


April 1

 ... Let us run with perseverance the race that is set before 
us, looking to Jesus the pioneer and perfecter of our faith, 
who for the sake of the joy that was set before him endured 
the cross, disregarding its shame .... -- Hebrews 12:1c-2b.

Jewish law declared, "Anyone hung on a tree is under God's 
curse" (Deuteronomy 21:23b).  Crucifixion was a humiliating 
death by exposure, the same fate as the scapegoat sent off 
into the wilderness to die with the sins of the people 
projected onto it by the high priest on the annual Day of 
Atonement.  Yet Christ's faithfulness and God's will 
transformed the shame of the cross into the vindication and 
joy of the resurrection.

We have been cursed, shamed, and excommunicated.  But that's 
the will of the religious and political authorities, not the 
will of God.  So God has vindicated us and blessed us with 
joy in our resurrection: in gay neighborhoods and 
relationships and friends and extended families, in gay and 
lesbian groups, pride marches and festivals, in Presbyterians 
for Lesbian & Gay Concerns and More Light churches.

More and more, it is clearly members of our opposition who 
are twisted with their own cursing, humiliated by their own 
shaming, and buried in their own whitewashed tombs.

If only they could hear Jesus' call to Lazarus: "Come out!"


April 2

I will put my law within them, and I will write it upon their 
hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people.
-- Jeremiah 31:33.

God promises this new covenant because the people broke the 
old one "though I was married to them," God declares.

As central and significant as Torah was, the prophets 
repeatedly reminded the people that what counted most was 
what was going on in their hearts.  Rationalizations could 
argue a person out of the responsibility of caring for one's 
parents, Jesus pointed out, or even one's wife, both 
responsibilities demanded by the law.  Self-righteousness 
could easily stem from following the letter of the law while 
ignoring its spirit, both Jesus and the apostle Paul pointed 
out.

The addition to our own Torah of the infamous Amendment B 
last year is not half so significant as what was going on in 
the hearts of those who championed it.  They were intent on 
keeping us out, claiming the church is only for those with a 
heterosexual orientation.  Moreover, they idolatrously 
believe that heterosexuality is the condition of entrance 
into God's commonwealth rather than faith in Jesus Christ. 
The improvement of Amendment A, should it be ratified this 
year, still is not so important as what is in the hearts of 
Presbyterians who will still retain an anti-gay policy and 
prejudice.

Rationalizations and self-righteousness will continue to be 
the order of the Presbyterian day until more Presbyterians 
truly accept Jesus into their hearts as the new covenant, the 
law written upon our hearts.


April 3

What shall I render to the Lord
    for all God's bounty to me?
I will lift up the cup of salvation
    and call on the name of the Lord.
               -- Psalm 116:12-13.

When my family said grace for a meal at a restaurant, my 
brother would be under the table "looking for his napkin" out 
of embarrassment.  Though my parents' doing so was sincere 
and natural for them, I also dislike praying in restaurants 
because it feels like a public display of piety.  Instead, I 
have taken to toasting God, "Thanks be to God."  In an ethnic 
restaurant I might elaborate, "Thanks be to God for Mexican 
people and Mexican food" referring to whatever the origin of 
the food.

In his book, *Can You Drink the Cup*, Henri Nouwen wrote 
about three distinct movements of the spiritual life, using 
the cup as metaphor.  Holding the cup is contemplating one's 
life.  Lifting the cup is offering a blessing of one's life 
to others.  Drinking the cup is receiving life with all of 
its sorrows and joys.  All of the movements are part of 
thanksgiving, or eucharist.

We have much to be thankful for.  We have been given much, we 
have much to offer others as a blessing, and we have many 
sorrows and joys to savor.  Lent may be a season for holding, 
lifting, and drinking our cup.  To life!


April 4

 ... Let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of 
faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil 
conscience and our bodies washed with pure water.
-- Hebrews 10:22.

As a teenager, before I realized the sacred gift of my 
sexuality, I used my showers as an opportunity to wash away 
my "sins" symbolically, vowing never again to think 
*those* thoughts and never again to pleasure myself 
sexually.

As adults, many of us have not always remembered the sacred 
nature of our sexuality.  While sex may be recreational and 
re-creational, sometimes our sexuality has not always led us 
to treat ourselves and others as sacred, as loving, and as 
lovable.  We may carry regrets, sadness, and grief.

All the more we need to hear the writer of Hebrews reflecting 
on the Jeremiah passage of April 2, which includes the 
assurance of God, "I will remember their sins and their 
misdeeds no more."  As we wander in the wilderness with Jesus 
in search of the commonwealth of God, we need to let go of 
the dross of our lives that hangs on to us, that prevents us 
from rising to our true nature as beloved sons and daughters 
of God.  If God is willing to let it go, how much more should 
we!


April 5, Palm Sunday

As Jesus was now drawing near, at the descent of the Mount of 
Olives, the whole multitude of the disciples began to rejoice 
and praise God with a loud voice for all the mighty works 
that they had seen .... --  Luke 19:37.

Fickle folk.  They would subsequently doubt Jesus, question 
him, test him, plot against him, deny him, betray him, arrest 
him, and demand his crucifixion.

We have a small taste of Jesus' experience.  Many of us have 
served our community or our church in such a way that those 
who knew us would "praise God with a loud voice for all the 
mighty works that they had seen."  Yet coming out could bring 
or has brought the various negative reactions that Jesus 
suffered.

One could say the destructive reactions to Jesus resulted 
from the people's disillusionment.  But that implies that 
what they saw in Jesus was an illusion of God's presence 
among them.  Rather, I believe, it was a vision of God's 
presence among them that they later doubted.

The destructive reactions we endure result from a similar 
loss of vision among those who initially viewed us as beloved 
children of God.  But it is also our culture and church's 
illusion that beloved children of God are automatically 
straight.

"Without vision, the people perish."


April 6, Monday of Holy Week

Jesus said, "... The poor you always have with you, but you do 
not always have me." -- John 12:8.

Jesus said this defending Mary's anointing him with a costly 
balm.  It seems a strange thing to say for someone who 
devoted his life to the poor.

Years ago, a friend considered a call to serve among the poor 
of Latin America.  Sensing a little romantic idealism in his 
dream, I challenged him with the possibility that, as a gay 
man, he would be ideally suited to serve people with AIDS.

A minister with a liberal political agenda told me that he 
could not be openly supportive of gay members in his 
congregation or he would never be able to accomplish his 
goals of justice.  Huh?

A church leader with an evangelical agenda once said to me 
that homosexuals coming into the church would keep people 
from joining.  Come again?

Seems to me like we should anoint whomever is in our midst, 
whether it's the poor or Jesus or lesbians, gay men, 
bisexuals or the transgendered!  You never know how long any 
of us is going to be here.


April 7, Tuesday of Holy Week

Now among those who went up to worship at the feast were some 
Greeks.  So these came to Philip ... and said, "Sir, we wish to 
see Jesus." -- John 12:20-21.

Oddly, we never find out if the Greeks ever got to see Jesus. 
I remember a preacher telling the story of another preacher 
who kept before him, while preaching, the words, "We would 
see Jesus!"  Maybe it was someone famous, like Harry Emerson 
Fosdick, maybe not.  I can't recall that part of the story.

"We would see Jesus!"

These words should be carved on the inside of every 
Presbyterian pulpit, the table of every G.A. commissioner, 
embossed on the Book of Order of every member of the 
Permanent Judicial Commission, hung as a banner over every 
presbytery meeting.

"We would see Jesus!"

This should become the mantra of every Sunday school teacher, 
every church staff person, every church service provider, 
every Christian everywhere.

Remembering that the plea came from Greeks who were morally 
unacceptable and ritually unclean Gentiles, we might manifest 
Jesus to the very outcasts he chose as his own companions.


April 8, Wednesday of Holy Week

Jesus was troubled in spirit, and testified, "Truly, truly, I 
say to you, one of you will betray me." -- John 13:21

This reminds me of Jesus' reaction to the death of his 
beloved friend Lazarus two chapters earlier: "he was greatly 
disturbed in spirit and deeply moved."  Betrayal is like a 
death.  Many of us who have been leaders in our movement have 
been or felt betrayed at one time or another.  We have been 
betrayed by those who remained silent when we anticipated 
they would speak in our defense.  We have been betrayed by 
those to whom we confided a strategy who used the information 
to counter our moves.

Closer to home, we have been betrayed by those whose ambition 
made our movement another arena of competition.  We have been 
betrayed by those whose anger and self-hatred got projected 
onto us.  We have been betrayed by those whose expectations 
or standards we did not live up to.

Jesus suffered the ultimate betrayal, one that led to his 
death, as well as that of his betrayer.  Most of the 
betrayals we have endured have led "only" to the death of a 
friendship, an alliance, or at most, our vocation.  Yet as 
Jesus was to experience resurrection at God's hand, so God is 
able to offer us resurrection.  I have found reconciliation 
has been possible with many of the people by whom I've felt 
betrayed or who felt betrayed by me.  Today we might consider 
those reconciliations that are possible on this side of the 
commonwealth of God.  Reconciliation leads to new life for 
all involved.


April 9, Maundy Thursday

[Jesus said,] "I give you a new commandment, that you love 
one another.  Just as I have loved you, you also should love 
one another.  By this everyone will know that you are my 
disciples, if you have love for one another." -- John 13:34-35.

If only Christians *did* love one another, the whole 
world would be saved.  If only Christians and Jews and 
Muslims and Hindus and Sikhs and Buddhists and New Agers and 
New Thought practitioners and agnostics and atheists 
*did* love one another, the whole world would be at 
peace.

We all forget that we are all beloved by God, that we are all 
thus empowered to love others.

Ironic that some heterosexual Christians want to muzzle 
homosexual and bisexual love.  Seems like we need all the 
love we can get, in the church and world.  Why betray or deny 
or crucify that love?  Why not serve one another as Jesus 
did, humbling ourselves to wash one another's feet, bringing 
cooling, refreshing waters to those feet, hot and tired and 
blistered from life's pilgrimage?

If you think about it, Jesus was rejected for his 
*spiritual* orientation of love.


April 10, Good Friday

Surely this one has borne our griefs
    and carried our sorrows;
yet we esteemed the servant stricken,
    smitten by God, and afflicted.
                    -- Isaiah 53:4.

Blaming the victim is apparently as old as the Bible!  The 
Suffering Servant was to bear our grief and sorrows, yet we 
assumed and assume that it is somehow the servant's 
responsibility, karma, or destiny.  Later in the passage even the 
prophet concludes that "it was the will of God to bruise him and 
put him to grief" (v 10).

Gimme a break.  Rather, give God a break.  God's will was 
that we *listen up!* to Jesus, not beat him up!  God's 
will at most was for Jesus to take the risk that we might 
behave like Nazis, which we did, and have done again and 
again over the centuries, crucifying the innocent because we 
project onto them our own inadequacy, sins, fear, hatred, and 
violence.

It's time to get over our bloodthirsty, sacrificial needs. 
While championing victims' rights, we need to end the death 
penalty.  While supporting a woman's legal right to choose, 
we need to end the misconception that abortion is an 
acceptable means of birth control.  While encouraging family 
values, we need to end the destruction of gay people and gay 
families.  While promoting self-determination and democracy 
throughout the world, we need to end our warmaking.

If one believes in the need for sacrificial victims, then at 
least one must admit there's been enough bloodshed on earth 
alone to save the universe!  I think that's the atoning 
message of Jesus' crucifixion: enough is enough!  Stop, in 
the name of God, or else you might crucify God again!


April 11, Holy Saturday

After these things, Joseph of Arimathea, who was a disciple 
of Jesus, though a secret one because of his fear of the 
Jews, asked Pilate to let him take away the body of Jesus. 
 ... Nicodemus, who had at first come to Jesus by night, also 
came, bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes ....
-- John 19:38-39.

Those who wouldn't have been caught dead with Jesus in public 
and in daylight show up in private to anoint and bury a dead 
Jesus.  There's some redemption in that, of course.  But how 
much more they could have enjoyed their redemption if they'd 
been there earlier, with other disciples, who listened to his 
words, witnessed his healings, and ministered alongside!

We know Presbyterians and Presbyterian leaders who are 
supportive of us and our ministry privately.  For fear of 
other Presbyterians they do not acknowledge their support 
publicly.  They hesitate to be with us and share our 
ministry.

A friend with AIDS told his family and friends that he would 
rather they came to visit him while he was healthy than wait 
until he was dying or dead.  As needed as they would be then, 
he needed and wanted them even more in his everyday life, 
when they could enjoy one another's company to the fullest.


We will need our friends later, of course.  But we need them 
*now* to speak up, to speak out *now* -- not when it's 
too late.


April 12, Easter Sunday

Jesus said to her, "Mary!"  She turned and said to him in 
Hebrew, "Rabbouni!" (which means Teacher). -- John 20:16.

Along with Mary, we know the resurrected Jesus because we 
have somehow heard him speak our name.  He has called us 
personally to live the life he did, to minister in his name. 
He is as much alive to us as he was to Mary in that garden 
outside his tomb.

Many of our sisters and brothers have not heard Jesus speak 
their name, or have doubted his voice because the church has 
drowned out his message to them.  Many of our lesbian 
daughters and gay sons and bisexual and transgendered 
children may not hear Jesus speak their name.  If we, as the 
Body of Christ, do not call them by name, they may not know 
Jesus.  They may never experience the joy of Easter, God's 
desire to love us from death into life.

All we do must be for those who have not heard, who do not 
know the gospel story: that they are beloved children of God, 
created, redeemed, and nurtured by a God who calls them by 
name, reaching out to them like a mother hen gathers her 
brood under her wing, not wanting a single little one to be 
lost.

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