11-20-16-sermon-st-pauls-thanksgiving.md

Church

Sun, Nov 20, 2016 St. Paul’s

lectionary

• make us good stewards
• provide for us
• a wandering Aramean was my ancestor
• rejoice in the Lord always
• whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasing, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.
• I am the bread of life

What we “ought” to do

At a young age I remember being taught that I ought to be grateful – for any number of things. I ought to write thank you notes. I ought to appreciate all that my parents – or teachers – or ?? did for me.

For the most part I don’t think it worked very well.

On the other hand, I am curious to figure out when did I learn actually become grateful? At what point did I exercise gratitude?

Being grateful

It had to be connected with receiving a gift and knowing that I didn’t somehow deserve it. Had earned it or it belonged to me.

When I got good grades I figured I had worked for them. When I got them without working for them – English honors in senior year – I just figured it was something like good luck.

Being lucky isn’t really related to gratitude.

Possibly it was when my first born was raised above our heads by the delivering physician and he asked me what his name was? I cried uncontrollably.

Perhaps it was a little earlier when I was rock climbing and fell. I was caught:

• my friend held the rope
• the piton held in the rock
• the rope held

Perhaps it was the day I received a cash gift at seminary. Someone had known that our family was in need of money, perhaps because of the birth of our second child, I don’t remember. But I can still vividly remember the moment I opened the unmarked envelope I had just picked up at the campus post office. In it was a bundle of cash. No note. No way to send a thank you note. The only thing to do was to be grateful.

It was quite a bit later in life that I learned about a teaching of the Rabbis – the goal of offering 100 blessings / day

Question: I once heard that there is a certain amount of blessings we should attempt to say each day. How many is it, and what is the source of this idea?

Answer: There is indeed such a teaching. We are to recite 100 blessings each day. The Talmud1 extrapolates this from a verse in Deuteronomy:2 “Now, Israel, what does G‑d, your G‑d, ask of you? … to walk in His ways … and to serve Him.”

The Hebrew word for “what,” mah (מָה), is phonetically similar to the word me’ah (מֵאָה), which means 100. In other words, the verse can be understood as saying: “Now, Israel, a hundred does G‑d, your G‑d, ask of you”—one hundred blessings.

chabad.org

Guides

• thanking someone who doesn’t usually get thanks
• Know the value of small things
• learn the value of giving thanks for small things
• Cultivate being grateful
• make it a minimum goal to offer it 100 times in a day

There are countless articles out there touting the value of gratitude. But is that really what’s going on here? Is it – this is good for you – ?

That’s not the reason for doing it.

“Be thankful for what you have; you’ll end up having more. If you concentrate on what you don’t have, you will never, ever have enough.” – Oprah Winfrey

Habakkuk: giving thanks even when the fig tree withers

3:17 Though the fig tree does not blossom, and no fruit is on the vines; though the produce of the olive fails, and the fields yield no food; though the flock is cut off from the fold, and there is no herd in the stalls, 18 yet I will rejoice in the Lord; I will exult in the God of my salvation. 19 God, the Lord, is my strength; he makes my feet like the feet of a deer, and makes me tread upon the heights. To the leader: with stringed instruments.

“Sing as if no one can hear; dance as if no one is watching; dream as if there are no impossibilities” (Annie)

“If the only prayer you ever say in your entire life is thank you, it will be enough.” - Meister Eckhart

End of Church year – begin of new

• This Sunday is the last of the church year
• gift of last 50 years, that we get to hear from each of the gospels over a 3 year cycle – this next year gospel of Matthew
• Like other “new years”, it gives us a chance to look back and take stock and to gird our loins for the upcoming year. or
• For all that has been, Thank you. For all that is to come, Yes!
  Dag Hammarskjold

Sun, Nov 13, 2016: St. Paul’s

Church

Sun, Nov 13, 2016: St. Paul’s

lectionary

• Holy Scripture written for us
• I shall build a new Heavens – focus on Jerusalem – no more the sound of weeping
• the wolf and the lamb shall lie down together
• the stones of the temple thrown down – when you hear of wars and resurrection – nation will rise against nation
• they will arrest you

The Bible and the Times

“This past week has been an emotional and turbulent one for many people in our nation.”
We had an election last week. … you probably noticed.
Perhaps the greatest 20^th; c. theologians, Karl Barth, said that sermons should be written with the Bible in one hand and the newspaper in the other. He came to that conclusion after watching his German Evangelical Church first support the Kaiser in his war-making effort in the 1^st World War and then much more alarmingly when it supported the rise of Adolph Hitler.

The events of the past week require me to look at the Bible and the newspaper at the same time. And I’m not particularly comfortable doing it. What the newspaper (and all the other venues for news) tell us connected to the political events of the American election of the past week. I have been so cautious my whole ministry to avoid even the appearance of partisan politics in my church speech and actions.
I recognize that the church is “church” for all people, whatever their political persuasion. I recognize that Christ died for all people.

The results of my reading of the newspaper in one hand and the Bible in the other, however, convinces me that we live in radical times. One of the results of the election I read about in the newspaper is that there have been a number of racist and violent messages in a number of communities. I read that many of our citizens are fearful of what is to come after the pronouncements of the political campaign that we have just witnessed. There have been a number of protests to the election throughout the country. I wonder if there has ever been anything similar in the history of our country?

It convinces me that the message for the church cannot be “business as usual.”

Our times have become exceptional times

• apocalyptic times – like we hear of in the gospel today.

The eschatological images fit the time we live in.

• “Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom; there will be great earthquakes, and in various places famines and plagues; and there will be dreadful portents and great signs from heaven.”

The world we live in is filled with unfathomable images, trends and trajectories, hopes and despairs that seem beyond speaking.

• 9/11
• the melting of the ice caps
• warfare fought in the middle east with ferocity and frenzy that seems to come from a world gone by

But such events have been occurring with regularity throughout Christian History:

• The sack of Jerusalem, expulsion of Jews from Judea
• Nero blaming all his troubles on the Christians in Rome
• Justin Martyr and countless others marched to an amphitheater to be killed by lions.
• The destruction of Rome within a century of it becoming a “Christian” city
• The murder and destruction of Jews, Muslims and Arab Christians at time of the crusades
• the Black Plague when ½ the population of Europe died
• the wars of religion throughout Europe
• 20th c. wars … for example, the matter of deaths caused by war: in the 18th century, about 4 million people died in wars; in the 19th century, about 8 million people died in wars; in the 20th century, nearly 100 million people died in wars.
• the Holocaust, and genocides of the 20th c.

The end times: what is its meaning?

Apocalyptic literature was and continues to this day to be written for the encouragement of those who experience persecution or destruction. It is intended to convey the message that the ruins about us are not God’s final answer.
We, the church, must reflect God’s answer. It is not the case that things will inevitably get better and better for our country or the world. One person said:

There is no biblical basis for a hope in inevitable progress. Nowhere in the Bible does it say that things will gradually get better until at last the kingdom is present, and in fact it is closer to the biblical truth to say that things will get worse before they get better. 1

At the same time, the Bible could not be clearer that we are responsible for our end of things. Bp. Desmond Tutu once put it in the most succinct way possible: God has made us responsible for His reputation.

Exceptional demands are upon us

We are at this moment a nation deeply divided upon itself.

When Luke said of Jesus (back in ch. 11 of Luke) But he knew what they were thinking and said to them, “Every kingdom divided against itself becomes a desert, and house falls on house.” he wasn’t talking about politics. He was talking about the Kingdom of God vs. the Kingdom of this World.

What would Jesus do about the division in our country?

“What would Jesus do?”

What would he do about the more than ½ of our nation that feels themselves to be under threat from the President elect?

How can we be responsible for God’s reputation in these times?

I am not presuming to tell you the answer to the questions I pose, but I think the times demand an answer from us. Not to answer is itself an answer.

An expository article from Interpretation 1982. “It can be said that Christian life is placed between history and eternity. It takes part, on the one hand, in the history of the world within which it exercises its faith; and it participates, on the other hand, in the power of the resurrection as the token of the new world toward which it is straining."

All of this reminds us that the events of the last week – as polarizing and shocking as they were (no matter your allegiance) – is but the perspective from this side of the Resurrection -- where God made us responsible for His reputation.

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1. St. Louis commentary: ↩

The Episcopal Church circa 2016

I am grateful and inspired by The Rev. Tom Buechele's recent email, shared with the retired clergy of the diocese of Hawai’i. In it he took note of the seemingly extreme demand for supply clergy in remote congregations. He had received requests from as far away as Mexico. He wondered about the health of the church where so many Episcopalians were not able to get the sacraments on a Sunday morning. In his lengthy email he said:

“Allowing for really trying to maintain a non-anxious presence in
an anxious world, our institutional religious leadership needs to
“wake up and smell the coffee”. Many are, but not enough! Never mind
the folks not in the pews, the folks in the small congregation pews
are not happy. They are the ones, who if a Bishop Donald or Donna
Trump would come along …would vote for him or her immediately.
I’ve always been a Christian Socialist all my life, so unbridled
capitalism in my moral theological training is sinful. Feeling the
Bern has brought me to a conclusion about our grand and historical
Episcopal Church in the USA. It is part of the inequality quotient
that us older activist clergy and millions of millennials rail
against. Good and faithful worshippers, elder lay folks, new immigrant
communities are struggling and they are angry.” (My name is Rev. Tom
Buechele+ and I am a retired Episcopal priest, age 73, residing in
Oregon.)

I am a retired priest living in South Carolina, the opposite side of the
country from either Oregon or Hawai’i, depending on how you might see
it. The churches around here seem to be pretty occupied with keepin’ on
keepin’ on. Tom’s email strikes me as a wake-up bell to a church that
has gone to sleep, all too often focused and passionate about what is
tangential and too much unable to “smell the coffee” as Tom puts it.
This piece is only tangentially about making the sacraments, i.e.
Eucharist, available to small congregations. That is the presenting
issue of a much larger malaise. Analogous examples from the non-church
world would include: a graduate from college entering the adult world
saddled with debt that will leave them enslaved for life, millions of
Americans who suffer and die for lack of health care, while the
pharmaceutical industry and insurance companies enrich themselves,
oblivious to the human cost. We have become a nation with a few
ultra-wealthy and powerful “rulers” and a vast population of angry but
often compliant followers. Tom suggests, I think, that a similar kind of
misguided priorities exists and has existed in the Episcopal Church, the
church that Tom and I have loved and served.
The church, Tom seems to say, like our nation, has lost its way. As I
recently looked through old papers I had long ago filed away, I found an
article written in the 90’s by a church consultant and priest. The
author lamented that he saw no evidence that the challenge to double the
size of the church by 2020 would actually be met. With great fanfare the
institutional church put forward the “20/20” challenge. The author of
the article observed that he saw no deeper **purpose for doubling in
size** being articulated. There is no deeper driving force other than
keepin’ on doin’ what we’ve always done – just do it twice as hard and
twice as much. You might say it was the voice of a jaded and cynical old
priest who wrote that essay. You may say it of me. But in response I
affirm that I speak from a deep love of the God of the universe and of
the church which his Son passed on to our care and nurture. I have a
sense of the passing of time in one man’s life and of the enduring but
ever-changing seasons of the life of the church.
I have often remembered Bp. Michael Ramsey saying that he could well
imagine a time when the Anglican Communion was no longer a part of God’s
plan and would then pass away. I talked with my millennial son last year
about his thoughts regarding the approaching demise of the “American
Empire.” He accepted the diagnosis and said that he only hopes that the
new world order could be accomplished without war. Generally the passing
of one empire to the next is accompanied by violent upheaval.
We live in such times and Tom seems to me to be saying that the
Episcopal Church has for a long time been a representative of the old
order, “part of the inequality quotient.” Today, in the prayer we use
every day in our household, we observed World Conscientious Objector Day
and read Maximilian the martyr, “I cannot enlist, for I am a Christian.
I cannot serve, I cannot do evil. You can cut off my head, but I will
not be a soldier of this world, for I am a soldier of Christ.” In such
as he we can hear one who has a clear eye on the larger purpose for
leading the church into the new age. Do we as a church offer the kind of
vision that can inspire the world? Or do we offer a vision of an
institution that wants to maintain the status quo? The professional
clergy of our church have a huge stake in defending the financial
benefits the church offers – it offered it to me in retirement. But how
is that not an impediment to risking one’s life on the truth of the
gospel in a way that inspires the world? I emphasize ”inspire” on the
Day of Pentecost when we celebrate and re-member the church as a place
that is filled with the air of the Holy Spirit. We note that it is that
air that sent the church aloft, a red balloon alive and floating through
the streets and alleyways of the empire. It is the whimsy of a red
balloon that I think our church needs in this age. Providing sacraments
isn’t about protocol and it isn’t about financial arrangements. We’re
talking about a little bit of wine and a bit of bread in a small
congregation. Even in the favelas of Brazil one could find a bit of wine
and bread for a small and poor congregation. It’s a question of
“inspiration” not of institutional adjustment.
On “A Prairie Home Companion” last night I heard a re-worked rendition
of Cole Porter’s “Let’s do it, Let’s Fall in Love.” Whether or not the
song intended to be euphemistic in its phraseology or not is an open
question. The nature of the song has meant that many times over the
years it has been re-worked the way Garrison Keillor did last night. His
version said among others things that even Democratic Socialists who
feel the Bern can “do it.” Even people in Spokane, WA (the location of
the broadcast show) “do it.” You have to sing along to really hear it.
But “falling in love” with God is what the red balloon is about.
In-spired with love. That could bring the sacrament to every nook and
crany the whole world over.
Faithfully,
The Rev’s Dale C. Hathaway, Rock Hill, SC

Parental Alienation

Title: Parental Alienation: my view of the Beast
Author: Dale C. Hathaway
Date: December 2015

Abstract:

This is an attempt to put into a few words the depth of emotion I have experienced as my beloved daughter has been stolen from my affections. While I have at times felt devastated by the experience, the far more important issue for me is the impact on the life of my daughter. I offer this as a vehicle for education regarding this important, though controversial, topic.

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The beast named: parental alienation.

Oh to feel helpless when injustice is imposed by the established powers. To see an innocent child used by the adults in her life for their own purposes is to want to rage inside and out. But the rage is impotent. The child acts tough and in charge. She just “carries on.” And the world goes on, much as it always has.
In prayer this morning the lectionary was from Isaiah:

God looked and saw evil looming on the horizon— so much evil and no
sign of Justice. He couldn’t believe what he saw: not a soul around to
correct this awful situation. So he did it himself, took on the work of
Salvation, fueled by his own Righteousness. He dressed in Righteousness,
put it on like a suit of armor, with Salvation on his head like a
helmet, Put on Judgment like an overcoat, and threw a cloak of Passion
across his shoulders. (59:15 ff.)

God has been looking on at his people and his creation for millenia, grieving at the pain and injustice his beloved have endured. He has watched as it has been repeated over and over again, generation after generation.
Who am I that think of myself as exceptional that I have seen and experienced my little acreage of injustice and innocent suffering?

What is this thing I have seen and experienced?

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Briefly it is the description and associated theories of the process whereby a child of estranged parents rejects a once-loved parent for reasons that are absurd or indecipherable. The process by which this happens has been studied over the course of the last generation and many nuances have been pursued. It has been associated with circumstances of child abuse and distorted parenting.

“when a group of parental behaviors are damaging to children’s mental and emotional well-being, and can interfere with a relationship of a child and either parent.” [see esp.] 1 [but see also]2 “In a survey at the Association of Family and Conciliation Courts in 2010, 98% of the 300 respondents agreed with the question, “Do you think that some children are manipulated by one parent to irrationally and unjustifiably reject the other parent?”. However, Parental Alienation Syndrome refers not to this manipulation, but to a serious illness in the child in which he or she despises and rejects one of the parents.”3

Some of the therapeutic literature focuses on the pathologies present in the rejecting parent. This might take the form of seeing patterns of the rejecting parent projecting his or her own inadequacies or abusive experiences onto the rejected parent. The pathology of the rejecting parent is of Borderline Personality Disorder or Narcissistic Personality Disorder.

“Superior courts worldwide are now recognizing parental alienation as serious child abuse with long-term effects and serious outcomes for the “PAS Child”. Some jurisdictions have enacted parental alienation as a criminal offense, the latest being Brazil and Mexico.”4

Parental alienation has been a contentious concept in the family law arena as well as among mental health professionals (some of whom have been co-opted for use in the court arena) since the 1970’s. The Wikipedia article is a tremendous resource. [see also] 5
At the same time, the discussion has taken place largely in the context of the legal system, divorce proceedings, child custody disputes.

Symptoms:

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Symptoms in the victim – the child – might include something like the following definition:

The child lacks attachment to a parent. In relationship to that parent, the child displays “grandiosity, entitlement, absence of empathy, haughty, arrogant behavior and delusional belief systems” about a parent being inadequate or abusive. The child engages in splitting, believing that one parent is entirely good and the other parent is entirely bad.
Except for the symptoms of attachment and delusional belief, each of these is a criterion in DSM 5 for either Narcissistic Personality Disorder or Borderline Personality Disorder*.6

The Child is the victim:

While the focus, in the courts and in the literature, is often on the parents in conflict, the primary concern is and ought to be on the child caught in the midst of parental forces.7
Johnston (2005) defines an alienated child as one

who expresses, freely and persistently, unreasonable negative feelings and beliefs (such as anger, hatred, rejection and/or fear) toward a parent that are significantly disproportionate to the child’s actual experience with that parent. Entrenched alienated children are marked by unambivalent, strident rejection of the parent with no apparent guilt or conflict (p. 762).(quoted in http://www.vawnet.org/advanced-search/referring to Johnston, J.R., Walters, M.G., & Olesen, N.W. (2005). Is It Alienating Parenting, Role Reversal or Child Abuse? A Study of Children’s Rejection of a Parent in Child Custody Disputes. Journal of Child Custody*, 5, 191-218.) 8

While the focus is properly on the true innocent victim in this process, recent research has paid attention to dynamics of the entire family system. This is in keeping with a general trend over recent generations to understand all of us as living in inter-related systems where what affects one may well affect another at some distance away.

Some formulations of the concept have emphasized the role of an alienating parent, termed variously the “programming” parent or “embittered-chaotic parent”. More recent descriptions, influenced by the research of Kelly and Johnston, have proposed a more complex analysis, in which all family members may play a role. This “systems-based” view acknowledges that a child may be alienated from one parent without “alienating” behaviour by the other parent. The results of an empirical study also suggest that alienating behaviors by both parents are the norm in high-conflict divorces. Rejected parents, generally fathers, tend to lack warmth and empathy with the child; instead, they engage in rigid parenting and critical attitudes. The rejected parent is often passive, depressed, anxious, and withdrawn - characteristics which may encourage further rejection. The parent that the child aligns with (the aligned parent) may engage in alienating behaviors, including undermining the other parent.9[and] 10
No man is an island,
Entire of itself,
Every man is a piece of the continent,
A part of the main. (John Donne)

The literature tends to assume that restoring the affection of the child to the rejected parent is a good thing. This is a good thing. Ultimately the parents’ wishes and needs must pass to the child and his or her well-being.

My experience has been outside the focus of the literature

My parenting:

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I used to joke about how God gave me multiple opportunities to learn how to be a father because I was so crappy at it that He gave me several chances to get it right (or better).
By the time I was working on my 3rd round of parenting, I was anything but the stereotypical American father: controlling, rigid, and remote.
I was engaged, loving, both maternal and paternal. I took the children to the doctors and made sure they were at soccer practice. I rocked them to sleep and read them stories at bedtime – up through middle school when they didn’t want it any more. I tried to provide a model for honesty, and accountability, believing that it was far more important for them to see me living the ideals I wanted them to learn and make their own.
Even in that setting I experienced how that set of circumstances could be used against me as a weapon.
I once experienced the American judicial system gone amuck in the name of protecting children.
An uneducated day care worker from another culture had just undergone child abuse training. She had learned there that if there was any indication of abuse with the child then she was required to report it to “the authorities.”
That worker didn’t understand me carrying my daughter on my shoulders into the day-care center every day. I took her every day, not her mother, and we laughed and played with great frequency. My daughter and I had a good rapport. The day care worker didn’t understand.
As a result the state intruded and prevented me from picking that child up from kindergarten that day and I underwent interrogation and investigation by the police department. They, of course, found no evidence of anything but a loving and involved parent.
I know something about these things and how easy it is to libel and defame an innocent person.
It seems that in the end my efforts to be the best possible father I could be were somehow used against me, somehow providing fodder for the alienation that was foisted onto my youngest children.
I have experienced how libel and lies can be used to tear down the innocent (myself) and to ultimately harm the truly innocent (my children).

The search for peace

Remorse for my part, mourning for the loss. Is there a lesson to be learned?

Divorce broke my marriage with my second wife and mother of two children. I had for years described my daughters to people I met as the “lights of my life”. I understood through them what it meant to be prepared to die to protect another person.
I don’t mean to sidestep responsibility for divorce when I say that some alien force called “divorce” happened to us, like a tree falling on us in the midst of a torrential storm. I participated in the narrative that culminated in divorce. I broke my vow that I would never willingly engage in divorce again. I decided that staying married for the sake of the children was a greater burden on the children than I wanted to heap on them.
I no doubt misunderstood all the players in our family drama. But it must be said that I had worked very hard for many decades at understanding myself and the people in my life. I was not just some oaf. The people of my parish (I am an Episcopal priest) experienced me as deeply caring, compassionate and understanding.
It was not I that sought to make sure that my children would never speak to me again. I don’t know the nature of the accusations against me. But what I have experienced is a child who once adored me has nothing to do with me now.
Many are the children who have lost their parents too young. Many are the children who have overcome great depredation, only to succeed and even flourish. But what of the scars? What is the cost? Who pays? How might extended family members have assisted the well-being of the child? How did the courts contribute to the alienation? How did they fail the child? How did the churches and her leaders fail the child – all in the name of “staying above the fray” or voicing concern when actions suggested cowardice?
I don’t know the answer to most of the questions that I was left with through this experience. I write this from the lanai of a condominium overlooking the ’Au’au Channel and Moloka’i. I am sensitive to the great Spirit that flows through these islands and I know that my alienated daughter has felt that spirit herself. I am moving to a place where I am prepared to entrust her to the care of that Spirit. Most everyone else has let her down.

Resources:

Barbara Kay(2015). Barbara Kay: Teaching children to hate the ex. URL:http://news.nationalpost.com/full-comment/barbara-kay-teaching-children-to-hate-the-ex.
Is Emotional Abuse as Harmful as Physical and Sexual Abuse? (2015). URL:https://chronicleofsocialchange.org/featured/emotional-abuse-harmful-physical-sexual-abuse/13944.
Parental alienation(2015).en.Wikipedia:PageVersionID:696354612. URL:https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Parental_alienation&oldid=696354612.
The Impact of Parental Alienation on Children(2015). URL:http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/co-parenting-after-divorce/201304/the-impact-parental-alienation-children.
Wallin, Paul (2015). Should Parental Alienation Be a Crime? | WK. URL:http://www.wkfamilylaw.com/parental-alienation-crime/.

Notes:

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1. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Parental_alienation&oldid=696354612 ↩
2. http://news.nationalpost.com/full-comment/barbara-kay-teaching-children-to-hate-the-ex ↩
3. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Parental_alienation&oldid=696354612 ↩
4. http://www.vawnet.org/advanced-search/print-document.php?doc_id=1679&find_type=web_desc_AR ↩
5. The Impact of Parental Alienation on Children*(2015). URL:http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/co-parenting-after-divorce/201304/the-impact-parental-alienation-children. ↩
6. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Parental_alienation&oldid=696354612 ↩
7. The Impact of Parental Alienation on Children*(2015). URL:http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/co-parenting-after-divorce/201304/the-impact-parental-alienation-children. ↩
8. The Impact of Parental Alienation on Children*(2015). URL:http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/co-parenting-after-divorce/201304/the-impact-parental-alienation-children. ↩
9. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Parental_alienation&oldid=696354612 ↩
10. http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/co-parenting-after-divorce/201304/the-impact-parental-alienation-children ↩