Sermon: Sergius, Abbot of Holy Trinity

Sermon for September 25, 2012

Feast Day of Sergius, Abbot of Holy Trinity, Moscow

St. Philips In The Hills Parish, Tucson, AZ

The Rev. Vicki Hesse, September 25, 2012

Proverbs 4:1-9 and Luke 8:16–21

I speak to you in the name of one God, + Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

Today is the feast day of Sergius,

a national hero and patron saint of Russia

from the mid-14^th century. 

A little bit about his background:

He was born during civil war and

his family left Moscow to begin farming in a nearby village. 

At the age of only twenty, he and his brother

moved to an even more secluded life in a nearby forest. 

From this location,

they developed what is now the Monastery of the Holy Trinity.

Apparently, he had a humble nature and

refused higher advancement, such as becoming

Bishop of Moscow. 

Instead, he remained, (and this line in particular struck me)

“…simple and gentle in nature, mystical in temperament and eager to ensure that his monks should serve the needs of their neighbors…” 

In other words, his life was not about him. 

We can draw inspiration from this one who grew deeply

in his faith through devotion and through his fellow monks.

The fertile inner-work that he did

is reflected in Proverbs and

in the Gospel and inspires our own inner-spiritual work.

From Proverbs,

“Listen, children, to a father’s instruction,

and be attentive, that you may gain insight…”

and again

“The beginning of wisdom is this:

Get wisdom, and whatever else you get, get insight…”

From the Gospel, we hear

“Pay attention to how you listen;

for to those who have, more will be given…”

Woven together, these texts raise up the nature of wisdom, gained from attentive listening and sharing. 

In biblical context,

the Gospel passage

“No one after lighting a lamp hides it under a jar or

puts it under a bed but puts it on a lamp stand…”

can be seen as a commentary on the parable

that actually preceded it. 

The parable that preceded it (but not read today)

was the parable of the sower and the seeds –

the seeds that fall on the path,

that grow among thorns,

that fall on the rocks and

that grow in good soil. 

In biblical context, then, Jesus could be heard saying

just as one sows in order to reap a harvest,

so one lights a lamp in order to give light. 

One doesn’t sow in order to feed birds or

to choke a bush with thorns –

so also one does not light a lamp

to put it under a suffocating jar or

under a bed. 

The purpose of sowing –

God’s purpose for the Word or the light –

is to effect change. 

If you receive God’s word –

the light of God’s word –

like good soil receives the seed,

you gain even greater insight and

maturity and knowledge of God. 

This is what Sergius did. 

He received the Word and passed it on. 

His sharing – his own proclamation

was the dynamic act that effected change. 

Today we hear how God’s word

burns like an eternal candle.

When we allow it, when we are attentive to it,

it gives light to produce a bountiful harvest. 

The very hearing of God’s word can transform us –

and especially so if we approach it

with radical openness and trust. 

Then, as we share our gifts of wisdom, time,

endurance and life experience,

so will we grow in the knowledge and love of God. 

The good news is that God’s word –

God’s light –

shines all the time,

eternally,

whether or not we are aware of it. 

We are called

to offer our simple, gentle, humble attention to it and

to realize the life and vitality it offers. 

With our simple and gentle nature,

may we continue to seek and serve Christ

in every person we meet this day and every day,

just as Sergius invites us.

Amen.

Sermon: Framed

Sermon for Pentecost 16/Proper 19, Year B

St. Philips In The Hills Parish, Tucson, AZ

Vicki Hesse, September 16, 2012

Mark 8:27-38

²⁷Jesus went on with his disciples to the villages of Caesarea Philippi; and on the way he asked his disciples, “Who do people say that I am?” ²⁸And they answered him, “John the Baptist; and others, Elijah; and still others, one of the prophets.” ²⁹He asked them, “But who do you say that I am?” Peter answered him, “You are the Messiah.” ³⁰And he sternly ordered them not to tell anyone about him.
³¹Then he began to teach them that the Son of Man must undergo great suffering, and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again. ³²He said all this quite openly. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. ³³But turning and looking at his disciples, he rebuked Peter and said, “Get behind me, Satan! For you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things.”
³⁴He called the crowd with his disciples, and said to them, “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. ³⁵For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it. ³⁶For what will it profit them to gain the whole world and forfeit their life? ³⁷Indeed, what can they give in return for their life? ³⁸Those who are ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of them the Son of Man will also be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels.”

I speak to you in the name of one God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. + Amen

Jesus asked them, “But who do YOU say that I am?” 

When I thought about that question, I remembered a story[1]

that I heard about two friends, Marion and Sandra. 

They were school friends who met on the street one day. 

Marion had recently lost her husband, David. 

They had been married for about 34 years,

he had had a heart attack and he had died. 

About 10 days after he had died, Marion met Sandra along the street.

Sandra was not a close friend but one who was very warm to Marion; they had seen each other occasionally.  

When they met, Sandra was filled with remorse because

she had not contacted Marion when she saw David’s obituary.  

Sandra was highly apologetic,

“I should have phoned you, I should have come to see you, and

I don’t know why, but I just want to say, I’m sorry, Marion.”

Marion said, “That’s alright, Sandra. 

You know, when people die, not everyone knows

what to say to those who are bereft,

so please don’t feel embarrassed about that…

it was a very sudden death. We had not anticipated it. 

He had had a massive coronary and it turns out that

if he had lived, he would have had a very restricted existence. 

So, because he was such a lively man,

maybe in a way that this is a blessing. 

We’ve been upheld by the prayers of the church and

by the people who have come to see us and

we’ll just have to go through the grieving, you can’t go around it.” 

Then Marion asked, “How about you, Sandra?”

Sandra said, “Oh, everyone’s fine, Marion, fine, yeah, fine,

all except my father.” 

“Oh?” Marion said, “What’s up with your father?”

Sandra said, “Well, he, um, died about 8-9 months ago.” 

“Oh!” Marion said, “I never saw the notice of your father’s death

in the newspaper.” 

Sandra said, “No, we never put it in – but he died a peaceful death,

he was about 85 and his time was up and he went gladly.” 

Then Sandra asked, “Do you remember my father, Marion?”

Marion said, “ Of course I remember your father…

I remember when I would walk down King Street

(a main street in the town) and

I would look into the butcher shop at the cross roads and

there would be your father, when he worked in the shop,

with his pork-pie hat on and a blue and white stripped apron

and his sleeves rolled up and his arms up to the elbows in

mincemeat or kidney or liver or whatever he was working on. 

Oh! in fact, I can remember your father

more easily that I can remember my husband David.”

Now here is an odd thing –

a woman’s husband has died 10 days earlier and

she can remember another woman’s father

more easily than she can remember her own husband. 

If we had time we could discuss why that might have been the case

and might come up with any number of possibilities –

a guilt associated with the death,

unfinished business,

perhaps an argument, or

some reason of a block.

This is actually a more common phenomenon

than we like to admit. 

Sometimes when people die, we cannot remember them. 

Perhaps the reason was because Sandra’s father was a man

that Marion only knew as the butcher on King Street. 

She looked through, as it were, a frame and

saw him at his work.  

She had never seen him fishing.

She had never seen him bowling. 

She had never seen him in his Masonic Apron

(probably his wife had never seen him in his Masonic Apron, either!). 

She had never seen him on vacation,

she had only seen him as this man who worked in a butcher shop. 

Now David, her husband, she’d seen him in many guises. 

She’d seen him in his army suit.

She’d seen him in his gardening suit because that was his first job. 

She’d seen him in his wedding suit,

she’d seen him in his birthday suit,

she’d seen him when he was in deep grief, as when

his younger brother, Tom, died of pneumonia at age 14.

She’d seen him delighted as when it was announced to him

that he had become the father of twin boys. 

She’d seen him in so many guises – so what could she focus on?

Sometimes we imagine that the people we know well

are actually the people we know only in one context. 

See, the people I know best and that you know best

are those who will have seen us at work and at play

and in different situations –

angry,

or full of fun,

puzzled or

full of joy. 

And when we see people in a numerous ways, then,

we can say that we know people well.  

This is how God knows us and relates to us.

God, through Jesus, has chosen to relate to us person to person,

not as distant, far off objects. 

And we will have a fuller understanding

of the one who calls us “friend” if we have in our mind –

and in our experience –

a range of pictures or images or characteristics of that one,

from which we can draw to seek and serve the Christ in one another.

1

In today’s gospel, Jesus asked his disciples,

“Who do people say that I am?”

and they answered him, with single-frame personalities –

“John the Baptist, Elijah, one of the prophets.”

Jesus re-asked, “but who do YOU say that I am?”

and Peter answered, “You are the Messiah.” 

When Jesus taught them the Son of Man

must suffer, be rejected, be killed and

after three days, will rise again – then,

Jesus expanded the frame of who he was. 

Peter reacted by rebuking Jesus;

this was not the Jesus he thought he knew so well. 

Jesus reacted by rebuking Peter;

he was not accepting this expansive frame.

Jesus said, “You are setting your mind not

on divine things but on human things.” 

Jesus rejected Peter’s control,

Peter’s single-minded context of who Jesus was. 

Jesus expanded the frame of who he was and

who the disciples were, too. 

Jesus explained that

to be a disciple of his meant this:

“if any want to become my followers

let them deny themselves, take up their cross and follow me.” 

Jesus set his mind on divine things and

saw the disciples in an expansive frame,

that they were called to

“take up their cross”

for the cause of God’s kingdom.

2

Perhaps we can see ourselves in this scene.  

Perhaps we know Jesus as the one who

shares communion with us every Sunday

but if we meet Jesus on Monday,

at the corner of River and Campbell begging for food or money,

we don’t know what to say. 

We want to rebuke that Jesus –

we have set our mind not on divine things but on human things. 

Perhaps we know Jesus as the one who

holds a sheep with a gentle smile,

but when we hear about the Jesus who speaks truth to power

by saying, “get behind me, Satan!”

we cringe, close our ears and don’t know what to say. 

This is not the Jesus who fits into a nice, neat frame. 

Like Marion who knew Sandra’s father just as the “butcher”

with the pork-pie hat and striped apron,

we sometimes see Jesus only in one frame –

as the one “up there,” the one distant from us. 

Or is he only that?

3

In today’s gospel,

Jesus told the disciples about

God’s faithfulness to redeem all of creation. 

He told them what it meant that he was the Messiah. 

He refused to be boxed-in.

He told them how it was necessary

to be rejected, to die and that then he will rise again.

Jesus told them that through him, all of humanity –

even those in the isolated region of Caesarea Philippi –

all of humanity, will be redeemed – that is,

liberated, healed and saved –

that all of humanity will know God’s love. 

In the question, “But who do YOU say that I am?”  

Jesus freely invited his disciples to expand their frame –

to follow him in the same manner,

to have their own experience of God’s gracious love. 

God, through Jesus, revealed a

deep, vulnerable, and intimate everlasting love

for all of humanity.

4

In this question, “But who do YOU say that I am?”

Jesus freely invites us to expand our frame and

to follow him in the same manner,

to have our own experience of God’s gracious love.

In this question, Jesus invites us to “set our mind… on divine things.” 

In this question, Jesus reveals God’s steadfast love of you and of me.

Jesus expands the frame of who we are, as his disciples, too.

Each time we look deeply into the eyes of our sisters and brothers;

each time we suffer, are rejected and some part of us dies;

each time we share ourselves deeply;

we increase our capacity to know who Jesus is -

We broaden the frame of Jesus and of ourselves. 

We are transformed when we follow as a disciple

 in the footsteps of the one who calls us friend. 

And each time, we can recognize

how God is alive and faithful and present with us in  

our own suffering, our sacrifices and our deaths.

This is where Jesus reveals, again,

God’s unwavering love for us and

is already resurrecting new hope in our lives. 

Jesus asks me, today, and you, today, “Who do YOU say that I am?” 

When you answer this question,

know that you are a disciple of him who refuses to be boxed in,

who offered himself to God’s will and

who reveals God’s deep, abiding love. 

When you answer this question, think of who God says that you are:

Loved.

Know you are loved.

Amen

---

[1] From John Bell, Iona Community, speaking at a retreat at Montreat Presbyterian Conference Center in 2010.

A L'il Welcome

I'm learning about welcoming from a 7 year old.

Last week, the "yellow visitor cards" arrived in my box.  These are those cards that folks fill out who are "visitors" and they use the little golf pencil to write their contact info.  I collected several cards, left a few "welcome!" voice mail messages and wrote simply notes to a few.

This week, I received an email from one of the vestry members.  She wrote,

"...I haven't actually met you in person yet ...We received the nicest handwritten note from you today in our mailbox addressed to our son, (name withheld), who is 7 years old.  

I think he must have filled out a card from a pew and dropped it into the offering plate.  He is precocious to say the least so I am sorry if you mistook him for a visitor to the parish.  ...Anyhow, I am looking forward to meeting you and hoping that you get to spend some time our congregation's younger children and their families...Welcome to Tucson .  We are so glad that you are here!"

So, while I was busy welcoming a new visitor, they were welcoming me!

God continues to show up in the most unexpected places.

 

Firsts

This week, I started my at my first parish position.

First time in *that* sanctuary.  First time someone called me, awkwardly, "Um, Reverend?..." First time meeting an altar guild of thirty women who know the names of sacred objects and know how to clean them.  First Vestry meeting.  First use of the "split" chalice.  First time wearing a collar in the grocery story.  First time reading this specific Gospel for a congregation, "In my Father's house there are many dwellings..." which is, of course, one of the selected texts for a funeral.

All these firsts, and it got me thinking.

How is God showing up in these firsts?  In some way, I believe that God overflows in those "first" moments.  With awe, with confidence, with delicacy, with color, with surprise.  *That's* a living God, alive!  God - loving me through it all, despite my new-ness.

I hope it always feels "first."

“So I started in, talking. Before I’d spoken half a dozen sentences, the Holy Spirit fell on them just as he did on us the first time. I remembered Jesus’ words: ‘John baptized with water; you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit.’ So I ask you: If God gave the same exact gift to them as to us when we believed in the Master Jesus Christ, how could I object to God?” - Acts 11:15-17 (The Message)

Not Every Meal Is Just About Food

Sermon for Pentecost 11/Proper 14, Year B

St. Barnabas Episcopal Church, Denver, CO ~ August 12, 2012

John 6:35, 41-51

³⁵Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty. ³⁶But I said to you that you have seen me and yet do not believe. 
⁴¹Then the Jews began to complain about him because he said, “I am the bread that came down from heaven.” ⁴²They were saying, “Is not this Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How can he now say, ‘I have come down from heaven’?” ⁴³Jesus answered them, “Do not complain among yourselves. ⁴⁴No one can come to me unless drawn by the Father who sent me; and I will raise that person up on the last day. ⁴⁵It is written in the prophets, ‘And they shall all be taught by God.’ Everyone who has heard and learned from the Father comes to me. ⁴⁶Not that anyone has seen the Father except the one who is from God; he has seen the Father. ⁴⁷Very truly, I tell you, whoever believes has eternal life. ⁴⁸I am the bread of life. ⁴⁹Your ancestors ate the manna in the wilderness, and they died. ⁵⁰This is the bread that comes down from heaven, so that one may eat of it and not die. ⁵¹I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats of this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.” 

A week before the Olympics began, we watched the final episode of Bachelorette.

(I can’t believe I admit watching that). The show featured a capable and sensitive woman who was very publicly looking for her “Mr. Right.” 

Since we were unavailable the exact night that the last episode aired,

we “streamed” the episode the next day on the station’s website.  This meant the show was punctuated by two, 30-second commercial clips. The same ads, every time. To watch the show on the website, we were obliged to see the ads over and over.

And over. Has anyone else experienced this?  

Both commercials positioned their product next to food. 

The first commercial began with the image of a kind woman’s face –

softly, out of focus, while Al Green’s song,

“Let’s Stay Together” played in the background:

“I, I'm so in love with you / Whatever you want to do / Is all right with me”

As the song played, the image of Lays potato chips appeared. 

We heard the refrain lyrics, straight from the Gospel of Al Green:

“ 'Cause you make me feel so brand new / And I want to spend my life with you…”

The advertisers cleverly positioned the ordinary potato chip with a familiar love song.

What stood out for me was this explicit linking of love and food…

to let it “do what you want to do” because it “makes you feel so brand new.” 

It was a bit ridiculous, aligning potato chips and love …

The second commercial began with the image of a bank’s logo

flashing across the screen. Quickly, the image transitioned

to a soft black-n-white video. We watched two very cute five- or seven-year-olds

run towards a booth at a diner, their father in tow trying to keep up behind them. 

They slipped into a booth, laughed, and folded their fries

before stuffing them in their mouth for a fun time with their dad. 

Meanwhile, Thin Lizzy’s song, “The Boys are Back In Town” 

played in the background. You know the one:

“The boys are back in town /the boys are back in town….”

Very quickly, the logo of the bank re-appeared on the screen with the words,

 “Not every meal is about food. ” We saw the father paying his check with that bank’s preferred credit card. The narrator closed the commercial by saying, 

“Why not make lunch more than just lunch? With our card you get two times the points at every meal…not every meal is about food / With our card you may be tempted to say yes to more meals than you thought.”

The advertisers cleverly positioned the ordinary credit card with a take-the-kids-out-for-lunch scene.

What stood out for me was the explicit linking of family love, product and food.

So that “not every meal is about food” I wondered – who says that every meal is only about food anyway?

Both of these commercials included food to position their product. Why?

Elementally, we humans hunger.  We need to eat, physiologically. We have hungers and thirsts, physiologically and metaphorically.   Advertisers know that.  They connect their product to satisfying that hunger.  This approach has been going on for hundreds of years. 

Even Jesus, in today’s Gospel reading.  When Jesus said, “I am the bread of life” he connected the people’s elemental hunger – what was needed for life – to himself. 

Jesus turned things upside down (once again) by raising at least three key issues: 

Who is “I Am,”

Who and what is “The Bread” and

Who draws people to Jesus. 

Jesus’ statement “I am the bread of life” was a bold self-revelation.  Last week, Dennis explored fabulously how in that bread we find Jesus – the one who we meet at the Communion table.   Today’s reading opens with this statement “I am the bread of life.” It’s kind of the biblical version of Jesus’ logo flashing across our screen. 

Just so you know, this won’t be the last time Jesus says  “I am.”Spoiler Alert!

Five times in the Gospel of John we read

“I am…the light of the world.”

“I am…the gate for the sheep.”

“I am…the good shepherd.”

“I am… the resurrection and the life.”

“I am… the way, the truth and the life.”  

In so doing, Jesus used common symbols of ancient Near Eastern religious and

human experiences.   In these “I am” statements,  Jesus declared how religious and human longings are met in him. He used a variety of symbols because not one of them

can totally describe who Jesus is.   Each one presents a different lens through which Jesus meets human longings.

The loaded phrase “I Am” must have resonated with the scholars and Jewish people gathered there. They probably knew their Hebrew Scriptures and knew Exodus 3,

when Moses asked God what name to use to describe God to the Israelites?

“God replied to Moses, “I AM WHO I AM.” … “Thus you shall say to the Israelites,

‘The Lord, the God of your ancestors, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you’: This is my name forever, and this my title for all generations.”

So when Jesus said, “I am… the bread that came down from heaven,” he aligned ordinary bread with himself and with the scholarly name for God (I AM) from texts of his tradition and his people.

Jesus positioned himself as The Bread.

Bread, made from the ingredients of the earth (flour, water, salt and yeast) and

prepared in three steps (mix, rise and bake), which people ate daily.

Bread, that people also used in the religious rituals of meaning and in offerings to God. 

Bread, like the manna that their ancestors ate in the wilderness (but died).

Bread, in the person of Jesus, was different than that old time-limited manna. 

 

Jesus, as The bread of life – was God’s once-for-all living gift to the world.[1] 

Who draws people to Jesus?

See, the people of this synagogue were familiar with how Rabbis were supposed to act and when “proper” teaching about God’s heaven was not being followed. 

They knew “about” Jesus – they said, “Is this not Jesus, the son of Joseph,

whose father and mother we know? How can he now say, ‘I have come down from heaven’?”  They complained about his statements …“coming down from heaven,” –

how can he say that? That didn’t fit who they understood Jesus to be,

the son of Joseph.

We can all relate to this shock they must have felt. How many of us have known someone in one context, only to learn about them in another context and been flabbergasted at who they then became.  Like me, taking a yoga class from my sister –

my “little” sister – who is a really gifted teacher! 

The Jews gathered there murmured gna gna gna... So Jesus responded to them,

“Do not complain among yourselves.”  Then, he elaborated.  There’s more going on here. 

“No one can come to me unless drawn by the Father who sent me…” 

Jesus diverted the attention away from himself to God, the source and power of life. 

“No one can come to me unless drawn by the Father who sent me…” 

What did Jesus mean, “drawn by the Father”? Augustine has helpful words to say about this: 

“See how he draws. Not by imposing necessity” but by grace – enabling the “inner palate” of the soul to find it’s greatest “pleasure” and “delight” in partaking of the truth. It is not, Augustine cautions, for us to judge who is drawn and who is not, but rather to realize that our preaching is only noise to the ears unless listeners are drawn

by [God’s] love to hear it.”[2]

In other words, God draws hearts to Love.  God draws through grace. God satisfies our inner palate.

What are you hungry for? What is your deepest longing? 

What is really behind that hunger & longing?

Is it to be enough? accepted? understood? forgiven? loved?

In Jesus, the I Am, we know God. In Jesus, incarnate and ordinary as bread, we know God.  By the grace of God’s drawing, our palate is satisfied in Love.   

As members of this faith community, we are called to love others as we are loved.

Today’s good news reminds us that we are called to invite others to know God, just as we are drawn to know God. It is not for us to convert or to change others, simply to invite.    

We know Jesus in this messy, ordinary, incarnational human experience. Jesus, the bread of life that comes down from heaven, continues to feed our hungers and our thirsts. 

Maybe this week, for St. B’s, Jesus is the peach of life – juicy, messy, tasty.

Can you invite Jesus to satisfy you?  

Can you invite others to experience the Love of God found in this place? 

Perhaps the advertiser has got it right –

sometimes a meal is not just about food.

Can we join in this meal of ordinary bread and wine,  and together, through Jesus, be drawn closer to Love.

Amen.

---

[1] New Interpreter’s Bible, Commentary on John 6, p. 603

[2] Christopher Morse, “Theological Perspective,” Feasting On The Word, Proper 14, p. 336

seriously

Under the category of "don't take church too seriously," I offer these observances:

Recently, I attended "The Welcome Table" worship, the Sunday Morning service at 8am at Epiphany Episcopal Church, in downtown DC.  This congregation consists of fifty to seventy five street people, the ten or so lay volunteers who serve a hot breakfast for them, and a half a dozen folks like me who simply enjoy this diverse crowd.  (This is very different from the later morning service, that I have not attended, which consists of folks who work and live in DC, making their career in politics or hospitality or other DC-like vocations.)

At The Welcome Table service, the "prelude" is sung by the sometimes out of tune walk-up choir of three or four people who belt out a popular hymn. Or, one of the street folks offers a heart-felt solo.  After we all read an opening prayer together, the Liturgy of the Word continues with readers for the lessons and someone guides the congregation in sharing the psalm.  Sometimes their speech impediment prevents clear understanding.  Sometimes the words are difficult for them to pronounce.  Sometimes they are shy at the lectern.  Always, their countenance is love.

During the homily, I heard stereophonic snoring.  The man sitting in the pew directly behind me was fast asleep, gurgling as he breathed deeply.  A man a few rows up was out cold, head tilted uncomfortably to the left.  The "cool cat" with the sunglasses on in the front row was perusing a magazine, turning the pages of his reading material quite loudly.  The smell of someone who had not showered in, say, an entire season, waifed across the sanctuary. Occasionally someone from the back, agreeing with the preacher, shouts an "Amen!" that wakes up a few people.  Always, the congregation gathered respects each persons' needs and dignity.

In the midst of the Eucharistic prayer, when the celebrant touches the bread and says, "on the night that Jesus died, he took bread, and when he gave thanks to you, he broke it..." - *just* then, a wandering street person traipsed in front of the raised altar platform with his rolling bag and all his belongings, to cross the space to get to the other side.  He was mumbling to himself, quietly, but he was quietly ignored by the celebrant.  The prayer continued with out missing a beat, "and gave it to them and said, Take Eat, this is my body given for you." Always... his body given in so many forms.

On Tuesday, when I attended "Street Church," there was a similar mid-Eucharistic prayer interruption.  The enthusiastic lay helper tapped the celebrant on the shoulder, offering her some hand sanitizer.  Seriously, it was mid-prayer just after blessing the bread but before the wine was blessed. 

As I reflect on my year of Episcopal formation, learning the "proper" forms of prayers, the "proper" hand movements, the "proper" way to be with the congregation, I realized *this* was a time to learn how NOT to take church so seriously.  What is serious, is that mid-Eucharistic prayer interruptions by well-meaning people in all their humanness might give a pause, but that pause brings glory to God.

Seriously - love, love and love.  That's all.  That matters.  Seriously.