Frontpage, Feb. 7, 2021

Laying on of hands, Feb. 4, 2018, 3 years ago.

Feb. 7 – Fifth Sunday after the Epiphany

Feb. 7 – 11:00am, Morning Prayer – Join here at 10:30am for gathering – service starts at 11am Meeting ID: 869 9926 3545 Passcode: 889278

• Bulletin
• Lectionary
• Sermon

Feb. 7 – 7:00pm, Compline – Join here at 6:30am for gathering – service starts at 7pm Meeting ID: 878 7167 9302 Passcode: 729195

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Feb. 10 – 10:00am – Ecumenical Bible Study through Zoom Meeting ID: 837 2389 1841 Passcode: 067156

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Feb. 14 – Last Sunday after the Epiphany

Feb. 14 – 11:00am Morning Prayer – Join here at 10:30am for gathering – service starts at 11am Meeting ID 834 7356 6532 Password 748475

Feb. 14 – 7:00pm, Compline – Join here at 6:30am for gathering – service starts at 7pm Meeting ID 834 7356 6532 Password 748475

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Videos from the Parish Meeting, Jan. 31

The videos were a combination of a celebration of current ministries (Village Dinner, Village Harvest, Flowers, sacred ground, completion of the pavilion) as well as a look ahead – Mission for Jamaica, Additional work in Port Royal.

Watch the videos here if you have not seen them or want another viewing.

You can also read the reports from the meeting.

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Sacred Ground Book Group – sign up now

10 people met with Catherine on Feb. 4 as part of the Sacred Ground book group reading the book Caste.

In Caste, Isabel Wilkerson argues that the current social and political landscapes in America derive from the infrastructure of human hierarchy developed 400 years ago when Europeans first came to this land. This hierarchy placing whites at the top and black people at the bottom is the American caste system, and although no one alive today is responsible for starting it, we have inherited it and perpetuated it for generations.

Wilkerson examines the different caste systems around the world and how they damage the lives of everyone involved, even those at the top. She believes that to understand how to move forward, we must examine the past and the racial structures that keep progress as a nation at bay.

The book is available at Amazon

Email Catherine if you would like to join the discussion. The next meeting is the last Thursday in Feb., Feb 25 at 7pm.

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SuperBowl Sunday Feb. 7 – remember the hungry.

Before the COVID-19 crisis began, more than 35 million people, including nearly 11 million children, lived in a food-insecure household. 2 Pre-pandemic data reflect the lowest food insecurity rates had been in more than 20 years, but the current crisis has reversed improvements made over the past decade since the Great Recession.

Here are some local examples of the changed. In many cases they show an increase in food insecurity of 3%:

Sunday Feb 7 is the day of the Superbowl and for us the Souper Bowl. Since 1990, the Souper Bowl of Caring has collected over $163 million with 100% providing hunger relief in local communities – supporting 12,000 charities. All donations collected through food drives go to the hunger relief charity of their choice.

We have collected food and donations for almost 10 years for this group. All donations collected through food drives go to the hunger relief charity of their choice. The Village Harvest food distribution is one way we can be a light unto the world as described in the Gospel. This year with the church closed to gathered services we cannot do that.

Alternately, we encourage people to support our supplier, Heathy Harvest Food Bank or our ministry the Village Harvest directly with a donation.

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Last Epiphany, Year B Lectionary Sunday, Feb. 14, 2021 

I.Theme –   God’s Transformative presence

 “Transfiguration” – Fra Angelico

The lectionary readings are here  or individually:

Old Testament – 2 Kings 2:1-12
Psalm – Psalm 50:1-6 Page 654, BCP
Epistle –2 Corinthians 4:3-6
Gospel – Mark 9:2-9

Old Testament – Elisha receives the mantle of prophetic responsibility from Elijah

Psalm – focuses on the meaning of sacrifice

Paul – Pictures the changes brought by the light of Christ

Mark – Peter, James and John are transformed at Jesus transfiguration

Commentary by Rev. Mindi Welton-Mitchell:

“Transfiguration Sunday marks the movement from Christ’s entry into the world (Advent/Christmas/Epiphany) into Christ’s Resurrection (Lent/Easter/Pentecost).

“We begin by reading the ascension into heaven by Elijah (in the Old Testament reading), preparing us for the vision of Elijah we will read in the Gospel. The ascension of Elijah marks one of those Mystery times in the Bible, when heaven and earth fully meet, where the Divine and Human intersect. People do not die but instead ascend into heaven. People’s faces are transformed. What has died is brought to new life.

“While this passage may be about Elijah’s ascension into heaven, it really is about Elisha’s faithfulness to both God and to his friendship with Elijah. Elisha is willing to go the distance for his friend, even to the point of being grieved as Elijah is taken up in the whirlwind. Elisha probably did not fully understand what was going to happen to Elijah, but he chose to accompany him rather than let him go the journey alone until the time he was taken up.

“Psalm 50:1-6 also speaks of the intersection of heaven and earth through God. The fire and tempest or whirlwind that Elijah experienced is present here before God in verse 3, and in the following verse, God calls to both the heavens and earth. These moments of intersection, where the Mystery happens, where the Divine and Creation intersect are not just for prophets, but can happen to those who are faithful.

“Mark 9:2-9 is the story of the Transfiguration. Peter, James and John experience this moment of intersection as they witness Jesus with Elijah and Moses. Jesus’s clothes become dazzling white, transfigured as Jesus appears to enter the veil between heaven and earth and stand between the two. But Peter does not get it. Peter does not listen and keep silent, as Elisha did. Peter, terrified of this space where heaven and earth meet, tries to fill the silence, tries to say something but does not understand what is happening. Perhaps Peter, as some scholars speculate, assumed Elijah and Moses were also divine beings or equals with Jesus and made his declaration of building tents. Perhaps Peter was ready for the restoration of the earthly kingdom of Israel and took this as a sign. We don’t really know.

“The Transfiguration is one of those passages that we don’t clearly understand what happened nor do we understand why Peter reacted the way he did. But what we do know is this: heaven and earth, Divine and Human, intersected on that mountain, just as they intersected in the person of Jesus the Christ.

“2 Corinthians 4:3-6 reminds us that the call to proclaim the Gospel is always at hand, and it is our call to proclaim it for the sake of Jesus, not for our own gain. There are some that will not receive and will not understand. We are called to bear the light of Christ to the world.

“There are moments when heaven and earth, Divine and Human, Creator and Creation intersect in our lives. They may not be as earth-shattering as the whirlwind and fire that Elisha saw Elijah taken up in, or as incredibly brilliant as Jesus speaking with Elijah and Moses. But they do happen to us: in our moments of baptism, when we fall and rise out of the waters anew; when we let go of loved ones as they pass on to God’s sole care; and in moments such as watching a brilliant sunrise or experiencing the Northern Lights: there are moments in creation and in our relationships with others where we experience the veil being torn and heaven and earth intersecting. Elisha experienced this in his faithfulness to Elijah; Peter experienced it on the mountain with Jesus and Moses experienced it on the mountain alone with God. But we all have our own experiences of the great Mystery, when we realize that the kingdom of heaven is very near. And as we remember, both John the Baptist and Jesus the Christ preached the same sermon that we often hear as we enter Lent: ‘The kingdom of heaven has drawn near; repent, and believe in the Good News.’” 

Read more about the Lectionary…

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Raphael’s Transfiguration – story of a painting 

Raphael (1483-1520) was a master painter of the Renaissance. He considered the Transfiguration to be his greatest masterpiece though he died before he could finish it at age 37. A student finished it.

In his final delirium he asked to see his painting for the last time. His friends brought it to him, and placed it on the bed in which he died on Good Friday, 1520.

Giorgio Vasari, the sixteenth century Italian painter, writer, historian said of the painting that is was “…the most famous, the most beautiful and most divine…”

Cardinal Giulio de’ Medici (who later became Pope Clement VII), commissioned Raphael to paint Transfiguration for the city of Narbonne, in France. The painting was kept personally by the Pope after Raphael’s untimely death, until he donated it to the church of San Pietro in Rome.

The painting is now housed in the Vatican Museum and is large – 15 feet, 1.5 inches by 9 feet, 1.5 inches. (Only a part of it is shown above). Raphael preferred painting on canvas, but this painting was done with oil paints on wood as chosen mediums.

The Transfiguration was ahead of its time, just as Raphael’s death came too soon. The dramatic tension within these figures, and the liberal use of light to dark was characteristic of the next age – the Baroque.

On the most obvious level, the painting can be interpreted as the split between the flaws of men, depicted in the lower half, and the redemptive power of Christ, in the upper half of the painting.

Two scenes from the Gospel of Matthew are depicted in Raphael’s Transfiguration. One the transfiguration itself, Christ reaching to the heavens symbolic of a future resurrected stage and an epileptic boy falling to the ground in a seizure, lies there as if dead and then ‘rises’ up again.

The only link between the two parts of the picture is made by the epileptic boy, who is the only person in the lower half of the picture whose face is turned to the transfigured Christ in the upper part of the painting.

• At the top, it is Mathew 17:1-9. Christ has climbed Mount Tabor with the Apostles, and there he is transfigured—appearing in his glorified body, flanked by Moses (representing the Law) and Elijah (representing the Prophets).

We see the transfigured Christ floating aloft, bathed in a blue/white aura of light and clouds. To his left and right are the figures of the prophets, Moses and Elijah. White and blue colors are used symbolically to signify spiritual colors.

Read more about this painting

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Voices of the Transfiguration

Apse Mosaic, Church of the Transfiguration, Mount Tabor Israel. Scholars think the transfiguration took place either on Mount Tabor or Mount Hermon in Israel.

1.  Transfiguration is transformation. No one and no situation is “untransfigurable” – Dawn Hutchings

In his book, God Has A Dream: A Vision of Home for Our Time, Desmond Tutu tells about a transfiguration experience that he will never forget. It occurred when apartheid was still in full swing. Tutu and other church leaders were preparing for a meeting with the prime minister of South Africa to discuss the troubles that were destroying their nation. They met at a theological college that had closed down because of the white government’s racist policies. During a break from the proceedings, Tutu walked into the college’s garden for some quiet time. In the midst of the garden was a huge wooden cross. As Tutu looked at the barren cross, he realized that it was winter, a time when the grass was pale and dry, a time when almost no one could imagine that in a few short weeks it would be lush, green, and beautiful again. In a few short weeks, the grass and all the surrounding world would be transfigured.

As the archbishop sat there and pondered that, he obtained a new insight into the power of transfiguration, of God’s ability to transform our world. Tutu concluded that transfiguration means that no one and no situation is “untransfigurable.” The time will eventually come when the whole world will be released from its current bondage and brought to share in the glorious liberty that God intends.

2.  Transfiguration emphasizes the mission of Jesus -that the way of Jesus is the way of the cross

A. Travis Meir

“Jesus’ ministry continues with the trip back down the mountain. He will not take Peter’s advice and stay on the mountaintop. The mountaintop was a vision of the glory of God, but it is not to be confused with the way of the cross, the true ministry of Jesus. Jesus is to be found where the people are, leaning into their needs, and giving life back to those on the margins.

The disciples do not understand this, and will not understand it until they here the message from the young man at the tomb, delivered by the women. “He has been raised…Go back to Galilee..he is going ahead of you to Galilee (16:6-7).” That is where the ministry of the kingdom of God continues to unfold”

B. Lawrence  “Disclosing New Worlds”

 The shadow of the cross hangs over the narrative. And it is the cross, not the resurrection, which is emphasised here on the mountain… the Transfiguration is different from what most of us have been brought up to believe since we coloured in our first picture of the event in Sunday School. This is not a moment of glory, or of hope. It is confirmation of the second great cycle in Mark’s narrative: the Way of the Cross. The Way of the Cross is about engagement with the powers of the day. It will bring about suffering and death. It is the only way – both for Jesus and for would-be followers. The Transfiguration confirms the call to suffering discipleship issued in 8:34f. The divine voice underscores it: “This is my beloved Son. Listen to what he tells you!”

.. At the end of Epiphany, we stand on the threshold of Lent and have to be prepared to hear the call to the Way of the Cross as shocking, new, uncomfortable, divisive and repellent. We need to commit ourselves to dealing with our blindness and our deafness. In Mark’s narrative, the blind and the deaf symbolise the disciples’ condition and response to Jesus. But it’s a narrative of hope, because the deaf hear and the blind see – and the disciples on the mountain do deny themselves, take up their crosses, and follow Jesus! That, too, needs to be our story.

Hear more voices…

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Poet Extraordinaire: Mary Oliver

Mary Oliver was one of our most beloved poets, winner of the National Book World and Pulitzer Prize for Poetry. Krista Tippett spoke to her in Tippet’s show “On Being ” in an interview “Listening to the World.” Here is the interview.

You can also hear her read her own poems and view an illustrated version of her wonderful poem “Wild Geese”. Two poems follow:

Wild Geese 

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
For a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about your despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting —
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.

In Blackwater Woods

Look, the trees
are turning
their own bodies
into pillars

of light,
are giving off the rich
fragrance of cinnamon
and fulfillment,

the long tapers
of cattails
are bursting and floating away over
the blue shoulders

of the ponds,
and every pond,
no matter what its
name is, is

nameless now.
Every year
everything
I have ever learned

in my lifetime
leads back to this: the fires
and the black river of loss
whose other side

is salvation,
whose meaning
none of us will ever know.
To live in this world

you must be able
to do three things:
to love what is mortal;
to hold it

against your bones knowing
your own life depends on it;
and, when the time comes to let it
go,
to let it go.

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