Musings of an Anglican/Episcopal Priest

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Update

Just a note to say there was a catastrophic failure with my site and I lost my content, which I’m trying to restore from various sources. It’s going to take me a while.

Thoughts on War

Years ago I recall an article by the interim Dean at The School of Theology at Sewanee, where I did my MDiv, Dr. Allan M. Parrent, where he argued that the default moral position of many within the Episcopal Church (and elsewhere in the old mainline) had become a sort of default unreflective pacifism. He contrasted this with the thoughtful position of Christian non-violence as upheld by the traditional peace churches. Largely, it could be seen that these knee jerk positions were developed in a reactionary way beginning in the 1960s over against the perception of a rah-rah patriotism in more conservative denominations that seemed to forget, to paraphrase Hannah Arendt, that a lesser or necessary evil taken up, is still an evil.

At any rate, all of this means that a situation like that in Ukraine challenges our ethical reflections, even as the still developing news of atrocities offends our moral imaginations. In that vein, I commend this piece written a few days ago (before the news of the war crimes in Bucha) by my Bishop, regarding the context for the Christian Just War tradition’s reflections on the use of force, and, essentially, the primacy and importance of judgement and discernment, particularly between the guilty and the innocent in contexts where no law can be easily assumed or enforced.

And, of course, I’ve been thinking, during this time, about a particular lecture by a former ethics professor who once challenged us as future priests to be prepared to challenge parishioners engaged in immoral businesses, such as being tobacco farmers or working at Boeing and making bombers. At the time I was irritated that his moral imagination only seemed to reach toward the farmers and not the corporate executives (read some Wendell Berry!), considering that my grandparents had been Tobacco farmers. But the war in Ukraine raises questions about the manufacture of weaponry.  What if Lockhead/Raytheon hadn’t developed and manufactured Javelins?  Flooding markets with weapons–whether handguns or weapons of war–for the interests of profit and not recognizing that indiscriminate sale and greater accessibility increases violence and death is one thing–but what of the need for weapons of war when a plow (or tractor or combine in the case of Ukraine) is threatened by a tank?

In rendering these extraordinary judgments, Christians should not forget what is true about our ordinary judgments: we are not God, and our judgments are not perfect. Whatever judgment we render is not final judgment, which is reserved for God. We trust in divine providence, approaching judgment in humility and with prayer. “In enacting judgment we are not invited to assume the all-seeing view of God. … We have a specific civic human duty laid upon us, which is to distinguish innocence and guilt as far as is given us in the conduct of human affairs. … To lose the will to discriminate is to lose the will to do justice” (47).

Christian thinking about war, in what has come to be called “the just war tradition,” is properly considered under the heading of the love of neighbor. O’Donovan points out that even in a defensive war, where a nation has been attacked, Christians look less to a claim of absolute right to defend themselves, and more to the call to love the neighbor. This commitment also involves the neighbor who is the enemy. “In the context of war we find in its sharpest and most paradoxical form the thought that love can sometimes smite, and even slay” (9).

Source: War – Covenant

In The Myth of Disenchantment: Magic, Modernity, and the Birth of the Human Sciences, I argue that as broad cultural history goes, this narrative is wrong. Our era is far from mythless, belief in spirits continues to be widespread, vitalized nature has been a persistent philosophical counter-current, and even attempts to suppress magic have failed more often than they have succeeded. Hence, I contend that the whole notion of “modernity” as rupture that undergirds a host of disciplines is itself a myth.

The Myth of Disenchantment: An Introduction by Jason Ā. Josephson-Storm

September 2007

September 2007
Schedule of Ministries

Date Readers Prayer Station Chalicist Acolytes/Crucifer Usher/Oblationers Hospitality
September 2 Shelley Sircy
Ecclesiasticus 10:7-18
Psalm 112

Thom Chittom
Hebrews 13:1-8

Linda Palmer Adam Waltenbaugh None Edwards Family Howards
September 9 Adam Waltenbaugh
Deuteronomy 30:15-20
Psalm 1

Roy Edwards
Philemon 1-20

Tonya Edwards Shelley Sircy Adam Waltenbaugh Chittom Family
September 16 Nanci Frey
Exodus 32:1,7-14
Psalm 51:1-18 or 51:1-11

Carlene Johnson
1 Timothy 1:12-17

Shelley Sircy Adam Waltenbaugh none Ralph & Karen Eddy
September 23 Dawn Kingsley
Amos 8:4-7(8-12)
Psalm 138

Shelley Sircy
1 Timothy 2:1-8

Opal Guntel Shelley Sircy Adam Waltenbaugh Edwards Family Shelley Sircy
September 30 Thom Chittom
Amos 6:1-7
Psalm 146 or 146:4-9

Adam Waltenbaugh
1 Timothy 6:11-19

Nanci Frey Adam Waltenbaugh None Chittom Family

canon

The Canon of Scripture

What is a Canon? Canon is a Greek word that means “reed,” and referred to a stick used for measuring. The Canon of Scripture then is the “measure” or guideline of what is included in Holy Scripture.

What about the differences? You’ll notice that there are two major differences evident in the lists below. One is that the ordering of the Hebrew Bible and the Christian Old Testament are different (hence why it is technically inappropriate to refer to the Old Testament as a “Hebrew Bible”–the two have different orders).

The other difference is between the various Christian canons of the Old Testament. These differences primarily arise because of tradition and various translation and exegetical choices. It is important when considering these differences, to note that they are confined to the Old Testament and that every Christian body puts forth the same books for the New Testament.

What are the reasons behind the differences and what does it mean to say that Anglicans have a “stepped” canon? That’s what we’re about to discuss…

Jewish Canon

Torah (Law)

Genesis

Exodus

Leviticus

Numbers

Deuteronomy

Nevi’im (Prophets)

Former Prophets

Joshua

Judges

Samuel (1&2)

Kings (1&2)

Latter Prophets

Isaiah

Jeremiah

Ezekiel

The Twelve

Hosea

Joel

Amos

Obadiah

Jonah

Micah

Nahum

Habakkuk

Zephaniah

Haggai

Zechariah

Malachi

Ketubim (Writings)
Psalms
Proverbs
Job
(Five Scrolls)

Song of Solomon

Ruth

Lamentations

Ecclesiastes

Esther

Daniel

Ezra-Nehemiah

Chronicles (1&2)

There is no apocrypha in the Hebrew Bible

Protestant Canon

Pentateuch

Genesis

Exodus

Leviticus

Numbers

Deuteronomy

Histories

Joshua

Judges

Ruth

1&2 Samuel

1&2 Kings

1&2 Chronicles

Ezra

Nehemiah

Esther

Poetical/Wisdom Books

Job

Psalms

Proverbs

Ecclesiastes

Song of Solomon


Prophets

Isaiah

Jeremiah

Lamentations

Ezekiel

Daniel

Hosea

Joel

Amos

Obadiah

Jonah

Micah

Nahum

Habakkuk

Zephaniah

Haggai

Zechariah

Malachi

The Apocrypha

(not bound with the Bible)

1&2 Esdras

Tobit

Judith

Esther (with additions)

Wisdom of Solomon

Ecclesiasticus (Sirach)

Baruch

Letter of Jeremiah (Baruch Ch. 6)

Prayer of Azariah and Song of the Three

Daniel and Susanna

Daniel, Bel & the Dragon

Prayer of Manasseh

1&2 Maccabees

Anglican (stepped) Canon

Pentateuch

Genesis

Exodus

Leviticus

Numbers

Deuteronomy

Histories

Joshua

Judges

Ruth

1&2 Samuel

1&2 Kings

1&2 Chronicles

Ezra

Nehemiah

Esther


Poetical/Wisdom Books

Job

Psalms

Proverbs

Ecclesiastes

Song of Solomon


Prophets

Isaiah

Jeremiah

Lamentations

Ezekiel

Daniel

Hosea

Joel

Amos

Obadiah

Jonah

Micah

Nahum

Habakkuk

Zephaniah

Haggai

Zechariah

Malachi

The Apocrypha

(bound with the Bible)


The Third Book of Esdras,

The rest of the Book of Esther,

The Fourth Book of Esdras,

The Book of Wisdom,

The Book of Tobias,
Jesus the Son of Sirach,

The Book of Judith,
Baruch the Prophet,

The Song of the Three Children,

The Prayer of Manasses,

The Story of Susanna,

The First Book of Maccabees,

Of Bel and the Dragon,

The Second Book of Maccabees.

Roman Catholic/Orthodox Canon

Pentateuch

Genesis

Exodus

Leviticus

Numbers

Deuteronomy

Histories

Joshua

Judges

Ruth

1&2 Samuel

1&2 Kings

1&2 Chronicles

Ezra

Nehemiah

Tobit

Judith

Esther

1&2 Maccabees

Poetical/Wisdom Books

Job

Psalms

Proverbs

Ecclesiastes

Song of Solomon

Wisdom of Solomon

Sirach

Prophets

Isaiah

Jeremiah

Lamentations

Baruch

Ezekiel

Daniel

Hosea

Joel

Amos

Obadiah

Jonah

Micah

Nahum

Habakkuk

Zephaniah

Haggai

Zechariah

Malachi

Orthodox Canons generally include:

1&2 Esdras

Prayer of Manasseh

Psalm 151

3 Maccabees

4 Maccabees (as an appendix)

The New Testament

While not as contentious (at least now) as the canon of the OT, the New Testament took what is for some people a surprisingly long time to come together.

The Muratorian Canon (2nd-4th century) The List of Eusibius (Early 4th century) The Canon of Athanasius (367 AD)
[Matthew]*
[Mark]*
Luke
John
Acts
1&2 Corinthians
Ephesians
Philippians
Colossians
Galatians
1&2 Thessalonians
Romans
Philemon
Titus
1&2 Timothy
Jude
1&2 John*
Wisdom of Solomon
Revelation to John
Matthew
Mark
Luke
John
Acts
Romans
1&2 Corinthians
Ephesians
Philippians
Colossians
Galatians
1&2 Thessalonians
Philemon
Titus
1&2 Timothy
[Hebrews]*
1 Peter
1 John
[Revelation to John]

Disputed books:
James
Jude
2 Peter
2&3 John

Matthew
Mark
Luke
John
Acts
James
1&2 Peter
1,2,&3 John
Jude
Romans
1&2 Corinthians
Galatians
Ephesians
Philippians
Colossians
1&2 Thessalonians
Hebrews*
1&2 Timothy
Titus
Philemon
Revelation to John

Elizabeth Edwards puts American moral utilitarianism on display

I don’t make predictions, but I have no doubt that if the Edwards campaign pushes on issues like this, even if they are able to win the Democratic nomination for president, they will not win the State of North Carolina in a general election. Maybe they don’t care, but they should have seen from the Gore campaign how embarrassing it is to not carry your home state. I just read the following statement from Elizabeth Edwards, from her first speech since she announced the return of her cancer. She has chosen to address the subject of fetal stem cell research. Here’s a bit of what she said:

“We’re talking about using something to save ourselves and our children,” she said. “Instead of throwing it away, don’t we want to use it in a way that’s productive?”

Some opponents of the work believe that life begins at conception and that using stem cells is tantamount to killing a human.

But Edwards said opponents will not be able to halt the work, whatever their beliefs. “You’re not going to stop it by saying there is no federal funding,” she said. “You’re just going to stop it from happening here.”

[read it all]

To quote one of my favorite theologians Stan “the man” Hauerwas, in regards to fetal tissue experimentation: “What if it were discovered that fetal tissue were a delicacy. Could you eat it?” While shocking–intentionally so–Hauerwas’ statement illustrates one of the foundational beliefs of Christian ethics: no good can come of an evil, therefore the ends never justify the means. In this comment, Mrs. Edwards reveals her ethical foundation to be largely that of the general sort of American utilitarianism that flourishes in the absence of any sort of solid moral teaching. Rather than taking the time to wrestle with moral implications, this system finds it much easier to run a moral calculus and base decisions on a cost-benefit analysis.

I can’t condemn Mrs. Edward’s too harshly, but I would hope that in one of her stays in the Triangle area, she and her hubby might sit in on a basic ethics course at Duke. I would also say that this sort of thinking is why I feel alienated from not just the Democratic Party, but the Republican party also–for each has some major issues that prevent me as a Christian from supporting them. That’s one reason I will always register as an independent. Too many Christians have come to associate their faith with one party or the other, and this is at least a terrible mistake, if not a form of idolatry.

Here’s a related essay I wrote comparing how a Christian would face a sticky moral decision vs. a utilitarian, entitled “The Christian apprehension of Tragedy.”

From Touchstone: a Poem

The following poem is by a Jesuit named Fr. Donahgy, and was posted on Touchstone’s Mere Comments in the post “L’Etat, C’est Dieu,” I share it here for your reflection as we prepare to enter Holy Week:

1. He Is Condemned

Pilate must heed the public pulse and poll,
As every politician quickly learns;
The multitude that smiles, as quickly spurns,
And so he shrugs his shoulders and his soul;
His fingers flutter in the brazen bowl;
The guilt is off his hands and head; he turns
To take the spotless towel; in him burns
A doubt — but Caesar’s favour is his goal.

“Sub Pontio Pilato”–down the years
Before a man may truly live, reborn
Of water and the Holy Ghost, he hears
Caught in the Creed, those words of pitying scorn
For him whose heart was meagre, not malign,
Who used ironic water for a sign.

Touchstone– “Filthy Rich: The Unnoticed Gift of Trickle-Down Decadence”

I was catching up on my periodical reading recently, when I came across this little gem from Anthony Esolen in the editorial section of Touchstone: a Journal of Mere Christianity. The basic thrust of Esolen’s editorial–more observation than argumentative essay–is that societies, whatever their time or location, structure themselves so that the filth that the upper-classes wade through (nearly) unscathed, or that they produce, is foisted upon the lower classes and results in their struggle and demise. The first, highly illustrative example he gives is of the ancient Roman sewer system which emptied at the Esquiline gate. “I’m not sure” he says “whether the Roman’s arranged it so that the end of the sewer wold be located in the poor quarter. More likely, it became the poor quarter because people don’t wan’t to live near a sewer, and will spend money to avoid it.” Later, he mentions that “…in Dickens we have the miserable corpse-robbing thieves at Old Joe’s pawn-shop, and they are but Scrooge himself, and his money-hungry class, shorn of top hat and watch fob and man-of-business etiquette.”

This little editorial struck me not only because of its truth–the poor do often suffer more for the sins they learn from the wealthy–but because of the situations I have seen that bear this out. When a woman comes into my office in need of help with groceries for the final few days before her disability or welfare check comes because she or her husband drink alcohol or smoke, it becomes clear that the simple vices the more well-heeled among us take for granted have become more immediately deadly. On the other side, in attending Sewanee, I often described the University itself as in large part a padded play-pen for wealthy southern elite. While parts of this identity may be fading (the Southern part is enduring a campaign of whitewashing and title changing) it is still amazing to see the lengths to which the institution goes to create a safe environment for wealthy adolescents to engage in behavior that would leave their less well-off contemporaries injured, sick, in jail or worse.

All this is to say that we need to take more notice of the “trickle-down effect” of decadence, and the impact it has on those without the means to mitigate the effects of the vice they mimic from their “betters.” As Esolen says:

The rich can afford their vices, for a time anyway; the poor have no such margin for comfort. They are, in fact, endangered by the vices of the rich.

Sermon for Lent 4: The Story we need to hear

[Note: This past Sunday, Lent 4, I filled in at Holy Cross Church in Murfreesboro TN. This is the mission I did my field education at, so it was nice to see the familiar faces, as well as all the new ones. This is the sermon I preached there.]

Scriptures: Joshua 4:19-5:12; 2 Corinthians 5:17-21; Luke 15:11-32; Psalm 34 or 34:1-8

Return of the ProdigalThe parable from our Gospel reading this morning is probably the most well known of Jesus’ parables, and with good reason—it speaks to us on many levels.

But before we really get down to it this morning, I wonder, who knows what a parable is? One member of my parish suggested that it was what you get when you put two steers together.

I’ll relieve you of your anticipation and tell you that it really has nothing to do with Bulls. A parable is a story—in particular a story that has as its purpose the explanation of one point.

It’s more than a bit ironic that we call this parable the “parable of the prodigal son…”

By rights it should be called the parable of the forgiving or faithful father.

You see a parable, as we said, has only one point, one focus. We might identify with any number of characters within the story, but the action of the story is meant to lead you to one primary realization.

In this parable, Jesus tells us about a man who had two sons. One day the younger son comes up to him and says “Father, give me the share of the property that will belong to me.”

Now, in Jesus’ day, this would have been shocking. It would have been unheard of for a son to speak to his father this way, and would have been seen as very disrespectful.

I remember one time seeing a middle school girl at a football game throw a tantrum trying to get what she wanted from her father. In the process she yelled at him and said “I hate you, I wish you were dead.”

This is the sort of thing that makes us uncomfortable these days…. All of the rest of us in the same area in the stands were sort of trying not to look…err… we were trying not to be seen looking—we were all embarrassed for the father, that his daughter would act like that, really at all, let alone in public.

But the thing is, this is exactly the way the people who heard Jesus’ story would have felt. For a son to go to his father and ask for his inheritance, something that one normally didn’t get until after the death of the father, would have been tantamount to going up to your dad and saying “I wish you were dead…. I don’t care about you, just give me what’s going to be mine so I can get out of here.”

And, as if that’s not strange enough, Jesus goes on, and tells us that the father listens to the son’s request and divides the inheritance between his elder and younger sons.

Already we see the love of the father, the extent he’s willing to go to for his son.

Then we’re told that the younger son squandered his inheritance in what the scripture terms “loose living.”

Not only that, but once he’d done this, a famine came upon the far country he was in, and he was left with no other choice but to get a job—we’re told he joined himself to a citizen of that country, who employed him to feed his swine.

Now, when we’re told that he joined himself to a citizen of that country, that doesn’t mean he went and put in an application, went through an interview process and got a desirable job. No…instead, he was in such horrible circumstances that he had to go begging around to get a job, to get anything, that would help him keep himself alive.

So what happens to him? He ends up basically becoming a servant to one of the natives of this far country, who has him out there slopping his pigs.

Suddenly he finds himself in such a bad situation that he would gladly have eaten what the pigs ate.

This would be horrible for anyone… but just imagine yourself as a Jew listening to this story—Pigs are unclean, anything associated with them is unclean…to be caring for pigs would have been the lowest possible point in someone’s life.

And so, the younger son gets up his nerve and decides he’s got to go back to his dad and ask for help. He doesn’t expect that there will be no consequences for what he’s done, in fact he thinks to himself that he might be able to go back and apologize to his father and just be able to live as a hired hand in his house.

But what happens? He goes home and the scripture tells us that “while he was yet at a distance” his father saw him and went running to him,

And when he got to him he grabbed him and embraced him…. he was so thankful to have his son home.

He didn’t even listen to the protests…

“Father,” the son says “I have sinned against heaven and before you; I am no longer worthy to be called your son.”

Does he listen?

No… he throws a party….

The father is so glad to have his son back that he throws a party to celebrate.

“my son was dead, and is alive again;” he says, “he was lost, and is found.”

But what about the older brother…he’s not too happy about this.

He comes in from a hard day’s work and he sees that there’s a party going on, a feast.

“What’s going on here?” he asks…
Well, once he hears what’s going on, he’s so upset he won’t even go inside.

And here’s the cool thing…Jesus again tells us something important about what the father did….

You remember that when the younger son was still a long way off, the father ran out to him… it was the father who took the initiative and closed the gap to his son.

The same thing happens this time, only it’s the older son that the Father comes out to.

When faced with his anger the father says to him:

“Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours. It was fitting to make merry and be glad, for this your brother was dead, and is alive; he was lost, and is found.'”

You see, the point Jesus is making in the telling of this story isn’t a point about the prodigal son…

Just think about it for a moment…why would he need to make a point about the prodigal son?

To tell us how he was greedy, or impatient, or how he didn’t really respect his father….

How he spent all his money, or how he ended up in a pigsty?

Don’t we know that already?

Don’t we all live life like the prodigal?
We are, all of us, the prodigal at some point with someone we love…even—especially—in our relationship with God.

So I guess it’s natural that we would identify with the prodigal son, and call the parable by his part in the story…

Maybe some of us feel like the older brother, wondering why people we know who don’t really live the right way seem to get all the breaks while we—good people that we are—do everything we’re supposed to do and don’t feel like we get any recognition for it.

But you see, Jesus isn’t talking about us—not directly—he didn’t need to spend time telling us about ourselves.

We know from experience what it’s like to live our lives that way…

To make bad decisions…
Or to judge them….

To become estranged from family and friends for—well, stupid reasons…
Or to foster the separation by pointing out others’ flaws.

And finally to find ourselves in a pigsty of some sort.
Or alone with no one there to stand beside us.

Jesus doesn’t need to tell us a story about our own lives…and he doesn’t…
Instead he leaves us this story of a Father’s love. Of THE Father’s love.
A love that always takes the initiative….

That leads the Father out to meet his wandering children.

That led the Father to send his only Son, Jesus Christ, to save a race of prodigals…
…of judgmental older brothers.

And that’s something we need to know…
We need to know about the father’s love, for us and for everyone else.

And we need to know about the rejoicing that takes place in heaven—the party that God throws every time one_single_lost_sinner comes back to him.

One of my favorite preachers, Fred Craddock—one time preaching professor down at Emory, has this to say about how he came to understand the meaning of this story.
He says that he’d always preached sermons about this parable as though it were a wonderful, natural, easy and right thing for the father to respond this way to the prodigal son…

But he says, he had never thought about the party until a family on his street divorced and left three or four children, all girls. One of them he says, was attractive, “prematurely mature” and about fourteen years old…
After the divorce of her parents she started getting into a lot of trouble, she’d lay out of school, and Craddock says she’d hang on the tail end of every motorcycle that came through the neighborhood.

Eventually the judge got fed up and sent her away to boarding school. “About the fourth or fifth month that she was there,” Craddock says, “she gave birth to the child she was carrying. She was fifteen at the time.”

Craddock StoriesWord came to the neighborhood some months afterward that she was coming home. “Will she have that baby with her?” “Is she really coming home, back to our neighborhood?” The day we heard she was to come, all of us in the neighborhood had to mow our grass. We were out in our yards, mowing our grass, and watching the house. She didn’t show, nobody came, and we kept watching the house and mowing the grass. I was down to about a blade at a time, you know, watching the house, when a car pulled in the driveway—and out steps…. “It’s Cathy. She has the baby, she brought home the baby.” People in the house ran out and grabbed her and took turns holding that baby, and they were all laughing and joking, then they went in. Another car pulled in, then another car pulled in, and another car pulled in. They started parking in the street. You couldn’t have gotten a Christian car down the street, just cars on either side, and they’re all gathering there, you know. Suddenly I got disturbed and anxious and went in my house. It suddenly struck me, what if one of them saw me down in the yard and said, “Hey Fred, she’s home and she has the baby. We’re giving a party, and we’d like for you and Nettie to come.”

“Well, I’ve got a lot of papers to grade and all.” Would I have gone? If you lived next door to the prodigal son’s father’s house, would you have gone over to the party? It’s easier to preach on that than to go to the party.

You see, Jesus knew which story we needed to hear… Which point he needed to make.
The father rejoices whenever a lost sinner is found…he doesn’t stay put, he comes out to meet us, to take us to the party thrown in honor of our homecoming….

The question is, are we ready to live up to that? Are we ready to go to the party when it’s thrown in someone else’s honor? Can we—can I—put aside the part of us that wants to be a judgmental and angry older brother or an equally judgmental and embarrassed neighbor…and come, accepting the father’s welcome, and take part in the heavenly party he’s throwing in honor of all who make their way back home.

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