This is a busy Sunday!
Why?
Because the word “father” is not just a biological definition, but is also a matter of personal fulfillment…
Because our relationship with God is, for better or worse, often spoken of using the language of fatherhood…
Because a good father does not express power without also expressing compassion…
And because seeking what is good in relationship is the kind of spiritual aspiration that, more than any other, reveals the workings of a loving God…
Because of these things…
And because, of course, today is Father’s Day, we gather, this morning, to celebrate fathers.
This is a busy Sunday!
Why?
Because this church is proud of its legacy as being the second church in New Hampshire to declare itself open and affirming… way back in 1994, when being open and affirming was not an easy conviction to live into.
Because the people of this church, in their great wisdom, hung a banner over the edge of the balcony that reads “Always of others”…
Because the mission of this church states, without apology, that we grow our Christian faith through acts of love toward all – not just the people who look, act and love as we do…
And because now, as in no other time in recent memory, our LGBTQ kindred are actively under threat, not just by the bigoted few, but by those in the highest halls of power…
Because of these things,
And because, of course, today is second Sunday of Pride Month, it is high time that we gather to celebrate our LGBTQ brothers and sisters.
This is a busy Sunday!
Why?
Because, in addition to being prayerful followers of Jesus Christ, all who are gathered here are also proud to be citizens of the United States of America.
Because we remember the hale and hearty men of Jaffrey who, while building the town meetinghouse, heard the distant sound of cannonfire, and responded, mustering with their compatriots from around Cheshire county and beyond, to form the New Hampshire regiment of the Continental Army.
Because when Betsy Ross sat down to stitch the first American flag, she made thirteen stars for each of the thirteen colonies, and one of the stars that she sewed was ours.
Because the flag is not only a symbol that offers us a sense of identity – it is, with its bold colors, also a symbol that embodies the noble aspirations of our founding fathers – aspirations of liberty, dignity, religious freedom, freedom of speech, that, throughout it’s history, this nation has struggled to live up to.
And because, of course, yesterday, Saturday June 14th, was flag day, and this is the Sunday that we once again pledge our allegiance to, and bless the flag that strives to embody the majestic values of the great American experiment.
**
This is a busy Sunday!
Why?
Because, in addition to being Father’s day, Flag day, and Pride month, the liturgical calendar informs us that it is Trinity Sunday!
The Trinity!
What is the Holy Trinity?
For the two plus millennia that communities have gathered around the teachings of Christ, there has been no end of speculating, theorizing, systematizing, and debating, over this question. Disagreements about the precise triune nature of the divine abound. Did the Son come from the Father? Or are the two coeternal? And what about the Holy Spirit? Where does it come from? How can there be three, while God is understood to be one? Are they distinct expressions of a single unity? It’s enough to make your head spin.
Today I am not so much intimidated by all the complex mental gymnastics, as I am impatient with the whole project of explaining the nature of God. It seems to me that the Trinity has value as an idea – as a way to describe, or imagine the divine – but it is a fool’s errand to think that it is possible to define God’s nature through this, or any other idea. Massive books have been written, but I am not confident that they succeeded in doing anything but further confuse matters.
If a doctrine does not feed our souls – all of our souls – then what good is it? I suppose it has institutional value, in that it empowers people who say they have it right… but we all know what happens when religion is used as a tool to consolidate power.
That is never pretty.
I prefer the imagination over the institution. Or rather, I am of the opinion that an institution that does not accept the nourishing input of the imagination will become useless and die. This is why doctrine makes me nervous. Doctrine assumes there is ONE right answer.
The ONE right answer mindset is a problem right out of the gates. If your answer is right, the tendency is to think that other people’s answers are wrong. If they have the same attitude that you have (that is, that their doctrine is right, and yours is wrong) then what do you have? Instead of community, you have people digging their heels in the ground.
I’m right
No, I’m right.
The basic problem with the Trinity, as an idea, is a mathematical one…
Our religion, in keeping with its roots in Judaism, insists that there is only one true God. And yet, at the same time, Christian doctrine has evolved around another idea – the idea that the Divine is expressed as Trinity –
The Father / The Son / The Holy Spirit.
One. Three?
Which is it?
The Orthodox Church in the east, and the Catholic church in the West, have been arguing for millenia about who has figured out the right way to understand the trinity.
Unfortunately, the August men (they are all men) in pointy hats who are the keepers of doctrine, are addicted to being right. They have built institutions around having the ONE right answer, and in their zeal to defend their vision, they are allergic to the nourishment of the imagination.
If they could use their words, and perhaps exercise a little grace, they might recognize something that is right there in front of them.
The Trinity may not be about theory. It may be a simple truth… one that Tevye, the humble milkman from Anatevka, stumbled upon in this morning’s second reading:
That more than one thing can be true at the same time.
**
Recently, I have begun the practice of writing letters to my children.
It feels a little silly to write a letter, address and stamp an envelop and walk it to the post office, when I live in a world in which I could, if I chose, communicate the same ideas much more efficiently (and receive an instant response) if I just texted them with my phone.
But a letter is different from a text.
Not long after my mother died, I found a box among her stuff that contained a collection of letters that she received from her sister in the mid 1950’s. At that time my mother was teaching music at a missionary school in Southern India.
I read a few of the letters, and though a significant portion of the news was related to mundane matters like the weather, and the internal goings on of the Rozendaal family – the cumulative effect of all the letters moved me deeply. There were so many of them. It was a lovely testimony to the love and respect that my Aunt felt for my mother.
So about a month ago, I pulled the old Royal manual typewriter that once belonged to my father-in-law, out of the basement and cleaned it up and re-threaded the ribbon. I have been using it to tap-tap short letters to my kids – one to Isabel, one to Amos, and one to Silas. The old typewriter has a satisfying heft to it, and the resulting page or two of print looks antique and fun.
At first I wrote a version of the same letter to each of my kids, but after the second week I realized that each child required a different letter. I found myself thinking deeply about each of them – considering what they might value… what they might need.
They are so different!
As I meditate about each of their needs, I realize that my love for each of them is expressed in unique ways.
As I aspire to be a good father to each of them, I understand that I am a different father for each of them.
As I write the letters, I become aware that I am one person, but three fathers.
**
In 1994 when the United Church of Jaffrey decided to become Open and affirming, I was living in New York City.
Isabel was born in October of that year. My first child, Isabel’s birth changed my life completely.
I was not here, but I think I can say with assurance that the ONA process changed the life of this church completely.
When I became a father, the transformation that I experienced was unlike anything that I had ever known in my prior life. My focus moved from self, to other. Isabel’s well being became more important than my own. My own survival was less important to me, than her survival.
My identity formed, not around my needs, but around my daughter’s needs.
In a very personal and spiritual sense, my existence shifted from a “me” orientation” to a “we” orientation.
Life was no longer the path of the individual. Now, life was a richer, more intentional thing – a venture that went beyond the self, embracing the needs of another human soul.
In the ONA process, the United Church of Jaffrey wrote a covenant entitled “The declaration of open and affirming for the united church of jaffrey, new hampshire”
In that document, we stated our commitment using the following language:
Statement of Commitment
These children of the Creator God have been rejected and met with silence by the very Church of Jesus Christ. This rejection was caused by a lack of knowledge and an unwillingness to learn.
Since we of the United Church of Jaffrey do strongly believe in the equality of personhood before God of every one of God’s people – including those of gay, lesbian and bisexual orientation– it is not possible for us to close our doors to anyone. We are and remain open to anyone who seeks with us the true nature of the Christian Life.
In 1994, The United Church of Jaffrey, like me, was moving from me, to we.
The church was coming into an understanding that was fundamentally beyond itself. The church was challenging itself to grow, through acts of faith toward all.
**
I am proud of the United Church of Jaffrey.
I believe that, in writing the above statement, we were going through the spiritual transformation that Jesus asked us to make – the transformation from me to we.
And as we were doing this – as we ran the Rainbow flag up the flagpole outside the church (as we will do again today), we were not only growing into our faith – we were also stretching our identities as Amercans…
We were growing, not only as Christians, but also as citizens of a country that, throughout its history, has been striving to live up to its majestic founding principles…
That all people are created equal
that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
This morning, after the service, we will briefly dedicate two flags – the rainbow flag, and the flag of this great nation. I submit to you, that dedicating these two flags on the same day is a powerful way to grow into our faith. It is a powerful way that we can express our faith in our country.
A country where there are many kinds of people, and many kinds of truth.
This beautiful diversity is a divine gift. A divine truth.
E Pluribus Unum
From the many, one.
Truth like people
People like truth…
they come in many forms.
Amen.