Three parishes

 

The current rector of the parish, Mariclair Partee Carlsen, asked if I’d write something for the quarterly newsletter--“about your connection to St Mary’s, and how the parish was a part of your path to what you are currently doing?” 

I was a seminary intern at St. Mary’s Hamilton Village and the Episcopal Office of the Christian Association at Penn, 1968-69; and was ordained a deacon at St. Mary’s in 1970. The work involved routine matters of pastoral care, some liturgical functioning, and working with an anti-racism group in the parish; and a role of maintaining a relationship with the more radical groups and individuals on campus. The last included being involved, with others on parish staff, in the anti-racism demonstration of 1969 in which students held a sit-in of College Hall pressing demands regarding the University’s relationship with the Black community.

Simple right? I needed to write two hundred words or so. The first thing that came to mind went over the 200 words. I thought, that’s fine, I’ll get there. Then the worst happened. My mind began to wander into how a number of parishes brought me to where I am now. And that expanded into how God’s forming any of us involves thousands of experiences and people. The writer's curse – too much.

Over the next couple of days, I reshaped Mother Mariclair’s statement into, “How were parish churches part of the pathway to what you ended up doing and who you have become?”

So, three parishes

What became obvious as I reflected was that 1963 to 1977, me being 19 to 33 years old, was when my path became clear. My guess is that many of you reading this have your own stories about grace, challenge, and growth in the period from your late teens into your early thirties.

Those years included being on the staff of an industrial mission, working to bring IAF to the city, joining the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) and participation in demonstrations and voter registration drives; college, seminary and grad school; life in a commune; two marriages; a considerable amount of training and work in group dynamics and organization development, living in apartments in most areas of Philadelphia. And belonging to three parish churches.

Those parishes were part of my formation. In each the process was multifaceted and complex. All too much. So, I’ll focus it with stories that illustrate something at the center of what happened between me, those parishes, and Jesus Christ.

Church of the Advocate, North Philadelphia

What you ended up doing and who you have become

It was sometime in the late '90s. I was doing an organization development consultation with a diocesan Integrity group. The weekend had gone well.  On the last night at dinner the spirit was excited and purposeful. I was asked to join the leaders in the front. The president of the chapter gave me a rainbow ribbon with a star on it and said that the group was declaring me an honorary lesbian. Lots of laughter! I felt accepted, loved, and trusted.  

Driving home the following day I thought about all the client groups I was working with at the time—a couple of parishes, several affordable housing groups, two shelters for women, a theater company, Integrity, a Tay Sachs association—not one was led by a straight, white, man.

Part of my path

The Church of the Advocate had a basketball court on the second floor of the parish house. We played in t-shirts. It was hot and we played hard. Lots of sweating. We were all into the rhythm of the game. It was fun!

I was the only white person on the court. We were taking a time-out. Standing there breathing hard. And that’s what occurred to me. I don’t recall any judgment about it. There was no special meaning in the moment. It was just a fact. I was the only white person on the court. An observation that came and went as the game resumed. 

I had come home from Quantico where we learned to work as a team in a common cause and went to the Advocate where we did the same thing. That morning was basketball. The next day it was a day camp of a couple of hundred children. By the fall it moved into civil rights demonstrations.

There’s a woman, a white woman, who served on staff and saw the experience this way: “A world that welcomed us and in which we were so naive. We met wonderful, remarkable people, were warmly received and loved, trusted and engaged.” On the basketball court that day in 1963 I was gifted that knowledge. Working as a team in a common cause can set loose God's love and joy among us. 

Saint Mary’s Hamilton Village, West Philadelphia

What you ended up doing and who you have become

During the 2011 Order of the Ascension retreat, Brother Lowell said, “You need to write.”  At the time I was still doing a fair amount of consulting with parishes, especially in the Diocese of Washington. 2010 had been my cancer year (Stage 4 esophageal); yes, I know, I have a lot to be thankful for. The aftereffects of that, plus just getting older, left me with less energy and a variety of other limitations.

So, when the time came for what we called mutual spiritual guidance, while others explored their work in the parishes they served, I had a vocational question. My discernment issue was what I was going to spend my time and energy doing in the years ahead. The Rule calls on Professed Members to place such vocational matters before the community. In the end, each makes their own decision about how to serve within the Promise and charism. Along the way, there would be the prayers and counsel of others.

Part of my path

“Charlie has died. Will you come over?”

I knocked on their apartment door. Jane invited me in repeating that Charlie died. I looked to the left and there was Charlie. On the floor of the hallway. He had just died. Her first call was to the church; before a funeral home, their doctor, and relatives. She was a rather disciplined Episcopalian.

I think their names were Jane and Charlie. That may be wrong. The two of them had been St. Mary’s parishioners for many years. In 1969 Fr. Scott was on sabbatical. So, the call came to me, the seminary intern.  I had never dealt with a sudden death before. I was fond of them and I was very unskilled. I was scared that I’d get it all wrong. I did remember to take a Prayer Book.

I just stood there staring at Charlie in the hallway floor. I was frozen.

Jane said. “Pray!” Sounded like a drill instructor I once had.

She knelt. I knelt. We prayed the litany. “O Lamb of God, who takest away the sins of the world; Grant him thy peace.” There was an absolution to be said by “the priest.” I knew that wasn’t me. I returned to being frozen. Jane placed her hand on Charlie. Then she made the sign of the cross on his forehead and said a blessing.

I think of Saint Mary’s as a community in which I began to see how my participation and growth in the Divine Life was shaped by others—by their patience, forgiveness, counsel, prayers and feedback; by their holiness of life.

 

Saint Elisabeth’s, South Philadelphia

What you ended up doing and who you have become

I had a consulting contract with WomenRising in Jersey City that lasted for 15 years (1991-2006). The work started with a meeting with Martha Lewin and her executive team. Martha said something like this: “We are deeply committed to the empowerment of women, both our clients and our staff. But I have to admit we don’t really know how to do it.”  She thought I could help.

I didn’t know how to run a group home, I didn’t know how to run a domestic abuse shelter, I didn’t know how to do affordable housing, I didn’t know how to run a daycare center. The woman of WomenRising did know all that.

I knew something about how real empowerment occurred in an organization. 

We were going to do this together—with what they knew and what I knew, with who they were and who I was. We were going to shape an organizational culture that was grounded in listening, quality service, respect, institutional adaptability and integrity, and facing into the mess. 

Part of my path

I wanted to have an Easter Vigil. It was my first year at St. Elisabeth’s. Things had been going well. A sense of hopelessness was lifting. Lay leaders were coming forward with more energy. There were a few new people. Some trust had been built.  I wanted to do the Vigil in Easter 1976.

But the congregation was small, very small. So, doing a Vigil and an Easter morning Mass would split the community into two small fragments. That didn’t seem right. So, in my half thought through wisdom, I decided. We’d just have the Vigil and forgo Easter morning. So that’s what appeared in the newsletter.

Then…Ed, the parish musician, came to me at coffee hour. He took me aside and said, “Father, people are upset about Easter. They want the Sunday morning Mass.” There was this small knot in my stomach. I wasn’t sure but wondered if the floor was moving beneath my feet. My mind was racing. It was as though I was scanning the files in my head—triangulation, leadership requiring listening and risking, a tug between my preferred conflict styles of compete and collaborate. “Oh shit! Was the plane going to crash?”

God’s grace is wondrous and having a lot of T-group training was a useful side benefit. Words came. “Ed, I really want to hear what they have to say. Please ask them to speak with me directly.”  The following Sunday at coffee hour I was surrounded by a slightly anxious crowd. “Father, we really like the Easter morning Mass.”  I said, “How about this, you agree to come to the Vigil and party the night before and we’ll do both Masses?” I don’t think they liked the idea, but they didn’t want to fight with their young vicar (or listen to all the sound liturgical and pastoral reasons I could go on about). “They said, “Yes, let’s do that.”  So, we did.

At the party after the Vigil they started to come to me two-by-two. “Tonight, has been wonderful. The Liturgy was beautiful. Would it be okay if we don’t come in the morning?”

Somehow, we worked it out together. And that’s what we continued to do. Strong lay leaders and a strong vicar. Just like the organization development books said about the best forms of leadership.

Reflections 

Michelle Heyne, OA and I have been writing a book on parish pastoral theology with a chapter on cultural density. We explore what a healthy, dense parish culture looks like and on how you shape such a culture. One of the characteristics of such parishes is that they leave a beneficial mark upon people. I think of it as the uniqueness of the person flowing from the first marking – “you are sealed by the Holy Spirit in Baptism and marked as Christ’s own for ever. Amen.”

There were more dramatic moments at each parish—the kid coming at me with a knife in the church courtyard, being thrown out of the Philadelphia Art Museum with 200 kids, and Father Washington racing out of the pulpit to chase a man who had just stolen the purse of a parishioner; being with thousands of students at the sit-in at College Hall and an antiwar rally in the church; doing an awful job of firing staff members, the anger of most of the diocesan staff when I wrote “Stay in the City," and John’s heart attack at the Easter Vigil (a different year).

Still, the events and people I recall as deeply formative, the shoulders I came to stand upon, were Father Washington in his office speaking about the value of each child in the day camp, the young men and boys on the basketball court, Jane reaching out her hand to bless Charlie, Father Scott telling me that I need to bring better bread for the Eucharist, Rose responding to my urgency about getting to know my new parishioners with, “It’s okay Father, we’ll get to know you and you’ll get to know us,” and the gentle crowd gathering around their new priest to talk about Easter.

Evy, a friend from the 1966 summer staff at the Advocate, and I write each other a few times each year. We reconnected in the '90s and have been doing it since then. Recently she wrote this,

Your experiences in so many ways parallel mine in going from an all white past into a world that welcomed us and in which we were so naive. We met wonderful, remarkable people, were warmly received and loved, trusted and engaged. We tried. I am sure we let many down. We grew and we became better people because of it. I sometimes wonder where I would be today if it were not for my summer of '66 Church of the Advocate experience. And how do we repay the world for that opportunity?How do we live up to that experience and the trust put in us? We have both tried in our own ways and succeeded and failed in our own ways. I hope I have become a better person for it all, and that I have helped to make some positive changes.  (Evelyn Kennenwood)

There are two pieces from St. Paul’s letters that have come to mind as I wrote this.

for you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life is revealed, then you also will be revealed with him in glory. (Colossians 3.3-4)

For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Romans 8.38-39) 

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The Rev'd Robert A. Gallagher, OA 

Related posts

Reflection and a thicker parish culture

The Benedictine DNA of the Episcopal Church

On the WomanRising experience

Looking for the glimpse of glory 

List of all postings 

Jazz provides the beat for a changing congregation

An emotional connection with the clergy

We’ll be back in church with few restrictions sometime in 2021. When we get back to opening our doors to any and all, I hope clergy will take an emotionally intelligent approach to visitors, which is different than the one I observed most clergy taking during my ten plus years as a diocesan bishop.

Let me make one assumption first. The Sunday Eucharist is foremost a proclamation of God’s redemption of the world by Jesus Christ. It may be other things to some gathered (social time, community organizing, protest against the principalities and powers, etc.), but it is most importantly God’s people massed around the great narrative of redemption in Jesus.

As we make our common proclamation of God’s redemption in Jesus, we should also be aware of our stance toward visitors. Our stance should be based an honest understanding of how people first connect with any group. When doing so, we’ll be helped by avoiding wishful thinking (“if our liturgy is sublime, then people will return”) and certain sentimentalities (“they’ll just see we’re such a happy family, so why wouldn’t they want to join us?”). Both stances are unhelpful, however true we might want them to be.

One of the things we know about human behavior and how humans connect with others is that it’s not rationally thought out at the beginning. Our emotions, as David Brooks points out in his book The Social Animal, determine our first reactions to a new group. We first ask (even if it’s subconscious): “Am I safe here? Will I be accepted? Can I trust the person I see up front leading?” As much as we might like to see ourselves as mainly rational, we actually respond first to new experiences with these emotional-laden questions.

This means when people visit churches, if they make a connection at all, it’ll first be an emotional one before it’s a theological or liturgical one. And such emotional connections, by and large, aren’t made to a new group as a whole. They are focused on the leader. We might wish this weren’t so believing people should respond differently (see: wishing thinking, above), but it’s how humans process new experiences. So, if visitors can’t make an emotional connection with the clergy they see presiding at the mass, then they likely won’t return even if the homily was brilliant and the mass done sublimely (although both of those certainly help). They have to be able to imagine, even if that’s done subconsciously, that the clergy person is someone they could trust and relate to.

Again, we might think that it should be different; that visitors should first connect with others at the liturgy; that the clergy role is not that significant, but what we know about human behavior doesn’t bear that out. The initial experience of visitors will be overwhelmingly determined by their emotional connection to the clergy. This reality should change the way clergy connect with visitors before, during, and after mass. Clergy need to prepare strategically for their entire interaction with “the public” on Sunday. To be sure, that means how they prepare their sermon and how they preside in the liturgy, but it also includes how they make announcements and the way they make themselves available to visitors before and after the liturgy.

Rather than be trapped in the sacristy corralling acolytes before the liturgy or chatting with parishioners after the liturgy about an upcoming committee meeting, clergy should be out front meeting and greeting everyone, especially visitors, welcoming them, asking their names, shaking their hands (we’ll do that again someday) and then making a point of following up with them to arrange to meet in the next few days following the liturgy. This is not in the sweet spot for introverts, but such folk (me included) need to function extrovertedly for a few hours each week to respond to the visitor’s need for emotional connection. This, of course, places a significant burden on the clergy to make those emotional connections.

When meeting with the visitor soon after their visit, the emotional connection can be solidified (don’t let a visitor leave without inviting them for coffee or lunch – paid by you – get your vestry to give you a budget for that). This meeting over coffee or lunch is not a time to do a “sales job” on visitors. Rather, it is a time to listen with genuine interest to their life and their spiritual longings. Consider it a spiritual interview during which the clergy can connect the visitors’ spiritual lives to the congregation’s ministry, helping them see how the church can walk with them on their pilgrimage. When I met with visitors, I’d try to learn one thing about their lives that I could connect to the parish. I’d then call a parish leader I knew with similar interests and ask that person to connect with the visitor. For example, if I learned the visitor loved gardening, then I’d make sure the head of our community garden ministry called and invited the visitor to serve with our community gardeners. When they returned the next Sunday, they’d know me and at least one other person.

Lay leaders are also important partners in effective connection with visitors. The most significant role they play is to liberate clergy from liturgical and logistical housekeeping chores on Sundays. It’s hard for clergy to give up such housekeeping because of our need to control things. It’s the one thing we can control on Sunday, so we tend to keep our focus there; things like the acolyte’s order in the procession, who’ll hand out bulletins to worshippers before the liturgy, or who we can find to read a lesson for a no-show lector. Needless to say, this is the worst way clergy can steward their time on Sundays. And lay leaders are often co-dependent with clergy in this, leaving clergy to handle these “housekeeping” details and not seeing their important role in welcoming visitors by helping them make an emotional connection with the clergy. That means the clergy need to enlist their support, explain to them why it is so important, and get their buy-in.

Evangelism and hospitality are “retail” ministries. When we treat them as “wholesale,” we’re usually left wondering why visitors don’t return. Martin Luther was right: It is just “one beggar telling another beggar where to find bread.” What we know about human interaction tells us that beggar needs to be the parish clergy.

+Scott

 The Rt. Rev'd Scott Benhase, OA

Earlier postings -  list of postings

the work of a people

the work of a people
who have been doing this a long time (Amy Hunter, 2002)

The Daily Office is part of the Church’s grounding. Grounding in God. Grounding in who we are. Grounding in the inner life. It’s foundational. Solid. An act of obedience and stability that opens us to new life. My thesaurus connects grounding with coaching, guidance, and instruction. Doing the Office doesn’t just happen.

Years ago, Amy Hunter shared her poem “daily office” with participants in the Church Development Institute. I return to it from time to time. I find it grounding. It helps me stay with the prayers at times when I’d rather take a walk, write a book, nap, watch Netflix—I know you understand.

I heard from Amy this morning. I returned to her poem. So, I’ll share “daily office” with you – see below the signature.

Amy writes of the then two most common ways of saying the office—at home with coffee and with a community gathered in a chapel. Last night Sister Michelle, OA and I sat, with wine, on my balcony saying the Office from our iPhones with the city’s noise joining in the praise. This morning I sat in my chair, two candles lit, with coffee, Prayer Book and Bible in hand. For much of my life I’ve been fortunate in being able to say the Office in community—my parishes, on diocesan staff, at monastic houses. In February, before the pandemic, Michelle and I were on retreat at SSJE Cambridge. As Amy said, “we pray five times a day.”

Now there’s another way of offering the Prayers of the Church. Zoom, Facebook, streaming— “the work of a people who have been doing this a long time.” I hear from parish clergy about how the number of people gathering for the daily office has increased. Clergy who have spent much of their ordained life rationalizing why they don’t provide a public office are now saying the prayers. Grounding!

“The real significance of the Divine Office is that in its recitation the individual or group enters the ancient cycle of prayer, by which day by day and hour by hour the church in the name of all creation adores and implores the eternal God” -Evelyn Underhill

“…a way by which we keep ourselves in constant awareness of the divine order; an order of love and justice which embraces and underlies all order” -John Macquarrie

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 Earlier postings -  list of postings

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Amy B. Hunter wrote a poem on the Office that she shared with Church Development Institute participants.  From Fill All Things: The Spiritual Dynamics of the Parish Church, p 178

daily office

three days on the Cape
sharing the sacrament of coffee
doing morning prayer on a porch
from which I could see the ocean
the morning office spoken and laughed
as we read one another’s lines
or added comments to the Scripture
until my husband said from the other room “that was lovely
but I’ve never heard it done as stand-up before” and you said
“we’ve been doing this a long time”

and now I’ve fallen among monks
five days retreat where I could see a river were I to walk that far
we pray five times a day
and here no one laughs at the mis-said lines when guest or brother misses a cue
reads loudly into the silence
then fades—embarrassed perhaps
smiling I hope
and no one begins the reading
“now here’s a surprise—
the people did what was evil
in the sight of the Lord”
and no one slurps coffee
in the midst of confession

yet both catch me and hold
because these prayers are not woven by angels but are built

every day every office anew by human voice and hunger

the work of a people
who have been doing this a long time

~abh~ Transfiguration 2002 Emery House

for Tom Barrington

for the Brothers at Emery House (Printed with permission Amy B. Hunter)

His unique holiness.

for I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me.

At the moment we in the United States are rightly concerned (obsessed?) with the election, an odd transition, the constitution. And Sunday is the Feast of Christ the King. 

This is from Fr. Michael at All Saints Margaret Street -- 

Jesus' kingship is to be understood in that context: it is a re-set of what royalty and power means. The authority of Jesus is not dynastic or constitutional but born of his unique holiness. No one on earth conferred that authority on him and no one could take it away. His kingdom, as we hear in Sunday's Gospel, is one that attends to people who are ignored in every other kingdom: the poor, the broken and the wounded. Christ the King comes among us, in his kingdom, like that, in solidarity with the poorest of his brothers and sisters. His royal progress is Palm Sunday. But it is also Good Friday and Easter. Jesus was born and lived and ministered and died and rose again to remind us that true celebrity, true royalty, true distinction belongs to every one of us, for we are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a people set apart. We need to take that seriously: who we are and the priorities of the kingdom we serve are as counter-cultural today as they were in Jesus' time.

Throughout his ministry Jesus shared forgiveness; even as he died on the cross he was still doing that. He died as he had lived, reaching out to the distressed on either side of him, still finding time for others in the midst of his own suffering. The crown he wore was made of thorns; his throne was the cross; his royal banner was an ironic scribbled sign that proclaimed him 'King' of the Jews. There is the Gospel image of royalty: the king and the criminal who go together into paradise, This is the king we celebrate and whose values we are pledged to live by. We see his kingship above all in the resurrection, the defeat of death and the affirmation of true life.

This sentence caught my attention - " The authority of Jesus is not dynastic or constitutional but born of his unique holiness."  There's the connection with parish development. Of course we should care about the here and now affairs of our nation and world. And, the primary contribution we can make to all that is to be the Body of Christ. We can continue the apostolic practice of the daily prayers of the church and the Sunday Eucharist. We can open ourselves to holiness of life. We can shape an apostolic climate in the parish. 

The parish is not a political club, nor is it a social justice movement, nor a society for the preservation of old ways, nor a medical clinic--though at times we may engage work of such a nature. The parish is the Body of Christ in place. Much of our fear and anxiety, our frustration and anger, will ease as we focus ourselves on the places of our influence and duty. 

Almighty and everlasting God, whose will it is to restore all things in your well-beloved Son, the King of kings and Lord of lords: Mercifully grant that the peoples of the earth, divided and enslaved by sin, may be freed and brought together under his most gracious rule; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

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  list of postings

My anxieties are real

As we listen, floating up through all the jangling echoes of our turbulence, there is a sound of another kind – A deeper note which only the stillness of the heart makes clear. It moves directly to the core of our being. Howard Thurman

Here in the USA

There’s an increased concern about national security and dealing with the pandemic as the President continues to refuse to allow a transition to take place.

And more importantly, Americans continue to demonize each other as the right pushes a narrative that the Democrats are really socialists and defunders; while the left wants us to believe that conservatives seeking small government and protection from “the woke” cause are really white supremacists.

Here in Washington 

Governor Inslee announced new restrictions after days of increased COVID-19 cases. No indoor dining at restaurants. Public worship services limited to 25% indoor capacity. Museums, zoos, movie theaters, and gyms are closing.

Here in Seattle

Thirteen arrested over the weekend in a group “obstructing traffic and creating a public safety hazard.”

Yes, I know all sorts of good things are also happening. But this article is “My anxieties are real.”

 

God is present with me this day

In today’s Reflection Bishop Peter Eaton wrote, “We are all too aware of the strain on emotions and bodies, on individuals and communities.  Fear, anxiety, exhaustion, impatience, frustration, uncertainty, and everything else.  We almost do not have to ask each other how we are any longer.  The usual response is not ‘I am well,’ or ‘I am not so good.’  The usual response to the question, ‘How are you?’ is ‘Well…you know…’ “

And he shared this from Howard Thurman

God is present with me in the midst of my anxieties. I affirm in my own heart and mind the reality of his presence.  He makes immediately available to me the strength of his goodness, the reassurance of his wisdom and the heartiness of his courage.  My anxieties are real; they are the result of a wide variety of experiences, some of which I understand, some of which I do not understand. One thing I know concerning my anxieties: they are real to me.  Sometimes they dominate my mood and possess my thoughts.  The presence of God does not always deliver me from anxiety but it always delivers me from anxieties.  Little by little, I am beginning to understand that deliverance from anxiety means fundamental growth in spiritual character and awareness.  It becomes a quality of being, emerging from deep within, giving to all the dimensions of experience a vast immunity against being anxious.  A ground of calm underlies experiences whatever may be the tempestuous character of events.  This calm is the manifestation in life of the active, dynamic Presence of God.

Inner core of silence

Thurman’s “a quality of being, emerging from deep within” brings to mind Ken Leech’s retreat address to the Order of the Ascension in 1988. Fr. Leech was addressing the priests about to take the Benedictine Promise. The “inner core of silence” is for all the baptized.

Any authentic priesthood must derive from an inner core of silence, a life hid with Christ in God ...Only those who are at home with silence and darkness will be able to survive in, and minister to, the perplexity and confusion of the modern world. Let us seek that dark silence out of which an authentic ministry and a renewed theology can grow and flourish. 

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Receiving notice of new postings at “Means of Grace, Hope of Glory”

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As an alternative, you may send an email to Brother Robert and be placed on a list maintained by the Order. You'll receive all the same messages going to those on the Next-door group. In Subject: Means of Grace, Hope of Glory. In your message: please provide your name and email address. 

Related postings

Inner core of silence 2020

Inner core of silence 2019

Spiritual Reading

Howard Thurman is mentioned in two earlier postings

A Compassion and Justice Award - Worship “to make music in the heart.”

Red cars 2 - “As we listen, floating up through all the jangling echoes of our turbulence, there is a sound of another kind – A deeper note which only the stillness of the heart makes clear. It moves directly to the core of our being.”