The Sunday after All Saints’ Day (RCL, Year A)
November 2, 2008
The Reverend Paul R. Abernathy, Rector
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Two Sundays ago, Larry Dill,[1] our guest preacher, observed how important it is that we “do alright” on Sunday morning,
that our worship be thoughtful and spiritual, thus, potentially meaningful for all who come. Because we never know who’s coming – even which self of
ours is coming – and with what needs or desires, hungers or hurts.
I thought about this as I reflected on this morning’s gospel passage. I wondered whether Jesus did alright with the crowds that came to him. But first,
who were they? To answer, we have to back up a few verses…
Jesus went throughout (the land)…proclaiming the good news of God’s kingdom and curing every sickness…His fame spread…and they brought
to him all those afflicted with various diseases…and he cured them. Great crowds followed him.[2]
These were not happy crowds on a weekend spiritual retreat. They were grief-stricken and guilt-ridden, worried and world-weary, hungry and thirsty,
impoverished and oppressed, sick and dying. All, having heard about a famous miracle worker, coming to Jesus. And what did Jesus do? He “saw the
crowds…sat down… (and) began to speak.”
Speak? Jesus, you doing alright by these people means getting up and doing something! The grieving need relief. The guilty, release. The
weary, rest. The hungry, bread. The poor, help. The sick and dying, healing. No one wants words! Nevertheless, “he began to speak,” saying to
them all, “Blessed are you.”
These words, the Beatitudes, so beyond the compass of human reason, astounded the people. How can life beset by insuperable difficulty, caught
in the poet’s “fell clutch of circumstance”[3] be blessed?
Today, we celebrate All Saints’ Day. Since the 10th century C.E., that annual day on which western Christendom commemorates all who follow Jesus –
that “great cloud of witnesses”[4] in ages past, in the present day church throughout the world and here at St. Mark’s,
including those baptized today, and those not yet born who will join and share the Christian life.
Today, let us, as those crowds two millennia ago, listen to these astounding words of Jesus…
Spiritual poverty is not low self-esteem, but the humility that arises from our acceptance of all that we are – weakness and
strength, want and wealth. And in that acceptance, the humility that knows we are never in control. Our truest trust, then, must always be i
n that which, in one who is greater than we. To live that way is to receive the kingdom of heaven, living in accord with the way things
really are – aware that God is God and we’re not.
Mourning is not the melancholia that bemoans all things. It is to care deeply for others. Even more, it is to suffer, to allow
ourselves to know our brokenness, to recognize how deeply we, in our essential humanness, often grieve others and ourselves. It is, therefore, to
acknowledge our need for the comfort of forgiveness.
Meekness is not spinelessness. It literally means “the right kind of anger.” In godly anger, Jesus cleansed the
temple,[5] which being used as a marketplace for graft and greed was being misused. We, therefore, are meek
whenever we are angry about the abuse of the creation or any creature and, in acting to halt or stem the exploitation, we inherit, redeem
the earth.
Hungering and thirsting for righteousness is to desire insatiably right relationship with God and ourselves, so to be fully human as
we have been created and, as such, to be filled with the healing of being whole.
Mercy is not safe-distance-sympathy or passing-moment-pity. It is our response-ability to another, seeing through the eyes
of another, being as another. And, in keeping with the spiritual principle that what we give, we get; to be merciful is to receive mercy – often
from our very selves.
Spiritual principle became existential reality around the time of the dissolution of my first marriage and, over the immediate years, the growing
distance between my daughter, Kristin, and me, to whom, as she aged, she was able to verbalize and act out, at times, very painfully to me, her
anger at the upheaval in her life caused by her parents’ divorce. To protect myself, I held her at a long arm’s reach, often, painfully to her.
Yet, as I increasingly came to understand and identify Kristin’s anger, often through Pontheolla’s good grace and guidance, the more I was able
to be merciful – open and welcoming – to her. And there, in that giving, I found the power to be merciful to me, forgiving myself for all of my
part in the crash of my marriage and the harm done to Kristin. Yes, “blessed are the merciful, for they will receive mercy.”
Purity of heart is singleness of purpose. Neither distracted nor confounded by myriad things, but rather, wanting, willing one thing. To
live with singular focus is to see God, to behold the unfolding of God’s revelation or, in other words, to discern the meaning of our lives.
Peacemaking is not passive acquiescence to every point of view. To make peace is to step up and stand squarely on the stage of conflict.
Bridging divisions among people. Reminding all of our common dignity as children of God and our common destiny – we either live together
in peace or die together in turmoil.
Persecution is that sacrifice of well-being, even the respect of others that often comes when we stand in a committed place. For the Christian,
that place is the cross. When Pontheolla and I returned from sabbatical, nearly two years ago, these words were on my lips: May we each find a cause
for which we are willing to die and, thus, find a self with whom we truly can live. This remains my call to you and to me.
The Beatitudes. The description of that blessed non-self delusional state where we know who we are. That is, not God. That happy existence where
we, to paraphrase Pascal, rise in the morning and look up so to remember that we are not the highest point.[6]
Problem is that none of us trusts God – or anyone or anything – totally at all times for all things. And from time to time, all of us, in our
self-interested individuality, suffer the delusion that we are the highest, most important point.
But the Beatitudes still astound. These words are not simply good advice, which we, by our own devices, strive to practice. Rather, they constitute
a mirror, a looking glass through which we can behold our authentic reflection. That we always are poor in spirit – mournfully, meekly, hungrily
and thirstily, mercifully, purely, peacefully, and perseveringly. To know that is doing alright because it is being alright – true to
God, others, and ourselves.
[1] The Rev. Dr. R. Laurence Dill, III, a United Methodist minister, is the Executive Director of the Institute for Clergy Excellence and the father and father-in-law, respectively, of the Rev. David Dill, Assistant Rector for Congregational Development of Trinity Episcopal Church, Boston, and Mary Alex Dill, both members of the St. Mark’s community.
[2] Matthew 4.23a, 24a, 25a (adapted; emphases mine). The gospel passage appointed for the day is Matthew 5.1-12.
[3] From Invictus by William Ernest Henley (1849-1903).
