Advent 1: get ready

12/1

The Soviet Union Isaiah statue

The first Sunday in Advent. Off to a bad start as I have to clear Joe and company off the steps. It’s getting harder and harder to get movement in the morning. George at least relocates to the bus stop for the duration of services. I’m on the receiving end of attitude. And Joe’s wife seems to moved to use the steps as a restroom before leaving. Enough already, OK? And I struggle with my need to make the entrance open, clean and inviting against the guilt trip accusations that come my way about neighborhood rich people and their sensibilities. From my side, it’s respect I’m after. Beginning with self.

Pat has come early with Larry to get the place ready for Advent. Wreath. Greens. Candles. Other seasonal decorations. She has a good eye and a caring touch. And as always I’m happy to see my son Dan here.

We start with singing Barbara Lundblad’s first verse of a rewritten O Come o come Immanuel.. seeking to avoid the supercessionism of ransoming captive Israel.

O come, o come Immanuel                                                                                                                                      

And bless each place your people dwell

Melt ev’ry weapon crafted for war

Bring peace upon the earth for evermore

Rejoice, rejoice! Take heart and do not fear,

God’s chosen one, Immanuel, draws near.

Our first lesson is ISAIAH 2:1-5

We talk about how

^t He shall judge between the nations, 
and shall arbitrate for many peoples; 
     they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; 
nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more

is the inspiration for the former  Soviet Union’s gift to  the United Nations, a statue depicting this Isaiah  passage. How strange that an officially atheist country would  choose a biblical image, regardless of how universally appealing it is .  Directly across the street from the Isaiah plaza where so many antiwar protests take place.

Ain’t gonna study war no more, ain’t gonna study war no more…(Down by the River Side)

And we talk about swords to plowshares. Anna talks  about the city's gun buy back program. Someone else about landmines, Cambodian fields now stripped of land mines and available for rice production the first time in a generation. Buddhists turning  bullets into bells.

Then we talk about ROMANS 13:11-14. Leaving aside for the moment all the finger waving admonitions, ¹³let us live honorably as in the day, not in reveling and drunkenness, not in debauchery and licentiousness, not in quarreling and jealousy and instead focusing on the advice to put on the Lord Jesus Christ… asking ourselves exactly what does that mean?

And I talk about Ignacio Silone’s Bread and Wine, the story of a  former seminarian now communist underground resistance fighter  hiding in the guise of a village priest. And how the townspeople begin to come to him for what should be expected from a priest. And to keep his cover, he begins to do the work of a priest. And slowly, act by act, he comes to be a priest, servant, even believer again. In Catholic existentialist terms, being precedes belief.

And I recall how as when I don’t believe, the simple act of praying  with someone can make it real again.

Finally, we look at the Gospel. MATTHEW 24:36-44. Clearly about getting ready. We have to deal with the way it has been appropriated the premillenial dispensationlists and their rapture agenda. But the fact is, it’s not clear that it’s those who are taken who are the blessed ones.

* It is certainly clear that on World AIDS day, before we understood what was going on, that was the case, that one will be taken and one will be left.

* We talk about our friend Diana who just died of lung cancer. During her days of capture by the Argentine junta during the dirty war, that was the case, one taken, one left.

Being taken could be the judgment…

It’s about keeping awake. Like my friend Father Earl helped St.Mary’s in Harlem become the we are not afraid church, I would like West-Park to be the we are wide awake church. Get ready.

And as always, Marhsa wants to know for what? The end of time? And John R says that for those who go on the Metro North this morning, it was the end of time.  Six dead as a speeding train jumps the tracks.  A bad day for people get ready, there’s a train a comin’.

                                                    People Get Ready

If it’s just about the next world, Marsha isn't  interested.And doing the right thing  now needs to be done because it is right of its own nature, not because you’ll get punished if you don’t do it. We ponder how we teach children:

You better watch out

You better not cry

Better not pout

I'm telling you why

Santa Claus is coming to town

He's making a list

And checking it twice;

Gonna find out Who's naughty and nice

Santa Claus is coming to town

He sees you when you're sleeping

He knows when you're awake

He knows if you've been bad or good

So be good for goodness sake!

O! You better watch out!

You better not cry

Better not pout

I'm telling you why

Santa Claus is coming to town

Santa Claus is coming to town

                                                     Santa Claus is Comin to Town

That’s not what living is all about…

Live today as if it were your last. Just because.

Before our communion, we talk about World AIDS Day. And we talk about Stephen  Festa. As he always saw himself as the child inJesus’ arms and when he died, his partner rested the Tiffany widow and rededicated it to Stpehen’s memory so that today we call it the Stephen window. 

The Stephen window

We read the litany prepared by the Presbyterian Health Education and Welfare Association Aids Network litany. Light his candle. Recall others we have  lost. We prepare for communion. And following  the service, share in some  classic brown and white cookies Gary Greengrass has given us  for the 4^th day of Hanukkah.

                                                        Get ready for Christmas Day

We end the day with Paul Simon's get ready...

Later on  way for a night of volunteer work at the shelter at SPSA,  I encounter Rachel. She’s been released from the mental ward at St. Luke’s. But still been evicted from he Capital  Hall room. Now nowhere to go. And with a brand new shopping cart full of accumulated items.  It’s frustrating.

Late at night, I’m getting ready to leave. RL, Joe and Pat stop in. Invite me up to the studio for an Amanda listening party. We sit quietly as her voice on CD fills the room. That Tin Man song that led RL to call her Tin Girl. Almost as if she’s here with us.

https://soundcloud.com/amandachristine

Advent 1: Signs

12/2

The table is ready

Makes me feel good, coming into the sanctuary, seeing it all ready for worship. The work we did yesterday--Teddy, Jay, Stephen-- worth it. Appears that Sanctuary has added festive wreaths to the mix. And Teddy has a pot of hot mulled cider simmering...

I couldn’t find our traditional brass Advent wreath yesterday so I brought my blue ceramic one from home, made years ago by Latvian potter Valda from Pittsburgh. It was a special commission. I gave her the idea one Christmas. A longtime friend of my late Uncle Leon, she would host an annual open house with Latvian cookies and mulled wine while in the living  room you could see her tree decorated, in the Latvian tradition with real candles. Every year she would terrify her guests when she lit the candles. It’s OK, she’d say, I have a bucket of water nearby...

So I also brought the communion set she made for me. Not doing any good at home. It’s a risk, I know. Things have a disturbing way of disappearing around here, even from locked rooms. 

I should have known. We did all that work yesterday getting Rachelle’s stuff ready to be  moved out. The desk guy at Capital Hall said he hadn’t seen her in days. So of course, today, right before worship, she shows up. I can see the looks on Stephen and Teddy’s faces, their hearts sinking. 

And of course, right before worship, she’s all worked up. 

Why didn’t you tell me? 

We’ve been telling you for months.

How am I going to help people, I don’t know where anything is..

It’s all very neatly packed up.

Well.they’ve messed everything up, I knew where every item was...and some of my best things, my pretty things, my beautiful things, I showed the young lady, they’re gone pastor, they’re gone, what am I going to do?

Rachelle, Rachelle, I can’t have this conversation now.

I see the congregation gathering. She will be in there, opening boxes, rummaging through things...Rachelle, please wait until after the service,please...

I look out and see Tracy and her partner Su Young and I smile. Soon her two sisters will arrive as well. And there will be another visitor, a young woman, dragged in, it will turn out, by Rachelle.

We begin with O Come, O Come, Emmanuel... and I have Teddy light the first Advent candle. 

We say our prayers, read our scriptures. And then, with Marc’s help, Something’s coming from West Side Story comes over the sound system. 

Could be!  Who knows?  There's something due any day;  I will know right away,  Soon as it shows.  It may come cannonballing down through the sky,  Gleam in its eye,  Bright as a rose!  Who knows?  It's only just out of reach,  Down the block, on a beach,  Under a tree.  I got a feeling there's a miracle due,  Gonna come true,  Coming to me!  Could it be? Yes, it could.  Something's coming, something good,  If I can wait!  Something's coming, I don't know what it is,  But it is  Gonna be great!  With a click, with a shock,  Phone'll jingle, door'll knock,  Open the latch!  Something's coming, don't know when, but it's soon;  Catch the moon,  One-handed catch!  Around the corner,  Or whistling down the river,  Come on, deliver  To me!  Will it be? Yes, it will.  Maybe just by holding still,  It'll be there!  Come on, something, come on in, don't be shy,  Meet a guy,  Pull up a chair!  The air is humming,  And something great is coming!  Who knows?  It's only just out of reach,  Down the block, on a beach,  Maybe tonight . . .  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xu7sRdRrm_w

So why did I do that? It’s Advent....and something’s....coming...something’s coming...and like 

Tony in West Side Story.....we are filled with anticipation. And not even sure what it is we are waiting for. Just that something’s coming...

Every year, we go through three Advents at the same time. First of all, we’re waiting, getting ready for this year’s  Christmas that is coming...but we also remember all the Christmases of our lives. And even  more....we’re getting ready for Jesus. His return. The coming of his kindom, his reign, his beloved community. 

We experience time chronologically but also in cycles. So every year when I see the decorations go up, I have a sinking feeling. Another year coming to an end, another year of so much left undone...where am I, where are we, on our journey? All in the hustle and bustle and stress of a holiday season. 

So we need Advent. To carve out some time. Some space in time, out of time, to prepare...to get ready...

Our Luke passage (21: 25-36) is all about signs and portents...People are always looking for that...and it’s not like we don’t see them...Any age, any time is filled with its own apocalyptic images. Enough to prove the end is near. In Bible study, we learned that the devastating earthquake in Pompeii informed some of Mark’s apocalyptic imagery.

(I shared the story of the man in Far Rockaway....the wall of water, the screaming car alarms, electric wires hitting the water, wading through floating garbage...almost losing his daughter in law...)

It doesn’t get any more apocalyptic than that...

We lit our first candle today for the Prophets..those who help us discern the times. Strikes me that today, scientists are our prophets now...They are trying to get us to see that actions have consequences....put too much carbon emission in the air, you get global warming...destroy the wetlands, you get catastrophic flooding...actions have consequences...

Like I said the first weekend after Sandy, don’t talk about natural disasters...the hurricane was weather...the disaster human made...a direct result of our policy decisions.

The call of the gospel  is to not  give in to our fears...and I always note that the worries of this world are right up there with dissipation and drunkenness...as someone said, worrying is like praying for what you don’t want.... you almost draw it to you....

And I want us also to see that the  redemption  spoken of by the prophet (Jeremiah 33: 14-16) is collective, not individual...like they said at Midland Beach in Staten Island, the problem here is individualization of crisis...

Signs...We see signs......I tell them of the story of the Occupiers and police on Staten Island....the wariness, slowly beginning to work together daily...the growing mutual respect...to see the Occupy signs and NYPD/FDNY signs side by side...that’s somewhere between hell freezing over and Jesus coming again...signs of the coming world we’re supposed to live into...signs of the alternative reality we’re called to live in now....

That’s what I have, this first Sunday in Advent...signs....

a candle for Stephen Festa

we remember

Before we gather for communion, we stop to commemorate World AIDS day. I remind the church of the deep history of the AIDS crisis at West-Park. I recall the creation of God’s Love We Deliver meals on wheels program for people with AIDS. I point to the Tiffany window restored in honor of and dedicated to Stephen Festa in 1987. And light a candle by his plaque. And we light candles in memory of those we have lost. And invite their spirits, and the spirits of all who came before us in this place to join us in our communion. 

As I lift up the bread, I recall that food justice is at every level....production, distribution, consumption...and think of all the hands involved in our loaf of bread, from seeds to store... and how grapes too must go through that process...and that in the end, it is we who are transformed into the bread of life, the risen body, to be leaven, to bring ferment to our world.  

As the people come forward for communion, I hear Tracy as she comes to Hope, a little unsure what to do...I’ve never dome this before...she says... 

We sing Come thou long expected Jesus and gather around the table. And I read the day’s Epistle lesson as a benediction:

⁹How can we thank God enough for you in return for all the joy that we feel before our God because of you? ¹⁰Night and day we pray most earnestly that we may see you face to face and restore whatever is lacking in your faith.

11 Now may our God and Father himself and our Lord Jesus direct our way to you. ¹²And may the Lord make you increase and abound in love for one another and for all, just as we abound in love for you. ¹³And may he so strengthen your hearts in holiness that you may be blameless before our God and Father at the coming of our Lord Jesus with all his saints. 

And we sing our amens, return to Teddy’s hot mulled cider.

Stephen invites the Sanctuary NYC folks to share in our AIDS memorial candles.  Later, I’ll look and see that they did and that  all the candles are lit and glowing...

The young woman who was visiting comes forward. Tells me that she was dragged in by Rachelle. That she was raised Catholic, with serious issues with church. And that she didn’t know it could be this way.  I like the intimacy, the caring of your community she says...And I thank her for her presence. 

Ramon is preparing for his ballet. He came in as we left yesterday. Didn’t hear Jeremy when he called. Jeremy had to come down to the Gate to borrow keys. A package of bacalao in his hands. It’s a long story , he said....

Tracy and her sisters

I take a picture of Tracy and her sisters. You’re like an Asian, she said,always taking pictures...

Rachelle renews her assault. Her high pitched, staccato words like a dentist’s drill boring into my head. Later she will set up a display on the steps. Tired, I finally say, if it bothers Sanctuary, they can deal with it.

She sees me going up Amsterdam and follows. Telling me her medical miracle, living with scleroderma. (I told her I knew the story)And of her miraculous rescue from a car accident and the cop who called her an angel. She tells me an angel of mercy. She says I am an angel, too. .This is going on too long. I a exhausted. Remember the first West-Park rule. Remember...don’t try and have rational conversations with irrational people...