A Touch of Grace
Galatians 1: 1-12
June 2, 2013
Marsh Chapel
Rev. Dr. Robert Allan Hill, Dean
New York
When
St. Paul writes that the gospel came to him by apocalypse he intends neither a
sole reliance on experience to the left nor a rejection of experience to the
right. The gospel comes by
apocalypse at the incursion of spirit in life, of love in experience, of
experience inside out, a touch of grace.
So our experience matters, and our awareness of experience invaded is
largely all we have.
May
2 our friend and teacher retired in New York City. Dr. Christopher Morse lectured on the history of Christian
theology in September of 1976, and before and after. The lectures , built in part upon the lectures of Robert
Calhoun at Yale a decade earlier, in may have been, are today still shimmering
in memory, forty years later.
Speech matters. On a bright
May morning, some from near and some from far drove to Riverside Drive, parked
behind Grant’s tomb, wondered again and aloud who was buried there (J), peered in at the
dark, historic, gothic emptiness of Riverside Church, hunted down friends at
the Interchurch Center next door, sat in the venerable Union Theological
Seminary courtyard, fragrant and cloistered and quiet, then in James Chapel,
now filling with five decades of friends and students. The honoree asked not to preach, but
only to celebrate the Eucharist, in clear Methodist fashion, as we do
today. Doctoral students
sang an anthem musically summarizing Morse’s theological principles. (Hear these words set to guitar and
folk music: coherence,
catholicity, conformity…(J)). A young student preached. Prayers were offered by another,
strong, sonorous, spirited prayers by another young student, the son of a
prominent NYC Methodist preacher. A simple luncheon followed, with a portrait unveiled, no
eulogies or roasts or remembrances.
Just 90 minutes, noon on, of grace. Then the drive home, along the coast and through New Haven,
a drive most richly populated by ghosts, haunted by recollection and reckoning,
riddled with gratitude. Friends,
an excellent 80 minute lecture lives, feeds, and lasts a lifetime, maybe even
three such. By the way, the young
man who prayed so well, a cradle Methodist, a parsonage child, a brilliant
future preacher, is gay. Said a
proud, heart broken dad, ‘He will not lie. He will not stay.
He will find another denomination’. But the father’s smile through pain was a real, though fragile,
real though apocalyptic touch of grace, a holy Eucharist, love made real.
Boston
May
16 started six days of Commencement gladness, here at Boston University, across
a campus and city still bruised and hurting from spring terror and death. We shall sorely and truly need together
the ongoing development of a spiritual discipline against resentment
(acknowledged, admitted, accepted—and then wrestled with, like love with an
angel). More than 80 graduates
were anointed by word and sword with a scarlet key. The dental school celebration—large, colorful, global. A
certain choir learned that they would sing with the Rolling Stones, a band
active when Christopher Morse was in college. Of course, with gladness, we happily recall the great, big
moments of Commencement 2013.
Morgan Freeman photographed with Jan Hill. Morgan Freeman cheered by students, ‘speech, speech…’ And in extatraditional mode, he
did. The Marsh Chapel choir, soon
to sing with Mick Jagger, resplendent, redolent at Baccalaureate. The thrilled celebration of hooding
like that of the theology school here in the Chapel. Music from ‘A Chorus Line’—perhaps generationally specific
in thrill—with the Boston Pops. A
magnificent Advisory Board meeting with a world class presentation on global
health. Greek and Latin orations,
from memory, in the original, at the BU Academy graduation, with a fine sermon
given there, on ‘closing the opportunity gap’ on the text, ‘to whom much is
given, from him much is required’ in St. Luke. All these and others were wonderful and more than wonderful.
But
come with me to an out of the way, smaller gathering, and a particularly
powerful one every year. For us,
the most meaningful graduation moment each year is not under the big tent but
among several dozen in Faneuil Hall, where 20 or so soldiers are commissioned
as second lieutenants. In crisp
attire and crisp liturgy, young men and women assemble before the portraits of
Sam Adams, John Hancock, and George Washington, in the cradle of the cradle of
liberty. “The President of the
United States has placed his trust and confidence…” “Do you promise to
preserve, protect, and defence…”
Then the loved ones—parents, or siblings or spouses—place the apulets
upon the commissioned officers, sending them potentially into harm’s way for
our sakes. Freedom is not
free. To see mom and dad, brother
and sister, husband and wife struggling to get the shoulder boards in place,
every May, is the marrow of commencement, where a courageous present enters an
uncertain future. This year—by
apocalypse came the gospel said Paul—one fine woman was aided by two other
young women, her sister—and her partner.
In Boston, Faneuil Hall.
Before Adams, Hancock, and Washington. She is going to place herself in mortal danger for us. And we are going to question her
practice of love? It was a very
full moment, an apocalypse if you will.
A touch of grace.
Montreal
By
May 22, after the last of 27 different Commencement events for us, this the
gracious retired faculty and staff association luncheon, an organization long
chaired by two Marsh Chapter stalwarts, pointed the car due north toward ‘le
Europe prochain’, Montreal, the Europe next door, the second largest French
speaking city in the world. A BU
class was there arranged on urban mission and ministry. While students pondered the pattern and
significance of the work of Jean Vanier, founder of L’Arche, and his emphasis
on ‘belonging’, his longing for belonging, and remembered our own decade in and
out of Quebec. The Faculty of
Religious Studies Birks Building, pristine and waxed and gothic and beautiful
and summer empty, welcomed us with open arms. Part school part church, part library part chapel, part
study part sanctuary, part office part altar, part lectern part pulpit, part
mind part heart. The current
faculty, many friends—Green, Kirkpatrick, Aiken, Baum, Hall, Golberger,
Henderson, Sharma, Pettem—had place there books on display, and their faces
restored a part of our being. Our
friends give us back ourselves.
Shadows, shades of memory greeted us too. NT Wright, in 1981, in chapel announcing the death of Anwar
Sadat. Dean Eric Jay, long
retired, admitting that the early church rejected patri-passianism, ‘but just
barely’. Dean RBY Scott, whose
hymn we sing here. Deans Johnston,
Mclelland, and Runnells, Johnston stating at a oral that Q was a missionary,
teaching tract. Wilfred Cantwell
Smith, like Howard Thurman, more than 100 years ahead of his time more than
fifty year ago. The day of
registration and of defense and of graduation. Forms of real contest at a time of young hope, fear and
life. The Canadian
self-deferential self mockery, of which we could use a steady dose here: ‘We could have had the best of British
culture, French cuisine, and American government, but we got instead British
cuisine, French government, and American culture’. Funny, but not true, expect in the tone of self deprecation.
When
GB Caird came to McGill he spoke of the Unity of the New Testament, and in his
portrait we saw resembled a
Methodist minister, Dr Thomas Ogletree.
Tom is nearly 80. Let
me describe him for you: courtly, gracious, soft spoken white
bearded, grandfatherly, bespectacled. The former dean of Yale Divinity, and athe other of
much of the theological substance in our current UM Book of Discipline. I expect that if you look in the
dictionary to find the definition o ‘Christian gentleman’, you will discover
his photograph. Last year he
solemnized the marriage one of his five children, a son—to another man. Now the winds of reaction, abetted by
the mistaken misguidance of the current general superintendent in NY, are
bringing him to trial. The measure
of our current failure to live up to the much ballyhooed Methodist tradition of
social justice and holiness, can no more accurately be taken than by this dark
image of Ogletree on trial before Methodism. ‘Al contraire’ we thought in Montreal. It is Ogletree who has brought
Methodism to trial, not the reverse.
Here he is—gentle, forebearing, honest. A touch of grace.
Syracuse
Our
Annual Conference in Syracuse concluded yesterday. Among many other earthly delights it included a fire
alarm—no harm, no injuries—during opening worship. Imagine 1500 Methodists fleeing and stampeding out of a
convention center, ‘fleeing from the wrath to come’. No flames, just apocalyptic mirth and moments in the
sunshine for fellowship, and for conference. It was also a truth moment. A fire alarm is ringing, right now, across Methodism. Since 2010 from Albany to Buffalo
my beloved conference has lost 11% of its people. For those under 45, the disaffection is highly
specific. We refuse to affirm the
full humanity of gay people. Can
we be surprised that people of conscience go elsewhere? What kind of future could you honestly
want or expect for an excluding denomination? During the fire alarm, I took the occasion to find and meet
a pastor from Binghamton, whose blog post I had read the week before. I close with Stephen Heiss’s words, for
they are truly my very own:
To Bishop
Mark Webb, my brother in Christ!
In the
spirit of the One who said the truth will set us free, and emboldened by the freedom given by grace for which
Jesus lived and died, I want and need to share with you how God has led me (and
many of our colleagues) in ministries to help set at liberty those who have
been held captive by the tyranny against people who are gay.
In the
last few years I have officiated at several weddings for brothers and sisters
who are lesbian or gay. One of those weddings—the highlight of my ministry—was
for my own daughter and the woman who is now her wife. They are so happy!
Further,
much to my delight, I have plans to officiate in the near future at yet another
wedding for two women, that their joy may also be complete.
Bishop
Webb—the long bitter era of scorn and hatred against gay people is dissolving
before our very eyes. Christ has broken down the walls.
Those who
have lived within the law and
those who have lived outside
the law are sitting down together at the table of grace.
The
parable of the Kingdom of God as a wedding banquet has become an event in real
time for hundreds of gay couples across our state. Finally, like the guest list
in Jesus’ parable, those on the outside are invited to the inside of God’s
grace. They must come!
Nevertheless,
some yet refuse the invitation.
They make
excuses.
They cite
Scriptures, yet offer no interpretive principle by which their claims are
validated.
They
prefer the “tradition of the elders” to Jesus’ teachings about “not judging the
other.”
They
screen for the gnats of sexual correctness while the elephants of consumer
materialism, environmental degradation, and global starvation pass right by,
completely unnoticed.
We cannot
judge them, of course, for they too are given grace.
Who among
us can say we have always accepted every invitation toward grace and away from
judgment?
And so,
grace abounds!
Further,
the harvest of that grace is found everywhere—even in the church!
With
regard to homosexuality, we who count ourselves as United Methodists have been
wandering in the wilderness of
uncertainty about all things gay for 40 long years. Now the
Promised Land is coming into view.
During
those 40 years we have attempted to trap gay folks in nets of shame.
We
stalked them with bible verses.
We
legislated against them – whereas
this, and whereas that.
We sent
them to trials.
In
righteous rage we lifted stones against them.
Now, in
our own time, we are dropping those stones, one by one -
at first
- mothers, dads, sisters, brothers, school mates, talk show hosts, the
neighbor next door.
We were
learning.
Then—psychologists,
pediatricians, sociologists, school teachers, neuro-scientists, biologists,
counselors.
We were
learning.
Then—Anglicans,
Episcopalians, Lutherans, United Churches of Christ, Presbyterians,
Reformed Jews.
We were
learning.
And now –
baseball players, bible scholars, theologians, professional ethicists, Sunday school
teachers, pastors . . .
and bishops.
We are
learning.
We are finally learning that
being gay harms no one.
No one.
No one.
We are
learning it is not a sin to be gay nor was it ever “incompatible with Christian
teaching”.
We are
learning that it is really OK with God if one is gay -
(just as eating shrimp is OK, regardless
stern biblical injunctions to the contrary!)
And so a new circle is forming.
A new circle is being created,
and it is being drawn wide.
A circle of understanding.
A circle of compassion.
A circle of truth.
The
complex name for that circle might be:
“the fellowship of those who are no
longer
throwing stones at people just because
they happen to be gay, lesbian,
bisexual or transgender”
A simpler
name for that circle might be:
“those who are trying to live in the light of
God’s grace”
But the
name of the circle I most hope for, is this one:
The United Methodist Church
