Let me tell you why this blog is named "Standing at the Empty Tomb."

The Companions of Mary the Apostle are a new community, still forming and finding our shape.  We are currently three priests, all women, in the Episcopal Church.  We are dedicated to bridging past and future in the Church, to fostering women's leadership and feminine imagery in worship, to integrating masculine and feminine energies.  (At least that's my take on what we're about!)

We chose Mary Magdalene, also known as the Apostle to the Apostles, for many reasons.  She is a sinner (like us all) who is healed and loved by Jesus, transformed into a voice for the Gospel.  She goes to the tomb expecting to prepare the dead body of her beloved rabbi, but she finds an empty tomb.  She doesn't recognize Jesus - resurrection doesn't fit her picture of what is possible in the world.  But she comes to believe, and she runs to tell others.

That's what I want to do.  I have been and will continue to be healed by the love of God in Christ.  I have been and will be a sinner, converted and empowered to follow.  I have loved Jesus in his death, and I now believe in resurrection.  I stand in possibility - the possibility that Church will live again, but not in the forms we recognize; the possibility that the Holy Spirit is blowing and swirling and laughing among us; the possibility that we can live in community even in an age that destroys it.

So I'm standing at the empty tomb, between death and resurrection.  I invite you to stand here with me, to tell others what you find.  Sometimes it will be just absence, confusion, grief.  But often it will be hope, courage, joy.  Where else would you want to be?

starting up!

Hi everyone,
I promised Terry P. that I would begin this today.  I'm off to our weekly meeting of the Companions, reading Peter Block's Community: The Structure of Belonging.  We are learning how to be a bi-coastal, mixed residential/dispersed community.  We just made our initial commitments for six months on January 17, the feast of St. Anthony of Egypt, one of the founders of monastic life in the Christian tradition.  A good day!

So stay tuned.  I will let you know what we're up to, what we'd like to be up to, what we need, and random thoughts.  Please let us know if you have prayer requests, or ideas for activities or events, or just want to talk about what we're doing.  I'm so excited!