Prayer and Community

This morning I was thinking about this coming Saturday, when Elizabeth and I will miss evening prayer to attend a movie (shocking!  scandalous!).  I need to let people know, since we stream our prayers via Zoom to our covenant group members and covenant companions.  And that made me think about the importance of community in prayer.

Before I entered religious life, I joined the Guild of St. Benedict.  The central practice was a four-fold daily office.  We never met in person, but I knew that people around the globe were praying - some when I was, others at other times.  It was a powerful mystical bond.

Later, when I lived in a convent, I got used to having people to pray with every day.  But there were times - rarely, but occasionally - when only 3 or 4 of us were there.  Once it was only me.  And those were powerful times too: I knew that I was praying not only for myself, but for my sisters who were called away.  I was doing my part to keep the community praying.  That not only strengthened my connection to God; it strengthened my awareness and connection to my sisters.

Now the people who join us online may think that we are praying, and they are praying with us.  But if we aren't there, if there's no computer, they may think they can't pray.  Au contraire, mes amies!  You have your turn to uphold the Companions in prayer.  And Elizabeth and I do pray when we're gone: if we're in the car we sing the Phos Hilaron and the Magnificat, say the Lord's Prayer, and close.  There is no wrong way to pray.

So I say, not only to our immediate community but to all of you: when you pray, you join the great stream of prayer flowing out of God and back to God.  You join sisters and brothers in joy and pain.  When you take your turn in prayer, you receive back the gift of connection to God and others.

Let us pray.  Amen.

Sermon July 29 2018, at Hopewell Junction NY

I’m glad to be with you today, but I have to be honest.  I wish our time together was beginning on a different note.  There’s good news in today’s readings, but there’s a lot of pain too.  It would be easy to avoid the pain and focus on the loaves and fishes.  Or we could enjoy the beautiful prayer of Ephesians.  But there’s no shortcut to that prayer, to that abundance.  We cannot buy our joy at the price of ignoring sin and horror.  There’s no resurrection without the cross.

Two weeks ago we heard the grim story of Herod’s beheading of John the Baptist.  Today we are confronted again with the abuse of power.  David, the Anointed One, the ancestor of Jesus, is guilty of rape and murder.

For many years we didn’t hear the word rape.  If people mentioned this story, they called it a seduction.  But the text says not a word about persuasion or seduction.  David saw her, he wanted her, he sent for her, he took her.  And he knew it was wrong.  He knew it needed to be hidden.  But rather than repent, he compounded his sin by having Bathsheba’s husband, David’s faithful servant, killed in battle.  He will repent later, but the damage has been done.

Now, I could preach a whole sermon about the dangers of absolute power.  And it’s true, Samuel warned the people when they called for a king: a king, he said, will take your daughters and sons.  He will take your land.  He will exploit and oppress you.  He didn’t say any particular king would do this; he said, this is what kings do.  And certainly the Scriptures give us plenty of examples of this abuse of royal power.  So when the people want to make Jesus king, he flees.  That is not the sort of authority he carries, or desires.  His vision for the people is greater than their own desire or imagination.  The reign of God is about community, not hierarchy; it’s about caring for the least of these, rather than indulging the whims of the rich.

But I don’t want to focus on David.  In this era of #MeToo, it’s time to listen to Bathsheba and her sisters.  What do we learn from Bathsheba?

First, we can learn simply to read more sides of a story.  I wonder, what was life like for Bathsheba after the rape?  She learns she’s pregnant.  When she tells David, her husband is killed in battle in a most conspicuous way.  She knows he’s been killed so that David can hide his crime and take her for himself.  The child born of that rape dies.  Later she will bear a son who becomes king in turn, and who in his turn will be known both for wisdom and for opulence.  He built the first Temple, and a palace, using the forced labor of thousands of men.  Bathsheba has a royal life indeed.  

Does that erase the scars?  We don’t know.  We’re left with more questions than answers.

One of the strengths of Judaism is the willingness to confront God, even knowing that we will not get the answers we seek.  It’s part of Jewish piety to question God, to express outrage, to lament.  The Psalms give us some of that picture.  We too can be outraged and still be faithful.  We can ask, “What are you thinking?  Where are you?” as part of an honest prayer life.  Praise and petition that doesn’t acknowledge hard feelings is just flattery.  God hungers for real relationship.

After this section of Scripture, we hear of Bathsheba once again.  Matthew’s Gospel opens with a genealogy of Jesus.  In the long line of male ancestors, four women are listed.  Bathsheba is there, though her name is missing: she is known only as “the wife of Uriah.”  She takes her place with Tamar, who was used by her father-in-law as a prostitute and bore Perez; with Rahab, a prostitute who helped the Hebrews conquer Canaan; and Ruth, a poor Moabite widow who offered herself as slave to Boaz.  She gave birth to Jesse, father of David.  These four women are the ones Matthew wants us to know about.

What does this tell us about God?  The Hebrew Scriptures make clear that being used or called by God does nor make anyone morally superior.  David is truly called by God, anointed, and that is not changed by his sin.  But neither does his call erase the sin or justify it.

God works by redeeming what has been broken and lost, but we must acknowledge the brokenness.  If we try to deny or justify, we cannot open to God’s grace.  We can’t ignore suffering on our way to glory.  God stands with the victims and the powerless.  We are called to stand there too.  

God’s power, working in us.

We are the ones through whom Bathsheba and her sisters will be redeemed.  We do that by welcoming those labelled unclean, those victimized by powerful and ruthless people - whether they be kings or other political officials, corporate titans, or simply the petty tyrants who keep others imprisoned through poverty or unjust incarceration or human trafficking.  Victims of domestic or political violence are part of Jesus’ family.

We also need to welcome those who have perpetrated these injustices.  The reign of God does not leave anyone out.  David is called to account by Nathan, and he does repent.  When we confront oppressors, when we name the truth and offer forgiveness, we make a space for them to return to God and to human community.  Jesus does this.  We can do this, with God’s grace.

This is a challenging way of life.  But we see it lived around us: in the Truth and Reconciliation process in South Africa, in the Amish community that forgave those who killed its children, in the movement for restorative justice that brings together criminals and victims to create a new future for them both.  This is the work of the Spirit, and the promise of Christian community.  

I pray that each of us, and all of us, may be strengthened in our inner being, that Christ may dwell in our hearts by faith, that we may be rooted and grounded in love, and that we may know and be filled with all the fullness of God.  To God be the glory.Se