Can't buy me Agape (B28O)

Jesus looked around and said to his disciples,
"How hard it is for those who have wealth
to enter the kingdom of God!"
The disciples were amazed at his words.

So Jesus again said to them in reply,
"Children, how hard it is to enter the kingdom of God!

It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle
than for one who is rich to enter the kingdom of God."

They were exceedingly astonished and said among themselves,
"Then who can be saved?" (RNAB)

Late again, but I'm going to try to add a few thoughts anyway. In other times, I would have salivated over this gospel, and the opportunity to excoriate the rich and delight over their impending miseries, but I think I see it differently this year. And it's not just that I'm rich, either, part of the tiny number of the world's population that has more of its share of the riches of the world while a huge majority of people barely eke out a living. It's that while I'm pretty sure Jesus meant exactly what he said, that it is impossibly hard for the rich to enter the reign of God, I also think it's less about money itself than about entitlement ("I've been good, God owes me") and signification ("I'm rich,  therefore I'm blessed"). At the heart of all this, the metaphorical camel going through the needle's eye, is the damned assurance that I can stay the way I am, comfortable and unchanged, and come to understand within myself that I can be part of the life of God.

A few things I've picked up about the language of the gospel from sources, particularly "Say to This Mountain" Mark's Story of Discipleship by Ched Myers and others, and The Jewish Annotated New Testament, edited by Amy-Jill Levine etal, but most of it can be found in other resources as well. 

Like other passages, this event takes place "on the way," "setting out on a journey." A wealthy man does homage to Jesus and asks him, "What must I do to inherit eternal life?" The verb "inherit" indicates that the man expects that a relationship exists there whereby, due to some vagary of birth, he is owed something by God. If he had asked "how can I earn eternal life?" he would have made a much more common mistake, right, one we all make in our relationships not only with God but with each other. While it is a common disorientation in us that imagines we can "earn" our way into the relationship with God that will deepen our life into God's own, it's a peculiar mistake of the rich and religious that imagines we can get there by bloodlines or creed. Note at the end of the reading that the disciples are incredulous that the rich can't easily enter—or aren't already clearly in—the reign of God. They are spectacularly "blessed" in life, isn't that a sign of God's favor? And looking at that insight from this perspective, that is, that the rich, with all their foibles, cruelties, injustices, and manipulations are somehow "blessed" by God, what does that make people imagine God is like? No  wonder, I think, people were ready to hear the gospel. They knew something was wrong, and finally here was a teacher smart enough and good enough to say it out loud.

He calls Jesus "good teacher," and Jesus calls him out on it, because "only God is good," and so he is about to teach him the Torah, which he purports to know and follow well. Jesus's response is, "You know the Torah," and he lists the second half of the decalogue, but with a notable deviation. Instead of the final commandment about desiring the property of another, Jesus substitutes, "you shall not defraud," which is indeed in the Torah, but from a section of Leviticus about property, rather than from Deuteronomy (and Exodus.) Jesus knows that the man is wealthy; maybe he even knows him and reputation, and that his disciples and others suspect (or know) that, like all of the rich, what they have is not their own, but has been taken by fraud from others. 

"You're just missing one thing," Jesus announces. "Sell it all, give it to the poor. Then come follow me." There it is, that nagging demand that he, and all of us, "turn around and believe in the gospel," that is, turn from the mechanics and economy that we think determine civilization and give our hearts (be-love) to the good news of the other, alternative, kingdom of God. And, by the way, "eternal life" does not mean (only, or primarily) "life after death." The only eternal being is God, so "eternal life" is a figure of speech, a metonymy, that means "share in the fullness of God's life." It means a way of being now, in this world. Jesus is already living there. He's inviting the young man to join him, but his attachment to his own world, the world of money and property and power, is holding him (and us) back. Jesus isn't offering him heaven after he dies. He's offering him freedom and happiness now. But we have to let go of what makes us unhappy first, and what we are clinging onto that makes everyone, the whole world, in fact, unhappy.

We have tried really hard to soften this particular piece of scripture. There was a medieval story about this text that there was a gate in Jerusalem called "the needle's eye" that a camel could only get through "on its knees," and I know that I've heard that story, known to be false for a long time, repeated in homilies. More subtly, some evangelical preaching I've read said that Jesus only meant this particular road for this particular would-be saint, that not everyone is called to "sell everything and give it to the poor," and I really want to believe this, but I think it's another dodge. 

The rich young man, with us, feels that he can barter some of what we have in such a way as to make God pleased with us and give us heaven because we're somehow "owed." But the truth is that God doesn't owe us anything. God has already given us all there is to give. We have to get out of our own way, and tear down the structures we've created to hang onto what is ours, in order to experience the life that God is offering through Christ. Real freedom. Real community. Real joy and security. But we can't live in both worlds. We can't go into any relationship and imagine that the other person owes us love. Love, when it is given, is always just that, a gift, or it is not love. This is what the rich young man doesn't understand. He can't receive it because his hands are full of pictures and gifts of his other girlfriend, who really is no good for him! 

Jesus is offering him love. In fact, Mark says so. "Jesus looked at him and loved him." This is the only time (or one of two, I lost the reference) that the verb agapoi is used in the entire gospel of Mark. Jesus wants the young man to get past his own vision and see with God's eyes, but instead, his vision goes to the ground, "his face fell," and he walked away. 

I can't condemn him, that's for sure. I believe that God loves me, not because of what I have done or might do, not even because of who I am ("God can raise up sons of Abraham (or anybody else) out of the clay"), but because that's what God does. That's what God is. So God's love empowers me to do the same for others, and to try to live in such a way that the lives of others are made better with the same energy by which I try to live well myself. It's not that I can earn my way to God. The path is wide open, waiting for me to walk on it. Every step I take is so tentative, even with all these witnesses, and I take two back for every one toward it.

But the Beatitudes, and the life of Jesus itself, demonstrates that God is already present in the places where we most think God absent: poverty, innocence, meekness, peacemaking, the bottom of the justice food chain. In being bullied and beaten down and killed for thinking that it's all right not to be beautiful, wealthy, straight, Christian, a gun advocate, Republican, Democrat, or have my own lobbyist. All of that entitlement thinking is sin. We have to sell it all, give it away, and hit the road with the Rabbi. It's a journey, that's for damn sure.

Here's what we're singing at St. Anne:

Entrance: Walk in the Reign

Psalm 90: In Every Age (Whitaker)

Presentation of Gifts: These Alone Are Enough (Schutte)

Communion: I Say Yes/Digo Si (Peña)

Sending Forth: We Are Called (Haas)

Like a child: learning to walk, talk, and live in the reign of God (B27O)

On Monday, my usual day off, I try to look at the readings for the following weekend to see what I might like to post here about the connections between the liturgy and life that the readings suggest to me. Sometimes it's easier than other times. One would think, with all the hubbub about the International Meeting of Families in Philadelphia and the visit of Pope Francis last week there would be a lot to be said, but the truth is, it already has been said, and there's not much new or engaging in the conversation. One might say, I guess, that the pope's focus on such a huge stage on human kindness, mercy, and social consciousness is news insofar as he did not, like so many of his American bishops, use the media as a bully pulpit to push a narrow moral worldview on an intentionally pluralistic society. Like Jesus, Pope Francis was focused on the moral code of the reign of God, but another activity took me in a slightly different direction.

The other thing I do on Monday is try to get my first look, for my weekly presentation at parish, at the piece of James Alison's video series that accompanies his four-volume book of essays on theology called Jesus the Forgiving Victim: Listening for the Unheard Voice. If you haven't heard me speak of this before, it's a series of essays and videos intended for small group discussion on a theological system based on Rene Girard's mimetic theory, but re-imagined in such a way that it can be of great benefit to normal Christians like us who have a little trouble reconciling a vengeful, retributive God with the Father of Jesus, who have come to realize that the whole business of bible reading and interpretation is a little more complex than reading a newspaper or a novel, and who are looking for that experience like the Emmaus experience, wherein someone we know and love takes our lives, the very ones we have lived and thought we knew so well, and reinterprets them in a way that changes us and moves us outward with love.

What happened to me was the discovery in Alison of a metaphor that opened up part of Sunday's gospel for me in a way I hadn't imagined before. It's this section, near the end, which echoes last Sundays as well, with its language about the attitude Jesus had for children.

And people were bringing children to him that he might touch them,
but the disciples rebuked them.
When Jesus saw this he became indignant and said to them,
"Let the children come to me;
do not prevent them, for the kingdom of God belongs to
such as these.
Amen, I say to you,
whoever does not accept the kingdom of God like a child
will not enter it."
Then he embraced them and blessed them,
placing his hands on them.

Most of the time when I've heard these words, about becoming like children, or accepting the kingdom like a child, the words "meekness" and "obedient" get used, and pretty soon the whole thing just loses me. Of course, I blame myself for being jaded and such a hopeless "sophisticate" that I don't want to hear any of that churchspeak. Ched Myers' book Binding the Strong Man: A Political Reading of Mark's Story of Jesus helped me a little by suggesting that children in the world, especially in agrarian and vassal state economies before the Victorian era, occupied the lowest social strata possible, with slaves, and so the championing of their cause by Jesus was a challenge to the power structure, making the case for the equality before God of children with parents, just as he did for other kinds of outsiders like prostitutes, the lame and mute, and those "possessed by demons."

But James Alison presents an image of the child-as-receiver, as imitator, that seems to me right in line with what Jesus is talking about. In fact, it is receiving the reign of God that is at stake here, not the image of the child as such. Let me see if I can summarize a bit, because this really helped me. As far as I can tell, it has nothing to do with meekness or simplicity. It has to do with imitation, and relaxing into who we are meant to be by way of being loved by someone, Someone, who wants our greatest good.

Humans are mimetic creatures. Alison uses a phrase that, I believe, originated with Girard, that "we desire according to the desire of the other." Babies learn to walk and talk not by sitting with a computer course or being left alone in a room full of balls and rattles. They learn to walk and talk by other human beings, parents especially, but siblings and grandparents and caregivers too, who look after them closely, watch for their safety, help them get onto two legs and do dancing leg bends, facilitate their creeping along couches and tables, take them by two little hands for a few steps, then for longer and longer assisted perambulations, stand a step away with outstretched arms while the child takes her first step into a future of forays, and then keep watch along the way with encouraging sounds and occasional rescues from unforeseen obstacles. It's a process into which we are inducted into a habit of acting (walking) by people who love us and want to see us succeed. It would be impossible to do without imitating someone; we start crawling, perhaps, to get around a bit, but we wouldn't imagine getting onto two legs without knowing that other people do it, and we don't have the leg muscle strength to do it without the gradual strength built up by practice over time.

The same goes for speaking. Language is a gift that we receive from others. Language, like the other, preexists us. We receive it over time, being introduced gradually into the sounds that match the objects we desire, those things we need or want to satisfy our appetites and needs, or that we want to grasp for their sparkles, or that otherwise pique our curiosity. A child's first word is usually something truly basic: mama, dada, yes, no. We graduate to other necessities quickly: more, juice, up, remote, crême brûlée. We learn what to want by seeing it in others, we learn how to ask for it by other people teaching us how that goes.

"Whoever does not accept the reign of God like a child..." What I heard this meaning this time around, thanks to Alison's analogy about how Jesus is trying to teach us what faith is, is that we have to stop thinking that we can learn to be holy, good, clean, righteous, by following some kind of manual, whether divinely inspired or of our own device. Our idea of goodness is almost certainly idolatrous, some extension of our idea about what would be best for us and the human race, probably including the exercise of force to get others to agree to our ideas. God, and faith, isn't like that. What Jesus came to show us about faith is that God loves us, has always loved us, right in the mess and the misery that we make for each other, right in the midst of our violence and scapegoating, our fear and denial of death, and all the ways we have of trying to insulate ourselves from its reality. The ministry of Jesus, healing, reconciling, uniting, and the death he endured as a result, and the act of God raising him from the dead, are all a way of saying, "I'm not like what you imagined. I not only have seen how bad you can be, but I am here among you, I've experienced you at your worst in my own body, and I love you anyway." Look at me, says the God-parent, take baby steps my way, I'll catch you if you fall. Say "our Abba."

The gospel, the announcement of the reign of God, the evangelion of God's victory over death, is a call to listen to a parent trying to tell all of us at once to say, Mama, Papa, Abba, and to begin to allow a habit of loving imitation, without rancor, rivalry, or exclusion, of Jesus, because "whoever has seen me has seen the Father."

The idea of scandal, skandalon, a stumbling block, that entered the discourse last week and caused the litany of amputations, is the suggestion that bad example, offering a model for imitation that is not like God and therefore destructive of the human race, will result in catastrophe. In a brilliant homily last weekend given at her increasingly famous little Denver church, Rev. Nadia Bolz-Weber described accepting rescue by grace from our many addictions is indeed like having a part of us cut off. If you haven't seen that yet, you can read it online on the Patheos blog.

I think I'll leave it there. It's a simple insight, but I'm grateful for it, for the strange confluence of Alison's essay and the gospel for this weekend, and for the chance to share it with you.

What we're singing at St. Anne this weekend:

Entrance: I Have Loved You (Joncas), or Let the Children Come (Cooney, WLP)
Psalm 128: All the Days of Our Lives
Presentation of Gifts: New Families 
Communion: Covenant Hymn
Recessional: Lover of Us All (Schutte)

Frenemy love—beyond rivalry (B26O)

I am a Christian, and I believe that I need some diversity training.

Step inside my rivalrous heart for a few moments. This won't take long. Any of this sound familiar?

My meditation:
Who are these Catholics who think Pope Francis is a communist?
Why isn't the Catholic majority in Congress doing something about the death penalty, about guns, about war, about helping refugees and immigrants? Don't they have ears?
Why was I so relieved at the "retirement" of Pope Benedict? Why am I so angry about virtually everything about EWTN?
"Those idiots, those craven politicos, those religious fascists are teaching, healing, doing good works in your name. Stop them!"
Gospel response:
"Whoever is not against us is with us."

There is a marvelous chapter in Rachel Held Evans' endearing Searching for Sunday: Loving, Leaving, and Finding the Church in which she describes her ongoing struggle to reconcile herself with her roots in evangelical Christianity, having moved into a more diverse vision of Christianity, embracing the Episcopal tradition. She tells of working as a blogger to get the word out about the work that World Vision is doing for children around the world. Acutely sensitive in her religious heart to church prejudice against women and gay marriage, she rejoiced when, as reported in Wikipedia, "on March 24, 2014, the United States branch of World Vision announced that it would no longer bar employees from being in same-sex marriages." The rub came two days later, when "facing protests from donors and the larger evangelical community after the announcement, World Vision reversed the policy change…." It felt to her like "a punch in the gut," she reports, that "using needy kids as bargaining chips in the culture war had actually worked." (Kindle Locations 2929-2930). The chapter is entitled "Evangelical Acedia," that is, apathy or spiritual not-caring. She is at war with herself over her feelings, her (justifiable, in my opinion) outrage, and finds these actions of other Christians cause her to sink into deep spiritual depression and cynicism. She knows it's not a healthy path, because, she concludes, "We have to allow ourselves to feel the pain and joy and heartache of being in relationship with other human beings." Faith is a relationship with other people who are as crazy and fallible as we are. We have to embrace those differences, without allowing them to crush us or participate in ecclesial behaviors that offend our conscience, "even if it means taking a risk and losing it all." (ibid, Kindle Locations 2987-2988).

Turning the jewel of contemporary gospel wisdom a bit, I was also reminded as I reflected on this Sunday's gospel (and the first reading from Numbers) of a story in Nadia Bolz-Weber's Pastrix: The Cranky, Beautiful Faith of a Sinner & Saint, in which she speaks of encountering at a conference a Lutheran blogger who ridiculed her, calling her a heretic for being a female pastor, having gays in her church, etc. etc. He showed up at a talk she gave and introduced himself, which put her into a panic, evoking "fight or flight" mode, and causing her to say a prayer for deliverance. But, she said, they "proceeded to have a conversation about our need for God’s grace, forgiveness of sins and the Eucharist." He wept during their conversation. Twice. And they talk by phone every couple of months now. She still "can't stand the guy," she said, but the opportunity for reconciliation and the conversation itself "could only flow from the heart of a forgiving God."


One more story, this one from Malcolm Gladwell, in an article from New Yorker back in May of 2015. In discussing the tactics of the DEA and other covert operatives, Gladwell refers to a 1964 essay by Richard Hofstadter, that offers some insight into the process of demonization of the other, idealizing the enemy as a master of his craft, and then imitating him:

Hofstadter observes, “It is hard to resist the conclusion that this enemy is on many counts a projection of the self; both the ideal and the unacceptable aspects of the self are attributed to him,” and he goes on:

The Ku Klux Klan imitated Catholicism to the point of donning priestly vestments, developing an elaborate ritual and an equally elaborate hierarchy. The John Birch Society emulates Communist cells and quasi-secret operation through “front” groups, and preaches a ruthless prosecution of the ideological war along lines very similar to those it finds in the Communist enemy. Spokesmen of the various fundamentalist anti-Communist “crusades” openly express their admiration for the dedication and discipline the Communist cause calls forth.

The paranoid crusader is not disdainful of his enemy. He is in awe of him. Hofstadter quotes that staunchest of cold warriors, Barry Goldwater: “I would suggest that we analyze and copy the strategy of the enemy; theirs has worked and ours has not.” 

People we disagree with aren't always our enemies, of course. The prophesying elders in Leviticus and those outside Jesus's immediate circle who were preaching and healing in his name were, from all we can tell, doing good. And yet, for those on the inside, like Miriam and Aaron, like the Twelve, the represented a challenge to their status as insiders, as people close to the heart of some kind of real, experienced "power," and therefore they present as rivals. Our instinct is to circle the wagons and bring out the guns.

But as Gladwell sees in the activities of black ops in the government, what we generally are doing in situations like this is fashioning projections of ourselves. We want the same power, recognition, freedom to act that our rivals have shown that they have. And here's the thing: they must want that because we have it, and there's not enough for all of us. Therefore, "Tell them to stop!" That counterfeit of light inside of us that wants to win, that wants to have the power, that wants to be known as the friends of the powerful god-who-is-really-an-idol, we project that upon the other, and make the announcement that God must put an end to their falsehood.

But the thing is, there is no rivalry in God. God works in all kinds of ways, through all kinds of means and people, and in ways that are unfathomable to us, completely unbound by our categories, expectations, or even by death. So Moses is able to say, "If only all people were prophets!" And Jesus is able to say, "Whoever is not against us is with us."

I'm only too willing to project my own vile pettiness onto, say, Pope Francis's detractors, or people who disrespect the "Nuns on a Bus" movement and the LCRW, or Marco Rubio, Ted Cruz, John Boehner, or any of the Catholic Supreme Court justices who gave us the Citizens United ruling. What I need to do about that is not participate, I think, in the ad hominem attacks, not use the name calling and trolling tactics that I despise, and acknowledge the possibility that in a pluralistic world and a pluralistic church it's quite possible for us to come to different conclusions about the same data. I need to remember the political differences around the table of Jesus, where the zealot and the collaborator both found a place, and who both became saints.

Mostly, I want to be grateful for people like Nadia Bolz-Weber, Richard Rohr, Brian McLaren, Rachel Held Evans and even Pope Francis who bravely work inside and outside of their traditions and continue to tell the truth even when other Christians who ought to take their side try to break their hearts and spirits with words of derision and attempts to marginalize them as irrelevant. That isn't my particular sin, because I agree with them. What I need to do is to try to act on what I believe, and not try to deride or marginalize others within the Christian fold who want to pray in Latin, or champion a celibate male priesthood, or demonstrate against gay marriage. By acting on my faith, speaking my truth without rancor, advocating for diversity with love, I will promote what the gospel of Jesus by my life, by persuasion, example, and enthusiasm and not by tactics that imitate those of my "enemies." That's what God does for me; shows me that, in spite of how I feel and how I act, I am not a rival or an enemy but a beloved if recalcitrant child, just like every other person who ever is, was, or will be. How did God do this? By coming into my world and teaching me to love my enemies, even my "frenemies," by saying, "whoever is not against us is with us."

It's not easy to opt out of rivalry in such a competitive society. But to "be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect" means trying to do just that, to recognize, with the servant Christ, that there's nowhere worth going but down.

What we're singing Sunday:

Entrance: A Place at the Table (True)
Psalm 19 Your Words, O God (Cooney, OCP)
Presentation of Gifts: In Christ There Is No East or West (MCKEE, arr. Cooney)
Communion: We Are Many Parts (Haugen)
Recessional: Send Down the Fire (Haugen)

Letting our light shine--St. Anne's Hope Ministries

In my last post, about the Crop Hunger Walk next month, I mentioned that for the first time our music ministry team of walkers and fundraisers is partnering with Hope Ministries and House of Hope, our parish's cluster of social outreach ministries and its shining light, the resale shop. I wanted to introduce you to the woman who is coordinating all those efforts, Marie Jochum, who came to us in 2014 from Catholic Charities Refugee Program in Chicago. There are, quite literally, hundreds of volunteers who work year round in St. Anne's many outreach ministries, and Marie came onto the scene after the death of Sr. Lorraine Menheer, SSSF, the beloved founder of House of Hope and the woman who had dreamed and built "Annie's Attic," a parish-wide garage sale that benefitted the poor, and that over a two week period collected, sorted, and sold donated items that covered every square inch of the campus, raising money for their work, making really good used items available for resale at excellent prices, and filling trucks with the unsold items for the warehouse and donation to other Chicago charities. It was a sight to behold.

Over the last year three new hires (excluding the parish school) have, as they do not tire of reminding

us geezers, brought the average age of the parish staff down a couple of decades. With assistant faith formation director Jeffrey Joseph and pastoral associate Michael Beard, Marie brings a new generations vision of the gospel to our parish life. I asked her a few questions about her life, and I'd like to share a bit of her response with you so you can see the reason we are so excited to be working with her, to have her in the parish. Then, I'd like to share with you the brief talk she gave at the 2015 appreciation dinner for the House of Hope volunteers, which filled the dining room at our local Pinstripes last month. It will give you a glimpse of the scope of what Hope Ministries is doing in the parish for the Barrington area. For me, it's a moment of doing what Jesus asked us to do in the Sermon on the Mount, letting the community's "light shine for all the world to see, so that others may see the good you do, and give praise to your Father in heaven."

Me: Marie, can you tell me a little bit about your background, how you got interested in social work, and what led you to St. Anne?

MJ: I went to college at Catholic University of America in (Washington) DC. I have a Masters in Social work from DePaul. I wanted to be a sociologist (among other things…I also wanted to be a princess named Princess Dream for awhile too). I was interested, still am, in war and the movements of people in response to war and genocide. In high school (Loyola Academy) and in college I did a lot of volunteering (Catholic Worker House, immigrant rights group, Guatemala, etc.) and those experiences led me to be more interested in the lived, daily experiences of people beyond just studying them.

Me: What work did you do with Catholic Charities Refugee Program before you came to St. Anne?

MJ: I’ve worked primarily with refuges and immigrants. I loved that work and still do. I’ve done lots of different types of social work with this population. I am really interested in how a community can respond in better and bigger ways to the needs of our neighbors…meaning program expansion and development.

Me: This is the thing, isn't it? I've always felt that it was important for any church to open up pathways for people to exercise their calling to work for the gospel. People really seem to want to help, but often don't see any clear access to various ways to work for social justice. I know that when Sr. Lorraine and others began the food pantry in Carpentersville, it was an opportunity for my family to begin work together, and after all these years I still love doing that.

MJ: Yes, we are creating space for all of us to serve in the ways we are best equipped to do and allowing opportunities for engagement so that we can learn from the marginalized in our communities. 

Me: Can you tell us about any "conversion moments," times in your life when you knew that this was the kind of work you wanted to do?

MJ: A conversion moment, I have them twelve times a day and usually they are more like me being dragged kicking and screaming by the Holy Spirit (hello! …that’s how I ended up in Barrington). I am not sure I can pinpoint one moment; more a series of moments that led me to believing that Jesus wasn’t joking about serving our brothers and sisters. I love Matthew 25. Not the judgment part in terms of me being included or the idea that I could deserve somehow to be included in the group on the right…I’ve a far way to go for that. More like when he says that whatever you did for the least you did for me, and what you didn’t do, you didn’t do for me. To me this isn’t something sweet, this is real. If I claim to be a lover of God, then how can I not serve God? 

To me serving means the dirty work. It’s more in the ugly, hard moments that I learn about God’s love than in sweet songs (uh, no offense...) or platitudes. It's in the interactions I have had with the refugee, the homeless mother, the substance user, the angry drunk, the abuser, the undocumented, the mentally ill, that I have met God. That for me the incarnation is made real. That God came to us as Jesus and that it mattered. It should change the way we deal with the “other.' 

All of this is hard though, I can’t say that I am  “good” at it or that I always do it lovingly…thus the dragging, kicking and screaming of conversion. Especially as this intersects with my professional role as a social worker and setting boundaries and discerning what is best for a client and for an organization (or ministry as it is here). I just know that my own personal brokenness has been responded to with such love and grace by God and by God made manifest in my tribe of people. My hope is that as a ministry we do this for others, and I think we do, we provide hope and more importantly we tell people that they matter,that their life is valuable and that they are loved by a God that’s bigger than any brokeness or any of the shit life throws at them. 

Me: OK, and to follow up with hipper interview questions–favorite color? 

MJ: Yellow

Me: Celebrity crush?

MJ: Gary Daigle.

Me: If you only knew how many times I've heard that! Any last thoughts?

MJ: Well, yes...I also I blame my mother for tipping my life toward this work. We had "solidarity with the poor" nights….she would make a very simple meal (rice and beans) and we would talk about how better to serve the poor in our communities. Yup. Mama Jokes. 

Maybe, friends, you can begin to understand why I look forward to having Marie on staff with us at St. Anne for many years to come. It's hard not to catch her fire for her work even while being a little intimidated by she exposes how much closer we really are to tremendous suffering than maybe we had imagined. But there is hope in the solidarity of a community that faces that suffering together. That's what I hope to catch. Hope.

Now, as promised, this is the text of Marie's talk to the House of Hope volunteers at the 2015 appreciation dinner from last month. Even I, who work at St. Anne and know a lot of these people as my friends and neighbors for over twenty years, was amazed at what they are able to do in the community on behalf of the poor. I leave you with Marie's words:

______________

Tonight we celebrate you. You the volunteer who works long hours in House of Hope, sorting

through bags of clothing, moving furniture, working with a family as they move from despair to hope. This year brought our ministry many changes and joy.

This year, we were called to serve in increasingly bigger and bolder ways. You responded to this call the way you do all things…with joy and hard work.

This year we fed 6,200 people. 6,200 of our neighbors in need who came to us for help in keeping their families fed and healthy. Even more than food you offered hope.

We worked with 1700 households in our community that were in need of rental assistance, help with prescription medication, school supplies for their children. You kept lights on and homes heated. You repaired cars. You kept people employed and self sufficient. But even more than that you offered hope.

You gave out $170,000 in grants to 14 local organizations that feed, house, and counsel those in need; extending our reach in the community further than the Project Hope walls. But even more than that You offered hope to our community.

In order to do all of this you worked long, hours in the food pantry, Project Hope office, on the grant committee, on the Board of Advisors and at House of Hope.

House of Hope: This year we had another record breaking year. You just can’t stop yourselves……For the first time in our history, House of Hope brought in over one million dollars in revenue. One million dollars to serve God’s people. Thank you. Thank you. Our clients thank you, our community thanks you, I thank you.

A special thanks goes out to our (donations truck driver) Jim. I literally begged him to come. We all did. So perhaps we can show our gratitude to Jim even with him not being here.

From polishing silver, to keeping our pantry stocked, answering phones, sorting and pricing shoes, linens, clothing, household goods, sporting equipment, stationery, the welcoming of customers & Clients alike …. All of these moments you are offering grace and mercy. You offer this mercy to each other, to our clients, our customers

One of the many things I am continually impressed with is the way that we minister and are ministered to by one another. This is a community of friends, neighbors, and family. Nowhere was this more apparent then in the passing of our dear friend and manager Caryn. Many of you walked with her in her final weeks, visiting, praying, and supporting Jim and Peggy as they cared for Caryn right up to the end. It was beautiful to see this community come together to support one another.

Caryn remained deeply committed to Hope Ministries to the end of her life. She shared with our ministry some of the financial gifts of her life for which we are extremely grateful. As you know, One of the things Caryn was most passionate about was serving families who faced a housing crisis such as a fire, flooding, or transitioning out of homelessness. She loved putting together the things that turn a house into a home. We will specifically be using these funds from Caryn to serve families in a housing crisis. Continuing to pass on the gift of mercy and love that Caryn was to all of us.

The book of notes and memories you shared with Caryn near the end of her life was full of stories of hope. Stories that demonstrate the many ways you are a community of the faithful. Faithful real people.

Some days the thought of yet another bin of clothing might be enough to put you over the edge. Or hearing of yet another tale of substance abuse or family disintegration may be enough to hang up your Project Hope hat. Sister Lorraine’s vision of working together to serve the poor is a hard one. She did not intend that this work was to be done by one person. Her vision was and our vision remains to do this work together, as a community….a community of the faithful who are real people. This life of service within a community challenges us to be together in the tough parts of life and the hard parts of serving. The tough conversations, the tough decisions-it is not easy to do this work.

And yet You demonstrate, that it’s worth it. The call of the faithful is answered daily by each of you, to serve, to love in the hard times and through the hard moments.. As a community You demonstrate an openness to learn, to grow, and to think in new ways about old problems. You are a group of people open to God’s call. Open to listening to the Holy Spirit as lived in our real lives. In the smelly, ugly bits, just as much as in the times of rejoicing.

As we continue to grow in all parts of our ministry, change is inevitable. We know Peggy will be retiring as our General manager next June. She and I along with the Board of Advisors and ministry leaders have been working closely to ensure our long term sustainability, I am confident in all of you to continue to do the work of serving the poor because this call was not reserved for Sr. Lorraine, for Peggy, for Diane, for Jim. This call is all of ours. Those of us in this room and the many others we invite to join us. As we continue to evolve, I want to share my awe for each of you as you serve God’s people with love and mercy. Your brave, generous, open, and humble response to the call to serve is an inspiration. I can’t wait to see what next year brings us.

So while I am in awe of the money we’ve made, the people we’ve fed, the grants we’ve given and I am certain we have the best "upscale" resale shop in the state….I am convincd that what we do best is this; being in community with one another. Ministrering to each other, offering hope to our community, and growing in faith together. 

 This is who you are, this is who we are.

Plant peace, harvest justice - Crop Hunger Walk 2015

In one month, on October 18, 2015, our village churches (and others) will take part in the Barrington Area CROP Hunger Walk. For many years now (I've lost count!) music ministry and I have raised money by walking the 10K route with dozens of other citizens. Church World Services, sponsor of the Crop Hunger Walk movement around the country, has its headquarters in West Chicago, and is rated and listed by Charity Navigator with a 3-star (of four) rating, funneling 86¢ of every dollar raised directly to those whom it serves. In 2014, over 65% of its funds went directly to refugee settlement and assistance.

The autumn walk in Barrington is generally delightful, with the trees offering a brightly-lit course through the village for participants. On those rare occasions where we experience a rain-out (many of us will walk on a drizzly day, but for some it's dangerous for health and walking), we'll walk the course another day when the sun is out. The entire route is 10K (about six miles) through and around the village, and there is a "golden mile" for those unable to the entire route. This year, we start at SALEM UNITED METHODIST CHURCH on Lincoln, west of Hough Street (Rte. 59), with check-in beginning at 12:30 and the walk beginning at 1:00 p.m.

Sara Miles runs The Food Pantry, a ministry of 

St. Gregory of Nyssa Episcopal Church in San Francisco. 

She is the author of the book Jesus Freak: Feeding, Healing, Raising the Dead. 

Every Friday more than 500 people line up for the free food the pantry serves. 

You can join us in fighting hunger by walking with us and raising funds for the team (follow link, click "join team"), or just by making a donation (follow link, click "donate now.") To our Barrington friends especially: not only does CROP Hunger Walk help relieve the suffering of the hungry in other places around our nation and the world: every year, for the last several years, some of the money raised has come back to Barrington, in fact, right to our own food pantry at St. Anne. So we are making a difference everywhere, including our own back yard.

I'm going to write more next week on this blog about what St. Anne's House of Hope is doing in and around Barrington. For now, let me just say that just in the ministry of feeding the hungry, the parish runs a food pantry on the premises that is open five days a week, and another monthly pantry at the Public Works building in Carpentersville with the Northern Illinois Food Bank that gives groceries to nearly a hundred families, and we're looking to start this on a second day every month. I'm proud of what my fellow parishioners are doing for the love of Christ and the gospel to make this happen. It is the goal of our liturgical and music ministry to inspire this kind of living in one another, so that by receiving the bread of life on Sunday, we can feed others with the bread that is our own lives the other six days of the week. Over and over, like your church too, I'm sure, this is what happens.

Marie Jochum, the wonderful and energetic director of Hope Ministries, has continued and begun to expand on the rich legacy of Sr. Lorraine Menheer, SSSF, who began House of Hope in the parish many years ago and who passed away in 2010. Her legacy lives on in the life of the parish in the consciousness and work of St. Anne on behalf of the poor in our area and in ministries in Latin America and Africa. Sister Lorraine inspired me, many years ago, to get involved with Crop Hunger Walk and in our food pantry, and it has been something I have loved to do with her and now in her memory, with our wonderful community.

So, please, if you are able, join our team and/or make a donation. And I'll see you on October 18 at Salem! Beloved child of God, let gratitude fill your heart, and say "me too!" to what this realtor's sign said, which I snapped along the route of Crop Hunger Walk last year:

It was a sign from God (and ReMax) along the 2014 route.

Sometimes, the word alone (B25O)

Where do the wars
and where do the conflicts among you come from?
Is it not from your passions
that make war within your members?
You covet but do not possess.
You kill and envy but you cannot obtain;
you fight and wage war.  (Jas. 4: 1-2a)

Taking a child, he placed it in the their midst,
and putting his arms around it, he said to them,
“Whoever receives one child such as this in my name, receives me;
and whoever receives me,
receives not me but the One who sent me.” (Mk 9:36-37)

Donate to UNICEF

or

Donate to Catholic Relief Services

or

Donate to Medical Teams International

All of these charities use more than 90¢ of every dollar to actually help those in need.

When peacemakers plant seeds of peace, they will harvest justice. (James 3:18, CEV, the last words of the 2nd reading for Sunday)

Set list MMA 2015 Benefit Concert at St. Edna's

What a wonderful time we all had last night singing and playing music with the wonderful community gathered at St. Edna's. Gary Daigle and his team of wonderful and hospitable collaborators made it a day to remember from the on-site meals for us artistes with our incessant demands for Perrier at 42° and blue M&Ms to the well-rehearsed choir and general set-up. It was clearly a lot of work, but done with such transparent efficiency and apparent grace that we were just caught up in the joy and faith of the community. Thanks to Lisa, Lara, Diane, Lorie, and the entire St. Edna team.

So this was the playlist from the concert last night, and as many iTunes versions as I could find.

Remember that all this was in service of Music Ministry Alive, which I've written about before. It is David Haas's and Lori True's summertime "camp" at St. Catherine University in St. Paul for high school and young college age liturgical musicians. You can read more about it here and here, and see more on their website. Last year's setlist is here, so you can see that we didn't completely do a rerun—certainly the happy addition of Lori True to the list of performers brought another dimension of passionate, pastoral song to our gathering.

Our concert was, obviously, on the 14th anniversary of the 9/11 tragedy, and in the shadow of the refugee crisis in Europe (and, as Mike Joncas pointed out, here at home along our southern border.) Lori's song "Who Is the Alien?" and Michael's "A Place Called Home," a new text for the beautiful "Finlandia" melody of Jean Sibelius, gave us opportunity for prayer and reflection on those realities, and Marty's new song for the Year of Mercy, "Be Merciful," was also a reminder to imitate God in our treatment of one another.

Set list:
All seven of us together:
A Place at the Table (True)
Joyfully Singing (Balhoff, Daigle, Ducote)

Local contingent
I Am for You (Cooney)
Psalm 23 (Daigle)
Too Many Walls - Theresa Donohoo
Trumpet in the Morning (Cooney)
In the Bleak Midwinter (Holst/Rosetti, Cooney)
Covenant Hymn (Daigle, Cooney)

All seven of us:
Canticle of the Turning (Cooney)
We Come to Your Feast (Joncas)

Visiting Team:
I Have Loved You (Joncas)
You Are Mine (Haas)
Within the Reign of God (Haugen)
Light a Candle (True)
I Will Live On - David Haas
Shepherd Me, O God (Haugen)
A Place Called Home (Joncas)
Who Is the Alien? (True)
Be Merciful (Haugen)
Watch, O Lord (Haugen)

All seven of us:
Blest Are They (Haas)
On Eagle's Wings (Joncas)
Encore: We Are Called (Haas)

MMA alumna Olivia Guntin from St. Anne sang with Terry on "In the Bleak Midwinter," and also performed the first verse of "Blest Are They" with the seven of us.

Here are the songs on iTunes - the two that wouldn't fit are linked above.