The Last Sunday after the Epiphany

1 Kings, 19:9-18
2 Peter, 1:16-21
Mark, 9:2-9

In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.

When I first arrived at seminary, one of my responsibilities was to serve at the Sunday mass of a small church down the road. S. Alban's is a homey, rather plain modern church, hardly noticeable among blocks of humble row houses. Most of the people in the area attended the lovely and grand SS. Mary and John, a few blocks away. S. Alban's did not have the benefit of having the same priest every Sunday. On my first Sunday, I was surprised to find that the distinguished Lady Margaret Professor of Theology, Rowan Williams, was the celebrant. Indeed, he celebrated the mass there every third Sunday because he and his family found so much life, love, and sustenance in that congregation. I suspect that most people would have found his beautifully carved canon's stall at the Christ Church Cathedral with the pleasant tones of a world class collegiate boy choir more attractive. I attended some of his lectures and was in his modern doctrine seminar before the Diocese of Monmouth in southern Wales elected him to be their bishop, and he accepted! One of my tutors wondered, "I don't know why Rowan's going off there. It's a bit of a dead end. If he'd wait a year or two, they'd give him Durham." In the eyes of most people, the ivory towers of Durham are far more attractive than the bleak, grimy industrial and mining valleys of Wales. I am glad that the new Archbishop of Canterbury does not see as most people see.

I take pleasure, and encouragement, that last Thursday, the feast of George Herbert, the great 17^th century priest and poet, Rowan Williams was enthroned as the 104^th Archbishop of Canterbury. In his sermon, Archbishop Williams spoke of the transfiguring power of Christ in our lives.

We only become completely human when we allow God to remake us. Like the conservationist in the art gallery, God works patiently to remove the grime, the oil and dust of ages, and to let us appear - as we say - in our true colours. Wonderful, yes; but it means also that God will lay bare all the ways we hide from him and each other, all the sad and compromised and cowardly things we do to stop ourselves from being human. ⁽¹⁾

My impressions of a dozen years ago were not only of his brilliance, which everyone agrees upon, but of his refined, mature reflection, his spiritual depth, his sincerity, his humane passion: God improves our humanity. Now you may, or may not, agree with him about everything, and a sign of his strength of character is that he appears to be grateful for that. He says,

Living in Jesus' company, I have to live in a community that is more than just the gathering of those who happen to agree with me, because I need also to be surprised and challenged by the Jesus each of you will have experienced. As long as we can still identify the same Jesus in each other's life, we have something to share and to learn. ⁽²⁾

Archbishop Williams reminds us that every human face, those we like and love, and those we dislike and find unattractive, that every human we encounter shows us something of Christ, something of the divine, something that calls for our love. That is the incarnation; that is the mass; that is the heart of our religion.

Where will this new Archbishop try to lead the Anglican Communion? He said,

The Church of the future, I believe, will do both its prophetic and its pastoral work effectively only if it is concerned first with gratitude and joy; orthodoxy flows from this, not the other way around, and we don't solve our problems just by better discipline but by better discipleship, a fuller entry into the intimate joy of Jesus' life. ⁽³⁾

That is the right direction, and certainly the direction of this parish, toward the intimate joy of Jesus' life. Orthodoxy means 'right glory' or 'right worship' more than it means 'right belief.' 'Right glory,' 'right belief' comes from gratitude and joy. We have had a lot of joy and gratitude here in the last year. It is transfiguring each of us, and it is transfiguring this parish so that it shines more brightly with the glory of God, and I thank you for that.

One of the ways we can see this change is our stewardship. I am going to speak frankly about money for a moment, and there is no reason to squirm. Money is not bad, it's not dirty - what we do with it may be bad, but it is not bad in itself. What we do with money is sacramental. What we do with money shows us what is important to us. Jesus said, "Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also." (Mt 6:21) The heart of this parish is moving toward our Lord. I am grateful to you for that. For we appear to understand that relying upon, or dreaming of, sugar daddies and sugar mommies is not the solution, that nothing could be worse for our spiritual health. Congregations must accept responsibility for themselves. Congregations living simply on their endowments often lose their fervor for the gospel. We are fortunate to have a small endowment, but even if we had an endowment that could meet all of our expenses, and we are far, far from that - it's not in our future, but even if we did, we as individuals would need to be generous because proportional giving, the discipline of generosity, is part of a healthy spiritual life. We do not give to a budget; we give to God. We return a portion of what he has given us.

I am really proud of the way we have increased our giving. We all should be. Last year we had about $215,000 in pledges. This year, it's over $270,000. That's a rise of more than 25%. That is a sign of health, a sign of real change, and that should continue to grow. We should continue to grow in our giving in the coming years, but we need to increase the number of pledgers, which has remained level. Our goal for this year is to increase the number of pledgers by ten percent, and all of us bear responsibility for attaining that goal. We have to be better evangelists. That is our biggest challenge.

At the annual meeting, you will receive an analysis of last year's budget. Last year, we stretched ourselves. We hired a full-time parish administrator. We could not really afford the new position, and we ended the year a little in the red. But we need to challenge ourselves. We need to stretch our budget; and that is another way of saying we need to stretch ourselves. We needed good staff in the parish, and we've got it. Challenges are essential for growth, both for our individual growth, and for the growth of the parish. I worry less about money here now than I ever have, and that's because I'm learning about the generosity of our people. I'm learning to trust the parish's ability - through the grace of God - to meet challenges.

As I look back over the last year, there are many other things for which I am grateful. We have had some excellent fellowship events and new opportunities for worship. We have new people in the parish, and they bring vitality and devotion and interest which greatly encourages me. We are starting to do things in new ways to promote inclusion, and we'll talk more about that after mass at the annual meeting. There is always need for change.

That is one of the lessons of today's gospel. S. Peter wants to build tabernacles, tents, for Jesus, Moses, and Elijah, so that he can hang on to the high of being with them, but Jesus does not allow it. Peter has to move beyond this mountain top experience. The glory on the mountain top he has to take out into the world. For me, and for most of us, mass here is a mountain top experience, but we do not live here. We are strengthened and fed and experience God's glory here, and then we go back into the world to do Jesus' work.

We have to keep in mind what our purpose is, what God want us to do. Every Christian has the duty to proclaim the gospel, to make known God's love for all people. We can't shrink from speaking honestly about Christ, and what he means to us. We do not come to church here to perpetuate the past or to maintain an institution. We come to church here because we have met Christ here, and through this parish he is transfiguring us, he is changing our lives, and now we want to help Christ to make a difference in the rest of the world.

We have some tremendous strengths in this parish, and our Lord wants us to share what he's given us. There are thousands of people outside our doors who would appreciate our worship, whose lives would be changed by their experience of Christ here. Our preference for formal, refined, catholic worship does not make us different from other people. Sure, high mass is not everyone's cup of tea, but there are thousands of people in our area who want what God has given us, and we can't keep it a secret.

The real challenge of this parish, the challenge of every one of us, the challenge that God has given us, is to become better about sharing the good news that God loves and gives life to all who seek it. We know the power of God, how he changes lives, and we have to let other people know. Christ is beginning to transform us so that we shall meet the challenge, and that is exciting.

In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.

1. Rowan Williams, Enthronement Sermon, Canterbury Cathedral, 27 February 2003.

2. Ibid.

3. Ibid.