Aug 04, 2022 |
Rector's Blog, A Tale of Two Churches
| The Rev. Philip DeVaul
Rector's Blog, A Tale of Two Churches
It’s a tale of two churches.
One is grieving. The church they knew and loved is gone. The building is there, as beautiful as it has ever been, and many of the people are still engaged, and relationships of deep connection, prayer and support have stood the test of the pandemic. But whenever they worship, they are reminded of just how different things are. Sometimes they are required to wear masks when they gather. For months they were not allowed to sing. This is after over a year of not being able to worship in their beloved space at all – having to watch it on a screen in their family room or, if the weather was allowing, maybe worshiping outside in a park. They’ve shown back up, but many of their friends haven’t. Some of their beloved pewmates have died. Others haven’t shown back up yet, out of caution, or because their priorities have shifted, or because they simply haven’t gotten back into the habit. Still others have found watching worship online in their pajamas a comfort rather than a letdown – especially since the church chose to change the time or location – or both – of their preferred service.
It’s not like it used to be – and that’s not just stodgy grumbling. It was something special, this church as they knew it. It was growing and thriving and joyful, and without any kind of warning the doors were closed. When they were all scared, confused, lonely, one of the main ways they knew how to find strength, direction, and connection was gone. Yes, there were digital offerings, and remote Bible studies, and neighborhood groups checking in and creative ways to be church. It was admirable and loving. But it didn’t change the fact that they never got the chance to say goodbye to what was – not really. And now the doors are open and it’s not the same and they are grieving.
Jul 29, 2022 |
Rector's Blog, Will The Church Survive?
| The Rev. Philip DeVaul
Rector's Blog, Will The Church Survive?
I’m not trying to sidestep the issue of declining church attendance. Christians have a lot to reflect on as fewer and fewer people see our presence in the world as particularly positive or meaningful. We should not shy away from this conversation. Nor do I want to minimize the feelings of grief and anxiety many of us have as our experience of church shifts. We don’t need to act like we’re too cool to feel feelings, too smart to worry. We’re humans. And we’re humans who are living through a time of protracted radical culture change. Amidst the uncertainty and trauma, it would be odd if we were not expressing some fear and worry.
We should not hide from all this. But we also should not pretend it’s the whole story of the church. And we should not pretend that the impending death of church as we know it is equivalent to the death of Christ’s work in the world. Jesus himself called the church into being, gathering those who believed in him into a community for the purpose of practicing unconditional love in God’s name. The world’s need to be united in Love is not dying.
Jul 22, 2022 |
Rector's Blog Throwback Series, Angry and Beautiful
| The Rev. Philip DeVaul
Rector's Blog Throwback Series, Angry and Beautiful
Editor's note:
As part of our When Love Shows Up Throwback Series we are re-posting this blog
post which was originally posted on March 18, 2022.
Six months later I found out my parents were getting a divorce. My mom came into my room and, with an unusually delicate gravity, said we needed to talk. “Did someone die?” I asked. “No,” she said. I followed that immediately with, “Are you and Dad getting a divorce?” “Yes.” She was sort of surprised and relieved that I said it before she had to. I was grateful for her bluntness. But the thing I remember the most about that moment was that I had guessed it. You know what that means? It means I knew it was coming. It means that even though I wanted to be a perfect kid with a perfect family and a perfect life, not too far under the surface I knew things were a mess. My parents weren’t separated. They had never mentioned splitting up in front of me. We were all trying so hard to be ok and to seem ok. We weren’t. None of us were. I had no idea how to admit that, much less articulate it. I couldn’t ask for help because I didn’t even know I needed help.
We might think we grow out of this, that I’m just describing adolescence, but I wonder if that’s true. Do we really grow out of not admitting we’re not ok? Do we really grow out of not knowing we need help? The most significant growth and maturity I have experienced has not come simply with age – it’s come through practice and intention. So if we do not practice the ownership of our broken feelings, how do we think we will ever actually get good at being honest with ourselves? If we only practice putting on the best face possible and moving forward as if things are ok, aren’t we just getting better and better at denial?
Nirvana’s music, that grunge, that angry beautiful wall of sound, tapped into the part of me that was not ok and gave me something I couldn’t even ask for: It made it ok for me not to be ok. It made anger beautiful. It gave melody to my fears. We’re all so afraid of being alone. They made me less alone.
Six months later I found out my parents were getting a divorce. My mom came into my room and, with an unusually delicate gravity, said we needed to talk. “Did someone die?” I asked. “No,” she said. I followed that immediately with, “Are you and Dad getting a divorce?” “Yes.” She was sort of surprised and relieved that I said it before she had to. I was grateful for her bluntness. But the thing I remember the most about that moment was that I had guessed it. You know what that means? It means I knew it was coming. It means that even though I wanted to be a perfect kid with a perfect family and a perfect life, not too far under the surface I knew things were a mess. My parents weren’t separated. They had never mentioned splitting up in front of me. We were all trying so hard to be ok and to seem ok. We weren’t. None of us were. I had no idea how to admit that, much less articulate it. I couldn’t ask for help because I didn’t even know I needed help.
We might think we grow out of this, that I’m just describing adolescence, but I wonder if that’s true. Do we really grow out of not admitting we’re not ok? Do we really grow out of not knowing we need help? The most significant growth and maturity I have experienced has not come simply with age – it’s come through practice and intention. So if we do not practice the ownership of our broken feelings, how do we think we will ever actually get good at being honest with ourselves? If we only practice putting on the best face possible and moving forward as if things are ok, aren’t we just getting better and better at denial?
Nirvana’s music, that grunge, that angry beautiful wall of sound, tapped into the part of me that was not ok and gave me something I couldn’t even ask for: It made it ok for me not to be ok. It made anger beautiful. It gave melody to my fears. We’re all so afraid of being alone. They made me less alone.
Jul 15, 2022 |
Rector's Blog Throwback Series, A Need for Hope
| The Rev. Philip DeVaul
Rector's Blog Throwback Series, A Need for Hope
Editor's note: As part of our
When Love Shows Up Throwback Series we are re-posting this blog post which was
originally posted on September 30 2021.
"I could not see past my own life, my own comfort. And there were a lot of things happening around me that I chose not to see. The word “privilege” is another word that is politically loaded right now, but it is a fitting description of me: I was allowed to not pay attention to people’s lives that were worse than mine. I was able to focus on what was working for me and could filter out the pain and strife of others...
I’m paying attention now. To the degree that I can. I bet you are too. The need for hope is so obvious to everyone I meet, and I’m sure that includes you.
Hope doesn’t thrive well in privilege. Hope requires acknowledgement of need. Hope is born in the midst of sorrow and strife. Hope is the purple sky that accompanies the sunrise and is so beautiful because it signals the end of the sleepless night."
"I could not see past my own life, my own comfort. And there were a lot of things happening around me that I chose not to see. The word “privilege” is another word that is politically loaded right now, but it is a fitting description of me: I was allowed to not pay attention to people’s lives that were worse than mine. I was able to focus on what was working for me and could filter out the pain and strife of others...
I’m paying attention now. To the degree that I can. I bet you are too. The need for hope is so obvious to everyone I meet, and I’m sure that includes you.
Hope doesn’t thrive well in privilege. Hope requires acknowledgement of need. Hope is born in the midst of sorrow and strife. Hope is the purple sky that accompanies the sunrise and is so beautiful because it signals the end of the sleepless night."
Jul 08, 2022 |
Rector's Blog Throwback Series: Hoping for Peace
| The Rev. Philip DeVaul
Rector's Blog Throwback Series: Hoping for Peace
Editor's note: As part of our When Love Shows Up
Throwback Series we are re-posting this blog post which was originally posted
on December 1, 2021.
"Christians often refer to Jesus as the Prince of Peace. Paul simply calls Jesus himself Peace - the way John calls God Love. And yet Jesus rarely makes people like us comfortable or unbothered. Jesus doesn’t strive to create a happy and content middle, but heads to the margins of our lives and communities in order to reveal God’s presence and blessing in the places most unlike us.
“Blessed are the peacemakers,” Jesus declares, and then lives the rest of his life as an exclamation point to that declaration. Jesus makes peace, and he doesn’t do it by creating false binaries or forcing others into his way of seeing things. Jesus shows up. Jesus makes himself present. Jesus listens. Jesus recognizes faith and beauty and holiness and humanity in lives that look nothing like his own."
"Christians often refer to Jesus as the Prince of Peace. Paul simply calls Jesus himself Peace - the way John calls God Love. And yet Jesus rarely makes people like us comfortable or unbothered. Jesus doesn’t strive to create a happy and content middle, but heads to the margins of our lives and communities in order to reveal God’s presence and blessing in the places most unlike us.
“Blessed are the peacemakers,” Jesus declares, and then lives the rest of his life as an exclamation point to that declaration. Jesus makes peace, and he doesn’t do it by creating false binaries or forcing others into his way of seeing things. Jesus shows up. Jesus makes himself present. Jesus listens. Jesus recognizes faith and beauty and holiness and humanity in lives that look nothing like his own."
Jul 01, 2022 |
Rector's Blog Throwback Series: We Don't Talk About Abortion
| The Rev. Philip DeVaul
Rector's Blog Throwback Series: We Don't Talk About Abortion
Editor's note: As part of our When Love Shows Up Throwback Series we are re-posting this blog post which was originally posted on May 20, 2022.
The prevailing narrative in our country is that Christianity and abortion rights are incompatible with each other. This narrative exists despite the fact that, outside of White evangelical protestants, the majority of Christians in America support a person’s right to terminate a pregnancy. This also despite the fact that the majority of people who terminate a pregnancy identify as Christian. But the narrative persists that Christians oppose abortion. And it persists so strongly that many Christians who believe in reproductive rights end up thinking that their beliefs are inherently at odds with their religion – even when they are not. And there’s a reason this false narrative continues.
We don’t talk about abortion.
We Christians who support reproductive rights are mostly silent. We may not be silent individually. Some of us may work at Planned Parenthood. Some of us may vote for candidates and resolutions in favor of reproductive rights. Some of us may attend rallies. But as Christian communities, we are mostly silent. Some of us may stand up and speak out for abortion rights, but we don’t do it in Jesus’ name.
And we should.
The prevailing narrative in our country is that Christianity and abortion rights are incompatible with each other. This narrative exists despite the fact that, outside of White evangelical protestants, the majority of Christians in America support a person’s right to terminate a pregnancy. This also despite the fact that the majority of people who terminate a pregnancy identify as Christian. But the narrative persists that Christians oppose abortion. And it persists so strongly that many Christians who believe in reproductive rights end up thinking that their beliefs are inherently at odds with their religion – even when they are not. And there’s a reason this false narrative continues.
We don’t talk about abortion.
We Christians who support reproductive rights are mostly silent. We may not be silent individually. Some of us may work at Planned Parenthood. Some of us may vote for candidates and resolutions in favor of reproductive rights. Some of us may attend rallies. But as Christian communities, we are mostly silent. Some of us may stand up and speak out for abortion rights, but we don’t do it in Jesus’ name.
And we should.
Jun 24, 2022 |
Rector's Blog Throwback Series: We're Taking a Break
| The Rev. Philip DeVaul
Rector's Blog Throwback Series: We're Taking a Break
Editor's note: As part of our When Love Shows Up Throwback Series we are re-posting this blog post which was originally posted on November 18, 2020.
Since Biblical times, when we find ourselves in a culture that seeks for us anything other than the Love for which we were made, resistance to that is an act of faithful obedience to God. Tempted as we are in our current paradigm to demonize those with whom we disagree, seeking to love our enemies is an act of resistance. Entrenched as we are in a zero-sum mindset that celebrates winners and mocks so-called losers, the decision to seek and serve Christ in all persons is an act of resistance. Saturated as we are by a climate of racial and economic inequality, the decision to do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly is an act of resistance.
Likewise, we take an honest look at our culture and realize that we are conditioned to believe that rest is something to be earned. This is counter to the commandment of God. God literally commands that we build regular rest into our lives, not as a reward for work well done, but as a source of strength and centering on God’s presence. And “earned” rest is counter to the Gospel that our belovedness and belonging are a gift from God, given with grace and adoration. Our decision to rest is an act of faithful resistance against the temptation to believe our worth is found in our work.
Jun 17, 2022 |
Rector's Blog: What, Me Worry?
| The Rev. Philip DeVaul
Rector's Blog: What, Me Worry?
I have experienced both financial stability and instability. But you never really get over the instability. I’m in a stable place now, but I’ve seen the bottom fall out before. You get what I mean. Security doesn’t linger in my psyche quite the way insecurity does. I have experienced both, and of course I strongly prefer stability and security – however tenuous it can feel. That being said, it occurs to me that when I am in a state of financial insecurity, when I am wondering if I’ll be ok next month, I am much closer to the experience of the vast majority of humans past and present on this planet. My childhood was the outlier.
Of all the teachings of Jesus, there is one that is the most challenging, the most perplexing, and the most tempting to reject. It is not the command to love your enemies, or to turn the other cheek. It is not when he tells lustful men to pluck out their eyes. It’s not even when he tells people to eat his body and drink his blood: No, the most difficult, impossible lesson in Jesus’ repertoire is, “Do not worry.”
“Do not worry,” Jesus says, and I nod my head out of respect and deference and all the while I don’t believe him. Or at least I find myself tempted to think Jesus is just being idealistic or simplistic or impossible. But this is Jesus talking, so I keep listening anyway. Here’s what he says.
He says, “I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air; they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?
Jun 10, 2022 |
Rector's Blog: Conversion
| The Rev. Philip DeVaul
Rector's Blog: Conversion
Understanding that conversion is ongoing is a game changer. It undercuts any unspoken belief in an easy answer, a quick fix, instant solution. You and I were born to love and be loved. And at the same time, our lives are filled with obstacles and barriers – things that keep us from living into that beloved reality. So we yearn for a moment, an instant, a blink of an eye where the obstacles just disappear. Many Christians have been sold the snake oil that if we just believe the right thing, pray the right prayer, act the right way – if we just “convert” or “get saved” – the barriers to belovedness will be banished.
This is not real. And when we acknowledge that our conversion - the opening of our hearts to the presence saving love of God in the world – is a lifelong process, we begin to embrace the reality of Christianity as a practice rather than a set of magical escapist beliefs.
When I got to this church, there was an old man here named Chet. Many of you knew him well. He was a leader, a rabble rouser, a prayer warrior, a seeker, a smart-ass, and a true patriarch of our community. I loved him instantly, and I was not alone in that. One Sunday, when I walked into the room for our Adult Education hour, he barked, “Hey, there’s that guy who talks about love all the time!” I said, “That’s me!”
“When are you gonna talk about something else?” Chet asked, and I said, “When you all actually start believing that you’re loved no matter what, I will start talking about something else.”
Jun 03, 2022 |
Rector's Blog Pride Series: You Are a Blessing
| The Rev. Philip DeVaul
Rector's Blog Pride Series: You Are a Blessing
Hey, friends, I am still recovering from COVID, and am in
need of rest, so I do not have a new blog/podcast for you this week. That being
said, we are at the beginning of Pride month, and I did not want to let this
week go by without stating clearly and unequivocally that the Episcopal Church
of the Redeemer – its clergy, staff, and lay leaders – stand in full support,
love, and affirmation of LGBTQ+ persons, all of whom are made beautifully and
powerfully in God’s image. This week I am re-running the first in a series of
blog/podcasts I wrote/recorded on Pride in 2019, and on the
blog page you will find a link to the Pride series for your continued reading/listening.
I invite you this month to support your local Pride festivities, and then to do your part in Jesus’ name to make sure that LGBTQ+ persons are more fully loved, heard, empowered, supported, and cared for in your community. Each of us has a part to play in making our world truly inclusive, and this work is central to our understanding of the Gospel of God’s love in Jesus Christ.
"We believe that the God that created you made you as you are on purpose. You are not a mistake. Your sexuality is not a mistake, a sin, or something to be cured, fixed, or healed. You are a blessing. Your journey to self-understanding is essential to the healing of this world. You matter tremendously to God and to the people around you. Your expression of love is even now teaching this world a deeper understanding of what love really is. When you are part of the Church community, the church is more of who God means it to be. When you are empowered, the Spirit is revealed. When you lead, we see Jesus."
I invite you this month to support your local Pride festivities, and then to do your part in Jesus’ name to make sure that LGBTQ+ persons are more fully loved, heard, empowered, supported, and cared for in your community. Each of us has a part to play in making our world truly inclusive, and this work is central to our understanding of the Gospel of God’s love in Jesus Christ.
"We believe that the God that created you made you as you are on purpose. You are not a mistake. Your sexuality is not a mistake, a sin, or something to be cured, fixed, or healed. You are a blessing. Your journey to self-understanding is essential to the healing of this world. You matter tremendously to God and to the people around you. Your expression of love is even now teaching this world a deeper understanding of what love really is. When you are part of the Church community, the church is more of who God means it to be. When you are empowered, the Spirit is revealed. When you lead, we see Jesus."
May 27, 2022 |
Rector's Blog: Bury The Rag Deep
| The Rev. Philip DeVaul
Rector's Blog: Bury The Rag Deep
This blog is about Buffalo, New York. This blog is about Uvalde, Texas.
Each event on its own is catastrophically tragic. Taken together, along with the countless mass shootings about which we’ve already forgotten, we can no longer call them unthinkable. They are not unthinkable, inconceivable, or unexplainable. They are every day. They are a part of us. When we bury the rag deep in our face, it is not for one isolated incident, however awful it may be. The tears we shed are a collection of years of sorrow and rage brought on by our complete unwillingness to be transformed. We want these shootings to stop. We want to change nothing about our lives, our culture, our laws in order to make them stop. We throw up our hands. What can be done? This is who we are.
There is a tendency for us to treat Jesus’ crucifixion as if it is uniquely gruesome. But the stripping and beating and hanging of Jesus is no more gruesome than the endless AR-15 slaughter of innocents that makes up the fabric of modern American life. How is Golgotha worse than Uvalde? How is Calvary different from Buffalo?
May 20, 2022 |
Rector's Blog: We Don't Talk About Abortion
| The Rev. Philip DeVaul
Rector's Blog: We Don't Talk About Abortion
We Christians who support reproductive rights are mostly silent. We may not be silent individually. Some of us may work at Planned Parenthood. Some of us may vote for candidates and resolutions in favor of reproductive rights. Some of us may attend rallies. But as Christian communities, we are mostly silent. Some of us may stand up and speak out for abortion rights, but we don’t do it in Jesus’ name.
And we should. We who belong to Christian communities and support abortion rights should be speaking up in Jesus’ name.
But instead, we choose not to talk about abortion. In part, this is because of how you felt when you read(heard) the word abortion on a church blog(podcast) just now. Many of us try to avoid making people feel that way. We often steer clear of hot button topics, and there is no hotter button in American culture than abortion.
During particularly polarizing times such as these, there is something attractive about creating spaces that do not broach sensitive topics. Having a church that doesn’t talk about controversial issues gives some of us a sense of respite from the endless cacophony of opinion out there in the real world. Some of us may think to ourselves that we need a community that acts as a timeout, an escape from those things that keep us up at night.
May 13, 2022 |
Rector's Blog: Learning What I Believe
| The Rev. Philip DeVaul
Rector's Blog: Learning What I Believe
"I have to admit that my friend’s abortion began a shift in me even if I did not see it or understand it at the time. The shift that occurred was simple, and it came in the form of a question I asked myself. Did I think she was a murderer? I had been taught she was. But did I believe it? No. No, I did not believe that. It did not make sense. It did not fit. I did not know what to do with this incongruity, any more than I knew what to do with my own hypocrisy – which I could not see or accept.
A few years later I was working as a waiter. One of my coworkers got pregnant, and she was contemplating an abortion. She was a faithful Christian, and she knew me as a Christian too and wanted to talk with me about it. This was the first real discussion I ever actually had about abortion. It was not about laws. It was not about rights. It was about her and what was happening to her and within her. She decided to terminate the pregnancy.
It was the first time I remember not knowing what to think.
In full disclosure to you, I told her I didn’t think she should get an abortion.
And then, before I knew what was happening, I heard the words come out of my mouth, “But if you need a ride, or you need someone to wait for you or pick you up afterward, I can do that.”
So, what did I really believe?"
May 06, 2022 |
Rector's Blog: We Believe
| The Rev. Philip DeVaul
Rector's Blog: We Believe
We believe that access to a safe, legal abortion is healthcare, and treating it otherwise serves to diminish the fullness of your humanity and weaponize your own bodies against you.
We believe you don’t need us to explain to you the complexity of carrying life within you, and the decision to terminate that life.
We believe that Christians can in good conscience disagree with one another about abortion without taking it out on you.
We believe that choosing abortion does not make you less faithful, less loved, less of anything.
We believe God knows this better than we do.
We believe God Is compassionate and understanding, and will never abandon or forsake you.
We believe that the church should not be a source of judgment and shame, but a community of love and support that stands with you unflinchingly.
We believe you.
Apr 29, 2022 |
Rector's Blog: Magnificent and Complicated
| The Rev. Philip DeVaul
Rector's Blog: Magnificent and Complicated
Weddings are endlessly fascinating. They carry with them immense baggage – not just the hope of perfection, but the expectation of it. Unmitigated joy is assumed as the default feeling at a wedding even though no such thing has ever happened. We have never in our adult lives felt uncomplicated happiness, and yet we saddle weddings with this burden.
I had a mentor who would say that, as a pastor, funerals were easier than weddings. He said that at funerals people were allowed to feel anything, were allowed to have complicated, strange, hard, sad feelings, were allowed to laugh and cry and love and mourn and grieve and hope all at once. And I remember him saying at a funeral there is usually a coffin or an urn or a picture where we can focus all the complexity of our emotions in that moment.
But, he said, at a wedding, everyone was supposed only to be happy. Never mind if they’d recently been divorced or widowed, if they’d loved and lost, or if they wanted to be married but weren’t. Never mind if they couldn’t find clothes that fit, or if they weren’t sure what they thought about the institution of marriage or if they were uncomfortable in this church: Pure happiness is what they should feel
Apr 22, 2022 |
Rector's Blog Throwback Series, Hoping for Peace
| The Rev. Philip DeVaul
Rector's Blog Throwback Series, Hoping for Peace
Editor's note: This blog is part of our Throwback Series and
was originally posted on December 17, 2021.
"We talk about wanting peace a lot. We talk about our hope for a peaceful future, with peaceful relationships, a peaceful nation, a peaceful planet. But it seems like every version of peace we imagine requires everyone else to see things the way we see them. During the height of the Roman Empire, there was a time commonly known as the Pax Romana, or Roman Peace. It was known as such because of the relative lack of war and bloodshed that was being experienced in the major areas of the Empire. But throughout this Peace, Rome was in a state of constant battle and conquest on the margins of its empire, always fighting, always conquering, always subduing others and bringing them under Roman rule. And the internal peace and stability came under threat of great violence. That’s the kind of peace most of us understand: A peace that is achieved by constant violence and threats. So long as that violence is kept far enough away, we feel safe.
Do we really hope for peace? Or is our hope just to feel comfortable and unbothered?"
"We talk about wanting peace a lot. We talk about our hope for a peaceful future, with peaceful relationships, a peaceful nation, a peaceful planet. But it seems like every version of peace we imagine requires everyone else to see things the way we see them. During the height of the Roman Empire, there was a time commonly known as the Pax Romana, or Roman Peace. It was known as such because of the relative lack of war and bloodshed that was being experienced in the major areas of the Empire. But throughout this Peace, Rome was in a state of constant battle and conquest on the margins of its empire, always fighting, always conquering, always subduing others and bringing them under Roman rule. And the internal peace and stability came under threat of great violence. That’s the kind of peace most of us understand: A peace that is achieved by constant violence and threats. So long as that violence is kept far enough away, we feel safe.
Do we really hope for peace? Or is our hope just to feel comfortable and unbothered?"
Apr 14, 2022 |
Rector's Blog: For The Unprepared
| The Rev. Philip DeVaul
Rector's Blog: For The Unprepared
I have failed at another Lent. It has become my new tradition, failing at Lent. I cannot seem to get it together for this season of penitence, fasting, and devotion. I have not been able to consistently give something up for years, I am literally eating a sleeve of Thin Mints while I write this blog – a blog that I was supposed to write a week ago. It’s fair to say I did not become a better Christian in the 6 weeks.
Really, nothing makes me feel like more of a failure as a Christian than Lent – which is funny since I am terrible at turning the other cheek, loving my enemy, praying for those who persecute me, refraining from judging others – all explicit directives of Jesus himself. My failure at these just makes me shrug and say, “nobody’s perfect.” But my inability to achieve a productive Lent, that 40-day feat of faithfulness – the one that Jesus had never heard of – somehow makes me feel guilty.
This happens, of course, because I keep thinking Lent is about being better, about self-improvement. But it’s not. Lent is about Jesus.
Apr 08, 2022 |
Rector's Blog: Proclaiming the Blessing You See
| The Rev. Philip DeVaul
Rector's Blog: Proclaiming the Blessing You See
Editor's note: This blog is part of our Throwback Series. This
blog post was originally posted on March 17, 2021.
Proclaiming the blessing of LGBTQ+ people in this world will change us as Christians. It will change our church. It will change how we understand God. It will change how we understand one another. Every time we see blessing in someone, our experience of God’s presence is expanded and deepened. God’s magnificent Love becomes more obvious, more powerful, more clear in our lives when we see it in places we hadn’t before. And we are transformed in a way that glorifies God.
Apr 01, 2022 |
Rector's Blog: Thy Kingdom Come
| The Rev. Philip DeVaul
Rector's Blog: Thy Kingdom Come
" I have been Christian my whole life, which means I’ve been saying, hearing, reading this prayer my whole life, and it wasn’t until a few years ago that I actually paid any attention at all to that first petition, to what it means. Plainly speaking, we are asking that God make this life, this place just like Heaven. That’s what we’re asking. And I don’t think Jesus was being hyperbolic, parabolic, symbolic, or idealistic. I think Jesus meant it, and I think Jesus wants us to mean it.
That this world be heavenly should be something we actively seek and desire.
The Episcopal Church is explicitly meant to be a visionary and driven body. Our catechism states that our mission is to restore all people to unity with God through Jesus Christ, and that we do this by praying, worshiping, proclaiming the Gospel, and promoting justice, peace, and love. At Church of the Redeemer we have our own Vision Statement that is likewise driven, and it seeks to focus us on how we live into that mission. It is worth recognizing that what we are really doing is trying to help our own petition to God come true. We are saying, “God we want Earth look more like Heaven, and we want to help make it happen.”
That this world be heavenly should be something we actively seek and desire.
The Episcopal Church is explicitly meant to be a visionary and driven body. Our catechism states that our mission is to restore all people to unity with God through Jesus Christ, and that we do this by praying, worshiping, proclaiming the Gospel, and promoting justice, peace, and love. At Church of the Redeemer we have our own Vision Statement that is likewise driven, and it seeks to focus us on how we live into that mission. It is worth recognizing that what we are really doing is trying to help our own petition to God come true. We are saying, “God we want Earth look more like Heaven, and we want to help make it happen.”
Mar 25, 2022 |
Rector's Blog: Incompletely White
| The Rev. Philip DeVaul
Rector's Blog: Incompletely White
As we turned from the presentation towards the people at our table for a small group breakout discussion, one of our brilliant, beloved, thoughtful parishioners spoke up. “Well, I’ll just say it, and I guess I should be sorry, but I love our liturgy.” I love her. I love that she said this. This was exactly the right thing for her to say and exactly the right place for her to say it. And my immediate response was, “I love it too, and I don’t think you need to be sorry.” Because the point of the work of Becoming Beloved Community isn’t to make you feel bad or shame you for loving something that has shaped your relationship with God. The work is meant to open us up to the fact that, however beautiful our experience of God has been, it is incomplete because we have not allowed ourselves to be influenced by people who don’t look like us. The liturgy isn’t bad. It’s incomplete.
However beautiful our lives have been, they are incomplete because we have not allowed ourselves to be influenced, led, taught, pastored, challenged, pushed, transformed, forgiven and loved by people who don’t look like us. We are not bad people, finally learning to be good. We are incomplete people searching for the wholeness of God, and the wholeness of God’s creation as seen in the people we have historically ignored and marginalized.
