Piled in the back with their father, they slap and lean into each other constantly.

Their skin is taut and tan, shining in the summer sun as we inch along the highway.

They look like brown trout, who move constantly in the current just to stay in one place.

It occurs to me when I glance back, that these slippery fish, are slipping
through my veined hands that desire nothing more than to hold on to them.

I take the freeze frame image in the mirror as a gift.

The picture of them in this honda piled on each other makes me laugh and suddenly tear up.

It is the sweet sound of summer with my beautiful school of brown trout,
that will swim upstream soon enough.

In a few weeks, a book I have written called, “Funeral for a Stranger” is coming out. The outline of the book came in a parking lot several years ago as I was preparing to conduct a funeral for someone I had never met. This week I am thinking a lot about funerals as we prepare the funeral for Danny Petraitis today and David Hanna tomorrow. What I remember about sitting in the parking lot is that it felt like I was falling in love with the world. I knew the commandment to love the world, but I never thought about what it would be like to fall in love with it. I knew what it felt like to fall in love with individuals, but never has a wave for billions of people washed over my heart. That day at the funeral, all I wanted to do was comfort the family I never had seen before and knew I wouldn’t see again. And somehow that opened up my heart to a huge feeling of love for the world. I don’t understand the trinity, I am beginning to understand that through the Universal Creator incarnate in Jesus Christ filled with the Holy Spirit there is a mystical formula for loving the whole world. Theology helps us frame our faith, learn the path, and then open us up to the possibility of falling in love with the world. Nicodemus, in the middle of the night, sought to understand God in Christ and the means by which we can really love the world. It led him to a theological discussion and ultimately to fall in love with Christ; why else anoint and bury his condemned body? We like Nicodemus struggle to understand and keep seeking a deeper faith.

The triune God is not an exhaustive formula or limiting; it is the framework from which Christians move toward love. It is in trying to live out the faith we have been taught that a deeper understanding is possible. That is why it feels like there are always nuisances and deeper dimensions even within our perfect trinities. In the description of the clover, there are ones with four leaves that are considered the luckiest. In the description of the kiss it is the longing between the kisses that can be the most powerful. In the three legged stool of our faith there has long been a tradition of a fourth mysterious leg called revelation.

All our experience, theology and doctrine begin with one word, “God”. And from that we form three words and call it a trinity that creates, redeems and inspires. God is our past, present and future. From this doctrine we can write a volume on each word. From these volumes we fill libraries with different interpretations and understandings, both faithful and heretical. And that is just the beginning of understanding. We could write all that was in the beginning, is now and will be forever and still the reality of God could not be contained.

We miss the point of Pentecost if we celebrate it as a one-time historical event set in stone. The event in Luke/Acts is not the one spirit-filled moment in an otherwise spirit-less story; it is not the one time the spirit covered the church or caught humanity. Instead, Pentecost is the celebration of the outpouring of the Holy Spirit on the early church. It is a theological celebration that attaches the Holy Spirit to the events of crucifixion and resurrection. Whether we read from John or Luke/Acts, the disciples are gathered, trying to understand what they are supposed to do. The familiar way they had been in ministry together was over, and so they did what they did when they were with their Lord, gather, talk and wait. Then the spirit that was birthed in the dawn of Eden moved and breathed on them and sent them back into the world to love and serve. This is a celebration of the unique and energetic way that spirit descended on them and sustained them on their missionary journey to form the church. This is day we celebrate the power of the spirit in community that can dance like flames on heads, bring peace, forgive and retain sins.

A couple of springs ago I went to the University of Virginia to sit in a circle of about 20 pastors who were working in the field of reconciliation to listen to Jurgon Moltmann. He spoke for two days in a beautiful ground-floor room with huge windows that opened out onto the Jefferson lawn that is hedged by azalea bushes. He spoke facing us with his back to the window from a chair about his theology of the Holy Spirit and the early church. Moltmann was born in 1926 and is one of the preeminent theologians of our time. He has a passion for the realization of the Kingdom of God as it exists both in the future and in the present. As he talked about his own life and the spirit, you could see bright red azaleas encircling him that when you squinted looked like flames dancing on his head and shoulders. He had a wise and powerful voice. He said there were two characteristics of the Holy Spirit in the life of the church, first, it comes as a surprise and second, it is abundant.

What speaks to me this year in the midst of this Pentecost celebration is that the spirit is a gift to the community. That is how it comes as a surprise and in abundance. That is why it came when the disciples were gathered. Sometimes I forget that in my desire to feel the presence of God, and I have misunderstood the Holy Spirit as if it were a muse. The Holy Spirit is not present only when we feel it or when we feel inspired to act. The Holy Spirit is Ruach, the wind spirit, and it moves in community and is there whether we feel it brush against our cheeks or lite on our heads. The Holy Spirit does not depend upon our feeling or inspired thoughts.

Last week on Ascension Sunday, I talked about how outrage and heartbreak can be means of our ascension to be with God and specifically told the story of a woman from the streets who was shot twice, once internally, and the mistreatment she had received after her wounds including that she didn’t have a detective helping her. It was horrible, and it was a hard sermon to preach and hear. This year ascension was about believing less and being more faithful. In the past seven days I have been witness to a Pentecost, a new birth, of the Holy Spirit that I saw dancing on heads all around me. First as Kay West gave an audible volume to the voice of the woman, making her a priority for the police, then as volunteer sitters, clothes givers, nurses, and friends gathered to help her leave the hospital and find shelter. Then as Regina and the graduates of Magdalene took down all the information and did an outreach to make sure other women knew the vitals of the man and the car. Then as donations came in to buy her medicine, food and new clothing that would go over the three bags she carries on her body. Then as several prayer groups added her to their list for healing. And on and on. Yesterday she told me that she felt worthy and loved. She is experiencing the gift of the spirit from a group she had never met moved to action. I am so thankful to celebrate the gift of the Holy Spirit that helped birth Magdalene and all the ministries that grew from that—that put the vision of Escuela Anne Stevens into place and created the clinic that has saved and enriched lives. That has welcomed and sent out hundreds of students like Ami Waters, who came here, then went to Africa and said she would never be the same. It is in the context of communities like this that individuals are surprised by the power of the spirit and see its abundance.

I am thankful to my core to be part of a community that is open to the spirit and great commission, but always in the light of the great commandment. I am thankful that the spirit celebrated here can take our thinnest prayers and weakest moments as holy. I am thankful that we celebrate the strongest cries without judgment that come from beneath our souls where tears and laughter rest beside the spirit always. I am thankful we are not celebrating the Holy Spirit like a muse, but as the grace given to community that allows love to be manifested in ways we could never imagine by ourselves. I am reborn by this spirit.

Mother May Apple
A poem given on Mother's day at the Riverside baptism at St. Martin's Meadow, May 10, 2009

Rain fell on spring-soaked soil so much it pooled and flowed unbounded.
Love, blessing and abundance poured out on all God's green earth.
Thick new growth sprouted from every pore from this water feast.
In this vast wilderness, the Mayapple comes prepared for the rainy season.
Her single leaf, an umbrella, lets water flow and protects her single blossom.
That flower, like all creation, is made in secret,
intricately women in the depths of the earth.
It is not fragile or sweet, but miraculous and healing.
Before we ever dreamed of this flower or this rain, her eyes beheld it.
When it finally opens for the world, it is a wondrous delight.
Mayapples fourish in wet Springs as they gather gather in community on hillsides.

Come, celebrate our Mother May apple and the Mother who bears all fruit.
Sing praise to her and to her waters that bring new life to everything.
Count her blessings that number more than all the widflowers in all the woods.
Then pray her waters bring us new life worthy of her children.

The community of St. Augustine's celebrated

the sacrament of baptism with:

Gabriel Grant Heuser

Briyanna Marie Mcclain

Jonnah Danielle Alexander

Aundreah Jonnaye Alexander

Jeffrey Calhoun Maddox, Jr.

Claiborne McIlwaine Elam

Nancy Jane Terzian

Julia Ruth Hermann

Lucy Elizabeth Hermann

Chesnee Seals Foster

James Barton Kensler

James Barton Kensler II

Gryffin McCorry Anatol Anderson

She spent another long afternoon watching the laundry dry.
The wind blew slow and steady against
Her story hanging out in faded colors.
Frayed shirts talk about how hard it is
To get through the rainy seasons.
Patched skirts whisper how easy it is to give up prayers
That were never answered anyway.
There is a road that leads north,
But it’s lined with a thousand more clotheslines
Draped with similar rags like a Tibetan prayer chain.
Injustice from behind her eyes is clouded
By the cataracts, still undiagnosed.
Life is damp and this afternoon drags on.
Still, there is in the depth of her valley,
A small creek that keeps flowing,
So she keeps going down and washing her clothes.

As soon as Easter was over I went to Target. I gave up Target for lent because it was a place I was spending too much time and money, and I had several spiritual experiences there thinking about life walking down the aisles which was kind of scary to me about what it said about the depth of my life. So, since I had completed my lent and proved that I didn’t need Target, I headed back in, stopped and got some green tea at the Starbucks in front, sent my son Moses down to go look at toys, and preceded to wander the aisles before I picked up a few things that I needed. I was happy and still full of the great Easter and holy week feeling when I ran into the sheets section and noticed they were selling 600 thread count sheets that were so soft and the interior dialogue began. “These are great, you should get them.” “Don’t get them, think of all the people without sheets, you are just fine with 250 thread count that you have.” I backed away toward the main aisle, sipped on my tea, and before I made it to the dishwashing liquid, right there on the main aisle was a huge display of mascara. There was one called Colossal that said it made your eyelashes 9 times bigger for only $3.98! I had to get that, and when I put into the cart that is when I knew. I was back to where I started as if there hadn’t been a holy week, a fast, or hours of prayer. My own funny or not so funny issues take up space, and it makes me mad at myself. It’s funny because you know what I am talking about, and there are a lot of other issues we all struggle with that we can substitute for target. Maybe unless something dramatic happens like touching an open wound on a risen body, my life won’t look that much different, and I will keep worrying about the same things; I will keep getting distracted in the same ways.

Slip sliding away, slip sliding away
You know the nearer your destination, the more you slip sliding away

Whoah and I know a man, he came from my hometown
He wore his passion for his woman like a thorny crown
He said dolores, I live in fear
My love for yous so overpowering, Im afraid that I will disappear

Chorus

So, on Friday morning I decided to head back to Target and write a sermon for you about doubt and faith. After settling in with my notebook and visiting some friends I ran into, I sit down and I began to quiet myself. I could feel that doubt was about believing or not believing, it was being unable to believe given my feeling of unworthiness. Doubt is about us, not about God. In my quietness all the conversations around me sounded louder than usual. There was a group of nursing students talking about another student not present, two older women nodding and talking and holding onto their carts, a grandmother eating pizza with her two-year old grandchild who couldn’t quite talking, and two men laughing at the very same moment when out of a young mother’s over-crowded cart a metal trash bin banged onto the marble floor. In becoming an observer, I felt compassionate and generous towards all the people, and it gave me some sympathy for my own shortcomings. I see myself in a sea of people mulling about, hoping that something might help them organize their lives, or make them feel a little more beautiful. I could see how all the stages of life come down the aisle and stand exposed in carts infront of strangers.

Chorus

Whoah God only knows, God makes his plan
The informations unavailable to the mortal man
Were workin our jobs, collect our pay
Believe were gliding down the highway, when in fact were slip sliding away

Sitting there I could feel my doubts and distractions were the agents leading me toward a compassionate faith. I was loving Thomas and wanted to tell him that his doubts freed a lot of people and kept them coming back. He teaches us that mistakes and lenten blackslides are the communion of compassion towards humanity. He reminds us of the need of mercy more than justice. In that feeling I knew there was nothing in the store that I needed, and I wanted to walk away and go out into the sunshine and catch the last days of the larkspur. I wanted to go out into the parking lot and help the woman with the thinning hair and hospital bracelet get into her car. But instead I stay seated until I learned my lesson.

The proclamation Jesus offers to the disciples is Peace, and it is coming to terms with our shortcomings with compassion that brings us closer to belief, and through that belief we are able to walk again in faith. Target, my lenten backslide, is my humble reminder that I am a cousin of Thomas, and that while I cannot understand the whole gift of faith, I can celebrate it with the community and come back. I am as frail and needy as any other customer at the Target. I am as faithful and giving as well. This resurrection journey is a call to keep walking with both in peace.

This is what I believe. In the sacred and imperishable truth of resurrection, all journeys lead home. I have thought about the truth in all the Gospel stories about resurrection my whole life. I have talked about it from each perspective given to us from the four Gospels. The accounts of resurrection differ because they are offered by communities trying to share their understanding of what transpired on the third day. In every account though, there is a group of women who were at the foot of cross, led by Mary Magdalene, who are now grieving and making oils and spices to anoint the body of their beloved Jesus.

I love imaging the women preparing oils and spices to bring to the tomb. I love it because grieving and comforting each other when death has done its worst seems the most human part of this whole story. It is where we can join in the resurrection proclamation. We have all grieved for people we love who have died. Mark says in this account that this is the same Mary from whom seven demons were cast out. We know because of her suffering she knows grief and pain. It makes sense that she is the one leading the women in their grieving. We know grief. We intuitively know how to gather in death and try and figure out what it all means. It happens all over the world. We know instinctively what they felt stirring the spices into the scented oil mixed with tears. We can hear the women in the gospel recalling Jesus’ last words and the stories he told. They worried their hope and love would die with him and that what he lived for might die as well. We know the wave of tears that came as the reality of what was laid in the tomb washes over them. We have seen it when we have been graced to sit bedside as a beloved dies. Fear moves in as we try and say goodbye. Doubt rises in our stomachs as we rehearse what it is we believe and how unbelievable it feels. We know something else thought. We know that something transpires in our hearts before we make it to that loved one’s graveside. Just like we intuitively know how to grieve, we know how to see God in death.

One of the great symbols of Easter is the monarch butterfly. The monarch is thought to be a resurrection symbol because it takes about three days for it to become a butterfly once it enters the chrysalis. The monarch butterfly also migrates about 3,000 miles in its yearly cycle. What makes the journey so amazing though is that the butterflies that return to their home every spring are the great, great, grandchildren of the butterflies that started the journey. The life cycle of the butterfly is about 8 weeks, except for the generation that hibernates through the winter. So these amazing creatures return to the same area, and many times the same tree, having never been there before. They just know how to find their way home. It is that intuitive ability to find their way home that makes them a beautiful symbol of Easter.

No one who is dying knows how to resurrect. None of us can fathom it. But all of us will find our way home to God because that is how we are made and the journey is implanted in our souls. It is even deeper than the monarch’s ability to come back. What I have heard since I was a girl was that after the last Eucharist my father served at the age of 41, a woman came up to him and told him he did a beautiful job. He said to her, “I have never felt closer to God.” Then he got in his car and was killed within the hour. When we make our way to the graveside of someone we love, signs always point to the truth that God is close. As intuitive as grieving is, so is this hope of resurrection. Every flower, bird, cloud, and word becomes a reminder of the hope that unfolds in this story.

There have been several deaths of friends and loved ones this week. This week we celebrated the life and ministry of the Methodist Minister who served this community for nine years, Dr. Perry Parker who was 79. He was a retired Chaplain serving 22 years in the U.S. Air Force. Perry preached before Easter a few years ago that healing comes in many ways. “From my limited perspective, healing too often means absence of disease and pain, and a restoration to former health. And yet, I know that isn’t possible in the long run. I can never expect at my age to be like I was 40 years ago. I will grow older and frailer until I am utterly finished with this body. My vision in spiritual matters is pretty poor; we see things on this side of death with much less clarity. And we have received the healing we needed far more often than we realized. If I understand the ministry of Jesus, it was not only to prepare us to live on this planet in harmony with God and our fellow earth dwellers, but also to prepare us for a spiritual eternity in a closer relation with the One who created it all. So I will continue to pray for myself and others, that God’s healing power may strengthen and restore us to health until our work is utterly finished here on earth. It may be that healing is for the purpose of finishing our work here on earth. But, I will try to remember that my destiny as a Christian is not to remain here on earth forever, but to be joined with that entire countless host in God’s presence.”

Mary Magdalene, Mary, and Joanne, come unsure and afraid as the sun breaks over the horizon. But they keep walking having no idea what comes next. They don’t even know how to move the stone. But without knowing or understanding what is happening, they know it. They feel the hope rising in their chest that lives deep in their souls. That hope, mixed with fear and awe calls them to run and tell someone. And they are telling us again this morning. “He is risen”. We carry in us a knowledge that is older and deeper than death. It is the implanted knowledge that will carry us beyond death. It is the deepest truth that makes love eternal and carries us home. It is the truth that makes the story of resurrection a journey of love. With this knowledge we stand by gravesides and proclaim from the richest truth, even as we lay a body in the earth, “All of us go down to the dust; yet even at the grave we make our song: Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia.”

In the morning light of Easter, all signs point us to hope.

In the presence of an empty tomb all our fear is gone.

In the sacred and imperishable proclamation that death has lost its sting,

All journeys lead us home.