SERMON PREACHED AT St PAUL’S, ARROWTOWN,
and St PETER’S, QUEENSTOWN
ORDINARY SUNDAY 31 (and ALL SAINTS’, translated)
READINGS
Hebrews 9: 11-14
Psalm 146: 1-8
Mark 12: 38-44
If
you are in the know you will be aware that today can be celebrated as All
Saints’ Sunday. It is a wonderful feast of the church year, and a great
counterbalance to the idiocies of Halloween, yet another piece of American
commercialism that did not exist for most of us when we were young. Unless of
course we watched that critical and iconic American documentary Scooby-Doo.
But apart from that? Certainly, I was always unaware of Halloween – though I
admit growing up in New Zealand I was at this time of the year building up
excitement against that equally ridiculous observation of Guy Fawkes,
mercifully banned in Australia, where as many of you know I’ve spent half my
life.
Yet
by dwelling on the readings that have continued through the past many weeks,
readings from Mark and from Hebrews, I think there is a deep connection with
the notion of the saints.
By
“saints” I am never referring to that slightly bewildering practice of the
Roman Catholic communion, one of very few that I don’t agree with, of a coven
of elderly men sitting at a board table discussing whether posthumous miracles
emanating from a saint’s sarcophagus or bodily remains, or some such, can be
authenticated.
When
I look back on the saints that have registered on my consciousness, about whom
I've often spoken on All Saints Days over the year, saints like Molly and Leo
and Ursula* that I’ve mentioned (though not here) I need no greater proof of
holiness than that they have dared to struggle on, believing in our invisible
God, often against all odds. That they have reached out their hands to receive
communion believing that in some way it is for us the body and blood of Christ,
against all odds. That they have dared to cling to the hope of resurrection and
of justice, often against all odds. They have no shrines or weeping statues.
As
we have journeyed through Hebrews in recent weeks I have had to remind us all
from time to time that the priesthood of Christ in which all Christians share
is the biblical priesthood, and that it is only by an unfortunate fluke of
translation that those of us who wear our collars back to front and even
sometimes wear dresses on a Sunday have come to be called priests. Let us
ignore that word at least in so much as it applies to clergy.
Yet
in some ways the word saint has undergone the same corruption as the word
priest. It is not often that I say this but with regards to this word it is the
Protestant and Pentecostal denominations that have got the terminology right.
To be made a saint is simply to be a person who has taken the commitment to
open heart mind and soul to the risen Lord. To be a person who has dared, in
some cases more daringly than others, to believe that Jesus is Lord. And we can
of course argue for a lifetime as to what that means in its out-working, but it
is fundamentally the same: to believe that Jesus has entered our lives, and is
transforming our lives into his own likeness, despite our flaws and
fallibilities, and often our active resistance.
So
although I cringe when I hear it, Pentecostal pastors for example are theologically correct when they turn to the congregation and call them saints.
I cringe a little because it can sound not so much Christ-righteous but
collectively self-righteous, especially as the speaker will always be including
him or herself in the description. The emphasis has to be on the holiness and
the righteousness of the Christ who calls us not on any residue of goodness
that happens to attach itself to the sieve of our lives. And when we
forget that, when we parade our self righteousness then we become what Jesus in
our passage today highlights as the behaviour of the scribes, “who likes to
walk around in long robes and be greeted with respect” etc.
AHEM!
(Do
I notice what I am wearing most Sundays? Well … yes. As an aside, when once
faced with a barrage of criticism delivered to my then bishop about my terrible
performance as a priest, I refuted myriad claims except the last one, that I
did not look after my robes. I pleaded guilty. I have never quite got the hang
of wearing a dress, much less looking after it, as some of you may have noticed!)
No,
that is just an ancient and harmless tradition, in the same way that a judge or
academic might wear robes in a formal ceremony, to add colour and gravitas. Event
Protestant pastors have dress codes!
But
if I come to believe that the robes are The Thing, or worse than I am The Thing,
then I am revoking my sainthood, in the sense that Paul in the New Testament
uses that word. I am becoming as a scribe or a pharisee, as a phylactery-wearing
hypocrite seeking aggrandisement as I strut around thinking I’m important.
And,
contrary to some Protestant paranoia, the same is true of using the title
“Father,” which was something of the norm in circles that I moved in in
Australia, and particularly so amongst some indigenous peoples. The title becomes a
barrier to my Christ-bearing when I begin to abuse it, seeking power or glory,
rather than just seeking by the grace of God to touch a life or two with a hint
of divine love. You may of course know it that I haven’t dared to use that
title in the New Zealand church, where it is less common. In any case the
ordination of women made this a complex deal, and being married to a woman who
is a priest has made it more complex still.
Jesus uses the metaphors of robes and phylacteries and titles to describe any way in which we as bearers of his name can mar the integrity of our witness. I once watched a priest clad in all black shouldering mere parishioners aside at a diocesan function (not in this diocese) to get to the goodies at the table before mere hoi polloi. It was a shocking display of phylactery-wearing, father-parading hypocrisy. Sadly some of the tales of abuse that have emanated from the church have far exceeded even that. Our response must always to ascertain whether we are seeking the place of honour at any metaphorical table, or indeed, real table. And if so: desist.
So,
while perhaps at times I lean a little towards what my brother-in-law refers to
as a model of unholier-than-thou, I think the combined message about priesthood
and sainthood is that the saints are those who are what the Orthodox call a
window on Christ. We will have all met some in our lives, and indeed by virtue
of our baptism and our growth into baptismal vows we are all amongst them,
however flawed we are on our journey.
It’s
just that when we begin to believe that this is based on our own merits or
significance, then we begin to tarnish that very same sainthood.
So
on this day when readings about priesthood, sainthood and hypocrisy all mash up,
I suggest the simple message is that we take a long hard look at ourselves,
check that that selfhood is not particularly glamorous in its own right, and
then get on with the job of opening ourself up to the Spirit of the risen
servant Christ.
* Name changed to save her family from embarrassment or coyness
