[Magdalen] Sermon with a poem by Ann Capers Limehouse

[Marion Thompson]

'Muscular Christianity' in these words.  Thank you for this profoundly 
motivational start to the day and moving tribute to Capers.

Marion, a pilgrim

On 5/22/2015 2:09 AM, Georgia DuBose wrote:
> As those of you who have known me for awhile are aware, I am not much
> inclined to posting sermons on the various social media I use.
> However, I would like to post this one, which I preached at both
> National Cathedral, and St. John's Episcopal Church, Harpers Ferry,
> West Virginia.
>
> The reason is that it includes a poem by Capers, and has considerable
> reference to her calls both as deacon and as poet.
>
> It's rather long. I'm sorry.
>
> Georgia+
>
> Proper 10, Year C, July 11, 2010
>
> "Wisdom, Mercy, and the Call to the Way of the Cross"
>
>   Times are hard. Many people struggle. We have lost jobs, savings,
> sometimes even our homes, our vehicles, . We ask ourselves, “Do I pay
> the medical bill or the mortgage this month?” Yet in the midst of this
> swamp of questions, we are called beyond ourselves into life in Jesus
> Christ. We may feel that we have nothing to give to Jesus at this
> point, but we do—we still have our love, our brokenness and our
> witness. If you have been longing to hear that following Jesus Christ
> is the way to prosperity, abundance and jolly times, it may be useful
> to know that you will not hear such doctrine preached while I serve
> this church.
>
>   The New Interpreter’s Study Bible commentator, Warren Carter, writes,
> “This way of life (that is, life in Jesus Christ) is the life of the
> cross. This image should not be trivialized to refer to some little
> burden or inconvenience. Rather, it denotes the shame, pain, social
> rejection, violence, humiliation and marginalization of crucifixion.
> Rome crucified those who threatened its control over society, such as
> traitors, violent criminals and foreigners. The cross divided citizen
> from non-citizen, the accepted from the rejected. To take up the cross
> is to identify with those who threaten the empire. It is to refuse to
> be intimidated into compliance. It is to be at cross-purposes with
> imperial commitments. And it is to recognize the limits of Rome’s
> power that could not keep the crucified Jesus dead!” It is joy that
> Jesus calls us to in his glorious resurrection. We are not called to
> have all our expectations fulfilled, nor to an easy life.
>
>   In the familiar story from today’s Gospel, it is not the “expected
> person” who is called to help the Jew left for dead on the dangerous
> and desperate road to Jericho. It is the marginalized heretic, the
> Samaritan, who does the right thing. The teacher, called to educate
> and to be a role model for others, passes by. The Levite, called to
> care for the holy things in the Holy of Holies in the temple, passes
> by. The one despised by the greater community because he believes
> differently than the orthodox Jews, is the one who reflects the
> qualities of God, and shows mercy to the Jew attacked by robbers.
>
>   It is important to understand that, until the 1930s and later, and
> certainly in the time of Jesus, the road to Jericho was known as a
> dangerous road to travel. St. Jerome, in his fourth century current
> era commentaries, called it the Red, or Bloody, Way. Usually people
> who had reason to be on the road traveled in groups, so that robbers
> would not overcome them. Similarly, the Way of Jesus is not an easy
> way, but it is made more worthwhile and more fun by traveling in
> groups. The way that every Christian travels differs somewhat;
> Epaphras, in Colossae, was called to be a faithful minister of Christ,
> and what he is remembered for today is that he loved his fellow
> Colossians, served them in the name of Jesus, and let Paul know that
> they lived loving and spirit-filled lives.
>
>   Despite the struggles and difficulties of daily life, every Christian
> is called to something beyond him or herself. And yes, some people are
> called to dangerous roads. My friend Ann Capers Limehouse, a deacon in
> Charleston, South Carolina, writes this poem that arises out of her
> work as a hospital chaplain: it is called:
>
>
> "Chaplain's Note: Describe This"
>
>   For 17 months Anna Akhmatova,
>   the famous poet, stood with the other women
>   standing outside the prison in Leningrad
>   waiting to hear news of a son, a father, a husband,
>   a lover - who was alive? who dead?
>   who only tortured past recognition?
>
> Silenced, she had not written a poem in years,
>   but a woman recognized her, said, 'Can you
>   describe this?' and she did, 10 poems.
>
>
> I've never stood where they stand.
>   My sons, my daughter are as safe as can be
>   in this world. I am not a woman in the crowd
>   outside a prison, in the debris of a bomb site,
>   in a cathedral square, any of all those places
>   where they wait, or fathers or daughters,
>   to hear the unbearable and bear witness.
>   But, today I listened to a man my own age
>   stand trembling, a boy, gun in his hands,
>   in a jungle his body left 40 years ago,
>   where he still sees, hears, smells the unbearable
>   and the news never stops, never changes.
>
> I cannot describe this. I listen. I witness
>   that he wept, like a tired child,
>   the whole time he spoke, and when I prayed.
>
>   ~Deacon Ann Capers Limehouse~
>
>
> Just as Capers is not called to the extremity of witness that was
> asked of the great Anna Akhmatova, (who indeed was called to identify
> with those who threatened an empire simply by existing) so we may not
> be called to:
>
> a cathedral square, turbulent and war-torn and very unlike the one in
> front of this great cathedral;
>
> the smoking ruins of a burned mosque;
>
> or the courtyard outside a prison where people are tortured.
>
>
> Capers does her witnessing in hospital corridors. You may do yours
>
> in your living room,
>
> at a senior center,
>
> riding the bus,
>
> or sitting on a park bench.
>
>
> One thing we can be sure of: call to witness to the power of the cross
> will ask something of us that we may think we are unprepared to do.
> Prophets in the Bible were notably hesitant to take up the mantle of
> speaking on behalf of the living God.
>
> Moses told God that he was no good at public speaking.
>
> Jonah needed to have the experience of being swallowed by a whale, and
> even after that he was not what you would call a willing voice.
>
> Amos said he was just a pruner of sycamores.
>
> Samuel had to be called three times, and told by Eli who was calling
> him, before he said, “Speak, Lord, for your servant hears.”
>
> Indeed, most of us say, “Lord, I am not worthy,” when we sense the
> call from God. (There is ample reason to believe that those who are
> deeply convinced of their worthiness to speak for God will later end
> up on the front pages of scandal sheets.) We venture forth, as St.
> Teresa of Avila indicated, to be the hands and feet and voice of Jesus
> in the world, and we go through some transformative event, or series
> of events. We are strengthened by the promises of God, who says, “The
> word is very near to you. It is in your mouth and your heart for you
> to observe.” We know that, just as God hears our prayers with
> mercy—that is, with holy connection to his beloved creations—so we are
> called to the mercy that the Samaritan showed the Jew. The knowledge
> and understanding mentioned in today’s collect are not enough. We need
> grace and power to accomplish the things God calls us to do. In God’s
> divine economy, knowledge and understanding lead to accomplishment.
> All Christians are called to something.
>
>   We had best undertake the demands of our call in great humility: “he
> guides the humble in doing right and teaches his way to the lowly.”
> Humility is to remember that we come from humus, the earth. Such
> remembrance is the foundation of right action, as well as of wisdom.
> Yet, at some point in our travels, the prayer to God turns from, “O
> God, send anyone but me, because I am a sinner” as so many of the
> prophets said when first called, to “Speak Lord, for your servant
> hears,” as Samuel said, and eventually to “Here am I; send me!” as
> Isaiah said to God.
>
>   Once we acknowledge that we belong to Jesus, the unexpected always
> happens. God tells the prophet Ezekiel, “Know that all lives are mine;
> the life of the parent as well as the life of the child is mine.” As
> we seek to learn what our call is, in a rich and surprising process
> known as discernment, we may be called from familiar places of witness
> to places we have not expected, and may feel, with the prophet Jonah,
> that the travel in the belly of the whale is not the way we would
> choose to spend our time. Yet, as Thomas Merton said in The Sign of
> Jonah , “We all travel towards our destiny in the belly of a paradox.”
> A literary prophetic voice puts it this way:
>
>   “If it were not for the honor of it,” said Mark Twain of being
> tarred, feathered and ridden out of town of a rail after writing a
> newspaper editorial that called certain people to account, “I would
> just as soon have passed it up.”
>
>   At some point our own preferences and expectations lose their power;
> we go where we are called. This is how we find ourselves standing at
> the bed of a nursing home patient who needs to have her colostomy bag
> changed; looking into the sole remaining eye of an Iraq veteran;
> serving lunch to homeless people in a park; or flying into Haiti with
> a container box of rice, powdered milk, diapers, tents and clean
> water.
>
> Some people put tremendous resistance into living life fully in Jesus
> Christ, and wonder why they feel bad all the time. There is a kind of
> spiritual influenza that results from ignoring your call and
> struggling with the will of God. The cure for it is to walk the way of
> the Cross.
>
> Be aware: once you begin to walk the Way of the Cross, your life is no
> longer your own. At the same time, you will discover that, in the Body
> of Jesus Christ, you have never been more truly yourself. For which
> God be praised. Alleluia. AMEN.
>
> May the memory of Ann Capers Limehouse be blessed. AMEN.
>