[Magdalen] Sermon with a poem by Ann Capers Limehouse

[Jay Weigel]

Amen.

On Fri, May 22, 2015 at 8:48 AM, Marion Thompson <marionwhitevale at gmail.com>
wrote:

> '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.
>>
>>
>