Reports about the moving “U2charist” made the news services. Here’s one Episcopalian priest-blogger’s experience:

From Father Jake Stops the World

Last night it suddenly dawned on me that the Episcopal Church has moved on from a focus on human sexuality issues. We are doing an unexpected and wonderful new thing. We have a new vision emerging. We have seen the movement of God’s Spirit, and are beginning to join that dance.

What are the specifics of this vision? Episcopalians for Global Reconciliation spells things out well for us, and offers practical suggestions of what we can do. The vision is focused around making the Millennium Development Goals a reality:

1. Eradicate extreme hunger and poverty.
2. Achieve universal primary education.
3. Promote gender equality and empower women.
4. Reduce child mortality.
5. Improve maternal health.
6. Combat HIV/AIDS, malaria, and other diseases.
7. Ensure environmental sustainability.
8. Develop a global partnership for development.

Making poverty history is a movement that has been gaining momentum for some time, under different names. In this country, it falls under the ONE.org umbrella, with celebrity spokespeople such as Brad Pitt and George Clooney. In Britain, it’s a much more mass-movement kind of thing, but there are also celebrities and rock stars and big concerts. The Make Poverty History website, and also ONE.org urge people to buy and wear white wristbands, or wrap large objects or buildings in white, in order to gain visibility for world poverty issues and to remind the nations of the Millennium Development Goals.

I wear such a wristband to remind me of the poor and hungry, and to remind me of how much remains to be done. I often fiddle with it in church. I have given one or two away as gifts, and hope to give more.

It’s possible to make a difference in this world, to make poverty history, even in small ways. What can we do? How can we respond, as the lyrics say “in the name of love, One more, in the name of love?”

Tuesday, June 6: Grow in Love

by Sarah Knoll-Williams
,

A smart young mother did a very smart thing. After she poured a full glass of milk, she set it before her daughter. As her daughter reached for it, the mother stretched out her hand and knocked it over. Milk was everywhere; all over the table, onto the floor, making a puddle. The daughter looked up at her mother in complete shock. The mother smiled down at her daughter.

?What happened?? she asked the little girl.

?You spilled the milk!? the daughter replied.

?The milk?? asked the mother in mock confusion. ?Why didn?t juice come out of the glass??

?There was no juice in there! You put in milk!? the daughter squealed.

?Ohhhh!? the mother laughed. ?You mean, whatever we put in the glass is what comes out when the glass is spilled?? As they cleaned up the spill, the mother spoke to her daughter. ?We fall down, too,? she said. ?When something goes wrong, whatever is inside us is what comes out. If you are angry and someone pushes you down, your anger will spill out like the milk. If you are full of love, love will spill out instead.?

Jesus says, ?What comes out of the mouth proceeds from the heart? (Matt 15:18).

The last time someone pushed you down, what came spilling out?

It is hard to fill our own glass with love. When I draw near to God in scripture and prayer, God fills my glass with good things. I have known people whose glass was filled with love, and it often overflowed into mine. If my glass is already full of selfishness, impatience, or anger, there is no room for love from God or anyone else. Have you looked in your glass? What?s in there?

Our heart is like our own roots. Our lips, our hands, our feet ? these are like leaves on the stem. You can tell the roots by how the leaves look. You can tell the state of my heart by what I say to you and do for you. In Ephesians we learn to pray for each other ?that Christ may dwell in our hearts through faith, as we are being rooted and grounded in love? (Eph 3:17). If our roots are planted and watered in love, if love fills our glass, we will not be afraid of falling down. When we do fall, our good things from God will spill out.

Ephesians urges us to grow in love because we invite God to tend the garden. Jesus says, I am the vine, and my Father is the vinegrower. He removes every branch in me that bears no fruit. Every branch that bears fruit he prunes, to make it bear more fruit? (John 15:1-2). I urge you to offer your branch to be pruned, and see what fruit God makes through you. Let?s offer ourselves to God with an empty glass, that we would be filled with good things. If we grow in love, we grow in God. Out of God?s great love, ?my cup overflows? (Psalm 23:5).

As long as we are living with others on a daily basis, we will fall down. Some may push us; we may push others. Prepare with me to fall down and spill a full glass of love. Prepare with me to have a cup that overflows for others.
— Sarah Knoll-Williams is a member of the continuing class at the Church Divinity School of the Pacific in Berkeley, California and a third-time deputy from the Diocese of Kansas.

Monday, June 5: Grow in Hope

by The Very Rev’d Kevin Martin

V. Let not the needy, O Lord, be forgotten
R. Nor the hope of the poor be taken away

So we pray daily in the evening prayers of the Church. It certainly makes sense to pray daily that the needy not be forgotten, but why pray daily that the poor not lose hope?

Hope is, of course, one of the three theological virtues, ?now abides faith, hope and love.? Love may be the greatest, but hope is still given a high place among what we in the church value. Hope is the unflinching faith that God?s love will triumph at the end. It is the manifestation of what we once called ?realized eschatology;? the living presence of the future.

And hope is usually the last thing that humans will surrender. Victor Frankel attributed to hope the primary dynamic shared among those who survived the death camps of his day. When hope is lost, a grim resignation and despair seem to replace it.

I still remember vividly the first parishioner I had (some thirty years ago) given a terminal diagnosis from her doctors. She was so full of life and continually courageous in the face of her progressing cancer. I once asked her, ?What do you want to know about your illness?? I will never forget her penetrating response, ?I want the truth, the whole truth, but not nothing but the truth. I need some hope at the end of each day.?

Her hope was to see her 20 year old engaged daughter?s wedding. Despite frailness, she held on to the wedding day. Taken from the wedding to her bed too weak to attend the reception, I drew near to her. I knew her last hope was fulfilled, and I feared that now despair and resignation might set in. ?Are you OK,? I asked. Knowing my meaning she smiled and said, ?I told you I would make it and I did.? I awaited her next words. True to her spirit, a wry smile came upon her face, ?I do have two other daughters,? she assured me. Her hope had not been taken away.

Often these days, it seems that a grim resignation has settled upon our church, especially our leaders. They seem to have accepted that the present problems, discord, and even polarization will continue. Many have resigned themselves to the idea that divisions must increase, and that the decline of our church is written in the destiny of others of the ?mainline.? Has our hope been taken away?

Growth in hope is possible not because we wear rose-tinted glasses. Hope is not merely optimism. Growth in hope is possible because when all else fails us, like the poor, it becomes all that we have. Yet, as long as we have it, we have all that it promises. Give to your church in these days, O Lord, growth in hope.
— The Very Rev’d Kevin Martin was recently called as Dean of the Cathedral of St. Matthew in the Diocese of Dallas.