Forgiveness is a Gift: April 27, 2025

Easter 2, Year C          John 20: 19-31

        When my husband and I got engaged, we were both in the ordination process. We often spoke of what it would be liked to be married to another priest. We decided that while there were several drawbacks, there were also some perks. For instance, we would both be able to understand the hazards of clergy apparel. We could discuss the text that we were preaching on the coming Sunday. We would both find our church humor hysterical. Yet what we were most excited about was the prospect of absolving one another. 

         Absolve is another word for forgive. However, it has liturgical connotations. After the confession, the priest stands in front of the congregation and absolves everyone on behalf of Jesus Christ. It is not the priest who is doing the forgiveness, the priest is sort of the conduit. God is the one who is doing the actual forgiving. We call it a corporate confession, because we all do it together. In the Episcopal Church, people are also allowed to seek private confession with a priest. We just do not have those cute booths they have in the Roman Catholic Church, and no one actually knows it’s available, even though it is in the prayer book. It has become one of those fun trivia facts I like to share with people. 

         Roman Catholic priests trace their beginnings to the 12 apostles. In the Episcopal Church, we do that to some extent---although we don’t put the same importance on it as they do. The Roman Catholic Church has always been more adamant about the idea of the priest being Christ’s representative on earth. (That is one of the reasons that a priest has to be a man.) This idea of the clergy’s authority to absolve comes partly from this reading from John. Jesus said to his disciples, “As the Father has sent me, so I send you…If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them…” Jesus was giving his apostles something that not only would they need but also something that all Christians would need. The best people to convey this gift of forgiveness were those who had spent the most time with him, essentially been trained by Jesus. 

         The idea of Christian leaders forgiving others eventually became doctrine in the church and was corrupted in some circles. One of the things that the Protestant Reformation sought to do was to remove the priest as a mediator between the people and God. At this time, in the 1500’s and before, a person had to seek forgiveness from a priest. They could not simply confess their sins to God. This paved the way for a corrupt practice called indulgences, where people would “donate” money to the church or the priest to have their sins forgiven, or even forgive the sins of loved ones who had already died. Given how corrosive this practice was, one can understand why the church reformers were eager to get rid of the middleman (and yes, it was always a man). 

         The Church of England (which is our mother church) was just being formed at this point (right around the time of the Protestant Reformation) and as usual they sought the middle way, the compromise between the Protestants and the Catholics. While this middle way has taken on many different forms, the idea has always been the while people can confess directly to God, there is also the provision for a priest to declare this forgiveness verbally. Sometimes it is good to hear it out loud. 

        I have always been a little uncomfortable with this part of my job. I know that a priest doesn’t need to pronounce forgiveness for forgiveness to be granted. It makes me feel a little hypocritical knowing that I am so heavy with my own sin, and yet here I stand pronouncing forgiveness for all of you. Yet where I find comfort, is in the flaws of the apostles themselves. Jesus was very aware of the many imperfections of the men who were cowering in that room. Yet despite their failures, Jesus still asked his apostles to be his representative, to forgive others on his behalf, not because they themselves were not in need of forgiveness, but because they knew that they needed it more than anyone. 

         Even though Conor and I have been priests for almost our whole married lives, we pretty much never absolve each other. A couple of times he absolved me when I did not think I needed to be absolved and that was the end of that. Yet we both know, that it does not take a priest to forgive, just a person. Of course you can always expect it from a priest, because it’s part of the job description. 

         Sometimes I think that we see this call to forgive one another as a labor of love. We think it is something we have to do to be good Christians, that we have to forgive others so we can be forgiven, a kind of quid pro quo. However, if we look at it as something that Jesus gave to his most beloved disciples, then maybe it’s not such a hardship. Instead, what if we saw forgiveness as a gift, a gift that we are empowered to use and share? Because the thing about forgiveness is that it always helps both people. Letting go of anger, resentment, bitterness, jealousy, that is a gift to yourself, even more so than the person you may be forgiving. One of my favorite quotes about forgiveness is, “When you forgive you set a prisoner free. And then you discover the prisoner was you.” 

         I am not saying it is easy. I find it especially difficult when the person does not apologize or seem sorry at all. I rationalize my not forgiving them by saying that they do not deserve it, or that they do not even want to be forgiven, so what’s the point? Well that is assuming that forgiveness only benefits the person who is being forgiven. And we know there is more to it than that. 

         Jesus knew what it was to be hurt by the people who he loved the most. I am sure it was not easy to forgive them when he found them huddled in a locked room after deserting him when he was arrested. But he forgave them, and in doing so gave them the power to forgive others. Before they could forgive others, they had to forgive themselves. 

         That is one of the greatest challenges in forgiving others. We haven’t really figured out how to forgive ourselves. Yet we have to forgive ourselves, not because we deserve it, but because God has already forgiven us. By refusing to forgive ourselves or others, we are rejecting God’s grace. If God has already forgiven, we have no right to hold on to our sins or the sins and offenses of others. 

         And I know it’s not easy to let go. I think sometimes we assume forgiveness is some switch we can just turn on and then walk away. Forgiveness, like so many things, is a process. It’s not necessarily a once and done kind of thing. It’s a decision we make over and over again. But it’s a decision worth making. The power to forgive isn’t some special power Jesus gave to his disciples 2000 year ago. It’s a gift God has given to all of us and it’s a gift that we need to share.

Mary Magdalene Knew Darkness: April 20

Year C, Easter                                      John 20:1-18                                                                                                   Mary Magdalene is probably one of the most misrepresented and misunderstood people in the bible.  Part of the problem is that the name Mary, was the most common female name in the New Testament.  It is understandable that people might confuse her with the Mary of Bethany who is Lazarus’ sister and is the same Mary who poured perfume on Jesus’ feet and wiped it up with her hair.  But it’s not the same Mary. 

A good example of common misperceptions 

Mary Magdalene is commonly described as a prostitute even though there is no evidence to indicate this is true.  It was mostly likely an accusation that was used to discredit her because people didn’t want women leaders in the early church. However, what really sealed her fate was the claim that Pope Gregory the Great made in 591 that she was the same Mary as Mary of Bethany, as well as the unnamed woman who was caught in adultery.  He based this on…absolutely nothing but his own assumptions.

The other common accusation is that she had some sort of romantic relationship with Jesus.  Because obviously a single woman could only be important to Jesus if she was romantically involved with him.  The only slightly negative thing in the actual Biblical text about Mary Magdalene is that she was someone who Jesus released demons from, which could mean any number of things.   

What we know about Mary Magdalene---because it’s in every single Gospel—is that she was at the empty tomb.  In three out of the four gospels, she is also present at the crucifixion, even when every other disciple (except one unnamed disciple who is only mentioned in John) abandoned Jesus to die alone. She witnessed him suffer on the cross, was there to mourn him, and then spread the news of his resurrection. That is the truth of Mary Magdalene. 

It would be hard to be a woman in ministry and not spend some time thinking about Mary Magdalene.  I have studied her over the years, but admit that I forgot she was the same Mary who Jesus banished demons from.  That story wasn’t convenient to the narrative I created for her, so I forgot it.  I wanted to focus on her strength and her role as a leader in the early church. Yet this week, as I considered  her place in the story of the resurrection, I realized that her demon possession made her role in the resurrection that much more profound. 

One of my favorite details of John’s Easter story is that it starts in the dark. “Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb….”  My day started in the dark today because of our 5:30am service, but I had electric lights to guide me.  I knew that when I got to the church, there would be people around.  Mary Magdalene walked where there were no street lights, no flashlights.  She was going to a tomb of a man who had been killed by the Romans. It was a dangerous place to be. We know this because in the Gospel of Matthew, there were guards posted at the tomb to ensure no one stole the body.

  In the other gospels, multiple women went to the tomb and they went with a purpose. They went to anoint Jesus. But in the Gospel of John, Jesus was anointed by two of his secret disciples right before he was buried. Mary didn’t seem to be going there to anoint his body. She was going there to grieve, to grieve alone.

The Gospels include many stories of Jesus exorcising demons.  Many biblical scholars have concluded that those who were considered possessed were probably suffering from a mental or physical illness, something that could not easily be described or understood. Mary was described as having 7 demons.  We can’t know exactly what that looked like, but I am willing to bet that this woman had known darkness on many levels.  She knew what it was to be controlled by something, to be alone, to be ostracized. She knew darkness.

 We in the church love to talk about light in the darkness, about light conquering the darkness. That is how the Gospel of John begins. “The light shines in the darkness and the darkness did not overcome it.” Yet I wonder if in our desperation for light, we have lost the beauty and the wisdom that can come in the darkness.

When Mary went  to the tomb and saw that the stone was rolled away, she did the most logical thing. She went and told the disciples that Jesus’ body was gone.  She assumed someone had taken it. Because really, that was the most logical assumption.  The disciples needed to see it for themselves.  Peter and the beloved disciple (who by the way, we don’t know who it was) ran to the tomb. The text says, “(the beloved disciple) saw and believed; for as yet they did not understand the scripture, that he must rise from the dead.” That’s a confusing statement. What did they believe? It would appear, they just believed what Mary told them as they had now confirmed it.  The tomb was empty.  They did not yet know that Jesus had risen from the dead. They returned to their homes, but Mary stayed. She stayed alone outside an empty tomb because she was the kind of person who understood darkness.  She might not have liked it, but she was willing to sit in it for awhile.

            When the other disciples ran to the safety of their homes, she stayed and wept. No one knows how long. The text makes it seem like it was brief, but I imagine her staying for hours. Then she looked in.  When she first came to the tomb, it doesn’t say she looked in. It just said that she saw the stone was rolled away and immediately went to the disciples to let them know.

I think it took her some time to garner the strength to look in that tomb. It’s not easy to look in the place where your dead friend is supposed to be. It is not easy to confront our own grief. Because she took that time and stayed in that dark place, angels appeared.  Angels appeared and asked her why she was crying.  God bless her, she answered them kindly. (More than I would have done.)  She told them she was crying because someone took away her Lord and she didn’t know where he was.  Then another man, who she assumed was a gardener, asked the same inane question.  She accused him of taking the body.  She was bold. For a woman to be alone with men at that time was a risky thing. 

She should have run as soon as random men showed up asking her stupid questions.  But she stayed.  She stayed and spoke up, as she had no doubt done before.  Because of that…Jesus called her by name.  Then she saw him for who he was, not just the man who had freed her from demons, but her Lord and savior who had now defeated death.

            We all come to the tomb in different ways.  Maybe we come like Peter did.  We run as fast as we can, look in and see the emptiness and then run home and wait for a clearer invitation.  Maybe like the beloved disciple we find the courage to investigate but also return to our homes to wait for Jesus to barge in our front door.  Or maybe we have the courage of Mary to approach in darkness, get the wrong idea and then argue with people who try to help…but eventually drop our defenses enough, cry long enough— to hear Jesus’ voice break through the darkness. 

What I hope and pray, is that you will consider what your own approach to the tomb looks like, feels like, and sounds like.  What does holiness and rebirth look like to you? Where in your life do you need resurrection? Maybe it takes you awhile.  That’s ok.  If it does, I hope you will find some peace in the darkness because God comes to us in all kinds of places.  The more comfortable we are in the darkness, the more likely we are to find Jesus while those around us curse the darkness— the more likely we are to believe that there is hope, long before we see the light.  Light and darkness live side by side and as Christians, we find ways to live with them both.

Icons aren't meant to provide an accurate representation, but they do imply that this is someone who deserves respect, which is why I prefer this over most images. 

Loving in Pain: April 13, 2025

Year C, Palm Sunday                                                  Luke 22:39-23:49                                                                In my first church, we had an elaborate drama for Palm Sunday.  There were costumes and props.  It was my job to orchestrate it all and it was not my favorite job.  Recruiting the people to play the various parts was always tricky.  People would complain if they got Judas or Peter, Pilate or the soldiers... I remember one year someone asked, “Why do I always have to be the bad guy?” I replied, “They are all bad guys, except Jesus and no one want to be him either.”  Now, that’s not really true. Peter wasn’t a bad guy, just someone who was weak, as many of us are.  To some degree everyone in the passion play (besides Jesus) acted poorly (sometimes cruelly), but they weren’t evil. In my experience directing this drama, it was always hardest to find someone to play Jesus.  One year a young father was Jesus and as the soldiers dragged him away, I heard his 4 year old son ask, “Why does my dad have to be Jesus?”

          Each Gospel writer tells the story a little differently.  Every year in the Episcopal Church, we focus on a different Gospel writer---this year it’s Luke.  In Luke, Jesus seems to handle it all with a bit more composure.  For instance, the other Gospels have Jesus getting a lot more frustrated when the apostles fall asleep right before his arrest. In Luke, Jesus only checks on them once and then acknowledges that they are sleeping because they are grieving.  When he is walking to his crucifixion and the women are weeping, he turns to them and tells them not to weep for him, but to weep for themselves. It wasn’t a comforting statement, but it showed that even in the midst of his own pain, he was able to acknowledge the pain and grief of others.

          What really blows my mind in the Gospel of Luke is how he acts when he is hanging on the cross. A few years ago I was in the ICU in extraordinary pain and I have to say, I was not thinking about anyone else.  All I could think of was my pain. It was complete tunnel vision. After that when I was writing my book of irreverent prayers I thought a lot about the pain that Jesus must have been experiencing on the cross. He was nailed to a cross, (and this was after being beaten).  He was in agony, barely able to breathe.  Speaking would have been excruciating. And what did he do with his few remaining breaths? He forgave the people who crucified him and provided comfort and paradise to the criminal who was dying beside him.  In the other Gospels he cried out to God asking why he had been forsaken.  In Luke, his last words were, “Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.” In other words, I give myself to you.

          There is a part of me that prefers the other Gospels where Jesus’ agony feels a little more like my own experiences. I can identify with the Jesus who gets irritated and then feels abandoned when he is in extraordinary pain. Then I remind myself that I am not Jesus. I want to be like Jesus, but I don’t want to be Jesus.  I can just barely pull off being a little bit like him. I doubt any of us wants to be Jesus.  But I am so very grateful that this Jesus who experiences agony and still loves and forgives us the God we worship.  This Jesus we worship is a God who knows pain—not just on the day of his crucifixion— but every day. Despite that pain, his compassion for us runs deep and wide.

Another part of Luke’s version that I love is the moment after Peter denies Jesus for the 3^rd time, Luke says “The Lord turned and looked at him.” That is all it says. I want you to think of that look that Jesus gave Peter.  Luke doesn’t tell us what the look was, but I believe it was a look of love and forgiveness.  It was a look that said, “You kind of screwed up there, but I still love you.” It was a look that saw past Peter’s fear and into his heart, a heart that was broken, but also a heart that would serve God as long as it was still beating. 

A lot of my sermons remind us all of why it’s not easy to be a Christian, why we have to commit ourselves to our faith, try harder, be better. But today, in the midst of this story of pain, betrayal, denial, and sacrifice, I want to lift up the God who loves us through it all.  I know we are in a time when many of us feel powerless, helpless, like we can’t possibly do enough, even if we knew what the right thing to do was.  We just don’t know and that feels horrible.

God sees the pain in you and God sees the joy.  God sees it all. Right now, in this moment, I pray that you can release your fear, anger, disappointment, insecurity, grief—whatever is weighing you down and feel God’s compassion and love. That’s what this story, this story we call “The Passion”, is all about. It’s about the way that Jesus’ compassion superseded his pain.  It’s the way that he loved us and still loves us. 

Wanting to be Found: March 30

 Year C, Lent 4                                                           Luke 15:1-3, 11b-32                                                   

This Gospel reading is one of the most well-known parables in the Bible and also the parable that responsible siblings everywhere love to hate.  It’s often called “The Prodigal Son” which is somewhat of a misnomer.  The word prodigal doesn’t appear in the text, but it refers to the behavior of the youngest son who wasted his father’s money living recklessly.  Later the older brother accused him of wasting his money on prostitutes, but those are just accusations of an angry brother.  There is no point in adding on more sins to those of the younger brother.  If we focus on the sins of the sons rather than the love of the father, we miss the point of the story.  More recent biblical translations refer to this story as the “lost sons” or the “loving father.”

When considering the parable, a good place to start is the first three verses.  These verses show us why Jesus is telling this story.  Jesus didn’t just tell stories because he liked telling stories. They were often in response to questions or even comments that people around him made.  This story is a reaction to the comment that the Pharisees and Scribes were making. They said, “This fellow welcomes sinners and eats with them.”  I think we often read this and think, oh, sinners like me…these weren’t people who did something horrible, they were just regular old sinners.  But what if these people who Jesus was eating with were cruel or violent?  Would you want to share a meal with someone who sold drugs to children, someone who trafficked people?  It’s quite possible that these were the kind of people Jesus was sharing a meal with.  This is not to say that he was condoning what they did. No doubt, he encouraged them to change and be better.

We can better understand where the Pharisees and Scribes were coming from if we imagine these sinners as those people who are hurting others…who are actually causing harm to our world.  Consider the reaction Trump got when he had dinner with a Nazi sympathizer several years ago.  It was a pretty strong reaction. Now, I am not comparing Trump to Jesus, but we definitely judge people based on who they spend time with.  Jesus was becoming kind of high profile by that time which meant that who he chose to dine with, sent a message.

            It was in reaction to those comments that Jesus told this story.  The reason that  people are now calling this story “the parable of the lost sons,” is because there were two parables that came right after the comment from the Pharisees and Scribes, but before Jesus told the story of the lost sons.  The first story is of a shepherd who has 100 sheep.  One wanders off and the shepherd goes after the one and leaves the 99.  Jesus concludes that parable by saying, “there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous people who need no repentance.” The next story is a woman with 10 silver coins who loses one and goes to considerable effort to find that one.  She rejoices with friends and family when she finds it and the story concludes with, “there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents.”  These two parables show the importance of the lost being found and repentance.

            Thus it would make sense that the next parable would also be focused on those who are lost.  The youngest son is literally lost in a faraway place.  They had no idea if he would ever come home. They probably assumed that he wouldn’t.  But what about the older son, was he lost?  In many ways, he was.  Despite the fact that he obviously has a very loving father, who came outside to beg him to come in, he said that he had worked as a slave for him.  That is the way he saw working on a farm and land that he would inherit.  That’s an important point.  While the younger son had a small portion of the inheritance, the older son would inherit all the rest. 

Despite that future inheritance, we can understand why he was resentful.  He had done everything right while his brother insulted his father by asking for his inheritance early (which, at the time, was akin to wishing your father dead) and then wasted it.  Then instead of being reprimanded when he came home, he was given a party. Did the older son get a party? Nope.  The way he saw it, his father had given him nothing.  The way his father saw it, he had given him everything.  He said, “all that is mine is yours.” The older son just wanted a little recognition for being responsible and loyal.  I think many of us can appreciate that.  But the problem with the older son is that his need for appreciation had built into resentment, so much so that he couldn’t even refer to his brother as his brother.  He called him, “that son of yours.”

You know what they say about resentment— it’s like drinking poison and waiting for the other person to die.  The older son was lost.  He wasn’t bad or wrong, but he was lost.  Remember who was listening to this story-- the Pharisees and the Scribes, the very people who had dedicated their lives to the faith. Had they gotten a little caught up in the rules and judging people? Sure they had.  Many of them were still good and faithful people. I imagine it drove them crazy to see this obviously holy man hanging out with notorious sinners instead of them. They were a little lost themselves.  But notice that Jesus wasn’t telling them they were bad…he was just telling them that there was room in his heart for both sets of people, but the place he was going to put his energy, was with the people who really needed him and were most receptive to him.

In the end, this is a story about the Father’s love for both sons and God’s love for us.  We are all lost in different ways. We might be someone who has walked away from our faith and are afraid to return, or maybe afraid of a church that has wounded us.  We might be the one who has remained committed to our faith over our whole life, but we’ve gotten a little too comfortable, a little too complacent. Maybe we are upset with the changes that we see in the church, especially when they come from those new people who just showed up.  It doesn’t matter what way you are lost, if you are here or watching online, there is a part of you that wants to be found.  Whether you can admit it or not, you want to be found by God.

While the parable about the sheep and the coin both mention repentance, the parable of the lost sons doesn’t. We don’t know if the younger son was sincere in his repentance or if he was just hungry. The father ran to him before the son could get a word out.  I bet it was a lot easier for the younger son to repent when he saw that his father still loved him.  We also don’t know what the older son did? Did he go inside and greet his brother or did he stay outside and stew?  By leaving the story open ended, Jesus was challenging the Pharisees and also challenging all of us. Can we let go of our resentments and anger and accept the love of a God whose love doesn’t always seem fair? Can we admit that we are lost and wanting to be found.  I hope so, because what this story tells us his that God always meets us more than half way.  God never stops searching for you.