Homily 10.31.2020 (All Saints / All Souls)

Readings

1st Reading: Wisdom 3:1-9
2nd Reading: Romans 6:3-9
Gospel: John 6:37-40


At this time when the veil between the spirit world and our world is thin, I invite us to take a moment to honor the ancestors of the places where we are currently located, those who tended this land long before our own ancestors arrived.

We remember, we celebrate, we believe. This phrase from our opening song captures well the heart of these holy days of remembering and celebrating our beloved friends and ancestors who have passed on from this incarnation of life and we believe in this remembering and celebrating that they are still with us, united in the love of God that spans all time, and space, life, and death.

All three of our readings today emphasize this idea of connection – we are united to God and Christ not only in this life, but also in death and the new life that comes from death. Sophia wisdom reminds us that the souls of our beloved departed are in the hands of God. Paul opens our eyes to the Sacrament of Baptism as union with Christ in these cycles of life, death, and resurrection, the cycles of creation all around us, and the hopeful message that death is a necessary part of this cycle and from death springs new life. Our Gospel reminds us that in this intimate connection to the Triune God through the incarnation of Jesus we are promised life eternal, we continue to live on as we transition into an even deeper union with the divine in a Love that crosses all boundaries, including life and death.

Knowing that through this unitive presence of divine love we are connected to all who have gone before us and all who will come after us, we can call on these ancestors by name and invite in their gifts and support in our lives today. This is honestly one of my favorite things about Catholicism and our theological imagination: the understanding of the Communion of Saints. There are holy men and women who we can pray to and call on when we need them or their particular gifts in our lives. And this communion of saints extends beyond just the canonized, more well-known ancestors of faith, they include our more personal family members and ancestors as well, who through prayer we can also call on and invite into our lives here and now to support us with their gifts and blessings.

The necklace I am wearing tonight is my ancestor necklace, it contains a locket of my grandparents who have passed on, it includes a medallion of St. Francis and St. Clare, it includes a medallion of Our Lady of Guadalupe, our great divine Mother, and a medallion I bought from the Catacombs of Priscilla of an engraving of an early woman church leader leading prayer. They are all part of my communion of saints who I draw on in prayer and who’s support I feel on my own unraveling spiritual and life journey.

For millenia, at this particular time of year, cultures around the world have recognized there is something special and mysterious about our ability to connect with our beloved departed. Some of the language used is a thinning of the veil that separates the worlds. Given the rich Mexican-American cultural heritage in this country and our communities we might be most familiar with celebrations of the Day of the Dead, but there are similar festivals honoring the dead around this time in many cultures including European, Asian, African, and Latinx. Most of these cultural celebrations involve either visiting the tombs of the departed and/or creating altars, hosting parties and celebrations around bonfires, storytelling, dancing, and song. There is almost always a feast and food shared, particularly favorite foods of the departed. What all of this says to me is that ritual to remember and honor the dead, the ancestors, is an intrinsic part of being human. It is part of who we are.


At this time I would like to open it up for some sharing about what are the traditions in your own family or ancestral lineage to remember and celebrate the dead?


Food is an important part of these celebrations and rituals to honor the dead. Some include sharing a meal with the dead, leaving food out for them, or eating their favorite foods as a way to celebrate their ongoing presence.

I know there are certain foods or food related experiences that remind me of my grandparents who have passed on. I experience this when I make chocolate chip cookies in my grandmother’s green glass mixing bowl. Or over the summer when I went fishing with my nephews and then we cooked the fish we caught, I was reminded of my grandpa and our fishing trips.


What are some favorite foods or meals that remind you of the presence of your beloved departed?


As Catholics, we engage in the ritual meal of remembering our beloved dead every week! This is the Eucharist. When Jesus gathered with his friends before he passed and shared a meal, he said “do this in memory of me,” and in many of the resurrection appearances his presence was known in the breaking of the bread and the sharing of the meal. We believe Christ is truly present in the meal we share in his honor. And in continuing this ritual meal we are also bringing into presence all of the ancestors who have shared this meal over the centuries.

On this celebration of All Saints/All Souls may we be particularly tuned in to the presence of Christ and the whole communion of saints that accompany us in the breaking of the bread, and may we live in such a way that the generations who come after us may continue to be blessed by our memory and legacy.

Homily 10.4.2020 (Feast of St. Francis)

Readings:

1st Reading: Praises of God by St. Francis
2nd Reading: Phil 4:6-9
Gospel: MT 21:33-43

Holy. Strong. All Good. Love. Wisdom. Humility. Patience. Joy and Gladness. Justice. Beauty. Hope. Protector. Our Great Sweetness. 

These attributes and praises of God heard in our first reading today by St. Francis, speak to a reality that is not beyond or outside of us, but that is within us as Imago Dei - the images of God - and woven into and throughout the very fabric of creation. This weekend we honor and celebrate the life and witness of St. Francis of Assisi, one of our patron saints here at Sts. Clare & Francis, and we draw on his wisdom and spirituality rooted deeply in devotion to the God present in all of creation and uniquely embodied in the life of the Christ to help guide us and accompany us in the work we are called to today.

There is power in choosing and there is power in naming. The names we choose for ourselves are incredibly significant and have consequences. To highlight this on a personal level I’d like to share a little about my own relationship with St. Francis and then look at our community’s relationship with Francis. When I was facing the choice to be confirmed into the Catholic faith and had my doubts and questions about the institution and whether I really believed or wanted to be a part of it, the saint I turned to and chose as my confirmation saint was St. Francis of Assisi, and I have been blessed by that choice and naming ever since. When I traveled to Peru as a lay missionary, the church that I attended and served at was St. Francis of Assisi. It was through this Franciscan church community that I met my now husband, Roger, and we connected and grew in love through music just like Francis was a great lover of music, composing songs like the canticle of creation which we sung at the beginning of Mass. When I returned from Peru and was searching for a faith community that would honor and welcome my gifts I found Sts. Clare & Francis, ECC. The spirit of Francis has accompanied me in working to reconnect with the greater web of life in my development as an ecofeminist theologian and spiritual leader. I draw on the spirit of St. Francis in prayer frequently and I can feel his support, love, and encouragement. 

When this community was first forming and deciding on a name for itself, it chose Sts. Clare & Francis. In choosing Clare & Francis we invited in their spirits and legacies in a special way to guide us as a community and I believe they have. For the past year and a half or so we have been going through a process of discernment and visioning as a community to refine who we are and what we are called to do in the world as a witness to our faith. We can look to the saints we chose to model ourselves after to help give us wisdom and insight in this process, into the kind of community we are called to be at this time. 

We are called to ‘Preach the Gospel always, when necessary use words.’ 

This wisdom of Francis reminds us that our actions speak louder than our words. We are incarnate, embodied, divine beings. Yes we are called to speak out with our words as Francis frequently did, but our lives and actions should match those same values and beliefs spoken out loud. Choosing how to spend our time and resources speaks to our values as a community, and the witness of Francis calls us to take seriously the Good News of Jesus and work to realize the beloved community where justice reigns here and now in our midst. Part of this Good News involves making a preferential option for the poor, a vow that Francis and his community took seriously and that is a core part of Catholic Social Teaching today. How are we complicit in economic systems that continue to increase the wealth gap between the rich and poor, and what are we doing to not only meet the needs of those who are impoverished today but transform the systems keeping them impoverished tomorrow? And as we preach the Good News with our actions and work to transform these systems of inequality we are called to do so with great joy and celebration, with song and dance, praising our God who accompanies us in this work. 

We are called to rebuild the house of God which has fallen into disrepair. 

What is the house of God? Francis I think went through a few different understandings of this call which I believe continues to be our call today. At first, he thought it was the physical church building where he first heard the message. Later he came to understand it to be the wider church community and structure. And still further I believe he understood it to mean the whole of creation as the dwelling place of our God. Pope Francis’ encyclical Laudato Si’ - an encyclical deeply inspired by St. Francis of Assisi - reflects this understanding that this earth is our common home, the house of the living God which has not only fallen into disrepair but is being intentionally and systematically destroyed by human actions. I think we can see this call of Francis both in terms of rebuilding a new kind of Catholic community and also repairing the incredible harm happening throughout our common home. We are called to heal and repair the harm that has been committed in the name of God and Christ by welcoming and celebrating diversity and allowing each person to share their God given gifts with the church and with the world. We are called to help heal and repair our shattered relationships with the great web of life and to take bold, prophetic action in response to the worsening climate crisis. 

We are called to foster inter-religious dialogue and respect 

One famous encounter that St. Francis is known for is his meeting with the Muslim Sultan of Egypt during the Crusades, a bloody war between Christians and Muslims. Christian leaders were using fear and hatred to encourage young men to take up arms and fight against who they were told were their enemies in order to preserve their religion and way of life. Unfortunately we see a similar story playing out today. Francis however, at great personal risk, traveled and met with the Sultan of Egypt who received him and treated him warmly. It was through spending time together that Francis’ eyes and heart were opened to the beauty and deep faith of the Muslim people and he re-wrote his Order to include living peacefully among Muslims. We too today in an ever-changing world of religious diversity are called to get to know our neighbors and kin of differing faiths, to speak out against the violent actions fueled by white supremacy and Christian supremacy targeting other faith groups, and to work together to bring peace to our world. Which brings me to our final calling from Francis: 

We are called to be peacemakers. 

What does it mean to be a peacemaker in a violent world? St. Paul in his letter to the Philipians we heard today speaks of both the peace of God and the God of peace. St. Paul lived in the shadow of Roman occupation, in a violent world that saw his message as a threat to the status quo and powers that be, and imprisoned him and ultimately murdered him for his faithful witness. It is believed that this letter to the Philipians was written during one of his imprisonments. And yet he is able to speak of peace, and love, and justice even in these conditions because he knows a peace in his soul that only God can provide. 

St. Francis lived during violent times. Prior to his conversion he was a soldier and prisoner of war. After his conversion he continued to see great violence carried out in the name of God and Christ. He suffered ridicule and ostracization by family and friends, and yet he too continued to speak of good, love, justice, and peace because he knew the deep peace of God within him. 

How do we cultivate this grounding peace within us today and bring it into the world? We hear the powers that be call for peace in order to maintain their violent status quo. There is a chant we say in the streets: No justice, No peace - which recognizes that true peace cannot be separated from the reality of justice. Our call to be peacemakers in a world of violence today is a call to work for true justice so that all life can be healthy and thrive, and we do this work of justice rooted in the peace of God who hears our prayers and petitions, and who accompanies us in the struggle. 

There is a proverb: the more things change, the more they stay the same. While St. Francis lived over 800 years ago, the wisdom and witness of his life continues to be relevant to the times we are facing and our call as Christians today. I would like to end by inviting us to reflect on who we are called to be as channels of God’s peace in the world today as we listen to this beautiful prayer of St. Francis sung by Taft. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pKxuixb_ki0&list=PLYVjnvP5OvXfAFFMVJBXnnCahr-s7ECuu&index=5)

Homily 7.12.20

Readings:

IS 55:10-11
ROM 8:18-23
MAT 13:1-23

We just heard three passages from Scripture, the Word of God as we say after each reading. The words in all three of these readings point us to a deeper reality about the Word of God that does not solely dwell in books or even on the lips of human beings, but is also scattered in every seed, held in every rain drop, rooted down deep into the earth, and singing out to us in the symphony of the sounds of creation. Before I share a few more words with you mediated through my human body, I invite us to listen to the words of God woven into the beautiful creation that surrounds us. What more do they have to offer, what words of wisdom still want to be spoken? If you feel comfortable, I invite you to place your bare feet on the earth, breathe with the trees who breathe out what we breathe in, quiet the noises inside your head and heart and listen with your whole body to what our more than human siblings have to share.

 

[Pause for 2-3 min]

 

Would anyone like to share something they heard?

 

We are part of an absolutely incredible and complex ecosystem. Our bodies are ecosystems unto themselves, and we are also just one tiny part of this larger ecosystem of the environment in which we live, and the wider planet of earth. We can’t live without water, without oxygen, without another life form dying so that we can be nourished by its nutrients. The Buddhist teacher Thich Nhat Hanh calls this reality interbeing. Just as the plant is made up of sunshine, rain and soil, so too are we made up of sunshine, rain, and soil when we eat the plant. If what we rely on to eat becomes sick it can make us sick. We inter-are.

 

The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. understood this concept as well. He reflected in his Letter from a Birmingham jail that, “All life is inter-related. All of us are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly.

 

And the divine presence is woven into and throughout this incredible micro and macro system of inter-being. We are both the seed and the soil in the garden. The seed holds the full presence and potentiality of the emergent divine wisdom and incarnation. But it is also reliant on the environment that surrounds it to support this emergence and growth into what it desires to become. This is the wisdom of our Gospel tonight and of past and present prophets: the body of God is one giant living complex organism, and what impacts one part of it impacts the whole, for better or worse.

 

I would say I'm a novice gardener, I wasn’t raised in an agrarian environment like Jesus and his followers or like the ancient Jewish people of the Hebrew Scriptures, but I desire to learn what my ancestors knew about living in harmony with the land, and collaborating with the more than human world to bring forth life and sustenance. One thing I am learning is the importance of soil quality. Just like our Gospel pointed out, you need good quality soil for the seed to sprout and grow and thrive. When you don’t have good soil, the seed may never sprout, or it does but then it quickly dries out and dies, or it gets choked out by other invasive species.

 

Our bodies, are gardens unto themselves and also part of a larger garden. The lies we've been told about ourselves, about other living beings, and even about God, create poor soil conditions within this body and the collective body of the community. The same with negative thoughts and behaviors that we direct towards ourselves and others. If you haven’t heard it enough: you are good. You were born good. Your body is holy and sacred. You are loved beyond your wildest comprehension and there is nothing you can do to separate yourself from that love, except in your own mind. We have to nurture the soil of our bodies to create good health so life can grow, just like real soil and plants. 

 

Systems of oppression can’t bear fruit because they rooted in bad soil. Systems of oppression are death dealing, not life giving. White supremacy can never bear fruit, patriarchy cannot bear fruit, homophobia and transphobia cannot bear fruit, and this is why we are starving, because we are saturated in environments full of rock and sand in which only weeds can grow. The seeds that produce life and liberation are literally being choked out as they rise. We have a duty to ensure that not only our body but all bodies under attack can be nourished and healed and given the space to rise up and bear fruit a hundredfold. 

 

And because we are one living body, one living ecosystem, we can do this for each other. Plants already do this for one another! Take the example of trees. Trees are phenomenal for many reasons, but one is that when one is sick or a disease threatens their health - they will send extra strength and healing through an underground system of roots and communication to those in need!  Plants have underground railroad systems of deep root communication to take care of one another. Mycelium that make up fungi do this for many other plant species too. We have so much to learn from the words of God, the wisdom of God, woven into creation.

 

I want to end with this image from our second reading tonight of all creation groaning in labor pains. The brilliant Indian scholar and activist Arundati Roy has said "another world is not only possible, she is on her way. On a quiet day I can hear her breathing." Well I can not only hear her breathing but groaning, wailing, and shouting as she both births and midwife's this new world into being.

 

We are the body of earth groaning in labor pains. I can hear her in the streets reminding us it is our duty to fight for our freedom, it is our duty to win, we must love and support one another, we have nothing to lose but our chains! I can hear her in the unapologetic proclamations that all black lives matter. I can hear her in the chorus of #metoo and #timesup. I hear her in the cries of our youth shouting Fire and sounding the alarm as the climate crisis worsens. I can hear her in the indigenous resistance to the destruction of sacred land and ecosystems. And I can hear these birth pains in the beauty being created all around me and through me in resistance to these systems of oppression and this culture rooted in lies that has spread disease throughout the body of God and poisoned the soil.

 

But if you’ve ever seen a flower sprouting up through a crack in the concrete, you know there is hope. There is a saying I learned in Spanish from the freedom fighters in El Salvador, “se puede aplastar algunas flores, pero no se puede detener la primavera.” They can crush a few flowers, but they can’t stop the spring. There is power in community. Life is strong, and resilient, and new seeds are being planted every day. May we do all we can to cultivate the conditions of good healthy soil within us and the larger ecosystem so that we too can help birth and midwife this new world into being.  

Homily 5.3.2020

Readings: 

Acts 2:14, 36-41
Psalm 23
1 Peter 2:20-25
John 10:1-10

The Divine Shepherdess

May is here, and in the Catholic tradition this is a whole month dedicated to Mary, the Divine Mother, Queen of Heaven and Earth. Perhaps in your family you have participated in special devotions to Mary this month such as building a special altar for Mary and crowing her with a wreath of flowers, or giving renewed energy to praying the rosary. Maybe you didn’t even know that May was Mary’s month and now that you do you can create new traditions or recover ancient ones.  

The connections between the divine feminine and May pre-date Christianity, with the Greeks having dedicated this time of year to Artemis, the goddess of fecundity, and the Romans dedicating this time to Flora, the goddess of blooms. Christianity picked up these ancient connections between spring time and the divine feminine, and lifted up Mary as Queen of May, in connection with the season of life and beauty.  

This weekend, due to our lectionary readings, is also known as Good Shepherd weekend. We heard these passages about the Lord as shepherd, and Jesus as shepherd probably many times, and seen many statues, paintings and artistic representations of this image of the Good Shepherd. But since this is Mary’s month, I would like us to imagine and reflect today on the image of Mary as Divine Shepherdess. 

I did not invent this idea, the devotion to Mary as Divine Shepherdess has been around since at least the 1700s as Divina Pastora (or Divine Shepherdess in Spanish). This image of Mary as a shepherdess is credited to a vision of a Spanish Capuchin friar named Fray Isidore who lived in Seville, Spain in the early 1700s. He was devoted to Our Lady from early in his life and as a religious brother built small shrines to Our Lady along the roadways and taught the people how to sing the rosary while walking along the street. During one of these street tours Christ’s words, ‘I am the Good Shepherd” flashed across the Fray Isidore’s mind. That night he had a vision of the Blessed Virgin as a young shepherdess with a crook in her hand and a large straw hat falling over her shoulders. The next morning he hurried to an artist’s shop telling of his vision and ordered a picture be painted of Our Lady as she had appeared to him.

“Our Lady,” he said, sat on a rock under a tree. Her face radiated divine and tender love. Over a red tunic she wore a jacket of white sheepskin such as shepherds wore; from her shoulders hung a blue mantle. A large straw hat, held by a ribbon, dangled over her left shoulder. Near her right hand was a shepherd’s crook, symbolic of the love and care she gives her children. In her left hand she held a rose, while the right hand rested on the head of a lamb, which had sought shelter in her lap. The flock of sheep which surrounded her carried in their mouths – the Virgin’s Flower.  

The admiration of the Spanish for Our Lady as a Divine Shepherdess quickly spread. Practically every church had set aside a corner for the Divine Shepherdess. The Franciscans and Capuchin friars spread the devotion of Divina Pastora along with their missionary activities, as did other missionaries. Devotions to the Divine Shepherdess today are present around the world most notably in the Philippines, Venezuela, and France. 

The same characteristics that make a shepherd good as we heard in our Psalm and our Gospel reading today make the shepherdess good. She is the one who truly knows her flock, and will do all she can to ensure that they are safe, that they can rest, that they are well fed, that they have abundance of life. This is in contrast to what we know of those who are false shepherds, the thieves and robbers who only look out for themselves and steal, destroy, and kill. You can probably think of examples of these two different kinds of leaders or pastors right now, in your own life and experience. Those who truly know, love, and care for the well-being of others, and those who seek to gain and maintain their own power or privilege at the expense of the flock.   

One key characteristic of the good shepherdess is that she knows her sheep by name and we know her voice and follow that voice. As I contemplate the state of the world right now, all of the suffering and division, and the ever growing climate crisis, I can’t help but think we are where we are because we have forgotten the voice of the Divine Shepherdess. And it's not surprising given all the other voices that we have been inundated with since birth, voices that seek to foster ongoing division and discord, doubt and fear, voices that feed us lies daily about who we are and what we should do with our lives.

It has been and continues to be an ongoing journey of personal healing and transformation for me to tune out all those other voices and remember the voice of my Mother, the Divine Feminine, the Good Shepherdess; to reconnect to her in my body and the surrounding body of life. She has never left, I and we have just forgotten, and now is the time for us to remember and return.     

To return to the Mother is to return to the earth, to know the presence and power of resurrection budding all around us in the trees, flowers, greening of grass, and garden seedlings poking their head above ground. To return to the divine shepherdess and trust in her care and guidance is to know the peace and freedom of the sheep who wander the land, snack, take a nap, bask in the sun, frolic and play, and take another nap, trusting that in the words of Julian of Norwich, “all shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of things shall be well.” Because to know her is to know her constant presence, love, and protection, just like a good shepherdess.  

I believe she is calling to her sheep now, inviting us to come back home through her, the very gate that incarnated the Christ presence more fully into the world. To know and follow Christ is to know and follow the mother that brought him into the world and taught him the ways of the shepherd, taught him the ways of the earth and the path of love and beauty. 

This time of great challenge and change is also filled with great opportunity to sit and listen, to sing and listen, to dance and listen, to create and listen, to rest and listen. Listen for the voice of the Divine Shepherdess calling you home to her heart. Take a minute now of quiet, of breathing, of tuning into your heart, and listen. Who is the Divine Shepherdess to you? What might her invitation be to you this month of May, this month of Mary, this month of resurrection energy and new life? What questions or petitions do you have for her? 

[time of reflection and open response] 

Homily 2.8.2020

Readings: 

Isaiah 58:7-10

1 Corinthians 2: 1-5

Matthew 5:13-16

Grief and Praise

I’d like to do something a little different in the homily tonight, there are different stories and contexts I want to share that are all woven together through this chorus of grief and praise, and so I’d like to teach you a song, that we can sing together throughout the homily, as we weave these stories together. You up for that?

You have the words on a half sheet of paper, I’ll sing a couple lines then have you repeat it back to learn the tune. This is a song by Auspry that I learned at a community song circle.

[teach Grief and Praise]

Grief and Praise, Grief and Praise

Oh it turns the world around

Grief and Praise, Grief and Praise

I was lost but now I’m found

I can feel it in my bones, yeah in my bones

Crack me open like a stone, yeah like a stone

So when you hear me say “Grief and Praise” throughout the homily, I invite you to join me in this chorus.

There are a four different but intersecting contexts to our liturgy this evening that I’d like us to focus on. The first is the context of the faith tradition passed down through the centuries revealed in our Scripture readings tonight. Jesus as a Jewish rabbi, knew well the Hebrew Scriptures, particularly the prophets as he quoted them and their teachings often. It is the passage from Isaiah tonight that gives context to Jesus’ message about salt and light. Pairing the reading from Isaiah with this Gospel prevents an individualistic interpretation and puts it into its proper context of community, and more specifically a community that ensures the most vulnerable are cared for and protected as the true path towards making God’s light and love shine forth in the world.

There’s this great series of If/Then statements - IF you remove from your midst oppression, false accusation and malicious speech; IF you bestow your bread on the hungry and satisfy the afflicted; THEN light shall rise for you in the darkness, and the gloom shall become for you like midday. We can’t just say, “I’m going to let my light shine today” and then do nothing else. Non-action, silence, and complicity in systems of oppression are the equivalent of continuing to hide our light under a bushel basket, regardless of what we profess with our lips. The light in us, this spark of the divine present in all of creation, is what impels us to take action, to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, shelter the unhoused, call out the lies and malicious speech that surround us and enter into the struggle for liberation from all interconnected systems of oppression.

And this is not easy work. It is work that calls us to enter into the suffering, to be broken open, to shed tears of grief. But it is also through these salty tears we shed that our hearts of stone are broken open so that the light of Christ, the light of divine love, can being to shine forth. As you gather around the altar tonight, you will be encouraged to symbolize the tears you shed for the world by placing a pinch of salt into the bowl of water before the altar, entrusting them to the community gathered and the mystery of transformation we celebrate in the breaking and sharing of the bread. The stories of the steadfast presence of God, accompanying us, working for liberation in the context of great oppression and suffering, stories of salt and light, these are our stories, the stories of our ancestors, stories full of Grief and Praise.   

Grief and Praise, Grief and Praise

Oh it turns the world around

Grief and Praise, Grief and Praise

I was lost but now I’m found

I can feel it in my bones, yeah in my bones

Crack me open like a stone, yeah like a stone  

We are also in February, black history month, a time to honestly acknowledge and repent for the horrors endured by the black community at the hands of white supremacy and also celebrate the incredible brilliance and triumph of their spirit and the many ways they have made a positive impact in the world. Both are needed as we seek to live out the call of the prophet, to remove from our midst all oppression, false accusation, and malicious speech.

We need to tell the whole truth about the complicity of white Christians in the trans-Atlantic slave trade, the wealth accumulated on the backs of enslaved Africans, the abuse and torture of chattel slavery, and the silence and quiet complicity of all those who did nothing. We need to keep looking at how these systems of racial oppression continue to disproportionately harm the black community in the U.S. in basically every category of human rights. We can’t be salt and light, if we don’t honestly face this history and present reality. 

And we also need to tell the whole truth about the incredible brilliance, culture, and creativity of the many diverse people from the continent of Africa, who were brought to this country against their will and yet managed to keep alive that spark of the divine within them, resisting oppression and liberating their communities and continuing to foster and encourage that same spirit of brilliance, culture, and creativity of their ancestors. As we sit in the context of black history month, we sit in the reality of grief and praise.

Grief and Praise, Grief and Praise

Oh it turns the world around

Grief and Praise, Grief and Praise

I was lost but now I’m found

I can feel it in my bones, yeah in my bones

Crack me open like a stone, yeah like a stone

Today is also the feast of St. Josephine Bakhita, patron saint of survivors of human trafficking, as she herself was a survivor of slavery in the 1800s. Her feast was chosen as the World Day of Prayer and Awareness Against Human Trafficking. So we take time today to reflect on her story, an important part of black Catholic history, and connect it to our current reality that holds both grief for the millions of people in our world who are still enslaved through forced labor and sexual exploitation and also praise for the many who have been able to escape, reclaim their freedom, and pursue their dreams.

St. Bakhita was born in the Darfur region of South Sudan in 1869. At the age of seven she was kidnapped by Middle Eastern slave traders and re-sold multiple times throughout her childhood and adolescence. She was sold so many times she forgot her original name, and was given the name Bakhita by her slaver owners which meant “fortunate one.” She eventually ended up in Italy and was entrusted to the care of the Canossian Sisters while her owners were away on business. Living with the sisters she came to learn more about God and was able to put words to this Spirit that accompanied her and kept her alive during the brutal years of slavery. With the help of the Sisters and the patriarch of Venice she was granted her freedom and officially joined the order of the Canossian Sisters in 1896, choosing the name Josephine for herself. She lived and ministered with the Sisters the remainder of her life, sharing her story with all who would listen. She embodied the teachings of the prophet, caring for the poorest around her, shining the light of love brightly with all whom she encountered. 

While the legal slave trade that existed in the time of Bakhita has since been abolished, an illegal slave trade still exists in our world today in the form of human trafficking. Economic and gender based systems of oppression continue to treat people like commodities to be used, bought and sold for an individual’s profit or pleasure. St. Bakhita was targeted as a young girl, only 7 years old, and unfortunately children are still targeted today both for sexual exploitation and labor. It is estimated that one in four victims of human trafficking is a child. These aren’t just children living in foreign countries, that are our children, right here in this community who are being targeted.

I have been heart broken and inspired by the stories of survivors who were first trafficked at ages as young as 4 or 5, many by family members or trusted adults, and have since found the strength not only to heal themselves as adults but to advocate on behalf of others, and I continue to be outraged that this evil and abuse continues to persist in our communities and our world. St. Bakhita’s story like the story of so many survivors of human trafficking is one filled with deep grief and pain, but also hope and praise for the possibility of healing, restoration, and new life.  May this reality crack us open to let the light shine through and heal the broken body of Christ through Grief and Praise.

Grief and Praise, Grief and Praise

Oh it turns the world around

Grief and Praise, Grief and Praise

I was lost but now I’m found

I can feel it in my bones, yeah in my bones

Crack me open like a stone, yeah like a stone

Finally we are living in the context of our own community’s story, one of transition and visioning as we take this 2020 year to reflect on who we are, where we have been and where we are going. We are a community that over the years has experienced and shared together moments of deep grief for communal losses and transitions and also deep joy and praise for renewed life and hope. I believe this to be an important part of community, to be able to bring our whole selves just as we are, to accompany one another through the difficult moments of life as well as the celebratory ones.

To live the calling of our faith as Isaiah reminds us is to reach out beyond the boundaries of this community to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, shelter the unhoused, and remove all oppression and malicious speech from our presence.  It is by entering into these painful realities, accompanying one another as siblings in Christ, that THEN as the prophet reminds us, THEN we will make real the presence of God on this earth and our light shall shine through. And that is something to praise God for, that the spark of the divine in each of us grows and is illuminated in and through community, loving and serving one another through the good times and the bad, through both the grief and the praise.

Grief and Praise, Grief and Praise

Oh it turns the world around

Grief and Praise, Grief and Praise

I was lost but now I’m found

I can feel it in my bones, yeah in my bones

Crack me open like a stone, yeah like a stone