Keep Shoveling*

We’ve had lots of snow this week in Philadelphia. I have to laugh while people carry on about it. I spent a substantial part of my youth in Illinois, where this would not even have attracted anyone’s notice. I keep thinking, “it’s winter, it’s supposed to be like this.” Winter is good, because it is part of the cycle of creation. Summer brings heat and plant growth and bugs; winter brings snow and rain and cold, bugs die or hibernate, it is the cleansing cycle. So stop your bellyaching, I want to say.

It has been an even more curious week in the rest of the world. Wow I suppose the revolution in Tunisia was an amazing example of people power. But the spill-over into Egypt is genuinely frightening. It has not been this frightening on a global scale since the period when the Shah was driven from Iran and the world seemed to shift on its political axis. Let’s hope our own government knows what its doing (okay, we know it doesn’t, so let’s all just pray harder about that). Of course, the oppression of gay people in Egypt is well-documented and needs to come to an end. But replacing this regime doesn’t necessarily spell liberation. We’ll have to see. And wonder, we have to wonder, whether this is a kind of political winter. Is this a part of a cleansing cycle?

In the Anglican Communion there is considerable turmoil as well. The primates of the communion are meeting, except of course for the homo-phobes and mysogenists who have refused to attend because Presiding Bishop Jefferts-Schori is attending. David Kato Kisule, a lay leader in the Anglican Church of Uganda who had tried to organize the dialogue called for repeatedly by Lambeth councils about gay life in Africa, David was murdered this week. Let’s just make note that U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was the first to issue a press release condemning his murder and celebrating his life. The presiding bishop has also done so. At last, today, the Archbishop of Canterbury has done so as well, although let us also note that his press release backed away from acknowledgment of political murder.  No surprise there. Canterbury has rarely been so ill-served.

Am I ranting? I guess. Is this a proper homily? No, that should be clear by now.  This week’s scripture has no fun stories. The Gospel is Jesus preaching the beatitudes—you will be reviled if you love God. That’s always a neat slap in the face coming a few weeks after Christmas. The key this week is the last line in the pericope from Micah:  “and what does the LORD require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?” If that doesn’t sum up the whole of the Gospel I don’t know what does.

Do justice. Love kindness. Walk humbly with God. Easy enough to say. Much harder to do.

People are just sort of typically difficult. I think it is born of defense mechanisms that originally were programmed into our genes to help us flee from predators and protect our offspring. So we are constantly pushing back at each other, and constantly on guard at each other, and constantly ready to spring against each other. Not exactly a prescription for peace. What about all of those people on the streets in Egypt? What are they doing but pushing back, staying on guard, and springing against their oppressors.

But, there is another way to look at it. Maybe they are doing justice. They certainly have lived for decades, maybe even centuries, without justice. Maybe now is the time to do justice. Maybe they are loving kindness, and trying to throw off a regime that prevents both justice and kindness. And maybe, just maybe, they are walking humbly with God for once, instead of giving in to the demands of men. And I do mean men.

I’m not doing much for gay and lesbian uplift this week, am I? I think for that we have to look to the lesson from first Corinthians. Paul writes “has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world?” And a bit later, “God chose what is low and despised in the world, things that are not, to reduce to nothing things that are.” Ahh, that sounds like us. You see, there we are, wise for being oppressed, low and despised maybe, but lifted up by God because of it. As I keep telling you, God made us gay on purpose because the world needs us. We might be oppressed by humans but we are blessed by God for our capacity to love and our capacity to encourage doing justice and loving kindness wherever we go in the world. And when we do that, we are walking humbly with our God.

Okay go shovel your snow. There’s more coming Wednesday so you have a few days to clear out last week’s stuff. Think about it as a life metaphor. As you shovel, think about what in your life needs to be shoveled out of the way. So that when the sun next shines, you can do justice, and love kindness, which is why gay people have been put here. To show the world how to walk humbly with God.

*Fourth Sunday after Epiphany (Micah 6:1-8, Psalm 15, 1 Cor. 1:18-31, Matthew 5:1-12)
©2011. The Rev. Dr. Richard P. Smiraglia. All rights reserved.

Jesus, You, By the Seaside*

You do remember this is a gay blog, right? One thing I want glbt people to learn to do is to be proud of being gay. Another thing I want us to do is learn to read the Gospels with gay eyes; these stories are about us too, you see.

Well, when I was in seminary we had a lot of chatter, that is “we the gay folk,” about this particular Gospel, because it is a very gay-resounding story. To understand that, you need to understand what it meant to be a seagoing sailor who caught fish. Okay, enough with the polite stuff: you need to know we’re talking about a lot of men in their 20-30s (but mostly at the low end of that scale) and they’re all working naked. Think about it. If “clothed” meant a tunic, you would take that off to get into the water, wouldn’t you?  So, here is Jesus walking along selecting naked men to be his disciples. But I’m going to stop there. As I said last week, you can fill in the gaps for yourself according to your own experience of gay life.

You see, the magic of the Gospels is that they are written to liberate every one (and I split that deliberately), every single one. There are a zillion ways you can read that story so you are in it. And that is really the magic of the Gospels. They are not instructions for us; rather, they are stories about us. So our job is to see how we fit in.

Do we immediately leave our nets and follow Jesus? Everybody in this story did just that. Why would we do that? It says because we could learn to follow Jesus. And Jesus was proclaiming the good news of the kingdom.

I have to admit after almost two decades of preaching and writing I get pretty weary of trying to be a beacon of light in the gay community. In the church, we have a lot of gay people. They pretty much are scared that they are only being slightly tolerated. How many times have I been to meetings where gay vestry would say “well, we won’t get the crazy ones”—meaning gay people who might dare to hold hands, or sit close, or pray together. In the real world, there are many many gay people who just say “I reject religion” and won’t even talk about it. Of course, they are hurt, from having been rejected by religious communities.

Do you want me to say that’s okay? I won’t because it isn’t. There is no justification for any oppression of gay people in Christianity.

There is no justification. None, Nada, zip, zilch. I don’t care what you now think you are going to bring up “but it says …” or “ but she told me …” there is none. As Peter says in Acts, ‘there is no partiality in Christ Jesus.’ No partiality. And you are made gay, lesbian, bisexual, or transgendered in the image of God. Goodness there is a whole sermon there isn’t there, about how God is the very image of transgender?

Paul says this week “Has Christ been divided?” What a heroic preacher he was. No. I love the last line of this pericope: “for the message about the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.” And that’s just about it. Are you with God? If so, then the power of the cross is the power that brings you home to God. And if not, then all is foolishness.

Let’s go back to Jesus walking by the lake ….; did you think that story was about some old guys two thousand years ago? Ha ha … that story is about you. Jesus is choosing you. Right there wherever you are, however you are.

The message of this Gospel to gay and lesbian and bisexual and transgendered Christians is to come out with power. Isaiah says “there will be no gloom for those who were in anguish.” My friends God has given us life, and God has given us gay life on purpose to give us joy of a particular and special kind, and God has called us to spread that joy into all of God’s creation.

Amen.

*3rd Sunday after the Epiphany (Isaiah 9:1-4, Psalm 27:1, 5-13, 1 Corinthians 1:10-18, Matthew 4:12-23)

© 2011 The Rev. Dr. Richard P. Smiraglia. All rights reserved.

Seduction*

I guess Christmas is gone. All of the ornaments are put away. When I come downstairs in the morning I’m still a bit surprised not to find the Christmas tree. And ironically, we now have perfect “white Christmas” weather, cold and crisp and “snow lay all around” and so on. About all that’s left now are the memories. And the gifts.

We like to carry on about the gifts, either spending too much emotional energy on them or too much money or, alternatively, worrying too much about how they corrupt the spirit of Christmas. But it seems just about right this year—all of the outward signs of Christmas are gone, but as you move around our house, the gifts, which by now have been completely integrated into the flow of our lives, are visibly present. Our lives are enriched by them, and our hearts are warmed by using them in cognizance of the love that lay behind each.

It reminds me a little bit of the way glbt folk tend to occupy points along a social continuum between being either very gay or what we keep seeing in Craig’s List referred to as straight-acting. Let’s face it people, we’re gay. And we derive not just sexual identity from acknowledging our community, but also a sense of enrichment and warmth. Sort of like those gifts in the season after Christmas. We are all better off for knowing of each others’ presence, and to the extent we are able to participate in the real or virtual glbt communities, we are enriched by the experience. The proverbial “gift that keeps on giving,” I guess.

This gift of course is love. But more than that, it also is fellowship, which is the spiritual expression of love. You don’t have to go to a gay bar or a lesbian dance or the lgbt community center to experience this fellowship. All you have to do is accept yourself as God made you, to know that you are part of this greater spiritual community. Therein lies the gift.

So that brings me to this week’s scripture—because, of course, this is all a metaphor for the gifts of life and love given us by God, and the gifts of unity given us by God through Christ. Before you were even in your mother’s womb God had called you to this glbt life, to exercise your spiritual gifts by making fellowship of love in the human community. God does not require worship from you, rather, God has given you ears to hear God’s call to you. Listen to it in the quickening of your heart, in the warmth in your soul. And then proclaim who you are in the company of the community, for you have been enriched in every way.

I had a good chuckle (maybe I should say “LOL”) looking at this passage from John’s Gospel. Yes, outwardly it is the story of the calling of Jesus’ disciples Andrew and Peter from among the cohort of John the Baptist’s disciples. But look at it again, with the eyes of your gay heart. Jesus is being very coy, which is very seductive. There aren’t many details—for instance, it just says they were “standing” with John—it doesn’t tell us where. Not until the end do we learn it was 4 pm—T-dance time. It says John “exclaims”—now place one hand on one hip, and push, wave the other hand in the air, and “exclaim.” Remind you of anything? The disciples follow Jesus, discretely—or not. The punctuation provides the dramatic pause we need, to imagine the disco music fading out as Jesus turns to ask “what are you looking for?” Go ahead, fill in the rest for yourself.

It is a seduction of sorts. And there are two lessons here for glbt people. First, that the stories about Jesus are not exclusively the province of any band of humans. Rather, they are written so that everyone who encounters them can be drawn in, you and me included, and imagine ourselves, as ourselves, in the scene. Second, and more importantly, is that Jesus asks you and me to enter this seductive dance so that when we respond to his call to “Come and see” we too, will choose to stay.

One more thing. The choice to stay with Jesus is transformative. In the story Jesus gives them new names. In reality the encounter with Jesus transforms everything within us, enriches us in every way as Paul writes. It is just like our post-Christmas encounters with our gifts from those who love us and whom we love, contacts which generate the warmth of love with every encounter. Encounter Jesus, embrace your gay self, “come and see,” and live.

*2nd Sunday after the Epiphany (Isaiah 49:1-7, Psalm 40:1-12, 1 Corinthians 1:1-9, John 1:29-42)

©2011 The Rev. Dr. Richard P. Smiraglia. All rights reserved.

You thought it was just about Marriage!*

Last Monday the Episcopal News Service put out a notice that the Bishop of Massachusetts had solemnized the marriage of two female priests. It seemed like a sort of hallmark to me at the time so I made a note to note it here. You can read the story at the ENS site:  http://www.episcopalchurch.org/80263_126369_ENG_HTM.htm. Of course, probably thousands or millions even were married last Monday, and even hundreds by bishops, so we have to pause for a moment to think about why this merits a news release. Our marriages are still rare enough to evoke interest from society. I suppose for us, glbt folks, each one is sort of a marker of progress made.

The next day I flew to Toronto for my annual winter break, a bit of retreat time for writing and sleeping late. As it happened, that afternoon some friends were married at City Hall, in the same place where my husband and I were married two years ago. I was delighted to attend, and it brought up lots of thoughts for me, not the least of which was the simple observation about how absolutely normal it is for same sex couples to be wed in that chapel, or at all, in Canada. Marriage equality is no longer new here, and it has assumed a certain role in society that makes all of the hoo-hah about it in the US seem totally silly.

Then again, there is also my suspicion that it is deliberate that the right to marry is being denied to us. I told my friends they would notice a difference, but that it would be subtle. Just one day you sort of notice that you feel married, you feel like family, because you are. Like ordination or baptism, marriage is a sacrament (even civil marriage), and the people involved experience something theologians call an ontological shift. That means your very being changes somehow. Two really do become one, and not just the mathematical sum of A plus B, but a new and different entity, a family. And we really need to stop letting people make any argument about denying us the right to marry other than an acknowledgment that it is discrimination to set aside a class of people and deny them the right to an essential part of life.

Jesus’ own baptism is the action that assumes hallmark status in this week’s scripture. It is a dramatic  story. Jesus enters into the action in dialogue with John the Baptist by saying “let it be so” and “it is proper … to fulfill all righteousness.”  It is just action, and it is necessary action, for the equilibrium of God’s creation that this sacramental action should take place. And when it does, the simple dunking in the river becomes the gateway to the ontological shift in which the very voice of God becomes perceptible, audible and visible at once as though somehow the dimensions of the very universe were shifted on their axes.

Interestingly enough, this scripture is paired with a reading from Acts that we usually hear at Easter, in which Peter gives a startling sermon that begins “I truly understand that God shows no partiality, but in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him.” For “nation” you could read “society” or “neighborhood” or “congregation” or “family.” The point is, God has given us the grace of unity with God and one another, and our challenge is always and only to “fulfill all righteousness” by “doing what is right.” It is God’s plan that creates us gay, and it is God’s plan that we should be married, so that by establishing our families the axes of the universe can shift to show everyone the glory that is God.

And you thought it was just about marriage!

*1^st Sunday after the Epiphany (Isaiah 42:1-9, Psalm 29, Acts 10:34-43, Matthew 3:13-17)

©2011 The Rev. Dr. Richard P. Smiraglia. All rights reserved.

Open the Eyes of Your Heart*

This week’s scripture brings us one of my favorite passages from Paul, where he writes that we should come to know the hope to which God has called us through the eyes of our hearts.

Wow. The eyes of our hearts. And yes, of course it is a metaphor for learning to see the world from within the center of your soul. Which is rather a different way of looking at the world than what most of us do, which is to look at it from behind the ramparts.

It reminds me of my first week in seminary, which is—trust me—an eye-opening experience. You arrive, together with a bunch of other dewy-eyed people, full of hope, full of your own knowledge of the Holy Spirit, ready to dive into the job of becoming a priest. You mustn’t think, reading this, that there is any naïvete about these people. Like me, all of them had been through a “process” as “aspirants” and through the process of opening up and telling their spiritual histories to huge groups of total strangers over and over. That’s the first step toward becoming a “postulant” for holy orders. It is, frankly, an emotionally brutal process at best. But it teaches you to think with your heart as well as your brain.

The first day or two of seminary involve a lot of eating and singing, and then everyone gets down to work and before long the politics show up. And pretty soon, there you are walking around with your walls all down, because that’s how everybody else is, and then comes the zinger that hurts to the quick. And then you see, with the eyes of your heart , just how easy it is to hurt someone, even without really meaning it. And then, if you are to become a priest, you have to keep learning this lesson better and better … because Christ asks us to tear our walls down and walk together in love—as it says “so that, with the eyes of your heart enlightened, you may know what is the hope to which he has called you.”

It is not just a lesson for the clergy, of course. It is a lesson for everyone. Christ was born a baby, dangerously in a stable, not in a shiny hospital or an elegant home, but in a barn with animals and filth, it could hardly have been more real or more human. Our God became like us, to show us, that we can be like God, if we can tear down our walls.

GLBT folks live behind lots of walls. I’ve always thought it humorous that the first carpentry I ever did was to build a pantry—a closet—and in fact, in this present home, which is my third house, the only real carpentry I’ve done is to rebuild the pantries—closets. Building closets is the only thing at which I excel. Ha ha … We are all good at protecting ourselves from each other. But, the cost of that is that we wind up separating ourselves from each other. Thus, the power of the Christmas message is the power that tells us to tear down those walls, to open the closet doors, and to learn to see with the eyes of our hearts.

Will it hurt? Yes, certainly, and without question. Will the hurt be worth the gain? Yes, certainly and without question. Because if you can learn to live openly, as who God made you to be, and in full union with those around you, no walls up to separate your hearts … if you can do that, then you will indeed be enlightened to the hope to which Christ calls us in his humble birth.

What should we make of this odd story in Matthew’s Gospel? More dreams—poor Joseph is being jerked around by angels who come to him in dreams, and yet, they are the dreams that open the eyes of his heart to enlightenment, which ultimately fulfills the prophecy. You see, if you are going to be all that God has made you to be, then you must be open to the messages of angels in your dreams. Sounds weird doesn’t it? It means, open the eyes of your heart to see what God is calling you to do and to be. Learn to see with your heart, or listen with your soul. (Maybe I’m being too obtuse here—it means, set your five natural senses aside if you want to hear what God is showing you, or see what God is saying to you.) Or maybe I should just say, don’t overthink it.

There is a persistent theme in this scripture, about a garden full of water in a desolate valley, a place of springs, a place that nourishes, a place that is ordained by God. Not a desolate closet, but an enriching garden of friends and loved ones, whose hearts are opened by the enlightenment you bring. It reminds me of the first Christmas potluck I went to after I came out. There were about 40 guys there, and it was the warmest, most spiritual Christmas I had ever experienced to that point in my life.  I had found my real family, or perhaps I should say, with the eyes of my heart open, my family had found me.

This, then, is the responsibility of Christmastide. Open the eyes of your hearts my friends, and live!

*2nd Sunday after Christmas (Jeremiah 31:7-14; Psalm 84:1-8; Ephesians 1:3-6,15-19a; Matthew 2:13-15,19-23)

©2011 The Rev. Dr. Richard P. Smiraglia. All rights reserved.