The Bridegroom’s garland*

Isaiah’s prophecy (61:10 ff.) is rich with metaphor; how else do humans explain the experience of the presence of God but to say what it felt like? I have known God on the prairie sweeping like angels’  wings over acres of corn, I have known God in ascending clouds of incense at the feet of God’s altars, I have known God a million times in the eyes of communicants. God is everywhere for sure, but sometimes metaphor is useful for describing theophany, which is this experience we have of God in human time and space. Christmas is a time of ongoing theophany.

Isaiah has this lovely metaphor this week “God has clothed me with the robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom decks himself with a garland.” Of course, this metaphor is meaningful in a specific way at a specific time. Still I chuckled thinking about getting ready for our wedding.

Brad and I have been together for almost 36 years. We had a pretty exciting beginning, and then we had all of the usual potholes, and then we got it worked out. And like most gay men of our generation, and unlike most heterosexuals, we assumed we never could get married, so we didn’t even think about it. In our eighth year together we had a house blessing which we chose to think of as a blessing of our relationship. But it was in our 30^th year together that we decided to go to City Hall in Toronto and get married legally, just because we could.

What a shock. So I have been trying to think about how I felt getting dressed that morning. I don’t think that was the biggest thing on my mind. And, like being ordained, it turns out it is the aftermath that is the most important part of a sacrament like marriage. Still, I dressed as an Anglican priest, and I suppose the “garland” Isaiah refers to was my pectoral cross, which I drew on at the last moment as we were ready to go.

It was the cross of Christ crucified and risen, Christ who had chosen me, a gay man, as a priest in His church. Christ, who had chosen us, a gay couple, as an example of righteousness. The robe of righteousness was laid around our shoulders that day, in our aging bodies and in our mature love for each other.

The blessing of Christmastide is the coming of the light into a darkened world. No matter how many times we experience this, it remains a constant. Christ brings light. Christ is the light which is life. And we, gay people, are the candles in which Christ’s light enlightens the world.

I hope you had a merry Christmas. Don’t forget we still have nine days of Christmas left! Happy New Year to you too.

*First Sunday after Christmas (Isaiah 61:10-62:3; Psalm 147; Galatians 3:23-25;4:4-7; John 1:1-18)

©2013 The Rev. Dr. Richard P. Smiraglia. All rights reserved.

No need to dream, it’s Christmas for sure*

It has been snowing in Wisconsin for a couple of weeks now; the biggest snowfall yet was Sunday (about 8 inches fell then). I love snow. I love the romance of it falling in the night, the flakes like millions of stars floating against the inky night sky. I love the quiet it brings, blanketing everything with sound-absorbing insulation. I love the new sounds of neighbors shoveling, cars slushing past, and icicles melting in the afternoon sun. It is indeed a winter wonderland. Here’s a photo of the street where I live, taken Christmas morning after a new overnight snowfall. But more than that, it is nature’s own Advent, bringing us enforced quiet time, enforced indoor together time, and very very sweet quiet nights for sleeping and regeneration.

It is Christmas now, and once again the world has seen the glory of the Word made flesh who dwells among us. All things came into being through Him. What has come into being in Him is life, life is the light of all people. We see now his glory, glory as of an only son, what more glory could there be than the love of a parent for a newborn child? It is the powerful love born of nature’s own forces, like winter, Christmas is a moment of seeing and knowing and feeling the light, which is life, which is love. Love which is full of grace and truth.

(That bit of theologopoetry is based, of course, on John 1:1-14, which is usually thought to describe the birth of Christ, the anointed Savior, but also describes the creation in full. Apologies to my theology professors!)

Last night for maybe only the second time in twenty years, instead of working, I went to mass with Brad. Memories swirled around. Our first Christmas Eve mass together decades ago took place on the night after a major blizzard, in a high church with liturgy of the sort I knew before I became a priest, replete with incense and chanting and candlelight, and ending with an episcopal blessing. It made me realize that Christmas is always a miracle, because Christmas is the miracle of love come among us, and because Christmas always is. Me sitting at Brad’s left singing the pitch into his ear for the hymns, watching him nod in agreement during the sermon, taking the bread and wine together at the rail, driving home in the snow for some eggnog and turkey soup. We are truly blessed.

Love one another my friends. Christmas is here. For sure.

*Christmas (Isaiah 52:7-10; Psalm 98  Cantate Domino; Hebrews 1:1-4, (5-12); John 1:1-14) ©2011 The Rev. Dr. Richard P. Smiraglia. All rights reserved.

It must be Christmas*

It must be Christmas because: a) everyone keeps saying happy holiday to me; and, b) it keeps snowing, and snowing, and snowing.

And school is over at last. Time for rest, time for peace. Last night was the longest night of the year; the night in which we sleep, deeply, to prepare, to purify, to be ready for the coming of innocence into our hearts. The solstice is upon us indeed.

Thus this is the moment of the coming of light. From this moment forward the light increases, not just in real terms in the daylight, but in our hearts and souls as well, as the warmth of this season, nurtured with God’s love, grows into fulfillment of God’s kingdom, in and through us. What more can I say?

It is not anybody’s generic “holiday.” It is going to be Christmas.

God just wants all of us to be one. Decorate, light, give, rejoice.

*4 Advent (Isaiah 7:10-16; Psalm 80: 1-7, 16-18; Romans 1:1-7; Matthew 1:18-25)

©2013 The Rev. Dr. Richard P. Smiraglia. All rights reserved.

Snow, snow, snow … and lights, lights, lights*

Two weeks ago when it was still 50 degrees I had three publication deadlines so instead of going out to put up Christmas lights I kept running statistics and writing. It’s what I do. It’s what the university pays me to do. It fulfills me to discover something, each day, something new that nobody else yet knows. That’s the thrill of research. But, then it snowed. And then it was hellaciously cold. And it took a couple of tries before I was able to bear being outdoors long enough to put up a few lights on the front of the house. I asked for help a couple of times and people kept telling me, it has to be done before the snow comes.

But, then again, it is only the third Sunday in Advent. Really, we shouldn’t be putting up lights at all until after the 4^th Sunday in Advent. How I treasure that time as a child when Christmas lights went up the Sunday before Christmas, and all of my town was a magical kingdom of beautiful lights in the snow through Christmas and New Years’ Day up to Epiphany. This was when “the holidays” meant Christmas and New Year’s Day. It’s too bad that people have lost the ability to anticipate. After all, anticipation is 90 percent of the best experiences. Christmas is sweeter for the anticipation, for when it doesn’t happen until Christmas Eve, and then it unrolls in real time as a festival of love.

Yesterday it snowed a whole bunch. I actually love it, and I think it’s beautiful. So I went out in the snow and just walked around knee-deep putting up lights. Bah humbug on all of those people who think you should do it in October! Christmas finally is coming. So now we have some lights in the darkness … oh, now there’s a theme.

James says “be patient, beloved, until the coming of the Lord.” That’s the message. But of course, having patience doesn’t mean it isn’t already time for justice. James also says “Beloved, do not grumble against one another, so that you may not be judged. See, the Judge is standing at the doors!” And indeed, God is at the door.

Love, be loved, keep on loving. Have patience, but demand justice.

And don’t worry, Christmas is coming.

A blessed Advent to you all.

 

3 Advent (Isaiah 35:1-10; Psalm 146:4-9; James 5:7-10; Matthew 11:2-11

©2013 The Rev. Dr. Richard P. Smiraglia. All rights reserved.

Keep thinking*

It is tough to move around. No matter how nice a place your new place is, the change is always problematic. The shifting of culture is really more important than most of us think. We think the US is one country and everything is the same, but we really are a nation of 50 countries, and each one has its own collection of cultures, and they all really are different from each other.

Wisconsin is lovely. We are especially moved, after 30 some years in the Northeast corridor, to see the sky. And especially at night. We can see the moon, and the stars—all of them—against the inky black sky. And now we live on the edge of Lake Michigan, which is one of the world’s largest inland seas—freshwater notwithstanding. Just those things, simple as they sound, are part of the different culture here, and especially are part of our comprehension of this new place where we find ourselves.

I think maybe because I have not worked as a priest much (I am not yet licensed in Milwaukee, and have served only once in Philadelphia since moving in May), I have a kind of secular perspective. I notice how, when I hear church people talk, they sound churchy. And it almost immediately turns me off. There was an interesting article in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel a week or so ago about how churches are trying to attract young men. We drove past a place last week called “Brew City Church.” We laughed, but I bet they get more young men than anything with a saint in its name. So, I am going to try to make a theological point here without getting churchy. Let’s see how well I do.

To know, in the ancient texts, usually is code for sex. And when it isn’t code for sex, it is metaphor for the kind of melding that happens between souls during sex. Somehow the most human moment we can experience is also crossed with the most holy moment. And when the Old Testament prophets talk about “knowing” God, they mean having that kind of intimate experience with God, knowing God in your soul, and God knowing you in your soul. This is the second Sunday in Advent. Christmas is three weeks away (take that! all you premature marketers!). And God says through the prophet Isaiah that “the earth will be full of the knowledge of God.” Wow. The whole of the earth, every living thing, is destined to know the soul of God.

It means that you should take time in these deliciously dark nights of winter to look inside your own soul, to find God within you. The only sin, remember, is refusing to be one with God.

In this week’s scripture, we have the story of John the Baptist appearing in the wilderness. He eats locusts and honey—ick! And the author of Matthew’s Gospel has him saying some dramatic things. But the most important thing he says is this, which Jesus also will keep saying (a sort of leitmotif in Matthew’s Gospel): “repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.”

So let’s see. Repent means pause and look inward. Re- pent; pent, again. Do it again. Look inward, again, and again, and again. Because the kingdom of heaven not only has come near, it is here, nearby. Only by continually thinking (pent, penser, to think) can you move yourself into God’s dimension. God’s dimension of reality. Only by moving to the dimension where you know God will you find God’s kingdom.

In God’s dimension of reality there is justice. And there is peace. And there is equality for all of God’s creatures. We who are glbt must re-pent until we are truly proud of the souls God has given us to live in. When we have done that we will stop bowing to hetero-hegemony. Then we will see that the blindness society has keeps people from seeing that some people are not replicas but are diverse. Nature is diverse. Humanity is diverse. God’s creation is diverse. We are diverse.

Have a soulful second Sunday in Advent. (Remember, Christmas begins at sundown on Christmas Eve, the 24^th of December. Don’t be saying “happy holiday” to people for six *$&^@ weeks!)

*2 Advent (Isaiah 11:1-10; Psalm 72:1-7, 18-19; Romans 15:4-13; Matthew 3:1-12)

©2013 The Rev.Dr. Richard P. Smiraglia. All rights reserved.

*Now is the moment

It was a very nice Thanksgiving. It snowed early in the week. Not a lot, just enough to be pretty and to test the snow-removal systems (they worked). So we’re feeling a little bit better about being in a snow zone. It was a quiet Thanksgiving, and the meal went swimmingly. I’m used to watching old movies on Thanksgiving night waiting to get an appetite up for a sandwich, and absolutely nothing of interest was on. But then I got to have my deep turkey sleep. Friday was peaceful and we went to see Dallas Buyer’s Club. It was something Brad wanted to see. (We really wanted to see Harry Potter as Ginsberg but it had left already after only 6 days in theaters here?) The movie is critically acclaimed and I suppose that’s correct, although I found it thoroughly depressing. It reminded me too much of what those days were like. I lived through that era, I survived it, I worked as a chaplain in the trenches of those horrid hospitals where AIDS patients were warehoused to run down their insurance. It is behind me, I hope.

This morning the sun is shining and the snow has melted  … a harbinger of the week to come, I hope. (I’m having electrical outlets installed on the front of the house this week; guess why?)

There is a theme for the first Sunday in Advent that is hard to escape, Paul puts it best “You know what time it is, how it is now the moment.” The rest is clear from all the rest of the scripture, Isaiah promises peace, the psalmist praises unity and reminds us to pray for the peace of Jerusalem, for quietness, for prosperity. That resonates with me. I prayed each day this weekend for quiet and progress, and that’s pretty much what I got. Jesus says to his disciples in Matthew’s Gospel that they must be ready at every moment. As Paul said, we all know this. Now is the time, this is the moment. Of course, every moment is now, and in every now is the moment, which is the time, to turn to God. Ahhh … you see, it isn’t about scary things coming at you from outside. Rather, it is about whether you can turn to God and stop being apart from God, which is the definition of sin. Can you turn to love? Can you turn to justice? Can you turn away from selfish things? Those are the questions, and now is the time for them.

In the US I sometimes wonder whether there is any point for gay people staying. My friends know I am an expatriate waiting to happen. I already spend more time in Amsterdam and Toronto that I do in the US. This is because, in those places, now is now, and not some future make-believe time. Gay people have equality in those places, and freedom to love, and access to full citizenship and the rights that go with it—not true in the US. So, I’m not going to tell you not to go. I guess I should remind you, however, that it is easier said than done to emigrate.

On the other hand, it is way past time for gay people to come out. It is way past time for gay people to coddle their relatives who “just aren’t ready.” It is way past time for everyone to understand that hetero-hegemony is a sin, that cuts heterosexual people off from God, because by choosing to live in that way they are playing God. We need to remind our hetero-brethren that now is the time, now is the moment. For love and justice,for everyone.

Have a happy and peaceful Advent. I wish you bounteous snowfall, because it brings peace and introspection. I wish you joy in the cuddling and peace in the sleep of winter. And I hope you will remind yourself that now is the time, now is the moment. (Oh, and don’t be putting up Christmas lights or trees yet. It is only the first Sunday in Advent!)

*First Sunday of Advent (Isaiah 2:1-5; Psalm 122; Romans 13:11-14; Matthew 24:36-44)

©2013 The Rev. Dr. Richard P. Smiraglia. All rights reserved.