Superhighway of Harmony

Jupiter, it seems, has become my constant companion this summer. I’ve been watching it cross the night sky each night at a different time (it’s getting earlier each night) for awhile now. It has become almost humorous the way it seems sometimes to awaken me at just the right moment to look up and see it poking out through one Douglas fir on its way to the west to hide behind another. It is one of those wonderful points of harmony with creation, on the one hand, and God’s care of us, on the other, that reminds you there is a guiding force in creation.

Don’t get me wrong here, I’m not saying we are puppets by any means, there are no magic strings running things anywhere. Rather, it is that there is a harmony in creation that is at its best when we get onto its dimension, sort of like getting on the superhighway at the proper ramp.

In Lambeth the bishops of the Anglican communion are meeting, in some rancor. There is a lot of off-ramping or downright detouring from so-called conservative factions who keep insisting diverse sexualities are somehow “wrong.” But, as we who are God’s LGBTQ children created LGBTQ in God’s own image know, of course, our loves and lives are in perfect harmony. It is we who are on the superhighway breezing through the dimension of love.

And God is faithful to us.

This week’s scripture is all, humorously, focused on the idea of God’s faithfulness to God’s people. What is humorous is the idea that there is any question about that at all. It is not God whose faithfulness waivers, it is us. And so to understand the scripture we must invert our comprehension—look into yet another different spiritual dimension—to understand that like Jupiter night after night, God is always in harmony with us.

Hosea’s prophecy continues (https://rpsplus.wordpress.com/2022/07/25/whoredom-and-gods-prophets/) “they kept sacrificing to the Baals and offering incense to idols” (not unlike those voices of doom from the proverbial “right” wing) (Hosea 11:2). But (11:8) “my compassion grows warm and tender” and (11:11) “they shall come trembling like birds … and I will return them to their homes”—superhighways through the dimension of love indeed. Psalm 107 sings joyously of this superhighway into the dimension of love (3) “He gathered them out of the lands …”, (7) “He put their feet on a straight path ….”

Paul wrote to the fragile church at Colossae (Colossians 3: 2) “set your mind on things that are above” and (8) “get rid of all … anger, wrath, malice ….” (9) “seeing that you have stripped off the old self … and have clothed yourselves with the new self … renewed … according to the image of its creator … and (11) “Christ is all and in all.” We are meant to move in harmony with creation living the lives created for us in God’s image and moving always forward, not trapped in a past or distracting ourselves with petty anger. God’s faithfulness is most visible to us in this, when we live our lives walking in love in harmony with creation.

Jesus reminds the crowd (Luke 12:21) that treasures for self are not richness with God, that being distracted by jealousy blocks access to that superhighway of harmony.

Harmony with nature and humor with creation are all signs that we are traveling in the dimension of love. Like billboards on the side of the road, these are the reminders that God is always faithful to us, they are pointers to the places where we can show that we are faithful to God.

Proper 13 Year C 2022 RCL (Hosea 11:1-11; Psalm 107:1-9, 43 Confitemini Domino; Colossians 3:1-11; Luke 12:13-21)

©2022 The Rev. Dr. Richard P. Smiraglia. All rights reserved.

Whoredom and God’s Prophets

So here we are in late July. I have had a wonderful ten days (nights actually) or so watching Jupiter and the Moon move across the window I can see from my bed. I leave the blinds open so when I awaken during the night I can check out the universe moving on my “screen.” I close them just before sun-up so, like the veteran New Yorker I am, I can sleep as long as I need to.

Jupiter and the moon are incredibly bright. I actually caught on to this one night when they awakened me. (No, there is no such word as “woken.”) I couldn’t figure out who was shining that bright light in my face until I got sufficiently awake and focused to see. My is it beautiful. Since then it has been sort of like watching that old video where OJ was in the SUV and the police were following. They are in different positions to each other, now quite far apart, but still the brightness of the two is amazing. I gather it is a portent of something. Maybe just of beauty. Beauty, you know, is a sign of love, which is why LGBTQ people love beauty (and love) so much.

The Old Testament lesson today is from Hosea (1:2-10). It is awful on the face of it. God says to Hosea go marry a whore, and Hosea does, and then God says do it again (erm, he means have more children …) and on and on.

And we, English speakers in the 21^st century, are supposed to take it literally. But, mind you, this is how they have tricked us for a millennium into thinking our god-given love lives are misordered. Because, my friends, first you have to understand that:

            -Baal, the fertility god of the Canaanites, was worshiped with sex.

             -We worship our God (Yahweh) with thanksgiving, bread and wine; so we have deacons who set the table and priests who bless and distribute the bread and wine.

            -Baal’s temple had people who devoted their lives to sex to worshiping Baal by using their bodies to demonstrate fertility.

So this is no average street hooker Hosea is told to marry; he is told to marry one of those women who have been worshiping the other god, and he does it, and they have three children, and in this way they make a show of God’s love. Hosea marries a woman who used to worship Baal, and teaches her to devote her life to Yahweh. And this is the essence of prophecy of “whoredom,” that nothing can stop our God’s love, nothing.

So, who among us has not worried, or been called up short, about our sexuality? We all know how that song goes. Abomination they say, but you know what, “abomination” is the 18^th century word for “idolatry” which means worshiping Baal. All the OT scripture says about diverse sexualities is that we should be careful not to worship Baal in Yahweh’s temple.

They never tell you that when they’re wagging fingers at you for being gay.

Well, Hosea did what God asked and the result was a generation of “children of the living God.”

Psalm 85:8 says: “I will listen to what the LORD God is saying, * for he is speaking peace to his faithful people and to those who turn their hearts to him.”

From these bits of scripture today I preached at a real church. My sermon was that faith is not instant, like Hosea we have to just begin where we can and build on it.

For us it is important to understand that all God asks of us is to be who God made us to be, all God wants is for us to be at peace and in unity. And we do that by walking in the love God gave us, especially us, as LGBTQ people, to live.

And Jesus says it all (Luke 11:1-13): Ask, and it will be given you; search, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened for you.

Proper 12 Year C 2022 RCL (Hosea 1:2-10; Psalm 85 Benedixisti, Domine; Colossians 2:6-15, (16-19); Luke 11:1-13)

©2022 The Rev. Dr. Richard P. Smiraglia. All rights reserved.

Midsummer of Parallel Dimensions

I guess it is well past mid-summer although it feels about like it to me now; the spring rains went on for so long in Oregon we really only have had a few weeks of real summer at this point. It is lovely, not quite yet dog days (as they say back east). Roses from the garden are nice; the tomatoes and peppers are just beginning to fruit, later than usual, the herbs are doing well, the zucchini are blooming (fingers crossed there) and the broccoli beginning to mature. I still can’t get the mulch out, maybe this week.

Out in the real world it seems we are in something like dogged-days—a progressive president and administration can’t get traction on much of anything as disruption and disaster and a shifting economy seem to swirl uncontrolled, on the one hand, and a rising tide of miscontent and discontent threatens what the constitution calls “domestic tranquility.” Pride celebrations are protested more dangerously than is usual, and we are told our right to marriage equality is on the right-wing court’s hit list.

We can’t put on blinders and just tinker in the garden. But we can’t sink into despair either. Neither is an expression of walking in love as we have been called to do. In Amos (8:1-12) we see God providing Amos with prophecy by metaphor—a basket of summer fruit. A basket of summer fruit is a sign of the product of the power of God’s love. It also is a foretaste of the kingdom of love. It also is a warning that this is the last if love does not persist. If love does not persist, then all there is, is a basket of rotting fruit, soon gone, leaving waste matter in its past.

God’s ire in this tale arises from the piling up of miscontent and discontent among God’s people who have forsaken love for self. The prophecy describes the antithesis of love: wailing, death, casting out, land trembling, mourning, flooding, darkness, lamentation, famine, wandering seeking love. A basekt of summer fruit indeed.

Psalm 52 “Quid gloriaris” or “Why do you boast?” is a lament on the absence of love among people of discontent miscontent malcontent, they “see and tremble.” The psalm is sun by those who love who neither tinker in the garden nor sink into despair, but rather, they understand the mounting loss experienced by those who do not love. Those who do not love rely on wealth and selfishness instead of love. Love means loving neighbor as self. Those who love are like “the green olive tree,” rich with potential ripeness, with strength to grow and produce into eternity, a true sign of hope, justice, trust, mercy, thanksgiving.

In Colossians (1:15-28) Paul reminds the faithful that all it takes is a little bit of love. Love builds up. The absence of love is quickly healed with a little bit of love. This is the secret of God’s kingdom given to us in Christ which is intended to be spread throughout creation.

In Luke (10:38-42) Jesus visits his friends Mary and Martha. It doesn’t say so, but we can imagine all of the disciples have crowded in as well to sit about accepting hospitality and listening to Jesus. Mary sits at Jesus’ feet and listens intently. Martha scurries about in the background, working, cooking, planning, fuming (I understand, this is how I entertain, my husband is the talker who sits with the guests and socializes while I’m out in the kitchen banging things around and dropping food on the floor). Finally, Martha loses it, and tells Jesus to make Mary pony up some help. Jesus isn’t having any of it, because he knows what has happened to Martha is that she has let her loving lapse into despair and tinkering.

Mary and Martha are both people who walk in love. So, this is a message from Jesus to those of us who do already walk in love to not take ourselves too seriously and to not forget that love is more important than any thing of loving. Neither tinker nor worry. Rather, love in your heart, even just a little bit. This is more important, “the better part.”

This speaks to us now in the current time of trial. We occupy parallel dimensions. Some of us, most of us in the LGBTQ community, live in the dimension of love where God has created us to be people identified by love. Love is in our hearts, love is in our hospitality, love is in our caregiving, love is our path to eternity. We live alongside people who dwell mostly in a dimension without love. Our job is to build up God’s love to the point that they, too, can find the door into the dimension of God’s love. That basket of summer fruit should be a sign of hope and eternity for every child of God.

Proper 11 Year C RCL 2022 (Amos 8:1-12; Psalm 52 Quid gloriaris?; Colossians 1:15-28; Luke 10:38-42)

©2022 The Rev. Dr. Richard P. Smiraglia. All rights reserved.

Plumb Lines, Pride, and Optimism

Summer at last. The rain is mostly gone, thanks to the extra months of it everything is gloriously green, the gardens are beginning to produce. We’ve had a good run with arugula and lettuces, and from the flower gardens we’ve had roses in abundance for awhile now but the tomatoes and peppers are coming along just fine. The chore of mulching is at hand, now that the bulbs mostly have passed. After that, just a little pruning and we can relax and enjoy the gardens the rest of the summer. Optimism. It feels good to feel optimistic.

Optimism has been sparse the last few years, between the pandemic, the fluttering economy, and war in Europe on the one hand, gun violence, violence perpetrated on our persons by the right wing Supreme Court and the near constant terror of the 45^th president’s so-called administration, on the other. It feels good to feel optimistic. Optimism is a sign of the presence of love, of the approach of hope. We have to hang on to hope as we navigate this quagmire shoal armed as best we can with love.

God called Amos to a life of prophecy using a very real metaphorical plumb line. It says “[God] was standing beside a wall built with a plumb line, with a plumb line in [God’s] hand.” (Amos 7:7). God tells Amos it is a reminder that God has set a plumb line in the midst of the people. That line is the opening to the dimension of God’s love. One way is the way of the kingdom of God, the other is the abandonment of love and the pathway to disaster. The plumb line is a pretty terrific reminder that building is incremental and dependent on care and attention to detail. We are called to walk in love always, not just occasionally, and to be attentive to the power of love given to us at all times.

Regarding the plumb line with respect and choosing the dimension of love bears fruit and brings strength, not only for endurance but also for the joy of a world functioning in the dimension of love (Colossians 1). Jesus reminds an inquisitive lawyer (LOL) that the only law is that “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbor as yourself” (Luke 10:27).

Attention, care, caution, adherence to the plumb line, choosing always the dimension of love. The good Samaritan makes the right choice, to offer hospitality and healing regardless of politics or social standing (Luke 10:30-37). There’s that plumb line again.

The only law is to love your neighbor as yourself and that law has a requirement of loving yourself. The plumb line is in your own heart. The law of love emanates from our LGBTQ hearts, from the love that defines our lives, and it builds up with care and attention. Pride month might be over but the love of ourselves that is the gateway to a community where we all walk in love begins with our own pride in the LGBTQ people who God created us to be. Let’s begin there and hang onto hope and optimism as best we can.

Proper 10 Year C RCL 2022 (Amos 7:7-17; Psalm 82; Colossians 1:1-14; Luke 10:25-37)

©2022 The Rev. Dr. Richard P. Smiraglia. All rights reserved.

“Wash and be Clean”

We are watching the inexorable march of fascism.

We have seen the near overthrow of our own government

            which is still on-going.

We have seen the self-righteous right take over

            the supreme court and turn the law into dust.

We have seen the right to body sovereignty

            removed.

We can only expect that we will be next,

            first they will re-outlaw our marriages

                        then they will re-outlaw our selves.

And intelligent people don’t have the erm [gumption? cojones?]

            to make their friends and relatives understand this isn’t about the price

            of gasoline

            this is about life and death.

Your girlfriend dead from a coat-hanger abortion.

Your sister dead from carrying a fetus too long until it killed her.

This is my cry.

“Wash and be clean.”

How much more clear could Elisha’s instructions to Naaman

            have been (2 Kings 5:13)?

Naaman wanted magic.

But the magic is within you.

The spirit of God is within you.

God is within you.

God is with you.

God is with gay you,

God is with lesbian you,

God is with transgender you,

God is with queer you,

God is with polyamorous you …

            and you know what,

                        all you have to do is look in the Bible,

            throw it back in their faces,

                        all of us are there in God’s own image.

“Wash and be clean.”

That’s all it takes.

Admit your self

            to your self

                        and be

                                    your own God-given self.

Do it all with love in your heart.

“You reap whatever you sow” (Galatians 6:7).

Have love in your heart in all that you do.

If you do not have love

            get some,

                        any way you can.

If you feel upset or angry or vengeful (as I clearly have been doing)

            think about someone you love

            think about some thing that you love

            think about love

                        get some love in you.

Then

            go out and “wash and be clean”—

            go out and be gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, queer,

                        proudly, loudly, fiercely, boldly—

            remember,

                        you are made in God’s gay image

                        or you are made in God’s bisexual image

                        or you are made in God’s lesbian image

                        or you are made in God’s transgender image

                                    now how could that be? but it is,

                                                you are made in God’s own image

                                                            did you think God really was an old man?

                                                            did you never think God was intersectional?

And wherever you go say to them “the Kingdom of God has come near to you” (Luke 10:9, 11).

Because it has.

Because it is.

Because it is in us,

            the LGBTQ people made in God’s image,

                        we are the keepers of the kingdom of love.

Proper 9 Year C 2022 RCL (2 Kings 5:1-14; Psalm 30 Exaltabo te, Domine; Galatians 6:(1-6)7-16; Luke 10:1-11,16-20)

©2022The Rev. Dr. Richard P. Smiraglia. All rights reserved.