Celebration is a very important human social need. We want to build up happiness by sharing our happiness with other people. We all can think of many ways in which celebration has played an important part in our lives, from intimate dinners with significant others to major life events. In my generation, when we were young there was absolutely no possibility that marriage would ever be part of our life experience, so most of us never had any sort of concept of how we might celebrate that. I say this because, when it was time for me to be ordained a priest, I had no idea how to go about having 100 people over for three days!
But we managed it. First, I followed the “rules,” such as they were, for the formalities. First and foremost an engraved invitation with the consent of the bishop announcing the event itself, including vesting instructions for participating clergy. To whom would invitations go? Well, the Christmas card list (all relatives and friends), and the seminary and the diocese—that about took care of filling the church. But what about that having a crowd over part? I relied on my experience as an organizer of academic conferences—I arranged a block of hotel rooms, I hired caterers for the first two nights (I cooked the third night, the Sunday afterward by which time only a few people remained. I shouldn’t have, I was too pooped! But it worked out ok anyway.) I printed a separate little slip of paper announcing the hotel rooms and the meals and some other events (my first mass Sunday morning, followed immediately by the Pride Parade, in which I was playing a role, Pride Fest, at which I had a booth, and Pride Evensong at which I co-officiated and preached!). Now imagine me Saturday night after dinner trying to write two sermons! In the end it was a glorious weekend. Friends who were there are still telling me about it decades later! It turned out to be pretty much a simple matter of inviting and then waiting and then sharing love and feasting and gladness, and via the Fest sharing pride with the LGBTQ community. And I remember the people stopping by the booth all afternoon to congratulate the newest gay priest. Hallelujah.
Celebration, then, combines the grace of holiness imparted with the compassion of shared grace. The action of celebration is an action of loving, like the collect for today says “running to obtain [God’s] promises,” which, of course, are love. Walking in love (lol … or running!). Love in action building up community, sharing grace, building more love.
The Old Testament scripture for today is the story from the book of Esther (7:1-9:22) about the establishment of the Jewish celebration called Purim. The long story ends with gladness and holiday, with feasting and sharing food, and with giving, lots of giving. Celebration, which is love in action.
Of course, as LGBTQ people we also know how logical families create their own holidays. These are our own ways of celebrating the love we share. Love shared becomes enshrined in practices—special food, lots of cooking especially together, guests arriving to hugs and kisses, joyous meals, singing—the outpouring leads to the spillover of love into the community at large.
The New Testament scripture for today is from James (5:13-20). It is a record of the establishment of a different kind of celebration, the outlines of today’s worship expressed as community actions. We are told to pray, to sing songs of praise, to invite the prayer of elders, to confess our disconnectedness. All of this is the path to healing, which is the point of the church in some ways. What I mean is, the community of faith exists to bring everyone back to the dimension of unity with God and with each other. The tools for unity are the tools for shared grace, the tools of celebration. Love in action.
In these are the tenets of Christian life serve both as the rules for fait communities and the guideposts for how to walk in love. First, pray. This is to center yourself firmly in the power of God’s love. Ask God, tell God, be still and listen to God, feel God—love is most present in feelings. Push out of your consciousness any feeling that prevents love. Then, sing songs of praise, thanksgiving, for the love now in your heart. Then, ask for prayer. Reconnect! Celebrate
Mark’s Gospel (9:38-50) teaches about the inevitability of grace shared in following Christ. It is in the following that we achieve by loving the dimension-shifting that brings us into unity in the dimension of love. Strangely the passage ends with three sayings about salt: “Salt is good; but if salt has lost its saltiness, how can you season it? Have salt in yourselves, and be at peace with one another.”
It seems to remind us that salt is both seasoning that draws out flavor and preservative that makes the sharing of food possible. We are reminded that to lose our salt is to have lost the ability to love. We are to be salty and walk in love. Yes, love is salt.
We who are God’s LGBTQ children are created in God’s own image to be the salty lovers of souls. We are to be attentive to maintaining our saltiness.
To be closeted is to lose your salt; to come out is to gain it. To be oppressed by heteronormativity is to lose your salt; to overcome and celebrate is to gain it. We are to resist the urge to suppress our true nature. We are to be the salt! This is our job.
Be salty.
Walk in love.
Proper 21 Year B 2021 RCL (Esther 7:1-6, 9-10; 9:20-22; Psalm 124 Nisi quia Dominus ; James 5:13-20; Mark 9:38-50)
©2021 The Rev. Dr. Richard P. Smiraglia. All rights reserved.
Dimensions of Reality: glbt Christian spirituality 