Sunday, December 4, 2011: The Second Sunday of Advent

Noting that angels and their messages play rather a large role in the Advent readings for Year B, John H. Barden took a moment (in the November 208 issue of Homily Service) to reflect upon the role of Angels in God’s creation.

Angels are messengers, purely and simply, albeit messengers of God. In almost every instance in which an angel appears in both the Hebrew and Christian scriptures, the angel is a bringer of news, usually good news. sometimes angels are personal messengers, bringing good news to an individual, like Joseph or May. Sometimes angels are cosmic messengers, bringing good news to a whole group of people, such as to the shepherd of Bethlehem. It is hard for us to see angels for who they are, because we do not really understand what they are. Angels are messengers of good news. Angels are evangelists. The root word and meaning are the same. An evangelist is someone who tells forth good news; an angel is a messenger or herald of good news And , always, angels are inseparable from the good news they bring and the One who send them with the news. Angels do not bring just any news; they bring good news. Moreover, it is not simply good news in general, it is good news from God concerning god’s activity to bring about our salvation.

Homily Service: an ecumenical resource for sharing the word, vol. 42, no. 1, p. 20.
John H. Barden is a Presbyterian Pastor serving as Vice President for Admissions at Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary. He won the Presbyterian Church’s Jim Angell award for best first book in 2005 for 'Postle Jack Tales, Gospel: Images in New Appalachian Folktales.

November 20, 2011: Christ the King (Reign of Christ)

The celebration of the Feast of Christ the King (Reign of Christ) causes a bit of cognitive dissonance in today’s world. Inaugurated in 1925 by Pope Pius XI, it was meant to be the church’s response to the growing secularism of western society. At that time, the church which celebrated the Feast had living memory of the reign of powerful monarchs, and therefore had a real-world referent to the kind of kingship the Feast celebrates.

In the 1 September – 23 November 2008 issue of Homily Service, Judith Simonson addresses the need to re-imagine the Feast of Christ the King in a world where monarchs are, by and large, ceremonial figureheads devoid of real power.

Many of us have never lived in a monarchy. The actual concept of a king is foreign to us. We would be pleased to be invited to the White House for a state dinner with the king of some country. We would tell all our friends that we had shaken hands with the monarch and exchanged a few clever words. But we would not want to live under a system in which power was inherited automatically. (In the U.S. the same family can be elected to high office!) We have a lot of trouble granting power to another. Even in church, votes are carefully counted and we bring our ideas of winners and losers into our life together.
This day we worship a king whose power came from death on a cross – extreme weakness. Raymond Brown called this the “embodiment of truth.” In God’s economy, to give life is to gain it. To receive the gift of membership in the kingdom through baptism is to become free from the need for power as the world knows it because God works through us. We are called to embody that truth which says I do not need the glory or the credit, God has already taken care of me.

Homily Service: an ecumenical resource for sharing the word. 23 November 2008; Christ the King, 41:4, 143.

Judith Simonson is a retired pastor of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. She currently serves on the Inter-Lutheran Coordinating Committee for Ministries in Chaplaincy, Pastoral Counseling, and Clinical Education.

Spiritual Direction as a tool for times of crisis

The new issue of Liturgy takes “Liturgy and Crisis” as its theme. In the first article, Rev. D. Darrell Griffin explores the fascinating ways in which African American congregations can enculturate and utilize the practice of Spiritual Direction in order to move through times of crisis in faithful ways. Before that was possible, however, he faced the challenge of introducing what was perceived to be an unfamiliar practice.

Yet while I was able to experience a personal spiritual renewal, there was still a void in my understanding and a concern for the spiritual well-being of my church and community. I struggled to incorporate the African American religious experience and tradition into the context of spiritual direction, and I found, to my surprise and disappointment, that my congregation reacted to the ministry of spiritual direction with ambivalence and distrust.

One reason for this is that the term spiritual direction is unfamiliar, not only to my congregation, but to many Protestant African Americans. The ministry of spiritual direction focuses on listening, discernment, and prayer in a confidential setting of encouragement and compassion. In this context, the spiritual director listens to the stories of another’s life to help discern the presence and work of God’s Spirit. However, in the African American community, to entrust the story of one’s sacred journey to another person is a precious gift. For many African Americans such intimate sharing of sacred stories outside of the office of pastor is unheard of.

How can those who have the care of souls more effectively introduce traditional spiritual practices into Christian communities who are unfamiliar with them?

Darrell Griffin (2012): Spiritual Direction for African Americans in Crisis, Liturgy, 27:1, 3-9.

Rev. D. Darrell Griffin is the former associate pastor of Abyssinian Baptist Church in Harlem, New York, and has served as senior pastor of Oakdale Evangelical Covenant Church in Chicago since 2000.