Category Archives: Episcopal

Integrity USA: Update on Blessing Same-Sex Relationships in the Episcopal Church


Integrity USA is the main group that advocates for GLBT inclusiveness in the Episcopal Church. The Western Massachusetts chapter has been holding a series of discussion forums throughout our diocese, to foster dialogue and educate parishes about where we are in the process of creating official blessings for same-sex couples.

At the 2009 General Convention (the most recent policy-setting conclave of the entire national church) the bishops and lay deputies approved a sort of “local option” for dioceses to develop official rites for same-sex couples. Though nothing was mandated, some gesture in that direction was particularly encouraged for dioceses where gay marriage or civil unions are legal (e.g. Massachusetts). Ordination of GLBT candidates was similarly permitted but not required.

The next decision point for Western Mass churches will occur at the annual Diocesan Convention in October. The local chapter of Integrity is sponsoring a resolution that our diocese “initiate a process to develop pastoral and clergy resources that would accompany and support the forthcoming national church SCLM-authorized liturgies for the Blessing of Same-Gender Relationships”. (SCLM is the national church’s Standing Committee on Liturgy and Music.)

However, it’s up to us to make sure this resolution doesn’t die in committee, but is brought to a floor vote. Integrity chapter chairman Steve Symes needs affirming Episcopalians to register as delegates and sign on in support of the resolution. If you live in Western Mass and can attend the convention in Springfield, email him at swsymes@msn.com.

I’d like to share two excerpts from the materials Steve gave us at our workshop at St. John’s last weekend. These are taken from the report of the Task Force on the Blessing of Same-Sex Unions in the Diocese of Western Massachusetts.

Legal and Cultural Considerations:

The church has rightly been reluctant to discuss marriage, for either straight or gay couples,
using the language of rights such as is employed in legal discourse. Like the discussion of
ordination of women in the 1970s, we have held to the language of vocation. A couple is
“called” to the estate of marriage, and this calling is first heard by the couple. When the blessing
of the Church is desired, this calling is tested by the community, in the representative of the
priest, and then, more broadly, if “banns” are published. The publishing of banns invites the
community to affirm and pray for the couple as they prepare for their vows and also allows the
community to assert concerns if one’s history would indicate that marriage is unadvisable.

In the
view of the Church, Christian marriage is not a right in the sense that civil rights are understood.
Rather, in the Church, marriage is seen as a particular calling, discerned initially by two persons
and then confirmed and supported by the prayers, material and emotional support of the church.
Marriage is understood as one means by which a person pursues a course toward holiness — as
one learns to live together in times of both prosperity and adversity, sickness and health,
harmony and conflict, one has the opportunity to grow more and more into the full stature of
Christ.

We find the deliberation of the marriage or blessing of partners of the same sex tends to devolve
into the contentiousness of the society at large when we forsake the language of the Spirit’s
calling two persons to a holy covenant for the language of two persons demanding their rights in
the church. Such language is foreign both to the scriptures and the tradition of the Church.
Consequently, we have come to an awareness that marriage between two people is a gift from
God bestowed in order to further the mission of the church: to restore us to unity with God and
each other in Christ. Seen in this light, Christian marriage is a powerful and effective “school for
Christian holiness” where unity can overcome estrangement, shame, isolation so pervasive our
culture.
…

****

On the Care and Nurture of Children:

The rite of Holy Matrimony states as one of the purposes of marriage “the procreation of
children and their nurture in the knowledge and love of the Lord.” The modern social situation
and advances in technologies related to reproduction extend the concept of “procreation” well
beyond the fruit of sexual union between a man and a woman. We have also come to see
families created by adoption and remarriage as more prevalent. We therefore hold that the
nurturing of children in the knowledge and love of the Lord is a calling open to all couples called
to marriage. Furthermore, it is a calling in which the Church has great interest. Not only we
must always preferentially protect the weak and innocent, we desire to support parents in their
challenging calling to raise children, and to help especially in their spiritual nurture and care of
their souls. The Church, through her clergy and trained laity, stands ready to assist all couples
in discerning their call to parenthood, and to support couples as they nurture their children to the
abundant life promised them in Jesus Christ.

Indeed, another straight ally at our St. John’s meeting said she welcomed the same-sex blessings debate as an occasion for the church to rethink and modernize the theology of all marriages. How can Christians reclaim the meaning of marriage from its chauvinistic origins as a transfer of female “property” from father to husband, and also from the crass materialism and sentimentality of contemporary weddings? For personal reasons, I also welcome the notion that a nonprocreative marriage can bear spiritual fruit in other equally valuable ways.

Not to forget the “T” in GLBT, we also discussed the need for strengthening nondiscrimination provisions at the local level. This past May, in response to pressure from Integrity, our diocese added “gender identity and expression” to the protected categories in their human resources manual. However…this only applies to hiring by the diocese itself, and is not binding on individual parishes, which seriously limits the rule’s usefulness.

Similarly, at the parish level, nondiscrimination on the basis of sexual orientation is merely encouraged, not mandated, by the diocese. Integrity argued that Massachusetts civil rights protections for gays and lesbians override this policy, but the diocese does not believe that these laws apply. At least with respect to non-clergy hires, I personally think the state law should control.

Contact Steve to find out how you can help.

Attendees from the Integrity W. Mass. meeting at St. John’s in Northampton

Sealed as Christ’s Own Forever


Today, June 3, 2011, is the 10th calendar anniversary of my baptism into the Episcopal Church. The liturgical anniversary will be next weekend at Pentecost.

Baptism for me wasn’t then, and isn’t now, about being saved from Hell. At least not in the afterlife. Jesus did rescue me, in this life, from an abusive codependent relationship and the shame, perfectionism, and emotional chaos of mind that came out of that. His unconditional forgiving love allowed me to cling to hope and self-respect when my abilities fell far short of my goals.

What baptism primarily meant to me, in 2001, was coming home. Home to the artistic tradition where I’d always experienced my strongest encounters with transcendence. Home to a community of elders, living and dead, who had faced the same existential dilemmas and could give me companionship and guidance to move forward. In the same way that radical queer politics would do a decade later, the Protestant paradigm of sin and redemption began to cure me of the delusion that it was my personal responsibility to avoid failure and humiliation, at all costs. My “problem” was the human condition, and the followers of Jesus showed the way to not be defeated by it.

In Christianity, I saw a place where my countercultural values of chastity and emotional self-mastery would no longer be dismissed as the hang-ups of a socially immature young woman. Behind me stood a whole community that resisted compartmentalization of sex and spirit, and affirmed that the most intimate parts of ourselves were sacred and deserved to be handled with care.

This was the hymn I chose for my baptism service at the Church of the Ascension in NYC. (Love you guys!) It seemed like a special sign that it was today’s song for morning prayer at The Daily Office.

Now, in 2011, what does membership in the Christian church mean to me? Sometimes I feel that I’m in my Christian adolescence, as instinctively resistant to religious authority figures as I once was welcoming and trusting of their guidance. This questioning spirit even extends to God. I hold many orthodox beliefs at arm’s length now, looking at them from the reverse side, from the perspective of one who’s been made an outcast by the church or finds Christians personally so triggering that he can’t safely open up to the question of the doctrines’ truth. But it’s Jesus who has opened my heart to this perspective, Jesus who gives me the courage to “stand in the place of shame” (as gay Catholic theologian James Alison says) with the people who can’t rest in the assurance that they are God’s chosen.

I don’t know if it’s healthy anymore for me to think of the church as a substitute family, unless it’s a family of adults, not children who have no input into the parents’ rules. What happens at that crossroads where doctrinal disagreement threatens the community’s core mission, and separation is necessary for integrity? If we expect unconditional inclusion, like children in their parents’ house, we will feel terribly rejected–but perhaps we were expecting the wrong things.

I am an adult Christian, if I’m willing to be one. In an incorrigibly dysfunctional family, your choices are to stay and shut up, or walk away. Our faith communities can and do model a better way of processing our differences. Ten years later, I still feel just as blessed to play my part in that struggle to discern God’s will–though I sure do wish, sometimes, that it was more like sleeping in Mother Church’s lap.

Jesus began to speak to the crowd about John: “What did you go out into the wilderness to see? A reed swayed by the wind? If not, what did you go out to see? A man dressed in fine clothes? No, those who wear fine clothes are in kings’ palaces. Then what did you go out to see? A prophet? Yes, I tell you, and more than a prophet. This is the one about whom it is written:

“‘I will send my messenger ahead of you,
who will prepare your way before you.’

Truly I tell you, among those born of women there has not risen anyone greater than John the Baptist; yet whoever is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he. From the days of John the Baptist until now, the kingdom of heaven has been subjected to violence, and violent people have been raiding it. (Matthew 11:7-12)

Memorial Day Song: “Grant Peace, O Lord”


This hymn was written by Welsh clergyman Charles Henrywood. See more of his contemporary lyrics for classic tunes at New Hymns in Old Clothes. Sing along at Mission St. Clare (The Daily Office).

Grant peace, O Lord, across our strife-torn world,
Where war divides and greed and dogma drive.
Help us to learn the lessons from the past,
That all are human and all pay the price.
All life is dear and should be treated so;
Joined, not divided, is the way to go.

Protect, dear Lord, all who, on our behalf,
Now take the steps that place them in harm’s way.
May they find courage for each task they face
By knowing they are in our thoughts always.
Then, duty done and missions at an end,
Return them safe to family and friends.

Grant rest, O Lord, to those no longer with us;
Who died protecting us and this their land.
Bring healing, Lord, to those who, through their service,
Bear conflict’s scars on body or in mind.
With those who mourn support and comfort share.
Give strength to those who for hurt loved-ones care.

And some there be who no memorial have;
Who perished are as though they’d never been.
For our tomorrows their today they gave,
And simply asked that in our hearts they’d live.
We heed their call and pledge ourselves again,
At dusk and dawn – we will remember them!

****
Mr. Henrywood says, “I’ve always believed that Remembrance should not be limited to the dead—important though that is. Neither should it be a vehicle for glorifying war. If we loved one another as commanded war would be just history. We don’t but that shouldn’t stop us asking for help to do so.” Read more about the inspiration for this hymn here.

Some Different Angles on Mother’s Day


Kittredge Cherry at Jesus in Love notes that today, Mother’s Day (in the U.S.), is also the feast day of one of my favorite saints, the medieval mystic Julian of Norwich, whose writings celebrated the maternal love of Christ. Here’s a quote from her Revelations of Divine Love:

“A mother can give her child milk to suck, but our dear mother Jesus can feed us with himself, and he does so most courteously and most tenderly with the holy sacrament, which is the precious food of life itself…The mother can lay the child tenderly to her breast, but our tender mother Jesus, he can familiarly lead us to his blessed breast through his sweet open side…”

Mother’s Day brings up complex emotions for me, because it reminds me that my long journey through infertility and adoption has not yet come to a resolution. That’s why I greatly appreciated this article on Care2: “Today, Think of the Birth Mothers“. It’s a reminder that the opportunities for adoption in this country will not improve until we start respecting the loving sacrifices made by women who place their children for adoption. For adoptive parents, this includes honoring our agreements about openness (continuing contact between child and birthfamily). For the rest of society, it means ceasing to stigmatize women with unplanned pregnancies, and busting the myths about why a woman might make an adoption plan.

To end on a positive note, here’s a picture of me and my non-biological mom Roberta after yesterday’s Northampton Pride march. (T-shirt courtesy of TruthWinsOut.org. Thanks John!)

Christ Is Risen Indeed!


Alleluia! Happy Easter, everyone! Enjoy these signs of springtime rebirth from the Smith College Bulb Show, and praise God for His great love and creativity.

Our hymn for today, which we sang at the Easter service at St. John’s, celebrates the women who first brought the gospel to the world. Lyrics and music are copyright by Linda Wilberger Egan. Hear an audio clip and read the sheet music at RiteSeries Online.

The first one ever, oh, ever to know
of the birth of Jesus was the Maid Mary,
was Mary the Maid of Galilee,
and blessed is she, is she who believes.
Oh, blessed is she who believes in the Lord,
oh, blessed is she who believes.
She was Mary the Maid of Galilee,
and blessed is she, is she who believes.

The first one ever, oh, ever to know
of Messiah, Jesus, when he said, “I am he,”
was the Samaritan woman who drew from the well,
and blessed is she, is she who perceives.
Oh, blessed is she who perceives the Lord,
oh, blessed is she who perceives.
‘Twas the Samaritan woman who drew from the well,
and blessed is she, is she who perceives.

The first ones ever, oh, ever to know
of the rising of Jesus, his glory to be,
were Mary, Joanna, and Magdalene,
and blessed are they, are they who see.
Oh, blessed are they who see the Lord,
oh blessed are they who see.
They were Mary, Joanna, and Magdalene,
and blessed are they, are they who see.

The Acid Bath of Atonement


“Till on that cross as Jesus died/The wrath of God was satisfied…”

These lines from “In Christ Alone“, one of my favorite contemporary Christian songs, sum up the penal substitution theory of the Atonement — what the average person thinks of when you say “Christ died for your sins”. It’s a powerful but troubling formula that connects God’s love with violence.

Liberal Christians sometimes condemn this theory as “divine child abuse”. I feel sympathy for that point of view. And yet, as Experimental Theology’s Richard Beck observes in a recent post about his prison Bible study group, perhaps “doubt is the luxury of the privileged”. Traditional atonement theory seems to resonate most with people who are in extremis. Yes, this story about God is grotesque, terrifying, mysterious — and so are their lives. Richard writes:

The metaphors of penal substitutionary atonement speak to the issue of human guilt. No other suite of metaphors so powerfully addresses this facet of the human experience before a Holy God. Thus, I do think it would be rash to completely do away with penal substitutionary thinking. It performs a task that no other view of atonement can perform.

The problem with the penal substitutionary metaphors is that they are so very strong. Too strong to be deployed on a regular basis. And that is the real problem. It’s not so much that penal substitutionary thinking is wrong, it is rather that it is wrongfully deployed. Penal substitutionary atonement is at its best when deployed rarely and only in the most extreme circumstances. It can’t be everyday fare. The trouble is that it IS everyday fare in many churches. Penal substitutionary atonement is like a very strong acid. It has to be handled with care. And if you handle it as much as we do in our churches, often and carelessly, you end up with chemical burns. Thus many Christians are pulling away from churches in pain.

So when is the proper time to deploy penal substitutionary atonement? Like I said, penal substitutionary thinking is at its best when it speaks to profound human guilt. Specifically, some of us have committed such awful sins that our self-loathing, guilt, and shame destroy the soul. We cannot forgive ourselves. Only a very strong concoction can wash us clean. Penal substitutionary atonement is that chemical bath. It’s strong acid–You deserve death and hell for the life you’ve lived–making it the only thing powerful enough to wash away a guilt that has poisoned the taproot of a human existence. Nothing more mild (e.g., the moral influence views I so love) can speak to this issue.

So, it seems to me, there is a proper time to pull the beaker of penal substitutionary atonement off the theological shelf.

But here’s the trouble. Most of us live bland bourgeoisie lives with bland bourgeoisie sins. Few of us have lived catastrophically immoral lives. Thankfully so. But this creates a bit of a disjoint when a preacher throws penal substitutionary atonement at us. It just doesn’t resonate. The strong acid just burns us. The notion that God demands our death for these slight infractions AND that God will condemn us to an eternal torment of excruciating pain makes God seem, well, rather crazed.

This feeling gets worse when penal substitutionary atonement is thrown at children. In these contexts the deployment of penal substitutionary metaphors can seem obscene and psychologically abusive. Again, the issue for us is the incommensurability between the offenses of the children (not playing nice on the playground) and the penal substitutionary view (for these infractions God will punish you forever in hell). Continuing my chemical metaphor, kids shouldn’t play with acid.

The point I’m trying to make is that penal substitutionary atonement isn’t bad per se. The problem is that penal substitutionary atonement is a victim of its own strength. It has suffered not by being a bad idea, but by being handled too often and too carelessly. Some people do live in such a hell of guilt that only the vision of God’s death sentence, something they feel deep in their bones to be justified and proper, can reach the depth of their self-hatred. So we shouldn’t throw penal substitutionary atonement out the door. We just need to understand its proper function and place.

Christians just need to go to chemistry class.

To expand on Richard’s point, when I first converted, my core issues were guilt and shame. The story of the “cleansing blood” freed me from the crippling compulsion to be perfect. That’s a familiar conversion story for a lot of people. The problem comes when churches try to return people to that place of self-loathing, as if it were the only way to rekindle the emotions of gratitude and love that led us to Jesus. We’re not allowed to actually start living in grace, to see ourselves and our neighbors truly through the eyes of God as the good creations we were meant to be.

At the same time, sin is an ever-present condition. We will feel guilty again, maybe for good reason. Don’t be too proud, too liberal, too smart to rejoice that “it’s still the blood“.

Have a blessed Good Friday.

Murder Ballad Monday: Holy Week Edition


Yesterday our church celebrated Palm Sunday, a holiday whose mood swings I find disturbing, as I’m sure I’m meant to do. Some aspects of the traditional service feel like a preview of Easter: the entering procession with the palm fronds, the triumphal and almost martial music. At the same time, a minor chord is struck by the Passion Play and the hymns later in the service that uncomfortably foreground our guilt for Christ’s suffering.

I found myself wanting to arrest my long slide toward liberalism and force myself to dwell on this ancient accusation. What does it mean when I shout “Crucify him”?

Like Peter, surely, I can imagine myself losing my nerve to confess loyalty to Jesus when faced with torture. Hopefully this is an unlikely scenario in America, so there must be more ways I can challenge myself with this passage of Scripture.

Perhaps, like the crowd who would spare the bandit Barabbas over the Messiah, there are times when I rush to condemn someone without knowing enough about them. It’s easy to spread gossip, for instance, or racist stereotypes, because I don’t want to be the only one in the crowd with nothing to say. It’s easy to convince myself that I understand who the heroes and villains are because I read something bad about “those people” on the Internet.

By choosing between Jesus and Barabbas, the crowd gets it half right. No one should be crucified. Their lack of insight is twofold: they play the role of jury in a system that metes out excessive punishments, and on top of that, they condemn Jesus, who is innocent. In what ways am I participating in an unjust system by not seeing beyond its false alternatives? Change could start with something as simple as choosing to contribute to both charities whose flyers show up in my mailbox today, rather than one charity and a new hat. Trivial maybe, but these choices add up.

Though I’m not threatened with physical harm or even job discrimination for my justice work on behalf of the GLBT community, I still often feel deep pain and self-doubt when the opposition is led by fellow Christians whose faith I respect. I complain too much to Jesus about how hard and confusing it is to follow him. “What did you think you were signing up for?” he says. “Be grateful that you have the privilege to choose to enter into this place of shame, when many have no choice.” Then he shows me how it’s done.

And so, our song for today:

Sing along at Oremus Hymnal.

Bad Daughters of Eve


One of the lectionary readings for yesterday, the first Sunday in Lent, was the Genesis story of Adam, Eve, the snake and the apple. On its face, this text suggests that we disobeyed God by using our own judgment instead of obeying blindly, and all of humanity’s problems go back to this root. Given how easily and often this interpretation has lent itself to abuses of church authority, I feel compelled to search for more creative ways of understanding one of the foundational myths of Western culture.

Without proposing a reduction of religion to mere psychodrama, I’d like to suggest that the Garden of Eden story expresses (among many other things!) an early stage in the maturation of the individual. It’s a poetic representation of how the child looks at the parent’s authority. And because, in St. Paul’s words, we are eventually meant to “put away childish things”, it’s not the last word on the interplay between independence and obedience.

Remember how it felt to be a small child. Our parents made a lot of rules whose purpose we didn’t always understand. As we got older, hopefully we saw more of the reasons for rules that seemed arbitrary at the time. Meanwhile, though, the bargain looked a lot like Eden: nurture and protection, and the freedom to ignore the hard choices that adults had to puzzle through (“the knowledge of good and evil”), in exchange for being a dutiful son or daughter.

But one day, we decided to test those limits. Ride that bike into traffic. Eat a whole box of cookies. What happened when we got caught? If we tried to hide the evidence, or shift the blame, that reaction, rather than the disobedience itself, was the greatest proof that we really weren’t mature enough to write our own rulebook yet.

Even so, Eden was kind of nice. They do your laundry for you and there’s always popcorn in the cupboard. From the teenage perspective, being kicked out feels like punishment. What are you talking about, go earn your own bread by the sweat of your brow? Without that responsibility, though, you’re not really living into the independence that you said you wanted.

What I’m suggesting is that the Fall and expulsion only look like a crime and a penalty from the human viewpoint because we’re ambivalent about growing up–“growing into the full stature of Christ”, to quote St. Paul again. Adam and Eve’s first act of self-awareness is to clothe themselves, to create physical separation and privacy between themselves and their divine parent. Individuation is a necessary but lonely process, and both parent and child sometimes feel nostalgic for the Edenic oneness of the womb.

For Christians, this trajectory comes full circle in the Incarnation and Atonement. Where Adam and Eve fell short of God’s design for full human maturity because they didn’t take responsibility for their own transgressions, Jesus embodies that design by taking on and cleaning up the transgressions of others. Where Adam and Eve clothed themselves in fig leaves to become different from their creator, God clothed Godself in human form in order to restore that connection, but still in a way that respected human freedom.

Again, this has its parallels in family life. As we develop an adult’s broader perspective, we discover that our personal autonomy, which may have seemed so absolute during adolescence, is shaped and limited by family obligations and by the behavior patterns we’ve inherited from our forebears. Though our abusive ancestors weren’t our fault, it falls to us to say “The buck stops here”–to face and reform those abusive tendencies in ourselves, and to bind up the wounds of our loved ones.

What is a Covenantal Relationship?


Winning Writers subscriber Alvin T. Ethington is not only a published poet, but also the author of this eloquent argument for recognition of same-sex marriage in the Episcopal Church. (I’ll admit, he had me at “The Golden Girls”.) The article first appeared on FanStory.com, a good forum for emerging writers to receive feedback and enter members-only contests. He has kindly permitted me to reprint it below. Alvin tells me, “It proved to be very persuasive in the Diocese of Los Angeles, where same-sex blessings in many parishes now are a matter of course.”

What is a Covenantal Relationship?

by Alvin T. Ethington

On an episode of the television program “The Golden Girls,” Blanche, the woman who owns the house, discovers that she either has to make $10,000 worth of improvements or ask one of the three women who rent from her to move out. The house is not up to code for four people to occupy it. Whilst the women are in the process of discussing what to do, Dorothy comes up with the idea that Blanche can sell to her and the other women a portion of the equity in the house, thereby making the four co-owners. At first, Blanche is appalled by this idea—the house is one in which she lived with her husband, brought up her children, and spent most of her life. It is her family home. Later, when realizing she cannot ask any of her good friends to move out, she discovers her family has changed. Her husband is dead, her children are grown, and the people from whom she seeks support and with whom she lives in community are, indeed, the three other women who share the house. They are her family.

Our definition of family is changing. Adult children move back into the family home for economic reasons; sons and daughters choose to care for their elderly parents at home due to the high cost of medical care. Women have greater freedom in choosing societal roles; gay men and lesbians no longer have to keep the most important relationship of their lives secret. Children whose mother and father both work are often cared for by another relative or a friend; many families choose to adopt because of the large number of unwanted children in the world.

The nuclear family, which was engendered by the industrial revolution and which reached its apex in post-World War II white suburban America, is no longer the primary social unit it was once thought to be. For economic survival, women and men are choosing to live in groups of extended families and/or friends as they have in the past. Within these extended families and within societal communities, bonds of special relationships are being formed. Many people in these relationships of mutuality, love, and respect would like ecclesiastical recognition of what to them is of ultimate importance.

Some would argue that all this is the breakdown of Christian values in a societal context. I do not think so, for the message of Christianity is one of communal responsibility. The early Church provided for widows and orphans (Acts 6:1; cf. James 1:27). Whoever loves and serves Jesus of Nazareth by doing the will of God is his brother or his sister, a part of his family (Mark 3:35, Matthew 12:50).

Examples of covenantal relationships within the Christian community would be an older woman and man who have fallen deeply in love but whose financial situations preclude them marrying because of the concomitant loss of economic benefits that would bring, two lesbians or two gay men who have entered into a lifelong committed relationship, or adoptive parents who want to make a public pledge to bring up their children in the Church. (The Episcopal Church has started to recognize the last example in the 1979 Prayer Book rite “Thanksgiving for the Birth or the Adoption of a Child” which was previously limited to “The Thanksgiving of Women after Child-Birth.”)

Traditionally, the Church has recognized two kinds of covenantal relationships between persons — that of the promise the parents and godparents make to raise children in the faith and instruction of the Church at Baptism, and that of Holy Matrimony. These relationships are definitely sacramental. However, they have been developed and interpreted within the context of a Western society which has accepted the definition of Gratian for marriage — the union of a man and woman for procreation. Given the recognition that marriage has and can fulfill goals other than procreation and given the overpopulation of the world, it is expedient that we look to other definitions for marriage and for covenantal relationships.

The 1661/62 Anglican Prayer Book recognized that, although in its view, marriage is primarily for procreation, it is secondarily a remedy against sin, and tertiarily for mutual society, help, and comfort. Covenantal relationships which include a sexual component fulfill the goal of marriage to avoid fornication and all covenantal relationships fulfill the goal of mutual interdependence.

Is the Church in the process of affirming sexual sin in affirming covenantal relationships? These relationships only include a sexual component when the sex therein is other-concerned, respects the dignity of each person, and recognizes the partners as equals. Just as relationships of forced and non-consensual dominance and submission, of incest, and of rape break the covenant between parent and child or between wife and husband, so relationships which involve abuse of sexuality are not covenantal relationships. Covenantal relationships are inclusive of healthy sexual relationships, but not exclusive to them. Certainly the adoption of a child by a person does not include a sexual component.

Are these relationships sacramental? The Christian Church cannot agree on what exemplifies a Sacrament. If one accepts only the two Dominical Sacraments (Baptism and Holy Eucharist) as Sacraments, then these relationships are not Sacraments, but have a sacramental quality, as does marriage, for they are outward and visible signs of an inward and spiritual grace. If one accepts the seven historical sacraments as Sacraments, then these relationships do not have the Sacramental quality of marriage, but they do have the sacramental quality in which all of life is hallowed. A sacrament takes the simple things of life—water, wine, bread—and invests them with sacred meaning in the context of a person’s and a community’s relationship with God. Covenantal relationships are sacramental in that the two partners have made a commitment to themselves, to each other, to the Christian community, and to God to honor, love, and cherish each other. Because the sacramental quality of covenantal relationships involves two persons made in the image of God and the relationship between them, covenantal relationships are of a higher sacramental order than the blessing of an object. Covenantal relationships have a sacramental quality in that God is ever present in these relationships of love and faithfulness.

The Hebrews recognized this when they reflected on their relationship with God. They imaged their relationship with God in terms of covenantal relationships they knew and imaged their unfaithfulness to God in terms of covenant breaking they knew. God was the Father and Israel was His Son (Hosea 11:1). God was the Mother and Israel Her comforted child (Isaiah 66:13). When Israel was apostate, Israel “played the harlot” (Ezekiel 16:15, 16; cf.16:28); Israel was the unfaithful wife Gomer of the prophet Hosea (Hosea 1:2-3).

Jesus, as pictured in the Gospels, portrays his relationship to different groups in covenantal imagery. In the Q source material, he compares his relationship to the Jewish community of Jerusalem to that of a mother hen to her chicks (Matthew 23:37; Luke 13:34). The Johannine Jesus recognizes the deep bond of friendship between Jesus and his disciples (John 15:14-15).

The love poem Song of Songs has been interpreted to be exemplary of covenantal relationships. It illustrates the love of God for Israel and the love of Christ for the Church. What Jewish and Christian communities have done with this difficult text is to take the relationship between the two lovers and invest it with sacred meaning. God is ever present in the hallowing of special relationships.

Time moves on. The Church is required to be faithful to Scripture and tradition, but it is also open to the influence of reason and to the unfolding revelation of the Holy Spirit within the Church. We must stand in constant tension with and dialogue with society and affirm all persons on their spiritual journeys. We must not be afraid to speak out against sin, but we also must not be reluctant to recognize when God is present. Every good thing comes from God (cf. James 1:17). People are aching for spiritual recognition of their special relationships in a society in which the individual reigns supreme. We, as a Church, must comfort and succor those in this transitory life who daily face adversity. Where two people truly and authentically care about each other, where two people share joy and laughter, love and tears, sorrow and suffering, solace and comfort, life and death, there, indeed, is God.

First Sunday in Advent Non-Random Song: “Lo! he comes, with clouds descending”


The Episcopal Hymnal includes two musical settings for this Advent hymn written by John Cennick with later edits by Charles Wesley. My favorite is the one we sang in church this morning, the tune “Helmsley” by their 18th-century contemporary Martin Madan. It has a memorable complexity yet every phrase resolves in a way that makes sense.

In fact, I find it more of an unmitigated pleasure than the words, some of which can be troubling to a modern ear. I’m not so PC as to purge the worship service of all martial references. In my opinion, the Christian imagination needs both masculine and feminine moods, both the appealing vision of peace and the recognition that justice requires struggle.

However, I suspect there’s a veiled anti-Jewish polemic in the second verse: “those who set at nought and sold him….deeply wailing, shall the true Messiah see”.

When we sang these words today, I did some creative updating in my mind, recasting “those” as my fellow Christians who persecute others in Jesus’ name, profiting from hate. I’m still not sure that this is a completely skillful sentiment to indulge in, but as compared to the original interfaith hostility, it has the advantage of reminding us that we shouldn’t take Jesus’ approval for granted simply because we invoke his name.

Sing along (if you dare) at Oremus Hymnal.

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Lo! he comes, with clouds descending,
once for our salvation slain;
thousand thousand saints attending
swell the triumph of his train:
Alleluia! alleluia! alleluia!
Christ the Lord returns to reign.

Every eye shall now behold him,
robed in dreadful majesty;
those who set at nought and sold him,
pierced, and nailed him to the tree,
deeply wailing, deeply wailing, deeply wailing,
shall the true Messiah see.

Those dear tokens of his passion
still his dazzling body bears,
cause of endless exultation
to his ransomed worshipers;
with what rapture, with what rapture, with what rapture
gaze we on those glorious scars!

Now redemption, long expected,
see in solemn pomp appear;
all his saints, by man rejected,
now shall meet him in the air:
Alleluia! alleluia! alleluia!
See the day of God appear!

Yea, amen! let all adore thee,
high on thine eternal throne;
Savior, take the power and glory;
claim the kingdom for thine own:
Alleluia! alleluia! alleluia!
Thou shalt reign, and thou alone.