LITURGY THAT TEACHES AN AUTHENTICALLY SPIRITUAL STEWARDSHIP

     Those who see stewardship as just a way to fund the church’s mission might do well to skip this post. It assumes stewardship is a life-changing interaction with God, a discovery of gratitude, a triumph of faith over fear, a step away from having into being. Those who don’t get that stewardship is a spiritual thing that benefits the giver more than the church might do better to read this instead: http://bdsermons.blogspot.com/2014/06/ishmael-and-willy-loman.html But the reason they may not already get that “stewardship is a spiritual thing” (Bishop Robert Wright, Diocese of Atlanta) is probably not their fault. It is in no small part because our church hasn’t conveyed the message through its language of ritual. Most of the churches I know say some really confusing stuff about stewardship via their ritual, and only a few actually send a strong, coherent message.

     I was recently blessed to attend The Episcopal Network for Stewardship 2014 Conference. There were a lot of great workshops led by big name presenters. But for my money the most helpful workshop was given by J. R. Lander, a well-respected stewardship teacher, formerly from the Diocese of Olympia, now serving in the Diocese of Los Angeles, but I strongly suspect him of being a Texan. J. R.’s workshop was on Teaching Stewardship in the Liturgy. My goal here is to simply recap what J. R. said, or more accurately, what I heard. Anything true and helpful here is from J. R. Lander. Anything wrong is my misunderstanding.

Prayers Of The People

     Write your own. The BCP provides a checklist of what we have to cover and provides some canned sets to use. But for the prayers of the people to really be “of the people,” get the people to write them.

     Pray specifically for the current needs of your local community. Connect the life of the church to the life of the local community. Stewardship is about relationship, not abstraction. Root the life of the church in the human context.

     Pray for your community partners – other churches, synagogues, mosques, and non-profit service and advocacy agencies. Stewardship is connection. So is prayer. If your congregation does not have any partners in service to the community, get some.

     Seed the thanksgivings. You know the murmur of hopes and wishes that waft up when we invite petitions and intercessions. Then we invite thanksgivings and there is a dead silence. It’s like a taboo against gratitude. Give a few folks in the congregation the job of being the first ones to say something grateful. If they can’t think of anything to be personally grateful for, tell them something the church is grateful for. Stewardship happens when we start with the attitude of gratitude. Take affirmative action to help the liturgy say “thank you.”

Offertory

     The offering of alms, bread, and wine – together, with the people standing, as the rubric prescribes but hardly anyone does – has been a critical moment in the liturgy since the days of St. irenaeus of Lyons in the 2^nd Century (this history wonk digression is me, not J. R.). To combat the gnostic idea of spirituality as something for the few, Irenaeus had the alms, bread, and wine processed from the back of the nave through the congregation to the altar to show that it is our ordinary lives and labors we give to God to be sanctified. The ritual presentation of our lives and labors is essential to our worship. Without this element of the liturgy – this element is eliminated when the bread and wine are already in the sanctuary, and it is obscured when the bread and wine are unceremonially brought up to the altar while the people remain seated, then all leap to their feet for no apparent reason for the presentation of the money – without this element properly done the rest of what happens in the Eucharist does not make sense. I actually participated in a Eucharist yesterday in which the alms basins were being passed during the last third of the Eucharistic prayer and then taken God knows where – not the altar. What does that mean? Is it any wonder most people don’t get the spirituality of a “sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving”?

     The common reason people defy the rubric is to avoid an awkward silence while setting the table after the gifts are bought to the altar. But that is why we have Presentation Hymns. “The Doxology” is for the presentation of alms at Morning Prayer when there is no table setting to be done. For the Eucharist, we need a full Presentation Hymn. If the people are attached to “The Doxology,” don’t worry. It’s the last verse of a real hymn that makes a great Presentation Hymn, though there are countless other gems that usually don’t make it into our worship if we don’t have a Presentation Hymn, for example Adore Devote (“Humbly I adore thee Verity Unseen”). That’s my historical and liturgical background to J. R.s point: If there is a Eucharist, there is an offering. You can’t have a Eucharist without an offering.

     One more Dan insertion: in a service with music, the offering of alms is collected while the musicians (choir, ensemble, soloist, or instrumentalist) make an offering of music. Three points here: 1. The people are not standing and singing a hymn during the collection. For one thing, that makes it very challenging to transfer anything from pocket to plate while holding a hymnal and passing the alms basin. 2. The offering of money and music is all one movement. The music, like the money, is an offering to God, not a performance to applaud. 3. The people sit for the collection so that when they stand for the offering it signifies something. Now back to J. R.:

     The alms, bread, and wine should be processed up the aisle together, while the people stand. Then they should all be elevated together at the altar. Leave the alms on the altar through the consecration. The traditional prayer of oblation (though not a favorite of contemporary liturgists) makes the point that is the core of stewardship: “All things come of thee or Lord, and of thine own have we given thee.” It is a good thing to say while elevating the gifts. It is appropriate for the deacon to receive the gifts, but the priest should participate in the elevation and saying the prayer of oblation. It’s central to the priestly role in liturgy. A brief elevation by the deacon obscures the point.

     Before the procession of the gifts, there is the offertory sentence, the invitation to offer gifts. The stock sentences in the BCP are just options. By and large they don’t say anything to anyone. They have become rather blah, blah. So it is better to choose a Scripture that really says something. Following the example of Timothy Dombeck, I use: Jesus said, do not store up for yourselves treasure on earth where the moth corrupts and the thief breaks in to steal. Rather store up for yourselves treasure in heaven where the moth does not corrupt and the thief does not break in to steal. For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.”

     If a church wants people under 35 to contribute, that church must – not should, must -- provide a way to give electronically. It is that simple. No electronic option, no gift. The church and the young adult are both the poorer for it. But swiping a card is not a ritual act – at least not a very good one. It is important to provide cards to the electronic givers, which they put symbolically in the offering plate to be presented at the altar.

     The vested clergy put money in the plate. Bishop Greg Rickel (Diocese of Olympia – our best stewardship bishop) insists that he be the first one to put money in the plate to set an example. It is axiomatic that the clergy should pledge. If they are poor, then the pledge may be a token. But the clergy must pledge. Some clergy may have the idea that they have done their part by giving time. But clergy are leaders. It is crucial that by their example, they lead into truth, not error. I say this in all gentleness for those who have not yet learned this vital part of what it means to be ordained. A priest or deacon who serves a church but does not pledge is doing more harm than good.

     The clergy do two things for stewardship: they pledge and they reach under their albs and put money in the plate. Absent that symbolic gesture, it looks as if the offering is being presented to the clergy as a kind of quid pro quo for the sacrament. Obviously, that is not true, especially when clergy are non-stipendiary. But the symbolism of the offering is twisted when the clergy do not make a visible offering. If the clergy are not visibly making an offering, how can they credibly preach about the spirituality of gratitude and generosity? Recently I celebrated the Eucharist at a small 8 o’clock service in one of our congregations, just a dozen people. But it was the first time in all my years of ordained ministry that the usher has ever processed an empty alms basin up to the altar. Never saw that one. That would have been a ritual blasphemy. But it was so easily fixed. I reached in my pocket, put some money in the plate, blessed it, offered it, and the service went on.

Weddings & Funerals

     Back to the point: if there is a Eucharist, there is an offering. No offering, no Eucharist. Does it feel funny to have an offering at a wedding or a funeral? J. R. suggests: in a wedding, let the couple designate the charitable cause to which the offering will go; in a funeral, let the family designate the offering to a charitable cause the deceased cared about. In both cases, announce where the offering is going and why. An offering is not a distraction from a wedding or a funeral. It shifts the meaning of those pastoral offices in a way that is edifying for all.

Seasonal Gifts

     It is a helpful stewardship practice to take up special seasonal offerings for special purposes. An example would be collecting school supplies for poor children at the start of the school year. Another example comes from Nevada. Last Epiphany (the season of light) we collected money from throughout the diocese to buy solar lanterns for rural villages in our companion diocese in Kenya.

     J. R.’s point: do something with those offerings liturgically. Bless them, celebrate them, pray for the people who will receive the benefit of the offering. Find a ritual way to bring the whole congregation into the gift, whether they have contributed or not. Put their prayerful fingerprints on the gift. Whatever a congregation does, it does it as a whole, not as individuals. So make the gift a congregational event in the liturgy (the work of the people).

Conclusion

     This post is about how – not why. But just a word on that larger subject: spiritual consumers are doomed to frustration. They live in what Buddhists call “the Hungry Ghost realm” – symbolized by a Caspar shaped ghost with a huge belly and a tiny mouth, so he can never get enough. As long as we come to church to “get something out of it,” as long as we are looking for what God can do for us to support our own life agendas, we will be frustrated, anxious, and disconnected. Transformation happens when we learn the joy of giving ourselves away. The Eucharist is a ritual intended to demonstrate that central point. Yet, we often obscure the meaning of our ritual and thereby distort the gospel we proclaim. I am enormously grateful to J. R. Lander and to The Episcopal Network For Stewardship for helping us speak out plain and honest about surrendering and God and trusting his grace for our well-being.

THE MODERN DIACONATE COMES OF AGE

Deacons are in one sense as old as the Church. In another sense, deacons are rather new. If you want a concise history of how the diaconate was born, went dormant, and then sprang back to life, you could not do better than this link:

 http://www.sfd.edu/book/export/html/45

If you are satisfied with less, here’s a thumbnail summary: For the first 300 years of Christianity, deacons were full fledged clergy serving the poor and overseeing the social services offered by the fledgling Church. Then the diaconate faded into a kind of internship for priests. Deacons made a bit of a comeback in the 19^th Century, when industrialization and urbanization spawned a slough of social problems demanding action by the Church. Once again we had deacons who intended to be deacons for life – and there were saints among them, like David Pendleton Oakerhater. But the resurgence of the diaconate as a full and equal order of ministry really got going in the 1960s and then accelerated in the ensuing decades. In the 1970s, during the prayer book revision, things were still very much in flux and unformed.

The rebirth of the diaconate has restored balance to the Church. The Church is a spiritual body and “spirit” means breath. The Church breathes in and breathes out. The in-breath draws the people together for prayer, worship, fellowship, pastoral support, and spiritual companionship. The out-breath “sends us out into the world to do the work [God has] given us to do” – acts of mercy and advocacy for justice. The priest is ordained to lead the in-breath. The deacon is ordained to lead the out-breath. To be healthy, we need both.

After centuries of the diaconate being dormant, some people still object to diaconal ministry in the church. I recently got a complaint from one parishioner that a deacon was raising funds to cure muscular dystrophy – too controversial, I suppose. Bringing back the diaconate has been as if one half of the body was numb for a long time, then came back to life with a discomfiting tingle.

Our experience with deacons in Nevada has been phenomenally good. We have had some greats: Mary Hettler of Pioche, Gini Hart of Galilee and Fallon, Betty Ihfe of Glenbrook, Shirley Putz of Boulder City, Delaney Armistead of Las Vegas, to name just a few. We are blessed with excellent deacons today, both veterans and new recruits. They perform faithful ministry in their parishes and they network with each other better than any other group in the diocese. As I write, many of our deacons are attending the Province 8 deacons’ conference on domestic poverty. We may once again have one of the largest contingents – maybe the largest – of any diocese.

In the wider Church, the experience with the diaconate has been more checkered.  There has been a lot of good, but there have also been some problems. We had several groups of people who were ordained as deacons but did not really understand the diaconate. The major categories of not-so-helpful deacons were:

        

1.   Sacristy rats in collars. Some deacons have understood themselves as bosses of the altar guild or masters of ceremonies for liturgies, essentially as vergers. We need those jobs done. But they are not the duty of deacons and their focus on those non-diaconal functions obscured what the deacon is supposed to symbolize.

2.   Almost priests. In the Roman Church, some people who wanted to be priests but did not want to be celibate chose the diaconate as second best. In many of our dioceses, seminary was required for priests but not deacons, so some of our people chose the diaconate as second best. Those deacons try to do as much priestly ministry as they can get away with, but don’t authentically embrace the vocation of a deacon.

3.   Resident change-resisters. In most of the Church, priests are itinerant. A priest generally does not stay in one congregation too long. How long that should be can be debated. But we called, ordained, and deployed deacons in place, that is, in the congregations where they had been laity. Priests came and went, but the deacons were forever. They tended to become the main obstacle opposing changes introduced by new priests. This got so bad that some dioceses that had been ordaining deacons in the 1970s shut down the diaconate in the 1980s.

In Nevada, we have not been entirely problem-free, but our problems have been rare indeed. Our deacons have long understood that their ministry is to the broken world primarily outside the Church walls. I once served in a diocese that for a time had suspended any future ordinations to the diaconate because deacons were doing more harm than good. That diocese has now revived the diaconate and is in the ongoing process of reforming it to better serve God’s mission there. We have been blessed with a better diaconal track record.

         That said – and said with gratitude and appreciation – the modern diaconate is still young. It is even now coming of age, and I see some shifts occurring as the diaconate comes into its own. Some of the shifts will be in the thinking of deacons, but others will be in the thinking of the rest of us. All of us, deacons included, will come to a richer understanding of the diaconate together. These are the shifts I see happening:

1. From Nesting Doll To Collaborative Team Model

The Nesting Doll Model of Holy Orders was still being taught when I was in seminary, and we still have folks who think that way, in part because it is still built into the current Prayer Book that was created while the diaconate was still in its infancy. “Nesting Doll Model” means that a priest is still a deacon and can do everything a deacon can do, plus the stuff a priest does. So the priest is one up. A bishop is still a deacon and a priest, and so can do whatever they do, plus the bishop stuff. It is a hierarchical model in which each new ordination adds more clout. This is built into our system by still having the transitional diaconate (temporary deacons who are on their way to becoming priests) and by the way the prayer book permits priests to perform the liturgical functions of a deacon. For example, the BCP says, “the Deacon or a Priest reads the Gospel . . ..”

The better model, the one truer to the Ancient Church, is that the orders of ministry are all different positions on a team, different parts of the Body of Christ, not a hierarchy of importance. We still need to allow priests to perform the deacon’s role when there is no deacon present. But when a deacon is present, the priest should not usurp that role. If the priest muddles up the orders by functioning as a deacon, the diaconate loses its symbolic role and the liturgy loses coherence. Likewise, in the functioning of parish life, the deacons should be the main leaders of social ministries even if the priest is passionate about such ministries. The priest can and should be involved, but the deacons need to be out front leading the charge. Hopefully, we will abolish the transitional diaconate before too long.

2. From Doers To Leaders.

         When we see lay folks doing good service in the world – feeding the hungry, tending the sick, advocating for a more just society – we still sometimes say “that is diaconal work.” In the technical sense that “diakoneia” means “service,” that is true. But such works of justice and mercy are not the province of deacons. These corporal works of mercy are how the laity fulfill their baptismal vows. 

         Deacons may well be involved up to their elbows in such ministries so that they can lead by doing and share in the ministry of the laity. But fundamentally, the deacon’s job is not to do the ministry but rather to get someone else to do it. The one who serves receives a blessing. The one who gets the other to serve has in fact served two people, the one who did the service and the one who received it. By doing the job herself, the deacon deprives the layperson of the blessing. Better to enlist, train, and guide people in service.

         It takes more than a good heart to be a deacon. It takes leadership skills – specific leadership skills somewhat the same but also somewhat different from the leadership skills of a priest.

3.   From Charity To Empowerment

The Anglican Communion has defined our purpose in terms of the Five Marks of Mission: http://www.anglicancommunion.org/ministry/mission/fivemarks.cfm.

The Episcopal Church has adopted and embraced that definition of our mission. http://www.episcopalchurch.org/page/five-marks-mission

Mark 3 is:

         “to respond to human need by loving service.”

That is part of the ministry into which deacons lead us. Most deacons gravitate toward Mark 3 readily enough. But Mark 4 is also the province of deacons and it is more of a stretch:

         “to transform unjust structures of society, to challenge violence

          of every kind, and to pursue peace and reconciliation.”

Deacons are ordained to lead the Church into advocacy on matters where injustice, violence, and conflict tear the fabric of humanity. Deacons do not engage in partisan politics supporting or opposing political parties or candidates. But the Church does have positions on some issues. Contrary to a simplistic view of the 1^st Amendment, the Church has a Constitutional right to advocate for those positions. The Internal Revenue Code recognizes our right to take those stands. The group most uncomfortable with Church involvement in political matters is surely the ACLU, but I have been personally invited by ACLU leaders to join with them in advocating for civil rights.

The major denominations have special offices engaged in advocacy work. For us, that is the Episcopal Public Policy Network. At the state level we have Lutheran Episcopal Advocacy in Nevada (“LEAN”). Our positions are defined by resolutions of the bicameral General Convention. Those resolutions are derived from the Anglican process of engaging Scripture, Tradition, and Reason to find God’s will in our current circumstances.

        

         Deacons fulfill their ordination vows when they espouse Church teachings on issues like immigration, payday loans, and human trafficking. They are not interjecting their own political opinions. They are espousing the teachings of the Episcopal Church. Our Nevada deacons have long done a great job on Mark 3 (loving service). Today they are taking the lead on Mark 4 (transforming unjust structures) as well.

4.   From Kamikaze Prophets To Community Builders

When deacons move from Mark 3 to Mark 4 (from a focus on charity to a focus on transformation), in the past they tended to adopt the style of the 8^th century prophets announcing the will of God and flagellating the congregation for its unrighteousness and indifference. You know how well that has gone over. There are actually two lessons to be learned from the 8^th century prophets: First, the substance of their message, that God is deeply concerned about how we treat the poor and other folks at the margins of society, is absolutely right. Second, the prophets’ judgmental rhetoric didn’t work then and it sure won’t work today. I spoke with the leader of an ecumenical advocacy group awhile back, asking if they really thought their tactics were going to change anything. The leader said they had decided to “take a moral stand and speak with a prophetic voice.” I groaned.

Kamikaze deacons may feel righteous, but they actually prevent positive change buy provoking resistance. Instead of judgment, we need conversation, relationship, and curiosity. Today we train deacons to form relationships in the congregation, to form relationships outside the congregation, and then to network those inside with those outside to collaboratively improve the community. We have the basic guidelines of the Church’s teachings – but no Episcopalian and no congregation is going to engage everything the Church has said. It’s a question of “what do we care about locally” and “what approach will work for us here locally?” That takes starting with questions, not ideological assumptions. It takes conversation. It takes mutual respect. Most importantly, it takes bringing together for a common purpose people who might not know each other.

Diaconal ministry done right unifies a congregation. It does not divide a congregation. It relies on a certain gentleness and patience. It is practical and human. As deacons grow into their role as community builders, we will see stronger congregations more connected to the towns where they live.

5.   From Entitlement To Collaborative Vocation

Because the modern diaconate was young and because priests used to guard their turf (and sometimes turf that was not even theirs to begin with), deacons in the 1980s and 1990s had to fight for their place in the Church. I see less and less turf-guarding by priests. But even where the priests have come around, some deacons occasionally remind me of those Japanese soldiers who were lost on a Pacific Island and did not know the war was over.

         Sometimes some deacons guard their turf in the liturgy as if it were a personal entitlement, missing the point that their role is symbolic of the Church’s mission in the world. Some deacons still seem to regard priests as authority figures to rebel against. These attitudes are the residue of old conflicts that are really behind us.

         As the diaconate comes of age, we will see priests and deacons acting more and more as equal partners, each with their own distinct leadership role, each supporting the other in that role. The roles are complementary.

         Conclusion. Today we celebrate the rebirth of diaconal ministry. We can be grateful for having an exceptionally strong diaconate in Nevada. It is the deacons who lead us into active engagement with our communities. Particularly young people today judge the authenticity of our spirituality by how we live it out in the world. Without a solid record of missional service, no one will pay any attention to what we say.  

         We have been particularly blessed in our diocese to have avoided the pitfalls that have hampered the diaconate in some dioceses. In the future, as the diaconate continues to come of age, we will glean still greater benefits from diaconal ministry. Our congregations will be knit together more strongly, knowing each other better and sharing common goals formed through healthy processes. Deacons trained as leaders will inspire more hands on engagement of church people in works of mercy and transformation. The orders of ministry will work even more collaboratively. So as good as the diaconate has been in Nevada, as good as it is today, I look forward to even better things to come.

            

THE LAS VEGAS POLICE AMBUSH, CHURCH, AND BELONGING

A husband and wife walk into a pizza place and gun down two Las Vegas police officers eating lunch, flee to a Wal-Mart and shoot an armed bystander. The wife then kills her husband, and ends the episode with her own suicide.

An echo of the shooting at Seattle Pacific University last week; and of the deadlier shooting at UC Santa Barbara three weeks ago; and all the mass shootings – Tucson, Sandy Hook Elementary, the one-room Amish school, the Sikh Temple, Columbine. All just random nuts with weapons? Or are they canaries in our cultural coal mine of alienation, disempowerment, and desperation?

Does this have anything to do with the armed standoff of the militias and the BLM over grazing leases? What about the inability of our elected representatives to negotiate compromise solutions for the various issues of our day? Might it all connect somehow to the decline of participation in any sort of voluntary associations for common goals? And is that related to the decline of marriage and our inability to keep the marriages we’ve got together?

In the aftermath of gun violence, we reflexively say we need better regulation of firearms and we need more mental health services.  Yes, obviously true. I am 100% for both those technical responses. But whenever we say those things in the aftermath of gun violence, people rush out to the gun stores to beef up their firepower, the daily attrition through gun violence continues, and a short while later (these days a very short while later), we have another mass shooting. The problem is deeper and wider than loose gun laws and the shortage of affordable therapists.

For whatever reasons – let competent sociologists explain them – people are becoming more and more disconnected. The loneliness and despair overwhelms us. We are alienated and in our alienation, we are disempowered, unable to influence our environment because the channels of influence – relationships – are broken. We lose the ability to shake hands, look each other in they eye, and have an honest conversation. In the absence of such organic connection, the economic machine chews us up. In despair, we drink, gamble, distract ourselves with work and electronic games, and some of us become angry – angry enough to kill, to kill someone, anyone – it doesn’t matter who we kill because we aren’t really connected to anyone. We don’t have the capacity to connect with anyone. We have lost the capacity to imagine how the world looks through another person’s eyes, and no one can imagine what it is like to be us. We live and die unknown. In a crowded room, perhaps in a casino sitting at a gaming machine, we are in solitary confinement. The only connection we know how to make with another human being is to shoot them.

My question is: where do faith and the community of faith come into this? Some of our congregations are open and welcoming, embracing people who come their way, offering them caring presence, attention, appreciation, and a chance to participate in activities ranging from the fun to the noble. I hear stories from people who were lost, alienated, and discouraged until they connected with a congregation, and little by little, they came back to hope.

I heard a story from one woman whose family life had been hard, so she had resolved not to have children. But when she saw how people loved and nurtured the children in our church, she changed her mind. Her children with her that day in church were born because of the grace she experienced in our community. I have heard stories of people who came to us from broken relationships and found comfort, hope, and healing. I have heard from people who had lived on the streets but were able to get back on their feet not just through material support we offered but also through encounter with people who understood that to believe in God we have to also believe in each other. We believed in those people and our faith in them gave them courage.

Not all of us get this. Some of us want to keep the church just for ourselves. Others want to grow the church to add to our institutional strength, so we can feel successful. Both approaches utterly and completely miss the mark of our mission. It is to give and receive mercy. It is to reconcile people to the human race. It is to give up the futility of acquisition and self-advancement for the better life of extending caring presence to other people and eliciting their caring presence in return. We might call it belonging. We celebrate it ritually as Communion.

When the loneliness in the world is so great, the call is to open our doors wider, make our porch light burn brighter. We have no time for crankiness or pettiness. There is a world to me healed.