Light in the Darkness

Wednesday in Holy Week

19 March 2008

Saint Mary’s Anglican Church

Vancouver BC

+ My friends in Christ, I speak to you in the name of God the Weaver, who through the shuttle of the Holy Spirit weaves us into the pattern of the Word made flesh. Amen.

I have a confession to make. There was a point at which I really did not want to go to Myanmar. When Bishop Cowan first called me to ask if I would be willing to go, I said ‘Yes’ in an almost automatic response. Then as the reality of the trip come closer, there were moments when I was hopeful that some obstacle would arise that would permit me to withdraw gracefully from the project.

The first opportunity came when I learned of the length of the trip, more than three weeks. Given that faculty members may only be away for no more than two weeks during term, a secret part of me hoped that the Principal would say ‘No’. I went to see Wendy Fletcher. She thought it was a wonderful opportunity and said ‘Yes’.

The second opportunity came when the government of Myanmar began to require more and more information from us regarding our visit. A month before we were scheduled to depart, the embassy asked that we write a letter, in our own handwriting, stating that we were travelling only as tourists and would not engage in any religious activities. As Bishop Cowan’s secretary said, such a letter would make saying one’s prayers in a hotel room a violation! So we wrote a letter stating that we were coming as tourists to attend the installation of the new Archbishop and to visit with other Anglicans. No other ‘religious activities’ were ‘planned’. The travel agent said she doubted a visa would be granted. Then two weeks before departure our visas arrived.

On the Friday before our departure my final opportunity presented itself. My long bout with a digestive problem flared up. I went to UBC Urgent Care. After a thorough interview where I indicated that I was due to go off to Myanmar and some basic diagnostic tests, the doctor said to me, “I don’t think you want to go to Myanmar.” I had to agree. I had become a prisoner of my own fears, some based on reasonable concerns, others arising from a deeply embedded fear of dying far away from home.

Jesus said to them, “The light is with you for a little longer. Walk while you have the light, so that the darkness may not overtake you. If you walk in the darkness, you do not know where you are going. While you have the light, believe in the light, so that you may become children of light.” (John 12.35-36)

For those who first heard the words of the gospel according to John darkness was a reality. The controversy regarding the ministry of Jesus of Nazareth had led to a full-blown conflict between those Jews who accepted that Jesus was the Messiah, who believed that in Jesus the Logos, the Wisdom of God, had come to dwell and those Jews who believed that Jesus was deluded at best and heretic at worst. This conflict was not resolved when, in the year 70 of the common era, a Jewish revolt had led the Roman army to destroy the Temple. Rather than calm things down, the theological conflict spread throughout the Empire, as refugees found their way into Jewish communities spread around the Mediterranean Sea.

We know that family fights tend to be more vicious than fights between strangers. While one can be angry at a stranger, conflict with a family member or a close friend can arouse feelings of betrayal even profound hatred. This depth of feeling is present throughout John’s gospel where the conflict between Jesus is always described as being with ‘the Jews’ --- this term used as if Jesus were not himself a Jew. In some ways John’s gospel, while upholding the image of Jesus as light, falls prey to the darkness of which Jesus speaks.

The darkness to which John’s community fell prey to, the darkness to which I fell prey to, has a name: fear. This fear extends to our present controversy over how gay and lesbian disciples of Christ are to live out their lives in fidelity. Paul Gibson, the retired Liturgical Officer of the Anglican Communion and the Anglican Church of Canada, has recently written the following comments:

The current controversy in the Communion over issues related to homosexuality appears to have created a mood or atmosphere of anxiety and fear, as though schism were the greatest evil that could befall the church and which should be avoided at all cost.

I am not afraid of schism. I am afraid of a church in which some leaders voted to commit themselves to listen to the experience of homosexual persons and to assure them that they are loved by God and that all baptized, believing and faithful persons, regardless of sexual orientation, are full members of the Body of Christ (from the Lambeth Conference of Anglican bishops in 1998, Resolution I.10.c), but show little evidence of having acted on that promise.

Fear is a powerful force that can overcome our God-given faculties of rational thought and panic sets in rather than a cool appraisal of the situation and a re-assertion of our primary values and faith.

There is no doubt that there is a climate of fear in many places. In this diocese some Anglicans fear the ending of structures and patterns of Anglican life that have guided and nourished us for several generations but that can no longer sustain us. Throughout this country some Anglicans fear being wrong or on the wrong side of any of the controversies that beset us, whether issues of sexuality or issues of reconciliation with First Nations.

Many people in this country, whether they belong to communities of faith or not, fear for their own well-being. Will our health care system continue to provide the necessary services to meet the needs of a changing population? Will we outlive the resources we have managed to set aside for our retirements? Can we sustain the quality of life that we have become accustomed to over many years? Have we so damaged the environment that our only option is damage control rather than the reversal of the consequences of our poor stewardship?

If we speak the truth, we know that some of us are afraid of dying. Our society idolizes youth and bodily perfection; our consciousness tells us that the media ideal is not the reality the majority of human beings, either in this country or elsewhere, actually live. We all die, but coming to grips with this reality is a life project that evades many, whether young or old or in between.

But even in the grip of the darkness of his own community’s fear, the evangelist John records words of Jesus spoken in the midst of the tense and tragic events of this last week. These are not words about fear but words of confidence and reassurance.

Jesus said to them, “The light is with you for a little longer. Walk while you have the light, so that the darkness may not overtake you. If you walk in the darkness, you do not know where you are going. While you have the light, believe in the light, so that you may become children of light.” (John 12.35-36)

My mentor in seminary and afterwards, Louis Weil, presently Professor of Liturgics at the Church Divinity School of the Pacific, tells this story about himself. Louis was born to a Jewish father and a Southern Baptist mother. During his growing up, Louis became an Anglican but never lost touch with his father’s rabbi. While he was serving as a member of the faculty of the Anglican seminary in Puerto Rico, Louis experienced a time of doubt, conflict and physical discomfort. On a visit home to Dallas, he went to see the rabbi and poured out to him all that had happened in Puerto Rico, all his anxieties and uncertainties. After a period of silence, the rabbi said to him, “Louis, if Jesus is who you say he is, the Messiah and the Hope that has come into the world, why do you have an ulcer?” The rabbi was not attempting to dissuade Louis from his Christian faith; he was challenging him to re-commit, to re-discover the wells of life, the sources of light, within the faith Louis had chosen as a younger man.

I tell this story not to suggest that any of us who have suffered anxiety or stress or any fear are unfaithful people. Rather I tell this story to remind myself and others that the darkness that we may sense around us is not now nor will it ever be greater than the Light which has come into the world. When you and I were baptized, we were given the potential to be ‘lucifers’ --- ‘light-bearers’ --- in the darkness that many of our brothers and sisters here and abroad find themselves wandering in uncertainty and fear.

There are times when I find myself reaching not only for the Bible or the Prayer Book or the Book of Alternative Services but for Frank Herbert’s science fiction novel, Dune. In the first volume of this multi-volume work, Herbert puts in the mouth of several characters a litany:

I must not fear.

Fear is the mind-killer.

Fear is the little death

that brings total obliteration.

I will face my fear.

I will permit it

to pass over and through me.

And when it has gone past

I will turn the inner eye to see its path.

When fear has gone

there will be nothing.

Only I will remain.

My friends, I do not doubt that there are places and moments of darkness for all of us. I do not doubt that there are places and moments when our fears overcome our rationality and our composure. But I know that we are not made for fear; we are made in the image and likeness of God. That image and likeness is light and hope. That image and likeness enables us to face controversies and conflicts without the fearful response of coercion and oppression that marks an all too frequent human response to controversy and conflict.

But not tonight. Tonight we hear the words of Jesus that remind us that we are not children of darkness, the darkness of fear; we are children of light who can enter the night confident of the light within and without. Even in the face of death we are free from the fear that burdens many.

I close tonight with the epistle for Wednesday in Holy Week found in Hebrews 12.

Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight and the sin that clings so closely, and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus the pioneer and perfecter of our faith, who for the sake of the joy that was set before him endured the cross, disregarding its shame, and has taken his seat at the right hand of the throne of God.

Consider him who endured such hostility against himself from sinners, so that you may not grow weary or lose heart.

Let us pray.

Most Holy One, grant that we may be counted as members of the great cloud of witnesses who live with justice and compassion, and reveal your divine glory before all people; through Jesus your Beloved, who with you and the Holy Spirit, lives and reigns now and for ever. Amen.