We Crucified Thee, We Continue to Crucify Thee
According to a new poll put out by the Pew Forum, if you attend Christian church services semi-regularly in America, you are more likely than not to believe that torture is at least sometimes justified. However, of the four groups distinguished in the poll–Mainline Protestants, White Evangelicals, White Catholics and Unidentified–Mainline Protestants are most likely to believe that torture is never justified. But still–that number is only 31 percent, while 46 percent of Mainline Protestants think that torture can at least be “sometimes” justified.
How unbelievably depressing.
- Jamie McElroy
Do You Believe… in Global Warming?
In anticipation of The Rev. Sally Bingham’s presentation tonight on what churches and other faith-based organizations can do to address the problem of global warming, here’s opinion poll guru, Nate Silver, crunching the numbers on religious belief and global warming belief:
The first thing I noticed from this Gallup survey on attitudes toward global warming is that the percentage of persons who think global warming is manmade appears to be much higher in predominately Catholic nations than in Protestant ones…
Poling in the United States has suggested that Catholics are considerably more concerned about climate change than evangelical Protestants, although not more than mainline or black Protestant denominations, and less so than Jewish or atheist voters.
- Jamie McElroy
Cecilia Redux
On Sunday, May 3, at 4pm, the St. Bede’s Choir will present Blessed Cecilia! –a repeat performance of the choir ’s beautiful concert earlier this year. The program includes the exquisite Serenade to Music, for solo voices and piano accompaniment, by Ralph Vaughan Williams, and Benjamin Britten’s lovely Hymn to St. Cecilia, to a poem by W.H.Auden.
We would love to share these musical treasures with you. We invite you to come and sit in our lovely redwood sanctuary with us, and allow us to give you this gift. The concert will be less than an hour, is free, and will be followed by a light, strawberry reception in the Great Hall.
- Jane McDougle
Feeling Blue?
This enchanting mix of music and image must be shared!
If You Have A Hammer
St. Bede’s has worked for many years to support the work of GAIA in Malawi. We’ve had this recent request from GAIA founder and president, Bill Rankin:
If people skilled in constructing 2 small houses for 2 nurses in southern Malawi could get to Malawi to do this work, there is a great need for the same.
This is a health center in Zomba District where one Medical Assistant sees up to 400 people per day. If two small houses can be constructed for nurses, it will be possible to get some nurses there to help him.
GAIA could provide a bit of funds to assist the project, but nearly everything would have to be donated. We are looking for a group to go to Malawi to do this work, probably before the November rains come.
Our Country Director, Jones Laviwa, writes, “We could deploy the building foreman who has been supervising the construction work of our offices to be with the group, he knows all about where bricks can be sourced and all other building materials.”
If anyone is interested and can pay the airfare, please contact me WRankin@theGAIA.org and I will help with further information.
Best wishes.
William W. Rankin, Ph.D., President and C.E.O.
www.thegaia.org
-Judy Werner-Hall
The Messy Bible vs. The Sunday School Bible
David Plotz has written The Good Book, an analysis of the Bible from the perspective of a thoughtful non-clergy-person/non-religious scholar. And The New Yorker online recently posted an interview with him. It’s fascinating reading.
Here’s one question and answer I found particularly provocative:
Early in your reading, you find that some well-known Biblical figures and stories are more complicated than our present understanding of them suggests. Noah’s tale is grim, you say—and yet we’ve turned it into a theme for children’s playrooms. Why have some stories persisted over others?
The stories that persist do so because, as we have cleaned them up, they generally offer some morally coherent lesson for us: Noah teaches about obedience, God’s might, and God’s mercy. Joseph teaches about the persistence of faith in a hostile land. But almost every popularized Bible story leaves out the worst bits, or glosses over the confusing parts. Who remembers the second half of the Jonah story, for example, when Jonah sulks and rages at God because God won’t destroy Nineveh? Or the last couple of chapters of the book of Esther—the basis of the story of Purim—when Queen Esther orders Haman’s ten sons impaled on stakes, for no good reason? My own feeling is that the Messy Bible—with its ambiguous (or worse) heroes and its erratic and wrathful God—is a lot more interesting, and more true to our ugly world, than the Sunday School Bible. But the Sunday School Bible is easier to teach.
- Jamie McElroy
Alternative Gift Ideas
Mother’s Day is coming! Won’t you consider an outreach alternative gift for the Moms in your family?
Netsforlife — Your $12 donation to Nets For Life pays for 1 mosquito net which protects 3 persons from contracting malaria in Africa! You’ll receive an attractive and informative greeting card in receipt to inform Mom of your donation in her honor! Contact the parish office jwhall@stbedesmenlopark.org to join St. Bede’s nets campaign.
Global AIDS Interfaith Alliance (GAIA) — An alternative gift is another way we acknowledge special occasions or holidays while being charitable to those less fortunate. Instead of giving one more sweater or scarf, donations to GAIA can be given in the name of a loved one while ameliorating the ravaging effects of poverty, famine and the relentless spread of HIV.
-Judy Werner-Hall
This Week at St. Bede’s
Thursday, May 21st, 6:30pm in the Great Hall — Young Adults Break Bread at Bede’s with The Theology of Battlestar Galactica. You won’t want to miss this! There will be a catered supper. Your $10 donation will be most appreciated. RSVP
Sunday, May 24th, 5pm — Eve of Bede Evensong. The English monk Bede was the greatest scholar of the eighth century in the Western Church. Legend reports he was given the title of “Venerable’ by an obliging angel. Join us for this celebration of our patronal saint with a choral service of hymns, evening canticles, readings and prayers. Magnificat & Nunc Dimittis (The Gloucester Service) – John Sanders 1988. Freewill offering.
NB — We have four more openings for the Parish Retreat at the Bishop’s Ranch, June 12-14 with space in the Ranch House and in Webb Lodge. Let the Parish Office know asap if you would like to go!
- Judy Werner-Hall
A Poem For Today
Laughter
What is laughter? What is laughter?
It is God waking up! O it is God waking up!
It is the sun poking its sweet head out
From behind a cloud
You have been carrying too long,
Veiling your eyes and heart.
It is Light breaking ground for a great Structure
That is your Real body – called Truth.
It is happiness applauding itself and then taking flight
To embrace everyone and everything in this world.
Laughter is the polestar
Held in the sky by our Beloved,
Who eternally says,
“Yes, dear ones, come this way,
Come this way towards Me and Love!
Come with your tender mouths moving
And your beautiful tongues conducting songs
And with your movements – your magic movements
Of hands and feet and glands and cells – Dancing!
Know that to God’s Eye,
All movement is a Wondrous Language,
And Music – such exquisite, wild Music!”
O what is laughter, Hafiz?
What is this precious love and laughter
Budding in our hearts?
It is the glorious sound
Of a soul waking up!
~ Hafiz ~
-Judy Werner-Hall
Easter Sermon 3: Faith vs. Belief
Wouldn’t it be nice if Jesus would appear, in all his glory, once and for all, as then we could stop worrying the edges of our faith, and just get on with living it?
But Jesus isn’t going to appear, at least not in that way. If he did, we would have no choice but to believe. As Jayber Crow, in Wendell Berry’s novel of the same name, says, “He would be the absolute tyrant of the world and we would be His slaves. Even those who hated Him and hated one another and hated their own souls would have to believe in Him then. From that moment the possibility that we might be bound to Him and He to us and us to one another by love forever would be ended.”
So, we are given the choice: we can choose to try to believe, or we can choose not to bother. If we choose to make the effort, perhaps the first question should be, what should we believe?It’s certainly would seem to be the easier question to answer, because we have the creeds. We recite the Nicene Creed almost every Sunday. That’s what we believe, isn’t it? A nice tidy list, that keeps everyone agreed and looking in the right direction? Not quite, I suspect. Hasn’t each one of us, at least at one time or another, had trouble with the creeds? And, more sadly, how many people have found those words to be such a stumbling block that they have walked away from our doors.
While not intending to be too heretical, I think it’s interesting to consider that for the first three hundred years of Christianity, there were many Christians who would have struggled with being made to affirm that particular set of tenets…
The Nicene Creed was created to bring into line all the varying Christian theologies, and to make clear which ones were not acceptable, or heretical…
But do we believe what we are told to believe? Not usually. However, being told can be comforting. Beliefs bring groups together. At least you know what you should believe, even if you don’t yet. And where is faith in all of this? In an interesting article by the French philosopher and theologian Jacques Ellul, called “Belief and Faith”(1983), he differentiates between the two in, I think, very helpful ways. He writes: “Belief provides answers to people’s questions while faith never does….Belief is reassuring. People who live in the world of belief feel safe…For belief things are simple: God is almighty.” On the other hand, faith will never provide answers, faith listens and waits.
- Jane McDougle
[Click below for the complete sermon.]
The Diocese of California on Swine Flu
The Diocese has contacted DioCal churches, schools & institutions with the following letter:
As all of you know, there is an outbreak of swine flu. There are some very simple things that we can all do to minimize the risk of becoming ill and also protecting those around us. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued a statement yesterday addressing concerns about the recent outbreak of Swine Flu. Spokespeople asked that we do not panic and follow the same preventative measures used during regular flu season.
CONCERN: EAP has been monitoring the developments of the swine influenza and prepared this special edition newsletter that will keep you informed about this situation. It contains the need-to-know information about the outbreak that congregations will find immediately valuable. There are also web sites referenced that will enable us to remain current with the latest developments.
Here are some recommendations from the CDC (Centers for Disease Control). You might also want to check their regularly updated page on the swine flu: http://www.cdc.gov/swineflu/ <http://www.cdc.gov/swineflu/>
Cover your nose and mouth with a tissue when you cough or sneeze. Throw the tissue in the trash after you use it.
Wash your hands often with soap and water, especially after you cough or sneeze. Alcohol-based hands cleaners are also effective.
Avoid touching your eyes, nose or mouth. Germs spread that way.
Try to avoid close contact with sick people.
Influenza is thought to spread mainly person-to-person through coughing or sneezing of infected people.
If you get sick, CDC recommends that you stay home from work or school and limit contact with others to keep from infecting them.
Most importantly, please do not come to work or enter public places if you develop flu-like symptoms. Contact your physician as needed. For additional information visit the CDC website at www.cdc.gov.
- Judy Werner-Hall
Easter Sermon 2: Believing Thomas
It really irritates me, making St. Thomas go through 2,000 years being called ‘Doubting Thomas’. He deserves more credit than that.
Can you imagine the depression Thomas must have felt when Jesus was crucified? Jesus was dead for Thomas — he had been sealed in the tomb along with the hope and generosity of spirit within which they had lived for those three years. And then it was all over and there wasn’t even a body left as proof of their loss. Those years with Jesus meant far too much to Thomas for him to be tricked by some ghostly figment of his brothers’ and sisters’ imagination. He wasn’t about to buy some imposter — some false Jesus look alike. Would you?
Considering his situation, Thomas’s protestations over the Lord’s resurrection — “unless I see…I will not believe” — speak not so much from doubt as from a profound desire to believe…
William Temple wrote of Thomas: “Such vigour of disbelief plainly represents a strong urge to believe.” It’s that Shakespearean sense of “Methinks, [Thomas,] thou protesteth too much.”
To be fair, Thomas really ought to be remembered as ‘Believing Thomas’ since he so profoundly desired to believe. And in the end, he did believe.
I think it was also William Temple who first said, “We are Easter people,” and we are. We are Easter people and as such we embrace resurrection.
Now, I use the word ‘embrace’ deliberately. Some folks, good and committed Christians, seem at times a bit embarrassed in admitting to belief in resurrection. Such people, in their heart of hearts, want to believe, but when it comes to making things work in their ‘head of heads’, well, therein lies the rub.
Yet belief, you see, is so much more than mental assent. In biblical terms, belief, or credo, implies giving one’s heart to something, more than just the mind. We don’t believe by getting our heads around the faith but by getting our hearts around these things.
- Joseph Lane
[Click below for the complete sermon.]
Holy Miniature Replica!
Breen Mullins just passed along this article about a man in England named Alec Girard who has spent the past 30 years of his life painstakingly constructing an incredibly detailed miniature replica of King Herod’s Temple, the first century C.E. Jerusalem temple that Jesus would have known and that was destroyed by the Romans around 70 C.E.
By contrast, according to ancient Israelite lore, Herod and his minions are believed to have spent only 3 years building their life-sized version (completed in 19 B.C.E.)–though most scholars think it must have taken much longer.
Says Girard (as quoted in the article),
“It’s now recognised as the most authentic version of the temple in the world,” he said. “I’ve had a lot of offers from people to buy it, but it’s not for sale.” And while he sees it as a form of relaxation, he says his wife thinks he is mad. “She wishes she’d married a normal person,” he said.
- Jamie McElroy
Beautiful
Since posting that video of 47-year-old Susan Boyle auditioning for “Britain’s Got Talent” (the English version of “American Idol”), a few people have admitted to me that watching it made them tear up. Probably not unlike this:
I think that, in part, many people find Boyle’s audition performance so moving because it demonstrates how much beauty everyone has–beauty that usually goes unnoticed in this fallen world. I think she’s making us tear up in front of our computers because she’s reminding us that we’re all heavenly creatures, created in God’s image, prepared to shine with the light to enlighten the nations; and this despite the cynical way much of the world routinely dismisses so many as ugly and useless hunks of clay.
- Jamie McElroy
Doing Impersonal Good
This Sunday, when philosopher Lauren Hartzell was introducing us to the new landscape of environmental ethics, something she said burrowed into my brain. And I’ve been thinking about it ever since.
She spoke of how our moral obligations regarding our natural environment are often very hard to see directly. And she spoke of how serving the needs of the environment so as to produce change for the better usually does not come with the personal gratification of immediately seeing the fruits of our labor.
For example, she said, when you volunteer in a soup kitchen or homeless shelter, you get to see, in compelling human terms, the positive effect of your labor. It’s right there on the faces of the people you’re trying to help. But when you spend a couple of hours pulling mustard weeds in the Bede’s Bog (for example), the sense of good work, of positive social change, is much more impersonal, more theoretical–and can therefore feel less rewarding. But that doesn’t mean it is less worthy of our effort.
This has interesting implications for how we at St. Bede’s structure our social ministries. Often, when we consider what sorts of social ministry projects to rally behind, we specifically consider how to make sure those who participate in that ministry can, in some sense, get to know and directly interact with the people we hope to help. We do this because we know it will be gratifying for those involved to see the faces of those whom they hope to help.
However, our work at the Bede’s Bog, like much service work devoted to the welfare of our planet, will not better the lives of any people we are likely to meet first-hand. Most likely, those whose lives we are helping probably haven’t been born yet. Also, rather than helping a relatively small group of people enormously–as one does when serving hot meals for a couple of hours–the work we are doing in the Baylands will help a large population a little, incremental, but still important ways.
To be honest, this is precisely the sort of social ministry churches and other charitable organizations avoid because it feels impersonal and therefore less gratifying to join in. But I think that Lauren was implicitly challenging us to re-think the way we consider our sense of fulfillment when we engage in social ministry. Maybe we need to learn how to feel good about doing service work that is impersonal.
- Jamie McElroy
A Hot Topic
It has been eco-week at St. Bede’s.
This past Sunday, during our annual Spring Meeting, we heard from an environmental ethicist and an ecologist to help us think about how best to re-shape our Sand Hill Road site as it comes due for a round of landscaping and upgrading and maintenance.
And tomorrow evening, Thursday, April 30, 6:30 – 9 pm, as part of our Breaking Bread at Bede’s series, we will hear from The Rev. Cannon Sally Bingham, an Episcopal priest and the president of California Interfaith Power and Light, an organization working to promote the idea that global worming is the major religious and moral issue of our time.
Sally believes that all major religious traditions call us to be good stewards of the earth, therefore we must work together to address the grave threat to humanity and all creation posed by global warming. And she has already recruited over 460 congregations of many different faiths to join CIPL and to lead by example by reducing carbon-dioxide emissions from their own houses of worship by over 20 million pounds.
New Look, New Bloggers
As you’ve probably noticed, we’ve fiddled with our design so as to re-make Bede’s Blog into a more complete, all-purpose St. Bede’s website.
Also, as you may have noticed, our Parish Deacon and Administrator, Judy Werner-Hall, and our Associate Rector for Music and the Arts, Jane McDougle, have begun posting alongside me. I’m thrilled to have their voices added to our bloggy conversation. Now we need to hear more from you, our readers.
- Jamie McElroy
“The Sun” Shines
I was clever enough to subscribe to The Sun magazine a year ago, and would like to invite you to explore its literary and artistic delights!
The Sun is an independent, ad-free monthly magazine that for more than thirty years has used words and photographs to invoke the splendor and heartache of being human. The Sun celebrates life, but not in a way that ignores its complexity. The personal essays, short stories, interviews, poetry, and photographs that appear in its pages explore the challenges we face and the moments when we rise to meet those challenges.
The Sun publishes the work of emerging and established artists who are striving to be thoughtful and authentic. Writing from The Sun has won the Pushcart Prize, been published in Best American Short Stories and Best American Essays, and been broadcast on National Public Radio.
- Judy Werner-Hall
Let the Greening Begin
This past Sunday, while the adults were in the Great Hall discussing environmental ethics with Stanford Philosophy doctoral candidate Lauren Hartzell, as well as the environmental impact of future landscaping and building projects on the Bede’s site with ecologist, Ryan Navrotil, our kids were out behind the Great Hall breaking ground for the new St. Bede’s Community Garden.
Small-space farmer extraordinaire, Brian Leen is overseeing the project and this summer, we will put to work all the kids who participate in our Eco-Camp (August 17 – 21 — register today!), digging, planting and otherwise cultivating this new garden.
- Jamie McElroy
St. Bede’s Church Welcomes You!
You’ve got questions? We’ve got questions!
St. Bede’s Episcopal Church
2650 Sand Hill Road
Menlo Park, California 94025
650-854-6555
Rector’s Welcome – Services – Sermons
Sept 09 calendar – Map – Bede?
