2023.01.08 Where IS The Epiphany Light? Lyn G. Brakeman, Spiritual Lemons, blog post, 1/08/23

The Holy Bible is rich—full of proverbial wisdom, history of a people liberated, birth and death, prophetic vision—and most of all, stories. It must never be taken literally/factually yet must always be taken seriously.  It’s all called Holy, because it is all about people seeking God and God seeking people. In each story there is spiritual truth, even though it’s not a  documentary/docudrama. I promise you, your own story, or parts of it, is in there. Use your imagination and intuitional intelligence as your guiding light. 

You may not be a king or a Magus, one of a priestly cast in ancient Persia, but surely you have followed a dream against all good societal advice, simply because something has tweaked your heart, moved your soul deeply, saying GO or TRY.  You may even have taken traveling friends along, or traveled just in your own mind. Not every trip is about illegal drugs or mapped on AAA, yet every such trip is full of courage, wariness, fear, eagerness, curiosity, faith and doubt—yours and God’s, I assure you.  

The Epiphany story about the traveling threesome, Magi, is politically danger-ridden and compelling. I imagine a conversation they might have had after they saw something odd and fascinating at once. (Odd and fascinating usually accompany something Holy.) A simple family scene. What to make of that, really? They’d  trusted the night sky and had brought shower gifts in case. They also knew they couldn’t linger but had to get back home.  I’m spooked, let’s go home another way! What do you mean. Are you a scaredy cat? No, of course not, I was just thinking it might be easier on these panting camels. Yeah, and also your own butt, Melchior. Nah. Creature comfort is Balthasar’s issue, not mine. Well, I, Caspar, am the elder and I lead here. That king Herod hates competitors, so we’re not taking that same detour again. Come on, we have tons of light from the stars. Okay, you’re the boss, bossy. 

And so they head back by another way. They have followed the brightest Star. But when they turn their back on it, they discover they are still following it. Or it is following them?  Of course we know that astronomy doesn’t work this way, but holy stories do, and spirituality does. 

 

They were following this particularly bright star, and now they are leaving it behind. But this star seeks them out, still guides their wondering and their wandering. Remarkable. Look carefully. This camel has three humps, and these kings have new pronouns! In the “driver’s seat” sits a female who apparently knows the way quite well. Behind her rides an Asian figure, and behind him rides a black king—all similarly crowned. This group is inclusive. Maybe you’ve never noticed. 

Is this great Star shining to show us that the world is about to be transformed not by any ONE race, vision, regime, creed, or rule, but by something bigger? Right now our world is full of riots, violence, wars, bloody murders, abuses of women, starvation, and so much more. Perhaps this ongoing star is suggesting a much broader vision for our world, our planet, our politics, and our religion. Does this Light shine to light and enlighten the entire cosmos?  Is this what the Epiphany Light is? 

*  *  *  *  

I continue to question traditional imagery and interpretations. Here I see a Star that is more accompanying than leading, more beckoning than commanding, more shining than telling, more present than distant. This star is bigger, more universal than many Christians have thought and taught. Don’t you think? 

 

I will follow.  

2022.01.09 Epiphanytide, Lyn G. Brakeman, Spiritual Lemons, blog post, 1/09/22

Let There Be Light

At this time of winter solstice

In the nadir of the night,

Let us turn to one another

And appreciate the light.

Share the light of loving laughter

In the company of friends,

Light of dawning understanding

After nights of fear and doubt,

Light of simple, precious pleasures,

Newborn’s smile or kitten’s purr,

Lights on trees or light of candles

In our homes where families gather

Celebrating and sustaining

Mutuality of love.

For all in deprivation,

Let us strive to bring relief

Let the light of hope restore us

Lead us on the paths toward peace.

May the light provide us comfort,

Health, and safety through the year,

And the blessings of the season

To all those whom we hold dear. 

©PeterDalNegro

This beautiful poem was written by a friend who is a poet far too modest to boast. So someone needs to shed light on his work for him. That is I, by self-appointment. Thank you, Peter. 

Now of course, because I am one who presses to see all sides of people places and things, I seek the darkness alongside the light. The bible says we “walk by faith not by sight.” (II Cor. 5:7) It also says that the darkness, called Night, is not overcome by the Light, called Day. They coexist. Now that’s wise, and yet possibly annoying/angering to anyone who has lost their eyesight or is losing it. How many stories are there in the “Good Book” about blind people being healed by the touch of God through Jesus the Christ? Countless, I bet. But not everyone who asks receives what s/he/they desires. I don’t know why. 

I also remember the Magi or the Wise Men, seers, in pageants. My kids, and others over the years, having argued vociferously about who would get to wear the biggest crown, and who carried gold, because Myrrh was stoopid, and Frankincense was not pronounceable. The eager children jostled into position to march proudly up ( or is it down?) the aisle while the congregation sang the carol, “We Three Kings of Orient Are.”  The procession of these three came AFTER the "dumb angels,”  because the last is really the first, they'd heard. I also recall some fuss about the huge star on a stick that was carried in by an older child, a girl, or even a female Sunday School teacher, and without whose great light no one, apparently, went anywhere at all. That was how it went. And "almighty" God felt less "almighty" than usual—but more in love than ever. 

The loss of any of the five senses often causes one to lose faith in God, if such faith was ever there in the first place. Many still ask the classic unanswerable question we all keep on asking—secretly in the dark or out loud in the fury of light. 

Q: Why would a good God create evil and crime, and murderous weather, and blindness, and on and on. A: God didn’t. We did. Q: But why doesn’t God step in? A: I don’t know.

God only created Love. How useless is that?  And yet which would you prefer when you are in pain, or great fear, or all-consuming anxiety, or guilt/shame— a loving ear to listen to you all day and all night, a warm hand to touch yours, a medication that relieves pain and calms nerves, a gentle word of compassion OR the silent darkness of being alone?   

The best love poem I ever read is one by Emily Dickinson, written in a time when she was 56 and near death from disability, possibly epilepsy. Her poem, “Possibility”, tells it all. Why? Because she tells the truth: there is no clear answer, so we live with possibility. 

I dwell in Possibility --

by Emily Dickinson

I dwell in Possibility—

A fairer House than Prose—

More numerous of Windows—

Superior—for Doors—

Of Chambers as the Cedars—

Impregnable of Eye—

And for an Everlasting Roof

The Gambrels of the Sky—

Of Visitors—the fairest—

For Occupation—This—

The spreading wide of narrow Hands

To gather Paradise—

Possibility, or potentiation, is a gift of the Heart, the pulse of life within, and it keeps us alive in spite of our gloom, our darkness, our deafness, our blindness, or our disease. Still, we cannot see it, touch it, make it happen. All we can do is ask for it. And wait.  

for the light

for the hands

for the insight

for the grace of God alive within.  

2018.01.07 The "Royals" Arrive—Epiphany

We waited and waited through Advent. Then we waited with bated breathe for the actual baby to get born on Christmas Eve, or is that actually Christmas morning itself?

But  . . . nothing of moment happens until the “royals” arrive, and they, as “royals” do, take a very long time traversing, crisscrossing, the desert sands on camels to evade the watchful eye of a jealous ruler named Herod. Rumors have alerted them and they are curious to see if there really is a new “king” who will bring peace and good will and replace the politics of the tyrant Herod. That’s the ancient story. That story is not old!

There is no better idea than replacing our current politics—the whole fraught mess of it.

May we rise above partisanship. It’s not working for either party. I don’t know what a politics of Love would look like exactly, and perhaps it’s not humanly possible except in small ways in big hearts.

The “royals” were not kings but wise men/Magi from the far east. In our house, in ancient story, and in many cultures, they don’t make it to the creche until Epiphany.

We don’t fully celebrate Christmas until three guys arrive—El Dia de los Tres Reyes, January 6th.

Our Magi have just arrived—a bit disheveled—one Asian, one black, one female, all without their crowns. They must have lost them on the way.  If you look closely you can see the fallen crowns tucked in between the camels' one-too-many humps. I consider this an extremely good omen: no crowns, no kings, no emperors, no almighty display. Just a group of hopefuls following an out-sized star no less.  


Welcome these crownless dethroned worshipers. They’re exhausted; they still bring gifts; they still brandish Hope—in the most royally defiant way.

2016.01.03 Spotlight!

Spotlight! The Star of Bethlehem shone brightly on a poor family hovering over their newborn son. The unusual brilliance of this star attracted some Eastern sages, Magi who followed it to see what it spotlighted. It was a long uneasy journey they risked, seeking hope for a troubled world, seeking a sign from Divinity. This is a Christian story, and for Christians it means Divinity (God) becomes flesh of our flesh and bone of our bone. It means that the Love of God knows no bounds. We call this manifestation the Christ. We call this mysterious happening Incarnation. 

Fortunately, these Magi (not kings) were wise! They were sure enough of their calculations to bring with them riches and gifts for the newborn, one way to help this family begin the climb out of poverty and assure the survival of the child. They were also sure that what they found was a sign of divine presence and salvation significant enough to make King Herod jealous. So they told Herod a whopping lie, something like, “no big deal, King,  just a rumor."  Then they went home by a different route to divert Herod’s notice and quash his plans to assassinate any potential rival, even a divine one, to his own imperial reign. That’s the ingenious story. It is not literal but richly symbolic. To me it means that in every Nativity there is hope for new life; in every Nativity there is God; in every star there is light to follow if we’d but look carefully.

Spotlight!   As soon as it hit theaters, a few weeks ago, we saw the movie, “Spotlight". It's about the Boston Globe's 2001 superb journalistic, and I’d say prophetic, series that exposed the cover-up of the pedophile scandal in the Roman Catholic Church. I'd read the series, but film is the right medium to capture the whole action. The movie is brilliantly acted, and, according to those who lived it, accurate. What is portrayed is how corruption in one institutional system goes well beyond individuals, their institution, even their city and state. Not a new phenomenon, yet it’s a great emotional challenge to fully integrate into your consciousness the immensity of the impact of broad systemic sin. I admit to being a bit re-traumatized personally. We sat in the dark theater, stunned, and watched the entire roll of credits before we got up to leave. Not our usual get-up-and-exit strategy.

This movie was the right medium to catch the whole action. Its timely release dredges up the whole scandal once again, and rightly so, because, Pope Francis aside, it’s not over, and cover-up is still the name of the game. I see similar behaviors (misuse of funds, loss of vision, exploitation, dishonesty in leadership, not to mention the reign of -isms) in all our major institutions. I call it the death throes of patriarchy, a system of rank-ordering which has failed all humanity.

But how do we confront such deeply-rooted politics? We just start slowly, and stay thorough and observant, spotlighting where we can.

 Some quotes from the movie that stuck with me.

"It takes an outsider to change a system.”

In this case, the presence of an Armenian attorney, Mitchell Garabidian, who took on victims’ lawsuits, and a newly arrived Jewish editor-in-chief at the Globe, both of whom had interest only in the truth not in any religious or cultural attachments. I would add those Globe reporters on the inside of the religion who had been blind to the whole truth about their beloved Irish Boston, Roman Catholic Church, but not blind enough to have no vision at all, nor blind enough to have stayed active in their church.

Spiritual blindness is usually related to idolatry, a big fat sin………  In this case, I think, the idol worshiped above true divinity was, maybe is still, the mystique surrounding priesthood, aka  “Father.”  The journalists investigating the system were astounded with their findings, yet clear-eyed enough as “lapsed” Roman Catholics to look at their church from the inside out—not quite knowing why, but ready to be awakened. Courageous work!

The process made me think of the biblical Hebrew prophets awakening the people of Israel, and of Jesus the Jew with a new vision of the sacred covenant between God and Israel. Some Jews listened and followed his re-articulation of their own Torah covenant, and some refused, but were awakened enough to reflect on their own system. Historically, such processes happen over and over.

How will today's Roman Catholics respond? In the film Boston's Cardinal Bernard Law was almost a tragic figure, so corrupted by systemic sin that he didn't even see his part in it. When Marty Baron, the Globe's editor-in-chief, paid Law a visit to let him in on the story about to break, Law was impassive and gave Baron with a wrapped-and-ready copy of the latest Catechism.  Such effrontery and profound denial is hard even to imagine. (One wonders if he too was abused by a priest as a child.) But over-attachment to Catechism-ism and denial remain necessary ingredients for massive cover-up.

“It takes a village to raise a child and it takes a village to abuse a child.”

Officials at the top of church and state took care to heap the whipped cream of top-down politics while I, and others, listened to the underbelly of pain and trauma effects in our offices. Counselors, some clergy, medical personnel, social workers, and activists for social justice listened, organized and called attention to the whole truth. Victims also organized for truth. It took time!

Cardinal Law eventually was whisked off to Rome with a wrist slap and the offer of a posh apartment to live out his days in peace. Well, I doubt if he enjoyed deep down spiritual peace. Few criminals with any conscience at all do. Yet Law allowed the crimes to continue, and he stayed safe and out of prison while the Church paid out billions in damages to victims and backpedaled as fast as it could.

Spotlight! Since the movie came out, I have heard from three different people about someone close to them who, when young, suffered abuse by a priest in the name of godly love. Boys and girls. It is time to spotlight these wounds and heal the shame that binds. Also to acknowledge all the good priests who’ve served faithfully in a corrupt system.

Spotlight! We are entering the season of Light. What will we let ourselves see? Is it not time to be bold? Yes, we can see good things, often ad nauseum. Do we have courage too to spotlight ugly things like injustice, violence, addiction, greed, war, gun regulation, political and corporate corruption, unfair labor practices, and of course,  maybe especially, abuses in the name of divine love? Believe me, I’ve heard many a fear-inspiring sermon that abuses the image of God, as the author of hellfire and damnation. Theological crap!

Consider prayer, personal and communal, as worthy a spotlight as action.

2013.01.16 Epiphany Stories

Epiphany means revelation or insight. Or in words of James Joyce, the "revelation of the whatness of a thing . . .the moment when the soul of the commonest object...seems to be radiant." 

Twelfth Night, Epiphany Eve, is an English celebration, a time to try everything new you can think of—pranks, scandals, and role reversals.  This is my favorite season of the church year, because I just LOVE new ideas and insights that shed light on something in a different way. And I love the God of reversals. I watch for such surprises and usually applaud.

Epiphany takes us from Christmas to Lent and is based on the biblical story of the Magi arriving for a baby-viewing. They’ve heard that this kid may be special, sent from Godde—also dangerous, according to King Herod who feared a challenge to his own almighty rule/dictatorship. He sent the wisest men in his kingdom to check out the truth of the theological rumor.  

Imagine the scene: three august foreigners, Gentiles, astrologers from the east no less, arrived at the stable entrance bringing lavish gifts to the little Jewish baby cooing in a filthy crib around which huddled two exhausted parents, wondering if they would survive. Just imagine what Mary and Joseph felt at this appalling visitation. 

It's only a story (but never say only a story), for this kind of thing happens all the time to mess up what we all agree is true and real, and even what we are sure God’s plans are!   The story is biblical, therefore a bit grandiose on purpose, and rich in symbols and imagery of light and star, things these Magi know something about, and trust to guide them.

The story’s meaning is not just to emphasize God’s action in history to enlighten the people, but also to show that Jesus Christ is intended as Messiah, a liberator for ALL people. 

Stories have power to transform and inspire no matter how fantastical they seem. Even if they don’t turn out the way they predict we keep on telling them, because we need to hear them, over and over. 


I remember when a man who lived in the local shelter in Gloucester started to come to church at our parish of St. John’s. His name was David. He sat quietly in the back for weeks, and in time came up to join others for the Holy Communion meal. He said,  “something's going on here.”  He revealed nothing personal, except that he had a drinking problem.  No one asked for more.

One day the office staff heard someone talking out loud in the sanctuary (open for prayer when the parish office was open, or people were in the building), and peeked in to investigate. They saw David standing at the lectern reading aloud to an empty church the biblical readings for the Sunday just past. I don’t think the church was really empty. 

In time David vanished, as quickly as he had appeared. He left the place richer for his presence, and perhaps he received something himself.


I have a story I’m trying to write.  You have a story. Theology has a story. Even Science has a story. 

What might be the inside story the Wise Men would tell?  I wonder if those ancient astrologers and sages faced some of the same problems and insights modern astronomers and astro physicists encounter? They could read the stars, and they knew the sky pretty well, but they couldn’t quite come up with a really good insight about the origins of the universe.  For that they needed theology’s story.  Their astronomical GPS wasn’t enough.

Even today, scientific calculations come up against a brick wall in the search for truth. Sometimes, they need theology, or let’s say insights from the mystical/spiritual/religious faith traditions. They need the Mystery some call God to fill in the blanks about the cosmos and its quantum beginnings.

Like the ancients who followed a star that the prophets advertised as leading to Divinity, scientists today are in respectful conversation with theologians they once dismissed as too non-scientific to be useful.  A result a new discipline called astro-theology is evolving.  (The Journal of Cosmology, based on the science of astronomy and mathematics, has a theology issue.)

When two or three gather together to share their gifts, there is Epiphany and epiphanies.      

Last Last Suppers

Our last two suppers before we retire and move, one on Friday and one on Sunday, were held in the parish church sanctuary. Both were overseen by Christ, Host of the Christian faith; both were holy banquets.

We and all honored guests arrived Friday night to see the entire sanctuary set up as a feast, our penultimate last supper. Space had been made for milling and spilling. Tables and the altar itself were laden with every kind of delicious food and our choir’s baritone soloed as bar tender serving wine and soft drinks. Acolytes in black circled and weaved their way in and out with serving trays and little paper napkin/purificators (the name for the white cloth used to wipe the chalice as it is passes from communicant to communicant at Communion.)

A grand swell of organ music like a shofar summoned the people to be seated for a tasteful, funny and dear program. No one had to say “The Lord is with you.” We knew it. We all sat in prayer with unbowed heads. The parish comic acted as emcee; a parishioner guitarist, his young son at his feet playing air guitar, played his favorite Beatles song; and a poet with eloquence read “Wild Geese" by Mary Oliver. The wardens, a boy one and a girl one, gave brief tributes as Dick and I reached for the Kleenex.

Carol presented a beautiful book stand made by parish woodworkers to serve as perch for a huge Memory Book in which every parish individual or family created a page. Usually one puts a Bible on such a stand but for now this Book will be our bible of remembrance and thanksgiving. It represents a people who know how to be eucharist, how to give thanks for all things, how to remember and honor the best and the worst of times, and above all how to come regularly to dine at God’s holy dining room table for better or worse to receive the grace of God. The Church at its gracious unconditional best.

Rick presented us with a purse. I half expected him to lift up a small purse like the one Queen Elizabeth always has draped over her arm. But instead he held aloft an envelope. Suspense rose as in the academy awards while he slowly opened the envelope and announced in solemn tones, “There’s a check here for $42.50. Oops, move that decimal point over two.” The Magi never had such treasure, such richness of heart.

Dick and I gave our celebrative thanks. I don’t remember what either of us said, only that I asked Jesus to hold onto my tears so I could speak my gratitude without blubbering. But we both choked up.

To be known just as you are and loved just as you are is grace.

It was tribute enough to see that all our teaching and preaching over the years about being a eucharistic community, about bringing God into the middle of our lives on Sunday and every day, of not being afraid to let the sanctuary be holy all the time and filled with Spirit and joy whatever event was going on there. Just like a cathedral!

The second last supper at the parish was the regular Sunday liturgy for the third Sunday after Pentecost. Many of the same people returned for the second banquet, the altar still dressed up for a celebration. We priests wore red vestments, the color of the Holy Spirit— She who would not be called He.

The Sunday Mass/Holy Eucharist was as alive and vibrant with Presence divine and human as it was on Friday night and, for me and my personal Jewish roots as well as the roots of Christianity, connected Friday Shabbat holy meal with our Sunday Eucharist.

The reading from the Old Testament (I Kings) was a long story about King Ahab lusting over the vineyard of Naboth who refused to sell in spite of over the top royal purchase offers. Never mind, said Ahab’s wife Jezebel, I will get you the vineyard. She did by an elaborate ruse that included murder. Naboth dead the vineyard was now Ahab’s. What some women will do for their husbands! BUT of course God intervened with disapproval and Ahab and Jezebel suffered dire consequences for their crimes. There are consequences for everything and I can believe that God’s justice in the human soul sparks human action and conscience.

The lector read the whole drama with particular animation and a bass voice. Half way through the amazing but sadly true to human nature plot he interjected without missing a beat, “I’m not making this up you know.” And the people, already full of amused shock and awe, broke into open laughter. The place was alive, alert and authentic, as down to earth and true in fact as all Old Testament stories.

The gospel reading was from Luke 7, the story of the woman sinner, reputed to be Mary Magdalene, whom Jesus had healed of seven demons. Grateful for her wholeness she anointed him with perfumed oil of blessing as she kissed his feet and wiped them with her hair. A romantic gesture to be sure. Still, I can imagine someone feeling such gratitude and humility after healing by whatever means. But today such an extravagant gesture would be eschewed by doctors, therapists or clergy— bad professional boundaries.

What price boundaries when love is the message? I wonder.

I couldn’t resist a little post-homily (Dick's) addendum: Notice who gets to go down in history over centuries with the bad reputations! I had to keep up my feminist rant. Later I thanked everyone for their amused acceptance of my politics. For some it was to humor me; for some it was genuine appreciation, and for a few I’m sure it was teeth-gritting tolerance. Still I felt loved. Even when I met a former parishioner in the elevator at the hospital who asked me, “Is he gone yet?” I could tell him “not quite” and chuckle, he having no idea who I was as a priest, woman, spouse of the "real" priest.

Later as I presented the children with Bible quotes. I told them these wouldn’t mean much now but to keep them and one day they would dig them up and discover some spiritual wisdom. The Word in the words. I have heard many adults in this work tell me that they had received such a quote at Confirmation or something and years later found it hidden in a dresser drawer and suddenly light shone.

After the Holy Eucharist banquet was over and everyone had been fed Dick and I offered brief closing remarks. I thanked for many things, most importantly for this community having given me over the years an opportunity to blossom and grow into the fullness of myself as a woman priest. With very few exceptions I have never felt like a sidekick or some kind of subsidiary priest at St John’s. It is a gift of unimaginable blessing to me.

My exit line went something like: This parish is full of amazing creativity, musicians, artists, poets, dancers, writers, orators, woodworkers, liturgists and the unsung beauty of just plain good humor and kindness. I firmly believe that the arts will restore the world to its natural beauty and god-given goodness But now........get out there and recruit some corporate types. You need money.”

Then Dick with his own art of oratory made an elegant tribute, presented a flow chart of who will take care of what, said fear not in many ways, announced the end of his rectorship and our priestly ministry here, then said with a brief sob. “We will no longer be your priests and pastors, but we will always be your friends.”

We should have sold little tissue packets for an almighty sum as a last fund raiser as Dick suggested on Friday!

Dick then read a formal proclamation that officially turned full ecclesiastical authority over to the wardens until such time as the 21st rector of St. John’s parish church was elected to begin a new chapter in the life of Christ at St. John’s.

As our gift to the parish we had framed and gave them a blessing we have frequently used. Dick graciously invited honored guest, the Rev. Claude G. Hopper, the only grasshopper with a clerical collar, ordained as an Episcopal priest by the late Blair McElroy, to join us. Claude hopped between us as we said the final blessing together.

Life is short.
We do not have much time to gladden the hearts and minds of those who travel the way with us. So be swift to love and make haste to be kind.
And the blessing of God Almighty, Creator, Christ and Holy Spirit be upon you and remain with you always. AMEN.

PS Just one more holy banquet, a festive coffee hour with just the right amount of too much food.