Shared on March 15ht, 2017
I am here this evening because of my parents, three amazing women, a Rock Opera and an 18th century preacher from Epworth, Lincolnshire.
Let’s start with my parents – which makes sense – as that’s where I got started… My faith journey begins with them at West Barrington Methodist. Church was in many ways the center of my parents’ lives. It was not just their spiritual life, it was their social life. They served on committees, and served church dinners, my father raised money for our fellowship and literally helped raise the roof of the church to enlarge the community space. The church was so much a part of our lives it was even the food we ate. Among my mother’s ‘go to’ dishes was a concoction known as ‘Huftalen Casserole’ – Named after Dorothy Huftalen, a member of the church. I do not know the exact history, but most likely Mrs. Huftalen had brought the dish to a pot luck and shared the recipe with my mother. To this day, I am unsure of the exact difference between Huftalen Casserole and American Chop Suey, but knowing my mother, it probably contained fewer ingredients and was easier to make.
At Barrington Methodist, I was exposed to everything that is good about a church – the people, the good work, the feeling of community. Like most young people, I did struggle with the more mythical aspects of our faith – the miracles, and magic. God may have created the world in 7 days, but they must have been really, really long days. While I questioned the details, I did agree with everything the church taught me – about living a good, honest and productive life, the strong belief in a God and the many ways of serving that God, the Golden Rule, and the importance of forgiveness. The pathway of an easy faith journey had been cleared for me, free of roots and stones – well marked, well-traveled. And that is exactly why when it came time to commit to the church… to be confirmed, to stand with my parents and older brother as a member of this faith community… I balked.
It may not be human nature – but I can assure you it is “youthful” nature. When a teenager is led down a corridor that they perceive to be growing narrower and narrower – leading to a single door… there is always a high probability that they will not step through that door, no matter how inviting.
I think of this often when working with our confirmands. Until I was in my early teens nearly every major decision was made for me –where we lived, the school I went to, the church we attended and even my clothes and my haircut were decisions made for me. It wasn’t that they were bad decisions – they just weren’t my decisions. Because my faith was important to me – I did not want to make the wrong choice.
I have a number of amazing memories during my college years of exposure to a broad range of faith. I became close to a friend who was Jewish and was invited to Seder dinner for several years. I loved the traditions of the stories told at dinner. I remember once when I was volunteering as an usher at PPAC literately being pulled off the street to help pass the offering basket at a small church in downtown Providence… the only reason being that I was wearing a suit. I don’t even know what denomination the church was – but I will never forget the music, the exuberance of the congregation as they rose from their pews – hands stretched high – shouting Hallelujah and proclaiming their faith in Jesus.
I confess that in my youth I also harbored a concern that there was a real risk in pledging my faith to a single denomination. I imagined long lines stretching out at the pearly gates, not unlike the security checkpoint in the Atlanta airport. Catholics in this line – Muslims in another line – Methodist are somewhere over there – just follow the singing… What if I selected the wrong line? What if I found myself standing before God only to get the bad news that what I believed was the Good News was really fake news? Would I be turned away like a game show contestant who grossly overestimated the price of a toaster oven? As silly as that sounds, that was a real concern. Similar logic caused me to procrastinate from becoming an organ donor as I was afraid that God would be angry if I showed up with missing parts.
This leads me to the rock opera – Jesus Christ Superstar. As we used to say in the late 70’s – I wore the groove out on that album. Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice presented a portrait of Jesus Christ in a way totally new to me – a rebel and a radical who frightened the establishment. His disciples were not figures on stained glass – they were real people, people close to my age and although exuberant – they were also unsure. The depiction of Judas was especially meaningful to me… As Christ’s friend and most trusted advisor his character is more sympathetic than evil. He is blinded with fear that the person he believes in is taking the good news too far – being too vocal – and it would lead to no good… and he was right. The telling of the Gospel in Jesus Christ Superstar is very different on a number of levels – no miracles are depicted, and is there is no resurrection. It ends with Christ dying alone on the cross betrayed by his best friend, ridiculed by the masses, denied and abandoned by his followers. That story resonated with me but it would take me years to really understand why.
That leads me to the first woman key to my faith journey. I had known Elizabeth Eaton since I had interned for her in 1982. It took me five years to fall in love with her and two years longer to ask her out. A transplant from Pennsylvania, she had joined Central’s coir, in part, as a way of establishing a social life in Providence. As our relationship grew stronger our dates on Saturday nights — let’s just say were typically shorter than on Friday nights, as she needed to be up early for church. On one Saturday evening, she asked if I was interested in attending Sunday worship. Now, I know a good thing when I see it, so my answer was immediate and definitive – if not 100% honest… “Church? Well of course – you know I really miss church… that would be awesome – what time should I should I be there?” And that is how I first walked into Central on a Sunday morning in 1988.
My one visit turned into a weekly habit. Rebecca had just recently been appointed senior minister and the church had a new and exciting atmosphere. Liz and I were married here in 1990 just a few months after I took the Salem Convent and joined this Congregation.
As is expected with all new members, I agreed to serve on a committee and became involved.
One would think this would make another excellent end to my faith journey – thanks to the love a wonderful woman I found my spiritual home – end of story – cue the credits, check that action item off the to-do list – “Find a good church” – done…. But that wasn’t the case. Although worthy, the committee I was serving on was not a good fit for me and became even a worse fit when I agreed to chair that same committee. I had started a new job, Liz and I had bought our first of what would become a series of fixer-uppers and was struggling to keep up with all my obligations. Sadly, and selfishly, I started to feel put upon. Worship and serving this church had become another thing I felt had to do, rather than something I wanted to do – So I told Nominating I wasn’t interested in another term on the committee and after a missed Sunday here and a missed Sunday there – church quickly became an infrequent habit.
In the Fall of 1992 I would meet the second woman key to my faith journey. Samantha Viall was born in October. She was baptized right here at Central and despite my own strained relationship with the church I made my vow, without any hesitation, to raise Samantha as a child of God and a Christian. And that would certainly be the case… eventually…
Having a newborn and a wife dedicated to choir gave me the ultimate excuse to stop attending worship altogether. We both worked full time and Sam was in daycare five days a week. What kind of awful father would I be to add another morning of child care on Sundays – just so I could attend worship?
Weeks turned into months, and then into years. I still attended services and events at Central – but I had slipped into the ranks of a “special occasion” member… Christmas, Easter – maybe a gathering Sunday…
In the summer of 1996 I came down with a serious illness that landed me the hospital for weeks at a time as doctors attempted to come up with a diagnosis. During that very difficult time, I came to cherish anyone who took the time to visit me. One of those people was the third amazing woman who would play a key role in my faith journey. Her name is Rebecca Spencer. Now I know that visiting members in the hospital is something that clergy do – part of their every day work week – but her visit was special to me, especially given the fact that I had become such an infrequent visitor to Central. I do not recall who brought up my spotty attendance… I would suspect out of awkwardness that I did. Regardless – we talked… we talked a lot. I shared my experience on the ill-fitting committee… how church had become ‘yet another obligation.’ Rebecca did what she does best… she listened and when I was done her responses was simple… “We miss you, we would like to see you back, we can work together to find the right ways to put your talents to work for the church and you will know when that time is right.”
After about six months of being in and out of the hospital, my affliction – which was never fully diagnosed – vanished as mysteriously as it began.
Yet, despite my illness, and Rebecca’s visit, my habit of church was still not very strong. After all, now more than ever, I wanted to spend quality time with my daughter who was now nearly six. Quality time with Sam mainly consisted of seeing Liz off to church and spending the remainder of the morning watching re-runs of the Three Stooges on television. It was on one such morning, sprawled on the sofa, empty cereal bowls still sitting on the coffee table, that Sam asked me the question that brought me back to Central. Now – I realize it may have been a while since any of you engaged in the zany hijinks of Moe, Larry and Curly – but if you remember, the shows were presented by Screen Gems, the television division of Columbia pictures, each episode starting with the image of a woman draped in a tunic holding a torch high above her head all in glorious black and white. Upon seeing this open for perhaps the 50th time, Samantha crawled into my lap, looked at me with her big blue eyes and asked “Dad, is that the Virgin Mary? “
“No, honey”, I replied “I think that’s the Columbia chick… you know, maybe next week you and I should go to church with Mom.”
And just like that – I was back. Not for me, mind you – but because of Sam and the importance of her knowing the difference between John the Baptist and Shemp Howard (hint, one involves Baptisms in the River Jordan and the other a bowl of Oyster stew).
Well, as often in life, those things you do for others have a way of rewarding one’s self. Over the next dozen years everything Rebecca had shared with me in the hospital turned out to be 100% true. I had been missed, and I had missed the people. George Delany had been inspired to create a website for the church, and he asked for my help. This was the kind of work I enjoyed – I was good at the task and the task was good for the church… along with the website and the new Technology Committee… obligations were replaced by aspirations. I had at last found my place here.
In many ways, it felt like I had never left – and the truth is, I never really did. You see, there was one service at Central I had attended, with only one exception, every year since I had first walked in that door. It is the service of Tenebrae or shadows, usually referred to as Maundy Thursday. If you have never attended that service I can’t urge you enough to come on April 13th. Above all services here at Central it is the one that is most important to me. It could be the theatrical nature of the service so wonderfully coordinated by John Chaney but probably more so, it is the simplicity of the story it tells. A dozen short readings from the Book of Luke telling the story of Jesus Christ from the nativity, to the crucifixion. My connection to the service probably stems from my love of Jesus Christ Superstar… the story of Jesus that we too often over-analyze, over explain and over adorn is distilled into something that even I can understand. To me, that simple story is this – Once upon a time, God gave us the most important, loving, heartfelt gift in the history of mankind… and instead of embracing it, we threw it away. People just like us – people just like me – let this gift die on wooden cross. Maybe they were afraid that they would make the wrong choice, or felt over overburdened with responsibility or questioned the miracles rather than embracing the message.
This is what I think about at the end of the Maundy Thursday service – a service that ends in complete and utter darkness – every candle and lightbulb in extinguished. There is only one thing that can pierce such blackness… and that leads me to the final guide on this long faith journey – 18th Century cleric Charles Wesley… one of the founding fathers of the Methodist Church – ironically bringing my journey full circle.
I love tradition – those regular events and moments that act like mile markers on the journey of life. That first swim in the cold lake every summer, the first snow flake that falls on my windshield, that first time you hear the tree frogs chirping from the woods – the sound that tells me that summer can’t be too far away. One of the joys of these moments is that you’re never quite sure exactly when they are going to take place… they each represent that magical collision of expectation and surprise. However, there is one of my favorite moments every year that I can predict almost down to the minute… it happens right here every Sunday that follows the darkness of Maundy Thursday at about 10:36. It is when our entire congregation stands to sing Charles Wesley’s Hymn “Christ the Lord Has Risen Today.”
Hundreds of exuberant voices joining in unison. “Made like Him, like Him we rise…” and after 54 years on the planet I’m finally beginning to understand what all that joyous singing is really about. There is a lifetime of differences between my own personal relationship with God – which I’ve always had, and being a member of a faith community like Central Church which is what the world needs. It’s never been just about my parents, Liz, Sam, or Rebecca – it’s always been about all of you – and so many others. Made like him, like him WE rise. We rise to make a difference in this community. We rise together to help those who need our help, we rise together to support each other, we rise together in spite of our own individual fears, flaws and uncertainties, we rise together to do what we all promised to do when we joined Central – to walk together in all God’s ways… Made like Him, like him we rise – Alleluia.