In the name of the Holy Trinity.

It does seem that every time I embark on hiking (climbing) up to the top of a really big mountain, I think of this Biblical passage—a story hard to fathom in some ways because it is hard to frame it in one’s rational mind.  And I always hope, maybe even pray, for some supernatural manifestation. I sort of expect that God will manifest Godself in some amazing way-- going up that mountain, seeing light, dazzling raiment, a cloud, the voice of God, that as I climb higher and higher into the sky I will get closer to God’s dwelling place in the heavens and encounter Christ in his glory. I hope that I might have an epiphany experience.

Nothing of the like happened last month when I was in Colorado, hiking up Quandary Peak.  This evening I have nothing of the sort to share about such an ephiphanic manifestation.   But I do have something to share about what God might say to use in this passage.

In the past when I have talked about this piece of scripture I have challenged people to look at those experiences we want to freeze dry and return to, making them into a sort of shrine—like the beauty queen who wears that bling crown pin everywhere she goes ever since she was in the Miss America contest. Or like that military hero who wears his uniform to dinner every night at the elder care house where he lives. I imagine that our 2008 UF National Championship football team might want to enshrine that big game.

I think it worthwhile to look at the landscape of our lives for those events and experience that we sort of make a shrine out of—good or bad. Tonight I ask you to look especially at those shrines we keep that emerged from a negative experience, and that we stay stuck in.   Like being wounded by someone and staying stuck in feelings of avoidance and bitterness against that person.  Or living in the past when you were the favorite child of a parent and expected everyone to sort of treat you as if you were the first born on the plant.

I invite you to think about what that shrine that you have created, that keeps you stuck, and to ask Jesus’ healing and love into shrine.

In the name of the Holy Trinity.

Recently, as a part of our Inquirer’s Class series learning about the Christian faith in the Anglican tradition, I made the comment that one of the things I find meaningful about dwelling in Christian community is that it is a place where we repeatedly and continually try out of best selves—where people strive to bear fruit and abide in Jesus’ love by keeping his commandment to love one another as he loved us.  It is a place to be vulnerable, and to practice forgiveness and reconciliation, those ways Christ encourages and in fact demands. Anyway, the person in our Inquirer’s Class commented that some Christian communities that she had experienced were no different from being in the world, from secular communities. I have found myself returning to this observation time and time again.

The life and faith in Jesus the saint whose life we celebrate today, Aelred of Rievaulx, has something to say about spiritual friendships. His writings invite us to reflect on life in Christ in our community, in our friendships in Christ.  I like the imagery of Christ as friend that we hear about in our gospel for today, that we had in song, and that we hear in other parts of Holy Scripture. I frequently begin or end letters with “In Christ’s friendship,” and when I changed the voice mail at the Chapel just yesterday, I began with ‘greetings in Christ’s friendship.’  I give thanks with great regularity for our life in Christ, and the teachings of Aelred enhance our understanding of friendship in Christ.

Aelred of Rievaux lived in the12th century.  His family had long been treasurers of the shrine of Cuthbert of Lindisfarne at Durham Cathedral. He had the privilege of an upper-class education in the courts, and in fact, the king’s sons were his models and intimate friends. After intense inner struggle, Aelred went to Yorkshire, where he became a Cistercian monk.  Aelred soon became a major figure in English church life, and was sent to Rome on diocesan affairs.  Once on his return h stopped by Clairvaux, and made a deep impression on Bernard, who encouraged the young monk to write his first work, “Mirror of Charity,” on Christian perfection.  He went on to found a new Cistercian house at Revesby. By the time of his death from a painful kidney disease in 1167, the abbey had over 600 monks.  During this period, Aelred wrote his best-known work, “Spiritual Friendship.”  Friendship, Aelred taught, is both a gift from God and a creation of human effort. While love is universal, freely given to all, friendship is a particular love between individuals, of which the example is Jesus and John the Beloved Disciple. David and Jonathan had this mutual affection as well.

Aelred named four qualities, which characterize a friend in Christ:
•    Discretion
•    Loyalty
•    Patience
•    Right intention

Discretion is a sort of wisdom that brings understanding of what is done on a friend’s behalf, and ability to know when to correct faults.

Loyalty guards and protects friendship, in good or bitter times.

Patience enables one to be justly rebuked, or to bear adversity on another’s behalf.

Right intention seeks for nothing other than God and natural good.

As we begin another school year, let us reflect upon our friendship with our Lord, and also our friendships in Christ’s, reflecting upon how they measure up in terms of discretion, loyalty, patience, and right intention.  Amen.

"Reflections Upon Relationships Disconnected or Cut-off"
Mark the Evangelist Mark 1:1-15
Chapel of the Incarnation Gainesville, FL
The Reverend N. Martin-Coffey

In the name of the Holy Trinity.

When I set out to remind myself about all those precise things I learned in seminary about Mark, the author of the second gospel, I went to the introductory section of my Harper-Collins Bible (New Revised Standard translation) to read, the authorship of Mark remains an enigma, perhaps by the author's design.

A disciple of Jesus, named Mark, appears in several places in the New Testament. If all references to Mark can be accepted as referring to the same person, we learn that he was the son of a woman who owned a house in Jerusalem, perhaps the same house in which Jesus ate the Last Supper with his disciples. Mark may have been the young man who fled naked when Jesus was arrested in the Garden of Gethsemane (Mark 14:51-52). Mark the Evangelist was probably a cousin of Barnabas, who was with Barnabus in his imprisonment. Mark set out with Paul and Barnabas on their first missionary journey, but he turned back for reasons, which failed to satisfy Paul (Acts 15:36-40). When another journey was planned, Paul refused to have Mark with him. Instead, Mark went with Barnabas to Cyprus. The breach between Paul and Mark was later healed, and Mark became one of Paul's companions in Rome, as well as a close friend of Peter's.

Regarding the gospel itself, it is almost certainly the first gospel to be written. Matthew and Luke relied upon Mark for some of their material--the so-called "Marcan primacy." The first gospel is dated in the late 60s, whereas Matthew and Luke are thought to have been written toward the end of the first century. There are no birth narratives or post-resurrection accounts in Mark. It is the shortest

In reflecting on Mark's life and faithfulness to our Lord this week, I have been especially struck by Mark's relationship with Paul and how there was conflict and disconnection that was eventually healed. This has encouraged me to look at those relationships in my life where some sort of breech has happened, and be especially prayerfully and guided by the Holy Spirit in being open to God's healing of this breakage, as Mark and Paul's cut-off was healed.

Two pieces of scripture come to mind...

The one when Peter asks Jesus how many times must he forgive if a member of the church sins against him, and Jesus says, "Seventy-seven" or "seven time seventy" (Matthew 18:21-22). I think about last week's passage from John when Jesus says, "I came that they might have life, and have it abundantly" (John 10-10).

This day I invite you to reflect upon past relationships in your life that have become disconnected, cut-off. Maybe there was a misunderstanding, or perhaps this person did not treat you with the respect you think you deserve. Maybe it was some jealously that got in the way, or this friend broke your heart in some way but you reckon that in Christ's friendship, the relationship is more important than whatever it was that got in the way.

Christ calls us to be reconcilers in the world. May that work of reconciliation begin first in our lives. Amen.

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"Fighting Evil"
Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Lutheran Pastor, Theologian, and Martyr Matthew 13:47-52
Chapel of the Incarnation Trinity Episcopal Church, Gainesville
The Rev'd N. Martin-Coffey

In the name of the Holy Trinity.

Today we honor the life and faith in Christ of Dietrich Bonhoeffer--Lutheran pastor, theologian, and martyr in the faith (hence the reason I am wearing a red stole). Dietrich Bonhoeffer was born in 1906 and died in 1945---at the age thirty-nine. He grew up in a comfortable upper class family; his father was a professor of psychiatry and neurology in Berlin. He studied at the universities of Berlin and Tuebingen, being highly influenced by Karl Barth. After his education and ordination, he served in Barcelona, at the Union Theological Seminary in NY, in Berlin, and in London. Early on in his career, he began his enduring work with the ecumenical movement.

Opposed to the Nazi movement from the first, he sided with the Confessing Church (which was the center of the Protestant resistance to the Nazis) against the German Church. He felt that the German Church was striving for "cheap grace," a term from one of his many books, The Cost of Discipleship. From the first days of the Nazi ascent to power, Bonhoeffer was opposed to Adolph Hitler's regime. As this intensified, he was forbidden to teach and banned from Berlin. Bonhoeffer was arrested in 1943, and imprisoned in Berlin. After an attempt on Hitler's life failed, documents were discovered linking Bonhoeffer to the conspiracy. On Sunday, April 8, 1945, just as he concluded a service, two men came in with the chilling summons, "Prisoner Bonhoeffer . . . come with us." He said to another prisoner, "This is the end. For me, the beginning of life." Bonhoeffer was hanged the next day. This was just a few weeks before the allied liberation of his concentration camp.

There is in Bonhoeffer's life a remarkable unity of faith, prayer, courage, writing, and action.

As I reflect upon Bonhoeffer's life and faithfulness, a friend named Marsha comes to mind. I want to share her story---she too found the light of Christ all-powerful in fighting evil.

Marsha was born into a very devout and strict Christian family. They lived in the country here in the South, and her parents were leaders in the church they attended. More than leaders they were pillars of the community, especially her mother. Sunday after Sunday they were there in that little rural church worshipping Christ. On Friday nights, they were with some of those same people, but the thing about the Friday night gatherings is that they were worshipping the devil. That's right--a satanic church meeting in the basement of the church. Marsha recounts that there was lots of darkness in that basement, that the people there wore masks and robes, and drank miscarriage and menstrual blood. Having sex with the children, girls and boys, was a part of this satanic cult. Not only that, Marsha was forced to have sex with her father as a part of the ritual. Extreme submissiveness with the potential to have their lives extinguished was thought to appease Satan.

As Marsha grew in her Christian faith and prayer, and followed intensely the light of Christ, and with the help of a loving spiritual director and healers in Christ, she too stood up to one of the evils of our day, this satanic cult. She feared for her life because in telling and writing her life story, some in satanic cults might attempt to silence her. In Marsha, I sense this same faith in Jesus Christ, prayer, courage, writing, and action.

And so this day, when we honor the life of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, I invite us all to reflect on those places in our lives where we have, or are encountering, evil--which I understand to be supremely destructive exponentially. Some examples of evil:
∑ Addictions, whether that is with alcohol, recreational or prescription drugs, or sexual addictions
∑ Incest, pedophilia, rape
∑ Spousal abuse
∑ Elder abuse
∑ 21st century slavery (like Beatrice Hernandez who we hosted here in Gainesville)

This day, let us remember that nothing--not any darkness--is more powerful than the light of Christ.

This day, let us give thanks for the faith in Jesus Christ and courage of Dietrich Bonhoeffer.

This day, let us pray for faith in Jesus Christ and courage to stand up to the evil we encounter. Amen.

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"Healing Grace in our Wounds"
Boniface, Archbishop of Mainz, Missionary to Germany, and Martyr, 754 Luke 24:44-53
The Rev'd Dr. N. Martin-Coffey, Chapel of the Incarnation and Holy Trinity Episcopal Church, Gainesville

In the name of the Holy Trinity.

The gospel lesson assigned for the feast day of Boniface, Archbishop of Mainz, missionary to Germany and martyr is that of Jesus' ascension into heaven. You may remember that we celebrate the Ascension forty days after Easter and recalls Christ being taken gloriously into heaven. I wonder if this particular gospel was selected by the Standing Liturgical Committee with the assumption that Boniface too made his way to heaven. I wonder if this gospel passage was selected because holy seeds, I assume to have exploded everywhere when Jesus ascended into heaven, made their way into Boniface--empowering him to carry on our Lord's work.

I don't know about you but Boniface is not a name that rolls off the tongue in ordinary conversations. Before this week I recognized the name and had heard mention of St. Boniface Episcopal Churches (especially in Sarasota) but I knew little about this English Christian who was murdered by angry pagans"who stabbed him through his prayer book, according to one historian. Stabbed through his prayer book"

Boniface was born in England in the seventh century, educated at Exeter, was professed a monk, and ordained to the presbyterate. He decided to become a missionary, and made his first journey to Frisia (Netherlands) in 716 --- a venture with little success. In fact it was a dud-- a failure. But after Frisia, things picked up for Boniface. He started out again and went to Rome to seek papal approval. Pope Gregory the Second commissioned him to work in Germany, and gave him the name of Boniface.

For the rest of his days, Boniface devoted himself to reforming, planting, and organizing churches, monasteries, and dioceses in Hesse, Thuringia, and Bavaria. Many helpers and supplies came to him from friends in England. The Pope ordained him a bishop; ten years later made him an archbishop, and later gave him a fixed see at Mainz.

In 753 Boniface resigned his see, to spend his last years again as a missionary in Frisia. After a lifetime of accomplishment, it could not have been easy for Boniface to go back to Frisia--to a place associated with early frustration and failure.

Failure is something we want behind us. When we fail in school, we are loath to go back to learn what we did not know. Instead drop the course, change our major, take an incomplete, and move to another school! When we fail at love or friendship, it is easier to erase their phone number, hit the delete button---just write them off. When we fail at commitment, move on; when we fail at work, move on; when we fail at community, move on when we fail ourselves, move on. And do not look back.

Our communion prayers render thanks that when we turned away from God, God did not abandon us to sin and death, but returned to deliver us. Jesus, too, stayed the course when to some it some like failure. He did not turn away but went boldly to the work on the cross.

So Boniface returned to the scene of his failure---to take up the work he had begun so many years before. When waiting for a group of confirmands, he was murdered. His body was buried at a monastery near Mainz he had founded.

This day I invite you to look at those failures in your life---whether those be from work, school, in family, with friends and ask Christ's healing grace to come into those wounded places. Amen.

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"Still Praying the Psalms, Like Benedict"
St. Benedict of Nursia
Psalm 1 Luke 14.27-33
Chapel of the Incarnation, Gainesville, FL
The Reverend Dr. N. Martin-Coffey

When we gather on Wednesdays at this WOW (Worship on Wednesday) service to reflect upon the life of a saint, what his or her life might mean to us, and how Christ's grace might be refracted through that believer in the faith, there are actually four lessons assigned-one from the Old Testament, a Psalm, an Epistle (or letter), and the Gospel. A local tradition that I inherited when I arrived at the Chapel a year ago was to have only one lesson, as a way to shorten the service and encourage busy students to "stay in touch during the week." Typically we hear a gospel lesson, and, in fact, if there is to be communion, aka, Holy Eucharist, it is expected that there always be a gospel lesson. But today we are hearing not only the gospel but also the Psalm because the Psalms were important to Benedict of Nursia, today's saint. In fact some say an important part of his revived recognition of the importance of community was grounded in the Psalms.

Maybe you recall 5th century Benedict of Nursia--the so-called Father of Monasticism. Benedict's firm but reasonable three-fold rule of life-- stability, obedience to God and amendment of life is the basic source document from which most later monastic rules were derived. His Rule of Life is still followed throughout the world. I think the success of this rule is bound up with it being firm but flexible--stability of life, obedience to God, and amendment of life.

When I have done retreats at Benedictine communities, I have found reassuring their daily pattern. In Benedict's community, on average, one hour was spent eating. Four hours were for prayer. Five hours were for reading. Six hours for work, and eight hours of sleep. But the thing that grabs my attention about Benedict is this building of/incorporating into the Rule around the regular recitation of the entire Psalms, the so-called Psaltery, once every week. And Benedictines, including our own Episcopal/Anglican Benedictines, to this day continue in this rule and having the Psalms be a regular part of their spiritual diet.

Like so many others, I love the Psalms. They are so real. They transcend centuries and still speak so much about human nature, warts and all. Parts of some of them make us flinch in hearing the bitterness and rage they display, along with their occasional prejudice against other nations and peoples. They are not all pleasant and pious and devout, indeed they are sometimes almost violently self-righteous, but they are all honest before God and they can lead us to be honest about our selves, including our prejudices and our emotions

The Psalms give us permission to be where we are with God. They help us to realize that God already knows everything about us and still loves us and calls us to follow Him.

Very few of us are called to live the Rule of St. Benedict in a Benedictine house, but this early evening let us recommit ourselves to stability in our Christian life-whether that be to daily prayer, prayers before meals, stability in being in this community and coming to our two communion services, daily Bible reading, service to others. Let us recommit ourselves to obedience to God --- listening deeply for God's will for our lives and being obedient to that, saying yes to God and God's life giving ways. Let us recommit ourselves to changing our ways when we sin and fall short of the mark God intended for us. And let us recommit ourselves to the way of absolute honesty with ourselves, to be where we are, before God that the Psalms invite. Amen.

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"Embarrassed by Our Backgrounds"
Brigid of Kildare, 5th century Matthew 6.25-33
Chapel of the Incarnation, Gainesville
The Rev'd Dr. N. Martin-Coffey
In the name of the Holy Trinity.

When I began worshipping in the Episcopal Church some 30 years ago, I was envious of the so-called cradle Episcopalians. In all honesty, I was a bit embarrassed by my southern Baptist roots.

The cradle Episcopalian-types were the ones who just seemed to be more keenly aware of the traditions - when to cross oneself, when to bow, intuit the liturgy, know, and genuflect. They were the ones who remember the 1928 Prayer Book. The ones who somehow seemed more real and pure as Episcopalians.

Growing up in the liturgically bankrupted southern Baptist church left me feeling inadequate, less than, insecure. In a way, I was embarrassed by my southern Baptist background, the way their main thrust seemed bound up with expectations about how many folks you had witnessed to, how many you have been a apart of saving. At least that was the way it was in my Southern Baptist Church.

As I reflect on the life of the saint who we celebrate today, I wonder if her background embarrassed her, felt it was a bit inadequate. Brigid came from a Druid background -- you know someone who worshipped the forces of nature.
Brigid founded a convent in the 5th century at Kildare, Ireland - the center of the cult of a pagan goddess. A sacred fire said to be maintained by that goddess served as an object of devotion.

There is no indication that Brigid extinguished it. More likely she used wisdom and creativity to reclaim the flame for God's use.

Brigid reminds me how God uses what we were to enhance what we are. Her pagan past became part of her Christ experience. God uses all of us...

I sometimes wonder if God is using the weakness I had in not being able to witness as was expected of me in reaching... witnessing expected of me as a southern Baptist.

And this evening as we reflect on the life of Bridig of Kildare I invite you to wonder what God might be up to in your life... what weakness, past experience, addiction, abuse, or other human struggle from you past might God want to use to enhance who you as you seek the Kingdom of God and his righteousness? Amen.

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"Intervention and Our Need for God"
Catherine of Siena Mathew 22.41-46
Chapel of the Incarnation, Gainesville
The Reverend N. Martin-Coffey

In the name of the Holy Trinity.

In our gospel Jesus is interrogating the Pharisees about who they think he is. We hear the usual title--"Son of David"-- for the Messiah does not go far enough. Jesus is Messiah, Son of David, Lord, and Son of God. The saint whose faithfulness we honor today, Catherine of Siena got it that Jesus was Lord'Son of God, and sought communion with our Lord.

Catherine of Sienna's deepest longing was communion with God. Early on she recognized the need in her heart for Christ. I don't know if this recognition for her longing for communion with God had to do with her being the youngest child in a family of twenty-five, being sort of ignored, and having plenty of time on her hands. I don't know why God chose her for remarkable visions, or what it was about her that encouraged her to live each moment in a more attentiveness state to the spiritual dimensions---the kingdom of God---in our midst (the eternity in our midst that I spoke of on Sunday) that allowed her to see those visions.

Her family was wealthy dyers of cloth in the 14th century. At the age of six, when she was walking home from a visit she had a vision in which she saw the Lord seating in glory with St. Peter, St. Paul, and St. John---and the Savior smiled on her and blessed her. She went on to live a life of prayer and mediation, despite her mother's attention to force her to be like other girls. Eventually she was admitted to a Dominican order and was a nurse, caring for caring for patients with leprosy and cancer (whom other nurses disliked to treat). Catherine constantly was called upon to arbitrate feuds and to prepare troubled sinners for confession. She visited prisoners condemned to death, perhaps like a sort of 14th century Sister Helen Prejean (her story featured in the movie "Dead Man Walking"). During the great schism of the papacy, with rival popes in Rome and Avignon, Catherine wrote tirelessly to princes, kings, and popes, urging them to restore the unity of the Church. Besides her many letters to all manner of people, Catherine wrote a Dialogue, a mystical work dictated in ecstasy. Exhausted and paralyzed, she died at the age of thirty-three.

As I reflect upon Catherine's recognition of that deep longing for communion with God, I am reminded of an incident that happened a couple of weeks ago here at Chapel House. I was watching a TV show called "Intervention." Maybe you have seen it. "Intervention" features real life people who have addictions that are utterly destroying their life, and most of the people that they feature hang on to life precariously. The people featured in this so-called documentary, that turns into an intervention by loved ones and family, have a variety of addictions---to recreational drugs, prescription drugs, alcohol, sex, or addictions related to food. Anyway the Chapelite, with whom I was watching the show, and I were having a great conversation about what exactly makes an addiction an addiction, and what causes addictions. He said that one primary underlying factor in such addictions was that people were trying to fill a need for God with other things.

And so this summer as we go about our lives---being in classes, studying, doing research, working at a camp, or in the Episcogator Running Club, Chapel Beach or a sandy beach, let us recognize and live fully into that need for communion with God. Amen.

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"Mystical Experiences in Our Midst"
Hildegard of Bingen
John 3.16-21
Chapel of the Incarnation
The Rev'd N. Martin-Coffey

In the name of the Holy Trinity.

Hildegard of Bingen is one of my favorite saints, and if you have been around Chapel House for a while music is playing in the Common Room, you have heard some of Hildegard's music. when I spin some tunes on the CD player in our Common Room you have heard this sort of "strange and unheard-of music," these "chants of sweet melody." I find that the music she wrote points me to mystical places, places where I want to pause and dwell, places that have strands or smells or invitations to unitive experiences, one-ness with God. Hildegard was a mystic. She was a poet, composer, dramatist, doctor, and scientist -- quite a list of accomplishments for a woman in the 12th century.

Hildegard was born in the Rhineland Valley, her parents' tenth child. She was given as a family tithe to the church and raised by an anchoress named Jutta. Early on as a child she experienced dazzling spiritual visions. At 32, a voice commanded her to tell what she saw. And that she did, writing her first book of visions. Her imagery of God and God's creative activity is often feminine. She became sought after for her counsel by kings and queens, abbot and abbesses, archbishops and popes.

She exercised a commanding spiritual authority based on confidence in her visions, and considerable political astuteness.

In talking about mystical experiences, some common characteristics pervade.

• They are brief, usually lasting only a few minutes.
• They bring a feeling of oneness with the universe.
• Rather than that one has "found" God, one feels that one has encountered God.
• Lastly, each encounter contains an invitation to move
  on to greater spiritual growth,
  a deeper sense of commitment.