St. Barnabus Anglican Church - Advent 2 - Peace

It was good to be in the home church again. Being spiritual in community. It’s a wonderful experience.  Our relationship with God is one to one but knowing God’s love we are able to love others.

This is the season of the coming of the Christ.  Jesus was born of Virgin Mary.  Some might speculate Joseph was gay or Mary had an affair with a Roman soldier.  But that’s not what the Bible says. This is a virgin birth and Mary is pious.  We are today in a very reductionist material world no longer the age of miracles. No longer even the age of Dulcinea.  We see windmills as black and white. We are in functional times.  The sacred is a reach for the western consumer mind so propagandized by aetheism. Those who don’t know that secular is multivariate and not just the one and only.  It is a lingua franc but not all language.  

The story of the Gospel is told in Aramaic, Greek and Hebrew. Studying Hebrew I’m immediately aware of what a dynamic language it is, like the Old English of Chaucer.  There’s a flow and reality is lighter and more expansive.  Today we say ‘hell eternal’ when in those agricultural days before the advent of mathematical zero, ‘hell for a long time’ would be the ‘Correct’ translation.  Time was different. The Spiritual time is Now. So today Jesus is being born with in, he’s dying on the cross and being resurrect. Today.  And yesterday. And tomorrow.  Jesus lives.  Eternity is now.  

It was fun to see Rev. Emily. She’s a welcoming inclusive soul who laughs and smiles and her eyes twinkle like an elf. She is saintly in that earthy way that’s rather Anglican at it’s core.  A religion of the people. Created out of disobedience with Rome.  A Protestant Christianity of the land. It was the Church of England but now it’s more a commonwealth. It’s Bishops get together and politic and things swing to and fro but always there is love. Christianity is the religion of Love. Jesus said, Love God and Love your neighbour as yourself. That’s it.  

So all are welcome at St. Barnabus including my dog. Deacon Bill welcomed my dog by name, “Hello Gilbert’.  Bill has his own dog and immediately said he was sorry he’d left him at home because he’d have loved to have seen Gilbert. Now that’s a welcome.  Love my dog and you’re half way home. I love St. Francis.  Besides Gilbert has been blessed by the Bishop. 

So we sang. We listened. Rev. Jeanette gave the sermon. I remembered coming to church with my family, my father, brother and my mother and her sister. My earliest memories outside the home are churches and tobogganing .  Not that they occured together. They’re just part of being Canadian.  75% of us are Christian. Excluded and persecuted by our own government,
The church is as ubiquitous as the gym.  Indeed the church is the Spiritual Gym and now we have temples, mosques and synagogues as varietie’s of Spiritual Gym.
The church a a social place. The communion ,sharing the Las supper over and over again, reminded of the words of Jesus before he did God’s will and allowed for the ignorance of the authorities, religious and political to have God crucified, then God resurrected.  It’s all very reasonable. IF you have ears..  The sacred shines through the silences.  

It was good. God is good all the time.  Christmas is a season of hope and love and peace.  The celebration of God coming to his creation as the son. All now, sacred and forever.  As I encounter each Christmas I face them more fondly though I miss my mom and dad and brother and aunts and uncles.  I look forward to seeing family.  Laura will be with hers and I will be with mine and Gilbert will be with his cousins. 

Christmas a time of coming together.