John Hines Day Archives - 51视频 /tag/john-hines-day/ An Episcopal Seminary Thu, 12 Oct 2023 21:03:15 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.9.4 /wp-content/uploads/2023/08/cropped-SSW-Logo-Favi-32x32.png John Hines Day Archives - 51视频 /tag/john-hines-day/ 32 32 The Rt. Rev. Carlye Hughes /the-rt-rev-carlye-hughes/ /the-rt-rev-carlye-hughes/#respond Tue, 10 Oct 2023 19:26:57 +0000 /?p=25779 The post The Rt. Rev. Carlye Hughes appeared first on 51视频.

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The Rt. Rev. Greg Rickel on October 6, 2016, the Commemoration of John Hines /rt-rev-greg-rickel-october-6-2016-commemoration-john-hines/ Thu, 06 Oct 2016 14:01:51 +0000 http://ssw.edu/?p=14961 The post The Rt. Rev. Greg Rickel on October 6, 2016, the Commemoration of John Hines appeared first on 51视频.

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Bp. John Hines Day Sermon /bp-john-hines-day-sermon/ Thu, 08 Oct 2015 19:50:25 +0000 http://ssw.edu/?p=13679 This sermon was preached by Dr. Scott Bader-Saye, Academic Dean and Helen and Everett H. Jones Chair in Christian Ethics and Moral Theology, to students, faculty, staff, trustees, and members of […]

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This sermon was preached by Dr. Scott Bader-Saye, Academic Dean and Helen and Everett H. Jones Chair in Christian Ethics and Moral Theology, to students, faculty, staff, trustees, and members of the John Hines Legacy Society in celebration of Bishop John Hines Day.

The day was Thursday, October 15, 1964. The St. Louis Cardinals were playing host to the New York Yankees in Game 7 of the World Series. The Cardinals had scraped their way to the National league pennant thanks to a late September 10-game losing streak by the Philadelphia Phillies. The Yankees were seeking to ride the final wave of their 1950s dynasty built by Mantle, Maris, Ford, and Berra. And sitting in the seats watching that game were Scott Field Bailey and John Hines. They were in St. Louis for the 63rd General Convention of the Episcopal Church. Two days later John Hines would be elected the 22nd Presiding Bishop.
Like the Cardinals, Hines was an underdog. Both Hines and Bailey were convinced that night as they watched the game that he would not be elected; his friend Stephen Bayne, just coming off of a five year term as the first Executive Officer of the Anglican Communion, seemed to be a shoe-in for the position.1 But history or providence intervened. The Cardinals won and so did John Hines.
Today we celebrate the legacy, the passion, the vision, the tenacity of our founder. John Hines is best known for his work as presiding bishop leading the Episcopal Church through the racial tensions of the 1960s and assuring that we were on the right side of history. But he is perhaps best remembered here in Austin for founding St. Stephen鈥檚 Episcopal School and our own Episcopal Theological 51视频.
Hines looked around the church in 1950 and decided that it needed 鈥渁 new kind of theological school.鈥 Always the bold orator, Hines called for a 鈥渞evolutionary seminary鈥 that would turn out 鈥渕ature men of God instead of adolescents鈥 (GOF, 147). Seeking to mirror Hines鈥 own humility, I will not dwell on what his statement suggests about the other Episcopal seminaries.
From his early days as rector of St. Paul鈥檚 in Augusta, GA, Hines took on the pressing social issues of his day. A child of the south, born in 1910, he knew that racism was the besetting sin of the nation. But he also spoke out for the inclusion of women in church leadership and for all who were poor, downtrodden, and without voice.
Any of those issues are worthy of a sermon, but I want to focus my comments on a particular Christian virtue that Hines embodied so well 鈥 the virtue of magnanimity. As my ethics students will know, 鈥淢agnanimity … is the aspiration of the spirit to great things鈥 2 Thomas Aquinas describes it as 鈥渢he courage to seek what is great and become worthy of it.鈥 3 The opposite of magnanimity is pusillanimity 鈥 a word that almost onomatopoetically connotes the stench of a constricted and petty life. Pusillanimous people give great energy to trifling matters and end up with minds and hearts that have never been stretched to embrace something vast. They thus seek what鈥檚 easy instead of what鈥檚 right.
John Hines was a magnanimous soul, who, though born in South Carolina, developed Texas-sized ambitions for the church. He displayed a winning clarity about the path of justice, though he was very aware that being clear and being easy are quite different things. He had little patience with those who wanted a comfortable church. He lamented once that 鈥淭he Church carries too much dead weight. Too many people are scheming stowaways on the Ship of the Church. They are seeking salvation without working … [or] paying fares鈥 (GOF, 114).
To be in the church for Hines is to be called to action. He didn鈥檛 much like the idea of a Bishop鈥檚 chair because he thought bishops could best do their work standing up. He once asked, 鈥淐an you imagine Amos sitting down and saying 鈥榳oe to them that are at ease in Zion鈥?鈥 (GOF, 157). John Hines鈥 vision of discipleship can be well summarized in the words of Jesus that we read this morning:

鈥淚f any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up theircross daily and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will save it.鈥 (Luke 9:23-25)

I would imagine that most of us hear these words as a call to the individual Christian. We each, individually, need to be willing to take up our cross, follow Jesus, lose our life to find it. But Hines applied this logic to the church. The Episcopal Church, in particular, needed to be ready to take up its cross and lose its life in order to save its life.
He made this clear in his words to General Convention in 1970:

[T]he Body of Christ must be prepared to offer itself up for the sake of the healing and the solidarity of the whole human family, whatever its religious or racial identities. Especially must the Body of Christ risk its own life in bearing and sharing the burdens of those who are being exploited, humiliated, and disinherited! 4

The call to 鈥渙ffer itself up,鈥 to 鈥渞isk its own life鈥 is a corporate call for the church. You can imagine that this was not a message that resonated well with those church leaders who wanted to keep up Sunday attendance and who wanted to entice large givers to their capital campaigns. It was well known that Hines was not much of an administrator or fundraiser, partly because he was ready to lose the church in order to find it. This is scary business and not everyone appreciated his all-too-literal reading of Jesus鈥 words.
The thing about John Hines is that he was something of a biblicist in the best kind of way. He had no time for those who sought to explain away Jesus鈥 hard teachings by adding a thousand common sense qualifiers to explain what Jesus must have really meant or why its just unrealistic to follow Jesus鈥 words too closely. Hines鈥 theology was the simple gospel. This is not to say he was simplistic, only that he was straightforward in his desire to follow the way of Christ. This is how his theological orthodoxy met up with social progressivism.
He saw racism and he knew that this is not how Jesus would treat people. He saw poverty and he knew this is not how Jesus wanted people to live. He saw modern warfare and called it 鈥渋nimical鈥 to the 鈥渆thics of Jesus Christ.鈥 He had the confidence of a man who did not seek comfort by making Jesus more complicated than he was. He eschewed the self-serving conditions, provisos, and stipulations that allow most of us to encounter Jesus and then return to the life we were living.
Remembering John Hines is a way to resist the ubiquitous temptations of pusillanimity that often come to us today in the form of 鈥渟hiny objects.鈥 The 鈥渟hiny object syndrome鈥 鈥 our ability to be easily distracted from substance by means of spectacle 鈥 leads us to set aside our magnanimity 鈥 our great aspirations for social change 鈥 in order to chase petty victories and argue over contrived concerns. Recent shiny objects include anchor babies, Benghazi, the debt ceiling, Donald Trump鈥檚 hair, Donald Trump.
The trend among some southern police forces to add 鈥渋n God we trust鈥 decals to their patrol cars strikes me as a prime instance of shiny object sleight-of- hand. The problem with the decal is not that it affirms God (as an aside, I鈥檓 all for trusting God). The problem is that the decal functions as a diversion from the significant, painful, and necessary conversations we need to be having about police tactics, racial bias, and the growing mistrust of law enforcement. Instead of addressing these issues of substance, we are arguing about decals. We grow small minded and give great energy to petty matters.
To be a magnanimous church, a church willing to open wide its heart for the sake of the world will require the kind of tenacity that John Hines displayed. It will require active resistance to the trivializing or our political discourse. And it will mean making some people angry. But if we were afraid of making people angry, we wouldn鈥檛 be celebrating John Hines.
The victory of the 鈥64 Cardinals proved a turning point in baseball 鈥 both because it put an end to the Yankees dynasty and because it proved the wisdom of the National League鈥檚 willingness to sign Black and Latino baseball players. The Yankees general manager, George Weiss, would only sign white players and seemed to want only white fans. On the other hand, the Cardinals owner, Gussie Busch, was willing to sign anyone who would help him win. By 1964 the Cardinals had assembled a team that included several black athletes, two of whom would be future hall of famers 鈥 Bob Gibson and Lou Brock.
Bob Gibson was pitching Game 7 of the series on just two days rest after pitching a complete game victory in Game 5. Scott Field Bailey and John Hines looked on from the stands. By the time he got to the ninth inning Gibson was visibly spent, and he gave up two runs 鈥 putting the tying run on deck. But his manager, Johnny Keane, did not pull him out. Bob Gibson pitched the team to a 7-5 victory and a World Series Title. Keane later defended his decision to let Gibson finish the game by saying, 鈥淚 had a commitment to his heart.鈥5
In a moment of magnanimity Keane knew, consciously or unconsciously, that the right thing to do, not just for his team but for baseball and for Bob Gibson and for African-American athletes and for the dim hope of some kind of equality, was to let Gibson bring down the Yankees. That night in October of 1964 John Hines witnessed greatness from an African American pitcher, as well as magnanimity from the St. Louis manager, and he went on to lead the Episcopal Church with his own large-hearted aspirations for justice which we rightly celebrate today. Amen.
1. Kenneth Kesselus, Granite on Fire, 194-197.
2. Josef Pieper, cited in Paul Wadell, Happiness and the Christian Moral Life, 61.
3. Thomas Aquinas, cited in Paul Wadell, Happiness and the Christian Moral Life, 61.
4. 鈥淛ohn Hines鈥擳he Church Awakens: African Americans and the Struggle for Justice,鈥 The Episcopal Archives, http://www.episcopalarchives.org/Afro-Anglican_history/exhibit/leadership/hines.php, accessed Oct 7, 2015.
5. James E. B. Breslin, 鈥淒amned Yankees,鈥 New York Times, August 14, 1994, review of David Halberstam, October 1964; https://www.nytimes.com/books/98/03/15/home/halberstam-october.html.

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John Hines Day and Dedication of the Loise Henderson Wessendorff Center /john-hines-day-and-dedication-of-the-loise-henderson-wessendorff-center/ Mon, 14 Oct 2013 15:58:44 +0000 https://sswtemp.wpengine.com/john-hines-day-and-dedication-of-the-loise-henderson-wessendorff-center/ Amos 7:7-9

Psalm 18:21-36

2 Corinthians 4:5-12

Luke 9:23-26

“If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will save it.”

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Amos 7:7-9
Psalm 18:21-36
2 Corinthians 4:5-12
Luke 9:23-26

鈥淚f any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will save it.鈥

Today we honor John Elbridge Hines, the founder of the Episcopal Theological 51视频. We remember his fearlessness as he led the Episcopal Church into the most difficult, divisive, compelling challenge of his generation: the legacy of slavery, the inequities of race, the ongoing suffering of citizens of this nation. We recall his powerful preaching — that very old-fashioned low tech art of personal, corporate, scriptural persuasion and conversion. We give thanks that he established this seminary, and that God has given it growth to be the place that we love and serve today.
I know John Hines through those who knew him, Dena, Charlie Cook, and Carl Shannon, and lots of others, even people I run into in my travels: Dolores Goble, from Houston, who still talks proudly of having been confirmed by him as a young woman at the University of Texas in a confirmation class of one. I have heard fine preachers interpret him in sermons on his feast day.
However, I am mindful that whenever you celebrate the past, (especially if you weren鈥檛 there) there is a risk that you will romanticize and exaggerate the accomplishments of saints of an earlier era, and compare the colorful drama of then with your own pastel and uneventful present.
It would be a terrible shame to do that, because then we would miss God鈥檚 call upon us at the present moment.
Today, when we dedicate the Loise Henderson Wessendorff Center for Christian Ministry and Vocation and give God thanks for the gift from her foundation to endow and name the center, we are taking the present seriously.
Now in the present, we are exercising, in our own way, the gift that John Hines had: of reading the signs of the times.  He looked around, at reality of the world 鈥 in Jesus鈥 time the region of Galilee, in Hines鈥 the United States of America and he looked at it in light of the good news. And he discerned how the church was being called to take up the cross daily and follow Jesus.
We are reading the signs of our times and recognizing and naming the world鈥檚 brokenness and hurt. We are feeling the pressure and experiencing the lure of God鈥檚 call. Our Vocation.
For the drama of the present moment is indeed as intense, and the suffering as severe as in the time of John Hines.  The gospel makes a claim upon us to speak and to act 鈥 to proclaim good news to the poor, release to the captives, recovery of sight to the blind, let the oppressed go free, and proclaim the year of the Lord鈥檚 favor.
In the present moment, veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are returning home, and their wounds are not yet healed. Their families need to be held up and cared for. They are traumatized, broken, disoriented 鈥 these are the ones whom Jesus went with, those who showed faith.
The graduates of the Loise Henderson Wessendorff center will be serving these, they will listen for their questions, listen them into speech, hear them into healing. Bring them a word of hope.
Whole families without health insurance get sicker and sicker 鈥 the old, the babies and go en masse to the ER. Graduates of the masters programs in counseling and chaplaincy will care for the whole person, body, mind, and spirit. They will minister to them, in the translation of the scripture, 鈥渨ait upon them.鈥
Graduates of the Henderson Wessendorff Center for Christian Ministry and Vocation at the 51视频 will offer healthy food to the spiritually hungry, who are high on junk food but famished for the Word of God.
To postmodern, media-overloaded, surfers, driven to distraction, they will seek together for the peace which passeth all understanding.
God calls gifted people, from all walks of life, to come and study for ministry as counselors, chaplains, teachers, and spiritual directors. They come to be well trained in the clinical methods of their fields, and to be grounded in the Christian tradition, formed in its patterns of prayer. In their listening, questioning, pastoring, they invoke the prophetic vision of the new creation spun out by the prophets and embodied in Jesus.
In a violent dog eat dog world, human beings are chemically programed for survival at the expense of the unfit, and the laws of the marketplace are the only reliable rules, contrast and summon Amos鈥 vision of God鈥檚 justice measured with a plumb line, straight and true, against which the violence and greed of Israel would be judged.
Weave Isaiah鈥 vision of comfort to those who mourn in Zion, a garland instead of ashes, the oil of gladness instead of mourning, the mantle of praise instead of a faint spirit.
Recover and put into new words (or even old words) the vision of the human being, made in the image of God (Genesis 1) and (Genesis 2) molded from dirt and infused with the spirit of GOD.
The human being, us, our sister and brother, as made of clay, basically mud, or even hard fired shiny china, but even so, able to be shattered by force, by childhood trauma, by a roadside bomb, back into the dusty elements from which we were formed, and yet even then, precious, worthy, holy, beloved.
Paul recovers and weaves the prophetic vision:
鈥淲e have these treasures in earthen vessels (clay jars) so that it may be made clear that this extraordinary power belongs to God and does not come from us.鈥
鈥淏ut we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us.鈥
Jesus invoked the prophetic vision and preached the reign of God. He taught the paradox at the heart of reality that it is by losing one鈥檚 life that you ultimately save it. He performed that paradox in his passion.
It is God鈥檚 call upon us at this present moment to invoke this prophetic vision, through the work of the Loise Henderson Wessendorff Center for Christian Ministry and Vocation of the 51视频. Let us pray that we will be swept up into that same arc of prophetic preaching, shared with John Hines, with Amos, with Jesus, and with Paul, the vision of the new creation.
Amen

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John Hines Day 2012: The Rev. Kathryn Ryan /john-hines-day-2012-the-rev-kathryn-ryan/ Mon, 08 Oct 2012 22:33:47 +0000 https://sswtemp.wpengine.com/john-hines-day-2012-the-rev-kathryn-ryan/  

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鈥淎re you better off than you were four years ago?鈥  The question reverberated through the air at the Republican National Convention and caught democratic strategists off-guard.  A question far more complicated than the stark responses for which it begs, I鈥檓 sure it has kept at least a few of us awake at night. 鈥  Even now, I sense I have raised the anxiety in the room!  And not just in those protective of our tax-exempt status!  Are you better off than you were four years ago?  It depends, it seems, on what you mean by 鈥渂etter鈥.
Our question today is not that question 鈥 not whether we are better off than four, but more like 60 years ago, when Bishop John Hines, coadjutor of Texas, founded this seminary.  Is the Episcopal Church better off?  Depends on what you mean by 鈥渂etter鈥.  In terms of numbers, the Episcopal Church has declined over the past 60 years.  In 1952, there were 1 and a half Episcopalians for every hundred folk in the US.  By 2011, to get to 1 and a half Episcopalians, you鈥檇 have to gather at least 225 people. The life of the Episcopal Church has been slipping away, one might say.  Naturally, some yearn for the good old days, when youth groups burst at the seams, potlucks filled the parish halls, and all of the women were casserole baking, bazaar organizing members of the ECW. Oh, that we could go back to the robust and wealthy Church of those days. Shall we go back?  Are we better off, my friends, than we were 60 years ago? What measure shall we use to judge the state of the Church?
Our scriptures, honestly, overflow with references to the numbers of God鈥檚 people.   600,000 men led out of Egypt; five hundred thousand soldiers devoted to the Lord; 72 to go into all the places to which Jesus was headed; 3000  baptized in one day!  Apparently, numbers matter. But God never accepts numbers in lieu of God鈥檚 higher standard.  God calls God鈥檚 people to fidelity 鈥 faithfulness to the Lord and to the Lord鈥檚 purposes and ways.  Think we鈥檙e cozy with God because we鈥檙e rich or popular or numerous?  Think again!  God wants to know whether we love God with all our heart and love our neighbors as ourselves.   God measures the Church by whether she lives that love into concrete reality 鈥 doing justice and loving mercy, following Jesus, whatever the cost. More than sixty years ago, John Elbridge Hines joined the long line of prophetic voices calling the Church to measure herself by the same standards.
And so鈥 Are we?  Are we better off? Are we more faithful to God’s demands for justice?
Long before John Hines took up residence in Houston on the path that would lead him to election as the Episcopal Church鈥檚 22nd Presiding Bishop, Amos from Judah took up residence in Israel.  And God gave Amos a prophetic vision about the measurement of God鈥檚 people.  As God spoke to him, Amos saw a plumb line.  A plumb line to measure whether the wall that was Israel was straight and true.  A plumb line to judge the wall鈥檚 reliability and worthiness to stand.   Alas!  By God鈥檚 word Amos knew the wall of Israel rose crooked from the land. Rather than on the straight blocks of justice, and fairness, and concern for the poor, Israel鈥檚 wall was filled with the rubble of greed and self-indulgence and oppression. The wall would surely fall.
When John Hines looked at the Episcopal Church in which he ministered, he assessed it as if with Amos鈥 plumb line.  He saw a Church indulging in the same habits of injustice which filled the society.  The segregation of the races, which perpetuated poverty and stymied upward movement of African Americans.  A blind eye toward the crumbling life of the nation鈥檚 cities.  Self-satisfaction with ritual and institutional life that resisted change, lest the peace, beauty and strength of the church be threatened.
Hines, though, did not speak as Amos spoke to Israel, as an outsider, but as a son of the Church.   When Bishop Hines preached to the Church, his word was always 鈥渨e鈥 rather than 鈥測ou.鈥  And when he wanted to preach to society, to repair injustice and to bring good news, he pressed Christ鈥檚 own people to act.  Hines battled injustice in the world by calling the Church to change first: outraged by segregation, he proposed the integration of church institutions.  Reflecting on the exclusion of women, he pressed his diocese to admit them as delegates and Vestry members.  Witnessing first-hand the devastation of urban riots, he advocated the spending of the church鈥檚 own resources.
Hines knew there would be a cost for his zealous insistence on racial equality and inclusion and no-strings attached funding.  And there was 鈥 for Hines and for the church 鈥 a shortened ministry for Hines, withheld funds, angry colleagues, damaged relationships, empty pews, 鈥atigue, even mission curtailed.  And if we minister, as we surely do, in a church shaped by Hines鈥 vision, we still pay the price.   It鈥檚 been a costly toll.
Some critics of Hines and the Episcopal Church point to the decline and label Hines as a culprit 鈥 a reckless social justice advocate who confused worldly aims with gospel standards.  They argue that numerical decline proves the Church has been unfaithful. And they yearn for earlier days, before a progressive social agenda advocated either a courageous stand for the oppressed, or a wholesale abandonment of the tenets of scripture鈥 depending on who you ask.  Do they really hunger for those days? Days when programs inside our parishes kept us sheltered from human suffering in our streets? The days in which we, the Episcopal Church, politely defended our right to segregation, and piously justified a second-class status for women, minorities, and others, by referencing select passages of Holy Writ?
Today鈥檚 Episcopal Church reflects the commitments to justice and inclusion for which John Hines fought.  If we are to measure whether we are better off than we were 60 years ago, whether we would like to go back, we must surely ask whether the Church, measured by Amos鈥 plumb line, rests more firmly on God鈥檚 call for justice than in those days. 
Are we better off? Are we better advocates for God鈥檚 brand of justice?
If the cost paid proves fidelity, we must certainly be on the right path!   We’ve become a church expert at taking one for the justice team!  Some days it seems that all it takes to get a majority of the Episcopal Church fired up is to say the two magic words…..”justice issue”.   Don’t get me wrong.  I love that about our church.  I’ve not only drunk the kool-aid; I was weaned on it – the Hines’ vintage, nonetheless!   I wonder, though, does the angry resistance and a justice banner prove, without question, that we are carrying a cross right behind Jesus?
Lest we assume that Bishop Hines would be thrilled with the state of the Episcopal Church today, let us recall the commitment upon which all his prophetic witness rested.  Hines grounded his life – and called the Church he led – to an unwavering devotion to Jesus Christ.  His demand for social justice was not for some universal notion of social justice, equally obvious to all people of all faiths.  No. Hines鈥 standards were the ideals and demands he discovered in the gospel of Jesus Christ. He called the Church to deny herself, take up her cross, and follow Jesus.  Jesus鈥 life, Jesus鈥 teachings, Jesus鈥 sacrifice 鈥 Jesus鈥 compassion toward the hungry, the poor, the excluded, the oppressed 鈥 Jesus鈥 willing embrace of the cross 鈥 these defined the broad scope of Bishop Hines鈥 understanding of the word justice.
Are we better off?  Are we following Jesus?
Sometimes it鈥檚 hard to know.  The claim that a matter is a 鈥渏ustice issue鈥 often chills efforts at theological reflection within the Church. Try to initiate theological conversation about women鈥檚 health and abortion, or consumption, commoditization and the environment, and you, too, might discover my dilemma!  Where does this paralysis leave us?  We, the Episcopal Church, cannot discover a particularly Christian approach to justice in these matters unless we have the courage to talk about Jesus.  Unlike John Hines, we who follow him have failed to master the art of planting our flag of justice within the shadow of the cross on which we, and more importantly the world, have been redeemed.
A Church in which it is more acceptable to say justice than to name Jesus is no Church at all.  Christ cannot be incidental, and never was for John Hines. At his service of installation as Presiding Bishop, he preached, calling on St. Paul: 鈥淕od鈥檚 mandate to the Church requires that we preach not ourselves 鈥 but Christ Jesus as Lord.  And this can happen only when we in the Church are caught up in a real and saving encounter with Jesus Christ as Savior!鈥 (Kesselus, 214-215) Justice, for all its good, does not save.  Jesus does. Too often over our recent decades, our advocacy for the social gospel has dissolved into 鈥渟ocial鈥 without much 鈥済ospel鈥.   We have been zealous to pursue some brand of 鈥渏ustice鈥 –   while too timid or confused to proclaim with Bishop Hines why we do so. 
Are we better off?  Yes. Because justice matters, and God emboldened John Hines鈥 to lead and shape the Church as the servant of God鈥檚 justice for the sake of the world.  Are we?  Yes again.  Because numbers matter, but never so much as God鈥檚 call to do justice. And what about sixty years from now?  Will the Episcopal Church be true to God, servants of God鈥檚 mission, followers of Jesus? I guess it鈥檚 left to us 鈥 us happy few!  May the Lord fill us with the clear vision and voice of Bishop Hines 鈥 about society, and the church, and, especially, about Jesus!  Let us, in our own day, follow boldly behind our savior, the one whose face reveals true justice! Let us, like Jesus, live and love justly, whatever the cost.

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John Hines Day 2011 /john-hines-day-2011/ Thu, 01 Dec 2011 22:44:55 +0000 https://sswtemp.wpengine.com/john-hines-day-2011/  

John Hines Day
October 6, 2011

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John Hines Day
October 6, 2011

The Rt. Rev. David M. Reed, MDiv 鈥83, DD 鈥08
Bishop Suffragan 鈥 Diocese of West Texas                                                                                         

Christ Chapel, 51视频
Amos 7:7-9a; Ps. 18:21-36; II Corinthians 4:5-12; Luke 9:23-26

Jh. In the Name of God 鈥 Father, Son and Holy Spirit. AMEN.
INTRO:  It鈥檚 a privilege and a blessing to be with you for this celebration of the life and ministry of John Hines, 4th Bishop of Texas, 22nd Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church, and most importantly for our purposes here today, without which there wouldn鈥檛 be a here, here , for us to celebrate, Founder of 51视频 almost 60 years ago. Born 1910, died 1997鈥he child of God, and heir of the Kingdom.
When Bishop Hines announced his plans for this seminary, the first to be established in the 20th century, he dreamed of a seminary fully engaged with the culture, interpreting Christian theology in terms the modern world could understand and led by a faculty of intimidating intellect, stupendous scholarship, amazing good looks and rigorous yet incredibly merciful teaching methods. The seminarians from West Texas would like their professors to know that they feel the dream has come true.
It is an honor, and humbling, to be invited to preach on such a day as this, to stand in this chapel and this pulpit made possible by the vision and energy of Bishop Hines, a passionate and prophetic preacher. And to do so with his family and friends, and some of the clergy who were here when this place was built鈥攊t鈥檚 all a little intimidating. What was I thinking when I said yes? I haven鈥檛 preached here since my Senior Sermon in 1983, and am grateful to the dean for giving me another chance. It feels just the same, except I鈥檓 not being graded鈥ell, yes, I guess I am鈥
The bishop鈥檚 passion and prophetic leadership grew out of, of all things, his love for Jesus. He could not imagine that following Jesus could lead anywhere else but to the poor, the overlooked, the alienated, the oppressed鈥攖o lead him to stand against segregation, apartheid and poverty. The Incarnation illumined his life and his ministry, and in the crucified, dead and risen Christ, he found the grace, the strength and the stubbornness to enter into and stand with those who suffer. And not just stand there, gawking like a turista, but to talk about it boldly, to call and recall the comfortable and secure Church of his day to pay attention to Jesus.
鈥淭he more you genuinely concentrate upon the person and ministry of Christ,鈥 he told a gathering at the College of Preachers, 鈥渢he more you will be driven into confrontations in his name with the powers of darkness and with the demonic structures that demean human life and frustrate and scar the human spirit.鈥 Standing in this prophetic tradition, your dean said in a meeting last spring, 鈥淚f we don鈥檛 tell the world it鈥檚 crazy, who will?鈥 Or I guess the words of Jesus in today鈥檚 Gospel work, too: 鈥淚f you want to follow me, deny yourselves, take up your cross, and come on.鈥 I looked up Bishop Hines鈥 in the NY Times, and this was my favorite line: 鈥淗e was accused by critics of overlooking administrative detail as he focused on social issues.鈥 May that be engraved on all our tombstones.
It鈥檚 not easy being a prophet, and it鈥檚 even harder when you鈥檙e on the inside, and Bishop Hines was way on the inside. He was bishop and presiding bishop when that still carried a lot of weight and opened a lot of doors. And yet, not counting equality with the social movers and political shakers a thing to be grasped, he saw his office and authority as instruments and leverage for God鈥檚 Kingdom, ways in which he could confront the demonic structures that demean human life, go up against the love of power with the power of love, and get in the face of his own beloved Church and say, 鈥淧ay attention to Jesus.鈥
I suspect that one of the reasons most of us have a hard time hearing prophets鈥擨 mean, besides the fact that they鈥檙e usually talking about us鈥攊s that it seems to be a fine line between being a prophet and being a jerk. Real prophets seem to be pretty disinterested in their identity as prophets, don鈥檛 seem to dwell on it; it鈥檚 not about them, they say, and their words aren鈥檛 even their own. They seem overtaken by God鈥檚 Word. Fake prophets seem to be self-conscious, concerned with how they鈥檙e doing, maybe even enjoying how they鈥檙e upsetting everyone. Real prophets are heart-broken by the work God gives them.  There鈥檚 plenty of righteous anger, but they are speaking against the people they love鈥ecause they love them. Who else will bother to tell these people they鈥檙e crazy?
In the Book of Amos, just after the passage we heard about Amos鈥 waking-dream about the plumbline used to test the sturdiness and straightness of a wall, the priest Amaziah reports to King Jeroboam that Amos is stirring up trouble 鈥渋n the middle of the house of Israel.鈥 He characterizes him as both a political subversive and a religious nutcase. The priest then goes to Amos and says, 鈥淕o, please, just go away. Go home to Judah and earn your living prophesying there.鈥 Amos rejects both labels and responds heatedly, 鈥淚鈥檓 no prophet and not a prophet鈥檚 son, either. I鈥檓 a herdsman and a dresser of sycamore trees.鈥 (According to my advanced research, that does not involve putting clothing on trees, but harvesting and cutting up figs.) Then he says, in effect, this was not my idea. 鈥淭he Lord took me from following the flock, and the Lord said to me, 鈥楪o, prophesy to my people Israel.鈥欌  (Amos 7:14-15) He was all caught up in this prophetic Word.
I don鈥檛 get any sense that Bishop Hines spent much time wondering if he was a prophet. He was a priest, then a bishop, and always a churchman who loved the Church, and loved the Lord of the Church. He was trying to follow him. Only someone who loves the Church and has a lot of confidence in God鈥檚 purposes for the Church could have devoted so many years to challenging his people to take up the cross and have real life. If you think of time as the measuring out of our lives, then in a very real way, Bishop Hines laid down his life for the love of Jesus.
Times have changed, of course, and the Church is not the way it was when Bishop Hines served it. But I鈥檝e come to suspect that the Church has never been 鈥渢he way it was.鈥 We live in a time of anger, despair, fear, division, and distrust. And that鈥檚 just within the Church鈥hat were you all thinking when you said yes? How will the prophetic Word be heard in our own day, in a culture whose interest in the Church seems to be descending to the level of reality TV: if it鈥檚 not about sex, power, fighting, yelling and bad behavior, who cares? How do we get a hearing for God鈥檚 Word?
I don鈥檛 know if God has called or will call any one of you to be his prophet. Best not to worry about it. But know for sure that he has called you through your baptism into a prophetic movement, a countercultural Way that is against the world for love of the world. Because Jesus is our true Prophet, his whole Church is prophetic by nature. Listen: You are here, for Christ鈥檚 sake鈥ou鈥檙e here on a Thursday morning, in this chapel that a passion for the Gospel built. Have you not heard, and have you not seen, that gathering for worship, week by week, is an incredibly countercultural and prophetic act? (I was dragging my vestments in here earlier this morning, and walked right into Morning Prayer. What could I do, but stop and join my prayers to the prayers of those stopped to be recollected to God, those who stepped out of all their busyness to remember they have been set free, and to remember who now owns them. How countercultural is that?) Where else will people hear this life-giving Word? Where else will people be caught up in this Word, pressed down, sifted and transformed? And we come, week by week, not to hunker down and escape鈥攚e鈥檙e crazy if we think we can be at ease in Zion these days– but so that we can be comforted and confronted, strengthened, fed, lit up, and sent back out there, convinced that 鈥渋n here鈥 and 鈥渙ut there鈥 are all the same to God.
In your time in this seminary, you will feast on words, you will be overstuffed with words, and they aren鈥檛 always going to taste like honey-dipped scrolls. But the point– what makes it all worthwhile鈥攊s not that you become really, really smart, but that you be transformed鈥 made into God鈥檚 holy people鈥hat your heart gets changed. You will find that you begin to look out these chapel windows differently, that you see differently, maybe with the eyes of Jesus, and that you have a language of hope and joy with which to describe what you see and know. It could just be that you get carried away by it all and end up doing something bold and prophetic, and people will say, 鈥淲ell, yes, but he鈥檚 a political subversive, a religious nut,鈥 or 鈥淲ell, you know, she鈥檚 not much of an administrator.鈥 And you鈥檒l care, but not that much, because you鈥檝e been caught up in a movement that takes your breath away and gives you the breath of God, the living Word鈥 think it鈥檚 something in the baptismal water.
Because Jesus is a prophet鈥攃alling for repentance, saying the hard and hope-filled truth, announcing and embodying this Kingdom,  pointing to this new thing God is doing– the whole Church is, by nature, prophetic, standing like a cross jammed into the ground, recalling us鈥hem鈥veryone and each one鈥o the redeeming love of God in Christ Jesus. To us has been given the compelling Word that sends us out again and again to confront all that demeans and destroys life, to stand with those who suffer, to overcome the love of power with the power of love, and to always, always, pay attention to Jesus. AMEN.

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Sermon John Hines Day 2009 Oct 01, 2009 /sermon-john-hines-day-2009-oct-01-2009/ Tue, 15 Feb 2011 00:12:41 +0000 https://sswtemp.wpengine.com/sermon-john-hines-day-2009-oct-01-2009/ A sermon about Bishop John Hines - founder of 51视频 - given by the Rev. Kathleen Sams Russell, assistant professor of contextual theology, on John Hines Day (October 1, 2009) in Christ Chapel

 

This past summer, I made the journey-along with several thousand other people--to that particular expression of our tradition--General Convention which was held in Anaheim, California, the home of Disneyland and down the road from Hollywood. 

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A sermon about Bishop John Hines – founder of 51视频 – given by the Rev. Kathleen Sams Russell, assistant professor of contextual theology, on John Hines Day (October 1, 2009) in Christ Chapel

 
This past summer, I made the journey-along with several thousand other people–to that particular expression of our tradition–General Convention which was held in Anaheim, California, the home of Disneyland and down the road from Hollywood.
As I wasn’t a deputy I had the freedom to wander the exhibit hall, hang out around the free wi-fi station and generally schmooze with people I knew  and with people I didn’t know. It was fascinating-and proved to me once again that there might just be some truth to a theory called  “six degrees of separation.”
You may be familiar with the term from a movie by that name.  The idea is that any two individuals can be connected through at most five acquaintances, thus the phrase “six degrees of separation.”   In other words, I know x, and x knows y, and y knows z, and so on, thus there is a line that runs from me to z.
The idea that the distance between two perfect strangers is shorter than you might imagine intrigues people.  Curious mathematicians have worked on algorithms that would support its validity and social scientists have developed networking experiments to see if it really works.
But the idea’s most happy result so far has been a trivia game called —“The Kevin Bacon Movie Game” also known as “Six degrees of Kevin Bacon.”   Now Kevin Bacon is an actor whose career has been prolific.  He’s been steadily employed in one movie after another since the 1980s. At one point, noting how busy his career had been, he guessed that he had pretty much worked with all of the name actors in Hollywood.  Thus the game:  Name any actor that comes to mind and you can connect that actor to Kevin Bacon within the famous six degrees of separation by following a trail through the movies they’ve been in.
There’s even a web page that helps you do this. So I tried it, and for some reason-don’t ask me why–the name of Lillian Gish came to mind.  (Now for the youngsters among us she was the Julia Roberts of the 1920s, but but she continued to act as she aged and I was amazed to discover that there were only two degrees of separation between her and Kevin Bacon-TWO!a bit player in one her later movies went on to co-star with  the ubiquitous Mr. Bacon.  Amazing.
 
Of course this should come as no surprise to Episcopalians who play this game all the time.  When two Episcopalians meet, say in the exhibit hall at General Convention, it usually takes about five minutes before they start to plot out the degrees of separation and soon they find some common point of connection-a person, event, diocese, bishop or  place.
At one point I stopped at a booth just to pick up some handouts and then made the acquaintance of an Episcopal priest who it turned out had been best friends with a Catholic priest who had brightened my life when I was in fourth grade.  Amazing.
What that encounter made me realize is that even though the idea is called six degrees of separation it is really about the chain of connection, the ways in which we are linked to one other.
So of course this being the day when we gather to remember and celebrate the life and ministry of John Hines, the question comes to mind-What is our connection to John Hines, the founder of this seminary? What is it that links us to him?
         
For some the connection is obvious.  Some people are here today because they knew him well as a father, friend and colleague.  Many more, I would guess, know him indirectly. I myself  never knew him personally but are blessed to include those who did among our friends and colleagues. Even more are connected to him because we have benefited from the institutions that grew out of his vision-like St. Stephen’s School and we are connected because we are worshipping here in this chapel of the Seminary upon which he rested his hopes for preparing a generation of ministers who would serve the Church in a changing world.
See, I’ve already veered from the kind of simple straight lines that run from one person to another to a whole complex set of people and relationships-Bishop Hines, students, faculty and supporters of this school over several decades…and then the circle gets even bigger-the Episcopal Church at large, and then even more-the people in the world around us.  What John Hines liked to call “the entire universe.”
“Six degrees of separation” begins to look like a pretty thin way to account for the ways  our lives are intertwined-and the ways in which our lives are touched –not just by the people we know but by people who may appear to us just a names on a list -the 22nd Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church, for example, or as subjects of biographies that we plan to read when we have the time.
Even the question grows larger-it’s not just how we are linked to one another but how do we trace those patterns of connection in a way that brings us closer to God and closer to fulfilling God’s intention for us as the Christian community.
 
So what glimpse of the kingdom of God does the life of John Hines give us?
John Hines was a man with a fine mind, a big heart and an outgoing personality.  He was a priest whose spirituality ran deep and energy ran high. He was a bishop with a vision and a mission and he had the courage and resilience-and the grace–to stay true to it.
When I stop and think about the world in which John Hines lived and carried out his ministry, some of what he did is truly breathtaking.
He grew up in the Piedmont of South Carolina, in a small textile and farming town, where the lines between races and classes were tightly drawn and almost impossible to cross.  His family was not rich but he had all of the advantages that would have made it so easy for him to settle into a kind of acceptability and ambition that would have kept him silent in the face of the racism that was woven into every layer of society.
But he did not remain silent-from the very beginning of his ministry as a priest, John Hines took on the role of watchman for Christ, challenging not just prevailing attitudes toward race but the very particular ways in which that sense of how things should-must-be –damaged the lives of all it touched.
John Hines is often described as the modern day equivalent of the Old Testament prophet.  There is no doubt but that today’s passage from Amos shaped the way Hines understood what God expected of the Church.  But we do him an injustice if we think that his prophetic voice was all about the words.  It was all about the action too, the action that he was able to take because he had the gifts of courage and vision and also because he had another gift that is essential to leadership-clarity about his vocation and his identity.   For him there could be no separation between words and deeds.
This is who I am and so this is what I must do.
But that didn’t make it easy.  John Hines was not na茂ve—he knew that whenever the fabric of creation is pulled apart by sin, by self-interest or by self-righteousness, any attempt at reweaving it would be difficult, and it was.
He knew what it meant to be on the losing side of an issue-
 
In 1948, as the new bishop coadjutor of Texas, he proposed opening vestries and diocesan council to the participation of women-it failed. 
In 1949, again as bishop in Texas, he proposed that if black and white delegates to diocesan council could not be served together at a common meal, which they could not, then the council would forego the meal-that proposal not only failed but the delegates voted to commend the hosting parish for observing the segregation laws.
Throughout the 1950s he had to fight battle after battle to integrate diocesan camps and institutions, even his beloved St. Stephen’s was not formally desegregated until 1963.
And In 1971, as presiding bishop, and amid great criticism he challenged General Motors to stop making a profit off apartheid in South Africa, this ten years before the divestment movement gained ground.
John Hines’ accomplishments came at a cost.  His leadership as a bishop and as presiding bishop was marked by criticism, resistance and conflict but also on his part, by patiently waiting upon the Lord. But I’m not even sure the word “accomplishment” was in his vocabulary.   He knew that the work of creation remains unfinished, and that racism and other forms of oppression would continue.
I think he would call the things he did simply living in witness to the Gospel.
 
And that helps us see the real source of our connection with John Hines because at the heart of that connection is our connection with the heart of Christ. When all is said and done, what connects us to Hines is simply what we share with him-baptism into the life, death and resurrection of Christ.    And sharing that– we have a shared vocation-to proclaim not ourselves, earthen vessels that we are, but Jesus Christ.
We can’t be John Hines; we shouldn’t even try.  And our ministry will not look like his because our world is not the same as his-but we do know that racism remains, that people still live under many forms of oppression-and that Jesus Christ still calls us to turn our face to a broken and hurting world– as He did looking out from Calvary.
John Hines lived his life as priest, bishop,  leader and servant in response to the call that Jesus makes to his disciples in today’s Gospel-How will you follow me? Will you pick up the cross? Will you take the risk and give your lives over to the most radical thing of all-grace.
What John Hines deeply believed is that the personal answer to those questions cannot be separated from the answer that we give as the Body of Christ, the Christian community in all its particular expressions. How do we proclaim hope; how do we persevere in trust;  how do we speak truth -not just to power-but to ourselves!-and how will we embody God’s love in our life as an institution.
How we answer those questions matters for this Seminary, for this Church and for this  world.  These are not trivial pursuits, in the same category as knowing who acted in what movie.  They are deep and sacred journeys.  Because what we do matters-not so that we can proclaim our own righteousness or try to assure our own salvation but in service to others and for the glory of God.
It matters that John Hines saw
that the church needed to include women.
It matters that St. Stephen’s
and all the places where children gather need to be a blessing for all.
It matters that he envisioned a seminary
that would take the concerns of the world seriously.
It matters that he saw a connection
between his life and the life of perfect strangers in South Africa.
May we, standing in the circle of the earth-bound round by God’s embrace-
Proclaim God’s glory and God’s grace, through Jesus Christ we pray. Amen.
(Final prayer inspired by Hymn 540, Awake Thou Spirit of the Watchmen, Hymnal 1982; sung before the Gospel and a favorite hymn of Bishop Hines.)

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John Hines Day Sermon /john-hines-day-sermon/ Mon, 14 Feb 2011 23:52:13 +0000 https://sswtemp.wpengine.com/john-hines-day-sermon/ On the occasion of John Hines Day and the anniversary of his 100th Birthday

Christ Chapel-- 51视频

Micah Jackson, John Hines Assistant Professor of Preaching

 

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On the occasion of John Hines Day and the anniversary of his 100th Birthday

Christ Chapel– 51视频

Micah Jackson, John Hines Assistant Professor of Preaching

 
Several years ago, the United Church of Christ began an advertising campaign designed to answer what they considered to be one of the primary questions facing people wondering about the church. Their slogan was “God is still speaking.” It was a powerful campaign, and by all accounts, it was successful. And I wouldn’t want to criticize the marketing geniuses behind the United Church of Christ, but I do think that they’re asking the wrong question. If you ask me, there is a much more important question facing the Church these days. And I suspect that Bishop Hines would agree with me on this. Of course God is still speaking. The real question is this:
Are God’s prophets still speaking?
God said, “Amos, what do you see?” and Amos replied, “A plumb-line.” The plumb-line, of course, represents God’s way of building, one that is straight and true. This passage from Amos was very important to Bishop Hines, and indeed, it is the source for the beautiful sculpture in the narthex here in Christ Chapel. The sculpture shows the plumb-line coming from Heaven, to guide the people of the city toward that which is true. But it also hangs over the city as a sign of judgment, for indeed, dire consequences befall those who do not build straight to the plumb-line of the Lord. But in front of the sculpture is a stand, with a Bible on it. And inscribed on the stand are God’s words (in the Authorized Translation, of course) “Amos, what seest thou?” This is significant to me because it reveals that Bishop Hines knew that the plumb-line was important, but even more so was the vision of the prophet.
Prophets are the ones who see not only the world as it is, but also the world as God created it to be, wholly good, restored and rebuilt, as if with a plumb-line. And they can help others to see it, too. 51视频 a month ago, we presented the Charles Cook award in Servant Leadership to one of our own graduates, Zane Wilemon. He is the founder of Comfort the Children International. He was honored not only for his work, but also for his vision of relationships between us here in America and the people of Kenya. But more even than his vision, he was honored for what he causes others to see. The citation for the award quoted Zane’s grandmother who wisely taught him, “Seeing your life may be as close as some people get to reading the Bible.” Zane Wilemon is a plumb-line, placed in the midst of the people, which we are invited to see.
Are God’s prophets still speaking? Yes, they are.
Paul’s extraordinary letter to the Corinthians gives us another piece of this puzzle. He tells us how to proclaim the vision we see. For, as Christians, we do not see ourselves, or even plumb-lines. When God asks us “What seest thou” we see Christ crucified for the salvation of the world. And it is this vision that we must proclaim. And Paul knows that such a proclamation is not easy, indeed that it is very dangerous. But even if we are not simply afflicted in every way, perplexed, persecuted, and struck down, but also crushed, driven to despair, forsaken and destroyed, we follow the vision of a man who has been to all these places before, and has triumphed over them all, even death, the final fear.
Bishop Hines lived this way. He proclaimed a true Gospel–even though unpopular with some–a Gospel of social justice inflected by the particular concerns of his day, racial injustice. His work with the General Convention Special Program was criticized for his insistence that the money the program distributed be given freely, without conditions and without oversight. Some said that it was irresponsible, and that the money might be wasted, and that without oversight, there would be no way of knowing if the programs the GCSP supported, let alone the program itself, was being effective. But Hines knew that so long as people in power insisted on judging the effectiveness of things, that true change in the systems of oppression would never be possible. He disregarded this criticism and all others because he knew that proclaiming the vision he saw of a world transformed by justice was his sacred calling, his one duty, and his joy.
Are God’s prophets still speaking? Yes. They are.
Jesus makes a difficult invitation to us this morning. Surely, following him means going where he goes, and maybe even ending up where he ended up. Jesus tells us not to be too concerned about protecting our lives. Indeed, he says that those who save their lives will lose them. Certainly, lives here could mean that our earthly existence could be demanded of us, but it could just as easily mean our metaphorical life–our safety and comfort–which is often harder to imagine surrendering. Taking up the cross daily is not easy, but it is the third piece of the prophet’s call. Not only to see the vision, nor only to proclaim it, but also to live it out in the world.
I might give another example here of one of God’s prophets, and how he or she is a living example of Christ’s call to us to take up our cross daily, but I won’t do that. I won’t do that because, frankly, I don’t want to let any one of us off the hook. If I name someone here then it might seem like all is well and I can just go on about my daily business of caring mostly about myself and paying lip service to the rest of the world. As a part of fallen humanity, I have that tendency, and maybe you recognize it in yourself, too. Instead, I’ll simply ask my question again.
Are God’s prophets still speaking? Yes, they are.
But are you speaking? It’s not an empty question. Simply flipping on the television or tuning in the radio, even just going down to the corner store will reveal that there are plenty of unloving, uncharitable blowhards still speaking. And though many of them are Christians, you couldn’t tell it from their actions, or their message. They’re speaking all right, but it is not the kind of challenging yet life-giving prophecy God demands of us. Some of them have a plumb-line, but often it is they themselves–and not God–who is doing the measuring. There should be more vision than that. They’re speaking all right, but some of them proclaim themselves rather than Christ crucified, his life poured out for the salvation of the world. There should be better proclamation than that. They’re speaking all right, but they speak from the safety of distance–distance and safety born of wealth, and power, and privilege rather than the all-encompassing, unblinking love of God for the creation. There should be more congruence between word and life than that.
God calls out to each of us, every day, and charges us to speak–to speak of love, and justice, and understanding, and peace; to speak of strength, and power, and mercy; to speak of friendship, and joy; in other words, to speak of God. Samuel heard God’s voice and said, “Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening.” Today when you hear God’s voice calling out to you, you will hear it saying, “Speak, prophet, for my world is listening.”

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