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  • To whom are we speaking when we preach?

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    To Whom Are We Speaking when We Preach?

    Catherine Gunsalus Gonzalez

    Decatur, Georgia

    Two congregations For many years, during the late 1940’s and early 19505s, when I was in junior and senior high school, I was part of two very distinct congregations. One, my home church, was a Presbyterian congregation in an old and affluent suburb of New York City. It would be fairly easily classified as a liberal congregation, filled with members who were cosmopolitan, educated, and involved in some of the largest and most influential corporations of the time. It had about two thousand members. I attended the second church during the summer when we were at the farm in upstate New York where my mother was bom. It was a very conservative, rural, independent Baptist congregation. The pastor,s daughter was my age and a friend, so I was very involved there even though the rest of my family was not part of it. The membership was probably twenty-five, with an equal number attending with their children who were not members. That congregation would have been classified as fundamentalist in a somewhat naïve fashion. Few members—including the pastor—had any education beyond high school, and many did not have more than eighth grade. Most were subsistence farmers. Needless to say, it would be hard to find two more distinct congregations. Later, when I have reflected on these experiences from a different perspective, I have recognized that there was a great similarity in these two churches. In both, we in the congregation were addressed by the pastor as individuals. His concern was for what we believed or what we were supposed to do—or not do—in the wider society. The liberal congregation might stress seeing all people as our brothers and sisters. We should be positive toward the issue of civil rights in the wider society. The conservative congregation might stress our personal acceptance of the sacrifice of Christ and in the wider society oppose drinking and movies, etc. In almost every way those two congregations were at opposite poles of the Protestant churches at that time. And yet, both spoke to the congregation as a collection of individuals, gathered for worship, yes, but also gathered in order to get their marching orders for the time they spent outside the walls of the church, involved in some way in the wider society. The pastors might also consider what kinds of pressures and problems the members faced, but the intention still was to speak the word of God to individuals so that they would be comforted or strengthened in their particular lives outside of the church.

    The Individualism of our culture The strong, underlying current of both congregations was the individualism that has been so strong in our own culture and in much of the Western world. I believe it is stronger in Protestant than in Catholic churches, though it was not necessarily part of the Reformation itself. Much can be attributed to the Industrial Revolution ! that occurred after the Reformation, a development that was initially strongest in Europe in Protestant countries. One cannot imagine the Reformation without the printing press which made the Bible widely available in the language of the people. An unforeseen consequence of the access of Protestant church members to the Bible meant that very rapidly each member could read the Bible—the ultimate authority for

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    the church—privately. Reading the Bible in private is a very different experience than being part of a group that hears it read out loud. Reading it for oneself means hearing the intonation that one puts into it for oneself. It is possible and inevitable to have one’s own interpretation. If the Bible is the ultimate authority, then the individual reading it becomes an authority. Granted some denominations had confessional statements that were supposed to be the lens through which all members understood the scriptures because the pastor preached and taught the Bible through the confessional lens. But fairly quickly, individual laypersons could become their own authority because they believed they had the Bible on their side. (Even today, in many congregations as soon as the Bible is read aloud, each member reaches for his or her own Bible, so that even in a corporate setting, each member has some of the same effect as reading privately.) Think of the church before the printing press. The only way people heard the Bible was when it was read in the midst of the congregation. Preaching had generally disappeared in the Medieval church, but in the early church, people gathered for the worship service in order to hear scripture read. They heard it together. The preaching then interpreted it for the congregation. For most of the Middle Ages, congregations were in the midst of a relatively static society, most people not venturing far from their birth place. Their position in society was given, and little or no change was anticipated. Then imagine a Protestant congregation in the nineteenth century. There was little that was static in society at that time, especially in this country. Industry was growing, and people moved to the places where there were jobs. The frontier still called many to leave settled communities and move. In Europe and other places, individuals left their traditional societies and came to this country. There was enormous movement. For most people, the extended family was left behind, increasing the sense of individualism. Not everyone participated in this new sense, but the changes in society at large were great. And, as we have seen, the churches also participated in this strong sense of individualism. (An additional interesting support for individualism was the changes in the English language itself. Whereas the Reformation generation and beyond still used the old forms of Thee and Thou, with Ye for the plural, modem English dropped this and substituted You for both the singular and plural of the third person. This meant that while the Bible constantly speaks in the plural form, in modem English, reading the Bible alone, we often assume it is addressing us alone, in the singular.)

    The emerging new pattern Society at large remains highly individualistic and in some ways is increasingly so. The growing division of the United States by economic class has exacerbated this. Why worry about public schools if my children will be sent to private schools? Why worry about the local police force if I live in a gated community with its own security detail? Why worry about military personnel and veterans if my children will not need to join the military because they have other options that education and connections provide? And yet, in the midst of this, there are hopeful signs sprouting in many congregations , signs that point in a very new direction. The two congregations I described at the beginning both were flourishing in the midst of a time when the church—indeed all churches and synagogues as well—were looked upon with great favor by the whole

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    society. Everyone should be part of the religious establishment of their choice. “The family that prays together stays together” was a constant public-service announcement . It was on the radio, on billboards, and it expressed the sentiment of a large part of society. In many ways, the late forties and early fifties were the last gasp in this country of the old Constantinian arrangement. Earlier, in Europe, the war itself had pretty much the same effect. But now, though many congregations still live with that Constantinian mentality, j it is clear that the wider society has little use for organized religion. Religion is often portrayed as negative ,judgmental, irrational, and a major factor in civil strife. There is no need to belong to a church because of social pressure. In fact, in many subcultures in our society, there is clear social pressure not to have any part in church life. And yet, there are congregations that are vibrant and developing in a new way. I believe that one characteristic of these congregations is that members are not addressed individually , but rather the sermon, the prayers, even many of the hymns, speak to the congregation as a whole. Who are they? What are they called to be and to do as a congregation? How does the Bible address them as congregation? Imagine hearing the familiar words from the Sermon on the Mount: “You are the light of the world.” In the two congregations mentioned earlier, individual worshippers would think of how they—personally—were to be such a light. It probably would not occur to them that the words might mean how they—as a congregation—were to be a light in the wider community. Yet precisely that would be the reading in these new congregations. These new congregation are aware of the lack of support by the wider society. In many ways their situation is more like the early church that lived in the midst of a hostile culture. They have more in common with that early church than with the denomination’s own Reformation founders, who lived in a highly Constantinian situation, except for the Radical Reformation. Such a congregation today may differ extensively from other congregations of its own denomination. It begins to have a glimpse of the early church,s experience of living in the old world and yet also, especially within the congregation, living in a new world, a new creation. In those early church congregations many of the negative characteristics of the surrounding society were overcome: slaves and masters were part of the same congregation, Jew and Gentile were united, women and men related as equals. And yet, when they left the meeting, the old world again held sway. The experience in the church helped them negotiate their way through the old world without losing the experience of the new. These are characteristic experiences of these new congregations in our own society. It is a different experience for a pastor to read and preach from Scripture assumiftg the Word is addressed to the gathered community of God,s people and not to individual Christians, that it is a word about their life together and not only a word about how they are to live in the world beyond. Obviously, discipleship implies how Christians live out their discipleship in the wider world. But to lose the importance of how the congregation lives a new life in its own internal experience would be a j great loss of a new possibility that the end of the Constantinian era gives us. A pastor who begins to address the congregation as congregation may be able to change the members‘ understanding of their life as the church. The discipline of seeing how the Biblical text for the sermon could be interpreted in an individualistic way and in a corporate way is a starting point.

  • The protagonist corner [36 no 4 Pentecost 2013]

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    The Protagonist Corner

    Meg Peery McLaughlin

    Village Presbyterian Church, Prairie Village, Kansas

    This is the Pentecost issue of Journal for Preachers, which means it will arrive before the High Holy Day in early May, Mother’s Day, known to women struggling with infertility as the terrible-horrible-move-to־Australia-kind-of-day. We don’t have a color for it on the liturgical calendar, but in the congregation I serve, it should be cast in pastels to match the carnations that are passed out to mothers as they walk into the sanctuary. I have not spent a Mother’s Day Sunday in worship where the sacrament of Baptism was missing. Where I serve, baptism on Mother’s Day is a given. A number of years ago, I remember walking down the center aisle, holding an infant, one of the newly baptized, in my arms. My colleague and I were introducing the children to the congregation. He was inviting the children to look out and see their brothers and sisters, the people who had just promised to nurture them, love them, and teach them the stories of Jesus. I was following behind, holding a little tyke facing out. All the faces in the pews were smiling, craning their necks to get a good view. All except Martha. I’ll always remember her sitting on the aisle, staring down, picking at the skin around her thumbnail. I knew her from young adult activities at church. The parade of children and parents and pastors came to a pause in that center aisle, and I was standing next to her. She didn’t raise her eyes. It wasn’t that she was distracted. She refused to look. Now I know why. It was just too painful to see: the tiny feet dangling there, the mothers beaming, the baptismal gowns passed down from grandmothers, the wonder of life cradled in a pastor’s arms, newly blessed. She couldn’t do it. If she did, she would have to explain her tears. Or worse, the sight would illicit the anger, the jealousy , even the hate, and all that would make her feel guilty, right there in church. It’s not just young adults who struggle with this kind of unspoken pain. A few months back, I was sitting in a sunroom with Hal and Molly, who on their fifty-eighth wedding anniversary learned that Hal had bladder cancer. We three were sitting in the stun of it all, talking about surgery schedule and chemo and when their only son was going to arrive. Molly went into the kitchen to pour more tea, and the moment she left us alone, Hal said, “You know we had two children. Our infant daughter died in the hospital. She was three days old. She didn’t get to come home or meet her brother. We tried to get pregnant again, but we just couldn’t. Molly never talks about it.” Molly came back with the tea, and I could see in Hal’s face that I wasn’t supposed to know what he had just blurted out and that our ninety-second conversation was over. The heartache associated with infertility and pregnancy loss is severe, and so very often it is hidden. It’s also widespread: one in eight couples face this life crisis. Research studies show that infertility is experienced as a traumatic life event, and that the stress and depression levels are basically indistinguishable from patients with cancer and heart disease. A parishioner may tell you about her radiation schedule, but she is not likely to tell you about her desperate disappointment when her cycle starts month after month. A parishioner may tell you how her mother is handling a

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    broken ankle, but will likely not confess her mother’s broken heart over not joining the ranks of grandmotherhood. A parishioner may tell you about the nightmare of negotiating a business contract, but not the financial black hole he’s in trying to pay for the adoption lawyer. It is not easy to tell your pastor that it freaks you out to keep a sharps container in your bathroom or that you’re embarrassed that you can’t keep your eyes open during a baptism. Perhaps someone has welcomed you into the often isolated world of infertility pain. I hope so. Having a trusted friend along the journey can be life giving. In those conversations, you ’ ve likely learned not to say things like “Just Relax,” “ Don ’t stress or “Once you stop trying, it will surely happen.” Couples who are facing infertility, which is defined as unsuccessful trying for a full year, are not infertile because they are stressed. And to tell them to not think about it is insensitive and frankly impossible. Be aware also that if you bring up adoption, which is a beautiful way to become a parent, you might not be giving the couple space to grieve the loss of the experience of pregnancy and a biological child. In your conversations, care like you do with anyone who is grieving, with hefty amounts of listening, tenderness, and hope—not hope that you force down their throats, but hope that you hold quietly for them. You hold that hope for them even when they can’t hold it for themselves. Hope is a risky thing, you know. Hope is especially hard to hold during Advent, which I know is ironic, as Advent is generally a season of hope. This could be attributed to the songs recounting the infant so tender and mild, the virgin’s tender arms enfolding the babe, the son of Mary. Singing already cracks the heart open, but when the lyrics are painted with the images of what you lack, the crack hurts. Advent is also so much about waiting. Infertile couples are practiced at waiting. Advent can frame their waiting theologically, but it can also exacerbate it. A helpful devotional Advent resource, specially written for couples who have experienced loss, is called Holding Hope: Grieving Pregnancy Loss During Advent, written by Ashley-Anne Masters. Most helpful, I think, is some word, some clue, some indication during worship that we preachers are not oblivious. Let us be subtle but not silent. Please not silent. I say subtle because there is no way to cover every heartache, every circumstance that breaks the hearts of God’s people every week in worship. We aren’t called to present liturgical laundry lists of issues in our sermons and prayers. We’ve all heard the pastoral prayers that function as the kitchen sink. No, I’m advocating for a simple word in a prayer, an acknowledgement in a sermon that sometimes during Advent and Christmas not all is calm, not all is bright. And my hunch is that when that opening is made, when that space is created, the hope of the season and ultimately the hope of the Gospel will be able to be heard in a new way. And if nothing else, those couples will know that should they want to take their pain out of hiding, it would be safe camping in your heart. This Mother’s Day, walk those infants proudly down the aisle, introduce them to their family of faith, knowing that in that family there are some pretty amazing people, people who can teach them one day what it means to love before there was life to love, people who can teach them about strength and resilience and persistence, people who can teach them that—even if they have to close their eyes sometimes or keep their voices quiet during a hymn or two—the church is still a place to come and hear a word of life.

    Journal for Preachers

  • I will not forget you

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    I Will Not Forget You

    6:24-34

    Isaiah 49:8-16a; Matthew

    Elna K. Solvang

    Concordia College, Moorhead, Minnesota

    “ I will not forget you” said my school friend Martha as we reached the end of third grade and I told her my family was moving and I would not be back in the fall . “ I will not forget you,” said my boyfriend as he was breaking off our long-term relationship . said my father recalling holding his infant daughter for the יי “ …I will not forget first time . “ I will not forget you,” said God to the despairing Jews living in exile in Baby – Ion . I am sure that Martha has not forgotten me, but we have had no contact since that last day of third grade. That boyfriend hasn’t forgotten me, but that does not remove the pain of forsakenness. My father has not forgotten the joy when we are together , but he is unable to recall my name. God pledges, “Even these may forget, yet I will not forget youThis is the assurance that God is better than third graders, boyfriends , and mothers and fathers at not forgetting . “ I will not forget you,” said my friend Martha. Not forgetting is not enough . Not forgetting is not about storing a memory but about building a relationship. Not forgetting is about a constancy and a continuity of contact throughout our lives, from which emerges a confidence that we are known, that in this bond we are safe, that our best interests are being sought, that there are available to us resources for negotiating life’s challenges and wisdom for ethical discernment . When God says, “I will not forget you,” these are words rooted in a trust-nw/7?y relationship that has a past, a present and a future. “I will not forget you” is God’s pledge marked upon our brow in baptism. The pledge not to forget is the promise to abide with us, to guide us, to redeem us, to gift our lives with purpose, and to welcome us into the kingdom – in this world and the next . But relationships are dynamic, and things do change. We disappoint and may be disappointed. In the passage from Isaiah, we hear the anguished cry of God’s chosen people: “The LORD has forsaken me, my Lord has forgotten me.” It is a cry that is just as likely to come across our lips and a cry that has certainly come to our ears. O , the shock, the shame, the dislocation, and the enormous pain of being forsaken. The forsaker may not forget you but washes his/her hands of you and walks away. To the accusation of forsaking the Israelites God replies, “I will not forget you.” And then God holds up God’s hands, “See, I have inscribed you on the palms of my hands .” Not forgetting is linked to being in God’s hands . “ I will not forget you” is the assurance that our fears, our struggles, our pain , and our needs are visible to God and that God responds. In Isaiah we hear: “the LORD has comforted his people and will have compassion on his suffering ones .” And in Matthew: “Therefore do not worry, saying, ‘What will we eat?’ or ‘What will we drink?’ or ‘What will we wear?”’ For it is the Gentiles who strive for all these

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    things; and indeed your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things.” “I will not forget you” is God’s invitation to let go of anxiety and to trust God’s steadfast compassion, comfort, and care. It is also an invitation to examine the work of our own hands. Who are the forgotten and forsaken to whom we reach out with compassion? Who are those anxious and in need for whom we lift our hands in prayer and with whom we join hands to create justice, mercy, and gladness? Who is inscribed on our hands? How are our hands God’s hands in the world? God says “I will not forget y o u If this pledge is to bring joy, remembering must be different. For God knows not only our cares and needs, but our desires and deeds. And those are not always praiseworthy. The prophets speak of the Babylonian Exile as the just consequence—punishment—for the behavior of the “Israelites.” The list is long and the permutations many of the ways the Israelites failed to live as God’s holy people. Adultery, coveting, taking advantage of the poor, swearing to falsehoods —a mountain of sins against God and a multitude of violations and violence against one another. “I will not forget you” is the reminder that God knows our intentions and sees our actions. How can we find peace with someone who knows us so well? I offer the witness of my father. When he sees me, he does not remember any of the things I have done to be a “good daughter,” none of my accomplishments—nor those of my siblings. Gone, too, are the memories of disagreements and disappointments, hurts and grievances. The past hasn’t been forgotten. I still remember everything, but because my father does not deal with me on the basis of those past accomplishments and failures, they have lost their power of alienation and condemnation. I can safely see what is good, where I have erred and how I can change. There are no benefits to memory loss. Memory loss is not a predictable progrèssion . The part of my father’s journey I relate today is likely to change. I speak of my father because in his involuntary loss of the ability to recall someone’s merits and demerits there is an analogy to God’s mercy through which we can examine our past honestly and experience the freedom to live in reconciled ways with God and with others. For our sake, for the sake of our neighbor, and for the sake of the world, God cannot ignore evil, harm, division, oppression, and injustice. God must judge. And we must face judgment. Our hope for peace rests not in God forgetting what we have done, but in God not forgetting what God is determined to do: transform, bless, and co-mission us to live as God’s holy and reconciling people in the world. “I will not forget you.” These are typically words of good-bye, words associated with parting. But in Isaiah, God’s pledge not to forget has nothing to do with separation and everything to do with vocation. “Thus says the LORD: In a time of favor I have answered you, on a day of salvation I have helped you; I have kept you and given you as a covenant to the people, to establish the land, to apportion the desolate heritages; saying to the prisoners, ‘Come out,’ to those who are in darkness, ‘Show yourselves’ (49:8-9a). God gathers the forgotten and the forsaken and calls us to be j partners in the work of healing, wholeness, and holiness. God has wrapped us together as a covenant, woven us together as a fabric, and God empowers us through the mercies of Christ and the gifts of the Spirit to live a life of not forgetting, full of the confidence that God does not forget us.

    Journal for Preachers

  • Christ and cultures

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    Christ and Cultures

    Thomas W. Currie Union Presbyterian Seminary’s Charlotte Campus, Charlotte, NC

    In 1755 a group of Ulster Scots began meeting in Mecklenburg County to organize the Sugaw Creek Presbyterian Church with the Rev. Alexander Craighead as their pastor. Craighead was active in the “Great Awakening” and an enthusiastic supporter of the American Revolution. The congregation he helped to found is still worshipping in Charlotte on the corner of North Try on Street and Sugar Creek Road. That area of town is popularly described today as “in transition.” The church is located on the northeast side of town, where there has been a good deal of industrial activity as well as commercial building. The neighborhood streets around the church are still leafy and even attractive in a 1940’s sort of way, but many of them look neglected and tired. This neighborhood’s young families have moved elsewhere. But the church has stayed. Its pastor now is a gifted young African American, Eulando Henton, a graduate of Louisville Seminary, who has done much to help the church recover its identity and mission. He and his wife, Hyun, a native of Korea, greeted me as I entered the church’s fellowship hall on a Sunday afternoon in May. One of the church’s ministries is to welcome the folk who have not left that part of town but who have moved in and stayed. A largely Vietnamese congregation meets in the late afternoon on Sundays, sharing in a vigorous worship led by their own ordained Presbyterian minister, Phuc Nguyen, who also helps prepare the delicious repast that often follows worship. I have had the privilege of attending these services and sharing in these meals, and both are occasions of real joy. But another group meets earlier in the afternoon, and this group is made up of people mostly from West Africa. Their pastor, Yao Thomas Agbemenou from Togo, is a student at the seminary where I teach. Thomas invited me to worship on this Sunday when his congregation would be celebrating the fiftieth anniversary of Togo’s independence. Thomas had designed this worship service in part to thank God for the end to colonialism, but also to caution his people against the perils of independence and freedom. Thomas preached in French and in one of the native languages of Togo and occasionally in English. His text was Isaiah 61:1-2, and he spoke on what it means “to proclaim liberty to the captives.” The congregation was filled with young people who needed little prompting to burst into exuberant songs of praise. The singing was accompanied by drums, pipes, various instruments of percussion, and piano, and usually involved movement, not just swaying back and forth, but almost a kind of conga line, or as I preferred to think of it, a kind of Exodus journey, threading its way through the fellowship hall. There was a lot of clapping and smiling. One of the most impressive parts of worship was the children’s choir, made up of eight young girls between the ages of five and thirteen (I would guess). They were clothed in their native dress and were covered with some kind of decorative tracing on their shoulders and faces. They sang and danced to the songs they were singing. They were full of joy, lovely in their praise of God. As I watched all of this and tried as hard as this thoroughly white, Western, proper Presbyterian could to keep time and clap and lift up my arms, I began to think about those Ulster Scots who settled this area and planted this church some 250 years ago.

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    They came to this part of the world to hold down the frontier for the more genteel folk back east. They were a tough crowd and not afraid of very much, which made them good settlers for the Piedmont and mountain areas of what was then a distant colony of the British Empire. They brought with them their Westminster Confession of Faith, a stern and unyielding form of Calvinism for a determined and fearless people. They did not do much dancing in church, I suspect, though in other places perhaps a good deal, and some drinking and hollering as well. And now, into the church they had made had come a new set of immigrants from West Africa, beating drums and swaying and dancing— all to the praise of God. These new immigrants were settling a kind of urban frontier in neighborhoods which others had largely abandoned. These folks worshipped God with their bodies, dancing , clapping, moving around, lifting up their arms. Trying to participate with them, I got tired. Here was something strange: worship made me tired, as if I had been in a workout—not bored, not despairing, not waiting for something else to happen, but bodily tired, a kind of good tired” that does not usually happen to me in worship. If the chief end of human life is to glorify God and enjoy God forever as those Ulster Scots insisted so long ago, then maybe they and these more recent immigrants have more in common than one might think. Glorifying and enjoying God is a robust activity that demands a good deal of oneself. Where is the church today? This service took place on the fourth Sunday after Easter, but I was hearing the gospel preached in various tongues so that all who were present could understand it, and though I saw no tongues of fire resting on each head, I did see folk who were filled with the Holy Spirit dancing and singing and praising God, a Pentecostal moment come early to a Presbyterian church. What is the future of the church? I don’t know and I don’t trust those who claim to know. But I wonder if the church is not going to look more and more like what I saw on this Sunday afternoon. And I am not thinking just of the different cultures represented or the impact of new immigrants or the more exuberant style of singing and dancing. One thing I noticed: Jesus is very important to these folks. They talk about him a lot, and they sing praises to him and insist that he is powerful. They do not hesitate to call him King of kings and Lord of lords. He heals their diseases and saves them from all manner of evil. In some ways he occupies a much more central place in their worship than he does in the Westminster Confession. Yet in all of their talk about Jesus and in all of their affirmation of his lordship, their words are not triumphalistic or defiant, but simply the glad language of gratitude and praise. When you are poor, living far away from home, struggling to make it in a culture whose strangeness is a daily feature of life, these affirmations of faith lose their smugness and become ways of simply telling the truth. I don’t know that I saw the future of the church, but I do believe I glimpsed something of the Kingdom. In any case, there was a refreshing lack of concern about “the future of the church” or the survival of our denomination. Rather, these folks seemed “lost in wonder, love, and praise.”

    Journal for Preachers

  • Toward perfect health: (on reading Acts 3:1-16)

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    Toward Perfect Health

    (On Reading Acts 3:1-16)

    Walter Brueggemann

    Cincinnati, Ohio

    You God who raises the dead;

    You God who gives life;

    You God who heals,

    Dear Sir: Here we are in the waiting room of your presence, hoping for an appointment. We come with our several diseases and disabilities, diseases of feet and arms and legs and digestive tracks, disabilities of body and of spirit, lame in a thousand ways. Here we sit and wait, with great expectation. We expect and hope for healing from you, for transformation, for forgiveness, for emancipation. We expect.. .because we have heard tales of your healing capacity, old stories of lepers healed and women with bad backs, new reports of beggars who ask for alms and receive healing. Here we are, waiting for you: But we do not wait alone: We bring as our companions in suffering, the folk in this congregation who wait in need and in hope. We bring as our companions the wretched who wait, diseased by economic disadvantage, disabled by political exclusionary power, immobilized by a thousand slaveries and a dozen anxieties, alienated by failures and other open sores. We bring as our companions the complacent who discover too late that they have grown numb in indifference, and cannot move their hands to help, or their hearts to connect. We bring as our companions the nations of the world that are not healed, the frightened nations armed to their teeth, the old colonial powers that still want to control oil and markets, the erstwhile colonies that still lack viability, and our own nation-state with pathologies of greed and hate and violence. We are all here before you, not doubting your capacity, waiting for your readiness,

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    open to your prescriptions, ready immediately to leap and run in health, to dance and sing in restoration, to praise to you in our newness.

    Dear Doctor: deal with us soon, bring your best arts of newness, and make all things new, even here, even now, even for us. Amen.

    Easter 2013

  • Respect and dialogue

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    Respect and Dialogue

    Rabbi John S. Friedman

    Judea Reform Congregation, Durham, North Carolina

    Have you ever been forced to accept an unwanted hug? When I was a rabbinical student in Jerusalem in 1971,1 used to visit the Western (Wailing) W’all on Shabbat mornings. The Wall, at that time, was not controlled by the ultra-Orthodox or Haredim as it is today, and all kinds of people would mill about the area. My visits were occasionally welcomed by a certain very large, full bearded, traditional fellow wearing a shtreimel (Eastern European style fur hat).. .even in the summer. He would approach me with confidence, his arms opened wide, and call out “Yankeleh” (an affectionate Yiddish form of Jacob, my Hebrew name), and then he would embrace me strongly. These episodes must have seemed amusing to any witnesses because I am a small man, and he very nearly picked me up off the ground during the hug. His hugs did not amuse me when I was getting one. In fact, I felt downright intruded upon. The man barely knew me! I understood the intention of his embraces, nonetheless. He confessed that he wished to express his “love” for me as a fellow Jew. That was only the icing on the cake, however. He hoped I would frequent his synagogue and gradually become part of his community. My Reform Judaism, or any kind other than his own, was simply inadequate, unworthy, unacceptable. I am sure you can understand that what this person felt for me was nothing like “love.” Dr. Eugene March has evidently been in the trenches of interfaith dialogue long enough to understand. His assertion that one cannot enter into honest dialogue, while harboring the ambition to pull your partner off of his path and drag him over to your own, is a priceless insight. Interfaith dialogue depends entirely upon trust and relationship , and the minute your partner suspects an ulterior motive, an unlevel playing field, the dialogue is over. When a person enters such a relationship with a conversionary agenda, she naturally assumes that her religion is the superior one because it holds a redemptive promise lacking in the faiths of her partners. If one sits at the dialogue table holding a position that treats other faiths as untrue, wrong, evil, or at best, inadequate, which the desire to convert someone implies, then the search for understanding, the noble goal of interfaith dialogue, will be elusive and the dialogue a waste of time. Be that as it may, Christians should wear the tenets of their faith proudly. In dialogue, we seek to understand one another. I want to know exactly what draws participants to the teachings and traditions of their faiths. This requires candor in interfaith conversations. Isaiah challenges us to be a “light to the nations,” not to stand at the airport and proclaim the superiority of our faith over others. Isaiah is asking us to live in such a way that our lives will reflect well upon God and upon our faith communities. By all means, be proud of your faith when explaining it to others and, by inference, feel joyful for the satisfaction others express about their own practices and beliefs. So far so good. A justification for mutual respect in interfaith relations based upon the nature of such dialogue is adequate and welcome. However, Dr. March heads off into territory that compromises his message. Our communities are indeed

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    more diverse than they were when our generation was growing up. Today we are exposed to “others” as our neighbors “once known to me only through books.” And what does our author bid us to learn from this new reality? That it was acceptable back then to champion the superiority of one’s religion over others when you did not have to look at so many of them in the face? It would be sufficient to say that diversity has changed us and taught us a lesson about God’s work in the world. But Dr. March seems to assert that the lesson that preachers should learn and teach their people is that the old message will not work anymore in this “altered context.” This sounds to the non-Christian to be more of a strategy than a change of heart, and a change of heart is necessary if interfaith dialogue is to become more honest and fruitful. I welcome Dr. March’s “tapestry” metaphor. Allow me to add one observation to that symbol. If God intended the diversity represented by the colors in this tapestry, we should be doing everything possible to keep them from running. The way to do that is to appreciate what God has created and recognize that we have so much to teach each other that it ill behooves us to cling to the greater truth of our faiths over those of others. If we insist on holding tight to our truer truth, we will wind up giving one another many uncomfortable and unwelcome hugs and learning nothing.

    Pentecost 2013

  • Protagonist corner [36 no 3 Easter 2013]

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    Protagonist Corner

    Adam J. Copeland

    Concordia College, Moorhead, Minnesota

    What a fine time to lead a mainline congregation. Yes, I’m serious. Despite the doom and gloom of many denominational gatherings, aware of the Pew Research findings that 30 percent of adults under 30 are unaffiliated with any religion, and acknowledging the diminished power of Christian institutions, a simple truth remains: the time is ripe for smart, creative, faithful pastoral leadership. Today, more than ever, calls for wise pastoral theologians to lead God’s people. Lutheran pastor Keith Anderson recently hit a nerve in the blogosphere with a post on his popular website, PastorKeithAnderson.net. In the post, “Pastors, Stop Complaining About Sunday Morning Sports,” Anderson argues that the popular lament of pastors—Sundays are no longer sacred; back in my day.. .—is largely unhelpful, a symptom, not a solution. The popularity of Sunday morning youth sports programs, Anderson writes, draws out from many pastors a sense of loss. He says, it is a loss of

    a privileged place of not only religious institutions, but Christian institutions , and not just Christian institutions, but Christian people, and the leaders of those people, the professional clergy, us. We are mourning our own diminishing cultural position and privilege. That’s what I hear just under the surface when clergy complain to each other about Sunday morning sports—it’s the loss of our place, our privilege, our position.1

    But Pastor Anderson does not stop there, arguing that this perspective on the loss of institutional privilege comes out in our preaching, conversations with other clergy, and use of guilt in many areas of ministry. In my experience, Anderson’s diagnosis is spot-on. In a pastors’ group, I once suggested that instead of complaining about the troublesome youth ice hockey away schedule that kept dozens of families from worshiping on Sunday mornings each winter, we instead craft a liturgy to be used on the road, suggesting a time of worship when athletes, parents, coaches, and grandparents might celebrate the gifts of friendship and sport that ultimately come from God. My idea went over like a figure skater in July. Ultimately, Anderson’s essay is a call to action, a call for pastoral leaders to help reframe the challenges of modern-day parenting as integral to their vocation, and for our churches to be supportive in ways beyond offering worship opportunities at 10:30 on Sunday morning. In clergy circles one often hears complaints about technology and social media. Indeed, the rise of information technology and cyber culture affects everything from youth group meetings to marriage counseling sessions. And yet, the new information age is a grand time for preachers to claim newly constructed, and essential, theologies of stewardship and Sabbath-keeping. Many Christians I know (though they may not voice it just so) are longing for

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    reflective guidance on how to be good stewards of their Facebook feed and smartphones . How, they wonder, can we achieve balance, Christian community, and connection beyond our consumerist cultured message to buy and buy? What is Sabbath in a 24/7 world that never stops, in an Internet age with almost literally no end? This is a splendid moment for theologies of Sabbath that move beyond not shopping on Sundays to robust understandings of life deeply lived in the hustle and bustle of the Internet age. I recently joined the faculty of a Midwestern liberal arts college that takes its Lutheran (ELCA) church-relatedness seriously. At Concordia College in Moorhead, Minnesota, a chapel is held four days a week. On top of the bell tower that stands at the center of campus juts an enormous cross. So it came as some surprise to me to find the campus community I joined was in the midst of launching an extensive movement to embrace interfaith dialogue across faith traditions. I came to a college historically better known for its guarding of Christian tradition that, in a recent college magazine, featured a cover story on the founder of Interfaith Youth Core, Eboo Patel, a Muslim. In the best tradition of interfaith dialogue, the college has embraced our growing pluralism—in the broader community, and in our student body—by seeking to deepen our understanding of many faith traditions. But, at every moment along the journey, our administrative leaders have been clear: Concordia is investing in the interfaith movement because it is a college of the church, because the Lutheran faith frees us to serve God and seek to understand our complex world, and because Jesus calls us to love our neighbor as ourselves. Amidst significant change in the makeup of the faith traditions of its applicants, the college sought both depth and breadth: depth in its understanding of Lutheranism and breadth in its embrace of all God’s people. For the past few years I have had the honor of serving on the Presbyterian Committee on Congregational Song, the new hymnal selection committee for my denomination, the Presbyterian Church (USA). The process of deciding which hymns and songs will appear in a denomination’s hymnal, and the launch of the list and publication of the collection is often fraught with arguments both theological and mundane—what color, how heavy, will it be? With this in mind, many committee members—myself included—anticipated more than a little dissention at our national General Assembly where the hymnal contents were released and commended to the church in a formal vote. We were happily surprised, then, that the collection sailed through its assigned committee, passing unanimously. It received a similar wholly positive response by the entire assembly. What should we make of this warm reception (at least, as of this writing)? Perhaps the relative lack of debate surrounding the next Presbyterian hymnal has something to do with this changing reality of mainline Christianity. Against the backdrop of broader cultural changes and awareness, denominational infighting over musical style appears less consequential. It is in this time that pastoral leadership and prophetic preaching can and must rise to the occasion and follow God’s call in this context bursting with potential. Today is not a time for mourning, but for dancing. Christ is risen! We have songs to sing, new Facebook messages to post. It is a time for resilient, creative pastoral leaders to thrive.

    Journal for Preachers

  • When I was a child I read books: essays

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    One New Book for the Preacher

    O. Benjamin Sparks

    Richmond, Virginia

    When 1 Was a Child I Read Books by Marilynne Robinson

    (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, New York, 2012), 206 pages.

    It would be surprising if this review introduces Marilynne Robinson to readers of the Journal for Preachers. She is one of America’s distinguished novelists who won the Pulitzer Prize for Gilead in 2005. She is also a public intellectual who speaks regularly in the accents of Reformed theology and has garnered national and international acclaim. Praise comes not only from religious and literary communities, but from self declared non-believers and atheists. (See quotations below.) What is surprising is the scant attention paid her by mainline (especially Presbyterian) seminaries. The notable exception is her receipt of the 2011 Abraham Kuyper Prize at Princeton Theological Seminary. Her address on that occasion is one of ten essays reproduced here: “Open Thy Hand Wide: Moses and the Origins of American Liberalism.” Liberalism here refers more to its original meaning as liberality or generosity. Robinson explores the word’s root associations through English translations of Deuteronomy, traces it back to John Calvin, and describes its understanding and use in Colonial New England. These essays are steeped in Reformed and humanist thinking, in American writers like Whitman and Poe, and in the “pastor/theologian,” Jonathan Edwards. “Who Was Oberlin?” takes a historical tour through the origins of the abolition of slavery and the founding of Oberlin College by exploring the question in the title. Another, “Wondrous Love,” is a prose poem which beautifully marks the power of Christmas and Easter narratives to “fracture the continuities of history.” It speaks to all who feel “a wistfulness and regret for the loss of Christianity.” The essay demolishes the anxieties of those religious folk who think that government should come to the defense of Christian faith and puts a universal twist on American exceptionalism. I have been an exuberant promoter of Robinson’s work for several years. Her novels delve into the meaning of human existence; they take the particulars of time and place, from the rising of the sun unto its setting and breathes into them universal human experience. With Robinson you also get God’s glory revealed in nature and in human faithfulness. There are obvious riches here for preachers. Excerpts from these essays are readily quotable. For example, she writes that not only in Christian scripture but in the Hebrew Bible she finds “a haunting solicitude for the vulnerable.” This trumps by several degrees the tired declaration of “God’s preferential option for the poor.” The phrase comes from an essay in which she surgically but gently deplores popular critiques of the Old Testament for being oppressive, and of setting Jesus’ kindness against the “terror” of the God of Israel, a practice commonplace not only in public discourse, but in the loftiest and most respectable Christian Churches (see John Shelby Spong). Yet there are more serious reasons that this book will enrich preaching. It’s not only for the low hanging fruit.

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    First, Ms. Robinson declares throughout these essays the importance of beauty and learning which have been marginalized — along with a sense of the sacred — in much of modem thought and even in religious life. “We have retreated,” she writes, “from the cultivation and celebration of learning and of beauty, by dumbing down, as if people were less than God made them and in need of nothing so much as condescension . Who among us wishes the songs we sing, the sermons we hear, were just a little dumber?” (p. 5). She implicitly calls us who traffic in the written and spoken word to care about quality, about reverence, and about mystery, not only in our preaching, but also in the structure and content of worship. To read these essays is to be drawn into a conversation about the worthiness of human life, its grandeur and possibility, and of this extraordinary world which is God’s gift to all species. We are reminded as we read (savor would be more like it) that when we are trite, clichéd, ill-prepared, or casual in what we speak and pray, we are diminishing not only those who depend upon us, but the authority and power of the gospel. Second, there isa narrative quality to her writing which is valuable for the construction of sermons — not in order to mimic her, but to assist a preacher in internalizing a style. Here one learns by example how to unfold and develop thoughts such that they seem to have a plot or form a narrative whose beginning and middle lead to a conclusion which the reader or hearer is eager to read or to hear. There is a satisfying quality to her writing, a depth and richness which model the kinds of thinking and expression that are certain to improve preaching. See how Robinson develops the ideas in “Wondrous Love.” I heard her deliver it as a lecture before it was ever in print. She was spellbinding and held the rapt attention of the audience. I’ve had that experience only when listening to some of the world’s best preachers, where my mind and heart and soul were fully engaged, and where the beauty of words and expressions were obvious, but never mannered, unnecessary, or distracting. When that can be achieved in the preaching of the word, the gospel is heard, and often, by God’s grace, believed. Third, her essays are full of scripture and theology. As one reviewer observes, it is handy to have a biblical concordance (or Wikipedia) beside you as you read. Robinson does not preach in these essays; she develops her thought and gives a publie voice to her faith — not stridently, not with shallow moralisms, but with grace, kindness, and occasional humor. There is no doubt where she stands, nor is there any doubt that she respects her opponents — or most of them. She is more contrarian than polemicist, and thus she stands over against all those who deplete our energy and our faith by their sordid, fearful views of human nature and creation itself. She sees the “glory in the flower” in all God’s works and communicates that underlying “music of the spheres” when she reviews matters both scientific and religious. She respects human life and the potential that has been realized among us at our best, the slow churning out of democratic ideals into public governance, a representative democracy that is generous in spirit, dedicated to the common good. And she shows us the origin of all that we take so much for granted in the Reformed tradition. To read her, to inhabit her world, will cause you to rejoice. If there is anything amiss in current preaching, it is the sense that Christ has deserted the public square, that the addressing of public matters in sermons is more a matter of naming enemies and scorning them than of generously calling all hearers together for the human good and for the upbuilding of the church. Many churches

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    are polarized along political and cultural lines. These essays are examples of both style and content that engage minds and hearts, that dig into meaning and history for the sake of the common good — of the church and the human community. Were this not true of her writing and speaking, Marilynne Robinson would never have received praise from the “secular press” with such extraordinary fulsomeness. Let two of her secular devotees speak by way of conclusion. Mark O’Connell writes in The New Yorker (“The First Church of Marilynne Robinson”): “Even though I’m more or less a fully paid up atheist, I’m more drawn to Robinson’s Christian humanism than I am to the Dawkins-Hitchens-Dennet-Harris school of anti-theist fighting talk.” Then there’s Kate Kellaway writing a review of this same book in The Guardian: “Her critical armory includes no ostentatious weapons — no cruelty, sarcasm or rhetorical flourishes Yet as a non-believer, there were occasions when she was in the pulpit and I was on my knees.” Would that all who preach could get the same respect and response from nonbelievers , or even from faithful worshippers. Imagine what that would mean for the witness of the church in times such as these.

    Note The Marilynne Robinson Appreciation Society is an excellent website (mrasociety.com) to consult.

  • Soul recreation: the contemplative-mystical piety of Puritanism

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    One New Bookfor the Preacher

    Peter Paulsen

    Decatur, Georgia

    Tom Schwanda, Soul Recreation—The Contemplative-Mystical Piety ofPuritanism (Eugene OR: Pickwick Publications, 2012), 292 pages.

    “The day of the ‘event church’ is over,” said the conference speaker. A church architect, he said that his clients now ask for worship space that honors the tradition. They want the pulpit, table, and font to be clearly visible, front and center, but they also want flexible space that nurtures community and allows for creativity in worship. They want people to know that they are in sacred space doing something important,but they also want the worshippers to be engaged on more than an intellectual level. As soon as 1 heard that, my mind shot to memories of church history classes at seminary and the tragic stories of division in the European Reformed family between those who wanted a scholastic presentation of the faith and those who wanted to expcricnce the faith as a present reality. 1 hoped that what the architect reported marked a new era in which the gospel is preached and the presence of God is felt. Ihave kept onmy reading standfor some months SoulRecreation.’TheContemplative -Mystical Piety ofPuritanism by Tom Schwanda. The book sat there untouched because 1 basically don’t like Puritans. Perhaps it was the taunting I received from schoolmates who criticized my pious youthful lifestyle wife fee accusation that 1 was a Puritan, ٢٠perhaps it was my study of a few colonial sermons from preachers identified as Puritans that ran too much to fee threats of hell fire as a motivation for belief. Whatever it was, perhaps the Providence of God, 1 picked up fee book after fee conference and began to read. Schwanda is a scholar, a professor at Wheaton College, who has spent his career studying “spirituality” in fee Reformed Evangelical tradition. His work has taken him to the unlikely community ofEnglish Puritans and fee cleric Isaac Ambrose. Porn in 1604 at Ormskirk, Lancashire, he was ordained by fee Church of England in 1627. After fee restoration of the monarchy, he joined other nonconformist ministers and schoolteachers in refusing to pray certain portions of the Book of Common Prayer and so was ejected from his position. What Schwanda discovers is that in fee community that we caricature as a monochrome Puritan culture there was great diversity and a healthy balance between enthusiastic evangelical preaching and fee exercise of spiritual practices, some wife roots in fee ancient Roman Catholic tradition. Schwanda delves into fee concept of “ravishmcut” and details the practices Ambrose followed—a yearly month-long retreat, for example, that gave him fee all-consuming joy he then could share wife his parishioners. Dr. Kimberly Bracken Long, Assistant Professor of Worship at Columbia Theological Seminary, discusses a similar phenomenon in her book, The Eucharistie Theology /٠the American Holy Fairs (WestminsterJohn Knox, 2011). In an article in Journalfor Preachers (Lent 2011), she reprises her research and reminds us of large crowds of Scots-lrish Presbyterians and their American descendants that gathered in fee countryside for a week of preaching, worship, and intense self-examination in preparation for Sunday Communion at which fee participants reported being joined with Christ as a bride is

    Page 46

    joined with a bridegroom. Sehwanda explores what the ?uritans called “Spiritual Marriage,” and following foe lead of the ?uritans uses the Song of Solomon to help us to understand the possibility of a passionate encounter with God. ? ٢٠those participating in contemporary worship, foe eoneept of ravishment and spiritual marriage is no new thing. In fact, some musie in foe contemporary Christian genre reflects the same theme. Consider foe lyrics to “Here 1 Am to Worship.” “Here I am to worship…, altogether lovely, altogether worthy.” Clearly the singers are communicating their experience of ־ ٧٠١ ing and being loved by foe Savior. What would it look like if we retrieved from foe often misunderstood Puritans important new perspectives on a style of Christian life, worship, and preaching for foe contemporary church? In one particularly interesting section,Sehwanda takesonKarl Barth and traces that theologian’s less than flattering understanding of spirituality and shows how Barth’s influence keeps the contemporary church from fully appreciating fois important part of our tradition and history. In contrast, he raises up Dutch Reformed scholar, Herman Bavinck, and establishes how this significant theologian was much more open to experience as a confirmation of faith alongside an intellectual assent. In ten pages that made foe book worth foe money, Sehwanda lays out seven insights for foe contemporary church. First recognizing a resistance among Reformed Evangelical people to contemplative-mystical piety, he points out the sources of that resistance and gives thanks for new voices that affirm that faith is more than of the mind, and Christian growth is more than intellectual knowledge. He goes on to call us to look more deeply and more carefully at ancient sources. He reports that foe Puritan Isaac Ambrose found rich resources for his life and ministry in foe works of Bernard of Clairvaux. I take from this that my reading ought to include more than foe current “how-to book” for congregational health. Second, he asks us to maintain a balance in our ministry and preaching between Word and Spirit. His criticism of those who preach froma limited number of favorite texts and who in essence have but one sermon is implicit in his call for us to engage in disciplines like ﻎﺳر Divina, which have foe potential of moving us to embrace foe full sweep of scripture and its concerns for bofo temporal life and everlasting life. Third, he tells us that ،ntcntionality is needed if we are to enjoy foe blessings of ravishment. We will not find joy in foe Lord nor be able to share that joy with others if we do not attend to finding ourselves purposefully in God’s presence on a regular basis. He says, “A deepening awareness of intentionality that properly values foe fullness of life and dependency upon grace would greatly enhance our relationships with both God and humanity” (p.236). Fourth, we are called to foe regular practice of spiritual disciplines, but personal experience must join communal practice. Sehwanda reminds us that in addition to the month-long retreat, Ambrose also models for us the wonderful opportunity of conversation, foe possibilities of public fasts, and foe joy of foe Lord’s Supper. Fifth, joy is the end of this endeavor. “Clearly, Ambrose’s desire for heaven was not an escape from foe many dangers the English nonconformists faced in foe seventeenth century. Rather they were motivated by love, since they entered into spiritual marriage with Jesus, they longed for foe consummation of what they had already tasted in part on earth.” (p.237)

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    Sixth, ؛٨€©ntcast to our perpetual activity ”cultivating a contemplative piety is the biblical integration of contemplation and activity” (p.238). This is a powerful response to those who think that contemplation takes one away from the work of the gospel in the world. Schwanda affirms that ■‘this approach could correct the fragmented division of sacred and secular and assist Christians in recognizing God’s presence throughout the day, regardless of their tasks” (p.238). Last, we are challenged “to discover and develop a language of delight and enjoyment in our experiences of God” (p.239). If the contemporary pulpit needs anything right now. it is more modeling of our delight and enjoyment of the sovereign God.

  • The good funeral: death, grief, and the community of care

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    Get to Know Your Local Undertaker

    Joseph s. Harvard

    Durham, North Carolina

    Thomas G. Long and Thomas Lynch, The GoodFuneral: Death, Grief, and the Community o/Care (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox ?ress, 2013), 245 pages.

    My father was a Presbyterian minister and taught me much about being a good pastor. A helpful piece of advice he passed on to me was: “Get to know your local undertakers. They know the people and the community they serve. They also know the best places to eat!” Gver the years I have found this to be sound advice and have been blessed by my association with some excellent funeral directors with whom I have worked to take care of the dead and those who loved them. This is an awesome and humbling responsibility for which none ofus is prepared. In The GoodFuneral, a minister and a funeral director have teamed up to provide us with a remarkable resource that should be read by everyone who is concerned about the quality of our common life. It sounds like a tough assignment to recommend reading a book about the care of the dead. Gur culture encourages us to ignore the unpleasant reality the Apostle Paul called “the last enemy.” Yet death comes, and clergy and funeral directors must regularly confront the work of the enemy—a dead body. So I found reading The Good Funeral good preparation for the confrontation and a help in ministering to the grieving in a caring community. It is no accident that this Presbyterian minister and professor of homiletics—Tom Drng—andthisRoman Catholic undertaker and poet—TomLynch—would collaborate on a book about “death, grief, and the community of caring.” They have both, from their varied experiences and perspectives, been reflecting for years on these matters. Both of them are excellent storytellers, and the stories they tell are poignant and rich. Both are gifted with toe use of words that Inform and touch deep parts of our hearts. And when you add to their insights and gifts two engaging “forewords”—one by Tom Lynch’s brother and colleague, Patrick Lynch, and one by Tom Long’s friend and colleague, Barbara Brown Taylor—you have a remarkable book on toe good funeral Each ofus is influenced by our location as individuals wito a history which has shaped us and provides toe lens through which we look at lito and death. The two Toms spend time at toe beginning of The Good Funeral letting us kuow“ ׳how we came to be toe ones we are.” These windows into their lives help us understand tire passions, concerns, and commitments they bring to their discussion of death, grief, and toe caring community. The authors are concerned that we have lost our way in performing an essential responsibility we have as human beings. We are not taking care of the dead. From their two perspectives, they explore toe reasons we have gone astray, and I found toe explanations fascinating and helpful. Tom Long puts it this way:

    What happens, or doesn’t happen, to toe bodies of the dead tells us much

    Advent 2013

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    about what we believe about life and death, what we think ofontselves as a society. A cotpse is entrusted to the care of the living for only a matter of hours or a few days, but how we سأ out our responsibilities to the bodies of the dead is a strong clue as to how we will treat the bodies of the living, (p. 86)

    To recover what it means “to serve the living by caring for the dead,” it is essential that we honor the body of the deceased. For the Christian funeral, this means having the body present. In our culture, the growing preference for cremation has meant the body is absent, so we engage in “a celebration of life” without the presence of the person being celebrated. There is a good discussion of cremation which does not exclude it as an option. ¥ ٧٠can have the body at a service prior to the cremation. The disposition of a dead body is the last stage in life’s journey, and the authors believe it is essential “to go the distance,” to accompany the body to its final resting place whether that be a grave ٢٠a fire. The theological implications of caring for and accompanying the body demonstrate a spirituality that embraces the sacredness of the body and expresses an incarnational faith. The theological implications are staggering! The authors are asking us to recover the funeral as an act of faith which puts the life of the dead in the context of a sacred story, a journey, in which we can entrust tire deceased and ourselves into the hands of God. Such a recovery provides a powerful witness in a secular society in which there is a deep human longing not to be closed off and indifferent to the transcendent.1 There is much more in the book—a criti،^ue, for example, of the roles of Jessica Mitford and Flisabeth Kübler-Ross; an insider’s view of what has gone wrong in the funeral “business” both commercially and ecclesiastically; and a dialogue with tire core values of various religious traditions in dealing with matters of life and death. Whether ٢٠not you agree with the arguments the authors are making,! hope 1 have convinced you that this is an important book for those who seek to care for the dead and to be with those who are grieving. 1 gladly confess that in my own ministry, the work of the two authors has strengthened my ability “to care for the living by caring for the dead.” And among the ways 1 believe 1 have been helped is the encouragement 1 have received by entering into serious theological conversation and by working to develop better practices with a local funeral director, Mark Higgins, about matters of life and death in a caring community.

    Note 1 David Brooks writes a helpful piece, “The Secular Society,1” New York Times, July 8,2013.

    Journalfor Preachers