postID: 7020; title: Saint Mary the Virgin
groupKey: secondary
groupKey: other
Saint Mary the Virgin
O God, who hast taken to thyself the blessed Virgin Mary, mother of thy incarnate Son: Grant that we, who have been redeemed by his blood, may share with her the glory of thine eternal kingdom; through the same thy Son Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.
Array
(
[date] => 2020-08-16 11:00:00
[scope] =>
[year] =>
[month] =>
[post_id] => 229611
[series_id] =>
[day_titles_only] =>
[exclusive] => 1
[return] => formatted
[formatted] =>
[show_date] =>
[show_meta] =>
[show_content] => 1
[admin] =>
[debug] => 1
[filter_types] => Array
(
[0] => primary
[1] => secondary
)
[type_labels] => Array
(
[primary] => Primary
[secondary] => Secondary
[other] => Other
)
[the_date] => 2020-08-16 11:00:00
)
1 post(s) found for dateStr : 2020-08-16postID: 7020 (Saint Mary the Virgin)
--- getDisplayDates ---
litdate post_id: 7020; date_type: variable; year: 2020
Variable date => check date_calculations.
=> check date_assignments.
dateAssigned: 2020-08-16 (2020)
yearAssigned matches year
dateAssigned: 2022-08-14 (2022)
yearAssigned (2022) does NOT match year (2020)
dateAssigned: 2023-08-20 (2023)
yearAssigned (2023) does NOT match year (2020)
dateAssigned: 2024-08-18 (2024)
yearAssigned (2024) does NOT match year (2020)
displayDates for postID: 7020/year: 2020
Array
(
[0] => 2020-08-16
)
postPriority: 1primaryPost found for date: 2020-08-16 with ID: 7020 (Saint Mary the Virgin)
Saint Mary the Virgin
Array
(
[date] => 2020-08-16 11:00:00
[scope] =>
[year] =>
[month] =>
[post_id] => 229611
[series_id] =>
[day_titles_only] =>
[exclusive] => 1
[return] => simple
[formatted] =>
[show_date] =>
[show_meta] =>
[show_content] => 1
[admin] =>
[debug] => 1
[filter_types] => Array
(
[0] => primary
[1] => secondary
)
[type_labels] => Array
(
[primary] => Primary
[secondary] => Secondary
[other] => Other
)
[the_date] => 2020-08-16 11:00:00
)
1 post(s) found for dateStr : 2020-08-16postID: 7020 (Saint Mary the Virgin)
--- getDisplayDates ---
litdate post_id: 7020; date_type: variable; year: 2020
Variable date => check date_calculations.
=> check date_assignments.
dateAssigned: 2020-08-16 (2020)
yearAssigned matches year
dateAssigned: 2022-08-14 (2022)
yearAssigned (2022) does NOT match year (2020)
dateAssigned: 2023-08-20 (2023)
yearAssigned (2023) does NOT match year (2020)
dateAssigned: 2024-08-18 (2024)
yearAssigned (2024) does NOT match year (2020)
displayDates for postID: 7020/year: 2020
Array
(
[0] => 2020-08-16
)
postPriority: 1primaryPost found for date: 2020-08-16 with ID: 7020 (Saint Mary the Virgin)
Scripture citation(s): Revelation 11:19, 12:1-6, 10; 1 Corinthians 15:20-26; Luke 1:46-55
A Sermon by
The Rev. Canon Carl Turner
on
Revelation 11:19, 12:1-6, 10; 1 Corinthians 15:20-26; Luke 1:46-55
✛
In this is love, not that we loved God but that he loved us.
Array
(
[0] => 60757
)
book: [] (reading_id: 142380)bbook_id:
The bbook_id [] is already in the array.
book: [] (reading_id: 142391)
bbook_id:
The bbook_id [] is already in the array.
book: [Array ( [0] => 60757 ) ] (reading_id: 73484)
bbook_id: 60757
The bbook_id [60757] is already in the array.
No update needed for sermon_bbooks.
Last Sunday, Father Spencer spoke movingly and poignantly about the struggle that he, and many of us, have experienced during this period of lockdown, and how it simply doesn’t seem to have an end in sight. A few days later, preaching at the Saturday monthly requiem, Fr. Spencer with that same honesty, shared how as a 16-year-old, he had his first thoughts about his own death, and how much that frightened him. Well, he is not alone. When I was young, I grew up in a very Evangelical Church where fear and guilt seemed to be just as important as love and forgiveness. If I was not careful, my actions, and even my bad thoughts might lead me to hell and, once in hell, I would never escape eternal punishment. I was also taught that what happened on the cross was God punishing Jesus instead of me; as we sang in one of the hymns, “on the cross, the wrath of God was satisfied.” I became increasingly paranoid about making mistakes. Of course, none of this is new – the early church struggled with what happened to someone who committed sin after baptism. The Church Fathers were not naïve – they knew that although baptism washed away original sin, it did not take away the desire or capability to sin. That led to some people putting off baptism until their deathbed, for fear that they might sin after they were baptized and go to hell.
As the early Church went through year after year of persecution, the question was asked, if God is a God of love, then why would he desire us to go to hell? If Jesus came to bring us back to the Father, to bring reconciliation, why would he want us to be eternally separated from him?
Dante’s incredible work, The Divine Comedy, explores the condition of Hell, Purgatory, and Heaven; but it is also an allegory for the journey of the soul from hell, through purgatory, and to heaven. The sense of journey after death – growth after death – is what Michael Ramsey used to describe as the meaning of ‘In my Father’s House there are many mansions’– or rooms – or, as he preferred, ‘staging-posts.’ Could it be that we can respond to God’s love and forgiveness after death?
It all came to a head for me when I was visiting Walsingham for the first time. I was there for the national Pilgrimage in 1980 with 15,000 other members of the Church of England, and the then Archbishop of Canterbury, Robert Runcie, was the principal celebrant and preacher – the first time this had happened since Henry VIII destroyed the original shrine. It was a heady day for someone who had been brought up in a completely different style of church, but it was the presence of a group of evangelical protestors that was to prove a changing point in my life. They were shouting and waving placards and telling us that we were going to hell for worshipping Mary. Now, perhaps I was a little naïve – after all, the Archbishop was there along with many other bishops and priests – so, how could this be so wrong? I did not think we were worshipping Mary, so I thought I would go and discuss it with them. Famous last words, as they say. Before I could open my mouth, one of the protesters started poking me in the chest, “You are going to hell!” he said. But it wasn’t the fact that I was in a procession of our Lady, but, apparently, because I was wearing a CND badge. In the late 70s, and early 80s, I like many of my friends was terrified of the idea of nuclear holocaust, and the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament brought people of many political views together. The protester explained to me that Jesus had said that there would be wars and rumors of wars, and that belonging to the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament was frustrating God’s plan and would send me straight to hell. I was dumbfounded! Thank goodness for Sister Wendy, from Yorkshire, and a member of Sr. Promise’s order, who scooped me up and said in a very loud voice, “I don’t mind protesters, but I won’t have them shushing Our Lady!”
In 2011, Rob Bell, pastor of Mars Hill Church in California, who had been named by Time magazine as one of the 100 most-influential people in the world, published a book that caused a rift between him and other evangelical leaders and, shortly after, to him leaving the church he had founded with its over 10,000 members. His book, Love Wins caused a storm of protest on Twitter from evangelical Americans even before its publication because in it he challenges the belief that the existence of hell is at the heart of the teaching of Jesus, and that to claim that those who are unsaved will be separated for ever from God does not sit easily with the message that our God is loving and sovereign. As he says himself, reflecting the teaching of St Paul, “Anybody who does not long for ‘all people to be saved’ is ‘straightforward resisting the heart of God’”. And all this stemming from the statement of a member of his church that Mahatma Ghandi is in hell.
Today’s celebration in honor of Mary is a celebration of God’s triumph over evil and death, and a vindication of the promises of Jesus that he wishes all people to be saved: “And I, when I am lifted up from the earth,” he said, “will draw all people to myself.” (John 12:32). What we say about Mary, we say about her Son, Jesus Christ, who came to save us from sin and death, and promised us eternal life. Mary journeyed with Jesus – from conception to his birth in Bethlehem, from his upbringing in Nazareth to his ministry in Galilee, from his death on the cross to his Resurrection on the third day, witnessing the outpouring of the Holy Spirit on the infant Church.
Mary responded to God’s call. Some say that she is the archetypal Christian and, certainly, the Church Father’s began to see her as a ‘type’ of the Church. For each of us is called by God into relationship with him. Like Mary, we might question, even resist the calling (Mary was not automaton after all) but Mary cooperated with God’s plan and our cooperation takes us on a journey which, yes, can deliver us from the many hells that we encounter during our life on earth and, I believe, from the hell that surely exists beyond the grave for those who continue to resist and frustrate God’s plan of redemption.
In the first letter of John we read, “Beloved, let us love one another, because love is from God; … Whoever does not love does not know God, for God is love.” (1 John 4:7-8)
If that is not true, then there is little hope for humanity. If that is not true, then we might as well give up resisting evil or trying to make a change to our world. If that is not true, then the Black Lives Matter movement is simply a phenomenon of our times rather than an attempt to build the Beloved Community.
Ultimately, love wins.
John goes on to say, “God’s love was revealed among us in this way: God sent his only Son into the world so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins.” (1 John 4:10)
In this is love, not that we loved God but that he loved us.
By stretching out his arms on the cross he proclaimed that love wins.
That love is reflected in acts of charity and forgiveness, in a search for a more humane society, in protecting the marginalized and oppressed, in protesting the abuse of power and the use of prejudice, and in a yearning to see all things in subjection under his feet. Do you think this is progressive nonsense? Our choristers are taught this story and sing it all the time –
“he hath scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts.
He hath put down the mighty from their seat,
and hath exalted the humble and meek.
He hath filled the hungry with good things,
and the rich…he hath sent empty away.”
Perhaps Mary’s Magnificat is also the song of the Beloved Community.
Jesus came to bring life, not death. We honor Mary today not only because she is the mother of Jesus but because and she inspires us to listen to him, to amend our lives according to his way of love, and to pass that story on to others.
“For since death came through a human being, the resurrection of the dead has also come through a human being; for as all die in Adam, so all will be made alive in Christ.” says St. Paul in our Epistle reading.
Today’s feast is a triumphant assertion of that belief; a re-telling of the story of God’s call to us, his salvific work with us, and his desire to draw us ever closer into the life of the Trinity.
“For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.” (John 3:16)
The poet, Malcolm Guite is retiring from Girton College, Cambridge, and recently wrote an article reflecting on the need to consolidate his library, and how every time he looked at books to dispose of, he simply sat down and started reading them. With respect to his many copies and translations of Dante’s Divine Comedy, he said these beautiful words:
“Ostensibly an account of the three realms of the afterlife, what it really offers is a map of the soul: a sequence of vivid emblems, not just of the vicious circles of our own little hells, but a glimpse of how, turned another way, they might be purged and redeemed, and become the virtuous spirals of Mount Purgatory, reaching up through clear air to that last circle of “refining fire” where “you must move in measure like a dancer”; and, beyond the fire, shimmering through the flames, the lovely blues and greens of paradise”[1]
Or, perhaps more simply put, I was once told a story of a young man who was looking through the window of an antique shop where there was a large, old, painting of the crucifixion. As he stared at it, he became aware of the presence of an older woman next to him.
“Is that Jesus?” she said, suddenly.
Somewhat startled, and a little embarrassed, the man stuttered, “Erm. Yes, that’s Jesus.”
The woman continued, “So, that’s Jesus, who died on the cross?”
“Yes,” said the man, wondering how he on earth he could escape,
“And that’s his mother Mary and the disciple he loved next to the cross.”
“Yes” said the man, beginning to feel like he was back at school.
“And, that is Jesus who is dead. Dead on the cross?”
“Yes,” said the man, “That is Jesus, dead on the cross.”
There was a pause and the woman quietly said, “Oh.” And, with her head down, walked away.
Something stirred inside the young man – some glimmer from the past perhaps – some remembrance of former things. He turned from the window to look at the old woman walking away, “Wait!” he suddenly shouted, and ran after her. “Yes, that was a picture of Jesus dying on the cross, but has nobody ever told you that’s not the end of the story and that he rose again on the third day?”
The old woman turned and, gently taking the young man’s face into her hands, beamed at him and said, “Oh yes. I guess I’ve heard it a thousand times, but I just glories to hear it again!”
References
| ↑1 |
|
|---|
