Conversations

For weeks, people have been debating about whether or not Easter will be canceled.  A little like wondering if Christmas will come this year, the Easter celebration of life over death, love triumphing over hate, hope overcoming despair, Easter arrives.

You see, Easter happens every Sunday. That is why Christians worship on Sunday, instead of on the Sabbath. Because every Sunday Christ is Risen. Easter can’t be canceled—it can’t be stopped from happening every week. But the feeling that missing out on the special music, the brass quintet, the Alleluia’s and the Lilies and Tulips seem to mean we are missing Easter. The loss is real.

Although we may not be together on Sunday, especially in this time of physical distancing, of caring for our neighbors by staying apart, of struggling to figure out how to gather, worship, and connect through the internet, we still have an opportunity to identify what is essential to be church. The short answer is Easter, resurrection, and proclaiming this amazingly good news.

To be the church we must go out and Easter the world around us—sharing the bounty of God’s love with the world. While we stay safely in our homes, we can Easter by calling one another, sending notes and cards, bringing extra food to the church for the Food Pantry and by spending time with God in prayer.

Whether we are gathered in the Crawford sanctuary this Easter or not, the rest of the world will know about Easter if we live out the good news. When we say “Christ is Risen.  Christ is Risen, indeed.  Alleluia!” we mean that in the midst of this pandemic there is good news for all including those who are homeless, hungry, sick, for those that are in prison, in violent relationships, living with addictions and mental health challenges.

Because God offers us hope, we offer have the opportunity at Easter to share our hope with friends, neighbors and strangers alike.  During this season of Easter (50 days long), let’s spread the spirit of hope and life and love with everyone God brings to mind and all those who cross our paths.  That will really be Easter!

“See” you on Sunday,
Hope

As we move into Holy Week, I cannot get this blessing out of my heart.  Some of you may recognize it as a piece from Fiddler on the Roof; some may be hearing the blessing for the first time.  My friend and former pastor, Joanne Engquist, shared it on her Facebook page.  It is a blessing from the Kaufman family who will miss a beloved Bar Mitzvah due to the stay-at-home order.  They share this beautiful blessing with these words: No matter your faith or your beliefs, I think we can all agree we hope our children feel safe and loved in this world. 

This week begins another part of our journey of faith — a triumphant entry into Jerusalem, a struggle for justice and for love, a crucifixion, a death and ultimately a resurrection.  The last of these is where  we find our faith, it is the source out of which we grow strong.

Shelter us in these days, O God, bless us with connection and grace, love and life everlasting.  Amen.

“See” you on Sunday,
Hope

Today, I had some really hard news.  A friend whose husband had beat all the odds with a terminal disease had a heart attack yesterday and died.  When a mutual friend called to let me know, I wondered how we could be present for her when we cannot visit her or hug her or let her lean on us physically, emotionally, spiritually. 

This news was on the heels of a note from the Bishop reminding clergy about the theology of why we cannot virtually celebrate Holy Communion and what we are to do should there be a request for a funeral, a wedding or any other public gathering at this time.  As people of faith, how do we respond? How do we, as Paul writes in I Corinthians 12, rejoice with those who rejoice and weep with those who weep?  

Sitting with these questions, I am drawn to the Psalm for Sunday.  Known by the Latin name De Profundis, Psalm 130 is a cry that reflects our time and our physically distant lives.  

Help, God—the bottom has fallen out of my life!
    Master, hear my cry for help!  Listen hard! Open your ears! Listen to my cries for mercy.

If you, God, kept records on wrongdoings, who would stand a chance?
As it turns out, forgiveness is your habit, and that’s why you’re worshiped.

I pray to God—my life a prayer—and wait for what God’ll say and do.
My life’s on the line before God, my Lord, waiting and watching till morning,
    waiting and watching till morning.

O Israel, wait and watch for God—with God’s arrival comes love, 

with God’s arrival comes generous redemption.
No doubt about it—God’ll redeem Israel, buy back Israel from captivity to sin.

In these words, in the emotion of the psalmist, I find myself and I find my prayer.  When it feels like the bottom has fallen out of my life, I know that God is present with love.  When I cry for help, I know that God will arrive with generous redemption and unmerited grace. I know these things because I know you.  Without touching, you touch my soul. In days of physical distancing, I know you are calling each other, checking in and offering words of comfort, gestures of faith and gifts of love.  I know you are praying for those who cannot see loved ones and for those who worry about being forgotten. I know you are reaching out in your own ways sending cards, sharing food, texting emojis and emailing beautifully evocative meditations and poems to get us through. 

As we wait and watch, as we check in and reach out, as we sing and pray, there is no doubt about it:  God is with us, God connects us, God loves us. 

“See” you on Sunday,
Hope

On Monday, after homeschooling for the very first time ever, I was interviewed by a reporter from the Christian Science Monitor about how clergy are responding to the current state of life and faith.  The reporter asked really compelling questions which left me thinking deeply, not about social distancing and isolation, but about opportunity and hope.

Last year during Lent our theme was reconnecting with our unhurried God.  Each week we practiced breathing and noticing God with us.  Even though we took a break for a little while, after the six-week journey, our routines and the demands on our lives returned with a vengeance.  Some of us are even more committed to work, to committees, to councils and to organizations than we were before we reconnected with God.

Right in the busyness of our lives, as we moved into Lent this year, we began a journey toward healing and wholeness; yet, we find ourselves separated, distanced and isolated by a pandemic.

In the middle of all of this, I have seen God in friends making phone calls checking on one another.  I’ve seen God in a five year old coloring cards that she plans to put in the mailboxes of all her neighbors. I’ve found God in the email conversations that imagine a Give and Take Food Box outside our church doors; a box in which people can give their extra and people can take what they need, no questions asked. I’ve discovered God in the willingness to learn from parents, the silly writing prompts, the communities that will not let us go and continue to connect through virtual meetings and text check-ins.  I’ve heard God in the laughter of children.  I’ve felt God in the recess break that included thrilling uphill and down bike rides.  I’ve seen God in the greeting of strangers from six feet away, looking each other in the eye and saying hello.

Where have you seen, discovered, heard and felt God this week?  Where have you found opportunity and hope? Where were you more aware than ever that you are not alone?

When my six year old has a Zoom meeting for Daisies (Girl Scouts) and my eight year old has daily  Zoom play dates with his BFF, I say we are navigating a whole new world.  The gift and joy of all of this is re-imagining our time, relearning to simply live, remembering that breathing and space is essential to being fully alive, and rediscovering that we are never alone — God is with us.

Zoom you on Sunday,
Hope

We live in an interesting time.

This week alone, I have been juggling local, regional and conference wide preparation of the ever expanding anxiety that COVID-19 is causing all of us.  The questions sound like this:  Do we meet?  Do we postpone?  Do we continue as plan and live-stream the events?  Do we cancel all together and video the presentation to be shown at a variety of gatherings?  How do we engage and connect with people, hold their hands, give them a hug, grieve with them if we are to maintain appropriate social distancing?  

Normally as a people of faith, we would care for each other by drawing close together. In times of loss or threat, we respond by coming together to pray and to sing, to hug and hold each other tight.

Pandemics are different. During an outbreak such as the one we are facing now, we are called to care for each other by moving further apart, creating what is being called social distance. We do this not only for our own safety and the safety of the people around us, but as a way of truly loving our neighbor as ourselves.

At a time of heightened fear and concern, wanting to compassionately respond in such a way that keeps us all healthy and whole, the co-chairs of Staff-Parish Relations Committee, Sue Powers and Carl Mittnight, the chairperson of Church Council, Pam Reeve, and Crawford’s Lay Leader, Laura Myers and I share these decisions:

We Will Not Meet for In Person forTwo Weeks But Have An Alternative Opportunity to Worship!!

We will not gather for worship or programming for the next two weeks.  This includes Adult Study, Christian Education, Bell Choir, Chancel Choir, Afternoon Tea, Sunday Worship and Fellowship.

Instead we will have several opportunities for weekly worship and conversation.  I will offer a Facebook Live family devotion service on Sunday, March 15 and March 22 at 10am on the Crawford Memorial United Methodist Church Facebook page.  Gary Richards (Belmont-Watertown UMC), Bill Hoch (Woburn UMC) and I will offer a Lenten on-line worship experience too.  More on that later.

For now, we encourage you to stay in your pajamas and gather as a family, sharing coffee, tea, hot chocolate on Sunday mornings and join together in this new way at 10am to worship God together.

Please know that we are not cancelling church, we are canceling our worship service. The church is the people and there are many ways to gather and stay connected as church even if the precautions we must take in this time of pandemic keep us at a social distance.

If you are concerned about someone who isn’t connected by technology, please let me know so that we can reach out and connect with them.  I am also available by phone/text (617-584-5713) or by e-mail at hope@crawfordumc.org.

Friends, these are interesting times.  We never know what tomorrow will bring.  For me, I am trusting that God is with us now, that God will be with us tomorrow, and that God will be with us forevermore.

“See” you,
Hope

My family is filled with ministers.  One of my uncles served the majority of his career as an Army Chaplain.  Before one of his many deployments our tradition was to stuff ourselves full on my grandmother’s delicious Sunday dinner and sing hymns reserved for family gatherings. Also part of this custom was giving thanks…he asked if we could circle around for prayer and he began by reading Psalm 121: 

I lift up my eyes to the hills—
from where will my help come?
My help comes from the Lord,
who made heaven and earth.
He will not let your foot be moved;
he who keeps you will not slumber.
He who keeps Israel
will neither slumber nor sleep.
The Lord is your keeper;
the Lord is your shade at your right hand.
The sun shall not strike you by day,
nor the moon by night.
The Lord will keep you from all evil;
he will keep your life.
The Lord will keep
your going out and your coming in
from this time on and forevermore.

Thinking about my uncle and all who serve in our military, all who face the horrors of war, hearing their cries in the voice of the psalmist left an indelible impression on me.  Not only in battle or conflict, there are many times in my life in which I have lifted my eyes to God, seeking help, pleading for assurance, longing to know I am not alone. 

Perhaps you have felt this way too.  In the stress of work, the struggle of family, the longing for connection, in the breaking of a heart, knowing that we are kept in grace and love day in and day out is a comfort.  If you know this cry, this longing, this prayer, then you won’t be surprised that it is the one that I turn to and share with those who need to remember that in life, in death, and in life beyond death, we are not alone. 

Holding on to this, as a community we gather this Lenten season to sing, to pray, and yes, even to eat, we are assured that God is with us holding us, healing us, keeping us from this time on and forevermore.

See you in church,
Hope

Left over ashes from Ash Wednesday for your reflection:

Blessing the Dust
For Ash Wednesday
By Jan Richardson from Circle of Grace

All those days
you felt like dust,
like dirt,
as if all you had to do
was turn your face
toward the wind
and be scattered
to the four corners

or swept away
by the smallest breath
as insubstantial—

did you not know
what the Holy One
can do with dust?

This is the day
we freely say
we are scorched.

This is the hour
we are marked
by what has made it
through the burning.

This is the moment
we ask for the blessing
that lives within
the ancient ashes,
that makes its home
inside the soil of
this sacred earth.

So let us be marked
not for sorrow.
And let us be marked
not for shame.
Let us be marked
not for false humility
or for thinking we are less
than we are

but for claiming
what God can do
within the dust,
within the dirt,
within the stuff
of which the world
is made
and the stars that blaze
in our bones
and the galaxies that spiral
inside the smudge we bear.

See you in church,
Hope

This Sunday, February 23, is Transfiguration Sunday, which is always the Sunday prior to Ash Wednesday and the beginning of Lent.  It is the Sunday we remember Jesus, taking Peter, James and John up a mountain and Jesus being transfigured before them.  It is a Sunday that marks a kind of transfiguration for us too. It is the time we set our the intention of our faith in front of us — to make it to that glorious Easter morn after forty days of self-reflection, study and prayer that the season of Lent offers us.

As we move toward Lent, I wonder what you will set aside and what you will take up?  What will you look toward to keep you on this journey of faith? Will you look for the evidence of kindness each day or will you commit yourself to at least one kind act, one act of love each day?  Will you let go of judging yourself or others and take on letting things be as they are and trusting that God is in it?  Will you pause each day and take a moment for gratitude?  Will you take a deep breath and know that you are loved?

This is a sacred time in our lives; it is a sacred season in our lives of faith.  It is also a transfiguring time in our denomination.  I hope that you will take time to join us this Sunday to listen to the letter from the Open Spirit Task Force and to stay for the beginning of another kind of journey — one that, I pray, will lead us all to resurrection.

See you in church,
Hope

Today I spent time with my spiritual director who left me to consider this scripture passage, “Where your treasure is, there your heart is also” (Matthew 6:21).  Given that this week ends with the heart holiday, the irony of her request was not lost on me.

When I take time to think about this passage, I think first about my heart and then about my treasure.  Where are the places my heart is open?  Where is my heart closed?  At what times does my heart feel free; when does it feel broken?  In those times, when my heart is open or closed, free or broken, what things do I value, what do I hold as treasure? Is my heart filled with joy, curiosity, hope and wonder?  Is my heart holding frustration, anger, vengeance, dread?  What is the treasure I hold and what does this say about my heart?

Have you ever thought about your heart and your treasure?  When you do, what do you find?  Is there wholeness and hope?  Do you find family and friends?  Do you find treasured experience and joy-filled accomplishments?  Do you notice community and connections?  When you notice your heart and your treasure, where is God?

In my work with the Open Spirit Task Force, as we struggle toward understanding whether and how a new expression of Methodism can be born from our New England roots, I have found myself delighted and heart-sick, joyful and heart-broken.  But as we move quickly toward a different Methodism, I pray that we will discover in our hearts a treasurer beyond denomination, beyond institution.  I pray that we will discover the greatest treasure of all:  The Body of Christ alive, loving one and all.  That is where my heart is and my treasure too.  What about you?

See you in church,
Hope

Friends, it has been a week.  With all the chaos in our country and in our denomination, yesterday I found myself on my way to church praying for understanding, compassion and wisdom.  Not a great psychic or spiritual space from which to move into a jam packed day of ministry.

With my hands and heart full, I walked from my car to the church door and was met with two smiling children from United Methodist Nursery School (UMNS).  They greeted me with, “Hello, Pastor Hope.”  As they held the door for their classmates, each giving exuberant high-fives to their friends, they told me about their day.  I didn’t think I would/could get out of my funk, but there they were evangelists of God’s presence and love.

At the beginning of worship each week, I ask where you have seen or experienced God.  Each week, I am blessed to hear about your experience of God in the beauty of creation, playing with grandchildren, sitting with a grieving friend, meeting immigrant neighbors for a cup of coffee and listening to stories of struggle and hope.  Each week in church, your God moments feed my soul.

So, here’s my moment:  yesterday, God met me in two four year old children who welcomed me with unforced grace and exuberant love.  Thanks be to God.

See you in church,
Hope