First reading: Acts 7:55-60
Psalm: Ps 97:1-2,6-7,9
Epistle: Revelation 22:12-14,16-17,20
Gospel: John 17:20-26

—Holy Father, I pray not only for them,
but also for those who will believe in me through their word,
so that they may all be one—

Christ is risen, Alleluia!
Indeed He is risen, Alleluia!

Song

I recently purchased a CD of music by a group from Cornwall in England. It is by the Port Isaac’s Fisherman’s Friends. For those who don’t know, Cornwall in located at the very southern tip of England a peninsula that juts out into the sea. Port Isaac is a fishing village along Cornwall’s west coast. This group of ten men, from varied background, with varied voices, began singing together in a seaside park in summers and in the pubs in winter. They were recently discovered, and the CD I purchased is their first major release. It opened at number 9 in England’s top 10.

People

I won’t tell you the name of the song until the end of this talk, but its words are especially pertinent today and to this Parish community. I sincerely hope and pray that you will listen.

The song begins:

For all the small people, tall people,
the dispossessed and the absurd,
All the broken hearted and the recently departed,
the unwashed, the unheard.

The lonely faces in empty spaces,
the unloved and the denied
For all the dreams that bloomed and those that died.

It is about people; you, those next to you, and those throughout our Holy Church. We are all types and all kinds, from many backgrounds, in many different circumstances. We possess all the good we have done and we bear the sins and failings we have committed. We are varied colors, liberal and conservative, men and women. We may like pierogi or biscuits and gravy, tacos or greens. You can figure that much out. Just look around. This is about you.

What is Church

So here you are, in church. Some of you are new, some have been here since the day they were born. So I ask, why in heaven’s name are you here? What are you looking for? What do you want? What do you expect to see or to get?

The question is not more or less difficult regardless of how long you have been here. St. Stephen, St. Paul, and St. John have all worked at answering that question. Jesus handed us the answer. Many, if not most, do not get it.

You, I, all of us, but today especially you, need to reflect on this question. Why are you here in Latham? What are you doing here? What is today’s motivation, what is the motivation in ten weeks, ten years?

Is your motivation to get a pastor? To hold successful fundraisers? To be more Polish or less Polish? To keep the place clean and tidy? To fulfill a parent’s expectations? To sing? To be left alone? To make pierogi and Polka dance? To find a boyfriend or girlfriend? To be respectable in your community? To be a good chairperson, or some other office on the Parish Committee? To reinvent liturgy or the order of the Church? Some of these things are noble and fine tasks, some not, but…

There should be only one, and absolutely only one reason for being here. Jesus never bid us to go ye therefore and make accountants, managers, and chairpersons. He never called bingo or looked for pierogi making volunteers. He never even invented church in the sense most people think.

Being Christians

Jesus called you to be Christians. He called you to walk in faith and to do the work He handed you. Jesus created the Church as a singular expression of that place where Christians perfectly represent community, a place for the community’s encounter with Jesus Christ in the most intimate of ways. He did not make an organization to be managed and manipulated by His people. Rather, He called His community into being Christ to everyone, not just club members with a ticket and a position, and only within the walls of this particular building.

You, and indeed a vast majority of people who call themselves Christians, need to get off the shtick of being and doing church. We do so much and so often that we exclude the possibility of being the Church Jesus wants. We involve ourselves in planning committees and committees on committees. We have a mission statement embossed in gold. We make pierogi and hand out bingo sheets till our hands bleed, and none of it, none of those wounds will come close to that of Jesus —“ and what He and His Church are all about.

We could invite

So what to do? Ask what you do. You could invite new parishioners to your homes or to meetings and regale them with the sins of Father A or Father B. We could discuss the idiocy of Mr. S and his plan, and discuss why Mrs. M is a selfish crab. We could focus on the small of doing church, maintaining the status quo and managing —“ and nothing will ever change —“ sin is self-perpetuating.

Oh, indeed, you can be and do church. You can become experts at it, even give advice to others as to how they should do it. You can tell others why their being and doing is wrong.

What would Paul say?

St. Paul encountered that among the Corinthians. He wrote (1 Corinthians 1:12):

What I mean is that each one of you says, “I belong to Paul,” or “I belong to Apol’los,” or “I belong to Cephas,” or “I belong to Christ.”

His answer: I am sure his words said it more eloquently, but basically shut up and start living for and in Christ. Christ is not divided!

Echo Christ

Paul echoed Jesus words. May they be one! Jesus continued and prayed to the Father:

—[may] the love with which you loved me
be in them and I in them—

The way the Father and Son love each other is the love we are to have. We are to love and be one. It is time to move on. It is time to stop the being and the doing and to take the many kinds of people here, across this region, and in the Church —“ joining with them and together being Christ to the world.

Do what is right —“ and hold yourselves to the highest of standards —“ the Christian life lived fully and in community. Do it here, and not just in Latham.

In a Capital Region, of only a few hundred thousand people, we walk as divided churches. A choice must be made, to set aside and to forgive the past. More than forgive, to see Christ in each person, clergy or not. A choice must be made to see Jesus Christ in the priest that lives two miles from here, in all the priests and all those previously dispossessed and hurt wherever they may be. Forgive and love as the Father and Son love. Be one as the Father and Son are one.

What would Jesus do is the question. If we are not living it we are not Christians, we are only hearers of the Word that forget what Jesus asked in the Gospel.

The title of the song is The Union of Different Kinds. Its refrain is:

Mother nature don’t draw straight lines
We’re broken moulds in the grand design
We look a mess, but we’re doing fine
We’re card carrying lifelong members of
The union of different kinds.

We are indeed all different, partially broken, but in our common baptism we became card carrying lifelong members of a union of different kinds —“ a union of different people —“ who are one in Christ Jesus. It is time to love and live like we are. Amen.