A Light That Leaves None Behind
From The Pastor’s Desk—
The Gospel takes away our right forever, to discriminate between the deserving and the undeserving poor. — Dorothy Day
One of the peculiarities of the Christian calendar is that while our two most significant holidays (Easter and Christmas) have attendant periods that follow (Eastertide and Epiphany, respectively), the wider world moves on almost immediately. As soon as candy canes are off of the shelves, they are replaced by heart shaped boxes of chocolate; bunnies and eggs give way to summer scenes.
Yet, for the faithful, these celebrations cannot and should not be confined to a single date on the calendar. The miracles of the Incarnation and the Resurrection reshape what it means to be human in this world. In the early church, theologians understood that Christ’s victory over death did not extend merely to Jesus, or to his disciples, or even to believers. Rather, the Resurrection was seen as reconciling the whole of creation -peoples, plants, stars, the very earth itself- with their creator.
This understanding informs our lives as well. In a recent sermon I shared these words from Rev. Nadia Bolz-Weber: The Christian faith, while widely misrepresented in so much of American culture, is really about death and resurrection. It’s about how God continues to reach into the graves we dig for ourselves and pull us out, giving us new life, in ways both dramatic and small.
I hold this wisdom in tension with the quote from Dorothy Day I share at the top. Resurrection forever changes our relationship to our lives, and to the lives of those around us. Death, the ultimate symbol of division and disconnection, has been robbed of its power. God reaches into all of the dark places of our lives -fear, prejudice, self-doubt- and causes new life to flourish there.
In these waning days of Lent, as we journey on to the cross and the tomb, may we remember that as those who are called to share the Good News, we are called to share it without partiality. We are asked to find the dark places, in our lives and in our world, and help to cast the light of life there.
—Pastor Jon
