UNITED
Easter Sunday -
Anne G. Cohen
Mark 16:1-8
For Our Reflection:
New life never comes easy.
Nothing is born without effort and pain.
Easter's dawn is not the pastel water color of springtime's return.
Easter breaks with thundering upheaval,
with the ocean's weight and salty power
crashing over the bleak rockscape of our hiding
places,
dissolving our fears with Holy Terror.
New life never comes easy.
Nothing is born without effort and pain.
This day we witness death itself
Giving way, giving birth, giving W I D E berth,
To Life.
- Mary Susan Gast (
After Ecstasy, The Laundry
Spring is perhaps the ugliest, messiest, nastiest season on this
planet. We humans tend to idealize the coming of Spring
- because in
most parts of the world it signals the end of the killing cold and the
relentless snow and ice. We see wildlife procreating and new buds on
the trees - and so we are moved to hope for better days and new life.
And in this way, Spring is seen through rose colored
lenses.
But Spring is really the ugliest, messiest, nastiest
season on this
planet. It begins with atmospheric pressure changes and storms,
hurricanes and tornadoes, increasing unpredictability and meltdown.
Anything that has frozen, turns liquid - which usually
means mud - lots
and lots of mud. The hardiest of plants begin to push their way through
the mud, creating tiny earthquakes in the top soil, looking pale and
fragile in the midst of the gray, ugly landscape.
Trees that still have their leaves drop them as new growth pushes it's
way out, groaning. Creatures that have survived the winter fight their
way back into territory, shed their winter fur everywhere - and begin
the process of procreation - a messy business, for sure. Birdlings
fight to break free from shells - sometimes failing - sometimes becoming
immediate prey -
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sometimes falling from the nest - sometimes continuing the family line.
Billions of salmon eggs - whose parents died on top of them in the
process of creating them - will begin the battle to be among the tiny
percentage who survive into adulthood. And mammals - well I won't
EVEN
begin to describe the mess of birth and afterbirth when it comes to
mammals.
For humans - in most parts of the world - Spring means
digging out from
under the wreckage of winter. It means shoveling and scraping,
sweeping, piling and debris containment. It means clearing out the
debris basins in the foothills so that neighborhoods won't be flooded or
buried. It means Spring cleaning - clearing the house of winter filth,
sanitizing, airing out, washing and waxing. And it means a
laundry.
Spring really IS the ugliest, messiest, nastiest season on this planet.
Its the best season for respiratory infections and
flu, allergies, mold
and rot. Even our own Margaret Potts succumbed to the weakening effects
of Spring on our elderly. Spring often creates a
surge in the human
hormone system - creating a desire for change, for travel, for love and
lust, for shopping and new clothes and new encounters with life.
Spring is often used as a metaphor for new life, transition,
metamorphosis. It is fitting - especially if you look at the wreckage
brought on by life changes, puberty or menopause, transgender
transitions or coming out of any particular closet you want to name,
changing jobs or life partners or living locations. Growing up is
messy. Getting old is messy. Regime change (aka
military occupation)
is messy - or, as Rumsfeld put it,
"untidy." Liberation - for
individuals, for nations - is messy. Living life with energy and
passion and conviction and a sense of meaning - is messy.
So, it is no mistake that Holy Week falls in the Spring.
It is one of
the ugliest, messiest, nastiest stories ever told. It begins with high
hopes for liberation, turns quickly to a mood of betrayal, fear and
despair - moves to State sanctioned murder, blood and stench - and
finally an open, apparently violated grave. And we are STILL doing the
laundry in the aftermath of the resurrection - an unspeakable mystery.
None of the Gospel accounts line up in terms of what really happened
that week or even Easter morning. They all have Jesus saying different
things on the cross and appearing in different ways to different people
after he was supposed to be dead. The Gospels were written at least 40
years after the actual events, over a period of at least 30 years, in
different locations to
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different audiences - based on a variety of oral traditions - during the
Roman military occupation of most of
transmission was and is a messy, messy process - always involving
interpretation - and never, ever FULLY coming clean.
The Gospel writer of a book called Mark wrote a version of the story
that ends abruptly and leaves the conclusions and interpretations up to
the listeners. Mark describes a group of Galilean women,
three in
particular, close associates of Jesus and witnesses to his life ministry
- who witness his humiliation, torture, murder, death and burial.
According to this account, the women are survivors and witnesses to a
traumatic series of events - within the terrifying context of a
repressive occupation by Roman troops. The women,
turning to familiar
rituals in a dangerous situation - already experiencing the
psychological and emotional symptoms of post-traumatic stress syndrome -
focus on the proper cleaning and anointing of Jesus' body for burial.
I
will let you imagine for yourself the sights and smells that they
anticipated in this task.
The people listening to this Gospel - written around the year 70 c.e. -
after the destruction of the
imagine such horrors vividly. The Jewish community, attempting to
maintain their identity within a repressive occupying regime, felt they
had to establish and defend an orthodoxy that did not allow for any
unorthodox practices in the synagogues. This meant that Jews practicing
Christianity were expelled, had to go underground and live a doubly
repressed life.
The Gospels - in the wake of this new reality - or realization - were
infiltrated by trauma, stories told for the benefit of people feeling
betrayed by their own religious family. You may have noticed in the
Good Friday Tenebrae Service two nights ago that the
scripture read
aloud - without further interpretation - implicated the Jews in the
murder of Jesus. And we have history to tell us the aftermath of those
accusations, the bloody laundry that is still being done to undo ancient
traumas compounded by modern reenactments. We have work to do to
interrupt the continuing accusations - however thoughtless the
participants in this perpetration.
The Christians in the year 70 c.e.,
just as the Jews in the year 30
c.e., had hopes of liberation - saw those hopes
murdered by the State -
and were left in grave danger and psychologically traumatized. They
were right there - with the Marys and Salome - doing
what had to be done
- and witnessing the hopeful, yet again traumatizing empty tomb.
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The text in Mark uses words that can be translated as "dumbfounded,"
"out of their wits," "trembling and bewildered,"
"terrified and
amazed." The women fled and were unable to articulate the
unspeakable.
And the community takes up the story from there. The community knows
the story - so the women must have recovered enough - eventually - to
speak about their experience. Perhaps it was at the riverside while
pounding laundry on the rocks. Perhaps it was cooking dinner for family
and friends. Perhaps it was at the market or while delivering a
neighbor's baby and cleaning the bedding afterward. The women began to
recover and to speak - and by speaking, began to heal.
Mark's Gospel leads the community into telling their own stories - and
to share their experiences of encountering Christ unexpectedly - in the
eyes of their life partner - in the birth of their second child - in the
words of a friend and the enchantment of sunlight glinting on the water
as they washed a filthy pile of laundry in the early morning - the
morning following Sabbath rest.
The end of the Gospel of Mark is the beginning of Christian dialogue -
human dialogue - about the meaning of these events - and the meaning of
our experience. And it is the beginning of arduous, ugly, messy growth
in our of understanding the process of recovery, of
creative
transformation, of new life forcing itself into the world.
We were witnesses to a certain amount of celebration in the streets of
number of people who had lived under the repressive regime of Sadaam
Hussein - and had not been in the small circle of profiteers - had real
hopes that these arriving Americans were their liberators. There was a
celebratory show of mutual destruction of icons, a metaphorical toppling
of Hussein's power structure - a momentary tableau of solidarity and
relief that - for the most part - the killing was over and rebuilding
could begin.
But we were also witnesses to the fact that the ecstasy was
short-lived. The soldiers - trained for combat and conquering - were
not ready for police work, crowd control or the reorganization of
infrastructure. They were trained for military victory, not for mop
up. They hadn't planned to do the laundry - their own or anyone
else's. To our shame, the mop up crew is very late - if they've begun
to arrive at all. So the celebration has rapidly metamorphosed into
unchecked revenge, uninterrupted looting, apparently American
sanctioned
chaos. Collateral damage durng
military operations has moved into
cultural decimation, international thievery and murder.
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And all of this was predictable - from experiences on the streets of Los
Angeles - from the post-9-11 responses by our administration - from
research on individual and communal responses to traumatic stress - or
even from familiarity with mythological and Biblical renderings of the
human condition. And recovery is only possible when order is restored,
safety is a priority and basic human needs are met. After the
well-orchestrated ecstasy of victory and the cessation of systematic
bombardment - the laundry MUST be addressed. Only then will new life
have ANY chance of manifesting in
Like Spring, like a new society, like any meaningful
change in
perspective - Easter comes slowly and with a great deal of mud, trauma
and laundry. Like the women at the tomb, it may take awhile for us to
feel safe enough to begin to articulate what we have witnessed in our
lives and what we make of it. Only when we feel safe enough from events
like 9-11, only when we feel secured from retribution by Arab nations
over our perceived intervention and occupation of Iraq, only when we are
psychologically ready to seriously deal with the realities of human
atrocities - in warfare, in our homes, on our streets - will the
conversation be anything but quiet and superficial - will our actions be
anything but unpredictable and reactive.
One of the first tasks of the Easter community is creating safe space -
by honoring the rules of human community, living consistently according
to the values we profess, and day after day - sharing in the tasks of
daily living:
mopping up after Spring storms or military bombardment
feeding those who are hungry or alone or poor
honoring and burying our deceased loved ones
supporting and giving comfort to those in pain
or those awaiting the blessing and severe trauma
of a heart transplant
cleaning up after ourselves and readying our own souls
for the difficult, messy and ever so necessary
rebirth of life and love and hope and meaning
now forcing it's way through the debris
of our encounters
with the divine.
On this beautiful, messy, muddy Easter morning
I thank God that we have each other.
***********************************
BULLETIN
Music for Gathering
Welcome and Perspective on the Day
Musical Preparation for Worship - A Time for Centering
+ Call to Worship
God, when I awake, and day begins,
waken me to Your presence;
waken me to Your indwelling;
waken me to inward sight of You,
and speech with You, and strength from You,
that all my earthly walk may waken into song,
and my spirit leap up to You all day, all ways.
+ Hymn of Celebration Christ the Lord is Risen Today Hymnal #
233
Prayer at the Empty Tomb (unison)
I never
meant you to roll back the stone
before I was
ready to ask.
I had not even fingered
the roughness and edge of it,
tested my shoulder against its painful weight,
stood contemplating its massive shadow,
or wept in the half dark for a miracle
I would not have accepted.
How can I
want what I wanted
but never
believed in?
Despair was at least articulate, unstrange:
I knew what the repeated question was,
endlessly safe from an answer.
Not this
open grave,
this
violation of my certainty,
this chill
ecstasy I can no longer refuse,
this fear I
flee from without hope
it will leave me behind;
this large, gratuitous terror
I cannot now seek refuge from
without complete betrayal.
You,
beloved,
for whom I
stretched my heart with grief,
rudely
announce its irrelevance;
arising to my unreadiness
not with a comfortable word,
but to a world appalled.
Time for Silent Reflection
One: My soul
waits in silence.
All: God is my rock and my fortress. I will be at peace.
Silent
Reflection
The
Assurance of Good News
Breaking forth from the tomb, God opens wide our
hearts,
turns the sharpness of death to the terror of new life
and of desire fulfilled. God breathes on our
fearfulness,
refines our truthfulness,sings
through our speechlessness
so that we may daily be taken up with praise!
Sung
Response
"Hallelujah. God be praised!"
Anthem Let All the World in Every
Corner Sing Sally Albrecht
Choir - accompanied by
Conversation with Our Children
Reading from the Christian
Gospels
Mark 16:1-8
Solo I Know That My
Redeemer Liveth G.F. Handel
Teaching and Proclamation After Ecstasy,
The Laundry
Intercessions, Celebrations and Encouragements
Call to
Prayer Be still and know that I am God Hymnal # 743
Time for
Silence
Our Joys and
Concerns and an Offering of Prayer
Sung
Response In
Solitude Hymnal #521 vv. 1 & 2
We Offer Our Gifts So That Our Lives May Be Our Prayer
Offertory Duet The Power of
Your Love G. Bulloch
Prayer of
Dedication (unison)
May our gifts flow easily from our hands because we accept compassion
and sharing as appropriate to the life of faith. May our gifts flow
easily from us because we identify with Christ's gracious and supportive
ministry to others. May gifts flow easily from
us because the Spirit of
God desires to heal the world and repair its brokenness through our
work, even now, even here. Amen.
+ Sending Hymn Joy Dawned Again on Easter
Day Hymnal # 241
+ Commissioning (unison)
May the God who shakes heaven and earth,
whom death could not contain, who lives to disturb and heal us,
bless you with power to go forth and proclaim the gospel. Amen
+ Sung
Response
Hymnal # 236
Halle, halle, halle - lu - ja,
Halle, halle, halle - lu - ja,
Halle, halle, halle - lu - ja,
Halleluja, halleluja.
+ Postlude
WORSHIP NOTES
The cross marks (+) in the order of service are an
invitation for those
in
the congregation who are able to stand to do so.
The New Century Hymnal or "Hymnal" has a black cover.
The Chapel Songbook is a blue, looseleaf notebook.
Call to Worship is by George Appleton, Acts of Devotion
Prayer at the Empty Tomb is based on Mark 16:1-8 (Women at the Tomb),
composed by Janet Morley, All Desires Known, c. 1988, 1992 (p.105)
The Assurance of Good News is by Janet Morley, Ibid. (p.34 adapted)
Commissioning is by Janet Morley, Ibid. (p.88)
***********************
Children's Sermon Easter Prayer
(with Jelly Beans)
What morning is this?
What is special about Easter morning?
Why are eggs such a big thing on Easter morning?
Symbols of New Life given to us by God....
Jelly Beans are sometimes called "Jelly Bird Eggs..."
because they look like eggs...
Jelly Beans are like eggs - but they taste a little better.
I want to give you some Jelly Beans to remind you of eggs
so that you will remember that God gives us all kinds of new chances
and new life every day.
Each color of these Jelly Beans reminded me of one thing that is a sign
of new life in the spring.
So I'm giving you a poem of prayers to go along with these Jelly Beans.
It goes like this:
A Basket of Jelly Beans to celebrate Spring...
A Rainbow of Prayers for Easter morning!
Yellow is the sun so bright
Orange is the edge of night
Red is for the early dawn
Green is for the garden lawn
Purple is the upper room
Black is for the empty tomb
White is for the peaceful dove
And Pink is for God's endless love
When you eat one, say a prayer
Thanking God that everywhere
Are signs that Jesus did revive
That hope and joy have come alive!
The colors may remind you of others things that you think are beautiful
and wonderful. Feel free to make up your own prayers as you eat these
jelly beans... like "Thank you God for red flowers..." or "Thank
you God
for my Mom and Dad dressed in yellow today!"
Thank you so much for sharing Easter morning with me and I
look forward
to meeting you all again after your Sunday School (and ours) is over!