Will We Be Good Compost for the Future?

3 Lent Cycle C March 20, 2022

Ex.3:1-17 Ps. 103:1-11

1 Cor. 10:1-13 Luke 13:1-9

Lectionary Link

The Bible is a book about Time, telling us how an Everlasting, Timeless God is involved in our history.

 

In the Burning Bush theophany to Moses, the name of God is revealed:  "I am what I am.  I am continuous Being within all beings in time.  I am always total becoming what I am becoming."

 

God as pure becoming, omni-becoming, comprehending everything as time moves on and as every change makes the God environment larger and larger, and about the environment God provides, St. Paul wrote, "In God, we live and move and have our being."  We live and move means change and becoming, and so we are a moving and changing total number of occasions of existing.

 

The nature of God's becoming is pure, continuous creative freedom.  And God’s great gamble in creation is that creative freedom is shared in degrees with all lesser beings that live in God's creation.

 

This freedom means that all the events of the past are absolute events which happened and contributed to the causing of all future events.

 

And because there are so many creative beings, human and non-humans, we cannot know with precision exact causation.  What does science try to do?  Scientists observe behaviors to establish significant causal connections which allow us to understand better how we should live to promote best probable outcomes for our future.

 

It is easier for scientist to establish causal connections in the physical world; but in the realm of human behavior, the ability to be exact in our understanding of cause and effect is more difficult.

 

We as human beings are engrossed with causes of human behavior or understanding why good and bad things happen to people in apparently some rather random ways.  And because we are insecure about the mystery of causality, we whistle in the dark by speculation, we find speculations of all sorts.

 

Why did those poor folk from Galilee end up dead and their blood used in Pilate's sacrifices?  What did they do to cause this?  And what about those poor people on whom fell the tower of Siloam?  And what about all those innocent people and children who are being bombed in Ukraine?  What did they do to deserve this?  Surely Putin's bombs were not so smart as to single out individual men, women, children, and buildings.

 

We think that we can know specific causation sometimes, but in very important areas of our lives it is a mystery; the mystery of an entire chain of indispensable former things which all contributed to what is happening now.  And we can’t know the precise connection of everything, and so we speculate as our coping mechanism.

 

In the face of speculation about the causes of tragic deaths, what did Jesus say?  He was less concerned about the cause of death, and more concerned about how one entered the portal of death.

 

And what does Jesus recommend as the ideal way to enter the portal of death?  In the state of repentance. Repentance is the best way to respond to Freedom and Time.  Repentance is learning and working at trying to be better today than yesterday being drawn by the magnetic lure of God's perfection.  No one enters the portal death perfect; but the perfect way to enter death is in the state of repentance.

 

If you and I are living in the state of repentance, then you and I can be the very best compost, after we are gone, for a more fruitful world after we are gone.  Compost and manure does not seem like a very romantic mode of our afterlife, but think about it: the past is dead and gone but the residue traces of how we have lived and left our influences can be rich compost for the future, or it can be waste that needs to be forgotten. 

 

I believe that Jesus is asking us to live repentant lives so that we can be deep, rich, fertile, holy compost for a better future world.  By being holy compost is the way in which we remain literally in this world after we are gone.

 

Today let us worry less about past causality and let us embrace repentance causality to pay the goodness of our lives forward into the future.  Our lives as God's compost can be used to give the future world another chance at surviving and bearing fruit.  Amen

Sunday School, March 20, 2022 3 Lent C

 Sunday School, March 20, 2022   3 Lent C

Sunday school themes

What happened to Moses after his disappointment and failure?

The Story of Moses

The life of Moses was spared as a newborn baby when an Egyptian princess adopted him and raised him in a palace.  But Moses was a Hebrew man and when he saw that the other Hebrew people were treated like slaves by the Pharaoh of Egypt, he knew that God wanted him to help to make the lives of the Hebrews better.  He tried to help but in his first attempt he was opposed by both the Egyptians and also his fellow Hebrew.  He felt like a failure so he ran for his life to a faraway place.  He became a shepherd and got married and he worked for his father-in-law.  When he was tending the flock, Moses saw a bright burning bush and he heard God call him.  God wanted him to go back to Egypt to help the Hebrew people.  Moses told God that he could not do it and that he had failed.  But God told him that God is greatest of all and that God would help him.  God said that Moses would be given another chance to go and help the Hebrew people be freed from slavery in Egypt.

We can learn from our failures.  Sometimes when we fail we want to give up and quit and run away.  We may want to say, “I can’t do that.”  But our teachers and parents come to us and say, “Keep trying and you will be successful.”  Our teachers and parents forgive us and accept us and they help us because they understand that we learn through our failures.  When we are not yet perfect, God does not forget us.  God keeps coming to us and inviting us to keep trying.  When we fail to love or be kind, God keeps inviting us to learn how to be better.  The lesson that we can learn from Moses is that God does not give up on us.  God keeps coming to us and asks us to do the good work that we know that we’re supposed to do.

The Gospel Riddle of Jesus

Jesus told a riddle about the patience of God.  When a fig tree did not have any fruit, the orchard owner wanted to cut it down.  What good is a fig tree if we can’t get figs?  The gardener of the orchard said, “Don’t cut it down; let me fertilize the soil around the tree; give the tree another chance to bear fruit.”

God is love because God always gives us more chances.  God tells us to use all of the things of our past, things that are dead and gone, but things like the memories of our failures can be used to help us grow new Christian fruit in our lives, like the fruits of love, joy, peace, patience, faith, self control and gentleness.  Compost is dead plant and animal remains which are used to fertilize new plants.  God is always using the human compost of our past life experience to help us produce new and wonderful fruits in our lives, the fruits of love and kindness.

Remember God did not give up on Moses when he failed.  God does not give up on us when we fail.  So we should not give up on ourselves or on each other when we have failure and some difficult times.  Let us remember that God is patient with us.  God will allow our lives to be fertilized with all that has happened to us to make us better in the future.

Children’s Sermon: Growing Christian Fruit

  If you are a fruit grower, and you plant an apple tree, what do you want to get from the tree?

  When it is time to harvest, you want to be able to pick some fruit don’t you.  You want some nice big red apples, don’t you?

  But what if harvest time comes and you go to your apple tree and you don’t find any apples to pick?  You have a lot of questions don’t you?  If the tree looks healthy and has lots of pretty green leaves, you ask why doesn’t this tree have any apples.  It looks good and it looks healthy; why doesn’t it have good apples.  Did I make a mistake?  Did I plant the wrong seed?  Did it have some hidden plant disease?  Did the bugs get under its bark?   Did it get enough water?

  What should I do with an apple tree if it doesn’t have any apples?  It looks like a good tree but I have to sell apples to make money.  What should I do?

  I will wait until next year.  I will water it better.  I will dig around it and puts some special fertilizer around the tree, some special tree food to make it grow some good apples.

  Jesus told a story about a tree farmer who grew a fig tree, but the fig tree did not have any figs on it.  So the tree farmer decided to keep the tree and put some fertilizer, some tree food around the tree in the soil and wait until next year to see if it would grow some figs.

  The story about Jesus is a story about God.  You and I are like trees that God plants in this life.  And God does not just want us to look pretty, God also wants us to be like trees that produce lots of good fruit.

  Now you and I cannot grow apples and figs can we?  What can we produce and grow?  What kind of fruit can we grow?  We can make deeds of love, joy, faith, patience, gentleness, goodness, self-control and kindness.

  Those are the kinds of fruit that God wants us to grow.  And God is always giving us more time to produce these wonderful fruits.

  Just as the tree farmer gives fertilizer to help grow good fruit, so God gives us things to help us learn how to love.  We have the Bible, we have God’s word and God’s law to teach us how we should live.  We have parents and teachers who teach us how we should live good lives.  And sometimes we have some difficult tests that we have to pass to help us get strong and get better.  Some times we don’t know how to help others until we have had a hard time and learned to get help from God and other people.  And when we learn to help other people, then God is happy because then God says, I have planted a good tree and it is producing good fruit.  I have made a good person and that person is kind and loving, so I have been a very successful God.  We can help make God a very successful God by learning to grow good human fruit.  And the fruit that you and I are supposed to make are the fruits of love and kindness.

A Family Eucharistic Liturgy

Intergenerational Family Service with Holy Eucharist

March 20, 2022 : The Third Sunday in Lent

Gathering Songs: Simple Gifts, The Butterfly Song, Jesus Stand Among Us, My Tribute

Song: Simple Gifts (Christian Children’s Songbook # 206)

‘Tis a gift to be simple, ‘tis a gift to free, ‘tis a gift to come down where you ought to be, and when we find ourselves in the place just right, ‘twill be in the valley of love and delight.  When true simplicity is gained, to bow and to bend we won’t be ashamed.  To turn, turn will be our delight till by turning and turning we come out right.

Liturgist: Bless the Lord who forgives all of our sins.

People: God’s mercy endures forever.  Amen.

Liturgist:  Oh God, Our hearts are open to you.

And you know us and we can hide nothing from you.

Prepare our hearts and our minds to love you and worship you.

Through Jesus Christ our Lord.  Amen.

Liturgist:         The Lord be with you.

People:            And also with you.

Liturgist:  Let us pray

Almighty God, you know that we have no power in ourselves to help ourselves: Keep us both outwardly in our bodies and inwardly in our souls, that we may be defended from all adversities which may happen to the body, and from all evil thoughts which may assault and hurt the soul; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

Litany of Praise: Chant: Praise be to God!

O God, you are Great!  Praise be to God!

O God, you have made us! Praise be to God!

O God, you have made yourself known to us!  Praise be to God!

O God, you have provided us with us a Savior!  Praise be to God!

O God, you have given us a Christian family!  Praise be to God!

O God, you have forgiven our sins!  Praise be to God!

O God, you brought your Son Jesus back from the dead!  Praise be to God!

Liturgist: A reading from the Book of Exodus

Moses was keeping the flock of his father-in-law Jethro, the priest of Midian; he led his flock beyond the wilderness, and came to Horeb, the mountain of God. There the angel of the LORD appeared to him in a flame of fire out of a bush; he looked, and the bush was blazing, yet it was not consumed. Then Moses said, "I must turn aside and look at this great sight, and see why the bush is not burned up." When the LORD saw that he had turned aside to see, God called to him out of the bush, "Moses, Moses!" And he said, "Here I am." Then he said, "Come no closer! Remove the sandals from your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground." He said further, "I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob." And Moses hid his face, for he was afraid to look at God.

Liturgist: The Word of the Lord

People: Thanks be to God

Liturgist: Let us read together from Psalm 63

For your loving-kindness is better than life itself; * my lips shall give you praise.

So will I bless you as long as I live * and lift up my hands in your Name.

My soul is content, as with marrow and fatness, * and my mouth praises you with joyful lips,

Litany Phrase: Thanks be to God! (chanted)

For the good earth, for our food and clothing. Thanks be to God!

For our families and friends. Thanks be to God!

For the talents and gifts that you have given to us. Thanks be to God!

For this day of worship. Thanks be to God!

For health and for a good night’s sleep. Thanks be to God!

For work and for play. Thanks be to God!

For teaching and for learning. Thanks be to God!

For the happy events of our lives. Thanks be to God!

For the celebration of the birthdays and anniversaries of our friends and parish family.

   Thanks be to God!

Liturgist:         The Holy Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ according to Luke

People:            Glory to you, Lord Christ.

Then Jesus told this parable: "A man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard; and he came looking for fruit on it and found none. So he said to the gardener, 'See here! For three years I have come looking for fruit on this fig tree, and still I find none. Cut it down! Why should it be wasting the soil?' He replied, 'Sir, let it alone for one more year, until I dig around it and put fertilizer on it. If it bears fruit next year, well and good; but if not, you can cut it down.'"

Liturgist:         The Gospel of the Lord.

People:            Praise to you, Lord Christ.

Sermon – Father Phil

Children’s Creed

We did not make ourselves, so we believe that God the Father is the maker of the world.

Since God is so great and we are so small,

We believe God came into our world and was born as Jesus, son of the Virgin Mary.

We need God’s help and we believe that God saved us by the life, death and

     resurrection of Jesus Christ.

We believe that God is present with us now as the Holy Spirit.

We believe that we are baptized into God’s family the Church where everyone is

     welcome.

We believe that Christ is kind and fair.

We believe that we have a future in knowing Jesus Christ.

And since we all must die, we believe that God will preserve us forever.  Amen.

Litany Phrase: Christ, have mercy.

For fighting and war to cease in our world. Christ, have mercy.

For peace on earth and good will towards all. Christ, have mercy.

For the safety of all who travel. Christ, have mercy.

For jobs for all who need them. Christ, have mercy.

For care of those who are growing old. Christ, have mercy.

For the safety, health and nutrition of all the children in our world. Christ, have mercy.

For the well-being of our families and friends. Christ, have mercy.

For the good health of those we know to be ill. Christ, have mercy.

For the remembrance of those who have died. Christ, have mercy.

For the forgiveness of all of our sins. Christ, have mercy.

Youth Liturgist:          The Peace of the Lord be always with you.

People:                        And also with you.

Song during the preparation of the Altar and the receiving of an offering

Offertory Hymn: If I Were a Butterfly (Christian Children’s Songbook, # 9)

1-If I were a butterfly, I’d thank you Lord for giving me wings.  If I were a robin in the tree, I’d thank you Lord that I could sing.  If I were a fish in the sea, I wiggle my tail and I’d giggle with glee, but I just thank you Father for making me, me. 

Refrain:  For you gave me a heart and you gave me a smile.  You gave me Jesus and you made me your child.  And I just thank you Father for making me, me.

2-If I were an elephant, I’d thank you Lord by raising my trunk.  If I were a kangaroo, you know I’d hop right up to you.  If I were an octopus, I thank you Lord for my fine looks.  But I just thank you Father, for making me, me.  Refrain

3-If I were a wiggly worm, I’d thank you Lord that I could squirm.  If I were a billy goat, I’d thank you Lord for my strong throat.  If I were a fuzzy-wuzzy bear, I’d thank you Lord for my fuzzy-wuzzy hair.  And I just thank you Father for making me, me.  Refrain

Doxology

Praise God from whom all blessings flow. Praise Him, all creatures here below.

Praise Him above, ye heavenly host. Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.

Prologue to the Eucharist

Jesus said, “Let the children come to me, for to them belong the kingdom of heaven.”

All become members of a family by birth or adoption.

Baptism is a celebration of birth into the family of God.

A family meal gathers and sustains each human family.

The Holy Eucharist is the special meal that Jesus gave to his friends to keep us together as the family of Christ.

The Lord be with you

And also with you.

Lift up your hearts

We lift them to the Lord.

Let us give thanks to God.

It is right to give God thanks and praise.

It is very good and right to give thanks, because God made us, Jesus redeemed us and the Holy Spirit dwells in our hearts.  Therefore with Angels and Archangels and all of the world that we see and don’t see, we forever sing this hymn of praise:

Holy, Holy, Holy (Intoned)

Holy, Holy, Holy Lord, God of Power and Might.  Heav’n and earth are full of your glory.

Hosanna in the highest.  Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. 

Hosanna in the highest. Hosanna in the Highest.

All may gather around the altar

Our grateful praise we offer to you God, our Creator;

You have made us in your image

And you gave us many men and women of faith to help us to live by faith:

Adam and Eve, Abraham and Sarah, Isaac and Rebekah, Jacob and Rachael.

And then you gave us your Son, Jesus, born of Mary, nurtured by Joseph

And he called us to be sons and daughters of God.

Your Son called us to live better lives and he gave us this Holy Meal so that when we eat

  the bread and drink the wine, we can  know that the Presence of Christ is as near to us as  

  this food and drink  that becomes a part of us.

And so, Father, we bring you these gifts of bread and wine. Bless and sanctify them by your Holy Spirit to be for your people the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ our Lord.  Sanctify us by your Holy Spirit so that we may love God and our neighbor

On the night when Jesus was betrayed he took bread, said the blessing, broke the bread, and gave it to his friends, and said, "Take, eat: This is my Body, which is given for you. Do this for the remembrance of me."

After supper, Jesus took the cup of wine, gave thanks, and said, "Drink this, all of you. This is my Blood of the new Covenant, which is shed for you and for many for the forgiveness of sins. Whenever you drink it, do this for the remembrance of me."

Father, we now celebrate the memorial of your Son. When we eat this holy Meal of Bread and Wine, we are telling the entire world about the life, death and resurrection of Christ and that his presence will be with us in our future.

Let this holy meal keep us together as friends who share a special relationship because of your Son Jesus Christ.  May we forever live with praise to God to whom we belong as sons and daughters.

By Christ, and with Christ, and in Christ, in the unity of the Holy Spirit all honor and glory

 is yours, Almighty Father, now and for ever. AMEN.

And now as our Savior Christ has taught us, we now sing,

Our Father: (Renew # 180, West Indian Lord’s Prayer)

Our Father who art in heaven:  Hallowed be thy name.

Thy Kingdom come, Thy Will be done: Hallowed be thy name.

Done on earth as it is in heaven: Hallowed be thy name.

Give us this day our daily bread: Hallowed be thy name.

And forgive us all our debts: Hallowed be thy name.

As we forgive our debtors: Hallowed be thy name.

Lead us not into temptation: Hallowed be thy name.

But deliver us from evil: Hallowed be thy name.

Thine is the kingdom, power, and glory: Hallowed be thy name.

Forever and ever: Hallowed be thy name.

Amen, amen, amen: Hallowed be thy name.

Amen, amen, amen: Hallowed be thy name.

Breaking of the Bread

Celebrant:       Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us.

People:            Therefore let us keep the feast. 

Words of Administration

Communion Song: Jesus, Stand Among Us (Renew! # 17)

1-Jesus, stand among us at the meeting of our lives, be our sweet agreement at the meeting of our eyes; O, Jesus, we love you, so we gather here, join our hearts in unity and take away our fear.

2-So to you we’re gathering out of each and every land, Christ the love between us at the joining of our hands; O, Jesus, we love you, so we gather here, join our hearts in unity and take away our fear.

3-Jesus, stand among us at the breaking of the break, join us as one body as we worship you our head.  O, Jesus, we love you, so we gather here, join our hearts in unity and take away our fear.

Post-Communion Prayer. 

Everlasting God, we have gathered for the meal that Jesus asked us to keep;

We have remembered his words of blessing on the bread and the wine.

And His Presence has been known to us.

We have remembered that we are sons and daughters of God and brothers

    and sisters in Christ.

Send us forth now into our everyday lives remembering that the blessing in the

     bread and wine spreads into each time, place and person in our lives,

As we are ever blessed by you, O Father, Son and Holy Spirit.  Amen.

Closing Song:   To God Be the Glory (Renew!  # 68)

To God be the glory, to God be the glory, to God be the glory for the things he has done.  With his blood he has saved me; with his power he has raised me; to god be the glory for the things he has done.

Dismissal:   

Liturgist: Let us go forth in the Name of Christ. 

People: Thanks be to God! 

Mothering Care for Our World

2  Lent C      March 13, 2022      
Gen.15:1-12,17-18   Ps. 27
Phil.3:17-4:1   Luke 13:22-35 

Lectionary Link

Let's begin with a lesson about words and language.  Words are abbreviations for entire experiences, so words are very reductive.  They're symbolic.  They are exaggerations.  Let me illustrate.  Long after Jesus had been a prophet killed in the city of Jerusalem, the writer of the Gospel of Luke who knew that Jerusalem had been destroyed, presented Jesus mourning over the city of Jerusalem.  "Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets..."  I don't think that the tourist bureau of Jerusalem has that on their welcome sign as a motto of their city, though they certainly want people to come and visit sites of tragic killings.

Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets....that cannot be literally true.  Why?  Jerusalem is the name of a geographical location, and locations cannot kill because they are not people.  But you say, by Jerusalem, the words of Jesus don't mean the location, Jerusalem refer to the people of that location.  But that is not literally true either.  Not all of the people of Jerusalem killed prophets.  And in fact, not that many prophets actually died in Jerusalem in its history.  In the Hebrew Scriptures, one cannot find the record of many prophets who were actually killed in Jerusalem.  Yes, the prophets often incurred the wrath of kings of Israel and Judah who did not like their rebuking words, but to say that the main thing about Jerusalem is that it has always been a place with people who killed prophets is not literally true.

The Jerusalem which killed Jesus was the Jerusalem controlled by Roman authorities who got involved in the dispute between warring groups in Judaism because there were insurrection passions involved when Jesus or anyone was referred to as rival to Caesar and his puppet King Herod.

The Greek word for city is "polis" from which we get political.  Jerusalem is like any city, which has politics which can lead to good and righteous people getting killed when they speak the truth to power.

We could say today that when any invasion has occurred and innocent people are killed, "that a city of people with political motives of power and greed, kill the prophets and the innocent."  I think that these words about Jerusalem could be said throughout history of almost any nation or country when power and greed in people resulted in the innocent deaths of good prophets, innocent people, subjugated people, and children.  One might hear today, "Moscow, Moscow, the city that kills the innocent people far beyond its border in the nation of Ukraine," even though we know that is not literally true for all people in Russia.

The words of Jesus almost sound helpless in face of the freedom that people of power and greed have to try to kill innocent and good people of this world, especially those who are brave enough to speak truth to power on behalf of those who are treated the worst.

Mother Julian of Norwich wrote about Jesus as being a mother, and this image was inspired by Jesus wishing to be like a mother hen for Jerusalem gathering all the vulnerable under her wing.  Jesus came to teach this world that God is like a devoted mothering presence for us to embrace us and unite us and protect us as one human family of faith, as heirs of the promise to Abraham to be people of faith. 

But over and over again, we refuse the mothering of God to unite us, and the politics of greed, power, and even religion, all become complicit in killing prophets and innocent people.  Even now, the Russian Orthodox Church, a church which gave us the lovely icons, veneration to Blessed Mary, contradicts the mothering of God and their church leaders are blessing the invaders and the killing spree.  We too, know that religion in our country has often blessed wars that surely have not fit the requirement of being just actions to defend the innocent.

The words of Jesus about Jerusalem, are words of the heart ache cry of Jesus wishing that that human beings could be convinced of the mothering care of God and live this kind of care with each other.

St. Paul lived as a Jew and as a Roman citizen, but after the end of the Jewish homeland and the destruction of Jerusalem, he believed that the way to survive the politics of his time was to carry the passport as a citizen of heaven, a parallel realm of God.  The early churches were comprised of diaspora Jews, not so tied to their homeland.  Also ritual non-adhering Jews, and Gentiles made up the church as a group of people who for very practical reason came to accept heavenly citizenship, rather than be tied to the Holy Land of Israel.  Paul tried to live as a Jew and Roman citizen and as a heavenly citizen, and Rome became the city that killed Peter and Paul and made many others martyrs.  So, it could be said "Rome, Rome, the city that kills the prophets..."

You and I cannot escape the same dilemma of living as citizens of heaven, within the very messy politics of our time and place.  We need wisdom to know how to live in the cities where it remains that people of power and greed, find a way to persecute or kill out of significance the prophetic messengers of truth.

In the midst of a messy world, we must live from our heavenly citizenship of faith, and we must proclaim the values of Jesus Christ, to be the mothering presence of God's love and care protecting the vulnerable people of our world. Amen.

Cherishing Mortality Through Authenticity

Ash Wednesday   March 2, 2022

Isaiah 58:1-12 Ps.103

1 Cor. 5:20b-6:10 Matt. 6:1-6, 16-21

Lectionary Link

Welcome to our annual face painting liturgy.  No we're not like Native American braves going to war, so what is purpose of the ashes?  Most of us in some way have some vanity about how we look and we use various cosmetic means to make us look better to ourselves.

Ash Wednesday is a different kind of face painting, a different kind of cosmetics.  What are we doing?  With ashes imposed on our foreheads, we are trying to present to ourselves what our bodies will look like some day just before they have reach the phase of being in a state of transformation into something that might actually be useful to let either a rose or a weed to grow in the earth.

The dust of the ashes is revist of the Genesis creation story in the laboratory of God who makes humanity and uses one part dust and dirt and one major part Holy Spirit. The mixture of the two made the soul which came to be the great interior mediator between the body and the direct image of God upon us.  The soul includes mind, emotions and our will, our choosing power.

Our bodies are very important; they are the address and the location for spirit and soul.  Our observation of what happens in time, change, and aging indicate a separation of soul and spirit from the body which gets left behind to become dust.  So the ashes of Ash Wednesday, symbolically represent the final earthly state of our bodies before they transform on the invisible level to be recycled within the physical world to contribute to the future physical life of the world, becoming fertilizer for weed or flower or tomato.

We represent the future of our bodies with these ashes, not to depress ourselves, because when our bodies have become ashes, we will be gone.  We place the ashes on our head not to depress ourselves but to cherish the wonderful mixture of body, soul and spirit which is the genius of human life.

And because we cherish this combination of body, soul and spirit, we want this formula to be live with authenticity.  That is what the words of Jesus asks of us, authenticity.  How do we make body, soul, and spirit all agree about what is the highest expression of human living.

The highest expression of human life is not to look religious in public; it is to be authentic when our private lives in our closets agree with the deeds that we do in public.  The Greek word for hypocrite also means actor.  An actor plays someone whom he or she isn't.  Acting is fine for the theatre, but the purpose of faith is to unite the entire person, body, soul, and spirit to express the highest values of love and justice. 

And authenticity is a life time task; we don't get there right away.  Being authentic also means learning; learning that the standard of perfection is always higher than we thought it was.  So it means that we always have room to grow.

Let us today, cherish our lives in our bodies, while we have our location in them.  Let us also cherish the earth as the "body of God,"and be good stewards of our environment.  How do we cherish life in our body?  By living authentically.  Jesus and his words are God's gift to us to teach us to live authentic lives.  And may this Lent be for us a journey in further authenticity, as persons, as a parish, as a country and as world citizens.  Amen.