On Being the Church
Beloved in Christ,
In times of local, national, and global upheaval, I find myself profoundly grateful for the bedrock of a church community.
I find myself profoundly grateful to be a part of this community.
Last week, during Lectio Divina, about twenty of us prayed the scriptures together. Quietly. Contemplating our place in the Gospel text. Contemplating where God is calling each of us in our lives of faith.
This spacious quietness allowed several folks to share their pain, their fears, their joys.
The life of the church is rooted in Christ, and its purpose is in part to be with one another through the trials and travails, the triumphs and tragedies, of our fragile lives in the midst of a broken and sin-sick world.
It is, in my experience, difficult to find places to rest with one another in the highs and lows of life.
But the Church is, ideally, a place where this can be done. Where we can be held in one another’s hearts, held by Christ’s own hands, held by people made in the image of God (Genesis 1:27).
Our local communities continue to face immense challenges. Nancy Guthrie, a Tucson resident, has been kidnapped. People continue to be disappeared from our homes and streets and shipped off into detention facilities without due process of any sort.
And in the midst of that, we continue to gather, to be with one another, to pray for those in need, and to act as we can. I am heartened because I feel that, however imperfect we may be, we strive to be a light to the world which the darkness does not overcome - following in the footsteps of our Lord, Jesus Christ (John 1:5)
We mourn. We lament. We act. We rest and recover and go at it again. We pray. We seek the very face of God who is I AM (Exodus 3:14). The very God who incarnated as Jesus Christ of the Blessed Virgin Mary. The very God who bestows the Holy Spirit upon us, and empowers us to be the Church which the world groans for (Romans 8:22-26).
May we continue to be the Church which God calls us to be.
Yours in Christ,
Alex+