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Home Page
The Rector's Welcome
Worship
Sermons
Music & the Organ
Newsletter
Schedule & Events
History
Programs & Ministries
Tour the Building
Links
Map & Directions
Monthly Calendar
Home Page
The Rector's Welcome
Worship
Sermons
Music & the Organ
Newsletter
Schedule & Events
History
Programs & Ministries
Tour the Building
Links
Map & Directions
Monthly Calendar
Fr. J. D. Ousley
30 October 2005Mt. 23.1-12“Free Long Distance”
In the Name of God: Creator, Redeemer, and Sanctifier. Amen.
When I hear today's Gospel lesson read in church, I often wonder how Roman Catholics, and Orthodox, and many Anglicans justify their custom of addressing their priests as "Father."
Jesus says to his disciples, "Call no one your father on earth, for you have one Father — the one in heaven." Seems pretty straightforward. So how can Christians seem to disregard the word of Jesus and call their priests, "Father Smith" or "Father Jones?"
And some who follow this custom always refer to their priests in this way. I know of Anglo-Catholic parishes in the Episcopal Church which have several priests on their staff, where the clergy serve together for years and they see each other every day — and they still address each other as "Father." The rector might say to his assistant, "Father, could you stop by my office this afternoon?"
In the Orthodox Church, this practice is taken so seriously that I once heard the wife of a Greek Orthodox priest address her own husband as "Father!"
Now some of you may be thinking, what about women priests? While the Orthodox and Roman Catholic churches don't ordain women, many Anglican churches do. And women can't be called, "Father." Well, some women priests like to be called, "Mother" — but that title has already been used traditionally by the heads of female religious orders. And other women priests don't want to be thought of as "mother superiors!"
Anyway, let's leave this issue of clergy titles — important though the topic may be! — and let's get back to Christ's original teaching. Christ's point seems to be that worldly, honorific names distract from the supreme respect that should be paid to God.
For, ultimately, there is only one "Father" — God in Heaven. And theologians have long pointed out that this "Father" is beyond human gender, neither male nor female. Reserving the title for God, then, is really a way of acknowledging the reality and the sovereignty of the divine.
Yet the same ambivalence we see in clergy titles can infect the way humans talk of God. While there is no Father like God the Father, many of us see this distance between us and God as signaling not God's authority but God's irrelevance. We give God honor and then we go on about our human business.
God certainly remains God! But we take advantage of God's distance from us; we live as we want as though God weren't around.
We recognize the infinite distance between human and the divine. But instead of this distance engendering respect, it does the opposite. Instead of respect, we feel indifference to the far-away Father. Out of sight, out of mind!
Jesus drew attention to this difference between the Divine and the human so that people wouldn't Adomesticate@ God — so they would recognize that the will of God should be the guiding force in the decisions they make.
Unfortunately, some people take Christ's words and go in the opposite direction. And God becomes so far from them that they can't see how God matters!
Happily though, another image Christ uses in the Gospel for today suggests a way for humans to bridge the gap between themselves and God. After restricting the use of "Father," Christ also says to the religious leaders, "you are not to be called rabbi, for you have one teacher, and you are all students."
Now, to Christ's audience, this admonition would have been a slap in the face. For it was just at this time that Hebrew authorities were beginning to be called "teacher," or "rabbi."
"Rabbi" was a sign of respect for their learning. Then as now, Jewish leaders gained authority in their communities because they were the most learned. They became teachers because they had more to teach than anyone else.
So Christ's words had the same effect as the injunction against the title, "Father," would have in some churches today. "Rabbi" was no longer to be a title of respect for human teachers. It was to be applied only to God.
Again, though, the issue isn't just clergy titles. Christ is making a broader point: what we learn in life that really counts comes from the Spirit of God. Divine inspiration is the best teacher.
Granted, these comments of Jesus about the term "rabbi" aren't as well-known as other parts of the Gospels. Yet they have a resonance in today's culture. Go into any bookstore and you'll find shelves of books that claim to offer spiritual teaching. Countless authors think they've discovered wisdom for living.
And, in this age of self-appointed gurus, Jesus reminds us that the most valuable spiritual teaching comes directly from the Spirit. Human spiritual guides are good — I'm sure you have profited the from spiritual writings of thoughtful Christians. But the most profound teacher for you will be the Holy Spirit at work in your soul.
Sarah Coakley is a British woman who teaches theology at Harvard Divinity School; I had some slight acquaintance with her a few years ago when I was trying to arrange for her to lecture at Incarnation, and so I read with interest a recent interview with her in a British publication.
In the interview, Professor Coakley described her personal religious journey. The end of the journey was a set of three thick books she has written on Christian doctrine that are about to be published. But to me, the beginning of her journey was even more impressive.
Professor Coakley had for some years been an exacting scholar of rather esoteric movements of Christian thought. Then, she began to spend a great deal of time in prayer, especially silent prayer.
"To begin with," she said in the interview, "this undertaking was very frightening for me: it was an embracing of a practice which is by no means a soft option. However, it was also uniquely alluring and magnetizing." She says that it was "as if all the fragmented pieces of my life were being lined up and drawn inexorably in one direction."
Her experience of silent prayer transformed her intellectual work: "What I discovered as a result of time on my knees was that my earlier dismantling of doctrines such as the incarnation and Trinity was itself being challenged and recast."
The result of this experience of God was not only three books of theology — Professor Coakley felt a new sense of how Christian doctrine is grounded and inspired by prayer.
For when we pray, the distance between the infinite God and the all-too-finite human being is overcome. God is found to be the one true Teacher.
As we are reminded in the baptismal liturgy, God grants to us "An inquiring and discerning heart," as well as "A spirit to know and to love God, and the gift of joy and wonder in all God's works."
Amen.