<html><body><div>Although my homily for Wednesday is shorter than usual, Propertalk sent my email to the black home for moderator approval.</div><div><br></div><div>I'll split it to see what happens. I put this together from thoughts last night and the Facebook quote of Jan Richardson - I have several of her books - very good!<div style="background-color: transparent; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Times New Roman; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;"><br></div><div style="background-color: transparent; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Times New Roman; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;">Bob</div><div style="background-color: transparent; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Times New Roman; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;"><br></div><div style="background-color: transparent; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Times New Roman; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;">
<p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 13.33px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">THE
EPISCOPAL CHURCH OF ST. ALBAN, ALBANY<span style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"> </span><span style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"> </span><span style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"> </span>ASH WEDNESDAY</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 13.33px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">JOEL
2:1-2, 12-17<span style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"> </span><span style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"> </span><span style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"> </span><span style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"> </span><span style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"> </span><span style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"> </span>14<sup>th</sup> FEBRUARY, 2018</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 13.33px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">2
CORINTHIANS 5:20b – 6:10<span style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"> </span><span style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"> </span><span style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"> </span><span style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"> </span><span style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"> </span>PSALM 103:8-14</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 13.33px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">MATTHEW
6:1-6, 16-21</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 13.33px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 13.33px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"> </span>On the face of it, you and I might
be excused for thinking that today’s titles might be an oxymoron, an emotional
downer, which may seem to take the pleasure out of what we hold to be most
uplifting, most renewing in life. The celebration of love – something which we
do, actually, every time we make our Thanksgiving through the Eucharistic Sacrament;
the celebration of love is all about affirming the most precious element of our
livers. It sustains us. It reaffirms us. It talks to us of being dignified and
valued. The old song said, “Love makes the world go round.” To know that one is
loved is, indeed, such a gift that it’s almost indescribable.</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 13.33px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"> </span>I say “almost” because the “being
loved” calls from us a response that we should at least try to put into words
and deeds how uplifting being loved is. The discovery that we are being loved should
help us to find a way to respond. Being loved should bring us to the exploration
of who we are and what we are, so that we can take that and give it,
unreservedly, to the source of that love. Being loved means not thinking about
any cost to us. Or maybe that’s not true. Perhaps being loved should help us to
see the costliness, the vulnerability of the person offering the loving, and
should draw from us an equal response of offering to the other something which
we consider most precious to ourselves – life itself.</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 13.33px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"> </span>The starting point of this response,
then, is, obviously, to say “Thank you”. Or perhaps this isn’t so obvious,
because to pour out ourselves, to give our life and all that’s important, as
much as it may bring an incredible smile to our faces, is so costly.</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 13.33px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"> </span>This is all the more important when
we acknowledge our mortality. “Make me to number my days,” pleads the psalm
writer, because then perhaps, we could know when to stop being selfish and
arrogant, and when to be loving. But the point of Ash Wednesday, this day’s
other title, the point of Ash Wednesday and Valentine’s Day coinciding is that
we don’t know when we’ll be dust. We don’t know when we’ll take our last breath
and lose the ability to smile at those who are most important; or to listen to
those people; or to share a special word or memory.</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 13.33px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"> </span>And as this is true of those along
our personal pilgrimage on earth, so it is true of our relationship with God.</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 13.33px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"> </span>One of the factors behind trying to
follow a particular discipline in Lent is that it helps us to try to discover
how to try to make the best use of the time we have, and to set aside whatever
is crippling us and those around us.</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 13.33px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"> </span>Last year at this time I’d just read
Endo’s novel called “Silence” and seem the film. It talks of human beings’
capacity to put anything and everything ahead of other people, and ahead of
what we know to be true and decent. This is especially true when we may be
adversely affected about taking a stance or advocating for another. Sadly, this
is true when we discover the costliness of love.<span style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"> </span></span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 13.33px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"> </span>“Sin,” reflected Fr. Rodrigues, one
of the principal characters in the novel, “Sin is not what it is usually
thought to be; it is not to steal and to tell lies. Sin is for one man to walk
brutally over the life of another and to be quite oblivious of the wounds he
has left behind.” <span style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"> </span><sup>1</sup></span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 13.33px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"> </span>One person walking brutally over the
life of another in complete oblivion of what that person is doing to anyone
else. It is the withholding of love, the cheapening of love to something that
doesn’t make demands on our hearts and minds.</span></p>
</div><p style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><div style="background-color: transparent; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Times New Roman; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 13.33px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"> </span></span></div><div style="background-color: transparent; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Times New Roman; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 13.33px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br></span></span></div></p><b></b></div></body></html>