Dean's Blog

Holy Saturday

Todd Donatelli — Sat, 07 Apr 2012 10:25:12 -0400

Psalm 31:1-3

In te, Domine, speravi

1

In you, O LORD, have I taken refuge;
let me never be put to shame; *
deliver me in your righteousness.

2

Incline your ear to me; *
make haste to deliver me.

3

Be my strong rock, a castle to keep me safe,
for you are my crag and my stronghold; *
for the sake of your Name, lead me and guide me.

Blessed Holy Saturday,

Todd

Good Friday

Todd Donatelli — Fri, 06 Apr 2012 09:22:07 -0400

“…according to the burial custom…”

What does it take to prepare a body?

What does it take to wash it, care for it, bear it, and wrap it in cloths?

What does it take to practice fidelity with one who is gone?

What does it take to lay this down and walk back home?

Todd

Maundy Thursday

Todd Donatelli — Thu, 05 Apr 2012 06:36:26 -0400

I have heard the passion narrative on Palm Sunday for decades. Yet I can’t recall ever noticing the above verse. It happens after they have had the ‘last supper’, the Passover meal. It is the last thing they do before going out into the night. By this time they are all aware of the danger in Jerusalem. I am guessing that in regard to the tension during that meal, as the saying goes, ‘you could cut it with a knife’. And the last thing they do before going out is to sing a hymn. I wonder what text they sang.

What will get them through these next days? These next weeks? These next years? When faced with the history and terror of Roman ‘cleansing’ of opposition, with the death and devastation of their friend, when faced with the obliteration of all they knew, what do they do?

We speak much of disciplines and practices as that which guides, shapes and informs, feeds and calls our communal and personal lives. We name the practice and movement of the Eucharistic Community: gather the people, tell the stories, break the bread, go out. When Jesus and his fellow pilgrims are faced with the end of their lives, what do they do? They gather around a table, they tell stories, they break bread, they sing a hymn and they go out. I wonder what they sang.

Join us tonight as we gather, tell the stories, break the bread, sing the hymns and go out into the darkness of this night.

Todd

Wednesday in Holy Week

Todd Donatelli — Wed, 04 Apr 2012 07:45:08 -0400

At supper with his friends, Jesus was troubled in spirit, and declared, "Very truly, I tell you, one of you will betray me." The disciples looked at one another, uncertain of whom he was speaking. One of his disciples-- the one whom Jesus loved-- was reclining next to him; Simon Peter therefore motioned to him to ask Jesus of whom he was speaking. So while reclining next to Jesus, he asked him, "Lord, who is it?" Jesus answered, "It is the one to whom I give this piece of bread when I have dipped it in the dish." So when he had dipped the piece of bread, he gave it to Judas son of Simon Iscariot. After he received the piece of bread, Satan entered into him. Jesus said to him, "Do quickly what you are going to do." Now no one at the table knew why he said this to him. Some thought that, because Judas had the common purse, Jesus was telling him, "Buy what we need for the festival"; or, that he should give something to the poor. So, after receiving the piece of bread, he immediately went out. And it was night. John 13

For me this is one of the more troubling gospel passages. It is akin to the moment in the Passion reading when the crowd shouts, “Crucify him!” I of course would like to think I would never be the one who betrays or be among those shouting for any person’s demise, let alone Jesus’.

I would like to think as I have grown older I have grown beyond the playground groups of kids who bully or take advantage of the one who is out of favor with the crowd that day. I would like to think I don’t ever betray others or somehow am above calling for the removal of the person or thing that confronts my life in some way.

More honest is that I have grown more subtle about it. Today I simply allow the dignity of individuals to be violated through my silence when someone is putting down another person or group of persons: ‘Can you believe they did…’ ‘Can you believe they think…’ Today I often hide behind the phrase, ‘Well this is pretty complex.’ I wish I was beyond not speaking up lest the other person take some offense. Today I am more likely to say, ‘Bless their hearts’ which really means ‘dumb son-of-a-gun.’ Today I say I am too busy to find some way to confront the erosion of communal responsibility for the children in our state, our country, and our world. Today I think I have too much to do to engage the ostracism of ‘strangers’ in our country, strangers who the scriptures command me to care for. Today I simply shut out the things that bring too much discomfort. After all is it not more expedient to eliminate than to engage.

Todd

Tuesday in Holy Week

Todd Donatelli — Tue, 03 Apr 2012 08:22:30 -0400

“Now among those who went up to worship at the festival were some Greeks. They came to Philip, who was from Bethsaida in Galilee, and said to him, "Sir, we wish to see Jesus." Philip went and told Andrew; then Andrew and Philip went and told Jesus. Jesus answered them, "The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. Very truly, I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. Those who love their life lose it, and those who hate their life in this world will keep it for eternal life. Whoever serves me must follow me, and where I am, there will my servant be also. Whoever serves me, the Father will honor. "Now my soul is troubled. And what should I say-- `Father, save me from this hour'? No, it is for this reason that I have come to this hour. Father, glorify your name." Then a voice came from heaven, "I have glorified it, and I will glorify it again." John 12:20-36

“Well, I don't know what will happen now. We've got some difficult days ahead. But it really doesn't matter with me now, because I've been to the mountaintop. And I don't mind. Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its place. But I'm not concerned about that now. I just want to do God's will. And He's allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I've looked over. And I've seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the promised land! Martin Luther King, Jr. April 3, 1968

The Psalmist cries, “How long, O Lord, how long?” The reading for today and the words of Dr. King 44 years ago today echo each other: those who choose fidelity with God will lose their life. It is not a question of if. The names Trayvon Martin and George Zimmerman are only the latest reminders that we are not yet in the promised land. They also remind us this is not about ‘us and them’. We, all of us, we, as a people, travel this path together. I do believe that either all of us get to the promised land or none of us gets there. That is not only a proclamation of the scriptures, it is also suggested by science and history: ‘we live in an inescapable web of mutuality’.

In sharing this moment of the Greeks coming to Jesus, the evangelist proclaims this is what the life of God is about: eliminating all ‘us/them’ understanding- 'all people from east, west, north and south will stream to the mountain of God'. As well, Jesus’ response proclaims that any who seek to be with and for all people will always face terror and death. What life is God asking us to lay down so that all persons, we, as a people, we/them/us/you/me/God, will find our life?

Blessed Holy Week,

Todd

Monday in Holy Week

Todd Donatelli — Mon, 02 Apr 2012 15:30:31 -0400

This has to be one of the strangest gospel readings. It is about five miles from Bathpage to Jerusalem. The people would have spent the better part of a day making this journey with Jesus. No doubt they attracted many folks along the way. Cloaks, palms and their deepest expectations are brought to Jesus.

The trappings of the event would not have been lost on the crowd. For through another gate in Jerusalem the Roman Governor would enter the city amid great pomp and ceremony with grand, noble beasts and not a donkey. Jesus is offering up not only a contrast but a confrontation. It is easy to understand the expectations the crowd would have watching Jesus ride in: here is the day of God’s deliverance, the new king who will overturn Roman control and free us to live; today all will be made right in our lives.

Great expectations turn to anti-climax. “…he looked around at everything, as it was late, he went out to Bethany with the twelve.” If I had spent the day and perhaps years waiting for this moment I would have expected more, much more. This will not be the last time in the week their expectations will be deeply challenged.

What am I expecting from God? What do I think will be my new life? Our new life? What am I expecting God to overturn and change? What expectations am I bringing to Jesus this week?

Blessed Monday in Holy Week,

Todd

Reflections around the anniversary of 9/11

Todd Donatelli — Thu, 08 Sep 2011 14:54:40 -0400

It was the first time I had 'sat shiva'. Shiva, a Jewish custom, refers to the seven days of observed grief after the burial of a family member. It is customary for friends and relatives to visit the family members during those seven days to 'sit with' the family and talk about the person who has died. I found myself telling the spouse of my deceased friend what their partner had meant to my life. I found myself talking to his grown children about what he had meant to me. For seven days people came to the house to laugh, to cry and to be quiet. It stands in contrast to many funerals I experience where talk about the deceased ends as soon as the deviled eggs run out.

I do not think we as a country, even we as a faith community, understand the importance of grieving and the practice of lament. It is practiced much differently in Jewish culture. Lament is not seen as some morbid practice of depressed, weak and hopeless persons, but instead is understood as necessary to any life of health and hope.

My guess is that most of us are not intimately familiar with the biblical book of Lamentations. Its five chapters are not the kind of thing you would read to your children at bedtime. We do read it at Tenebrae on the night of Good Friday. It is five chapters of named grief; five chapters of named loss, emptiness and dismay. "Is it nothing to all of you who pass by? Look and see if there is any sorrow like my sorrow."

I don't like to feel pain. I really don't like to feel emptiness. I really don't like the fear of an unknown, insecure future. As a species we don't tend to respond well to fear and unknown. Rather than be present to it we tend to seek its removal by action, action which is about seeking control when we feel none.

The Hebrews knew that to find life they had to face their emotions and name their emotions. Only then could they act free of the darker temptations of those emotions

As a country we are engaging in an anniversary that returns us to a day whose uniqueness is compared to days like Pearl Harbor (a day which over half of us were not alive for). We felt on 9/11 what a large part of our world feels on a regular basis: threat, fright, fear of an unknown future. On that day we were offered the ability to know and the ability to be companions with those for whom these realities are a regular part of life.

If Jesus lived anything it was being present with people who were at the mercy of those who sought to control them from a place of fear. He allowed their sufferings to be his sufferings. He allowed their laments to be his. He wailed with them as much as he danced with them. In being present with them he and they found hope.

My hope in all of this is that we somehow learn the gift of lament; that we somehow learn the importance of sitting with emptiness, sitting with our grief and finding names for our grief. My hope is that we learn to be present and learn to observe communally these realities and emotions. I believe that in so doing we can avoid a future born of our loss executed on others. I believe in so doing we will find the path to a future born of loss grieved.

"The joy of our hearts has ceased; our dancing has been turned to mourning. Because of this our hearts are sick, because of these things our eyes have grown dim; Why have you, O Lord, forgotten us completely? Restore us to yourself, O Lord, that we may be restored." The Book of Lamentations.

Peace,

Todd Donatelli

Holy Saturday: waiting with

Todd Donatelli — Sat, 23 Apr 2011 09:15:19 -0400

"O God, Creator of heaven and earth; Grant that, as the crucified body our your Son was laid in the tomb and rested on this holy Sabbath, so we may await with him..." Collect for Holy Saturday, BCP p. 221

Good Friday: death

Todd Donatelli — Fri, 22 Apr 2011 08:51:34 -0400

Jesus' death was nothing new. It was not the first and would not be the last. Put to death that which threatens. Eliminate that which might cause us to see things differently. Eliminate that which might cause us to make room in our lives for things we don't wish to welcome. Put them down. Put them to death. It is a common human exercise. It is still practiced today.

What will speak to our fear, the fear that causes us to put down others, to put down movements, causes us to put down ourselves?

On Good Friday,

Todd

Maundy Thursday: love

Todd Donatelli — Thu, 21 Apr 2011 08:15:29 -0400

The Beatles had it right. They just couldn't do it.

"All you need is love." Was that not what Jesus said? The basis of life, the foundation of it all is love. So why could John not stand Paul? (John and Paul of the Beatles of course, not the evangelist and the apostle, though we do know that Paul and Peter were not too keen on each other).

It sounds so simple. "What the world needs now is ...." And for millennia the human species seems not to have gotten any further along the road of love.

Love is patient, love is kind, love hopes all things, these may be true, and love is hard. What Jesus evidences, what he witnesses to those with whom he comes in contact is that love is something that is lived over time. Love involves choices. Acts of love can at times be viewed by others as something harsh. Love takes work. Love has as its basis something that fuels that work: a basic belief and a basic commitment. It also must be fed.

My guess is that those who were around Jesus saw him work at love and I am sure he had his moments. So as his darkness grows, as the terrain around him becomes more foreboding than ever before, where does he turn? He takes a towel and a bowl. He makes a choice. He goes to work. "If you are going to live into this, if you are going to grow into this, do as I do. No it makes no obvious sense, and it will take you to places you cannot know until you do it."

Blessed Maundy Thursday,

Todd

Wednesday in Holy Week: betrayal

Todd Donatelli — Wed, 20 Apr 2011 08:06:45 -0400

It is an intimate scene. The disciples are gathered with Jesus for a meal. Having a meal with Jesus was very common for these gathered. Over several years time they may have had over a thousand meals with him. Their posture is typical for their time: reclining around the table, one of the disciples reclining against Jesus.

Yet this meal seems different. Jesus seems different, seems more agitated than usual. Then they hear, "One of you will betray me." I think the fact they want to know who it is betrays more than curiosity. I think it suggests they could see a scenario in which they were the betrayer. Perhaps by then they had already had occasion to betray him in one way or another.

I want to know. For I wonder if it might be me. I too often hope a Judas will step forward so I can feel better about myself: "See, it wasn't me. Well, at least this time."

I have the sense we as a community don't have to look too far to find betrayal. Because we have a communal budget shortfall we are likely to cut prison chaplains from our payroll. That's ok, let them have volunteer chaplains. Because of our communal budget shortfall we are looking at cutting food aid to our children and our seniors. Because of our communal shortfall we are looking at cutting pregnancy planning even as we know cutting this will cost our community much more down the road in funds and in significant emotional stress. As we consider cutting these things to become 'fiscally responsible' we as a commune are responsible for 42% of all military spending globally, more than the next 9 countries combined, including China (7%), Russian (3.6%) and the country we refer to as 'no truer friend', the UK (3.7%). While cutting all the above, not to mention cuts affecting the basic integrity of our educational system, we will not reflect seriously on why we as a community are the over functioning sibling of global military spending.

What does Holy Week have to do with this?

"I tell you, one of you will betray me."

"Lord, who is it?"

On Wednesday in Holy Week,

Todd

Tuesday in Holy Week: ministry

Todd Donatelli — Tue, 19 Apr 2011 15:02:49 -0400

For 24 years I have gathered with lay people, deacons, priests and bishops during Holy Week for the reaffirmation of vows. It is a time where all the orders of the church, lay and ordained, have the opportunity to reflect on our respective ministry vows be they baptismal or ordination vows. 24 times I have stood with the body of Christ for this. 24 times I have left the liturgy in an awed reverence for the degree to which God trusts us, for the depths in which God believes in us.

In the Gospel for Tuesday in Holy Week, some Greeks come to Jesus' disciples asking to see Jesus. When the disciples tell him these folks want to see him, Jesus does not go see them. Instead it is left to the disciples 'to show' these folks Jesus. These Greeks will indeed see Jesus, and they will see Jesus in the disciples.

The ability of the world to see and experience the Good News of God in Christ is left entirely to us by God. The longer I live the more I realize God is not wincing when the Holy One considers to whom this is entrusted. Quite the contrary. God is heartened by us, by our capacity to manifest the sacred.

As we continue in the story of Holy Week, as we encounter the betrayals, the faithful choices, the fear and courage, the temptation to run and the hunger to stay, may we also remember God's belief in us. May we remember that God has not left ministry to the perfect or the 'obviously holy' ones. God has given it to us fully conscious of every last aspect of who we are.

Blessed Holy Week,

Todd

Monday in Holy Week: seeing and not seeing

Todd Donatelli — Mon, 18 Apr 2011 09:39:56 -0400

Palm Sunday seems to capture more of human experience than any short story I know. In it I find too much of my own experience: joining the enthusiasm of a crowd first to affirm the excitement and then to be swayed to finger point, denigrate and scapegoat, hoping and then having hope crushed, creeping in shadows like Peter 'to see how this would come out', the resigned faithfulness of Joseph to claim the body no one wished to claim, the stunned faithfulness of the woman who at the end of the day sit looking at the tomb where their joy and hope has been buried. It is appropriate we simply offer silence at the end of the passion. Words would be an affront; suggesting we have any immediate response would be idolatrous.

This week allows more time to sink into the story; more time to let the myriad of scenes and emotions of the Passion speak and invite us into their truth.

Today we have those who are seeing and those who are not. While it is no secret by now the evangelists show regularly it is the unexpected who see and the expected who do not see, it continues to be worth our contemplation why that is. It is contemplation particularly worthwhile for people who are 'inside' the church, perhaps we could say we who are the 'expected' to see.

Today I will sit quietly before the woman as she anoints Jesus' feet. I will resist quick words and let the image wash through my mind. Who is she and why is she so free?

Blessed Monday in Holy Week,

Todd

Lent Thursday Nights: Kathy Grieb and the Butterfly Effect

Todd Donatelli — Thu, 07 Apr 2011 07:26:01 -0400

When Kathy Grieb joins us tonight at 7 p.m. as part of our Lent Series on Reconciliation, she will be addressing how a 400 year old tradition, Anglicanism, responds to a world where our actions are now felt across the globe in less than 5 minutes.

I have mentioned that for the vast majority of its history The Anglican Communion acted more like cousins than siblings: people who recognized and were grateful for the members of our extended family yet who were very slow to engage ourselves in each other's business.

When The Episcopal Church affirmed the ordination of women in 1976 we received our news in the evening through 30 minute segments hosted by the likes of Walter Cronkite and David Brinkley. 30 minutes to communicate all the world events of the day. Today every human being with a cell phone is a potential camera person for 24 hour news channels with voracious appetites for film. The traditional buffers that allowed a certain slowness to receive and perceive news are gone.

What does this have to do with the Anglican Province of The Episcopal Church? What does this have to do with the Anglican Province of The Church of Uganda? Today each other's actions are experienced immediately and enhanced with the electrical current of contemporary anxiety. So how do we understand each other in this reality? How might we need to relate differently while valuing the traditional freedoms of individual provinces? (36 provinces in the Anglican Communion).

We are grateful to have Kathy Grieb with us to address these issues. Kathy is Professor of New Testament at Virginia Theological Seminary (where I studied and Kyle was an adjunct professor) and who has served as one of the The Episcopal Church's representatives for the work on the Anglican Covenant. You will find Kathy one who is respective of all the complexities of this issue and one who has a deep belief in this 400 year old experiment we call the Anglicanism. Please join us in the Nave this evening at 7 p.m. Dinner is served at 6 p.m.

Blessed Lent,

Todd

The Power of Words: Repairing the Breach, A Service of Reconciliation and Repentance

Todd Donatelli — Mon, 04 Apr 2011 13:17:43 -0400

I have heard the mafia references more than I care. Probably once was more than I needed. Now I want to say up front, as a white, straight male living in North America it will be a long, long time before my name shows up on any list of the oppressed. I don’t hear the dago and wop jokes much anymore, yet the reference still has some sting. The fact that I learned to say, “When your people were running through the woods with clubs and torches, mine were busy connecting Europe with roads and viaducts that still stand to this day. Oh, and the Renaissance? You’re welcome.” The fact that this runs off my tongue so quickly is merely a coincidence—right.

Again, I cannot say I know what it is to be a gay or lesbian person, I cannot say I know what it is like to be a Muslim in America, I cannot say I know what it is like to be a female (though I watched my mother work to get respect as a woman in the professional world—she will kill me for saying this) and I don’t know what it is like to be black in America. What I can remember is the jokes, the subtle comments from some fathers of girls I dated, and those who asked me if I had any family members in the mafia. I know what these moments did for me. And they were moments, not the day to day reality of those I have mentioned above.

By this point in my life if I hear comments like these I know to say internally ‘this says nothing about me’, to take a deep breath and move on with my life. And it would not slay me to hear an apology for those moments. Do I need an apology to live my life? No. Do I feel anyone owes me anything? No. Would it seem irrelevant or pointless? Not so sure. Might it change my experience of these moments?

In the Service of Reconciliation and Repentance which we will offer Saturday, April 9 at 11 am at Trinity Episcopal with the Presiding Bishop, there will be a time where we name and offer apology for the things perpetrated on African slaves brought to this country. My family never owned slaves and in fact my immigrant ancestors were likely paid what some would call slave wages when they came to this country in the mid 1800’s to work on the railroads. Yet I can understand that which was perpetrated on African slaves and have a compassion that allows me to voice an apology on behalf of those who were the perpetrators. I can recall the times I have made jokes about ethnic groups including African-American people. I remember the day I apologized to one of my best friends Rick for making a Jewish joke, to Rick in whose Bar Mitzvah I had participated.

I will attend this service and make apology not because I as a white person am a horrible person. I will attend and make apology not because I have some latent white guilt. I am not sure if I had lived in Charleston in the 1800’s, and was of means, whether or not I would have chosen to own a slave. I would like to think not. I cannot say with certainty I would have or would not have.

I will attend and voice apology because as one who works with words for a living, I know the power of words. I know the power of naming things and how the very naming begins to loosen the destructive power of those things. I know the power of hearing certain words even when you don’t expect them or believe you need them. I also know some of the attitudes I have carried, attitudes that have surprised me at times.

I remember the look of surprise on Rick’s face when I apologized. We were at our 20th high school reunion. I had made the Jewish reference 22 years before. He said, “Really? You said that?” He said, “I guess I was used to hearing that from folks from time to time.” While his affect in that statement was generous and sincere, the notion he had gotten used to those comments was not consoling for me. He then looked me in the eyes and said, “Thanks.”

Blessed Lent,

Todd