David Deppen's Sermon for 12.19.10

This sermon was preached by The Rev. David Deppen, on 12.19.10 at Church of the Nativity, on the occasion of the 51st anniversary of his ordination to the priesthood.

First of all, let me express my appreciation to Susan for her generous offer to let me celebrate the Eucharist this morning. After she had asked, I upped the ante by offering to preach as well. I wouldn’t have done that except for the fact that I have a sermon left over from a year ago – a sermon that went unheard. On this same Sunday last year, I was to celebrate my 50^th anniversary of ordination and the rector of our parish in Cape Cod – St Mary’s in Provincetown - issued the same invitation as Susan. Our family were all in Wellfleet for Christmas and all was in readiness. But that Sunday we awoke to a major snowstorm with a foot already on the ground and more coming down. The roads were a mess, the police warned against venturing out, and the 15 mile drive seemed foolhardy. Consequently, my 50^th went unheralded and the sermon went in my file. Until today! Not new, but unused and with a few obvious adjustments, here is what I wrote.

Fifty-one years ago today I was one of eleven men ordained to the priesthood of the Episcopal Church at St. James Cathedral in Chicago. Fifty-one years ago tomorrow I struggled through my first Eucharist, trying to get all the prayers and hand gestures and genuflections correct as befitted a proper newly minted Anglo-Catholic priest. I never did get the silent prayer at the Lavabo right, and when I confessed that a year or two later, my confessor nearly had a heart attack. Had I robbed a bank or run off with the organist, I would have upset him less. Well, fifty-one years later, I just wash my hands and to heck with the prayer.

In the greater scheme of things, fifty-one years is a pittance; in a lifetime, it amounts to a lot. Fifty-one years ago was like another world. Church going, for one thing, was all the rage. The parish where I was curate had an active men's club and several women's guilds, but the really big thing was the couple's club.

What a lot energy and creativity was poured into that group - and how much fun they had! The Church was a real focus for people's social lives, and I remember as if it were a refrain, the oft-repeated phrase "Church friends are the best friends."

Few of us were prepared for the changes that were to come, least of all this newly ordained cleric. It still amazes me that I could have gone through three years of seminary training, ignorant of and untouched by the breezes of Change that were soon to blow with gale force over the Church and nation.

In Seminary we used to joke that we were exquisitely trained to be 19^th Century English country parsons - right out of Trollope, if you please. It was not that there was any absence of prophets to caution us about the inevitability of the future, but as usual it was easier and more comfortable to ignore the prophets than to take them seriously. This has been the fate of prophets from the days of Israel down to the present.

In 1959, The Standing Liturgical Commission of the Episcopal Church had been at work for ten years in the long process leading to a new Prayer Book. It would be another 20 years before the new book was approved. But what phenomenal failure of vision led my seminary to ignore the work they were doing? The Civil Rights Movement was already underway, and its prophets could certainly be heard if we had listened. Viet Nam was, for most of us, still a failure of French Colonialism, but already CIA advisors were filling Saigon to prop up the Diem regime against a resurgent Ho Chi Minh, and the tragedy of the Viet Nam war was only a handful of years away. 'The voices of feminism were heard here and there, but who would have believed that women would be ordained priests within seventeen years when at that time they were not even seated as deputies to the General Convention of the Church.

Of course the issue of human sexuality was not on the radar screen then. AIDS had years to wait before it began to lay waste to so many gifted and vibrant men. And while there were gay priests by the dozens, no one raised the issue and "Don't ask; don't tell" worked like a charm.

Finally, the manifold advances in science and technology which have so altered our times were multiplying faster than anyone could keep up with them. The tempo of change was increasing dramatically, yet in 1959 I was ready to slip into a stable, secure and respected slot in what many of us still believed was a world we understood and could master. How soon that was all to change.

Today that old worldview which sustained us for so long has faded, and we are in the process of fashioning a new one to take its place. This is an uncomfortable time; we are in transition, and that is a suitable situation for our reflection in this Advent season. Advent is a time for waiting, a time of hope and expectation. What will be is not yet fully formed, and so we wait.

Many of us find it difficult entering that new world, but the birthing process is usually accompanied by trauma and pain. What we have to bring to the situation is our natural intelligence, the resilience and adaptability of our species, and, for those of us who profess the faith of Jesus Christ, a vision of what the world might be, indeed, what the world will be in the Day of the Lord. We bring the element of Christian hope, and the assurance that God reigns, into whatever confusion, doubt and uncertainty lie ahead.

What might we expect the role of the Church to be in this new age? First off, let me say what I think it will not be.

The Christian Church will never again enjoy the kind of centrality and power she experienced in the Western World for so long. The Western World itself has lost its grip and while the West may still be in the game, any dreams of the Church recovering its ancient supremacy are doomed to failure. The magisterium or teaching authority of the Church has largely vanished, as recent Popes know all too well. The very word magisterium speaks of an arrogance which makes honest men cringe. The days of "Father knows best" are mercifully long gone.

The popularity of Christian fundamentalism is a kind of last-ditch effort to hang on to what has been. It will not go away, but I believe it will become more and more eccentric and less and less influential over all. The Church that survives will be a genuinely constituted community of believers - of the committed. As for those who now cling to the fringes as a kind of insurance policy for heaven, or who utilize its services to be hatched, matched and dispatched, these will fade away.

Finally, I believe that for the Church to go forward with integrity into the future, she must embrace fully her calling as a servant Church. Triumphalism is not only dead; it was wrong in the first place. Jesus, at the Last Supper, washed his disciples’ feet as a sign of that servanthood. He said "The kings of the Gentiles lord it over them, but not so with you; rather the greatest among you must be like the youngest, and the leader like one who serves. I am among you as one who serves."

In the Near East and North Africa, where travel through barren and desert places was an arduous undertaking, it was the custom on caravan routes to set up shelters along the way where travelers might break their journey for a night's rest. It might be a small oasis or some other spot where comfort, shelter and safety could be found. Travelers would send servants on ahead to prepare at the next of these caravanserais, or resting places, for their arrival. It is this image of the caravanserai that Jesus used in his farewell discourse to the Disciples in John's Gospel. This is what He said, "Do not let your hearts be troubled. Believe in God, believe also in me. In my Father's house there are many dwelling places. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and take you to myself; so that where I am, there you may be also."

In the context in which they were first spoken, Jesus was clearly referring to his approaching death and resurrection - and his promise to his followers of their place with him in God' s Kingdom. In the translation I have used, the Greek word [unknown Greek word] is rendered as dwelling places; in others the word is rooms and in the familiar King James Version it is mansions.

Whatever the translation, it is Jesus who is the servant going on ahead to prepare a place and we who are His guests.

But in striking reversal of roles, today’s collect has us praying that we become the servants, so that at His coming Jesus may find in us a mansion prepared for Himself. That word mansion is misleading - it conjures up images of so many overbuilt properties peppering our area. Of course, no mansion would be great enough to house the Lord, but this is the servant king who was born in a strong smelling stable and was laid to rest in a borrowed tomb. Surely we can do better than that!

Servanthood was the hallmark of Jesus' life and ministry, and so it should be for the Church - for you and me who follow in His steps.

If we are to welcome the Christ-child into our lives this Christmas, if we are to prepare ourselves as a mansion for His dwelling place, we will need to clean house and lay up those treasures of the spirit which are uniquely ours to give, and in love and humility of service, embrace the world for which He gave his life.

Joy to the world! The Lord is come; let earth receive her king;

let every heart prepare him room, and heaven and nature sing.