Dear Friends,
What a week this has been. I don’t know about you, but I feel a bit whipsawed by all that is happening in our country and our lives.
This past Sunday we celebrated the Epiphany with an evening service after a glorious morning packed with folks ready to start the new year at church! At our service, we blessed chalk to be used in our homes to chalk the lintels of our front doors (you can get yours this Sunday!). Courtney chanted the Epiphany Proclamation, an ancient tradition to announce the “moveable feasts” of the year, such as Easter, Pentecost, and the beginning of Advent. We included the moveable feasts of All Saints, too: the Bake Auction, the Ravenswood Run, the Pet Blessing . . .
Epiphany, taken from the Greek word for “to reveal,” is one of the major feasts of the church and for good reason: it commemorates the revelation of Jesus as the Messiah, not just for one people but for the whole world.
And as a person of faith who looks forward each year to January 6th, to celebrating with worship and blessed chalk and king cakes and Magi, I find it repugnant that what we remember now on January 6th in our civic life is a violent insurrection.
So, this week has been a hard one as well as a holy one: a day doubled in joy and sorrow; a week watching Los Angeles burn in a fury of climate agony, fearing for our friends, families, and future; the funeral of a President who was a model of integrity for a century, who called us to our best selves, a celebration of his life that also feels like the passing of an era in our national life.
I wonder if you are also feeling a little whipsawed, a bit weighed down?
One of our practices in small groups at All Saints and in our weekly staff meetings is to share “God sightings.” Where have we experienced the Holy recently? I’ve been thinking about how in answering that question I often reach for the moments of joy and beauty, which, of course, are essential to our understanding of God. I am now also working to be alert to God’s presence even in the sorrow, the anger, the tragedy, for surely, God is manifest, revealed, even there, too.
This Sunday is the Baptism of our Lord, when we celebrate Jesus’ baptism and recognition as God’s “Beloved,” which means we are beloved, too. See you in church!
Faithfully, Suzanne+
P. S. Mark your calendars! Our Annual Meeting is January 26 and will be “wicked” fun!