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As I sit looking out my bedroom window, evergreens stand at a distance like ballerinas, arms swaying, spines straight. Closer to the window is a naked, disease-ravaged tree that will be put out of her misery next week.

The evergreens and naked tree have caught my attention because of the reflective mood in which I find myself — post-holidays, four days into 2024.

All that I had just recently been anticipating — Christmas Eve services, family gatherings, gift giving and receiving, meals and treats prepared and shared — is now in the rearview mirror. Angels and shepherds have appeared and disappeared. Baby Jesus has been swaddled and rocked. Good tidings of great joy, delivered and received.

2023 is also now a thing of the past, and 2024 (a year that sounded futuristic and impossible to imagine, as a child) is what I’m remembering to write and type in notes and messages.

Yesterday during our weekly 8 a.m. Wednesday Embodied Prayer service in the chapel, we took a moment to imagine what a “new year” really is — another revolution of our planet earth circling around our sun in the cosmos— and tried to tap into the conscious awareness and wonder of it all, that we even get to be a part. Perhaps you already know this, but — as passengers on planet Earth — we are orbiting around the sun at 67,100 miles per hour (30 kilometers per second), which is like traveling from New York to London in about 3 minutes!

And so my friends, as we move forward together — hurtling through space on our planet Earth at 67,100 mph — with all that each of us is carrying in our hearts and experiencing in our lives on this 11th day of Christmas (the last “official” day of Christmastide is actually tomorrow), I offer these two poems below, on which to reflect and linger briefly. Neither of them are “new”, in that they’ve appeared in e-Redeemer before; and yet, they feel right to share and be reminded of again today.

Love,
Cristina

When the song of the angels is stilled,
when the star in the sky is gone,
when the kings and princes are home,
when the shepherds are back with their flocks, the work of Christmas begins:
To find the lost,
To heal the broken,
To feed the hungry,
To release the prisoner,
To rebuild the nations,
To bring peace among the people,
To make music in the heart.
― Howard Thurman

*****

as you walk
across the threshold
behind you — what has been
before you — what has yet to be
be mindful
of what
you carry with you

like one
who is packing
a bag
to go
on pilgrimage

take time
to be still
to reflect
to envision

choose with intention

and take special care
that your compass
orients
to the voice
of the One
who calls you forth

to be
to become
to embody
more fully
who you really are

Beloved

Beloved

Beloved

‘Twas the night before Christmas
And all through the nave
The people had gathered
‘Midst the cold that they’d braved

The garlands were hung
On the walls with great care
Shim’ring trees ‘hind the altar
Poinsettias on stairs

Families and relatives
Friends old and new
Children and elders
The faithful and true

Had come once again
For a tale that’s beloved
Of a babe in a manger
From heaven above

The children post-pageant
Sat hopeful and restless
Envisioning treats that
St. Nich’las might gift us

And I and my colleagues —
this time, we’re just three
(That’s Cristina, Rebecca,
and Freda Marie) —

Extend a warm welcome
To old-timers and new
Rector David on sabbatical
Sends well wishes too

Here in Charm City
There’ve been marvels to cheer
Let’s start with our O’s —
Oh my, what a year!

And while young people swoon
Over Taylor and Kelce
We’re over the moon
‘Cause Lamar has stayed healthy!

But ‘midst all the joy
And excitement, my dears,
There’s also been heartbreak
Terror and fear

The Holy Land weeps
As war rages on
Russia, Ukraine
Still don’t get along

And here in our town
Our neighbors still long
For a city that’s whole
A Baltimore that’s One

Loved ones have passed
Anxiety’s high
Global warming continues
Threatening res’voirs to dry

And AI is abound
Writing papers and such
Sometimes, I wonder,
Is it all just too much?

But hark, can’t you hear?
The trumpets that sound!
Those angels, they herald
A love that’s unbound!

A light that shines bright
‘Midst the darkness and gloom —
Love Incarnate Is Come
In your hearts, make ye room!

For hope is alive
Don’t let headlines fool you
Breathe deep and exhale
Let God’s vision renew you

May singing and prayer
And scripture remind us
What’s lasting and real:
The love that does bind us

One to another
As part of God’s dream
That all be made well
Be made whole and agleam

So tonight cast your care
Christ’s Spirit set things right
Merry Christmas to all
And to all a good night!

Love,
the Paglinauan-Warner family

I was ordained to the priesthood on the Feast of the Annunciation at the beautiful Church of the Annunciation in the Diocese of Dallas almost 14 years ago.  So, various artists’ paintings of the Annunciation have held special meaning for me of Our Mother’s encounter with the Divine since that time.  Imagine my shock, however, when I discovered that the one I was so powerfully drawn to and had meditated upon many times was actually painted by a Black man. I NEVER knew…and I’ll bet you didn’t either.

In 1898, Henry Osswana Tanner completed the image here that is currently displayed at the Philadelphia Museum of Art.  Born in Pittsburgh to a father who was a pastor and a mother who was formerly enslaved, Tanner, as an artist, sold and became known for several non-religious paintings before making religious art his primary passion.  After a visit to the Middle East, including Egypt and Palestine, he returned to paint the image here.

I LOVE this image.  Mary is so-o young and innocent here.  Her clasped hands and demure half-look at the numinous energy appearing before her make her appear beautifully fragile with a sense of “Are you sure?” or “Oh my….” simultaneously.

Yet, from the biblical story, we know she had only two things to say.  First, “How can this be?” and then, “Let it be….”

The angel Gabriel doesn’t appear with the typical angel wings either.  Gabriel is first and foremost light—pure, unadulterated, white light.  It has been said that Mr. Tanner had a gift for his use of light and color.  I feel as if I am in this room of Mary’s, perhaps in a corner, hearing the words she heard for the first time, too.

We are preparing to celebrate unmanifested Be-ing choosing to become manifested (or expressed) in and through its Creation.  The beauty of what we commonly call The INCARNATION is our own invitation to allow the birth of the DIVINE within us.

As far as I am concerned, we are each Mary, and we are each given the opportunity to say, “Let it be…” to all that G-D desires to reveal in and through us.  Indeed, Richard Rohr has said that Mary’s “yes” is to G-D’s request to be present in and to the world through us.”  It is time to stop struggling and to trust and surrender.  I’m excited at the possibilities of G-D in and through me. What about you?  Are you ready?

Christ-mass Love & Peace,
Freda Marie+

 

Dear all,

During my first year of seminary, while we trimmed the tree at our annual Advent party, two friends and I came across four ornaments, clearly homemade, that said “Death,” “Judgment,” “Heaven,” and “Hell.” Laughing, we held them up to look at — I had never seen these words next to a Christmas tree before. Our dean explained that these were the Four Last Things: themes that, somewhere and sometime during the Church’s history, it had been topical to preach on the four Sundays of Advent. Gathered together that evening, my friends and I were delighted by the seemingly transgressive take on a season that often overflows with cheer. The ornaments added a little punk rock flair to our decorations.

There is another set of themes for the four Sundays in Advent: Hope, Peace, Joy, and Love. I didn’t grow up with these, either, but as an adult (and now a Professional Church Person) I’ve found them and used them in prayers for lighting candles on an Advent wreath, or in children’s or family formation materials for the season. While they may not seem as hardcore as the Four Last Things on the surface, at their heart, underneath the layers of sweetness we (or at least I) can sometimes apply, I think they are. In particular, in this moment, during this Advent, I’m reflecting a lot on hope.

In the midst of death or despair, hope is hard to hang on to. The act of claiming it when others might dismiss it as naïve takes incredible determination: hope is an action. Think of peace advocates, standing in front of soldiers, or of climate activists again and again sounding the alarm about our warming planet. Hope is no easy thing. In its deepest form it requires us to confront death and despair, rather than hiding from it, and to look beyond it, for it is not the end. Standing for peace in the face of violence, crying out for change to help prevent disaster – to me these are deeply hopeful actions, rooted in a desire and a belief for a different kind of world. As a Christian, it is the hope for a world free from death and its suffering: which is what Jesus promises us and offers us in and through his birth, death, and resurrection. (Rev 21:3-5)

I don’t mean to imply that we all have to be hopeful all the time, keeping our chins up and putting on a grin. There are moments and seasons of life that find us in the pit, surrounded by lions, or walking with Job as we question all that we have known. Telling anyone simply to have hope in such circumstances would feel empty. The gift of the Body of Christ is that in those moments we can journey with others who can hold our hope for us, who can remember for us that death is not the end, and that there is something more beyond it, even when we can’t.

This Advent, the world could use all of our fierce and persistent hope in the face of deep suffering and division. I wonder, how can you embody it? How can you live it, offer it to others and the world? What are the prayers you can make, the steps you can take? Whatever the form it takes, may you encounter hope’s radical presence in your life, in yourself or in another, in the weeks to come.

Love,
Rebecca+

Yesterday it felt like the sky was trying to remember how to snow.

Specks of white floated down intermittently and forgetfully, obedient to gravity’s command. Looking out the window with recognition and surprise, I was struck by how much I miss the days when seeing snowflakes falling from the sky on a cold winter day was not so unusual, and evergreen branches weighed down with white were a more ordinary sight.

Yesterday felt like the sky was trying to remember how to snow.

It can be hard to do something when we’ve fallen out of the habit and practice of doing it. There was a string of summers when David, Grace, Ben and I, along with my sister and her boys, would regularly meet to play tennis together on a nearby outdoor court. Those first couple of times back on the court together, having not picked up rackets for months, were comedic and trying; many balls were hit over the fence or into the net. But after awhile, our noodle arms remembered what to do, along with the rest of our bodies, and we enjoyed the rhythm and sound of a tennis rally, the neon yellow ball flying back and forth across the net.

When you and I came into the world as infants, we knew how to breathe, how to really breathe. Have you ever watched a sleeping baby? How her whole belly rises and falls, fully, and not just her chest? How even her back fills up, too? How there is a nice and easy rhythm to the deepness and fullness of each breath, replenishing and nourishing her with each inhale? Releasing, cleansing, and letting go, with each exhale?

As an adult, I used to think I knew how to breathe … until I realized I didn’t. Somewhere along the way, I had forgotten how to breathe — how to really breathe — like I breathed when I was a baby. Like most of us in our modern western world, my breathing had become much more shallow, engaging mostly just my chest, and unconsciously, at that.

In the first chapter of the book of Genesis, God’s spirit, God’s breath – ruach in Hebrew – hovers over the deep at the beginning of creation. Our human breath — when engaged fully, deeply, mindfully, intentionally – is one of the most powerful tools we have to connect us to God’s spirit within us, bringing us “back to ourselves” when we are angry or anxious, fearful or stressed. We hear in John’s Gospel that the Spirit of truth guides us, leads us, to all truth. How might this connect with how our breath leads and guides us?

During this season of preparation, leading up to Christmas — when the world around us is ramping up, and the unrelenting conflicts and division in our city, nation and world weigh heavy on our hearts; when our lists are long and the days are short; when the pain of grief over the earthly absence of a loved one can come upon us with a holiday song or a memory — might we, from time to time (… in the checkout line … at the traffic light … at the dinner table … in bed, turning in at night …) remember how to breathe?

Love,
Cristina

Let’s play, WHAT IF….

I am a scientist by formal training. I have always been and always will be.  I believe in the scientific method of observation, hypothesis, experimenting to test the theory, and then formulating a new truth based on multiple experiments.  That’s how I was taught that science worked. But knowing this has recently shifted my thinking and imagination to “what if’s.”  Have you ever considered your belief about something—anything—and how it just may no longer be helpful to your life or way of living at this time?  What if that belief was to change?

I mean, the idea of “believing” is just a mental concept that you and I have accepted as true. Some things we believe to be true don’t seem to be of much consequence because that belief doesn’t change how we live our lives much at all.  But others do.  Take, for instance, the belief that the Earth is rotating at 1,000 mph on its axis and is revolving around the sun in an elliptical pattern at 67,000 mph!  None of us have really performed any of these measurements, but others have, and we accept their words as truth and continue on with our lives.

But when we say we believe in G-D, what are we really saying?  How is it changing how we think or what we do at any particular moment?  I’m not saying that we are always thinking about G-D (I mean, WHO can do that anyway), but if we say we believe, the next question is, “And so what?”

What difference does what we say we believe make?  If you believe you are loved by someone (whoever that is), how has it made a difference in your life?  What if you did not believe that you were loved by them?

Generally, if we believe something is true, we trust it and act out of that trust or belief.  But What if what we believe is true is not helpful to our lives, meaning that it does not give us peace or joy or make us feel vibrantly alive?    What if what we believe to be true, or at least say we believe, does not help us live any differently—with more joy, peace, or equanimity?  No, really?

The one sermon I have ever remembered and will remember for the rest of my life was preached at my home parish in Dallas by our interim rector, Fr. Larry.  This was his question during that sermon: “What if that which you believed about G-D was no longer helpful to you, and what if you offered that belief to G-D with the intention that G-D should destroy it for something better— like G-D’s truth instead of your own?  He asked if/would/could we experiment to become open and receptive to who G-D really was in our lives.  This, of course, acknowledged the fact that what we think/thought or believed about G-D and G-D’s truth of G-D were two different things.  One is our imagining of G-D, and the other is who G-D truly is.  Fr. Larry taught us to live with “openness and receptivity” to life so that G-D could manifest in ways we have never considered.  It was a what-if experiment of mammoth proportions, which I carry with me to this day.  The experiment keeps getting bigger (more comprehensive) and better.

The results so far have been astounding, and one of them is my amazement of being here in Baltimore, MD, at this place and at this time. I can assure you that I would have never dreamt of being on this side of the continental US except for letting go of my original beliefs about G-D.  I needed to ask, “What if?” and then risk it for any possibility of G-D’s.  In that risk, I have experienced this Mysterious Higher Power in new and different ways.  Fr. Larry was correct.  Living open and receptive to G-D’s possibilities has led me to serve in a great faith community with wonderful colleagues and loving new friends.

Now that we are approaching the first Sunday of ADVENT and a new church year with new possibilities, you might want to experiment with your what-ifs.  Who knows?  You might discover more peace, joy, and love than you could have ever imagined.  The G-D beyond your imagination has got your back!

Stay WARM, Be Blessed, & Don’t Be Afraid to ask: What if…?

With Love,
Freda Marie+