Tag Archives: doubt

The Splendor of Grace

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Easter Sunday C, 17 April 2022.  The Rev. Pamela L. Werntz

Isaiah 65:17-25. Be glad and rejoice forever in what I am creating.
1 Corinthians 15:19-26. The last enemy to be destroyed is death.
Luke 24:1-12. Amazed at what had happened.

O God with us, grant us the strength, the wisdom and the courage to seek always and everywhere after truth, come when it may, and cost what it will.

Good morning! Good job getting here, whether you are here in the sanctuary or here via livestream. I’m so glad that you’re here whether you love this holiday, or you’re just trying to get through it. Maybe you couldn’t wait to celebrate Easter at Emmanuel for the first time in three years, and maybe you’re joining us for the first time ever. Maybe you are here because it matters to someone you love, or you are here for a sadder reason. I love to say, whether you have come for celebration or solace, whether you are energized or exhausted, excited or grumpy, whether you have skipped or stumbled into this Easter celebration, my hope for all of you is that you will leave here today knowing more deeply that you are loved, that even if (and maybe especially if) you don’t feel like you fit in, still you belong with us today. Emmanuel Church is a place where we actively practice belonging to one another no matter what. It’s not always easy, I assure you, but it is always worth it. This is a parish where we focus our efforts and attention not on whether we (or anyone else) will get into heaven, but on whether any heaven will get into us. This is a parish where we focus not so much on implausible ideas, but on fidelity in relationship. Continue reading →

Looking More Resurrected

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Second Sunday of Easter, Year B, April 8, 2018; The Rev. Pamela L. Werntz

Acts 4:32-35 There was not a needy person among them.
1 John 1:1-2:2 If we say that we have no sin we deceive ourselves.
John 20:19-31 Peace be with you.

O God of our wildest dreams, grant us the wisdom, the strength and the courage to seek always and everywhere after truth, come when it may, and cost what it will.

Today is the eighth day of Easter. Eight out of fifty of Easter – so it’s still early. The puppets from our grand first-day procession last week have been returned to their storage places, but the flowers are still pretty fresh, and there are still good Easter hymns left to be sung. We have a baptism to celebrate today. Emilia Julu Hudson Houge has brought together family and friends from near and far to join her Emmanuel Church peeps for a ceremony of Christian belonging. Thank you all for being here today. Almost any day in the church year is a good day for a baptism, as far as I’m concerned, and today is especially rich because the theological message for the second Sunday in Easter is always: “you should believe it whether or not you’ve seen it.” Because of Emi’s baptism, I’m reminded of what one of my seminary professors was fond of saying: “I believe in infant baptism, heck, I’ve seen it!” I want to make sure you know that you don’t have to have a baptism ceremony to belong here at Emmanuel Church, but why not give the community another reason to rejoice?
Continue reading →

Become trusting!

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Second Sunday of Easter, Year B, April 12, 2015; The Rev. Pamela L. Werntz

Acts 4:32-35 There was not a needy person among them.
1 John 1:1-2:2 If we say that we have no sin we deceive ourselves.
John 20:19-31 Peace be with you.

O God of hope, grant us the wisdom, the strength and the courage to seek always and everywhere after truth, come when it may, and cost what it will.

 

Many of you know that one of my life projects has to do with increasing literacy, particularly Biblical literacy among progressive Christians, who have tended to cede the Bible to more conservative Christians. For example, I want people to understand that what we call “The Bible” is actually more like a library or an anthology than a book. The anthology contains more than a dozen different kinds of literature – and each kind of literature has different rules and built-in assumptions for understanding it. For instance, one would read biography differently from reading a sermon or an editorial. One would read legislation differently from poetry or a song. It helps to know what type of literature one is reading in order to understand what it might mean or how to apply it to our lives. Unfortunately, figuring out the genre is often complicated by many centuries and many miles of distance, and further complicated by modern inventions – inventions such as the English language, punctuation, customs of printing, etc. Continue reading →

1988

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  • June.  Organist Michael Beattie joined Emmanuel Music for rehearsals in our Music Room of Peter Sellars‘ version of Mozart’s opera Le Nozze di Figaro, which played that summer in the PepsiCo Theater in Purchase NY.  Craig Smith conducted; Frank Kelley sang the part of Basilio; Jayne West, the Countess; and Susan Larson, Cherubino.
  • In her “Peace Pentecost” sermon at our Cathedral Church of St. Paul, poet Denise Levertov (1923-97) emphasized the connection between contemplation and action:  “If we neglect our inner lives, we destroy the sources of fruitful outer action.

    Thanks to U. of California Press for this image.

    But if we do not act, our inner lives become mere monuments to egotism.” At Emmanuel she founded a Peace Group to foster the links between spiritual thought and action among her fellow parishioners.

Earlier in the decade she had been attracted to Emmanuel by our social-justice activities, beautiful music and liturgy, and rector Al Kershaw, who counseled her.  “He assured her that doubt was part of spiritual growth and the darkness she encountered might increase her sense of dependence and lead her to God,” says her biographer Dana Greene citing Denise’s diary entry for June 13, 1988.

Denise’s father, Paul Philip Levertoff (1878–1954), born in Belarus, an early proponent of Messianic Judaism, took holy orders in the Anglican Church and preached wearing an alb with a tallit and kippa.

The Rev. Paul Philip Levertoff

In 1922 he become director of what is now the London Diocesan Council for Work among the Jews and edited its quarterly journal, The Church and the Jews. He was a prolific writer on theological subjects in Hebrew, German, and English and translated into English the Midrash Sifre on Numbers (1926) and the Zohar  (1933).

See also:

  1. Dana Greene.  Denise Levertov:  A Poet’s Life.  Urbana IL:  U. of Illinois Press, 2012.
  2. Denise Levertov.  Making Peace.  Breathing the Water.  NY:  New Directions, 1987.
  3. Donna Hollenberg.  A Poet’s Revolution: The Life of Denise Levertov. Berkeley: U of California Press, 2013.
  4. Paul A. Lacey and Anne Dewey, eds.  The Collected Poems of Denise Levertov.  NY: New Directions, 2013.
  5. Paul Philip Levertoff. Love and the Messianic Age.
  6. Timeline: 1994