The Trinity

When I was about nine years old, I stood in the bathroom on the second floor of the house that I grew up in. I was looking in the mirror, and it hit me. I say “it” because I don’t know how to describe the event that occurred. All of a sudden, I began to wonder who I really was and how I had gotten to this planet, to this existence, to this tiny little bathroom on the second floor in New Haven, Connecticut. Where was I from, really? Why was I here? I remember that I pictured the stars in the universe and the feeling of such mystery and such a large unknown swallowed me. I was simply without any answers.

That experience has not left me. Every once in awhile, I still get overwhelmed with the mystery of my existence. But now I like to think of these experiences as glimpses of the Trinity.

I believe that the Trinity is the highest conception of God that the human mind can fathom. It is the least inadequate way of referring to God. It was revealed to us by Jesus, who told us to go forth and baptize in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.

The Trinity tells us some essential aspects about God. It tells us that God cannot be understood. The notion that three persons could be one person and one could be three is simply not logical. It makes no sense! And that is the point. We cannot and must not ever think that we can understand God. If we think that we have grasped God, then whatever we are conceiving of is not God at all, but something that we have made up. The Trinity is God’s way of saying to us. “Give up on understanding me. I am Mystery.”

The Trinity also tells us that God is never lonely. God did not create humankind because God was experiencing some kind of loneliness. God has all love and all companionship within the divine self. We were made simply for the joy of it, as play.

Thirdly, the Trinity tells us that God is dynamic. God moves. God dances. The three persons of the Trinity are in an eternal dance of love and intimacy that we cannot even begin to contemplate. And when we love one another, that is when we live into the fullness of the image of God.

I myself am so grateful for the Trinity. It is a way of naming that crazy thing that happened to me in front of the mirror in the bathroom when I was nine. It is a way of naming God so that I can love God while always being reminded that I can never fully understand God.

To truly honor the Trinity is to give up on all fundamentalism. For we cannot war with one another about who is right about God if God is beyond our comprehension. When it comes to God, we cannot even begin to define the Mystery. We are to remain open and in awe, always listening and always respecting. For none of us have all the answers.

Are We Scared?

I do not consider myself to be a superstitious person. But when I see a black cat cross my path, it does occur to me that the event is supposed to be bad luck. Or I used to think those thoughts, until Cocoa came to us.

Cocoa is a black cat. He came to us as a kitten. My son Jacob claims that he wandered into the laundry room, but I don't believe that. I think Cocoa wandered onto our driveway and Jake led him the rest of the way into the house. For a long time, we thought Cocoa was female. Even the vet, at first glance, told us that “she” was healthy. We couldn't get “her” to stop peeing in the house. So we returned to the vet and discovered that Cocoa was a boy, hence the spraying. We changed his name to Mr. Cokes or the Cokanator.

The Cokanator is the most loving cat that I have ever known. His purr is so loud that it seems to rock his whole body. He will let my boys manhandle him and he never scratches. He is one great cat.
So now, when I see a black cat cross my path, I do not worry. It might be the Cokanator! I smile and wish it were him. The superstition of black cats has been wiped out of my mind by my love for this one cat.


There are three major holidays in the Christian tradition, a trinity of holy days. We celebrate two of them well, with major feasts and presents, candy and family gatherings. Christmas and Easter are done well. But the third holiday, Pentecost, has been lost. It is supposed to be as big a celebration as Christmas or Easter, but it is not. Only the faithful come to the Pentecost celebration. You can't see any of those Christmas and Easter Christians. Pentecost cannot be coapted by the mass media. Hallmark can't seem to make it a mandatory card day. Presents don't seem to work either. No, this holiday is hard to package because it is truly unpredictable and even a little bit scary.

On this day, the Holy Spirit radiates out from God to the first Christians. Light shines from their heads, they speak in foreign languages, and the Church is born. The story is wild, crazy and scary. You just can't make it short and sweet. It is radical stuff.

One of the reasons why we don't know what to do with Pentecost is that we are afraid of the Holy Spirit. We can't see God's spirit, we can't control it or order it or even predict where it is moving next. When it comes to matters of the Spirit, we know very little and so we are afraid. It seems better to semi-ignore the Holy Spirit. After all, if we give the Sprit the attention that it deserves, we might end up following it. And then, well, who knows what might happen to us.

The only way to overcome our fear of God's Spirit is to engage with it. Open your heart and let it inside, just like Jacob let our black cat into our house. Let the Spirit inside your heart and let it sit with you. Trust in God and you will find that the same Spirit, which can be strong and unpredictable, can also be lovely and trustworthy. It is meant to be a gift to us from God.

Over the years, I have become grateful that we cannot seem to package Pentecost. We don't know what to make of this crazy day. But we can allow that Spirit inside and find that it is incredibly loving. And when we learn to love the Spirit of God, everything changes.

From Laundry Lists to Listening

Is it OK to pray for a parking space? Numerous people have asked me that question over the course of my years as a priest. What do you think?

It seems to me that any kind of communication with God is better than none. So go ahead! Pray for a parking space, but don't stop there. There is much more to prayer than making requests. In fact, I have come to believe that there are levels of prayer. Some prayers are fairly immature, self-centered or simple. Our communication with God depends on how mature we are, what kind of mood we are in, and whether we are capable of listening as well as talking.

A few months ago, I began the process of getting my Florida license. I went to the DMV, one of my least favorite places on earth, with my old drivers license, a bill showing my Florida address, my insurance card for my car and my birth certificate.

There was a woman at the front desk. She checked all my documents, gave me a number, and told me to take a seat. I sat and I sat and I sat. It was my day off and I had to pick up my boys from school. I became irritated. I started asking God to make them hurry up. “I really don't want to have to come back, God,” I said.

They did not call me in time before I had to run to get the boys. So I came back earlier the next week. I tried to stay occupied sending emails and reading while I waited. After awhile, I was called up. The woman behind the glass told me that I didn't have enough documents. How could they be sure that I was the same person on my birth certificate? I had to bring in my marriage license. She told me this with a tired, resigned look on her face, like she would not be surprised if I just blew a gasket right there. So I had to leave with the Kansas license in tow.

Needless to say, I could not find my marriage license in the files and boxes, so JD wrote to Connecticut, where we were married fifteen years ago. They lost the request. One month later, we called again, only to find out that nothing had been done. Now I was praying not to be stopped by a cop on the road. I really tried not to drive too fast. Finally, the marriage license came in the mail. So the next Monday, I went to the DMV with lots of time to wait. I waited and waited. Just when I got to the woman behind the plexiglass, the computer system crashed.
“God,” I wanted to say. “Is this some kind of a joke?”

So I went early one morning on a Thursday and sure enough, the whole thing was done in fifteen minutes. It was like a miracle. Only fifteen minutes! Well, two months and fifteen minutes...

When we get frustrated or when we are in pain, we say mundane prayers to God.
“God, please let me pass this test.”
“God, please help the woman next to me not be so annoying.”

Physical pain can make us extremely focused and demanding in our prayers. I'll never forget the night JD had a horrible stomach virus and all I could pray was let it stop, please, let it stop.

A mother I knew had two sons. One of them would no longer speak to her. She talked about him incessantly, praying to God for him to come back to her. She could not ask for anything else. Just the same prayer, over and over, with very little remorse or understanding as to why he might have left. Just 'please bring him back to me. Please bring him back to me.”

Sometimes our prayers are more like laundry lists rather than a conversation. They are solely one way. Just items. Like a honey do list for God. God please help this person and that person and do this and that for me. Meanwhile, God can't get a word in edgewize.

Jesus encounters a sick man by the pool of Bethzatha in Jerusalem. The man has come, along with countless other wounded or sick, to see if the bubbling spring of the water will have some healing properties for him.

The man is lying by the pool. When the water started to bubble naturally from an underground spring, the people would pile in to see if the moving water would help them. But the man was weak and he did not have anyone to help him make his way into the water, so he was pushed aside time and time again. He was desperate for that water and he was angry, frustrated with his weakness and the people who were cheating him, cutting him out of the line.

Jesus asks him a simple question, 'Do you want to be made well?'

The sick man is so absorbed in his own predicament that he is unable to hear Jesus' question. Instead of answering Jesus, he complains about how no one will take him into the water and everyone keeps cutting him in line. He cannot grasp the fact that Jesus can make him truly well. The best that he can imagine is just getting his crippled body into the water. That is all he asks for because that is as far as he can conceive. He does not know what it means to be well. After 38 years, he has no idea of health. He just wants a place in the line of misery.

Our numerous requests don't make God mad, but they are a shame. They are like visiting a wise man and talking the whole time, instead of listening to what he has to say. What do we gain by making requests? Our requests assume that we know what is best for us. But what if we don't know what is best for us? What if God is asking us if we want to be well and we are asking for thinner thighs or a nap, for more money or a passing grade? God may be offering you caviar and you are making lists for different flavors of popcorn. God alone knows who you are without your cares and worries. God alone can make you well. Why make requests of the one who knows what you truly need?

So there comes a point in the life of a believer when we just stop asking because we realize that God might be saying something more important. There comes a time when we stop talking.

Try it. Stop worrying and moving and scheduling and thinking and doing. Just stop.
At some point we begin to wonder if God might have another, better plan, and if it might behoove us to listen.

God is giving you a chance to step out of the line, out of the mundane, daily worries of life. God is inviting you to open yourself to the possibility of becoming more than you ever thought you could be. You don't have to ask God for the small stuff. You don't have to just ask for contentment or health. You don't have to crawl through life when God made you to run.

The stories of the greatest disciples are always stories about people who listened to God and followed God. Never are they about people who told God what to do. When God told Paul to move, Paul moved. Paul went to places that he had never seen before, without a clue why he was going, always asking God to show him what to do, what to say. Paul listened when he prayed. He listened to his dreams. He listened to the people around him. Paul always knew that God had something much greater in mind than anything he could fathom. So he got up and walked, without asking how long it was going to take or what place he had in line. He just went forward. And look what God did with his life. God used Paul to change everything.

When Jesus prayed in the Garden of Gethsemane, I always thought he kind of gave up when he said, “thy will be done.” I thought he meant that God was the boss and that he would do whatever God wanted because God was in charge. It was like Jesus was saying, “You're right. I give up. I'll do what you want.” “I'll do it your way.” And sometimes I pray that way. I'll pray for someone in the hospital and I'll ask God to make them healthy again and then I'll add, “but Thy will be done.” It's like some kind of a thing I think I should say, because Jesus said it.
But what if Jesus really did know that God's way was better, was ultimately more joyful, more beautiful than anything he could imagine. What if he really did want to do what God wanted. What if he was really saying, “I'm scared, but I trust you, God.”

Isn't that what the words “Thy will be done” really mean? Don't they just mean I trust you. I trust that you're way is better than mine. You alone know how to make me well.

On this beautiful mothers day, I think of the phrase Mother knows best. But what if it is really God knows best? And truly believing that means changing how we pray, from lots of talk and lots of requests to lots of silence and lots of listening.

Do you trust God enough to let him make you truly well?

Glorifying God

This past week, I had the opportunity to go to St. Mary’s Church. St. Mary’s is a mission church that is hidden in the heart of Springfield. The Cathedral has quietly supported them for years.
Kathleen, one of our wonderful members here, took me to a Bible Study at St Mary’s. She picked me up here at the Cathedral and drove me over to Springfield.
We parked the car on the side of the road and got out. There was a tiny boy sitting on the sidewalk crying his eyes out. He could not have been more than two years old. He had great clumps of braided hair that stuck out from every side of his little head. He wore a blue shirt and plaid shorts. His eyes were red and blotchy from crying so hard. A woman who looked like she could be his mother stood nearby talking to some friends. She was holding a pink bundle, a newborn baby girl.
I went over to the little boy and knelt down to ask him if he was OK. He held out his arms for me to carry him. I picked him up and, man, did he hold on. He pressed his little self up against me and put his head on my shoulder. His crying stopped like a faucet that was just turned off. I held him and rocked him and time stood still for a moment.
The mother came over, grabbed him around his waist, and pulled him from me. He started to scream again. “He always goes to strangers,” she said to me. And my heart just broke. I had to walk away with him crying again, knowing that the moment of peace that we had together only made him long for more. It was heartbreaking.
Sometimes there is so much pain in the world that I do not know what to do. I cried for that little boy later that day. Just like I cried for the children in Russia that I knew so long ago when I worked in orphanages there. There was the little baby girl who cried so hard and loved to be held. They had found her in a dumpster just days before I met her and she still thought that someone might come when she cried. She had the most beautiful blue eyes.
When I encounter children who need more that I can give them, I wonder how God can cope with it all, all the pain. If it hurts my heart, God’s heart must be broken.
In the gospel for today, it is the night of the Last Supper. Jesus has just poured out his heart to his disciples and friends, washing their feet and feeding them with eternal food. And at the very moment when he is loving them with everything that he has – in that, perhaps the most intimate moment of all time – Judas gets up and leaves.
It hurts when someone just leaves without saying anything. When someone up and leaves a lecture it is seen as a sign of boredom or disagreement or even anger. And the Upper Room was no lecture hall. It was a small space, occupied by thirteen men who had been together through it all. And it was obvious to all of them that Judas was rejecting them. Just when Jesus was pouring himself out, Judas abandoned him in front of everybody. Without saying so much as goodbye, he walked out of their lives.
Jesus knew that he was about to die. He knew that this was his last night and that one of his best friends had just rejected him forever. You would think that this would be the bottom of the pit for Jesus, the last straw. You would think that he would despair, but instead he says something so profound that we usually gloss over it.
Now the Son of Man has been glorified.
Glorified? He was about to die a horrifying death. One of his friends was about to sell him for a few gold coins. How in the world could Jesus say that he was glorified in all this? Glorified in abandonment? Glorified in betrayal and treachery? How?
The word glory means brightness. It is the part of God that we cannot even bear to look at, the doxa¸ the glory. It is a word that only is used for God and God alone. Only God is bright, and the Son of God could only be made bright through the shame and suffering that he endured. The paradox is this: God is most glorified in the midst of pain and suffering. The brightness of God shines forth in the hardest of places and the darkest of times. The greater the darkness, the more the doxa or glory of God stands out and shines.
That is one of the great secrets of resurrection. Resurrection is born out of the pit of death and despair. Moments of pain, moments of darkness and of abandonment, are the greatest moments to glorify God. It is in these moments of greatest suffering that God is most glorified.
The light shines in the darkness and the darkness shall not overcome it. The light shines in the darkness.
Sometimes people ask me why I decided to come to a church located in the heart of downtown Jacksonville. At the time that I was praying about becoming your Dean, I was also talking with a church in Beverly Hills, California. One of my friends kept reminding me of the house that the Rector of that church lives in. It is huge and gorgeous. So when I came here, I got a lot of questions, as I’m sure you get…
Why do you come to the heart of downtown? Why do you drive past numerous churches to come here, where there are homeless people and poverty and abandoned houses? Why worship in a place like this?
And I find myself answering, because I want to glorify God. And God is best glorified in the places of hopelessness and despair. God is glorified here in the heart of downtown whenever we find a job for someone who needs one, whenever we hold a child who is crying. Whenever a home is built for a family that needs a roof over their heads, God is glorified.
My five-year-old son, Max, is blessed to go to the Cathedral School, our incredible school for early childhood. Max and I have great conversations on the way to and from school and work. This past week he asked me a question in the car. “Mom, if you were a superhero, who would you be?”
I thought about it for a moment. And I came up with Water Woman. I could swim to the bottom of the deepest oceans and plant my feet on the ground, then jump and touch the moon, only to come back into the water again. And I could understand the songs of the whales.
Sometimes, I really wish I could be Water Woman – or someone a little more powerful than Kate Moorehead. Someone who could take that little boy that I held in Springfied and make his life better. I want to be able to help him and others who are in despair. Sometimes the feeling of powerlessness is overwhelming. I wish that I could save the world.
We cannot save the world, or fix everything, but we can glorify God. We can use these moments of helplessness to shine the brightness of God into the darkness. We can let our prayers rise up and touch the moon. And God will be glorified. Each time we offer a scholarship to an inner-city child here at the Cathedral School, God is glorified. Each time we welcome the stranger, God is glorified. Each time we bring hope to the despairing, bring comfort to the dying, bring good news to the hopeless, God is glorified.
Ben Clance, a prison chaplain, goes out of this Cathedral each week and finds his way into a maximum security prison. There, in the midst of darkness and despair, he glorifies God by bringing communion to the prisoners. When a man is about to be executed, Ben comes and washes his feet, giving him the chance to turn his heart to God even at the last.
It is not your job to fix the world. That is God’s work. But it is your job and my job to go into the places of darkness and despair and make God’s light shine. We are called to glorify God, one moment at a time. Let God work in you. Become His hands and feet. Work one small miracle at a time. Let God work in you to do this.
God says, in the book of Revelation, I am the Alpha and the Omega. The start. The finish. If God is all that, then God will surely bring all of us to the resurrection life, where we will stand with countless throngs of angels who glorify the Almighty day and night. But the best place to start glorifying God is here, where we find ourselves, in the heart of downtown – in a place of great despair, great need, and great promise.
I thank God that you and I chose to be in this place.
Amen.