Unanswered Questions

In 1813, Morris Brown started a church for black slaves in Charleston, South Carolina. He was joined by Denmark Vesey, a man whose name came from the slave owner who sold him. Denmark had purchased his freedom for $1,500 because he was a gifted carpenter. However, the slave owner would not sell him the freedom of his wife and children. So Denmark Vesey began to preach at the church about the Book of Exodus and how Almighty God led the Hebrew people from slavery into freedom.

No one knows if Denmark Vesey ever did anything more than preach about the Exodus. What we do know is that his church grew to 3,000 strong. And in December of 1821, Denmark Vesey was arrested along with dozens of other members of the church. They were tortured and some broke down, confessing a plot to fight for their freedom. All of them were hanged.  They say that Denmark Vesey was stabbed to death but no one ever found his body. And, as a punishment for insurrection, the black churches in Charleston were closed for over thirty years.

After the Civil War, Denmark's son, Robert Vesey, rebuilt the church as an African Methodist Episcopal Church. They named it Emmanuel which means God is with us. Booker T. Washington and Dr. Martin Luther King would later preach in that church. It became a leading church in the Civil Rights movement.

On this past Wednesday, a 21 year old man named Dylan Roof walked into Emmanuel AME Church and joined a prayer group. After almost an hour of sharing and praying in which he was welcomed and included, Dylan shot and killed the participants. He killed them simply for being black.

A storm arose at sea when the disciples were in the boat with Jesus. It was night and it was dark so they could not have seen where the storm came from. It was strong. It blew the water causing great waves and wind. The disciples were afraid. Terrified. And Jesus remained asleep.

I have always wondered how Jesus could have slept through all that. Was he just so exhausted that nothing could wake him? Or was he so trusting in God's providence that he knew he would not die? Or was it that he was not afraid of dying? Could he simply ride the waves without fear? How could he have slept through all that wind and water, while the disciples were scurrying all over the little boat trying to get the water out and talking and praying and yelling to each other. How could Jesus have slept through that storm?

There are so many storms in our lives. Violence that makes no sense. Racism. Terrorism. These evils just seem to rise up and almost swallow us whole.  There are more Christians dying in this century than at any other time. And sometimes it feels like God is just asleep. How could an all-powerful God allow a man like Denmark Vesey to be hanged just for preaching a truth in Scripture? How could God allow the innocent pastor and the faithful members of a Emmanuel Church be murdered for nothing but the color of their skin? Is God just asleep? Does God even care?

The disciples at least had Jesus in the boat. Physically, bodily, their Lord could be woken up. They could shake him awake. They could talk to him, ask him what the heck was going on.  They could ask him how he could sleep through such a storm. "Do you not care about us?" they said. "Do you not care that we are going to die?"

That's what we all want to ask when a storm comes. "God, why don't you do something about this? Don't you care at all? 

When Jesus awakened, he calmed the storm. He brought peace. Just like he healed when he saw someone who was sick or cast out demons when someone possessed crossed his path. He calmed the sea for the disciples but he was clearly disappointed that they asked him to do that. After he calmed the sea, he turned to them and asked them THE QUESTION. 

"Why are you afraid? Have you still no faith?"

"Why are you afraid? Have you still no faith?"

When we come to God asking God to calm the storm, asking God to save the lives of those faithful at Emmanuel, asking God to simply stop this evil and violence in our world, God responds with a question...Why are you afraid? Have you no faith?

It is the same with our brother Job. The storm destroyed his whole life. His family was dead, his wealth gone, his friends were no help. He sat alone in the dust and when he asked God to wake up, God said, "Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth?" In other words, "who are you to ask me how this is supposed to happen?" You cannot understand me. You must trust.

There are some questions that cannot be answered in this life. Why are there storms? Why do people suffer? Why is there evil? Why is life unfair? Why do good people like our brothers and sister at Emmanuel AME Church have to die? They did not deserve it. They did nothing but be kind and loving and good. 

And when we say to God, "Please wake up and stop this storm! Please just bring us peace. Please just fix our problems," God answers with a question. One very important question...

"Why can't you trust me?"

Faith is not just about believing in God. Faith is also believing that God knows more than we know. Faith is believing that when good people suffer and die, it is not the end of the story. Faith is ability to trust that something beyond our understanding can come out of violence and hatred and death itself. Faith is believing that the cross can become the resurrection, even when we don't know how or when or why. Faith is believing that God is God and we are not.

My yoga teacher took the day off on Thursday and drove with her husband up to Charleston. There were thousands out on streets. Flowers left at the church. The families of the victims were talking about forgiveness and people were flooding into the city, just to be there, to pray and to eat at the restaurants and offer our condolences. People were so kind, she said. They thanked her for coming. 

And all across the country at 10 a.m. this morning, church bells will ring to remember those who died. Let us not let them die in vain. It is time for this country to unite and vow to serve one another, to bridge racial boundaries, to look out for our youth, especially when they seem lost or disturbed, to take better care of our children, to pray for one another. Out of these ashes, let us rise.

Denmark Vesey dreamed of a time when black people would be free. So long as there is violence and hatred like what happened on Wednesday, none of us our free. So we must put aside our whys and work toward peace and pray. We must always pray to the One who alone can bring peace, to Jesus.

Let us read aloud the names of our brothers and sisters who died at Emmanuel AME Church. 

Remembering Bernie

I have never done this before. Never, in all my years, has anyone requested that their funeral be held on Sunday morning at our normal service. And really, this is not a funeral. Father Bernie Dooly didn't want a funeral at all. He wanted us to worship together as we always have, as he did for decades. He wanted us to share in the body and blood of Jesus and to remember him at the same time. He did not want a special service giving thanks for his life. He just wanted us to come to church together and give thanks. He wanted to be with us when we came together to worship. He didn't want it to be all about him. That was so much like Bernie. 

I have known Bernie almost all of my adult life. I first met him when I came here to this very Cathedral to do an internship during Seminary.   He was a new Canon, having served as a chaplain at FSU for two decades. He was really happy at FSU. And so we both felt a little lost in this big Cathedral. I would wander down to Bernie's office and he always had time for me. He would lean back in his chair and just listen. I cried in his office and probably made a fool of myself. When I had to preach my first sermon, he suggested that he listen first. And so Bernie stood in the back of this empty Cathedral when I preached for the very first time to him alone. He just stood there and smiled. I can still see him there.

Bernie was Irish. He was born in Ireland and it was so much a part of him, in his blood. He also loved God and found God particularly in silence. Maybe his exposure to silence happened when he was young and suffered from double pneumonia. He would follow that sound of God in silence into the priesthood, reading and studying about God. He became an Irish Catholic priest and served in the church, finally being sent here to St. Augustine. 

When you love God in silence, it is easy to retreat into solitude, but Bernie's life was not complete with only solitude. All his life, he would struggle to find a balance between his love of people and his love of silence.  

It was in St Augustine that Bernie met and fell in love with an artist. Marcia had two daughters. She exposed Bernie to a kind of freedom and beauty that he had never known.  He gave up the priesthood to marry Marcia. Bernie became a father and he adored his girls.  Bishop Cerveny welcomed him as a priest into the Episcopal Church. 

Bernie loved all people but especially the young. He was so happy being a chaplain at FSU, where he and his students could be creative with all kinds of liturgy. Bernie was not one for tight schedules or hierarchy. He would always give up his seat in the chancel, always make himself available to listen. He had the students at FSU do everything, from having a Vestry to officiating at liturgies. Bernie was always ready to give up his seat. 

Our lives are a balance. We all need the sound of sheer silence that Elijah found when he was searching for God in a cave so long ago. But we also need one another. Bernie's face would light up when he spoke of Liz or Marta or Marcia. He adored Marcia's art. Her paintings gave him joy. But after beholding the presence of God in silence, Bernie could never just surround himself with business and people all day. He needed both, both people and quiet, and so do all of us.

In yoga sometimes we practice balancing. We stand on one foot and stare straight ahead. It is amazing how balance is nothing more than constant movement. The muscles in your foot and leg are always moving, first one way and then the other. After lots of practice, it becomes easier, but the movement from one side to the other never goes away. Bernie's life was spent balancing between his two joys, his need for God in silence and his need for all of you. When he spent too much time around people, he would become quiet, even a soft kind of grumpy. When he was alone too long, he would take joy in people.

At the end of his life, I think that Bernie struggled the most with being so weak. His body was giving out. That pneumonia that he had as a child led to him having a hole in his heart all his life, but he didn't know it until after retirement. He found himself weak and unable to care for Marcia as he wanted to. But he was a giver and he didn't know how to ask for help. I would go to see him for spiritual direction but, although I could always use Bernie's wisdom, I knew that he wouldn't let me come if the visit involved taking care of him in any way. He was terrible at that! 

I feel regret that Bernie did not let us help him more. It is so hard to age. I hope that he didn't feel alone. 

Bernie would want this message not to be just about him but to be about you. What kind of a balance have you found in your life? We all need to hear the sound of sheer silence that Elijah heard, for it will fill our hearts, but most often we run from that silence because before we can get to it, we often must hear our own crazy and disturbed thoughts. So we fill our lives with noise and activity. We run away from God.

If Bernie wanted one thing for you to receive from this service, I think he would want you to receive the gift of silence, to know that deep down, below the chaos of your thoughts and the noise of this world, there is a presence, so deep and so beautiful, so full of love as to take your breath away. And when we can't feel that presence it is not because it isn't there. It is because we are too rushed or wounded or angry to truly listen. Most of us have a storm of sorts in our minds, a storm that moves over the top of silence, making us think that that is all there is, so that when we are quiet, all we hear is worries and regrets and noise. But there is so much more beneath all that.  

The silence waits. It is always there for you and once you touch it, you will want nothing more than to find it again and again. It used to be translated as a still small voice. Then scholars got back together and decided that this translation was inadequate. So they called it the sound of sheer silence. My seminary professor translated it as eloquent silence. But words are still not good enough. There are no words to describe such things. The only thing Bernie would say about it was that it is God.

Bernie gave this Cathedral a few gifts. Along with Louise and Mary Busse, he gave us the gift of the Center for Prayer and Spirituality, a part of this Cathedral that will already remind us of the presence of God in silence.  He also gave us a chapel located on the third floor of Cathedral House. You can take an elevator up to it. It is full of Bernie's books and statues and icons. It is a place to be quiet. The only sounds that you hear are the children playing in the playground of the homeless shelter across the street. Bernie gave it to us, his community, so that we could find a place of quiet, a place to pray, a place apart from the hustle and bustle of life. It is always open to you. 

You have to fight for quiet in your life. It is a battle. But please try. It is vital for your mental and spiritual health. And try to find the other side as well, that balance that is community, the people who make your heart sing, with whom you can be yourself. Nurture those relationships, tell them who you really are. God is Trinity and God cannot be known alone. God must be known also in community. Three in one and one in three. God is all about balance. To try to find God is to dance your way to finding balance in your life. And balance between quiet and community looks entirely different for each and every one of you.

Bernie knew the beauty of loving people. He knew the beauty of time spent alone with God. He knew the beauty of nature and art and music. He lived and he loved. And we give thanks for his life. After all, that is what the Eucharist means...thanksgiving.