Not So BIg

About a decade ago, an architect named Sarah Susanka realized that she was being called on again and again to help people who had just bought new houses but were unhappy in them.  More likely than not, the house was newly built and large – what you might call a McMansion: lined up in a treeless cul de sac, with a soaring, glaringly white, double-height foyer, a great room with a wall of windows and cathedral ceilings (whatever that might be), and lots of very large rooms.  Her clients, thought they had bought their dream houses, and had mortgaged themselves to the hilt to do so, but were having trouble living in these houses, making them comfortable, making them feel like home, but they couldn’t quite figure out why.

Sarah, the architect, thought she knew why: the houses were simply too big.  The scale of them was out of proportion to the lives of the people living in them.  And rather than feeling at home in these too-big houses, their owners felt lost. 

Sarah Susanka published a book addressing these problems in a culture that continues to find status and supposed happiness in bigger and bigger houses.  Her book is called The Not So Big House.  “We are all searching for a home,” she writes, “but we are trying to find it by building more rooms and more space.”  She goes on to write that “while you might be able to afford a 6,000-sq-ft house, you may find that building a 3,000-sq-ft house that fits your lifestyle actually gives you more space to live in.”

Now, I watch enough HG TV to know that this way of thinking is very dangerous.  It is not the American way to opt for less if you can afford more, or to consciously decide for a smaller house when a bigger one is available and within your grasp.  For American society, bigger is better, and now that we are being shamed out of humongous cars, we have nowhere else to go but to our houses to realize this American dream of more, and more, and more.  There is a property ladder, and you want to be moving up the ladder, not down, any fool knows this.

Unfortunately, the Gospel sometimes forces us to consider what we are doing on a ladder in the first place.  Today’s Gospel passage is a perfect example of it, for we hear Jesus tell a crowd of people, “Take care!  Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; for one’s life does not consist in the abundance of possessions.”

Now, you hardly need me to explain what Jesus means when he says this; his meaning is perfectly clear.  But it may be that you need me to encourage you to stop and think about whether Jesus has anything at all to say to you this morning.  For you and I do not think we are greedy, but we are kidding ourselves, because we live in a greedy society, and by and large we have been shaped by that society, by that greed.  We may have developed our own defenses and prejudices, but still …  so I may feel that my Volvo wagon is modest compared to the Hummers and the Lexuses I see, but you might say that a Vovlo wagon is still more than enough, for instance.

The parable that Jesus tells this morning is one of the least often repeated that I can think of:

"The land of a rich man produced abundantly.  And he thought to himself, `What should I do, for I have no place to store my crops?' Then he said, `I will do this: I will pull down my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods. And I will say to my soul, `Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry.'  But God said to him, `You fool!  This very night your life is being demanded of you.  And the things you have prepared, whose will they be?'”

We don’t teach this parable to our kids, because we don’t really believe in it.  We teach our kids the value of compound interest (which I admit sounds quaint today) or of diversifying investment portfolios.

Do you remember the question that prompts Jesus to tell this parable?  Someone in the crowd shouts out to him, "Teacher, tell my brother to divide the family inheritance with me."  It seems a perfectly reasonable thing to ask, and the answer we would have liked to hear would be about the importance of sharing, about fairness, and about how nice it is that your parents left you something in the first place.  But that is not what we get.  You fool! we hear, this very night your life is being demanded of you.  And the things you have prepared – all that allowed you to eat, drink, and be merry – whose will they be?

One of the clever things about Sarah Susanka’s approach in writing her book was that she did not take a polarizing position; she didn’t call it The Small House, or The Smaller House, or The Smallest House.  She must have known that no one would buy such a book.  No one is looking for a small house; no one believes there is much virtue in a small house; even people looking for a smaller house, generally are not looking for a small one.  She was clever to title the book the Not So Big House, because it is possible that people would read such a book.

Jesus is not so clever.  He does not tailor his message in a way that makes it easier for us to hear.  The man in the parable – who does exactly what you or I would have done, exactly what we think is virtuous and good and wise – this man is called a fool by God.  And although you don’t need me to help you understand this passage from the Gospel, you may need me to help you pay attention to it.

And I think one way for us to pay attention to Jesus’ teaching today is to think of the Not So Big House.  Saint Luke is clear with us that Jesus is not teaching about the proper ways of storing grain, or the virtues of small-versus-big, or whether or not there is wisdom in saving and planning for the future.  Saint Luke tells us that Jesus is warning against greed.  And this is a warning we need to hear.  It is certainly a warning I need to hear.  Because I still suspect that I have problems that would be solved if I just had more money, and I bet you suspect this too.  I still hold on to that American prejudice that bigger might actually be better.  I would probably trade in my Volvo for an SUV if I thought I could afford to fill the tank with gas, and if I could find some way, any way, to justify it.

But more to the point, I could share my relative wealth more widely than I do, without trying very hard.  I could go out to eat less, or at less expensive places, I could spend less on wine, I could give up my membership at the Racquet Club, I could shop less at DiBruno Brothers.  As I list these things, I must admit that I am not sure I am ready to do any of them.  But I need to get them at least on the radar, because I need to consider whether or not I would be happier living a Not So Big Life, eating Not So Much Food and drinking Not So Much Wine.  And I’m guessing that if there are ways I could make my life Not So Big, there might be ways you could make yours Not So Big too.

The question that Jesus never puts to us, but that Sarah Susanka does, is whether or not we mightn’t be happier living with less.  And this is such an astonishing proposition that we hardly know what to do with it.  We have tended to believe that it is one or the other – that you can be happy or holy, but not both.  And we hear this kind of teaching from Jesus, and we think that is what he is telling us: give up, let go, throw away; abandon all that you thought was valuable, and trade it in for a shack, and learn to live with the grim unhappiness that follows.

But the secret of living in the Not So Big House is that you are happier living there.  It’s easier to clean, there is still room for everyone, it doesn’t need so much maintenance, and you actually feel like you have a home.

And the secret to the Not So Big Life that Jesus is advocating here, is the same – that you can be happy living a Not So Big Life, and that you might actually be happier than you were before.

Jesus knows that greed, like its cousin anger, traps us.  It disguises itself as virtue and makes us think that we are both superior and happier the more we have.  But it isn’t just that it traps us in a web of debt and expense that becomes a self-fulfilling requirement of daily life; it traps us in a world of meaninglessness.  After your first billion, it’s hard to keep track, after all.

Most of us are not outraged at the greedy society we live in and which continues to reward greed long after Michael Douglas made it a cliché, because most of us are not convinced that we don’t really want or need an investment banker’s bonus.  The reason we do not storm Goldman Sachs with pitchforks at outrage over the kind of money people are making there for no apparent reason, is because we are not sure we wouldn’t happily trade places with them for a bonus of a million or two or more.

Jesus knows that we have not yet become uncomfortable in the too-big houses of our lives, so he tells this parable to try to help us see just how uncomfortable we can be.

What if God called you to account, he asks, what if God required your life of you this night?  What if to do so means to stand before God and be held accountable for our choices, our debts, our savings, our investments, and what we have been willing to give away?  How would we fare, you and I?  Would we look like fools before God?

Jesus wants to spare us this unhappy judgment.  He wants us to consider building our own Not So Big Life not because smaller is better, but because to do so gives us real freedom: the kind of freedom that comes only when you know that you can and do give away part of what you could easily keep for yourself.

This means packing Not So Many Boxes into a Not So Big Truck, and watching the treeless landscape disappear behind you as you move away from all that was so much bigger, into a Not So Big Life with Not So Many Things, and your find that you are free to do what God has always wanted you to do: you are free to live.

Preached by Fr. Sean Mullen

1 August 2010

Saint Mark’s Church, Phialdelphia



Sitting at the feet of the rabbi

The story of Martha and Mary has always seemed to me like something of a homiletic minefield. I am made uncomfortable, first, by the gender roles in the passage, by the fact that the men are being waited on by the women; and then I am made uncomfortable by the men, who are eating or about to eat, telling the woman who has just produced a meal, that her sister, who sits listening “has chosen the better part.” It seems to me to be that most Anglican of sins, impoliteness.

There are other reasons that I am uncomfortable with the story of Martha and Mary. The story seems to me to be on one level a story about different personalities, different ways of being in the world. And those personality differences can be seen in Christian theology and spirituality: the divide between action and contemplation, between deep involvement with the world, and deep silence within the cell. There are examples of these differences: St. Francis within the world, and desert monasticism, far removed from it. St. Theresa of Avila planting monasteries and scolding kings, and Dame Julian of Norwich, walled into her cell, with her prayer holding the world upon its axis. Indeed, some people of faith struggle deeply with both the Martha and the Mary within them: torn between activity and silence.

So doubtless, there are personality differences at play in the Gospel this morning and who am I to decide which personality is better, which way of being in the world closer?

And of course, through time the story of Martha and Mary has been used to justify all sorts of nonsense: prelates and monastics lazying about, while growing fat and wealthy on the backs of the poor, active people, who haven't chosen the better part but are required to sustain those who have.

But I think the main reason that I am uncomfortable with this story is that it is a story that is massively colored by gender.

I was talking to a friend of mine who is a mother and she said whenever she read this story, especially around the holidays, she always feels the story with a special intensity. Because she would go to church, and hear again the message, told to her by men, to keep one's priorities straight during the holiday season, like Mary, and so she would spend large amounts of time feeling guilty if she was being Martha-like, and worrying about food making it to the table, etc. On the other hand, she felt guilty because the societal expectation was that she make everything perfect for her family, the perfect turkey and stuffing, the perfect presents, that she give them a perfect holiday experience, and so she felt damned if she did, and damned if she didn't. She was either failing religiously or failing her family.

And she was telling me this story, it struck me suddenly that part of the energy of this story of Martha and Mary has to do specifically with being a woman. I would never have imagined being caught in that kind of catch-22 that my friend was. And I thought, what if you tried to translate this story into maleness? It just doesn't really translate. If you were to retell this story about two brothers, one sitting at the feet of Jesus and one not, one who is active and one who is contemplative, it isn't the same story, it doesn't have the same emotional charge that it does when you tell the story about women and service.

And so I am uncomfortable with the passage because the role of gender seems quite significant. This is a passage that has a great deal to do with being a woman, with negotiating one's role as a woman in the world, with coming to grips with patriarchy and societal expectations. And I am loathe to attempt to interpret a passage that is so linked to being a woman, lest I fall into that perennial error of the clergy: speaking with authority about things that one has neither experienced nor understood.

This is most certainly a loaded story. It is a complex story, and in reading and understanding it as loaded and complex, I am not alone. This story has a lively history of interpretation throughout the life of the Church.

The standard interpretation of this story would suggest that Mary has chosen the important thing, listening to Jesus, whereas Martha has mistaken service as a substitute for sitting at the feet of the master. Of course, the history of the Church is in part a history of the failure to understand this story, because for most of its history, the Church has told women to be Marthas and not Marys.

But the fact that this story is colored massively with gender does not mean that it is a story only for women. There is, I think, a great deal to be gained from this story whoever you are, because we all live to some extent under the kind of societal and cultural expectations that both Martha and Mary do.

When I read this complex story, I always like to read it with one of the slightly sharp stories of the desert fathers next to it. Here's one of the sayings of the desert monastics about this story:

A brother came to visit Abba Silvanus at Mount Sinai. When he saw the brothers working hard, he said to the old man: Do not work for the food that perishes. For Mary has chosen the good part. Then the old man called his disciple: Zachary, give this brother a book and put him in an empty cell. Now, when it was three o'clock, the brother kept looking out the door, to see whether someone would come to call him for the meal. But nobody called him, so he got up, went to see the old man, and asked: Abba, didn't the brothers eat today? The old man said: Of course we did. Then he said: Why didn't you call me? The old man replied: You are a spiritual person and do not need that kind of food, but since we are earthly, we want to eat, and that's why we work. Indeed, you have chosen the good part, reading all day long, and not wanting to eat earthly food. When the brother heard this, he repented and said: Forgive me, Abba. Then the old man said to him: Mary certainly needed Martha, and it is really by Martha's help that Mary is praised.

And I wonder if that doesn't give us a better way into the passage, rather then simply saying it is more important to learn then to help. The saying speaks to the interrelatedness of Martha and Mary, and despite their tension, the way that Martha allows Mary to be herself, and the way that Mary gives meaning to Martha.

The implication, I think, is that Martha and Mary need each other desperately. Martha needs Mary to keep reminding her that there are contemplative things out there. Because of course, for the Marthas, for the helpers, the easiest thing in the world is to get too involved in helping, too focused on the helping, and not the reason one is helping.

The temptation of Mary, I always like to think of as the “surfer” temptation. Mary just wants to hang loose, to ride the wave of this “like totally amazing teaching”. She just wants to be in this moment, with her rabbi sharing his amazing new teaching, and Mary seems relatively devoid of the sense that the table doesn't lay itself, the food doesn't cook itself, and that even surfers must eat, and learners, and contemplatives.

The aspect of the gloss by the desert fathers that I love so much is the humility that comes through it. Mary indeed may have chosen the better part, but here for us “goats”, those of us who aren't lucky to be sheep, we need to worry about the lesser parts, the things like food and clothing. Mary may have chosen the better part, but we are all of us Marthas.

And so, instead of finding this passage to be only for women, or a source of guilt, of wondering if I've got my priorities straight, when I read about Martha and Mary, I always think: “Maybe Mary has chosen the greater part, but here below, I need to worry about things like food and clothing. Someday, maybe, I'll get my priorities together enough to be Mary-like, but until then, I'm in good company with Abba Silvanus and his brothers, with all the Marthas throughout the ages who have thought about food and clothing, who have lived under societal or cultural or familial expectations. Someday, I may get myself together enough to sit at the feet of my rabbi, and listen to his teaching. But for now, I'm going to run around like a chicken with my head cut off, and trust that even if is isn't the better part, my work will still serve my God.

Preached by Fr. Andrew Ashcroft

18 July 2010

Saint Mark's Church, Philadelphia

Martha and Mary

     Jesus had set his face toward Jerusalem…..we know what Luke means to say – Jesus will not be deterred from his mission, but first, a stopover with very dear friends at that sheltered place called Bethany; we know its name from John’s Gospel.

     Bethany is a small town, perhaps a dozen rectangular shaped,white-washed dwellings, built onto the Eastern slope of the Mount of Olives, only 1 and 5/8^th miles from Jerusalem, the same distance from here to Washington Square.

     Jesus and his disciples could see the homes of Bethany as they approached the town, because those homes stood out in contrast to the dry, rocky soil of the hillside and the few cedar trees among the homes, standing tall against the cloudless sky. Orchards of fig, olive and almond trees were arranged in tiers on the slope of the hill, with tidy stone walls separating the levels to aid in irrigation when the rainy season arrives. . .

     No wonder Bethany was a favorite place for Jesus: familiar, quiet, restful, lovely to behold and hospitable.

     Jesus made this journey to Bethany on many, many occasions and always stopped at the home of Martha, Mary and their brother, Lazarus. Martha’s generous hospitality was well known.

     Martha, Mary and Lazarus were three of Jesus’ closest and dearest friends. He had probably known them from his childhood; his family had most likely stayed over in Bethany and then went up with them to the High Holydays in Jerusalem.     

     On this particular day, the day we hear of in our Gospel, Martha stood at the front door of her home and beheld Jesus coming along the road, up the hill, with his disciples, raising a dust cloud as he slowly made his way to her home. Martha set to work, immediately, filling the water jugs to wash his feet and towels to dry them – this was Mary’s task in their household and she performed this act of hospitality with great care and love and respect for the Teacher.    

     But, on this day, something very extraordinary occurred: Jesus invited Mary to sit at his feet and listen to his teaching – this invitation was quite contrary to custom – a woman sitting at the feet of The Teacher? A woman welcomed and encouraged as a Disciple? Equal to the male disciples!? . . . . And, Mary, being the introvert, the contemplative type, was pleased, although somewhat shy, to sit in that front room with Jesus, that front room cooled in the shade of the cedars, yet, so full of light. What deep joy!

     Lazarus was most likely there, also, because as soon as he was told that Jesus had arrived, he came in from their carefully tended orchard, where for generations, his family kept fig, olive and almond trees. . .

     So, there they were, Jesus, with Mary and Lazarus, in a very intimate teaching time, while the other disciples sat out of doors, in circles, in the shade of the orchard trees, and . . . .      

     All this time, Martha labored in the rear room, the place for the cooking fire. Martha was preparing a very special meal for her very special guest: grain pilaf, with special additions of lamb and succulent vegetables. Martha enjoyed making these welcoming meals for Jesus; Martha relished the moments with Jesus in her home. But……

     Many of us here, today, can imagine how Martha may have felt, having no company in the kitchen to assist her in the meal preparation. Not only was she overwhelmed, perhaps, with the details of the meal preparation, but, perhaps, she was also feeling left out – surely, she could hear the low voice of The Teacher as he explained the wonderful truth of the Creator’s love. And, she was not there in that select group!

     Like many high energy, ‘management oriented’ people, she could not put her complicated meal preparation aside and just go into the front room and sit with Mary, listen at The Teacher’s feet. Who but herself was going to prepare the meal? And prepare it to her high expectations? Only Mary was capable of working with Martha in their kitchen, only Mary knew Martha’s ways and only Mary could be the ‘second woman’ in that kitchen!

     Finally, after much head shaking and heightening resentment, we hear of Martha’s next movement. She places her mixing bowl down on the low table in the cooking room, probably with some agitation, and enters the front room in a bit of a huff.

     “Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to do all the work by myself? Tell her then to help me.”  . . . . .

     Silence in the room, all eyes on Martha. Then, Jesus softly chides Martha: “Martha, Martha, you are worried and distracted by many things: there is need of only one thing. Mary has chosen the better part, which will not be taken away from her.”   . . . . .

      Was Jesus suggesting that Martha prepare a less elaborate pilaf? That he would be very content with a simpler meal? Yes, most probably, but there is something more to this.

     Jesus invites Martha (and here, today, invites us also) into a more balanced spirituality, a more complete holiness, a more intimate relationship with God. Jesus invites Martha, and us, also, to notice our need to be well nourished with the Word of God.

     Martha and everyone in that room (and everyone in this sacred space) has the words of Deuteronomy 8 written on the wall of our hearts: “(Neither men nor women nor children) can live on bread, alone, but from every Word that comes from the mouth of God.” Moreover, Jesus knows Martha’s heart (and, Jesus knows our hearts!), and invites Martha (and each of us) to desire Jesus’ indwelling and to make room, each day, for a ‘resting time with the Lord’.

     Truth is, in Martha’s life, and in each of our lives, our servant-hood issues from our love for God, our intimacy with Holy Spirit and our oneness with Jesus. This is a most important truth, hear this again: our servant-hood issues from our love for God, our intimacy with Holy Spirit and our oneness with Jesus.   . . . . 

     In one of his most recent books, Marcus Borg, a noteworthy and highly respected Scripture scholar of our own day, makes this observation about our lives as Christians: “…The goal of the Christian life is participating in the passion of God, as disclosed in the Bible and Jesus. God’s passion is that we center more deeply in God (‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul and strength’) and (that we center more deeply in) the world – a world of justice and peace. These are the inner and outer dimensions of the Christian life – union with God’s passion.” (Putting Away Childish Things, page 133.)

    Dear People of God, Jesus is our ‘Spiritual Director’ this morning, like Mary (and, eventually, Martha) we sit at Jesus’ feet and listen most intently for his wisdom to take root in our hearts. After all, Jesus is Way, Truth and Life.

     On a practical note: I imagine that if we were to ask any of the generous people who prepare the soup for our Saturday Soup Bowl, each would note that a part of each day is spent in quiet listening to Jesus, who speaks of his love in their hearts and that the soup preparation happens in a prayerful manner – and, perhaps, with a sip of the fruit of the vine and holy company?

    Friends, let us be full of joy and gratitude that Jesus invites each of us here, today, to sit at his feet, to know and experience, first hand, his deep, profoundly deep and complete love for each of us, his longing to be with us, always, in his word and sacrament and in each other. In the words of a favorite hymn: I come with joy to meet our Lord……

     Let us do that now……

Preached by Mother Marie Swayze

18 July 2010

Saint Mark's Church, Philadelphia