Remember Me

The most recent Pixar film, “Coco” tells the story of Miguel, a young Mexican boy who dreams of becoming a musician, but whose family has come to despise musicians, ever since his great-great grandfather left the family behind in search of stardom.  The entire story takes place on el Dia de los Muertos - the Day of the Dead - and unfolds as Miguel’s family is preparing the ofrenda, the altar covered in flowers, and foods, and symbols of familiar welcome for the dead ancestors who are being honored, and, according to tradition, who are to be welcomed back among the living this one night of the year.  At the center of the ofrenda there are photos of the beloved dead whose memories are being preserved, and whose visitation is being encouraged.   Miguel’s grandmother explains, “We've put their photos on the ofrenda so their spirits can cross over. That is very important! If we don't put them up, they can't come!....  We made all this food -- set out the things they loved in life.... We don't want their spirits to get lost. We want them to come....”*

Trying to escape the strictures of his family, who want him to become a shoe-maker rather than a musician, Miguel runs off in search of a guitar, as night falls.  And through a series of twists and unexpected turns, the boy finds himself in the Land of the Dead, still very much alive.  But he soon realizes that he is in danger of getting trapped forever on the wrong side of the marigold bridge that connects the living to the dead.

The boy discovers that he has only until sunrise to win a blessing from a departed ancestor in order to gain re-entry to the land of the living.  And he enlists the help of a dead man named Hector, who himself is unable to cross over to visit with the living on this Day of the Dead.  Hector explains to Miguel why his journey from the dead to visit the living is prevented: “this place runs on memories. When you're well-remembered, people put up your photo [on the ofrenda] and you get to cross the bridge and visit the living on Día de Muertos.  Unless you're me....  No one's ever put up my picture…”

As the story advances, Miguel discovers that an even worse fate awaits those who are forgotten amongst the living.  Hector tells him,  “when there's no one left in the living world who remembers you, you disappear from [the Land of the Dead, too.  They] call it the ‘Final Death.’”  And Hector is in immanent danger of being forgotten altogether.

The fortunes of the living boy and the doomed man become entangled, and they establish an uneasy alliance to help each other cross back over the marigold bridge to the world of the living: the boy to resume his life, and the man to visit his now aged daughter, the only living soul who might remember him, and place his photo on an ofrenda to keep his memory alive.

So far you may have been wondering why I did not preach this sermon back in November, and borrow the details of the vestigial Aztec customs of el Dia de los Muertos by way of reflection on our own commemoration of the dead - saints and sinners alike. 

The leitmotif of the film is the power of memory to preserve our familial relationships and to connect us to the past.  It’s a theme that is summed up in the recurring song that you will surely be humming when you leave the theater, “Remember me.”  Sung both as a rousing production number and as a soothing lullabye the song takes on a variety of meanings:

“Remember me.
Though I have to say good-bye,
Remember me.
Don’t let it make you cry.
For even if I’m far away
I hold you in my heart.
I sing a secret song to you
each night we are apart.

Remember me.
Though I have to travel far,
remember me.
Each time you hear a sad guitar
know that I am with you
the only way that I can be.
Until you’re in my arms again,
remember me.”**

This song, written for animated figures to sing in a movie, does, in fact, echo important themes of the Christian religion.  But not the themes of All Saints Day or All Souls Day, which coincide with el Dia de los Muertos.  No, this song rings out with the echoes of Maundy Thursday, which is the night, por excelencia, of Christian memory, since it is the night when our Lord shares bread and wine with his disciples, by way of imparting to them (and to us) the gift of his immortal living Presence, and then tells them (and us) to “Remember me.”

from Sagrada Familia, Barcelona

Do you hear an echo of that last night in the Upper Room in the details of this lovely movie, and in its signature song, as I do?  If we do, the movie invites us to consider what would have become of the Christian church without this Eucharistic gift to bring day by day to the ofrenda - to the altar where our hopes and needs meet God’s grace and mercy.  What would become of the church without the gift of this living memory of Jesus?  It was the gift on which the infant church was nourished, long before there was a Bible to read, or any scriptural tradition at all.  Before Paul wrote any of his letters (as attested to in First Corinthians), before the evangelists began to transcribe their notes, there was the tradition of this memory of this night, that was given as more than just a memory.  I’m not sure anyone ever sang it, but they should have.  They could have borrowed the tune, and even the words from Pixar: “Remember me.  Though I have to say goodbye, remember me.”

And there is a sense in which we gather tonight to listen to Jesus sing us a love song.  He gathers us at his altar, and it is he who makes the offering that matters, as he gives himself as a sacrifice for the sake of his love for us.  Having already washed our feet out of love, he now assures us that his love will endure for ever, as will his communion with his church.  And, knowing that it will be hard for us to follow in his Way after he is gone, he gives us the gift of a sacred memory that cannot ever die, with the simple instructions to “Do this, and remember me.”  Remember me.  Each time you hear these words, know that I am with you the only way that I can be.  Until you’re in my arms again, remember me.

On el Dia de los Muertos, I suppose you’d have to say that the Mexicans who set up their ofrendas in anticipation of visits from their dead ancestors are not relying on their memories in the usual, normal way, in order to recall with fondness  their family members of old.  They bring to that night the expectation of encountering the living presence of their departed loved ones, an expectation they learned from their ancient Aztec forebears.  And I suppose I’d have to say that, while I like the movie, I have my doubts (to say the least) about the possibility that the spirits of the dead cross over a marigold bridge to visit us once a year in November.

But tonight, we are not relying on our memories in the usual, normal way, in order to recall with fondness the loving acts of our spiritual ancestor of old.  No, we bring to this night (as we do to every Mass on every day of every year) the expectation of encountering the living Presence of Jesus.  The profound difference being that Jesus is not dead.  He was dead for three days, if you count days according Jewish custom, and if you allow for the fact that he died late on the first day, and rose early on the third day.  And so the living memory of Jesus is a different kind of memory altogether, than the feeble kinds of memories that we so easily lose.

The great challenge for Miguel (in the film), is that he must return before sunrise in order to reclaim the life that is his.  And his dead ancestors can do nothing for him but send him back whence he came.  And the best that he can do for Hector, is to bring back a photo of him to the land of the living, and place it on the ofrenda, and hang on to his memory a little while longer.  But the Final Death will come for him eventually, when enough generations have past, and memory fails, and the photo is lost, and the dead “dissolve into dust.”***  Didn’t we remind ourselves at the outset of Lent that we are dust, and to dust we shall return?

The challenge that lies before us is somewhat different, since Christ is alive, and since it is his grace, his power, his life from which all of us are given grace, and power, and life.   Tonight our challenge is to hear him sing his love song to us again and again; to hear him tell us to “Remember me,” as he gives us his Body and his Blood; and to take him in our hands, and to know that he is with us in the only way that he can be, until we rest in his arms again.  

But for now, to do this, and to remember him, and to know that he is here.

Preached by Fr. Sean Mullen

Maundy Thursday 2018

Saint Mark’s Church, Philadelphia

*All quotations from “Coco” Screenplay by Adrian Molina and Matthew Aldrich, produced by Disney Pixar, 2017

**Song by Kristen Anderson-Lopez and Robert J. Lopez, for Walt Disney Music Company, 2017

***“Coco” screenplay, page 61

Perhaps This Is the Last Temptation

Hosanna to the Son of David!
Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!
Blessed is the coming of the kingdom of our ancestor David!
Hosanna in the highest heaven!

To the joyful shouts of the crowd, Jesus riding on a colt entered Jerusalem, the royal city of David. People spread their garments and tree branches before him as a sign of royal welcome. He is the messiah and the king whose coming the ancient prophets prophesied and for whom they have been waiting for many years of oppression under the Roman rule. This is the moment for which the disciples have been following him all along.

There is, however, something odd about the whole scene. Jesus is riding on a colt or on a donkey in other gospels, an animal not fit for a king. Ordinarily for a regal entrance a king would be riding on a majestic and beautifully clothed stallion, a symbol of military power and victory. This is to fulfill the prophecy of Zechariah who prophesied: “Rejoice greatly, O Daughter of Zion! Shout, Daughter of Jerusalem! See, your king comes to you, righteous and having salvation, gentle and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey” (9:9). Donkey is a symbol of humility and peace.

This is a rather bizarre scene to imagine—Jesus riding on a colt and people shouting hosannas and laying down their garments and tree branches. But, therein is the irony and the paradox of this whole scene.

Lo and behold, his triumphal entry into Jerusalem is soon turned into a horrific journey of suffering to Calvary. The crowd’s joyful shouts of hosanna are changed to the violent cacophony of “Crucify him, crucify him.” The tree branches strewn on the road to welcome the Son of David is replaced by a humiliating crown of thorns over his head and a naked wood of the cross over his shoulder. Jesus is not the kind of the earthly messiah and king they have been expecting. How quickly things change!

Perhaps this IS the last temptation for Jesus. For anyone else, such a royal welcome would have been a huge ego booster. You can imagine what it might be like. Just as you are entering a ballroom a huge crowd of people cheering you on and giving you a red carpet welcome, like at the Oscars, what an ego-booster it would be!

All Jesus had to do was to give a go to his disciples and the revolt would have been quickly organized. Perhaps the disciples were already planning a rebellion against the Roman authority. Remember later on when they came to arrest Jesus, one of the disciples drew a sword and cut off the ear of one of the soldiers. This says that some of Jesus’ disciples were armed and ready for a fight when they gathered at Gethsemane. Perhaps they thought it was a secret meeting by night to plan the long-awaited revolt against the Romans.

But to their disappointment Jesus would have none of such violence. He stopped the violent intentions of his disciples and allowed himself to be arrested. No wonder they all immediately fled and deserted him. And no wonder the crowd’s cheers of hosannas turned into the cries for his crucifixion. They were not merely disappointed but were perhaps even angry with Jesus, for he failed their expectation. He was no messiah they had been waiting for.

So, what did they do? They put him on trial. What is so incredulous in this story is that human beings put God on trial. But then, we too often try God for things that inconvenience us and for things that are beyond our understanding and power. How often have you blamed God for things gone wrong in your life? Yet, what human beings muck up so terribly is transformed into the greatest gift of all by the sheer grace and love of God. That is the point of the Passion story—the power of God’s grace to redeem even the worst possible situation. Haven’t you had experiences where you made a mistake or did something wrong but then realized in hindsight that was precisely the moment and the occasion when God’s grace broke in and redeemed the situation? Things could not get worse for Jesus in this story. But also this is more importantly the story of God’s grace and love.

Yesterday my wife Clara and I joined the March for Our Lives at the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Park. In witness to the students who were killed by gun violence in Parkland FL and in witness to the thousands of children who have been killed by guns since Sandy Hook, March for Our Lives took place in many cities around the nation and around the world. This is a movement begun and organized by the youth of Marjorie Stoneman Douglas High School and the youth of our nation. They are crying out for their lives. They are crying out enough is enough. They are crying out for sensible gun control policy that honors the dignity and sacredness of life. We must listen to their cries unless we have lost our soul. Has America lost its soul? Where is our passion for love, justice and mercy? A passion for simply to do the right thing? The tragic deaths of thousands of children due to our failure to pass common sense gun control policy has ignited a passion in our youth to stand up for moral and spiritual justice. What I saw yesterday in the streets of Philadelphia is nothing short of the Passion for life. The death of seventeen students in Parkland FL could not get worse. But, this has become the occasion for the movement of redemption for life.

The Passion of our Lord Jesus is also all about passion for life, the holiness of  life God has given to each and everyone of us. This is a story about the Son of God who is loving, liberating and life-giving. It is the greatest and the ultimate story of love. “God so loved the world he gave his only Son even to death on the cross so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but have eternal life.” I know of no other religion that teaches that God laid down his own life so that we may have life.

The Father pours out his love on to the Son and  the Son, in turn, empties himself to the Father on the cross. This is the act of perfect selfless love. This is the story of perfect mutual love of Jesus the Son of God and God the Father. It is by this love that we are saved. It is by this love that the world will know that we are the followers of Jesus. There is no love story quite like it, friends. This is the greatest love story of all.

Love conquers all; love forgives all; Love suffers for all; Love triumphs over all evil. This is the Good News we believe in and proclaim to the world. Friends, we are in possession of the greatest love story of all.  Yet, we are timid and shy to tell this story. We are afraid to live and proclaim this great story. The world is hungry and thirsty to hear and know this powerful story. Today we begin retelling and living this story.

For Christians there is nothing holier than the Paschal mystery revealed in the Passion of Christ. The suffering of this innocent victim does not end in utter despair. It had the greater purpose of revealing the power of love.

Jesus gave it all for you and for me so that we may have new and eternal life. How much do you love Jesus in return? How far are you willing to go for Jesus? How much are you willing to give for his love? He gave it all for you and for me.

Preached by Bishop Allen Shin

25 March 2018

Saint Mark's Church, Philadelphia

Event Horizon

The death last week of Stephen Hawking has put me in mind of theoretical physics, and in particular of black holes - those phenomena of space and time on which so much of Hawking’s work focused.  For my purposes, I’ll just describe a black hole as a region of space and time with a gravitational pull so powerful that nothing can escape it.  Being more a man of letters than of numbers, I have a tendency to consider this as-yet-directly-unobserved phenomenon for its metaphorical possibility, rather than its scientific specificity, which is probably a disservice to the great physicist (or any physicist), for which I apologize in advance.  But chalk it up to the sheer force of Hawking’s influence in the contemporary, mainstream imagination, that the urge to enlist this avowed atheist in the enterprise of preaching the Gospel feels like, well, a gravitational pull so strong I can’t escape it.

I have no business talking about theoretical physics, in which I can’t even be called a dabbler.  But the more I have read about and by Stephen Hawking these past days, the more it has seemed to me that, although he was not himself a believer, his avenue of inquiry and his discoveries are in no way at odds with the avenues of inquiry and discoveries of faith.  And if scientific observations translate well into theological metaphor, mightn’t they shed light all the same?  Can’t science articulate more than one true thing at a time?

I hear Jesus say, “And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself.”  And can’t I be forgiven for hearing so clear an echo of that description of a black hole: a region of space and time with a gravitational pull so powerful that nothing can escape it?  And doesn’t it sound almost as if Jesus has something like this in mind, too?

How can I ignore it when I read that “when very massive stars collapse at the end of their life cycle... [and] a black hole has formed, it can continue to grow by absorbing mass from its surroundings”? (Wikipedia entry on “black holes”)  This doesn’t sound to me like a process unrelated to the mind of God.  Especially when it would nearly suffice as a description of the church, and when it seems entirely congruent with the unusual claim that Jesus made as he anticipated his death on the Cross: “I, when I am lifted up from the earth will draw all people to myself.”

It requires a shift, of course, for us to think of this inevitable gravitational pull as a positive force, and not simply a journey down the drain.  But Hawking, himself, is responsible for supplying us with this shift in thinking, since it was his research that showed that black holes were not merely sucking everything into them with irresistible force, they were also “leaking radiation and particles” and could eventually explode “transform[ing] them from destroyers to creators....” (NY Times, “Stephen Hawking Dies at 76, March 14, 2018, by Dennis Overbye)

“Hawking radiation,” if I have this right, is the stuff that comes out of a black hole - that is, it’s the stuff that escapes from the space and time from which nothing could escape.  That sounds a bit like resurrection to me.

To the popular mind, a black hole, of course signifies the inevitability of death, in some real sense.  The Times obituary of Hawking calls black holes “those mythological avatars of cosmic doom.”  I suppose that in many ways the site of a Roman crucifixion was meant to serve as an avatar of cosmic doom - or at least we may see it that way with hindsight.  Put three crosses on a hill and you could have a symbol for something like that.  Who would approach such a thing, knowing that the Cross - that symbol of the empire’s ability to to put you to a painful and tragic death - leads only and inevitably to doom?  But the story we begin to unfold every year at this time, includes this strange prescription of Jesus that “I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself.”  St. John makes it clear that it is the Cross that Jesus is referring to, telling us that “he said this to indicate the kind of death he was to die.”

And isn’t resurrection what happens when life escapes, so to speak, from death, that space and time from which nothing can escape?  And isn’t Jesus the pioneer of resurrection?  And don’t you hear him saying, only days before he is nailed to his Cross, not to be afraid, though he knows it is is frightening to be so close to death, so close to what the physicists call the “event horizon,” which is this point of no return at the edge of a black hole, from which no escape is possible. (Wikipedia entry on “event horizon”)

You get the sense, listening to Jesus today that he is in sight of the event horizon of his Crucifixion, on the threshold of a cosmic ministry that is new to him, although he came to us from eternity.  You get the sense that he knows that he is nearing the event horizon, and that although this is frightening to everyone involved, still, it must be encountered.  You can almost hear him steeling himself, and us, for the passage that is to come, which no one has ever made before, and which no one will ever have to make again.  And you can hear him reassure us that although the path looks frightening, we can trust him.

Remember that nothing should be able to escape the gravitational pull of a black hole - certainly no light.  And yet, the wonder of the cosmos is that something does emerge from its irresistible pull.  This doesn’t mean that you want to go sailing around the edges of a black hole to enjoy the view.  But it does mean that even the most powerful forces of the universe are more complex than we had imagined, and in a way, knowing this changes everything.  It certainly changes what we might be afraid of.  And nothing and no one is supposed to escape the inevitability of death.  But Jesus is the One who crossed over the event horizon into that inevitability, and then emerged from it again.

In the church’s terms, you might say that next Sunday, Palm Sunday, is, in a sense, the event horizon of the Christian story - the point of no return from which no escape is possible - at least for Jesus.  Only Jesus crosses over into the black hole of death in order to lead the way back out of it by the power of his resurrection.  He is the original Hawking radiation, so to speak, the One who escapes from a black hole.  That is, he is the One who rises from the space and time from which nothing can arise.  The good news for us is that he does it for us all, since all of us face the same event horizon of death, fearing that its inescapable darkness is all that lies before us.

And I think that he may be telling us with these strange prophetic words - “I, when I am lifted up from the earth will draw all people to myself,” - that from the Cross, where he himself meets death, he can assure us that he will be there at the event horizon of our own deaths, to hold us, and to carry us, to cross over, and eventually, to rise!

Preached by Fr. Sean Mullen

18 March 2018

Saint Mark’s Church Philadelphia