SeasonalJournal Grace and St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church

Advent / Christmas / Epiphany Volume 7, No. 1 November 26, 2017 SeasonalJournal Mission: To accept God’s grace and bear witness to His grace in the world.

3 Rector’s Welcome to the Season The Rev. Jeremiah Williamson 4 Editor’s Note: Norwich is Calling in July 2018! Joan Ray 6 Walking the Labyrinth, a Spiritual Pilgrimage Martha de Ulibarri 8 Parenting for the Season: The Wonder of Godly Play Kristin Brown 11 A Call to Live Life God’s Way: An Advent Sermon The Very Rev. Jane Hedges, Dean, Norwich Cathedral 14 Julian of Norwich and Christ as Mother Carol Neel 17 Christianity’s Radical Equality: A Christmas Sermon The Rev. Canon Dr. Peter Doll, Canon Librarian, Norwich Cathedral 19 St. Francis of Assisi’s Canticle of the Creatures 20 An epiphany for the Magi, but the Epiphany for the Poet: T.S. Eliot’s “Journey of the Magi” Joan Ray, PhD 24 Becoming a New Kind of People: An Epiphany Sermon The Very Rev. Jane Hedges, Dean, Norwich Cathedral 26 Music of the Season: Norwich Cathedral in our Sights! Concerts of the Season Inside Back Cover: Our Historic Crèche Marianna McJimsey Back Cover: Epiphany: A Celebration of Lights

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Grace and St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church Rector Rev. Jeremiah Williamson Tejon and Monument Streets (Nave) Curate Rev. Brendan Williams, CSJC 601 N. Tejon St. (Office) Editors Joan Ray Colorado Springs, CO 80903 Vicki Swanson Spellman Tel: (719) 328-1125 Cover Photo Detail Historic Crèche, www.gssepiscopal.org Grace and St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church Print/Design RhoDESCO, Colorado Springs, CO

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Advent / Christmas / Epiphany Volume 7, No. 1 Rector’s Welcome to the Season

Draw Near (by Scott Cairns) [Attend]

For near is where you’ll meet what you have wandered swoon just shy of apprehension. It was then. far to find. And near is where you’ll very likely see that time’s neat artifice fell in and made for us how far the near obtains. In the dark katholikon [cathedral] a figure for when time would slip free altogether. the lighted candles lent their gold to give the eye I have no sense of what this means to you, so little a more than common sense of what lay flickering sense of what to make of it myself, save one lit glimpse just beyond the ken, and lent the mind a likely of how we live and move, a more expansive sense in Whom.

--Scott Cairns (b. 1954) is an American poet.

traveled far to touch, see, smell things that seemed to be, upon further review, embedded. This is for me pilgrimage. For near is where you’ll meet what you have wandered far to find. IVacation is different. In a sense vacation takes you away—from life and busy and stress and the chores that seem to order time like how the church seasons keep repeating and keep telling you when to stand and kneel and say, “Alleluia.” But pilgrimage is something other. It does not take you away; it brings you closer to something that is mysteriously both close and hidden. Pilgrimage helps you remember your story. Not your autobiography. Your story. It sets you in context. Like the time I saw my family name scrawled across old Scottish memorials. Or the graves of Anglican priests in cathedral floors. I stood at the grave of St. Jerome (347-420, buried near the Grotto of the Nativity in Bethlehem), and I knew that he had whispered the Word into my ear though I could not tell you when that happened. And the Venerable Bede (673-735, the greatest of all Anglo-Saxon scholars, is buried in Durham Cathedral): he was a teacher though I’ve been only in the presence of his bones. At the Wailing Wall, the Church of the Nativity, the Church of the Holy Sepulcher (Jerusalem), and San Clemente al Laterano (The Basilica of St. Clement in Rome), I’ve spilled prayers into a sea of distant echoes, the dead and the living speaking in tongues. I’ve stood in silence, closed my eyes, and knew I was not alone. I’ve walked the steps that Jesus walked and touched the stone that drank his blood and saw the rock that cradled his corpse. And yet he was with me—every step, coursing through my veins, cradling me in his sacred heart. I touched his death and felt him alive. I had seen the pictures. I had read the texts. I had heard the tales. And yet I had to wander far to meet something that was already embedded—deep down, in my DNA, in my heart, in my soul. I have learned that there are pieces of us scattered all over the globe, pieces that we must go to find. Like collectors of a past that is ever present. My wife and I haven’t really traveled much, not once out of the country, since our two sons joined our lives. We needed to take some time, to be grounded, to keep the story going, I suppose. This summer, though, we will join the Taylor Choir on a pilgrimage to England, to haunts of St. Julian of Norwich. I am traveling with the living to commune with the dead. I hope to find something there that is so near I don’t know it is already here, if that makes sense: to gather another scattered piece of me, to slip further into my story. I’m not sure what I will find on my pilgrimage; I’m not even sure what exactly I am looking for. But I know whatever it is, is waiting for me, reaching out from a past that is never truly past, waiting in the golden flicker of revelation, waiting to be found. By Rev. Jeremiah Williamson, Rector Grace and St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church

Advent / Christmas / Epiphany 2017 3 Editor’s Note

Norwich is Calling in July 2018! By Joan Ray, Co-Editor Seasonal Journal

etween 16 and 20 July 2018, the voices served as a Benedictine Monastery. Here of our marvelous Taylor Choir will the 6th-century Benedict of Nursia (480- be heard in the historic Romanesque 543) composed The Rules of St. Benedict B(Norman) Norwich Cathedral, one of twelve for monks living in a community under an Heritage sites in the county of Norwich, abbot. Benedict’s Rules are in the motto of the England. To whet your appetite for our visit Benedictine Confederation2: pax (peace) and to Norwich, I invited clergy from Norwich the traditional ora et labora (pray and work). Cathedral, “Dedicated to the Holy and Norwich Cathedral continues the Benedictine Undivided Trinity,” to contribute to this issue ethos in its everyday life through “worship, of the Seasonal Journal. Cathedral clergy and learning, and hospitality.” You can see the staff responded promptly and pleasantly to my Norwich Cathedral Cloister—with pigs, cows, request. Special thanks go to Alison Porter, and many human extras dressed as nuns and PA to the Dean (The Very Rev. Jane Hedges), farmers— in the new film, Tulip Fever. and James Sheldon, the Cathedral’s Marketing Norwich is a walkable, charming medieval Manager, for their friendly assistance. city. I first became really aware of it when I Norwich Cathedral, built over 900 years ago read Revelations of Divine Love by Julian of (1096-1146), is meant “to inspire by its sheer Norwich (c. 1342- c. 1416); it is the first size and magnificence”1: the Cathedral Close book written in English (c. 1395) by a female. (enclosed area around a cathedral) is the largest Parishioner Carol Neel, PhD., Professor of in England and one of the largest in Europe. History (Colorado College), who specializes The Cathedral’s cloisters are the second largest in the European Middle Ages, kindly accepted in England, exceeded only by the cloisters of my invitation to write about Julian of Norwich Salisbury Cathedral. Norwich’s spire at 315 in this journal issue. feet is the second tallest in England. The Greek Located in Norwich is The Julian Centre, next word cathedra, the root of cathedral, means door to St. Julian’s Church (Anglo-Catholic) in the seat of the bishop; the Bishop’s Palace is Norwich. 3 The center’s website explains, “We adjacent to the Cathedral. do not know Julian’s actual name but her name During the Cathedral’s first 450 years, it is taken from St. Julian’s Church (where Julian’s

4 SeasonalJournal cell is located) in Norwich where she lived as ______an anchoress for most of her life.” Her original Endnotes cell, largely damaged by bombing in WW II, 1 Norwich Cathedral’s informative website is http:// was rebuilt. The Anglican religious order of www.cathedral.org.uk All Hallows Ditchingham (All Hallows Sisters) 2 maintains the shrine. The Episcopal Church The Benedictine Confederation is the international Calendar commemorates Julian on May 8. governing body of the Order of St. Benedict, established in 1893 by Pope Leo XII For information on the Choir’s Tour, contact 3 Deke Polifka, our Organist and Choirmaster, You can learn more about The Julian Centre at http// or the church office. juliancentre.org

Norwich Cathedral

Advent / Christmas / Epiphany 2017 5 Walking the Labyrinth, a Spiritual Pilgrimage

By Martha de Ulibarri

edieval pilgrims traveling to cathedral cities constructed of wood or ceramic, can be held in one’s ended their physical journeys with a walk lap to use as an aid to meditation or contemplative into a labyrinth. As we enter the season of prayer. MMary and Joseph traveling to Bethlehem and the three Following the Mystical Path kings following a star, the winding path of a labyrinth invites us to make our own spiritual pilgrimages. In her book, Walking a Sacred Path, Rev. Dr. Lauren Artress,1 known for reintroducing the labyrinth to In Christian spiritual practice, walking the path of the present-day seekers, writes: labyrinth is a form of contemplative prayer. Walking at an unconscious pace, along a path we don’t have to Once we make the choice to enter it, the path think about, allows us to detach gently from our racing becomes a metaphor for our journey through thoughts and open our minds and hearts to the voice life…The labyrinth is a spiritual tool meant of God. I find that if I let my mind and heart go where to awaken us to ourselves and to the Light they will, the path of the labyrinth will carry my heart that calls from within. In surrendering to where it needs to go. the winding path, the soul finds healing and The labyrinth is a geometrical design, usually in wholeness. (“Introduction,” p. xii) the form of a circle, containing a meandering but While there is no right way to walk a labyrinth, the purposeful path from the edge to the center and back classical description of following the mystical path, again. But unlike a maze, whose twists and dead ends where knowledge of self and of God become one, is present a puzzle designed to engage the mind to solve, three-fold: the labyrinth’s single path assures a safe return to those Purgation: Walking from the entrance to the who enter. The way in is the way out. center is the phase of emptying, releasing, and Nearly all religious traditions dating back 4,000 quieting our beings. years have embraced the labyrinth as a sacred space. Christian ninth-century monks decorated their Illumination: The center is a place of meditation manuscripts with the circular design, and medieval and prayer entered with a mind and heart open church architects incorporated labyrinths into to what is there for us. their structures. In France the labyrinth at Chartres Union: From the center, the final stage of the Cathedral, completed in 1201, serves as a model for walk empowers us to move back into the world many modern versions. The Medieval Chartres design replenished and directed. features eleven concentric rings or circuits around the Find your body’s natural pace as you walk alone or center. Seven circuits are common for labyrinths in the with others on the two-way path. You may pass people United States. or let them step around you. Linger as long as you like The labyrinth has never been confined to the in the center. pavement and mosaic floors of churches. Historians Finding a Labyrinth of labyrinths suggest that the ancient design evolved from the spiral form in nature and have found turf Since the mid-1990s growing numbers of churches labyrinths in England, Scandinavia, and Germany. and retreat centers have built or installed labyrinths. With the resurgent recognition that following the They have become part of wellness programs at health path is a walking meditation that benefits mind, body spas and resorts. Colorado Springs is home to a variety and spirit, many contemporary labyrinths are now of labyrinths on public and private properties ranging found in secular settings. Portable “finger labyrinths,” from downtown settings to plains and woodland areas.

6 SeasonalJournal Local labyrinth sites include: symbol wherever their travels take them, using the First Christian Church, 16 E. Platte Ave., Colorado Worldwide Labyrinth Locator, an online data-base Springs currently containing 5,400 labyrinths of all shapes and sizes, both historic and modern, in more than 80 Shove Memorial Chapel, 1010 N. Nevada Ave., different countries around the world. 2 Colorado Springs, on the Colorado College Campus ______Penrose Hospital, 2215 N. Cascade Ave., Colorado Martha de Ulibarri has been a member of Grace and St. Springs, north of the hospital building Stephen’s since 2014. She has been walking the winding Franciscan Retreat Center, 7740 Deer Hill Grove, path since 1999 when her Episcopal church in Evergreen, Colorado Springs, off west Woodmen Road Colorado built a labyrinth in a meadow on the church Indoor Labyrinth Center for Spiritual Living, 3685 property. Jeannine Drive, Colorado Springs, open during some ______events, (719) 596-6894 Endnotes Benet Hill Monastery/Benet Pines Retreat Center, 1 The Reverend Dr. Lauren Artress is an Episcopal priest, a 3190 Benet Lane, Colorado Springs, off Highway 83, licensed psychotherapist, and the author of Walking a Sacred south of Hodgen Road; check in with the office for Path, Rediscovering the Labyrinth as a Spiritual Tool, which directions to the labyrinth in the woods, (719) 633- reintroduced the labyrinth as a form of walking med-ministries at 0655 Grace Cathedral in San Francisco. She is the founder of Veriditas, Cherry Creek Crossing, 3215 Double Tree Court, The Worldwide Labyrinth Project, a non-profit worldwide center Colorado Springs, just west of Highway 83 off Hodgen devoted to “peppering the world with labyrinths” and “training Road, (719) 574-8748 and supporting labyrinth facilitators around the world” (https:// www.veriditas). Her home parish is Grace Cathedral in San La Foret Conference and Retreat Center, 6145 Shoup Francisco, California, which has two labyrinths. From 1986 Road, Colorado Springs, in the Black Forest, by to 1992, she served as Canon Pastor and then as Canon for appointment, (719) 495-2743 Special Ministries until August 2004 at the Cathedral. In May Sanctuary of the Rose, bed and breakfast, 4615 2006, Grace Cathedral honored her rediscovery of the labyrinth, Hageman Ave., Cascade CO, call first, (719) 433-3072 designating her an Honorary Canon, a lifetime title. As it was for medieval pilgrims, travelers today can also 2 To discover labyrinths beyond the local community, visit the experience the transformative power of this ancient WorldWide Labyrinth Locator < https://labyrinthlocator.com/ >

Labyrinth at Bennet Hill Monastery, Colorado Springs, based on the labyrinth design found in the Cathedral in Chartres, France. Photo courtesy Bennet Hill.

Advent / Christmas / Epiphany 2017 7 Parenting for the Season

The Wonder of Godly Play By Kristin Brown

odly Play” may sound irreligious. After Perhaps it is easier to enter into an explanation by all, when we enter church, we enter describing how a Godly Play session generally looks. a sacred place, not a playground, to An ideal time of Godly Play is designed like this: “Gworship God. But Godly Play is actually an approach for children’s Christian education, designed by an Gathering and Getting Ready: To enter into our Episcopal priest and used in Sunday School curricula story we must prepare: slow down, open our hearts since 1994. We have used the Godly Play curriculum and anticipate God in each other and in our coming in our Sunday School for twenty years. 1 together. We become ready. What is Godly Play? I am Crossing the Threshold asked this question often, “The Godly Play and building the Circle: The Godly Play room is but describing Godly Play room is intended to be a is like describing how intended to be a sacred something smells. How do sacred place.” space. It feels different from you describe the aroma of a other rooms or the hallway. peach? If I do not already Kids are at the center of know peaches, how can you tell me about them? It’s the design and use of the like that for Godly Play; it needs to be experienced to space. The adult posture changes to accommodate the be understood. It’s difficult to describe, but I’ll try. child’s perspective. The shelves are all within a child’s reach. We extend and receive welcome by providing Godly Play is an imaginative approach for working hospitality. The story is told in a circle on the floor. with children that supports, challenges, nourishes, and We tell the story with the children, not to them. As guides their spiritual quest. It is more akin to spiritual story-tellers, we take our place and make room for guidance than to what we generally think of as everyone to take their places in the circle. religious education. Godly Play assumes that children have some experience of the mystery of the presence of The Story is the Thing: Stories are the focal point of God in their lives, but that they lack the language and understanding to express and enjoy that experience. Godly Play is an intentional, structured way of finding identity through The Story. It includes Gathering, Story, Silence, Trusting, Nurturing, Wondering, and Drawing near to God. 2

Sunday School teacher Kristin Brown leads Godly Play session.

8 SeasonalJournal Godly Play. Jerome Berryman, creator of Godly Play, the inexplicable. Typical wondering questions might says that we need stories to navigate the challenges of be: “I wonder which part of the story you like best? I life. Our stories help children learn and hold on to the wonder where you are in the story? Which part of this language of our faith, which allows them to recall the story is about you? I wonder what the green grass and stories in difficult times. The stories of our faith also the cool water could really be? I wonder if there’s any help us to understand our own stories. A Godly Play part of the story we could leave out and still have all story is quiet; we are sparing in our use of words and the story we need?” gestures so that the children can have uncluttered and open access to the Time: We have all the time we need. Godly Play is not story. The stories are rushed. We believe tactile; we tell them that the Holy Spirit with beautifully “Stories are the focal helps us to leave the made objects that circle with whatever are lovely to touch point of Godly play.” it is that we needed and hold. when we joined the circle, and that Silence: There are what we receive will silent spaces in continue to grow in Godly Play, for without silence, we cannot think or the days ahead. listen. We trust and learn from silence. Silence is a gift in our noisy world and a way of knowing in itself. We Response: The children are always invited to create an treat Silence as a member of the group. After someone art response to the story of the day. If they do not feel speaks we take time to reflect without immediately like creating, they may retell the story that they have filling the space with words. just heard, using the story’s figures—or any other story in the room that they know. They may also choose to Our Sunday School is set up in a rotation schedule, build with items available for those times when that and on other Sundays our children are also gaining the seems the most appealing. “nuts and bolts” pieces of our faith. But Godly Play Sundays give us a way to enter deeper into those places As Sunday School time comes to an end, we extend that contain less definition, greater paradox, and more the sacred space of Godly Play by inviting the children Wonder. In Godly Play it is important that we just upstairs to celebrate the Eucharist among our church tell the story. My years of experience do not make family. me somehow more spiritual or closer to God than the Godly Play pulls us into a deeper understanding. It children are. I’m pretty sure the opposite is true. So creates a space to ponder, explore, imagine, and create. we do not interpret the story for our own comfort Jerome Berryman puts it this way: or clarification. Instead, we trust The ambiguity the Holy Spirit to of the be at work through “Godly Play…creates a space imagination the story. is at the root to ponder, explore, imagine, of our being. Wondering: To be alive we Following a story, and create.” must create we Wonder. in biological, Wondering is key; psychological, it can be elusive, social, and but this is the part of the story where we can consider spiritual ways. This is our destiny since Eden.

Advent / Christmas / Epiphany 2017 9 It is a life guarded by an angel with a flaming ______sword where endings imply beginnings and beginnings imply endings. Life itself is a Endnotes paradox that can be resolved only by the 1 The late Mary Webster brought the program to Grace and St. imagination in action, the creative process. Stephen’s when she served as Education Director. This is how we are in the image of God.3 2 The Rev. Jerome W. Berryman, M. Div., “Truly I tell you, unless you change J.D., developed the Godly Play children’s and become like children, you will education program. In 1972 Rev. Berryman never enter the kingdom of heaven.” (Matthew 18:3). This is no small graduated from the yearlong program at The commandment from our Lord. But Center for Advanced Montessori Studies in Godly Play provides a path for us. Bergamo, Italy, which inspired him to devote the rest of his academic and pastoral career ______to the moral and spiritual development of children. The General Theological Kristin Brown is a member of Grace Seminary (2009) and the Virginia and St. Stephen’s and has been a Sunday Theological Seminary (2010) have awarded School teacher at Grace and St. Stephen’s him honorary doctorates of divinity. He is since 1995, leading Godly Play in our presently the Director for the Center for the parish for 17 years. She has attended Theology of Childhood, which is part of multiple training sessions conducted the Godly Play Foundation, established in by the Godly Play founder, Jerome 2007. Located in Denver, it is the research Berryman, including one as recent as center for the Godly Play Foundation. For last June. Several other Sunday School more, see Godlyplayfoundation.org teachers have trained over the years in 3 Godly Play; this year she is happy to Jerome W. Berryman, Godly Play: A Way of be teaching Godly Play with Patrick Religious Education. New York: Harper San Dobbins. Francisco Publishing Company, 1991: 133.

10 SeasonalJournal A Call to Live Life God’s Way: An Advent Sermon

By: The Very Rev. Jane Hedges, Dean, Norwich Cathedral

A sermon delivered on the Third Sunday of Advent, December 11, 2016, at Norwich Cathedral. BIBLE READINGS: Isaiah 35: 1-10, James 5: 7-10, St Matthew 11: 2-11

f you have worked with children in a Sunday School Well, it’s reasonably easy to understand the first part of or you’ve ever read about St John the Baptist to Jesus’ remark, “No one has arisen greater than John the your children or grandchildren from a Children’s Baptist,” because he was quite clearly a great person. IBible, you’ll know that when you reach the part of the As the forerunner of the Messiah, John played a crucial story where we’re told that John wore a coat of camels role in preparing the way for the coming of Jesus; and hair and ate locusts for lunch, children on the whole having prepared the way, himself retreating into the will respond with an “Urhh.” background, saying, “I am not the Christ, but I have Outwardly, John was certainly a strange person— been sent before him . . . He must increase, but I must “eccentric” would be the most polite way to describe decrease.” him—but I wouldn’t mind betting that some of his We know from John’s lifestyle that he was devout; contemporaries would have had other names for him. brutally honest; courageous and completely committed However, despite this, he was an effective Prophet. He to speaking God’s Word to the people of his day— had a following of his own disciples, and people flocked calling them to repent—to about turn, change their to him from all over Judaea to hear him prophesy lives, and be baptised. Jesus recognised that it was against the Establishment. Jesus knew John well, knew John’s authenticity and integrity that drew people out of his oratory, his charisma and his courage and clearly to the wilderness to listen to him. They were not drawn thought highly of him. And yet, Jesus makes that very by outward appearances, as they might be drawn to a strange remark quoted at the end of today’s gospel: king in fine clothes; they were not drawn by a “softy” “Truly I tell you among those born of women no one who would speak a soothing message to them—in has arisen greater than John the Baptist; yet the least in Jesus’ words, by “A reed shaken by the wind.” They the Kingdom of heaven is greater than he.” were drawn by something much more powerful: by the What on earth did Jesus mean by this? words of a Prophet whose words would cut straight to

Advent / Christmas / Epiphany 2017 11 the heart. God’s word—and for us as Christians this kind of So John was a great person. But why did Jesus refer to prophetic action is an important part of our calling. him as the least in the Kingdom of Heaven? Perhaps a There is also some encouragement to be gained as we read about John the Baptist having doubts, and having “…it was John’s authenticity to send that message to Jesus to check if he really is the Messiah. If someone as faithful as John the Baptist can and integrity that drew have doubts, perhaps it’s OK for us to have doubts as people out to the wilderness well. So we might look at Jesus and ask, “Is he the Son of to listen to him.” God? Has his coming really changed the world?” And this is where we have to face up to a challenge. At this point we can stay with John the Baptist—a clue to this lies in the opening verse of today’s gospel. From prison, John sends his messengers to Jesus to ask, “Are you the one who is to come or are we to expect some other?” It seems that although John had prophesied about the coming Messiah, when Jesus began his ministry of healing and reconciliation, his ministry of bringing in the Kingdom, John was not himself able to read the signs. John stood in the old tradition of the prophets: he was like Isaiah, looking forward to a new age, but not actually able to enter that new way of being himself. But how do we see ourselves relating to John and to Jesus? In many ways, although John was a strange figure, he great person, but definitely part of the old covenant, is still an inspiration to us. There is something very a covenant that demanded obedience to the Law of attractive about a person who is willing to stand out Moses. from the crowd, who has uncomfortable things to say to people, who risks his own life in order to preach Or, we can step into a new dimension, into a different mode of being and be part of that Kingdom that Jesus has brought in. In this kingdom we live under “If someone as faithful as a new covenant by God’s grace— recognising that John the Baptist can have God’s love is generous beyond our imagining. This is a kingdom Jesus describes in his parables, a kingdom doubts, perhaps it’s OK for that welcomes the poor and downtrodden before the us to have doubts as well.” rich; a kingdom that demands that we become like children if we are to enter it, a kingdom in which great things will grow from small beginnings.

12 SeasonalJournal In this kingdom we don’t need to be driven by the desire (appointed 2014), is the to succeed, or ruled by consumerism, or pressured into 39th Dean and first female damaging others in order to protect our own interests Dean in the cathedral’s because the assurance that we are loved meets our 900-year history. Ordained deepest desires and sets us free. Deacon (1987) and priest If we choose this path and follow Jesus, in the words of (1994), Dean Hedges was educated at Durham University and has also “We can step into a new served at Westminster dimension, into a different Abbey as Canon Steward, Archdeacon and Sub- mode of being and be part Dean. of that Kingdom that Jesus ______has brought in.” Endnotes 1 Ursula Askham Fanthorpe, CBE, FRSL (1929-2009), an English poet, published her work with the byline U. A. Fanthorpe. The the poet, U.A. Fanthorpe, we walk into “the moment Dean quotes from her poem “BC: AD.” Earning her B.A. and when before turned into after—into the Kingdom of M.A. at St. Anne’s College, Oxford University, Fanthorpe worked 1 Heaven.” at a school and psychiatric hospital. She wrote nine volumes of And if we feel daunted about taking this step—to live published poetry. Fanthorpe began in 1974 writing poems in life God’s way—the way that Jesus lived, we can remind her Christmas cards until 2002. These poems are collected and ourselves that we do so in the company of millions available in the volume U.A. Fanthorpe, Christmas Poems (London: of others, and with Christ himself feeding us, in this Enitharmon Press, 2002). She was the first woman nominated for Eucharist, which is a foretaste of his heavenly banquet. the post of Oxford Professor of Poetry. Her many awards include ______the 2003 Queen’s Gold Medal for Poetry. Her poems are known The Very Rev. Jane Hedges, Dean of Norwich Cathedral for their accessibility.

Advent / Christmas / Epiphany 2017 13 Julian of Norwich and Christ as Mother

By Carol Neel

n summer of 2018, the choristers of Grace in Julian’s and St. Stephen’s will travel as pilgrims to childhood. many English holy places—among them Plague returned Ithe East Anglian town of Norwich, home of the again and again Door to St. Julian’s Chapel at fourteenth-century visionary Julian. Ironically, in the following Norwich Cathedral. although this medieval woman is best known decades, but for her evocation of a feminine divine, we know the visionary of Norwich, hopeful despite such her by the name of the male saint by whose massive loss, saw the whole world as held in church she lived immured. Julian would not love by God as if in her own hand: have minded. Her baptismal name dissolves And [God] showed me something into her hermitage just as her personal identity small, no bigger than a hazelnut, melts into the religious experience written in lying in the palm of my hand. . . the book of her visions. .I looked at it and thought: What Modern portraits in paint or glass often show can this be? And I was given the Julian with a cat. A window from her small general answer: It is everything quarters opened onto the choir of Saint Julian’s, which was made. . . .It lasts and so a small companion might have slipped in and always will, because God loves it. 1 out through the church. Rodents would have Her cat might have batted nuts about the floor tried to share the food brought to the anchoress, of her cell as she shelled them.

“For us…to see Julian as a For us, though, to see Julian as a kindly saint accompanied by a feline defender averts our kindly saint…averts our gaze gaze from the raw, bodily imagery of her from the raw, bodily imagery visions of God. Despite her separation from of her visions of God.” our time, her visions are wrapped in words with which modern English-speakers can fully engage. Julian’s Revelations of Divine Love— as she titled it more simply, Showings—is the beloved of the town and region, through first book-length work by a woman in our another opening onto the market square. A language. Scholars still argue over which of mouser would have been useful. The Black the handful of early manuscripts represents Death borne by rats’ fleas had struck England the text she intended to leave behind, but all 14 SeasonalJournal describe a young woman so intent to encounter tenderly to her brest, but our Christ that she prayed as she approached tender moder Jesus, he may her thirtieth year that she would be so ill as homley leden us into his blessed to believe she would die. Through physical brest be his swete open syde, suffering, Julian believed, she might call Christ and shewyn therein party of the to reveal himself. She mentions no cat. Nor Godhede and the ioyes of hevyn. would such domestic comfort have staunched . . .To the properte of moderhede her wrenching need for God. longyth kinde love, wisdam and knowing, and it is good. 3 Julian’s so-called “long text” includes a revelation missing in shorter versions. This These passages have recently been read—both passage, explaining what Julian came in her trumpeted and marginalized—as medieval anguish to understand about God’s mercy, feminist theology. At least in England and in portrays Christ as not only father-like in his English, many contemporaries have argued, care for his children but mother-like in their not only could women write about God, but embrace: the God about whom they wrote was gendered like them. Our Mother in nature, our Mother in grace, because he Such a reading offers some truth, more resonant wanted altogether to become with the fourteenth-century visionary than an our Mother in all things, made image of Julian as cat lady. But to characterize the foundation of his work most Julian’s work as assent to twenty-first century humbly and mildly in the theology is anachronistic. More damagingly, maiden’s womb. . . .The mother’s it domesticates the wild urgency in which she service is nearest, readiest and seeks God. To uproot Julian’s imagery of the surest: nearest because it is most feminine divine from its medieval context natural, readiest because it is and ancient sources is to compromise its most loving, and surest because power, denying its attribution of spiritual it is truest. No one ever might meaning to bodily experience. Only after or could perform this office fully, the Reformation period, concerned as it was except only him. . . .The mother can give of her child to suck other milk, but our precious Mother Jesus can feed us with himself, “Julian…portrays Christ not and does, most courteously only father-like in his care for and tenderly, with the blessed his children but mother-like in sacrament, which is the precious their embrace.” food of true life.2 So the modernization of Julian’s English. But her Middle English is close enough to ours that to establish the character of the divine as fully we understand her as she goes on: masculine, could Julian’s account of God’s The moder may leyn the child mothering seem surprising or discordant. The

Advent / Christmas / Epiphany 2017 15 visionary of Norwich spoke not only from her own heart, but from a long Western—still more What Does It Mean that Julian of a universal Christian—tradition in which God’s Norwich was an “Anchoress?” wisdom, divine “wisdam and knowing,” was best understood as a mother’s voice. St. Julian of Norwich was known as an “anchoress” (male: anchorite), a term we don’t often hear today. For us as moderns, Julian’s conviction that our Sometimes considered religious hermits, anchorites own embodiment—especially our physical of the Middle Ages vowed to withdraw from suffering—binds us to God’s maternal human society and confine themselves to a small compassion may seem distant and troubling. permanent cell attached to a church. They spent Suffering, after all, is what we wish to stop. But their time in this solitary confinement in intense prayer, living as if dead to the world around them. the words of the medieval woman, Julian, fuse the inevitability of human suffering with her witness A large number of the cells (“anchor holds”) can that we invoke Christ in the physicality in which still be seen in England, where the anchoritic life he shared. Like all medievals, Julian saw flesh— was particularly popular, especially among women. men’s as well as women’s—as feminine, as framed The cells were about 12-15 feet square, with one in women’s bodies. Jesus’s incarnation was then small opening facing the sanctuary through which the anchorite participated in daily Mass and Holy a revelation of love continually relived in human Eucharist. Another smaller interior opening embodiment. Here, behind the comforting allowed for delivery of food and removal of the Julian of the hazelnut and the cat, emerges the chamber pot. A third small window faced the compelling paradox of her Showings—that our street, allowing in a small amount of outside light. humanness and incompletion do not shame us, Anchorites were supposed to remain in their cells but rather dignify us through God’s love. From in all eventualities, even to the point of burning to a humble cell outside the modest church where death should their church catch on fire. our choir pilgrims will remember her, in the Although physically isolated from human contact, vernacular we share, Julian calls out that Christ anchorites were available to provide advice and our “moder” will find us wherever we are. spiritual guidance to those in the community who often sought it through the small window facing ______the street.

Carol Neel is a faculty member of the Department --Vicki Swanson Spellman, Co-Editor of History, Colorado College and a member of Grace and St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church. ______Endnotes

1 Julian of Norwich, Showings, trans. Edmund Colledge and James Walsh (Mahwah, NJ: Paulist Press, 1978), 130.

2 Showings, 299.

3 Julian of Norwich, A Revelation of Love, ed. Marion Glasscoe (Exeter: University of Exeter Press, 1976), 98.

16 SeasonalJournal Christianity’s Radical Equality: A Christmas Sermon

By The Rev Canon Dr. Peter Doll Canon Librarian, Norwich Cathedral

A Sermon delivered on the Second Sunday of Christmas, January 3, 2016, at Norwich Cathedral BIBLE READINGS: Jeremiah 31: 7-14; Psalm 147; Ephesians 1: 3-14; St John 1: 10-18

ith another New Year has come the annual For all the strengths of this aspect of our national life, publication of the New Years’ Honours list1 and however, it must be admitted that it does fall a good way with it the annual ding-dong in the news media short of a Christian ideal. It may do quite well for the aboutW whether this system of granting awards has had its United Kingdom, but it will not do for the Kingdom of day. As always the politicians abuse the system by giving God. In the Kingdom of God, all are equally chosen and gongs to their political and personal cronies, and as always equally loved, and the same prize of eternal life is available a number of fading celebrities have been given a publicity to all. We know the famous line penned by W. S. Gilbert boost by becoming dames and knights. These are the parts for The Gondoliers, “If everyone is somebody, then no one’s of the awards that get all the anybody,”2 and we decry the media attention and fuss, but school sports days when all the the awarding of the well known children win prizes, and not just is only the tip of the honours those who win the races. If such iceberg. It is in the hundreds of events are not good preparation names of people not well known for the rapacious realities of our outside their own geographical “marketized” society, they do communities or communities of give us an insight into God’s interest that the real democratic priorities, in whose kingdom strength of the honours list lies. the last shall be first, and the These are people, nominated first last. There, not only is by their fellow citizens, who are everyone somebody; everyone is recognized by the nation not uniquely precious and honoured for being famous or for having in God’s sight. Ultimately, the accumulated lots of money or eternal life of God’s kingdom is power, but because they have not something that anyone can served their neighbors in a vast win by merit but is the entirely variety of ways with outstanding unmerited gracious gift of God commitment. In the midst of a Western culture ever more won for us through the blood of the Christ. Human beings dominated by the conviction that economic growth is crucified Christ in history and continue to crucify him the sufficient rationale and goal of society, the honours daily in the lives of the poor and the weak, of the refugees lists remind us that there is more to life than monetary expelled from their homes by human cruelty and trapped in accumulation and that there is still such a thing as the their homeless state by human indifference. ‘common good’ and ‘public service’ that we still value as the In this season we celebrate the incarnation of the Son of essential glue of our national and local communities. I’m God in human flesh, and it is this incarnation that created not aware of another national system like it, and it is worth a revolution not only in human thought but also in human the support and participation of all citizens to ensure that history. The origin of this revolution is to be found in the those who are worthy are recognised. Hebrew Scriptures, particularly in the conviction that God

Advent / Christmas / Epiphany 2017 17 created humanity in his own image and likeness, made all notable part, out of all proportion to their numbers in the women and men capable of knowing him and sharing his wider society. Today Christians are playing a leading role in divine life. It was the incarnation, however, that ratified the fight against human trafficking, in defense of unborn life, this truth by God, himself, coming to share our flesh and and in the provision of food banks. No other global leader our mortality: “The Word became flesh and dwelt among than Pope Francis could have spoken with equal authority us, and we have seen his glory” (John 1:14). Nothing like and force on behalf of creation and the vulnerable of our this has ever been claimed world in the face of climate by any other religion. Most change.4 Nevertheless, there Jews could not then and is a danger in the Church “In the Kingdom of God, all are equally have not since been able being perceived to be yet to accept this teaching. chosen and equally loved, and the same another special-interest As John the evangelist prize of eternal life is available to all.” campaigning organization recognized in our gospel within the wider society, no for this morning, God “the matter how worthy its aims true light, which enlightens and goals may be. Christians everyone, was in the world, and the world came into being must recognise that the breaking in of the Kingdom of through him; yet the world did not know him. He came to God is never going to be our doing, the result of human what was his own, and his own people did not accept him” determination and effort. The secular world has come to (John 1:10-11). The incarnation was equally an affront to regard human equality as a purely human project, which the pagan world, which did not accept that divinity could we are capable of bringing to completion. Not so. This is a take on the materiality of the world (which pagans regarded fanciful dream fuelled by the myth of an inexorable onward as inescapably evil) or that there could be any equality in a march of enlightenment that history must move only human society governed by a hierarchy of wealth, power, forward towards a secular utopia of perfect health, designer and status. As Luc Ferry,3 the French secular humanist babies, unfettered freedom of consumer choice, assisted and philosopher points out in his book A Brief History of dying on demand, and glitch-free internet access. This is Human Thought, in contrast with a Greek understanding of a gross, materialist distortion of the life of the Kingdom of humanity, “Christianity was to introduce the notion that God that Christians are called not only to proclaim, but humanity was fundamentally identical, that men were equal also to live here and now. in dignity—an unprecedented idea at the time, and one to More important by far than having the “right” attitudes which our world owes its entire democratic inheritance.” and the “right” arguments in harmony with the teachings This principle of human equality is now a commonplace of our faith, Christians must above all live their lives and of our secular society without recognizing its Christian speak the truths of the faith in ways that manifest the origins, but it is not a principle for which governments or Gospel of Love, that make people are now prepared to Christ himself visible in fight. The vision of Mary’s the midst of a violent, Magnificat, where the mighty are humbled and the fearful, and selfish world. lowly and meek are raised We must not make our up, is nowhere evident in own plans, devise our own mainstream Britain. Even strategies to save humanity though the Prime Minister and the planet, but instead [i.e., David Cameron] has acknowledge that the work more than once insisted of redemption has already on his adherence to this happened, that the world country’s Christian values, a has already been redeemed radically Christian equality by God in Christ, and that is something that our our chief responsibility is to governments have decided live as God’s children and that austerity Britain cannot to shine not with our own afford, thereby driving light but with the uncreated the weakest and most light of the incarnate Word vulnerable among us to the wall. Among those striving for who has been with God from all eternity, our Lord and a more equal society and world, Christians are playing a Saviour Jesus Christ. St. Paul reminds us that this is our eternal destiny from before the foundation of the world, to

18 SeasonalJournal be free from our sins and to receive the fulfillment of our line, sung by all three singers, is “When everyone is somebodee, / Then eternal inheritance as God’s children, created in His image no one’s anybody.” The song tells of a King who “wishes all men as and likeness, not by our own efforts but by the shedding of rich as he (And he was rich as rich could be), So to the top of every tree / Promoted everybody”: “Lord Chancellors were cheap as sprats, And His blood. Bishops in their shovel hats /Were Plentiful as Tabby cats–In point of fact too many. / Ambassadors cropped up like hay. . . .” 3 French Philosopher Luc Ferry’s (b. 1951) Learning to Live was published “[Christians] must not make our own plans, under that title in 2010 in England. Harper-Collins published an devise our own strategies to save humanity English translation by Theo Cuffe in 2012 under the title A Brief History of Thought: A Philosophical Guide to Living and the planet…the world has already been . 4 redeemed by God in Christ….” In June 2015, Pope Francis issued a major encyclical letter, On Care for Our Common Home that began “‘LAUDATO SI’, mi’ Signore’” –“‘Praise be to you, my Lord.’ “In the words of this beautiful canticle, Saint Francis of Assisi reminds us that our common home is like a sister with whom If, like the rest of the secular world, we set our minds on we share our life and a beautiful mother who opens her arms to embrace us. ‘Praise be to you, my Lord, through our Sister, Mother Earth, who the fulfillment of our purely human capacities, to create sustains and governs us, and who produces various fruit with colored some humanist version of technologically perfected human flowers and herbs.” (You can read the entire document in English at individuals living ever longer lives in perfect health, http://w2.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/encyclicals/documents/papa- universal knowledge, and materialist happiness, then we francesco_20150524_enciclica-laudato-si.html). In September 2016, sell our humanity desperately short of its true fulfillment the Pope called climate change a “sin.” Time Magazine reported on May in God, short even of the society that awards new year’s 24, 2017 that the Pope gave President Trump a copy of this encyclical. honours. These honours reflect a society that is local and St. Francis composed The Canticle of the Creatures in spring 1225. St. Francis’s Canticle. The Canticle is below. communal, in which people are committed to assisting those-in-need and to enriching one another’s lives, in which St. Francis of Assisi’s Canticle of the Creatures we love our neighbours as ourselves. This is a stepping stone (also known as “Canticle of the Sun”) to our full participation in the “wondrous exchange” that Composed c. 1224 God in Christ offers to all people. God himself becomes a human man in order that, if we choose, we may become Most High, all powerful, good Lord, to you be praise, glory, honor and all blessing. partakers of his Divinity and sharers in the fullness of divine Only to you, Most High, do they belong life and love. If the world still refuses to embrace this divine and no one is worthy to call upon your name. inheritance, let it not be because we as Christians have May you be praised, my Lord, with all your creatures, especially Sir brother sun, failed to show them what life in Christ truly can be. through whom you lighten the day for us. ______He is beautiful and radiant with great splendor. He signifies you, O Most High. The Rev Canon Dr. Peter Doll, Canon Librarian is responsible Be praised, my Lord, for sister moon and the stars: clear and precious and lovely, they are formed in heaven. for the ministry of learning and co-chair of the Norfolk Be praised, my Lord, for brother wind; Theological Society. His PhD research focused on the history of and by air and clouds, clear skies and all weathers, the Anglican Church in North America. by which you give sustenance to your creatures. Be praised, my Lord, for sister water, ______who is very useful and humble and precious and pure. Be praised, my Lord, for brother fire, Endnotes by whom the night is illumined for us. 1 According to https://www.gov.uk/honours: “The honours system He is beautiful and cheerful, full of power and strength. Be praised, my Lord, for our sister, mother earth, recognises people who have made achievements in public life [and/or] who sustains and governs us committed themselves to serving and helping Britain. They’ll usually and produces diverse fruits have made life better for other people or be outstanding at what they and colored flowers and grass. do. Civilian gallantry awards recognise bravery by people who have Be praised, my Lord, by all those who forgive for love of you attempted to or saved the life of a British citizen who isn’t a family and who bear weakness and tribulation. member or close friend. Nominations are judged on: degree of risk; how Blessed are those who bear them in peace: for you, Most High, they will be crowned. aware the nominee was of the danger; and persistence. Whether someone Be praised, my Lord, for our sister, the death of the body, gets an honour and the honour they get is decided by an honours from which no one living is able to flee. committee. The committee’s decisions go to the Prime Minister and then Woe to those who are dying in mortal sin. to the Queen, who awards the honour.” Blessed are those who are found doing your most holy will, for the second death will do them no harm. 2 He refers to W.S. Gilbert, librettist, and Arthur Sullivan, musical composer, of The Gondoliers, Or, the King of Barataria, a comic opera that Praise and bless my Lord and give him thanks debuted in 1889. In Act II, The Grand Inquisitor sings with Giuseppe and serve him with great humility. and Marcos, “There Lived a King,” song number 16, of which the last

Advent / Christmas / Epiphany 2017 19 An epiphany for the Magi, but the Epiphany for the Poet: T.S. Eliot’s “Journey of the Magi” By Joan Ray

e celebrate the feast of the Epiphany as a Eliot’s wife said he celebration of the divinity of Jesus made known wrote the poem to the world. In reflecting on this important W 1 during one day in Christian feast, the poem, “The Journey of the Magi,” by the foremost twentieth-century American / British poet, 1927. Biographical T.S. (Thomas Stearns) Eliot (1888-1965) came to mind. In scholars speculate that Eliot may have written the poem this poem Eliot reminds the reader how Christmas, Good to reflect his converting from his family’s deep Unitarian Friday, and Easter must be seen together. background to the Church of England and accepting Christ While some readers find Elliot’s poems challenging, “The Journey of the Magi” is one of his more accessible texts. as his savior, which also occurred in 1927: Eliot’s going Nevertheless, readers will see that Eliot took creative from the old family religion to his new Christianity.3 A few liberties in his poetical treatment of the Magi’s journey: no months after his religious conversion, the Missouri-born shining star to guide them, no Magi’s gifts to the baby Jesus, Eliot assumed British citizenship, again in 1927. These life and no worship of the Christ child. changes likely inform Eliot’s poem. The poem is a narrative spoken retrospectively by one of the Magi who “a long time ago” traveled from the East to Like Whitman’s “Miracles,” discussed in the Pentecost issue Bethlehem. Biblical scholars observe that the three Magi of the Seasonal Journal, Eliot’s poem is written in free verse were likely Zoroastrian priests from the Parthian Empire, known today as Iran and Iraq2. Zoroastrianism is one of the with no set stanza pattern. Eliot structured his poem into world’s oldest monotheistic religions, founded 3,500 years three verse paragraphs. The tone is largely conversational ago and, for 1,000 years, was one of the most powerful and matter-of-fact as one of the Magi recalls the famous religions in the world. The poem tells us that the birth journey that he and his fellow Magi took “long ago.” The of Jesus marks the passing of the old religions, and for the Magi specifically, the passing of their religious beliefs of journey, as we’ll see, was both a physical and spiritual Zoroastrianism. struggle for the speaker—as conversion was for the poet.

20 SeasonalJournal The Journey of the Magi All this was a long time ago, I remember, A cold coming we had of it, And I would do it again, but set down Just the worst time of the year This set down For a journey, and such a long journey: This: were we led all that way for The ways deep and the weather sharp, Birth or Death? There was a Birth, The very dead of winter. 5 certainly 35 And the camels galled, sorefooted, refractory, We had evidence and no doubt. I had seen birth Lying down in the melting snow. and death, There were times we regretted But had thought they were different; this Birth The summer palaces on slopes, the terraces, was And the silken girls bringing sherbet. 10 Hard and bitter agony for us, like Death, our Then the camel men cursing and grumbling death. 38 and running away, and wanting their liquor and We returned to our places, these Kingdoms, women, But no longer at ease here, in the old And the night-fires going out, and the lack of dispensation, shelters, With an alien people clutching their gods. And the cities hostile and the towns unfriendly I should be glad of another death. 42 And the villages dirty and charging high prices: A hard time we had of it. 16 The first five lines of the priest’s recollection, a complaint At the end we preferred to travel all night, about the long, difficult, and cold journey, are taken nearly Sleeping in snatches, verbatim from the famous Christmas sermon (“Of the With the voices singing in our ears, saying Nativity,” Sermon No. 15) that Lancelot Andrewes (1565- That this was all folly. 20 1626)4 preached at the Palace of Whitehall before King James I in 1622: Then at dawn we came down to a temperate A cold coming they had of it, at this time of the valley, 21 year; just the worst time of the year to take a Wet, below the snow line, smelling of vegetation; journey, and specially a long journey in. The ways With a running stream and a water-mill beating deep, the weather sharp, the days short, the sun the darkness, farthest off, in solstitio brumali, / “the very dead of And three trees on the low sky, winter” [the winter solstice]. And an old white horse galloped away in the meadow. 25 The poetical speaker emphasizes how difficulties accumulate: Then we came to a tavern with vine-leaves over notice Eliot’s repetition of the word “and” / “And” in lines the lintel, 6-15 as the problems rack up. Camels are stubborn because Six hands at an open door dicing for pieces of their feet are “galled” (made sore by rubbing or chafing); silver, grumpy camel men desert the caravan because they long for And feet kicking the empty wine-skins. sensual pleasures, the women and liquor left behind; fires But there was no information, and so we go out on cold nights; villages where the travelers stop are continued dirty and over-priced. Both nature and humanity are hostile And arriving at evening, not a moment too soon forces for the travelers. Finding the place; it was (you might say) The Magi’s journey through a cold, inhospitable land satisfactory. 31 reflects the journey of Mary and Joseph to Bethlehem, and the cold arrival of baby Jesus in the manger. Birth in a cold

Advent / Christmas / Epiphany 2017 21 manger and Herod’s to the New Testament’s image of Christ as the true vine cold-blooded threat (John 15:1). The vine is also the source of the wine of the of death meet in the Eucharist newborn Jesus. The “three trees” foreshadow the three crosses at Cavalry. In this alien land, The trees are on “the low sky,” likely, the hill of Golgotha. the speaker recalls The white horse that gallops away suggests the white horse the sensuous that the crown-wearing Conqueror rides in Rev. 6:2. The and even sensual image of the feet kicking the empty wineskins reminds us pleasures he and that the old, empty wineskins are inappropriate for the new his fellow travelers wine that comes from Christ’s sacrifice. left behind: “silken At line 27, the priest sees “Six hands at an open door dicing girls” who brought for pieces of silver.” The six hands are the hands of three the sweet drink Roman soldiers who “cast lots” for Christ’s seamless tunic at known as sherbet, the foot of the cross. The silver, of course, refers to the thirty a sweet fizzy Lancelot Andrewes pieces of silver that Judas received for betraying Christ. refreshment popular The Zoroastrian priest observes, but does not understand all in southeast Asia. this Christian symbolism: he simply reports the objects he “A hard time we had of it,” says the speaker, paraphrasing saw as a witness to the seminal event of history. Seeking, but the poem’s first line. The Magi even doubt the wisdom of getting “no information,” the Magi continue their journey making this rugged trip: “With the voices singing in our and in the evening reach their journey’s goal, baby Jesus ears, saying / That this was all folly.” Are these the voices in the manger. “Finding the place; it was (you might say) of the “silken girls”? Are these the voices of practicality and satisfactory,” says the speaker with great understatement, logic, questioning if this journey is even worth the effort? not even mentioning Baby Jesus. While Eliot’s Magi experience doubt and despair, they nonetheless persist on their journey to Bethlehem, rather Finding the sought-after baby is merely a “satisfactory” than taking a detour to the path of pleasure or returning experience for the Zoroastrian priest. Of course, the home. Christian poet, T.S. Eliot, knows the “information” that the Magi fail to receive: the poet uses dramatic irony here— In the second verse paragraph, having traveled all night (l. irony understood by the author, reader, or audience, but 17), they arrive below the snow not by the speaker. line and come upon “at dawn” “a temperate valley,” signifying a “The Magi continue to We readers of the poem understand the “information,” change in the Magi’s experience. encounter a number of A “smell of vegetation” suggests futilely sought by the Magi is in the new life; a “running stream” and “a symbols foreshadowing sacrament of the Holy Eucharist. water-mill beating the darkness” Christ’s life and death….” But the Zoroastrian priest has imply continuity, renewal, and “no information” about either the the water of baptism, including Christian symbols he mentions John the Baptist’s baptism of Jesus seeing in verse paragraph 2 or the in the River Jordan—originally celebrated as Epiphany. Christian meaning of the word “satisfactory” in referring What a difference from their experiences in the dead of to the effect of the death of Christ. But we readers and the winter: they may have journeyed from death-in-life to life poet know from Rite I of the Holy Eucharist that with the or even to life-in-death. Crucifixion, Jesus Christ “made there, by his one oblation of himself once offered, a full, perfect, and sufficient sacrifice, The Magi continue to encounter a number of symbols oblation, and satisfaction, for the sins of the whole world” foreshadowing Christ’s life and death, reminding the (BCP 334, my italics). Christian reader that birth leads to death and then rebirth to eternal life in Christ. The vine leaves over the lintel The time moves into the future in paragraph 3 as the now older priest recollects the journey that occurred “a long time above the tavern door refer not only to the Old Testament ago.” Suffering marks the return journey, just as it did the Passover story told in Exodus (12:22)—“And ye shall take a journey to Bethlehem recounted in verse paragraph 1. But bunch of hyssop, and dip it in the blood that is in the bason now the suffering is intellectual and spiritual. The speaker [basin], and strike the lintel and the two side posts with the says he would undertake the journey to the manger again: blood that is in the bason [basin]; and none of you shall go after all, he and his companions arrived at a “satisfactory” out at the door of his house until the morning”— but also

22 SeasonalJournal location signified by the baby in the manger. But he asks, “[W]ere we led all that way for Birth or Coming to faith in Christ is frequently not without Death?” What is the relationship between the two, birth struggles, an arduous, sometimes puzzling journey through and death? Yes, they all saw a a wasteland. And then there is birth; they saw the baby Jesus an epiphany. in the manger. But this was “This birth promised a death that no ordinary baby’s birth. As would change everything. Christ’s ______Lancelot Andrewes preached Joan Ray, PhD (Brown in his 1622-Christmas sermon birth cannot be separated from University), Professor Emerita and as Andrewes-scholar Christ’s death and resurrection.” of English, UCCS, is co-editor Marianne Dorman (PhD, Oxford) explains, “The sword of the Journal and has been always hovered over the a member of Grace and St. cradle.” Put another way, the tree /cross of the crucifixion Stephen’s since 1978. was there from the beginning, as seen in verse paragraph 2. ______This birth promised a death that would change everything. Christ’s birth cannot be separated from Christ’s death and Endnotes resurrection. 1 T.S. Eliot’s “The Journey of the Magi” is poem number 8 in a pamphlet Seeing this newborn, special baby, the priest realizes that he series called The Ariel Poems published by the London firm, Faber and intuitively saw death: Gwyer, between 1928 and 1931: the original Ariel Poems consisted of 38 previously unpublished poems on holiday themes by “a leading writer There was a Birth, certainly of the day with new artwork from an eminent artist” (https://www. We had evidence and no doubt. I had seen birth faber.co.uk/9780571316434-the-ariel-poems.html). In 1936, Faber and death, and Gwyer became Faber and Faber; the new company published But had thought they were different; this Birth five T.S. Eliot poems under the heading Ariel Poems: “The Journey was of the Magi,” “A Song for Simeon,” “Animula,” “Mariana,” and Hard and bitter agony for us, like Death, our “Triumphal March.” death. (35-8) 2 See Psalm 72:10-11 “May the kings of Tarshish and the islands bring The Magi’s journey to see this birth was “Hard and bitter tribute, the kings of Sheba and Sheba offer gifts. May all nations serve agony for” them. The phrase, “like Death, our death” is a him.” Also see Isaiah. 60 : 1-6: “Arise! Shine, for your light has come, the paradox: Christ’s birth represented to the speaker the Magi’s glory of the Lord has dawned upon you. . . Nations shall walk by your deaths. That is, the coming of Christ ends not only the “old light, kings by the radiance of your dawning. Raise your eyes and look dispensation” (1. 40), but also the Magi’s earthly kingship about; they all gather and come to you —Your sons from afar. . . Then and authority: the Heavenly King is the newborn baby in you shall see and be radiant . . . For the riches of the sea shall be poured the manger, the King of Kings. The birth of Christ is the out before you, The wealth of nations shall come to you. Caravans death of old laws, old orders, old religions. of camels shall cover you, dromedaries of Midian [a kingdom east of When the Magi “returned to [their] places, these Jerusalem, in current Jordan] and Ephah [further south in the Arabian Kingdoms,” they were “no longer at ease here”: they peninsula]. All from Sheba [known today as Yemen] shall come bearing experience a spiritual crisis. They feel alienated at home. gold and frankincense and heralding the praises of the Lord.” Uncertain of the full significance of what he saw at the 3 Unitarians do not believe in the godhead of Jesus or that Jesus is an manger, our speaker wishes for his own death: “I should be atoning Savior; rather, they perceive Jesus as “a major figure in humanity’s glad of another death.” He desires to be released from his spiritual journey” (https://www.unitarian.org.uk/pages/frequently- old world, from the pre-Christian era when “an alien people asked-questions-faq) [were] clutching their gods.” The priest has some intuitive 4 Lancelot Andrewes, successively Bishop of Chichester, Ely, and insight that the old way has passed. But he does not fully Winchester, was a favorite preacher of Queen Elizabeth I and King James know the Christian paradox that says we live by dying. I. An eminent Biblical scholar, with language skills in Greek, Latin, and Christianity means that the birth of Jesus is the passing of 18 other tongues, he oversaw the translation of the Authorized Version or the Old Law: “Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a King James Version of the Bible. Scholars believe that reading Andrewes’ new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things sermons inspired Eliot’s conversion to Christianity. In 1928, T.S. Eliot’s are become new” (2 Corinthians 5:17). The Zoroastrian For Lancelot Andrewes: Essays on Style and Order (Faber and Gwyer) priest is unable to see fully into the new world, but he has examined the 17th-century clergyman’s prose style and thinking in his intuited that a new, magnificent phenomenon is occurring, sermons relative to Anglo-Catholicism.

Advent / Christmas / Epiphany 2017 23 Becoming a New Kind of People: A Sermon for Epiphany by The Very Rev. Jane Hedges, Dean, Norwich Cathedral A Sermon delivered on the 2nd Sunday after Epiphany January 17, 2016 Norwich Cathedral BIBLE READINGS: Isaiah 62: 1-5; 1 Corinthians 12: 1-11; St John 2: 1-11

ne of the less happy moments during the Diocesan consuming too many units of alcohol all in one go! Pilgrimage to the Holy Land last January was when At a deeper level here we have the first of the great signs the group arrived at Cana in Galilee where we or miracles recorded in St John’s gospel. In these accounts Ohad arranged to celebrate a Eucharist. A rather formidable John seeks to demonstrate to his readers that Jesus is the Nun on duty, once she discovered we were Anglicans, flatly Son of God—the Word made flesh—absolutely at one with refused to allow us to use the Church. No matter how much his Father. The detail given in each of these stories is also 1 Bishop Graham appealed to her better nature, nothing of great significance and no more so than in this story. The was going to make her give way, and so we eventually left water that Jesus uses is taken from the jars that were there without holding a service there. We were later made very for the Jewish rites of purification. John is making the point welcome at the Church of the here that Jesus, by taking this Transfiguration by a Roman particular water and changing Catholic Franciscan Brother and it into wine, is proclaiming that celebrated our Eucharist there the new wine of the kingdom is instead. made from the water of Judaism. Today, as we continue to keep It’s interesting that as John’s the season of Epiphany and gospel unfolds, we find Jesus begin the week of prayer for getting into more and more 2 Christian Unity we find a call conflict with the Jewish leaders. in our readings to become a new However, here John is making it kind of people—to be people clear that Jesus is not rejecting his God can rejoice over and to be Jewish roots—from those roots people who make the best use of will come new growth that will all the gifts He has given us. So spread to all the nations. There let us look at those scriptures a is a further interesting detail to little more closely and at what they have to offer us as we draw out of this story, and it concerns the comment made reflect on our Christian discipleship in today’s world. by the steward to the bridegroom: “‘Everyone serves the This morning’s gospel transported us to Cana in Galilee good wine first, and then the inferior wine after the guests to the joyful occasion of a wedding. This story is rich in have become drunk. But you have kept the good wine until meaning and can touch us at a number of levels. At a very now.’” Through the steward expressing his surprise that the simple level this is a story with human interest at its heart. best wine has been kept until the end of the party, John is Here Jesus shows that he’s happy to join in the celebrations saying that God has saved up until last his very best gift to at a wedding and that he approves of the drinking of alcohol. Israel and to the world. His best gift was not in Israel’s past Some might even argue that he does not mind people being when he gave Moses the law and Israel the Promised Land; rather extravagant as they party. There was obviously no his best gift is the coming of Jesus: he is the best wine. It chief medical officer there to warn them of the dangers of was also the case that in Jewish tradition, wedding banquets

24 SeasonalJournal and the abundance of good wine were associated with of the 5000 without the offering of the loaves and fish by the extravagant joy of the messianic age, so there is more the small boy; and in our Eucharist today there would be than a hint in this story that Jesus is the expected Messiah. no feeding with the body and blood of Christ without the Jesus enacts in this miracle what he later says in John’s offering of ordinary bread and wine by the people of God. gospel: “‘I have come that they might have life, and have it We may see ourselves as rather ordinary, but St Paul reminds abundantly.’” So here in this passage all kinds of elements us that within the Church we have also been given a rich are brought together—the and diverse variety of gifts, which proclamation of the messianic used together give us enormous age, the extravagance of God’s “…[the Scriptures] make us more potential and are expressions of love, the transformation aware of the overflowing generosity God’s love and generosity. of the old into the new— of God and inspire us to share that Then thirdly, our scriptures today and alongside all this, Jesus’ awareness with others.” show us that however bad things concern with the everyday get, they can always be turned lives of men and women. The around—the exiles returned to vibrancy and generosity of Jerusalem and the hosts of the God’s love is also expressed in the passage we heard today party were not embarrassed by running out of wine. But from St Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians. He was as we were reminded throughout the season of Advent, this addressing those who had been converted from paganism turn around only happens when we repent and recognise and the worship of idols and reminding them that they our need to change. now worshipped the One True God, who through the Holy Spirit pours out a variety of gifts upon his people. Whether In this week of prayer for Christian Unity let us recognise gifts of prophecy, discernment, wisdom, knowledge and so our need for greater generosity to each other so that the forth, all of them come from the One Spirit, and all these universal church may demonstrate God’s love for the world gifts contribute to the health and well-being of the Body of not only in its words but in its actions: becoming a church, Christ and the building up of the Church. which in the words of Isaiah, God can rejoice over. The Old Testament lesson from Isaiah also sings out about ______God’s steadfast love for his people. In earlier parts of Isaiah The Very Rev. Jane Hedges is Dean of Norwich Cathedral we hear of Israel’s disobedience and later of their period of (appointed 2014). exile. In this passage, though, restoration is taking place— ______the people are to return to Jerusalem as a refined and Endnotes renewed people in whom God can now delight. 1 The Right Reverend James Graham (1951-) has been the Bishop of As we reflect upon these scriptures with their positive Norwich since 1999. In January 2015, a group from the Diocese of messages, they are a huge encouragement to us. First, they Norwich, led by Bishop Graham, went on a pilgrimage to the Holy make us more aware of the overflowing generosity of God Land. Readers can see the details of “Faith Goes Walkabout” at http:// and inspire us to share that awareness with others. So, are www.faithgoeswalkabout.org/holylandpilgrimage/ we helping people to appreciate the beauty of the world 2 From the website of The Episcopal Church, Week of Prayer for Christian around them, the richness and diversity of life, the gifts Unity: The Week of Prayer for Christian Unity is an international Christian ecumenical observance kept annually between January 18 and personal skills that have been showered upon them, and January 25. It is an octave, that is, an observance lasting eight days. and above all are we helping them to come to know God The Week of Prayer for Christian Unity began in 1908 as the Octave through sharing with them the good news of the Gospel— of Christian Unity, and focused on prayer for church unity. Father Paul Wattson, cofounder of the Graymoor Franciscan Friars, proposed telling them about Jesus; what he did, what he taught, how the dates for the Week, beginning on the Feast of the Confession of he gave up his life but overcame death? Peter, the Protestant variant of the ancient Feast of the Chair of Saint Secondly, today’s miracle was not about Jesus using some Peter, on January 18, and concluding with the Feast of the Conversion kind of magic power in order to give people a good time; of Saint Paul on January 25. https://www.episcopalchurch.org/events/ week-prayer-christian-unity-2018 The theme for 2018 is based on the it was much more deeply profound than that. He took following: “Your right hand, O Lord, glorious in power” (cf. Exodus the ordinary things of life and transformed them into 15:6). The website for the World Council of Churches records that in something special. But the ordinary needs to be offered to January 2016, “The calling shared by all the baptized to proclaim the mighty acts of the Lord forms the theme of the Week of Prayer for him in order for this to happen. So there would have been Christian Unity for 2016. Inspired by two verses from the First Letter of no wine without the water first being given to him by the St Peter, members of different churches in Latvia prepared the resources servants; in later miracles there would have been no feeding for the week (cf. 1 Peter 2:9).”

Advent / Christmas / Epiphany 2017 25 Music of the Season

monastic day, dates back many centuries. Held Norwich Cathedral entirely by candlelight, this contemplative worship gives us pause from the hectic pace in Our Sights! of our lives. Ancient chants and beautiful polyphonic motets, performed by an octet of he Taylor Choir is the foundation of professional voices, speak of gratitude for the our music program, continuing a rich day just passed, and ask for God’s protection musical tradition in both the life of the through the dark night. Tparish and the larger community. The summer of 2018 will see the Taylor Choir traveling to Norwich Cathedral in the county of Norwich, England to be the choir-in-residence for a week of choral evensong and compline. During the Advent/Christmas/Epiphany season, however, those beautiful Anglican services will also be sung at our parish church. Evensong is a form of Evening Prayer, unique to the Church of England, where most of the service is sung by the choir. The service of Choral Compline, the final service of the

Concerts of the Season

Sunday Nov. 26, 2017—8 pm Choral Compline Service

Sunday Dec. 3, 2017—3 pm Advent Lessons and Carols (the adult and children’s choirs of Grace and St. Stephen’s combine for a classic service to begin the Advent season)

Sunday Jan. 28, 2018—8 pm Choral Compline Service

Sunday Feb. 11, 2018—3 pm Organ Recital by Benjamin Straley followed by Choral Evensong

26 SeasonalJournal Our Historic Crèche by Marianna McJimsey Parish Historian and Archivist This Christmas Eve during the 4:30 pm service at Grace and St. Realistically, the animals nibbled the hay in the manger. However, Stephen’s, a small child will carry a figure representing the infant their inclusion in the crèche refers to the Book of Isaiah 1:3: “the Jesus and will lay it in the crèche manger below the pulpit. The role ox knoweth his owner, and the ass his master’s crib.” Our crèche, of one of the youngest members of our parish to bring the baby which gathers together the primary participants of Christmas, Jesus to the crèche reminds us of the promise in Isaiah 11:6 that “a illustrates the whole story in one powerful display. little child shall lead them.” The tradition of a crèche or Nativity Before the Christmas Eve services, the parish Altar Guild sets up scene at our parish began 91 years ago in 1926 when Rev. Arthur the crèche, carefully placing the painted, fragile, plaster-of-Paris Taft, co-rector, and Mrs. Taft (Amy) brought the crafted figures of figures. Since the late 1960s, the crèche has been positioned below Mary, Joseph, and Jesus from Europe. A large manger was built to the pulpit. However, in earlier years the crèche had been placed in hold the infant figure. The figures surrounding the Holy Family the St. Stephen’s Chapel (before there were pews), in the narthex included farm animals, shepherds, and the three wise men. (before the screen was erected), or in the north transept (when it Tradition tells us that St. Francis of Assisi arranged the first was called the “Children’s Chapel”). Nativity scene in 1223 in the Italian town of Greccio. He gathered Around 2005, to replace the worn and rickety wooden crèche, the villagers in a cave where the “live” crèche featured men, women Micah Doherty, a fine woodworker in our parish, designed and children and an ox and a donkey. St. Francis’s Nativity scene and built a new wooden structure made of red oak donated by was a visual display to help children, weavers, smiths, farm workers, parishioner Norma Hollister. Although Micah was able to build and stonemasons focus on the centrality of the birth of Jesus. In the a new crèche, the historic figures in the crèche are irreplaceable; 13th century, church services were conducted only in Latin, which fingers and horns can easily be broken. Last year, parishioners Jill many Christians did not understand. St. Francis spoke to them in and Harold Wasinger gave the parish children their own small, their common language or vernacular so they could understand. sturdy crèche that they can handle without fear of breakage. The As a physical, visual rendition of the Nativity, the medieval period Wasingers’ gift honors their son, Douglas, who grew up in Grace crèche was a Bible story brought to life so that all could see and and St. Stephen’s, and is now the rector of St. Luke’s Episcopal understand it. The crèche still serves that function today. Church in Buffalo, Wyoming. It is immaterial that the Nativity scene does not accurately reflect Our historic crèche will remain in place until the celebration of gospel events. St. Matthew writes of the wise men’s journey, and the Feast of the Baptism of Our Lord on January 9, 2018. It will St. Luke describes the amazement of the shepherds upon hearing then be dismantled and carefully stored for another year. For unlike the angels sing. Neither writer suggests that the Holy Family, the dried Christmas trees that are disposed, the crèche will annually shepherds, the wise men, and the animals were in Bethlehem at the commit us at Grace and St. Stephen’s to celebrate the full liturgical same time. A donkey and an ox customarily appear in the crèche. season of Christmas. 601 N. Tejon Street Colorado Springs, CO 80903

Epiphany Celebration January 6, 2018 A special celebration of the visiting Wise Men and the Feast of the Epiphany will be held Saturday January 6, 2018 at 7 p.m. This service of Evening Prayer, held by candlelight, features special music by the children’s choirs as they lead the congregation to take the Light of Christ into the world. A festive candlelight reception follows the service.

Epiphany 2017, Grace and St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church