Please join us between 4:30 and 4:55 pm via Zoom
Here is the Zoom link: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82512159155
phone-in for (audio only).Phone Number: (646) 558-8656
Meeting ID: 825 1215 9155
Welcome:
I want to welcome everyone to this evening’s liturgy. I am so happy to spend part of this summer evening with you.
Opening Prayer:
Holy One, you call forth our true selves into discipleship. Help us to embrace both our true selves and the discipleship to which we are called. For we know that we are called to birth your Kin-dom. Amen.
Opening Song: God Bless the Grass, Pete Seeger https://youtu.be/MgiNEsgyhBM
Liturgy of the Word
First Reading:
Standing in that small space of Black Lives Matter Plaza in front of the White House was the most motley and diverse crew of God’s sacred creation that I had seen come together in protest. They reflected an “otherwise way of being in the world.” They were Black, white, brown, Asian and non-Asian, Latinx and non-Latinx, queer and non-queer, trans and non-trans, bi-gendered and non-bi-gendered. They were also young and old and everything in between. . . . People were there advocating, each in their own way, for a world that looked more like God’s just future: a future where all people were living in the peace that was justice. They were embodying that very future.
These inspired words are from Kelly Brown Douglas’s book, “Resurrection Hope: A Future Where Black Lives Matter.” We affirm them by saying Amen.
Alleluia: Jan Phillips https://youtu.be/IC4nbwmQDVw
Gospel: Matthew 10: 24-31 Message Bible:
“A student doesn’t get a better desk than her teacher. A laborer doesn’t make more money than his boss. Be content—pleased, even—when you, my students, my harvest hands, get the same treatment I get. If they call me, the teacher, ‘Dungface,’ what can the students expect?
“Don’t be intimidated. Eventually everything is going to be out in the open, and everyone will know how things really are. So don’t hesitate to go public now.
“Don’t be bluffed into silence by the threats of bullies. There’s nothing they can do to your soul, your core being.
“What’s the price of a pet canary? Some loose change, right? And the Holy One cares what happens to it even more than you do. The Divine One pays even greater attention to you, down to the last detail—even numbering the hairs on your head! So don’t be intimidated by all this bully talk. You’re worth more than a million canaries.
Homily Starter
“What will it cost you?” This line often concludes our shared homily starters. Today’s Gospel challenges us with just this question.
In chapter 10, the author of Matthew’s Gospel tells the story of Jesus as he sends out his twelve new apostles to carry his message to the people. Like a parent about to leave teenage children home alone for an evening he gives them a long list of instructions: stay away from Gentiles and Samaritans, heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, drive out demons, and proclaim that the kin-dom is near. Don’t take any money for your efforts. Accept hospitality. Don’t stay where you are not welcome. And then come the warnings: they will be flogged. They will be arrested. They will be hated and persecuted. One imagines that these newly commissioned ministers must have wondered exactly what they had signed up for!
In the portion of the chapter we hear today, Jesus explains that of course they should expect that kind of treatment, since they are acting as his messengers and that’s how he himself expects to be treated. Not very comforting. But with his usual way of seeing beyond the obvious Jesus tells them not to worry. The reality that is hidden now but will eventually be out in the open is that they can never really be killed. They are learning to become their true selves, their “core beings.” And that part of them cannot be killed. That is the part where the Divine dwells.
This is an amazing Gospel because here Jesus acknowledges the Divine in his fellow humans. He predicts not only his own resurrection but theirs as well. Their ministries will live on, along with the ministry of Jesus himself. Along with our own ministries, our own true selves, our own core being.
The cost, to answer the question posed at the outset, will be great. But like Kelly Brown Douglas’s “most motley and diverse crew of God’s sacred creation” we will embody the future. We will blossom the Kin-dom.
What are your thoughts on today’s readings? Please share your wisdom.
Shared Homily
Statement of Faith
We believe in the Holy One, a divine mystery
beyond all definition and rational understanding,
the heart of all that has ever existed,
that exists now, or that ever will exist.
We believe in Jesus, messenger of the Divine Word,
bringer of healing, heart of Divine compassion,
bright star in the firmament of the Holy One's
prophets, mystics, and saints.
We believe that We are called to follow Jesus
as a vehicle of divine love,
a source of wisdom and truth,
and an instrument of peace in the world.
We believe in the Spirit of the Holy One,
the life that is our innermost life,
the breath moving in our being,
the depth living in each of us.
We believe that the Divine kin-dom is here and now,
stretched out all around us for those
with eyes to see it, hearts to receive it,
and hands to make it happen.
Liturgy of the Eucharist
(Written by Jay Murnane)
Denise: As we prepare for this sacred meal we are aware of our call to serve, and just as Jesus is anointed, so is each of us. We bring to this table our prayers for the community.
Prayers for the Community
Denise: We pray for these and all unspoken intentions. Amen.
Denise: Please join in praying the Eucharistic prayer together.
Blessed are you, Holy One, source of all creation. Through your goodness you made this world and called us to be Your co-creators. We give thanks for the diversity and beauty of life around us and within us.
We open our awareness to the goodness of all of creation and we remember our responsibility to serve. You invite us to build the earth into a community of love rooted in justice. You placed confidence in us, for you made us and you know that we are good.
In joy and in thanksgiving we join with all the faithful servants who have gone before us and we sing:
Holy, Holy, Holy by Karen Drucker https://youtu.be/kl7vmiZ1YuI
Denise: We thank you for Jesus, simple servant, lifting up the lowly, revealing you as God-With-Us, and revealing us as one with you and all of creation.
He lived among us to show us who we are and challenged us to know you. He taught us the strength of compassionate love.
Please extend your hands in blessing.
We are grateful for your Spirit at our Eucharistic Table and for this bread and wine which reminds us of our call to be the body of Christ in the world.
On the night before he died, Jesus gathered for supper with the people closest to him. Like the least of household servants, he washed their feet, so that they would re-member him.
All lift their plates and pray the following:
When he returned to his place at the table, he lifted the bread, spoke the blessing, broke the bread and offered it to them saying:
Take and eat, this is my very self.
(pause)
All lift their cups and pray the following:
Then he took the cup of the covenant, spoke the grace, and offered it to them saying:
Take and drink.
Whenever you remember me like this,
I am among you.
(pause)
What we have heard with our ears, we will live with our lives. As we share communion, we become Communion both love’s nourishment and love’s challenge.
Please receive communion with the words, “I am called as a disciple.”
Communion Meditation/Song: Gather the Dreamers, Kathy Sherman https://youtu.be/MPywDlrWXl4
Prayer after communion:
Denise: Holy One, we are willing to do everything Jesus did, to re-create the living presence of a love that does justice, of a compassion that heals and liberates, of a joy that generates hope, of a light that illumines people and confronts the darkness of every injustice and inequity.
We trust you to continue to share with us your own spirit, the spirit that animated Jesus, for it is through his life and teaching, all honor and glory is yours, O Holy One, forever and ever. Amen.
All: Amen.
Let us pray as Jesus taught us:
Holy One, you are within, around and among us.
We celebrate your many names.
Your wisdom come; your will be done,
unfolding from the depths within us.
Each day you give us all that we need.
You remind us of our limits and we let go.
You support us in our power, and we act with courage.
For you are the dwelling place within us,
the empowerment around us,
and the celebration among us,
now and forever, Amen.
Adapted by Miriam Therese Winter
Presider: Let us raise our hands in blessing pray together:
Blessing: Holy One, hold us, envelop us in compassion because we are not yet who you made us to be. When we are tempted to fill up the empty spaces with things that create a deeper emptiness, lead us into the fullness of your grace. Let us walk with you today and every day, and if we stray along byways of our own choosing, turn us around and bring us home.
Amen.
Closing Song: Speechless https://youtu.be/csmku3VHFS0
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