https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82512159155
phone-in for (audio only).Phone Number: (646) 558-8656
Meeting ID: 825 1215 9155
Donna: Good morning. Welcome to the Upper Room Community. Today we celebrate the great challenge to be evangelists in the 21st century. We live in a time where religion is in decline but spiritual thirst and needs are as elemental to the human experience as they ever have been. We are each called to inner transformation through open hearted encounters with the Mystery of the Holy One. Through our own authentic spirituality, the light and love of this Mystery shines into the darkness of the world and the struggles of those we encounter.
Julie: Please join us in our opening meditation by joining us in singing Loving Kindness.
Opening Song: Loving Kindness by Karen Drucker https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uLwm68BlH_4
Liturgy of the Word
Readings
Tim: Excerpts from Wisdom Distilled from the Daily: Living the Rule of St. Benedict Today by Joan Chittister
Spirituality is more than churchgoing. It is possible to go to church and never develop a spirituality at all. Spirituality is the way in which we express a living faith in a real world. Spirituality is the sum total of the attitudes and actions that define our life of faith.
Spirituality, or “life according to the Spirit,” was measured for many by the number of masses attended or the number of rosaries said or the number of commands accepted with docility or the number and kinds of things that were “given up” in order to lead a higher or more “perfect” life. As a result of those criteria, only nuns, monks, and priests were credited with really being able to live the spiritual life. This understanding persisted until Vatican II with its recognition of the universal call to holiness and the authenticity of the lay vocation in the Church.
We are beginning again, as people did in earlier times, to see the spiritual life through a wider angle lens. The spirituality we develop affects the way we image God, the way we pray, the types of asceticism we practice, the place we give to ministry and community in our definition of “the spiritual life.” It is spirituality that draws us beyond ourselves to find significance and meaning in life. It is our spirituality that defines our life values: self-abnegation or self-development; community or solitude; contemplation or evangelization; personal transformation or social justice; hierarchy or equality. The spirituality we develop, in other words, is the filter through which we view our worlds and the limits within which we operate.
These are the inspired words of Joan Chittister and the community affirms them by saying AMEN.
Dennis: Alleluia
Thaeda: Gospel
Then Jesus summoned the Twelve and began to send them out in pairs, giving them authority over unclean spirits. He instructed them that they should take nothing for their journey except a mere staff—no bread, no bag, no money in their belts. They were to wear sandals but, he added, “Do not take a spare tunic.”
And Jesus said to them, “Whenever you enter a house, stay there until you leave town. Any place that does not receive you or listen to you, as you leave it, shake the dust from the soles of your feet as a testimony against them.”
And so they set off, proclaiming repentance as they went. They cast out many demons and anointed many sick people with oil and healed them.
These are the inspired words of the anonymous storyteller we call Mark and the community affirms them by saying AMEN.
Shared Homily
Donna: When you hear the phrase, your life as evangelism, what thoughts come to mind? The gospel reading describes early evangelism in a couple of ways: having authority over unclean spirits and preaching repentance. We hear this description today with the backdrop of tele-evangelists. So, the word evangelism can bring up troubling images of aggressive, pseudo-healers, and preachers who say we will go to hell if we do not give our lives to Jesus and send them seed faith money while we are at it. These images give the word evangelism an untrue and distorted meaning. As contemporary Christians, we are still spreading the message of Jesus today so there must be a better way to understand the concept.
Evangelism is defined as: Sharing the message and teachings of Jesus. It could be that Jesus’ instruction to his disciples to stay in one place in each town indicates that forming relationships was key to sharing his message. The word repentance came from the Greek word metanoia which means a change of mind and heart. Understanding repentance as a change of mind and heart can help us reframe evangelism from an unappealing idea to something in which we can all participate.
My favorite kind of movie or story has the theme of transformation. The hero myth studies that were popularized by Joseph Campbell are my kind of stories. These stories are called hero’s journey or monomyth. This is a story with a hero who goes on an adventure, is victorious in a decisive crisis and comes home changed or transformed. Could this be what Jesus and his disciples did when they were evangelizing? I think when people experience a hero’s journey they come back transformed and people they meet along the way are often transformed.
I think the way we live our lives can potentially be evangelism. Our way of being in the world can share the message and teachings of Jesus or can block the message and teachings of Jesus. When we are open to growth and change that brings us to our higher selves, we experience multiple hero’s journeys in one lifetime. We face a serious illness with openness rather than bitterness. We face the loss of a job with trust rather than despair. Joan Chittister, in our first reading says, “Spirituality is the way in which we express a living faith in a real world.” If we live our lives open to lessons, growth and change we are choosing a spiritual path that expresses faith in the message of Jesus and brings the gospel to the world.
As we embrace the post Vatican II “universal call to holiness,” Joan suggests that we are drawn to things bigger than ourselves and we seek purpose and meaning to our lives. When we discover purpose and meaning we can be authentic to ourselves and others in the choices we make. Scripture is full of examples of Jesus developing his own spiritual life. He often prayed alone at key moments in his life and he acted in the world from inner metanoia rather than through religious legalism. Following the example of Jesus can lead us to live as evangelists. We may find ourselves rejecting rules or anything that impedes our purpose. We may feel inspired by and seek transformative experiences in ourselves and in others. To me this is true evangelism that continues to be active and alive today as it was when Jesus began his mission on earth.
Margaret and Ed: 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)
Julie: 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.
Dennis: Prayers for the community.
We pray for these and all unspoken intentions. Amen.
Donna: 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
Julie: 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:)
Donna: 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.
You are called, consecrated and chosen to serve.
Please receive Communion with the words: I embrace my call.
Communion Meditation/Song: Mystery
Mystery by Paul Winter
And it lives in the seed of a tree as it grows.
You can hear it if you listen to the wind as it blows
It’s there in the river as it flows into the sea.
It’s the sound, in the soul of a man becoming free.
And it lives in the laughter of children at play,
And in the blazing sun, that gives light to the day.
It moves the planets and the stars in the sky.
It’s been the mover of mountains, since the beginning of time.
CHORUS
Oh Mystery, you are alive, I feel you all around.
You are the fire in my heart.
You are the holy sound.
You are all of life. It is to you I sing.
Oh, grant that I may feel you, always in everything.
And it lives in the waves as they crash upon the beach.
And in the Gods that man has tried to reach.
I feel it in the love we live for so much.
And I know it in your smile my friend, when our hearts do touch.
And when I listen deep inside, I feel best of all,
Like a moon that’s glowing white, I listen to your call.
And I know you will guide me, I feel like the tide,
Rushing to the ocean of my heart that opens wide.
Oh Mystery, you are alive…
Prayer after communion:
Julie: 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.
Kim: 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
Blessing
Donna: Let us raise our hands in blessing pray together:
May we continue to be the face of God to each other. May we call each other to extravagant generosity! May we walk with an awareness of our Call as companions on the journey, knowing we are not alone. May we, like Jesus, be a shining light and a blessing in our time!
AMEN.
Closing Song: I Will Follow Him
https://youtu.be/ZqN9aS2S3L0
