Laurel Massé

Expectancy

Advent. Waiting for something.

We wait for God, who is always with us. to come to be us, to be one of us, to join us in the web of senses through which we experience the world, and with which we try to capture and comprehend God. The language of the body, through the body, is the language we understand, for better and for worse.

We wait for God to come to us, take on our vision, and teach us how to use our eyes. If, in the Incarnation, God's human eyes are like our human eyes, then what is to prevent us from seeing as God sees? Only the hardness of our hearts, which we are promised can be changed. I will take away your hearts of stone and give you hearts of flesh (Ezekial 36:26).

We wait to be shown that what God asks of us can be done by us, in our bodies, in our senses, in our earthbound lives. We can love each other right here. We can hear each other right now. We can touch in comfort and blessing with the hands we have in this life. Jesus comes and shows us the way.

Christmas is an extravagant celebration of the Word made flesh. Come, Lord Jesus.

Still here!

Yes, I am still here. Many distractions and scheduling crunches have elbowed their way into this moving-toward-Christmas season. But this afternoon I dug down to the actual surface of my desk, and have been promised a day of rotten weather tomorrow, which will be perfect for staying in and writing. There is so much to tell. For now, today is the first Sunday of Advent, and here in New York City a beautiful snow drifted down from the grey morning sky. Because I only found my way to it last Lent, this was the first time I have seen the Cathedral through falling snow.
It's a really BIG snow globe...

Autumn in New York

I walked across Central Park today to go to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. It's closed on Mondays, which  I had forgotten. So I didn't visit great works of art, at least not framed ones. But I did see the most beautiful Irish Wolfhound imaginable. He was big-boned, well-built, magnificent. A different kind of work of art and greatness. I asked to pet him, his owner acquiesced, the dog graciously accepted my attention.

Then, as I walked back across the park to the west side, I felt myself slip into sadness. Or rather, there was suddenly a sadness on me, a beautiful and apt Irish expression. The sadness was on me, not in me. I miss my dogs. I usually feel this as an inner glow of joy for having had them at all. Sometimes, though, I feel the weight of their absence, heavy, grey, and sad.

I don't remember what I have written about them, but here is what they were: Shekinah, a Belgian Tervuren named after the feminine aspect of God, was courage and willfulness and incandescence. Wisdom 7:22 - 25a actually describes her perfectly, and here is some of it:

For within her is a spirit intelligent, holy,
unique, manifold, subtle,
mobile, incisive, unsullied,
lucid, invulnerable, benevolent, shrewd,
irresistible, beneficent, friendly to human beings,
steadfast, dependable...
quicker to move than any motion...
She is a breath of the power of God...

Shekinah was pushy. She taught that a car ride is an adventure, a walk is pure joy, and that sometimes it is appropriate to stand your ground, growl, and show an elegant sharp tooth.

My Shadow, a Belgian Sheepdog, was a quieter soul, devotion embodied. Faithfulness. Trust.  This dog had a noble heart and attitude, friendly to all people, but adoring only one. This was not so as to be adored in return, not like we do when we say "I love you" so as to force the reply "I love you, too,"  but rather loving  because he couldn't help himself, because he could do no other, a constant outpouring of love. He made more friends in his brief time here in the city than I had ever dreamed possible, as people gravitated to him, and felt good in his presence. His verse is Acts 18:9b - 10:

I am with you. I have so many people that belong to me in this city that no one will attempt to hurt you.

These are the companions I am missing today, on a crisp autumn day, when the sunlight is golden, the air in the park smells of earth and leaves,and none of the dogs are mine. It seems to me, though, that I still have my dog-inspired tasks: Christ calls us to love - can't I be as joyous as Shekinah? and as devoted as my Shadow? It's the least a human can do.

Excuse me, what?

I confess...and not to loving ice cream, trash novels, or expensive shoes. No, far simpler and cheaper! I love menu misprints. Typos on signs. Mondegreens. And, my favorite, labeling by someone who does knows what she or he has heard, but not what it means.

I saw the following on a restaurant menu board: "pre-fixed dinner". Without knowing when it was fixed, I'm not sure I'd want to order that dinner.

And I saw this one this morning on ebay where I was looking for an armchair: "old liar back chair". Hmmm. Whose was it? And - who in Washington should have it now? The mind reels.

Your turn. Go ahead. Make me laugh.

Six Years and a Day

Yesterday was the sixth anniversary of 9/11. The Cathedral became quiet, stood still and noticed. The noon eucharist was celebrated in the Great Choir, rather than in St. Martin's chapel as it usually is. What this means, to those who have never been in St.John the Divine, is that we who attended were not nestled in a small room, but rather gathered in a space that is has a larger-than-human scale. One sits in the choir, under the high vaulted ceiling, and feels very small, like a child.

The congregation included uniformed firefighters and policemen, and families and friends of some who died  under that day's clear blue sky. Together we listened to Revelation 21:2-7, about the holy city, the new Jerusalem, and heard God saying he will be with us, and will take away our mourning and crying and pain, and he will wipe away all our tears. As one does for a child.

Then we heard the gospel of John (11:21-27): Martha said to Jesus, "Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. But even now I know that God will give you whatever you ask of him." Jesus said to her, "Your brother will rise again." Martha said to him, "I know that he will rise up again in the resurrection on the last day." Jesus said to her, "I am the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?" She said to him, "Yes, Lord, I believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God, the one coming into the world."

I had noticed, as the liturgy began, that a young woman was sitting behind me with her two small children, a boy and a little girl with a feathery voice. When, in the reading, the question was asked Do you believe this?, that little voice behind me said, "Yes."

This morning I reread the sermon Tim Keller preached last year at the 9/11 memorial (full text is here). He quoted J.R.R. Tolkien: "In the last book of The Lord of the Rings, Sam Gamgee wakes up, thinking that everything is lost and discovering instead that all his friends were around him, he cries out: "Gandalf! I thought you were dead! But then I thought I was dead! Is everything sad going to come untrue?"

I can hear that small voice I heard behind me yesterday.

Yes.

Saying what is true

We tend to be suspicious of public figures who wrap themselves in divinity and claim that their will is God's will, but if no-one can articulate in an un-ignorable way in the public realm the creative energy of the love that we see in Christ, the human face of God, then we shall find ourselves inhabiting a maimed and diminished society.

from remarks made today by the Bishop of London at the memorial service for Diana, Princess of Wales

Poor pitiful me

It has been a wonderful few days so far this week, and yet, and yet... I could do so much better, I think. Write more, sing more, help more. Especially the last. I had something of a revelation recently when I was trying to avoid someone on my block. First, some background: the last office job I ever had, way back in the early 70s as the Manhattan Transfer was forming, involved filing documents. Not by title, alphabetically, but by content. So some thought was involved, thought about things I found uninteresting. I had an office, and a big desk, the kind that looks like a rectangular block. Sometimes I got so depressed by the job, and so tired from the attempted thinking (especially if the group had been rehearsing the night before), that I would crawl under that desk and curl up on the floor, and sleep, confident that no one walking in unexpectedly could see me. Hiding, you'd have to call it, if you were being honest.

I have not thought of this for years, but I remembered it a few days ago, as I found myself starting to duck into a store to avoid a conversation I felt I did not have time for. To avoid being seen by an elderly woman I know who walks very slowly, whose desire for company as she walks home might shave as much as 10 minutes off my so-very-important day, I was going to hide. For heaven's sake! I forgot who I am. I forgot what I care about. To save ten minutes.  Madness!

I stubbed my spiritual toe, ow ow. Poor me. Another fall, another boo boo. Another starting anew. Being a person of faith is a full-time commitment. I don't want my final review to read "Great singer, but she hid under the desk."