Dear Friends,
For the last couple of weeks Kathy and I traveled in Greece and Turkey. We explored the ruins of Ephesus, Thessaloniki, Rhodes, Crete, Heraklion and more. It was a rich experience and you were present with me as we traveled.
We walked among the ruins of daily life, but also of fortresses and castles and cannonballs. I took the cover photo, and it could be titled: “Love among the cannonballs in Rhodes, Greece.” It was not hard to imagine the people of Iran walking in rubble right now.
Walking in the rubble, getting alerts on my phone, it was not hard to wonder: “Will it be ever thus?”
Probably.
And…
It doesn’t have to deter us from working to end war (and wars).
How?
The bombs dropped on leaders and (God help us) school children may seem so far away. Our fingers are not on the button, the machinery of war.
Except this.
Lent.
When we gathered with some of you from the congregation to plan this Lenten season one of you (okay it was you, Evan) said (and I’m paraphrasing), “Instead of thinking about what to give up, how about thinking of how we move forward with joy and imagination into our future (individually and collectively).” Yes. This.
This Lent, in the midst of war, is a chance to encourage us to think with imagination about how we show a different world, a different way of being in the world, a different way of living together (through agreement and disagreement). We have learned some lessons as a congregation across our 167 year history. In this long history we have add our own version of wars and the same thing in our families and communities.
It is people in our communities who are and will be leaders in the years and decades ahead. How do we encourage each other to imagine a church, a community, a nation that finds other ways than bombing people back to the Stone Age to love our enemies? How do we notice where people in our parish are doing this in their neighborhoods, schools, workplaces, businesses, courts, etc…? The people who make these decisions who do have their fingers on the machinery, they were formed by peoples and communities, and this Lent we are reminded of how important it is we do this intentionally and with thought and care. And, may I say so, with song and prayer and challenge and above all else, love.
This is what a holy Lent looks like to me.
Keep tellin’ the Story,
Mike
This video is of Yo Yo Ma playing “Song of the Birds” (El Cant dels Ocells) an ancient Catalan folk melody that Pablo Casals played at every single concert as a prayer for peace.
This week’s takeaway: In the presence of war, we can use this season of Lent to imagine and show a different way of living together.