North Greenwich Congregational Church

“Doubting Thomas” by Peter Paul Reubens, 1615

“Beyond A Reasonable Doubt”

Sermon by Rev. Royal B. Garren

Second Sunday of Easter

John 20: 19-31

Text: “Unless I put my finger in the mark of the nails and my hand in his side, I will not believe!” John 20:25

We can all sympathize with Thomas. Before he is willing to commit himself to any new course of action, particularly after the trauma of witnessing the arrest, trial, beating and crucifixion of his leader, he’s going to need some certainty. He approaches his life logically. For him, things are black or white, right or wrong. He has no patience for “all truth is relative.” It’s either true or false. Once we head down this path, however, we’re apt to conclude that if something isn’t literally true, it can’t be true at all. This, of course, is fundamentalism. And in case you haven’t noticed, fundamentalism is on the rise these days across the board – Christianity, Judaism, Islam and Hinduism. A number of religious groups are intent on getting back to fundamentals, back to basic truths. Go to any of the world’s hot spots where tensions are at a boiling point – there is a good likelihood that you’ll find some form of fundamentalism at work nearby. This should make any “logical” thinker ponder whether religious fundamentalism is helping to defuse the unrest, or fanning the flames.

Please don’t get me wrong. Fundamentalism isn’t all bad. While Congregationalists tend to keep matters of faith in our heads, fundamentalists worship God with all their heart, and soul and strength. They certainly know their Holy Scriptures better than most – whether it be the Gospel, the Torah, or the Koran. And, let’s be honest, fundamentalists are far more attentive when it comes to committing their time, talent and treasure to the faith community.

On the other hand, there is a darker side to fundamentalism. With all of the fervor for the “basics,” fundamentalism has a way of depriving daily life of all of its rich complexity and beautiful diversity. Those definitive answers quickly become rigid, simplistic, moralistic and horribly authoritative. And, God have mercy on you if your life doesn’t conform to a pre-determined, mandatory ideal of how true believers are supposed to think and act. If you stray from their norm, you are sure to meet harsh rejection. I can’t tell you how many individuals I have met through the years who have found themselves profoundly hurt and alienated from the church because a particular congregation, minister, or priest followed a strict fundamentalist interpretation of Christianity.

Jesus, you will notice, reserves some of his harshest criticism toward the fundamentalists of his day – the Pharisees. He feels that the religious leaders are putting the Letter of the Law before God. They’re so caught up in their own rules and regulations that no room is left to enjoy God’s living presence in their daily experience.

At the end of the day, we are all looking for the full and abundant life promised in Christ’s Gospel. The Bible speaks of “shalom” – a sense of wholeness that is more than simply private pleasure, or personal satisfaction. We want to feel “at home” with ourselves, our neighbor, our surroundings and our God. Jesus looks to the day when we will all be “one.” That’s what atonement means: “at one” with all that is.

Back in 2004, I volunteered to be an Audubon Teacher/Naturalist. I wanted to do something in the community. But, I also wanted to feel connected to the larger scheme of things - whether strolling through a grove of Douglas firs, examining the intricacy of a dragonfly wing, observing animal behavior by strapping on a pair of snow shoes and following footprints in the snow, or simply enjoying the company of fellow naturalists – fellow adventurers on a mission to live in harmony with the natural order. Life is about relationships. It’s about being connected to the world and to each other. John Donne reminded us that no one is an “island.” Whether we like it or not, our survival as a species depends on us being inextricably bound to each other, our surroundings and our Creator. This is what we mean by “communion.” Life is all about establishing, nurturing, sustaining and forever restoring relationships. These connections bring us great pleasure. And yet, they also bring us pain - dealing with the loss of a loved one, witnessing the suffering of others, witnessing the destruction of a healthy forest – or the pollution of a once living river. During Holy Week, we reaffirmed not only the joy, but also the anguish, of being followers of Jesus.

This week, we launch the North Greenwich Congregational Church Teaching Garden. As I have said in the past, this project is more than growing flowers and vegetables in our back yard. This initiative will be about establishing connections and nurturing relationships. Following some basic organic principles, we are going to learn to live “at one” with our surroundings. We are going to learn, for example, that using chemical fertilizers and petroleum-based pesticides on our lawns impacts the local watershed. These chemicals are absorbed into the soil and eventually the Byram River. The choices we make then affect everyone living down Riversville Road – on into Glenville – on into Pemberwick - on into Port Chester – on into the Long Island Sound and beyond. In fact, we are going to learn that Water is going to play a key role in understanding how we live in harmony with each other throughout the world. During the Lenten season, we learned how Guatemalans have to spend four hours of their day transporting water from a secure source because they don’t have the technology, the resources and the where-with-all to build a well. (Knowledge and materials that we can provide!!) Our mission to Haiti is making us aware how access to clean water – something we take for granted – is the root cause of a horrific outbreak of cholera.

In rebuking Thomas, Jesus is making it clear that truth is relative – because we live in relationships. There are no absolutes when it comes to the dynamics of building and sustaining an extended family. In the end, we have to learn to get along with our “relatives.”

It may be difficult to believe this…our Teaching Garden - dedicated to simple Audubon-At-Home guidelines - will “bring us home” to ourselves, to each other, to our neighborhood, to our community – and, yes, to our world.

It may be difficult to believe this…we are already committed to an adventure that is going to take us places and develop relationships that we can’t even envision at the moment.

It may be difficult to believe this… the garden is going to teach us about faith. It’s going to teach us about the guidance of the Holy Spirit. You see, faith is not meant to tie us down to a bunch of rules and regulations. Faith is not about imposing guilt trips. Jesus says, “The Spirit is like the wind…it blows where it wills… we hear the sound of it, but we don’t know where it will lead.

Some of our paths may lead to dead ends. I can assure you that our neighbors – out there – are keeping an eye on our progress. And, I’m not talking about neighbors living in houses, but those burrowed in the ground, hiding in the stone wall, nesting in the trees – just waiting to help themselves to our first yield. I was reading the other night about black slugs. And, I have to say that I was ready to give up before we even start. Why even bother? Well, that’s where today’s scripture text comes in:

Thomas says, “Unless you can convince me at the outset that this is a sure thing, I refuse to believe!!”

Jesus says, “Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen… yet have to come to believe.”

So let’s continue to believe in our new ministry and go forth to experience life in all of its rich, diverse, complicated and beautiful abundance!!!

Sébastien Bourdon, “Moses and the Brazen Serpent”

“Chasing Snakes”

Sermon by the Rev. Royal B. Garren

March 18, 2012

Fourth Sunday of Lent

Numbers 21:4-9

John 3: 14-21

Text: “And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up.” John 3:14

O.K., I’ll admit it. I am an ophediophobe! There, I said it. I already feel like a millstone has been lifted from around my neck. I’ve known it since the day Jungle Jim visited my Wenga Nursery School class. Don’t get me wrong. I loved all the other critters in his entourage: Susie Skunk, Henry Hawk and Rascal Raccoon. But, I dreaded what was wriggling inside the sack!! I’d have nightmares for weeks after everyone in the class was required to come forward and touch Bobby’s shiny scales in order to discover that they were really as dry as shoe leather. I never trusted Jungle Jim’s reassurances; “Oh, Bobby won’t hurt you… Bobby’s really very gentle…. Bobby’s more scared of you, than you are of him.” I could see his beady eyes… his forked tongue… the way he was sizing me up. In case you haven’t figured it out, yet. Bobby was a Boa Constrictor. Yes, I hate snakes. Always have. Always will.

If God wants to get my attention, all God needs to do is throw a snake at me. My skin crawls when I think about what those Israelites are dealing with, here, in Deuteronomy, chapter 4. Although, in the overall scheme of things, I can certainly see why God decides to send in the snakes. Those Israelites really are a bunch of whiners!! They moan and groan about everything. Pea’s porridge hot. Pea’s porridge cold. Pea’s porridge in the pot… Oh, I forgot. There’s no pea’s porridge at all. That’s why they’re complaining. But, it isn’t as though God doesn’t provide. God sends all those quail at dusk. Granted…there’s not much “flesh” on a quail. But, what about the manna every morning! Well, you’ll remember when we sojourned with the Israelites for what seemed like forty years – a couple of years back…most scholars believe that the dewy, high-caloric substance that mysteriously appears on the ground each morning is “honey dew,” or I should say “honey poo.” Apparently it’s an excretion (rich in protein!) from a certain bug that populates the Sinai desert. Let’s be honest. We’d all complain if we were forced to subsist on that diet, ourselves… and yearn for the fleshpots of Egypt. At least there was flesh in those pots.

So, I guess one could say that God decides to give those whiners something to really whine about!! Poisonous snakes!!! Would someone please give St. Patrick a call?

It is rather ironic that on the weekend we celebrate St. Patrick’s Day, both passages have to do with snakes. Do you think it was planned?

Speaking of St. Patrick and those snakes - I learned something new this weekend!! Yes, it’s true!! There are no snakes in Ireland. (Although, they say the same thing about Haiti!! Don’t believe it for a minute, though. I was walking one morning to the Port of Jacquesi and there had to have been a six-foot snake smashed in the middle of the road.) Actually, what herpetologists contend is that there are no “native” snakes in Ireland. An equivocation – if I ever heard one. It has something to do with the Ice Age. Ireland was a frozen wasteland and completely inhospitable to cold-blooded reptiles and amphibians. Once the ice retreated, Ireland was an island with no snakes. But here’s what’s interesting. The Emerald Isle ended up inhabited by the Druids. Check out their art work – all those amazingly intricate, curlicue, interconnected Celtic “knots.” A lot of snakes in those patterns!! In fact, the nuns in Dublin are very quick to point out to school kids that those nasty, heathen Druids had big, scary snake tattoos on their arms!! As missionary to Ireland’s unconverted, Patrick was the vehicle by which Christianity supplanted pagan practices. Thus - their patron saint drove those nasty “snake” people right into the sea!! As I like to say (when it comes to things spiritual) keep your eye on the metaphor. It’s all about the metaphor!!

But, I digress. Back to those snakes in Numbers 21. They aren’t going anywhere. No amount of moaning and groaning, or pleading and cajoling, is going to change God’s mind. Actually, those snakes are still there – whether God wants them there or not. I spent some time in the Sinai Desert. They are a species of venomous vipers. We were warned about them. I never saw one. But, every morning as we collected our “honey dew,” we’d see how perilously close their tracks came to our tents!! It was very unsettling.

Moses is obviously a good teacher. He knows a good object lesson when he sees one. If Israel is to get through this wilderness ordeal, she is going to have to figure out a way to face her fears and deal with those vipers. They’re everywhere. And so, he fashions a brazen likeness of a serpent and puts it on a pole. As if to say, if you want to vanquish your enemy…your foe…your opposition… your challenge…your obstacle – it can’t be done by avoiding them, ignoring them, wishing them away – or even running away. In fact, the very thing that often fills us with the most fear usually ends up being the path by which that fear is ultimately conquered (Just as I had to learn: only by facing and staring down Bobby Boa could I make it through the perils of nursery school. Although, it doesn’t hurt to creatively “finesse” your problems. You can always drop a few marbles on the floor just at the moment when it’s your turn to touch the Boa’s scales. Everyone’s attention is diverted as you scramble to pick them up. The marbles will be confiscated. But your objective will be achieved. (My Dad helped me come up with that strategy.)

Turning to the Gospel lesson: there’s no avoiding Jesus’ worst fear – the fate that awaits all political dissidents. The core values of God’s kingdom inevitably threaten the status quo. Jesus’ “the way, the truth and the life” stands in stark contrast to “the way, the truth and the life” of the power elite. He knows only too well that once the decision is made to go to Jerusalem, there’s no turning back. The Sanhedrin will denounce him as a threat and will look for any opportunity to turn him over to Roman authorities for crucifixion – the Roman government’s horrifying way to rid themselves of troublemakers.

From this point onward, Jesus must stay true to his convictions… his principles…. his mission. At no point can he cut loose…cut corners…or, cut and run.

And so, on this Fourth Sunday in our Lenten pilgrimage, we come upon two symbols. A serpent lifted upon a pole (which, as you know, will eventually represent the entire medical profession) and the Son of Man lifted up on a cross. Both symbols are challenging us to stay true to our convictions and trust that no matter how hopeless a situation may seem… God will be there. God will not be found in some sweet, celestial “by-and-by” with no poisonous snakes. God will not be found by our pretending everything’s rosy and wonderful – when, in fact, it’s not. God will not be found by fearfully looking the other way and avoiding the way things really are. If the Gospel of Jesus Christ teaches us anything… it teaches us that God is always found in the midst of our everyday reality….in the everyday world where we struggle to live our lives - despite the challenges….despite the snakes. Keep your eyes on Jesus. Listen to him. Remember what he called his own opposition. In the next few weeks, he’s going to show us how to face and overcome any “brood of vipers.”