Changes to the neighborhood - Rector's Rambling for January 27, 2019

In the top right corner of the picture above we see, in a shadow, the outline of St. John’s Church.  Obviously, the use of color in the buildings in the center are meant to draw your attention to them.  I want to as well because in the next year or two the buildings depicted in this picture will be occupied by new residents within walking distance of St. John’s, and it will be our mission to reach out to them to join us for worship and ministry.

If you have driven up John R recently you see that the construction is well underway for this development in Brush Park called City Modern.  Old Victorian structures restored and surrounded by newer buildings to be apartments and condos.  It is an exciting renewal of our neighborhood that for many decades has been derelict.

As we are finishing our construction in the Ministry Center, and then the undercroft, we will be open and available for use by groups living in this new community, and more importantly, we will be challenged to reach out to the new residents to welcome them into our midst and help them to grow in a relationship with Jesus Christ.

Paramount in our reaching out will be inviting our new neighbors for worship – it is what the church primarily is about.  But we are also developing ministries to help in their needs for daily meaningful living which will also initiate a relationship with those in the community.  A financial planning course to get out of debt is being scheduled using Dave Ramsey’s program.  Healthy cooking classes will resume in the spring for those on a fixed income.  A casual speaker series at a coffeehouse is being discussed, and of course we host six Alcoholics Anonymous meetings a week from which people have joined the parish.

We look forward to developing new opportunities to interact with our new neighbors to bring them into our fellowship

30 years of sobriety

Over on twitter (@StJohnsPriest) I mused for a few days about getting sober.  For posterity's sake I have complied them here.

January 16, 11:00 PM
So by this time 30 years ago the drinking had begun again. The same fellow bartender said the same exact thing that started the binge a week earlier, “have one drink to calm your nerves”. An alcoholic doesn’t have one drink. By the end of the shift I’d had several and then... 1/2
....then I headed out into the night to find more alcohol. I remember heading into my fraternity house for a party and then BLACK OUT. My next conscious thought was 6 hours later lying in the hallway of my apartment house, puddle of vomit, a neighbor trying to wake me. 2/2

1. January 17, 8:40 AM
   AA advises that you shouldn’t forget your last drinking episode. This photo was taken inside my apartment where I came to outside in the hallway 30 years ago this morning. Friends had helped me home in a blackout but couldn’t find my keys on me, so they left me in a heap....
   ...I remember others who lived in there at 3913 Pine trying to rouse me on their way to class or work. Finally, I got up in a fog, and staggered a block away to the landlord office to get the spare key to let myself into my apartment. My life would change that evening
   One day at a time multiplied by 10,957 equals 30 years of #sobriety #sober #recovery #AA
   
   
   January 17, 7:09 PM
   This hour 30 years ago I was at my first AA meeting. 4 of us there for our 1st mtg - 2 of us stayed sober the first 3 years b4 I moved & we lost touch. The other 2 bounced in & out the first 6 months - one died in a workplace accident drunk, other one lost track after 3rd relapse
   
   
   January 17, 10 PM
   After my first AA meeting 30 years ago tonight we walked a block up to The Roost for pizza (slice of whole wheat with pepperoni). I remember thinking that these folks were not my cliche, but I would find out these folks “got me” in ways my drinking friends did not.
   
   
   january 17 11:18 PM - 6 tweet series
   As I get ready to go to bed and thank God for another day of sobriety and pray in gratitude for my dad and Mike P. who 12 stepped me a few weeks before my first #AA meeting. When I came to after that last binge it dawned on me that I drank like my dad - & he is in #recovery
   I also thank God for Greg B. my first #aa sponsor. He was the first guy I met when I showed up way too early for my@first meeting. “You look like you are in the right place” he said. He was right. He helped me with the steps and how to enjoy #sobriety
   I am also grateful for David L., who was also at his first #aa meeting that same night as I was. He became a good friend, moved into my apartment building, and helped me figure out how to live this new life as we both drove our shared sponsor crazy.
   And I am grateful for all the fellow recovering drunks who shared their experience, strength, and hope in Phila, East Goshen (PA), Delafield and Milwaukee WI, Bryn Mawr, PA, Charleroi PA, and here in Metro Detroit...and countless places I have gotten to a meeting on vacation.
   I pray tonight for those still suffering alcoholics who never got sober, despite the offer of hope through our High Power and the #12staps of #aa, and died in their addiction. I’ve buried too many, seen drunks and their families suffer from this disease.
   And I pray for those still suffering from the addiction to alcohol. There is help and hope! Call the #AA hotline or google “AA near me”. We stay sober by God’s Grace, working the #12steps, helping other alcoholics, and not taking the first drink - one day at a time.
   
   
   January 18 - 8:21 AM
   Day 10,958 now underway. It’s another good day to be sober.
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   

Keeping the 'catholic' in Anglicanism - Rector's Rambling for January 13, 2019

The month of January has two interesting Feast Days that are very English, but at the same time have had in important impact on us as Anglicans/Episcopalians.

On Wednesday, January 16, we commemorate the Feast of William Laud, the Archbishop of Canterbury from 1633 to 1645, under King Charles I.  It seems very long ago, and very far away.  But his life, ministry, and death, have had lasting effects on the Church.

The Church of England, our Mother Church, has tried through her history to find the “via media” of being both catholic and reformed, without compromising the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  As you might know, this “middle way” is not always easily found.  At times the Church as swung from one extreme to another in its desire to glorify Jesus, and in England that affects not only the Church, but the government as well.  They are intertwined because the Church of England is THE official Church in England.

Roman Catholic remnants inside and outside England tried to push for changes, and those with more protestant beliefs adopted from the continent of Europe also pushed at the government and church to change her worship, sacraments, and faith.  English and Scottish Puritan vandalism against the wearing of vestments and ornamentation of altars forced Archbishop Laud to enforce the law of church and state against them.  He had the full support of the King, Charles I, to preserve the catholic and apostolic orders of Bishops, Priests, and Deacons against the puritan claims to the contrary.  When the puritans gained control of the House of Commons Laud was arrested and beheaded.  Eventually, so was King Charles I (we commemorate his Feast Day on January 30).

Laud prayed at the scaffold “The Lord receive my soul, and have mercy on me, and bless this kingdom with peace and charity, that there may not be this effusion of Christian blood amongst them.”  But the kings death would follow in 1649, and the people would soon discover that the only thing worse than being under a king with strong catholic sensibilities about the church, would be under the even more despotic rule of the puritans of Oliver Cromwell.  The people would repent and the catholic order restored in 1660 with the restoration of the monarchy and the Church of England.

Epiphany - Rector's Rambling for January 6, 2019

Today we begin a new Church season with the Feast of the Epiphany.  This feast day has two names, but both mean the same thing.  To have an “epiphany” is to have something made manifest, or to have something shown to you.  In the 1928 Book of Common Prayer the title for today’s feast is The Epiphany, or the Manifestation of Christ to the Gentiles.

In the Christmas story we hear that the shepherds in the fields heard, by the proclamation of the Angelic Hosts, the good news of Jesus’ birth.  The shepherds represent the people of the Jews, since there would have surely been Jews in that region.  They come and adore Jesus.

The Magi (Wise Men or Three Kings) are not Jews, but Gentiles.  We hear in scripture that these wise men came from the east, having seen in the stars an amazing, celestial event which they understood to be the portent of the birth of a new king.

So, they went to Herod, assuming that this would foretell the birth of his heir, but of course there was no baby there.  Herod, whom secular history confirms was a man of great jealousy and wrath, tries to convince these men to let him know when and where they ultimately find this king (“…bring me word again, that I may come and worship him”).  Obviously, Herod had a poisonous intent; not to worship but destroy him.  However, the Magi were warned of God in a dream and Herod’s plan was thwarted.

As the shepherds represented the people of the Jews coming to worship Jesus, since it is the fulfillment of the promise to them to send a Saviour, so the Magi represent the rest of us.  Gentile basically means, “not Jew”.

Jesus’ birth is Good News, not only to the Jew, but the Gentile as well.  He is Lord of all, and all are included in the New Covenant sealed in His blood on the cross.  He was made manifest to the Jews in the persons of the shepherds, and to the rest of us through these wise men who also came to worship.

And the wise still come and worship Him!