6 Easter

 

Rogation Sunday

May 22, 2022

John 14:23-29

 

+ 8 years ago this coming week—on Sunday, May 26, 2014—we did something special at our Rogation Blessing.

 

On that Sunday eight years ago we processed out to our overgrown labyrinth and that bare patch of lawn under the tree there and dedicated and blessed the space for  our Memorial Garden.

 

And now, look!

 

Thanks to Sandy Holbrook and the gardening committee and all the people who have worked for that garden and all that beautiful landscaping that was done there, it has become a place of beauty.

 

And in these eight years, our memorial garden has become a place of rest for 14 people—and a place of consolation for countless others.

 

In fact just this past week we buried the ashes of two people in the garden.

 

And later today, at the close of our Rogation procession, we will bury yet another set of ashes, these some more unknown people.

 

On Saturday, after his Requiem Mass, we will be burying Leon Gelinske’s ashes there.

 

And in the next two months, we will be burying the ashes of  4 more people in our garden.

 

When I first proposed a memorial garden for St. Stephen’s, I remember people being resistant.

 

I got weird looks when I first mentioned it.

 

And there were some people who were outright vocal in their opposition for such a thing.

 

But your loyal priest persisted.

 

And he was diligent.

If, one day, when I shed this mortal coil, I believe those two words will definitely be used to describe the rector of St. Stephen’s.

 

Persistent and diligent.

 

(along with maybe a few other choice words)

 

Well, this persistent and diligent priest went out and did his research.

 

I visited memorial gardens in other places.

 

I learned how such things were done.

 

And I learned also about an apostolate of St. Timothy’s Episcopal Church in Winston-Salem, North Carolina called the Society of St. Joseph of Arimathea.

 

They were a group who provided burials for unclaimed babies in their church cemetery.

 

I wanted to make sure that anyone who needed a dignified burial had one in our memorial garden, that no one would be turned away because of financial difficulties, or for any other reason.

 

I remember a dear friend of mine at another church who was faithful in in her duties to that congregation.

 

As she was preparing for her own passing, she decided she wanted to be interred in the church’s columbarium.

 

But the price tag to do so was a bit steep for her.

 

I went to the priest (a person I did not get along with) and said, “She has been very faithful to this congregation. She has volunteered and been there for everything she is needed for. Just give her the niche.”

 

And that priest said no to me, and to that elderly woman.

 

She finally was able to muster the money together (due to some help from some of her friends) and she rests there in peace.

 

But the story struck me.

 

I never wanted anyone to struggle in their own lives to find a place of dignity for their final resting place.

 

That is why I am so grateful for our memorial garden, and for all those who made this place what it is not only for us, but for everyone else who has benefitted from it.

 

Now I don’t think I’m overestimating it when I say it has also become a place of mercy.

 

We of course have laid people to rest there who had no other place to rest, who were rejected or forgotten.

 

Why? Why do we do that?

 

Because that is what we do as Christians.

 

In our Christian tradition, mercy plays heavily into what we do.

 

And as a result, there have been, since the early Church, a series of what have been called corporal acts of mercy.

 

I’ve talked about this many times before.

 

These corporal acts of mercy are:

 

• To feed the hungry;
• To give drink to the thirsty;
• To clothe the naked;
• To harbor the harborless;
• To visit the sick;
• To ransom the captive;
• To bury the dead.

We at St. Stephen’s, in the ministry we do as followers of Jesus, have done most of those well (actually I don’t know if we’ve ransomed a whole lot of captives)

 

Including that last one. 

 

Burying the dead is a corporal act of mercy.

 

And, it’s appropriate we are discussing things like mercy and love on this Sunday, Rogation Sunday, the Sunday before the Ascension of Jesus.

 

In our Gospel reading for today we find Jesus explaining that although he is about to depart from his followers—this coming Thursday we celebrate the feast of Jesus’ Ascension to heaven—he will not leave them alone.

 

They will be left with the Advocate—the Spirit of Truth.

 

The Holy Spirit.

 

He prefaces all of this with those words that quickly get swallowed up by the comments on the Spirit, “If you love me, you will keep my commandments.”

 

And just to remind everyone, that command is, of course, “to love.”

 

To love God.

 

And to love our neighbors as ourselves.

 

This is what it means to be the Church.

 

To love.

 

To serve.

To be merciful.

To be Christ to those who need Christ.

 

To be a Christ of love and compassion and acceptance.

 

Without boundaries.

 

Without discrimination.

 

Because that is who Christ is to us.

 

Now, maybe you have been keeping up with debacle happening in the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of San Francisco.

 

The Archbishop there, Salvatore Cordileone, informed House Speaker Nancy Pelosi that he was denying her Communion because of her support for a woman’s right to choose.

 

He based the ground of his refusal on the fact that is she unrepentant in her “sin.”

 

Well, if you know me, you know where I stand on this one.

 

As I have said from the pulpit again and again over this issue: to deny Jesus from anyone is not my right, is not your right, is not any Bishop’s right, is certainly not Archbishop Cordileone’s right.

 

But always be assured of this: whenever anyone is excluded by the Church, Jesus will always side with the excluded.

 

Jesus will always side with those turned away.

 

And the Archbishop has failed miserably in his calling to follow Christ.

 

He is not being Christ to those how need Christ.

 

He is being judge and jury on who “gets” Jesus” and who doesn’t.

 

And that never ends well.

 

When we forget to be Christ to others, when we fail to do this, we fail to do mercy.

 

And God sees.

 

Our job as Christians, as followers of Jesus, to show mercy to others.

 

We are doing so this morning.

 

We are living into our ministry of mercy to others.

 

Today is, as I’ve said, Rogation Sunday.

 

Rogation comes from the Latin word “Rogare” which means “to ask.”

 

In our Gospel reading today we hear Jesus saying to us,  

 

 “I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate…”

 

From a very simple perspective, the thing we are asking today, on this Rogation Sunday, is to be faithful followers of Jesus, thorough our works and acts of mercy.

 

Now for some of us, this whole idea of Rogation Sunday and the procession that we will soon be making outside at the conclusion of our Eucharist this morning might seem a bit too much.

 

 The fact is, it is something, very much like burying the dead on the church grounds.

 

Our memorial garden—this visible sign of the final corporal act of mercy—is a part of this Rogation celebration.

 

This is where we do our blessing.

 

We process there and bless the earth and the land there.

 

We ask God’s blessings on the growth not only of crops and fields.

 

We also thank God today for the growth of our congregation.

 

We are thanking God for the acts of mercy and grace done to each of us.

 

And we are asking God to continue to make us Christ to those who need Christ.

 

We are thanking God especially for all the graces in our lives.

 

Grace is especially something we celebrate on Rogation Sunday.

 

Let’s see if you can remember my definition of grace.

 

Grace, in my very simple opinion, is a gift we receive from God that we don’t ask for.

 

In fact it is often something we receive from God that we may not even known how to ask for.

 

And we all get to be reminded of the fact that God’s grace still works in our midst in wonderful and beautiful ways.

 

This is how God works sometimes in our lives.

 

And w e have provided grace to several of the people buried in our garden.

 

We gave them something they could not ask for.

 

But we, seeking to live out mercy in our lives and in ministries here, provided them something others did not.  

 

It is appropriate to remember all of this on this Rogation Sunday—this Sunday in which we ask God’s blessings on us, on the growth in our lives, and on the renewal in our lives, and in which we seek to be grateful for the graces in our own lives.  

 

As  we process out at the end of the Eucharist today, I ask you to look around  atthe memorial garden.

 

I ask you to look at the names on the stones there.

 

We know many of them now.

 

Others of them we will never know on this side of veil.

 

I ask you as you walk about to thank God for them.

 

I ask you today to thank God for the growth God has granted us at St. Stephen’s.

 

And I ask that you remember Jesus’ call to us, to love God and to keep that  commandment of love and mercy.

 

This is more than just sweet, religious talk.

 

It is a challenge and a true calling to live out this love in radical ways.

 

It is a challenge to be merciful.

 

As we process, as we walk together, let us pay attention to this world around us.

 

Let us ponder the causes and the effects of what it means to be inter-related—to be dependent upon on each to some extent, as we are on this earth.

 

We do need each other.

 

And we do need each other’s love.

 

We definitely need each other.

 

And mercy.

 

We do need that radical love that Jesus commands us to have.

 

With that love, we will truly love our neighbors as ourselves.

 

We will show mercy to them.

 

Let this procession today truly be a "living walking" as the great poet (and one of my heroes) George Herbert put it.

 

But let our whole lives as Christians be also a “living walk,” a mindful walk, a walk in which we see the world around with eyes of love and respect and justice and care.

 

And, most importantly, with eyes of mercy.

 

Amen.