From Homily shared at the 6pm service on January 15, 2023

As we embark on our Lenten journey, I would enjoy offering some reflections on liturgy, theology, and calling. As the newly minted Lead Verger for our parish, I walk an interesting line as a "lay liturgist." I often find myself wishing I had a somewhat greater degree of decision making and (priestly?) oversight of the liturgical specifics in our worship, but as a lay person I have the fortune of working with clergy that have an eye for details and a keen desire to make our worship beautiful. 

There was a time in this role where I would fret a great deal over the smallest of things pertaining to liturgical details. However a shift (or maybe a gift?) has occurred in the last two or so years where I was able to transition from a need for military-level liturgical precision to a place where I was able to offer all forms of liturgical service, right down to the washing, wet-ironing, and gently thumb-creasing of purificators, so that my offerings appropriately glorify God during our worship. This shift occurred when I was able to recognize the tremendous gifts my life has received from God, from my church, and from "the church." Part of this shift was the realization that my level of attention to, and care for, every liturgical detail was indeed part of a calling, even a vocation. Martin Luther, in talking about the “Priesthood of all Believers,” beautifully illustrated this point in his writing on The Epistles of St. Peter and St. Jude. Luther asserted that even the work of a plowboy and a milkmaid can be as much a vocation as the work of consecration, absolution, and pastoral care. All work, whether done by clergy or laypersons, can be done as a thanksgiving and offering to God, if we stop to look for the meaning, or theology, in all of it.

As a graduate and "returning alumni” member of EfM, Education for Ministry, I have been quizzed a number of times by friends and family about the nature of the EfM program, and what it may be leading to in my life and the lives of others in our EfM cohort. Frequently the comment is something like this: "Oh, I didn't know you wanted to be ordained!" I have come up with a response that I am quite proud of: "While it is possible from time to time that someone in our group may be seeking ordination by the Church to preach, teach, and administer the sacraments, we are all continually being ordained by God to determine how we can be the hands and feet of Christ in the world." 

The marriage of liturgy and theology was expressed in a deeply poetic way recently, when I had the opportunity (which was the second such opportunity in my "career" as Verger) to carry cremains from the funeral service in our chapel to the memorial garden. The family, not knowing what to anticipate, said that they might have 50, or maybe 75 in attendance. As it happened, 103 turned up to attend this funeral, in our own Christ Chapel. By the way, if you ever need to plan a wedding or funeral in Christ Chapel, know that 103 people will not fit. Our dear sextons rushed in the few minutes before 2pm and set up 20 additional chairs out in the hallway, which I am certain broke at least a dozen fire codes. We carried the ashes in a beautiful, quiet processional up the aisle of the chapel, through the Narthex, by the baptismal font, and out of the nave's back door, then by the fire pit, ultimately to the appointed plot that had already been dug and was waiting for us. A non-theological person would view this as carrying a box of ashes under a towel from point A to point B. But for me, for our church, and for the collected family and friends, we were journeying with a departed and beloved child of God, with her earthly remains veiled in the white of purity, up an aisle that has been processed hundreds of times by clergy and many times by new brides, through a gallery where the Stations of Jesus’s final journey are depicted in beautiful statuary, and passing right by the font containing water that has for hundreds of children and adults been the site of their cleansing and renewal. We then processed through a worship space with ceilings and windows pointed directly to God, passed by the pit where the new Paschal flame, indeed the light of new life, is kindled every Easter, and ending at the place where an earthly body will find eternal rest. My dear friends, what a journey! If any person, clergy or lay, theologically educated or not, is unable to find deep theological meaning in any part of that journey, I regret to think of what richness their life could be missing. 

So, my beloved friends, as we embark on our Lenten journeys, may we all find the meaning in our lives. Let us all realize that, whether called to priestly ordination or not, we are all ordained by God to be the hands and feet of Christ in the world. Let us take up the Lenten discipline of eliminating barriers in our lives that keep us from doing God’s holy work. Let us find the theology, and indeed the Eucharist, which means Great Thanksgiving, in every task that we undertake. And may we all use the fruit we harvest from that meaning to go forth from our sacred place of worship, and use that fruit as the sustenance needed to feed the hungry, quench the thirsty, welcome the stranger, clothe the naked, and visit the prisoner. And, while we are at it, let us follow the wisdom of Mary Oliver. Pay attention. Be astonished. And, last but absolutely not least, tell about it. And in all that we do, may we always say thanks be to God.