SPEAKER_04: Blessed be God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_04: Let's pray together.
SPEAKER_04: Almighty God, unto whom all hearts are open, all desires known, and from whom no secrets are hid, cleanse the thoughts of our hearts by the inspiration of thy Holy Spirit, that we may perfectly love thee and worthily magnify thy holy name through Christ our Lord.
SPEAKER_04: Amen.
SPEAKER_04: The Lord be with you.
SPEAKER_04: Let us pray.
SPEAKER_04: Almighty God, you built your church upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ Himself being the chief cornerstone.
SPEAKER_04: Grant us so to be joined together in unity of spirit by their teaching, that we may be made a holy temple acceptable to you through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, forever and ever.
SPEAKER_04: Amen.
SPEAKER_05: A reading from 2 Samuel.
SPEAKER_05: After the death of Saul, when David had returned from defeating the Amal Amal Amal Amalkele Amalekites, excuse me, David remained two days in sick land.
SPEAKER_05: David intoned its lamentation over Saul and his son Jonathan.
SPEAKER_05: He ordered that the song of the bow be taught to the people of Judah.
SPEAKER_05: It is written in the book of Jaskar.
SPEAKER_05: He said, Your glory, O Israel, lies plain upon your high places.
SPEAKER_05: How the mighty have fallen.
SPEAKER_05: Tell it not in God, proclaim it not in the streets of Ascalon, or the daughters of the Philistines will rejoice.
SPEAKER_05: The daughters of the uncircumcised will exult.
SPEAKER_05: You mountains of Gilboa, let there be no dew arraign upon you, nor bounty his fields.
SPEAKER_05: For there the shield of the mighty was defiled, the shield of Saul, anointed with oil no more.
SPEAKER_05: From the blood of the slain, from the fat of the mighty, the bow of Jonathan did not turn back, nor the sword of Saul returned empty.
SPEAKER_05: Saul and Jonathan, beloved and lovely, in life and in death they were not divided.
SPEAKER_05: They were swifter than eagles, they were stronger than lions.
SPEAKER_05: O daughters of Israel, weep over Saul, who clothed you with crimson in luxury, who put ornaments of gold on your apparel, how the mighty have fallen in the midst of battle.
SPEAKER_05: Jonathan lies slain upon your high places.
SPEAKER_05: I am distressed for you, my brother Jonathan.
SPEAKER_05: Greatly beloved were you to me.
SPEAKER_05: Your love to me was wonderful.
SPEAKER_05: Passing the love of women.
SPEAKER_05: How the mighty have fallen, and the weapons of war perished.
SPEAKER_05: Hear what the Spirit is saying to God's people.
SPEAKER_05: Psalm 130.
SPEAKER_05: We will read responsibly by the half verse.
SPEAKER_05: Out of the depths have I called to you, O Lord.
SPEAKER_05: Hear my voice.
SPEAKER_05: If you, Lord, were to note what is done amiss.
SPEAKER_05: For there is forgiveness with you.
SPEAKER_05: I wait for you, O Lord.
SPEAKER_05: My soul waits for you.
SPEAKER_05: My soul waits for the Lord more than centuries for the morning.
SPEAKER_05: O Israel, wait for the Lord.
SPEAKER_05: There is plenteous redemption with the Lord.
SPEAKER_06: As you excel in everything, in faith, in speech, in knowledge, in utmost eagerness, and in our love for you, so we want you to excel also in this generous undertaking.
SPEAKER_06: I do not say this is a command, but I am testing the genuineness of your love against the earnestness of others.
SPEAKER_06: For you know the generous act of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for our sake he became poor, so that by his poverty you might become rich.
SPEAKER_06: And in this manner I am giving my advice.
SPEAKER_06: It is appropriate for you who began last year not only to do something, but even to desire to do something.
SPEAKER_06: Now finish doing it so that your eagerness may be matched by completing it according to your means.
SPEAKER_06: But if the eagerness is there, the gift is acceptable according to what one has, not according to what one does not have.
SPEAKER_06: I do not mean there should be relief for others and pressure on you, but it is a question of a fair balance between your presence uh present abundance and their need so that their abundance may be for your need in order that there may be a fair balance.
SPEAKER_06: As it is written, the one who had much did not have too much, and the one who had little did not have too little.
SPEAKER_06: Hear what the Spirit is saying to God's people.
SPEAKER_04: When Jesus had crossed again in the boat to the other side of the Sea of Galilee, a great crowd gathered around him, and he was by the sea.
SPEAKER_04: Then one of the leaders of the synagogue named Jairus came, and when he saw Jesus fell at his feet and begged him repeatedly, My littered little daughter is at the point of death.
SPEAKER_04: Come and lay your hands on her so that she may be made well and live.
SPEAKER_04: So Jesus went with him.
SPEAKER_04: And a large crowd followed Jesus and pressed in on him.
SPEAKER_04: Now there was a woman who'd been suffering from hemorrhages for twelve years.
SPEAKER_04: She'd endured much under many physicians and had spent all that she had, and she was no better, but rather grew worse.
SPEAKER_04: She heard about Jesus and came up behind him in the crowd and touched his cloak, for she said, If I but touch his clothes, I will be made well.
SPEAKER_04: Immediately her hemorrhage stopped, and she felt in her body that she was healed of her disease.
SPEAKER_04: Immediately aware that power had gone forth from him, Jesus turned about in the crowd and said, Who touched my clothes?
SPEAKER_04: And his disciples said to him, You see the crowd pressing in on you?
SPEAKER_04: How can you say who touched me?
SPEAKER_04: Jesus looked all around to see who had done it.
SPEAKER_04: But the woman, knowing what had happened to her, came in fear and trembling, fell down before Jesus and told him the whole truth.
SPEAKER_04: He said to her, Daughter, your faith has made you well.
SPEAKER_04: Go in peace and be healed of your disease.
SPEAKER_04: While he was speaking, some people came from the leader's house to say, Your daughter is dead, why trouble the teacher any further?
SPEAKER_04: But overhearing what they said, Jesus said to the leader of the synagogue, Do not fear, only believe.
SPEAKER_04: He allowed no one to follow him except Peter, James, and John, the brother of James.
SPEAKER_04: When they came to the house of the leader of the synagogue, he saw a commotion, people weeping and wailing loudly.
SPEAKER_04: When Jesus had entered, he said to them, Why do you make a commotion and weep?
SPEAKER_04: The child is not dead but sleeping.
SPEAKER_04: And they laughed at him.
SPEAKER_04: Then Jesus put them all outside and took the father, the child's father and mother and those who were with him, and went in where the child was.
SPEAKER_04: He took her by the hand and said to her, Talifa kum, which means, little girl, get up.
SPEAKER_04: And immediately the girl got up and began to walk around.
SPEAKER_04: She was twelve years of age.
SPEAKER_04: At this they were overcome with amazement.
SPEAKER_04: He strictly ordered them that no one should know this and told them to give her something to eat.
SPEAKER_04: The gospel of the Lord.
SPEAKER_04: I know I'm a week late with this prayer, but I saved it on purpose for the readings and the celebration today.
SPEAKER_04: So this is a prayer from last week for Juneteenth.
SPEAKER_04: Let us pray.
SPEAKER_04: Almighty God, you rescued your people from slavery in Egypt.
SPEAKER_04: And throughout the ages, you have never failed to hear the cries of the captives.
SPEAKER_04: So we remember before you our sisters and brothers in Galveston, Texas, who on the 19th of June received the glad tidings of their emancipation from slavery.
SPEAKER_04: Forgive us for the many grave sins that delayed that liberating word.
SPEAKER_04: Anoint us with your spirit to bring good news to the poor and proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free and proclaim the year of your favor through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, forever and ever.
SPEAKER_04: Amen.
SPEAKER_04: This is a photo of the scene of the hemorrhaging woman touching Jesus' fringe of his garment.
SPEAKER_04: We saw this painting when we went to Israel four years ago as a group.
SPEAKER_04: It's in a place called Middal.
SPEAKER_04: What's not abundantly clear from the reading is that the woman doesn't actually touch the hem of Jesus' clothes.
SPEAKER_04: She touches him.
SPEAKER_04: I don't know if you're familiar with this, if you're a Jewish man, particularly if you're Orthodox.
SPEAKER_04: This is something that you wear over your head when you pray.
SPEAKER_04: It's called a talit.
SPEAKER_04: Perhaps you've seen this before.
SPEAKER_04: And then is now there are a certain number of fringes on the edge of the talet.
SPEAKER_04: 613.
SPEAKER_04: And that's because there are 613 commands, if you're Jewish, that are extrapolated from the Hebrew Bible.
SPEAKER_04: There are 365 do's, like honor your father and mother, one for every day of the solar year, and there are 248 don'ts.
SPEAKER_04: And tradition says that there is a don't for every bone in your body.
SPEAKER_04: You don't have that many, it's tradition.
SPEAKER_04: So there are 613 of these strands, and they're worn on your head when you pray.
SPEAKER_04: But if you've seen the movie Fiddler on the Roof, depending on your level of orthodoxy, you would wear this under your clothes at all times.
SPEAKER_04: And these fringes are to remind you how it is that you keep God's intention for living together.
SPEAKER_04: Now you might hear this and say, oh, it's so legalistic, 613 rules.
SPEAKER_04: That wasn't the perception.
SPEAKER_04: These were sort of God's gifts for how it is that you treat one another joyfully and fairly and frankly enjoy life.
SPEAKER_04: It's sort of like when we make marital vows.
SPEAKER_04: Sometimes we keep the vows, but quite honestly, more often than not, the vows keep us.
SPEAKER_04: This is the understanding of Torah.
SPEAKER_04: Well, one of these fringes says, when a woman is bleeding, she's to be put outside of the camp.
SPEAKER_04: It's just one of these rules.
SPEAKER_04: You heard the story.
SPEAKER_04: The lady's been haorrhaging for twelve years, and the word that we get in Greek does suggest that she's bleeding.
SPEAKER_04: This is like an unstopped menstrual flow.
SPEAKER_04: So you have to consider that according to the law that she's wearing, you see, the fringe is on her own dress, and that Jesus is also wearing on his own clothes.
SPEAKER_04: She can't touch him.
SPEAKER_04: This is a woman who spent every penny she has paying extra like crisis fees to physicians because when they touch her, they'll be unclean and have to go outside for a night to kind of sleep off the cooties.
SPEAKER_04: She spent all of her money and she only got worse.
SPEAKER_04: This is a woman who hasn't been touched in 12 years.
SPEAKER_04: And the garment that's supposed to keep her in a spec of joy and community is what's keeping her from it.
SPEAKER_04: She goes up to Jesus, and here's the part we don't always get.
SPEAKER_04: When she touches him, she's going to make him unclean.
SPEAKER_04: He's not going to be allowed to go into the synagogue ruler's house.
SPEAKER_04: He's not going to be allowed to go into the synagogue because, sort of like germs, the ritual impurity can be passed on.
SPEAKER_04: So once this happens, she's essentially dishonored Jesus and kept him from this healing mission.
SPEAKER_04: This is what's going on in the story.
SPEAKER_04: And when she touches his clothing, she touches one of the fringes.
SPEAKER_04: And I think it's very fair to say she touches the very same fringe that says she's not allowed to touch him.
SPEAKER_04: And Jesus says, I mean, it's quite ironic, isn't it?
SPEAKER_04: And Jesus says, Who touched me?
SPEAKER_04: And she's terrified.
SPEAKER_04: Because what's she going to say?
SPEAKER_04: You can't heal that little girl anymore.
SPEAKER_04: I did that to you.
SPEAKER_04: Does she come to Jesus in faith or does she come to him in desperation?
SPEAKER_04: And quite honestly, is there a difference most of the time?
SPEAKER_04: This is a good question to ask.
SPEAKER_04: And Jesus makes her say what she did publicly.
SPEAKER_04: I want to tell you, I think probably this is because if she just got better, people might not actually trust that she got better.
SPEAKER_04: Here it is in front of everybody that's told her that no, she's unclean and can't be touched and can't even come into town.
SPEAKER_04: Jesus is going to recognize communally that she's been healed.
SPEAKER_04: She's terrified.
SPEAKER_04: But when she says, I touched you, Jesus says, Your faith has healed you.
SPEAKER_04: And I want you to hear, I don't think Jesus is just talking about her ailment.
SPEAKER_04: I think Jesus is also inviting her in the community to recognize since the ailment's gone, now she's touchable.
SPEAKER_04: She's touchable.
SPEAKER_04: She's fit for community interaction for the first time in 12 years.
SPEAKER_04: And Jesus does this publicly for her good and for theirs.
SPEAKER_04: The story proceeds where Jesus goes to a little girl, and you know the people come out and say, don't bother, the teacher's time, she's already dead.
SPEAKER_04: I don't know if you read the story carefully.
SPEAKER_04: Doesn't say she was dead.
SPEAKER_04: So what if this girl's so sick they've just written her off?
SPEAKER_04: And what if Jesus is the only one who bothers to look at her?
SPEAKER_04: Who is it Jesus inviting us to go in and see that we've written off as not worth it?
SPEAKER_04: And then all of this intersects gloriously as we celebrate the feast of Pauli Murray.
SPEAKER_04: You may or may not know Pauli Murray.
SPEAKER_04: She was the first black female ordained to the priesthood in the Episcopal Church.
SPEAKER_04: She's written a memoir called Hope is a Song in a Weary Throat that I recently finished.
SPEAKER_04: It was really quite fascinating.
SPEAKER_04: This was a woman who was ultimately raised by her aunt because her father got meningitis and was institutionalized.
SPEAKER_04: Her single mother died quite early.
SPEAKER_04: The father was completely unable to take care of the five children.
SPEAKER_04: They were all split up among different family members.
SPEAKER_04: And Polly Murray would learn to read at the age of four by going to school with her aunt, who was a teacher, and just sitting in the classroom with third graders.
SPEAKER_04: She listened and read at the third grade level by the time she was turned five, having gone to school all year.
SPEAKER_04: So she became a teacher, and then she was recruited to be a law student at Howard University.
SPEAKER_04: And it was really controversial at the time because while Howard was training young black men in the law, she was one of two female law students.
SPEAKER_04: And this is when Polly Murray discovered not only was there something called Jim Crow, which undoubtedly you've heard of, she discovered there was something called Jane Crow.
SPEAKER_04: And she decided that she's one of the reasons we use this word intersectionality.
SPEAKER_04: Not only was there discrimination against people in the South, particularly just for being black, but even in the black community there was strong discrimination against women.
SPEAKER_04: So for example, at Howard, uh there was one of those legal fraternities that offered internships and national recognition, and it was only for men, and there was no female equivalent, and she fought it.
SPEAKER_04: And she didn't win, but she fought it.
SPEAKER_04: She graduated Howard and there was nowhere to go.
SPEAKER_04: She applied to Harvard Law School and they wouldn't accept her both because she was a female and because she was black.
SPEAKER_04: And the Board of Trustees ruled against her on both grounds.
SPEAKER_04: So she went the only place she could go to earn a master's degree in law with the hope of being a teacher.
SPEAKER_04: She went to Berkeley.
SPEAKER_04: Berkeley's like the Episcopal Church in some ways, right?
SPEAKER_04: So uh so Berkeley took her, and um, here is where she did something uh most people don't even recognize her for.
SPEAKER_04: Perhaps you've heard of this landmark Supreme Court decision called Brown versus the Board of Education.
SPEAKER_04: And um the way that argument was won, Thurgood Marshall argued it, uh, was that separate but equal was deemed unequal because they psychologically examined black children who felt inferior by their separation.
SPEAKER_04: And this is the way they countered the idea that you could have separate and equal.
SPEAKER_04: Psychological trauma.
SPEAKER_04: That was Polly Murray's idea, and she came up with it in the 30s, and the rest of the Howard Law community thought it was crazy.
SPEAKER_04: But not only did she come up with the idea that overturned Plessy Ferguson, that was what created separate but equal.
SPEAKER_04: She also created a resource, it was like the Bible for every single law she could find.
SPEAKER_04: The United Methodist Church paid her to do this, uh, that resulted in both Jim and Jane Crow laws in the South.
SPEAKER_04: And by creating this manual, within three years of making it, it was rendered useless because of the Supreme Court's decision.
SPEAKER_04: That's a good thing.
SPEAKER_04: She created more ammunition for Thur Grid Marshall to make this reverse.
SPEAKER_04: Interesting life, she somehow became incredibly good friends with Eleanor Roosevelt in 1943, and that friendship extended throughout their life.
SPEAKER_04: She ended up with multiple posts.
SPEAKER_04: She taught law to people in Nigeria.
SPEAKER_04: She ended up being the first black female also at Brandeis University.
SPEAKER_04: Many of you know Brandeis was founded in 1948 and Out the Gate was an incredibly influential institution, right?
SPEAKER_04: The reputation is still incredible, not just for being thorough, but also for being accepting and for pushing civil rights.
SPEAKER_04: That's the legacy of Brandeis.
SPEAKER_04: And uh and Polly Murray was a lecturer there as well.
SPEAKER_04: Her career sort of flittered around, and what's interesting is that upon burying her best friend, she went to her best friend's room in the hospital and she read her uh The Rites, Ministration of the Time of Death.
SPEAKER_04: We don't call them rites of the last rites any longer.
SPEAKER_04: Doing this with her best friend, she realized.
SPEAKER_04: She'd been called to the priesthood.
SPEAKER_04: And so she entered into the ordination process before Episcopal folks were ordaining women.
SPEAKER_04: And somehow she squeezed in, went into seminary at the Episcopal Divinity School, and was ordained to the priesthood in 1977.
SPEAKER_04: Keep in mind that the first women had only been ordained in 1976.
SPEAKER_04: There were six white women that were ordained before the National Church allowed that.
SPEAKER_04: So some rogue bishops ordained some women to the priesthood, and then the General Convention figured out whether they want to do that or not.
SPEAKER_04: It had already been done.
SPEAKER_04: I want you to make sure you understand, right?
SPEAKER_04: Sometimes this is how change happens.
SPEAKER_04: And then she was ordained to the priesthood the next year and spent the rest of her life, only six years left, serving in the church.
SPEAKER_04: An incredibly, incredibly educated woman.
SPEAKER_04: She earned a PhD in law at Yale as well.
SPEAKER_04: We celebrate her, and I think these texts are really, really important, not just because she was the first, because don't you see in this text, she did exactly what this hemorrhaging woman did.
SPEAKER_04: She was isolated based on custom and law, both by the church, who would not only refuse to ordain women, but wouldn't allow them in the chancel.
SPEAKER_04: I don't know if you've got memories of this.
SPEAKER_04: Women couldn't trod in the chancel.
SPEAKER_04: They couldn't be altar girls or acolytes.
SPEAKER_04: They couldn't be laid Eucharistic ministers, they couldn't hold the chalice.
SPEAKER_04: This is when 80% of people who come to church are women.
SPEAKER_04: By the way, that's still true.
SPEAKER_04: Custom and tradition kept her separated.
SPEAKER_04: And she chose to continue to reach out and touch those same customs and traditions, not only for her healing, but for the healing of the world.
SPEAKER_04: And that's the same reversal that happens in the story, don't you see?
SPEAKER_04: This woman who's been segregated for 12 years and spent everything she has and gets no better, she touches Jesus exactly at the place that says she can't touch Jesus.
SPEAKER_04: And this is, I put to you, the difference between Jesus and just solid tradition.
SPEAKER_04: Jesus somehow knows that the tradition is keeping her from the joy and peace and community it's supposed to uphold.
SPEAKER_04: And instead of honoring tradition, Jesus honors community, joy, and connection.
SPEAKER_04: This has to be our call to ministry, don't you think?
SPEAKER_04: This has to be our call.
SPEAKER_04: And to say we've done it this way so long, so go outside is no longer acceptable when we read this gospel.
SPEAKER_04: Don't you hear?
SPEAKER_04: Jesus goes on to raise up a girl who everybody else has written off as dead and not worth his time.
SPEAKER_04: I don't even know that I need to say anything else.
SPEAKER_04: This is the gospel.
SPEAKER_04: So who are we in the story?
SPEAKER_04: Maybe we're the sick girl that everybody else has given up on.
SPEAKER_04: We might be.
SPEAKER_04: Maybe we're the disciples, the people who follow Jesus and say, come on, there's way too many people out there.
SPEAKER_04: Just keep going.
SPEAKER_04: Don't stop for this lady.
SPEAKER_04: As if you're going to restore the breach of the community.
SPEAKER_04: Maybe we're the people who say, don't waste the teacher's time.
SPEAKER_04: There's no hope for this.
SPEAKER_04: Fill in the blank who it is for you.
SPEAKER_04: But the story challenges us, I think.
SPEAKER_04: Challenges us to consider who can live again.
SPEAKER_04: Who are we unwilling to touch?
SPEAKER_04: In the words of Carla Polly Murray, he said, I intend to destroy segregation by positive and embracing methods.
SPEAKER_04: When my brothers try to draw a circle to exclude me as a woman, I shall draw a larger circle to include them.
SPEAKER_04: Where they speak out for the privileges of a puny group, I shall shout for the rights of all humankind.
SPEAKER_04: The legacy of Polly Murray is in the middle of a story like this gospel where a woman is continually taken from financially and kept away.
SPEAKER_04: People who are desperately in need of the Savior's touch, whether from the Savior directly or from the church who claims to follow him.
SPEAKER_04: Sometimes angering.
SPEAKER_04: Don't get mad, but get smart.
SPEAKER_04: And I think we're called to touch those fringes of God's guidance to us until we figure out what it is God's guiding us into.
SPEAKER_04: It's new life in this story.
SPEAKER_04: It's not just a second chance for the hemorrhaging woman or the sick daughter, it's a second chance for the village to recognize a God and a person that they thought God could not be.
SPEAKER_04: But it also has everything to do with denominations, with politics.
SPEAKER_04: But it's about that.
SPEAKER_04: This has everything to do with inter-office and gossip.
SPEAKER_04: This is about who the Savior touches, who the savior can bring your life to.
SPEAKER_04: What is often called exceptional ability, says Polly Murray, is nothing more than persistent endeavor.
SPEAKER_04: Please join me as we pray our faith in the words of an I seeing creed.
SPEAKER_04: We believe in one God, the Father, the Almighty.
SPEAKER_02: We believe in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Holy Son of God, eternally coming to the Father, coming from God, from God, true God, and true God, the name, and the name of the Father, our salvation, became heaven, and the power of the Holy Spirit, you can find the virtue of the man, and our saints crucified and justified, on the very name of God's hand, and Christmas, in heaven, and received the heart of the Father.
unknown: In Lord and Lord, just living in the dead, and happy man.
unknown: We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord given of God, who proceeds from the Father and the Son, who the Father and Son is glorified.
unknown: He has spoken to the prophets.
unknown: We believe in the Holy Happy Health of the Church.
unknown: We in the Holy Happy Sins.
unknown: We hope for God to be dead and the life of the world to come.
unknown: Amen.
SPEAKER_07: Hear us as we pray, saying, Lord, hear our prayer.
unknown: Let our cry come to you.
SPEAKER_07: Direct the counsel and knowledge of our leaders, Almighty One, that they may confront injustice and discrimination with words and acts of wisdom and compassion.
SPEAKER_07: Lord, hear our prayer.
unknown: Let our cry come to you.
SPEAKER_07: Revive our souls, O gracious one, and fill our communities with perseverance and enduring faith.
SPEAKER_07: When we encounter defeat, may we live on to see our loss cause found.
SPEAKER_07: Lord, hear our prayer.
SPEAKER_02: Let our eye come to you.
SPEAKER_07: We commend to you all those who have died, especially those whose lives were taken by the violence of systemic racism.
SPEAKER_07: Comfort all who grieve, uphold those whose lives are filled with fear, and uplift those for whom justice has too long been denied.
SPEAKER_07: Lord, hear our prayer.
SPEAKER_07: Loving God, help us to know ourselves to be held in the gaze of your love, that we might learn to love and to embrace all of creation itself.
SPEAKER_07: Lord, hear our prayer.
SPEAKER_07: Into your abundant heart, O God, we offer the cares and thanksgiving of our hearts.
SPEAKER_07: For what shall we give thanks today?
SPEAKER_07: For whom shall we pray?
SPEAKER_07: We give thanks for those who have gone before us.
SPEAKER_07: For whom shall we remember and not forget.
SPEAKER_07: Lord, hear our prayer.
SPEAKER_04: Liberating God, we thank you for the steadfast courage of your daughter, Paul Murray, who fought long and well.
SPEAKER_04: Unshackle us from bonds of prejudice and fear, so that we may show forth your reconciling love and true freedom, which you revealed through your Son, our Savior Jesus Christ, who lives and reigns with you in the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.
SPEAKER_04: Amen.
SPEAKER_04: Please join me in the mutual confession.
SPEAKER_04: Before God, with the people of God, I confess to my own brokenness, to the ways I wound my life, the lives of others, and the life of the world.
SPEAKER_00: May God forgive you, Christ renew you, and the spirit enable you to grow in love.
SPEAKER_02: Amen.
SPEAKER_04: Christ renew you, and the spirit enable you to grow in love.
SPEAKER_04: Amen.
SPEAKER_03: The peace of the Lord be always with you.
SPEAKER_04: Just a few announcements I'd like to call to your attention.
SPEAKER_04: You'll see many of these in your e-news.
SPEAKER_04: One is huge thanks to the community for honoring a truly lovely person yesterday at Martha Halliburton's funeral.
SPEAKER_04: And our Daughters of the King, as always, showed tremendous, tremendous generosity and hospitality with a lovely, lovely reception.
SPEAKER_04: Many of you knew Martha.
SPEAKER_04: She's been gone from us for about three and a half years in assisted living.
SPEAKER_04: But really an incredible and inspiring lady and a joy, a joy to honor her continued legacy here.
SPEAKER_04: There's an ECW meeting tomorrow night at 7 here at Christ Hall.
SPEAKER_04: You may say, I don't even know what that is.
SPEAKER_04: It's the Episcopal Church Women.
SPEAKER_04: And there's a couple of things going to happen at the meeting.
SPEAKER_04: One is to talk about the opportunities with the nearly new thrift shop, but also to talk about going forward as COVID conditions continue to allow.
SPEAKER_04: What's going to be helpful for our ECW?
SPEAKER_04: There's tremendous work going on, including a grant from the diocesan ECW to help us help students and families at McWorders.
SPEAKER_04: So I hope you'll make time, ladies, to join this meeting tomorrow night at 7.
SPEAKER_04: Is there anything else to say about it?
SPEAKER_04: Okay.
SPEAKER_04: Normally we celebrate a fresh food distribution on the first Saturday of the month, but because next week is the 4th of July, the food bank is closed.
SPEAKER_04: So we'll be pushing that distribution to the end of July.
SPEAKER_04: It'll be July 31st, and then we'll do two in a row.
SPEAKER_04: We'll do one on August 7th as well.
SPEAKER_04: So two in a row.
SPEAKER_04: Canons for mission development and canons for all kinds of things.
SPEAKER_04: And look, we're not a cathedral, but if you know Christine Alexander, well you may not know her, but she's the one who not only dreamt up but fabricated these windows and is working on a few more with us, along with contributions to guiding art.
SPEAKER_04: Levestry has very excitedly and unanimously named Christine Alexander our artist in residence.
SPEAKER_04: This is a win-win for us because it helps her, but it also helps us because uh it means we take art seriously here, and we do.
SPEAKER_04: And so um so I'm really excited to say that Christine Alexander has agreed to be our artist in residence.
SPEAKER_04: And these these little cards, this is just kind of for fun.
SPEAKER_04: Christine's got some work uh at a place called TXRX Labs.
SPEAKER_04: Uh the theme is called the Quadrivium, and she's going to be docenting me on Wednesday at one.
SPEAKER_04: If you have any interest, you can come along too.
SPEAKER_04: Uh so that's this Wednesday at one, but the installation is there for a while, and uh and Christine's work, what I love about it, it's it's always grounded in these really incredible, inviting, mature theological uh discourses.
SPEAKER_04: I mean, it's really, really splendid.
SPEAKER_04: You can just spend hours looking at those windows, and the same with this exhibit, which is about uh sacredness and number.
SPEAKER_04: So if this appeals to you at all, I've got some cards out there, and if you see Christine, please thank her for the ministry.
SPEAKER_04: She continues, not just to make herself, but uh you may not know this when we had the icon exhibition.
SPEAKER_04: She made the website, she made the booklets, um, she's made guidelines for uh artistic displays in the hallway.
SPEAKER_04: I mean, she really just continues to do a great deal for us, and uh so it's an honor that that she's willing to serve as our artist in residence.
SPEAKER_04: Um I gave a handout today.
SPEAKER_04: Uh it's on the back of the life of Pauli Murray.
SPEAKER_04: Again, it's easy not to know people that you haven't heard of before.
SPEAKER_04: How many of you heard of Polly Murray before?
SPEAKER_04: Okay.
SPEAKER_04: I'm grateful.
SPEAKER_04: I'm grateful to see some hands if I am.
SPEAKER_04: The rest of you, I hope, I really hope uh you'll enjoy reading more about the sheet and getting to know somebody who was underneath uh some tremendous moments in our own history.
SPEAKER_04: Continue to walk in love as Christ first loved us and gave himself for us, an offering and sacrifice to God.
SPEAKER_04: This is the table not of the church, but of Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_04: It is made ready for those who love him and those who want to love him more, so come, you who have much faith and you who have little, you who have been here often, and you who have not been for a long time or ever before.
SPEAKER_04: You who have tried to follow and you who have failed, come.
SPEAKER_04: Not because the church invites you, it is Christ.
SPEAKER_04: He invites you to meet him here.
SPEAKER_04: The Lord be with you.
SPEAKER_04: Lift up your hearts.
SPEAKER_04: Let us give thanks to the Lord our God.
SPEAKER_04: It is very meet, right, in our bounding duty that we should at all times and in all places give thanks unto thee, O Lord, Holy Father Almighty, everlasting God, through Jesus Christ our Lord, according to whose true promise the Holy Ghost came down from heaven, lighting upon the disciples to teach them and lead them into all truth, uniting peoples of many languages and worldviews in the confession of one faith, giving to thy church the power to serve thee as a royal priesthood, and to preach the gospel to all nations.
SPEAKER_04: Therefore, with archangels and with all the company of heaven, we laud and magnify thy glorious name, evermore praising thee and saying, Holy, holy, holy, Lord God of hosts, heaven and earth are full of thy glory.
SPEAKER_04: Glory be to thee, O Lord Most High.
SPEAKER_04: Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord, Hosanna in the highest.
SPEAKER_04: All glory be to thee, O Lord our God, for that thou didst create heaven and earth, and didst make us in thine own image.
SPEAKER_04: And if thy tender mercy didst give thine only Son Jesus Christ to take our nature upon him, and to suffer death upon the cross for our redemption.
SPEAKER_04: He made there a full and perfect sacrifice for the whole world, and did institute, and in his holy gospel command us to continue, a perpetual memory of that, his precious death and sacrifice, until his coming again.
SPEAKER_04: For in the night in which he was betrayed, Jesus took bread, and when he given thanks to thee, he broke it and gave it to his disciples, saying, Take, eat.
SPEAKER_04: This is my body which is given for you.
SPEAKER_04: Do this in remembrance of me.
SPEAKER_04: Likewise, after supper, Jesus took the cup of wine, and when he given thanks, he gave it to them, saying, Drink this, all of you.
SPEAKER_04: This is my blood of the new covenant, which is shed for you and for all for the remission of sins.
SPEAKER_04: Do this as oft as ye shall drink it in remembrance of me.
SPEAKER_04: Wherefore, our Lord and Heavenly Father, we thy people do celebrate and make with these thy holy gifts which we now offer unto thee, the memorial thy son hath commanded us to make, having in remembrance his blessed passion and precious death, his mighty resurrection and glorious ascension, and looking for his coming again with power and great glory.
SPEAKER_04: We most humbly beseech thee, O merciful Father, to hear us, and with thy word and Holy Spirit to bless and sanctify these gifts of bread and wine, that they may be unto us the body and blood of thy dearly beloved Son Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_04: And we earnestly desire thy fatherly goodness to accept this, our sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving, whereby we offer and present unto thee, O Lord, ourselves, our souls and bodies.
SPEAKER_04: Grant we beseech thee that all who partake of this holy communion may worthily receive the most precious body and blood of thy Son Jesus Christ, and be filled with thy grace and heavenly benediction.
SPEAKER_04: And also that we and all thy whole church may be made one body with Him, that He might dwell in us and we in Him, through the same Jesus Christ our Lord.
SPEAKER_04: By whom and with whom and in whom, in the unity of the Holy Ghost, all honor and glory be unto thee, O Father Almighty, world without end.
SPEAKER_04: Amen.
SPEAKER_04: And now, as our Savior Christ has taught us, we are bold to pray our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come.
SPEAKER_04: Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.
SPEAKER_04: Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us.
SPEAKER_04: Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil, for thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever and ever.
SPEAKER_04: Amen.
SPEAKER_04: Please join me in the spirit of Pentecost as we pray that prayer in a retranslation from the Aramaic language.
SPEAKER_04: O breathing life, your name shines everywhere.
SPEAKER_04: Release the space to plant your presence here.
SPEAKER_04: Imagine your possibilities now.
SPEAKER_04: Embody your desire in every life and form.
SPEAKER_04: Grow through us this moment's bread and wisdom.
SPEAKER_04: Untie the knots of failure binding us as we release the strands we hold of others' thoughts.
SPEAKER_04: Help us not forget our source, yet free us from not being in the present.
SPEAKER_04: From you arises every vision, power, and song, from gathering to gathering.
SPEAKER_04: Amen.
SPEAKER_04: May our future actions grow from here.
SPEAKER_04: O Lamb of God that takest away the sins of the world.
SPEAKER_04: Have mercy upon us.
SPEAKER_04: O Lamb of God that takest away the sins of the world.
SPEAKER_04: Have mercy upon us.
SPEAKER_04: O Lamb of God that takest away the sins of the world.
SPEAKER_04: Grant us thy peace.
SPEAKER_04: These are the gifts of God for you, the family of God.
SPEAKER_04: Feed them, feed on them in remembrance that Christ died for you, and feed on them in your hearts with faith, with thanksgiving.
SPEAKER_04: And I invite you to receive bread and wine through intention or to skip either and receive a blessing.
SPEAKER_04: We'll start in this section.
SPEAKER_04: Come to the road closest to your right and return to your seat on the far side.
SPEAKER_04: O thou who art a fire, consuming the unworthy.
SPEAKER_04: Consume us not, O our Creator.
SPEAKER_04: Consume the thorns of our transgressions.
SPEAKER_04: Instead, enter into our members, our veins, our hearts, cleanse our souls, and sanctify our reasonings.
SPEAKER_04: Make firm our knees and bodies with this nourishment from your table.
SPEAKER_04: Illumine our five senses to see you ever at work in the world.
SPEAKER_04: Always protect, guard, and keep us from soul-destroying words and deeds.
SPEAKER_04: Give us understanding and illumination.
SPEAKER_04: Show us to be a temple of thy one spirit, and not the home of many sins.
SPEAKER_04: Thou art the only sanctification, nourishment, and light of our souls, O good one.
SPEAKER_04: And to thee we ascribe glory day by day.
SPEAKER_04: Amen.
SPEAKER_04: May God who by the Holy Spirit cause those of many languages and world views to proclaim Jesus as Lord, strengthen your faith, and send you out to bear witness to God in word and deed.
SPEAKER_04: And the blessing of God Almighty, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit be with you this day and remain with you always.
SPEAKER_04: Amen.