A Solitary Egg
November 18, 2007, 33rd Sunday of Ordinary Time
Malachi 3:19-20 II Thessalonians 3:7-12 Luke 21:5-11, 25-28
To the church in the diaspora[1]
& to the church of the unchurched[2]
Gospel
Alleluia, alleluia.
A reading from the holy Gospel according to Luke.
Glory to you, Lord.
While some people were speaking about how the temple was adorned with costly stones and votive offerings, Jesus said, "All that you see here--the days will come when there will not be left a stone upon another stone that will not be thrown down."Then they asked him, "Teacher, when will this happen?And what sign will there be when all these things are about to happen?" He answered, "See that you not be deceived, for many will come in my name, saying, 'I am he,’ and 'The time has come.’ Do not follow them! When you hear of wars and insurrections, do not be terrified; for such things must happen first, but it will not immediately be the end." Then he said to them, "Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be powerful earthquakes, famines, and plagues from place to place; and awesome sights and mighty signs will come from the sky.
There will be signs in the sun, the moon and the stars. On earth, whole countries will be in despair afraid of the roar of the sea and the raging tides. Men will faint from fear as they wait for what is coming over the whole earth, for the powers in space will be driven from their courses. Then the Son of Man will appear, coming in a cloud with great power and glory. When these things begin to happen, stand up and raise your heads, because your salvation is near.”
The Gospel of the Lord.
Praise to you, Lord Jesus Christ.
Introduction
End Time readings (Apocalypses)
On December 31, the Western World ends its old year. On this 33rd Sunday of Ordinary Time, the church sounds the ending of her liturgical year with End Time readings, sometimes called Apocalypses. An apocalypse is a literary form, which appeared two centuries before and three centuries after Christ. You write an apocalypse in the face of hopelessly depressing news like the casualty count in Iraq or the peaking price of gas and healthcare or the empty promises of people who want to be the next president of the USA.
At first glance, an apocalypse seems to paint a foreboding picture of the End Time:
There will be signs in the sun, the moon and the stars.
On earth, whole countries will be in despair
afraid of the roar of the sea and the raging tides.
Men will faint from fear as they wait
for what is coming over the whole earth;
for the powers in space will be driven from their courses.
(Lk21:25-26)
At second glance, an apocalypse is not about destruction and annihilation but about consummation:
Then the Son of Man will appear,
coming in a cloud with great power and glory.
When these things begin to happen,
stand up and raise your heads,
because your salvation is near at hand.”(Lk 21:27-28)
An apocalypse is about a consummation which will put an end to all the hopelessly depressing news and will fix, once and for all, what we cannot fix for ourselves. It is about a consummation which will wipe away all tears from our eyes and put an end to all crying and dying (Rev 21:4).
Advent ahead
Next Sunday the church will celebrate the feast of Christ the King as a grand finale to her liturgical year. The Sunday after that will be New Year’s Day in the church with the arrival of the first Sunday of Advent in preparation for Christmas 2007. Cathedral Square has already constructed a towering Christmas tree to lighten up a world darkened by the war in Iraq, the price of gas at the pump and the need of presidential contenders for 2008 to tear each other down.
Faithful Thanksgiving
On the Thursday between this 33rd Sunday which speaks to us of the End Time and the 34th Sunday which crowns the liturgical year of 2007 with a feast in honor of Christ the King, the nation will celebrate Thanksgiving. That’s the nation’s most popular feast. It’s also the nation’s purest feast. Unlike Christmas and Easter which have gone astray, Thanksgiving has remained faithful to an original inspiration: giving thanks at the family table. Thanksgiving still sends us all hastening over the river and through the woods to the family table. At Thanksgiving sons and daughters, brothers and sisters (scattered all over the country) crowd our airways and highways, as they hurry home, uncluttered with any other gift but themselves.
At one time they couldn’t fly the coop fast enough. Now they can’t wait to get back, momentarily at least, to the nest called home. There they find warmth and welcome in a cold world. There they find encouragement and affirmation in a dog-eat-dog world. There they do not have to pay for every last thing, because grace and gift abound at home. There they do not have to prove anything because they are loved, even though family knows them very well.
Thanksgiving does not gather us around the family table to give thanks for high-tech toys like ipods, iphones, gps, play-stations, plasma TV, etc. It gathers us to give thanks for the basics of life – like family and friends, a roof over our heads, a warm bed to sleep in, food aplenty to eat, good health and tender loving care when we are ill. Thanksgiving is still faithful even to the very menu itself: turkey (whether you like it or not), cranberry sauce, pumpkin pie and sweet potatoes.
A mystic approach to holidays
Garrison Keillor, author of Lake Wobegon, tells of the great Thanksgiving feasts spent at his grandparents' farm. He speaks of the piping-hot kitchen stove, of the steaming pots and pans, of the heavenly aromas of pies and pudding, and of turkeys and trimmings. The kids were all turned lose into the snow outside, and were not allowed in until the turkey and its entourage were ready. Once when they were waiting to be admitted into the heavenly warm and aromatic banquet hall, all the kids huddled together in an old farm car, and there sang sad songs. At this Keillor makes a mystic observation: "It is sorrow and sadness that make the holiday." Not joy and gladness but sorrow and sadness make the holiday. That, indeed, is mystical.
It was sorrow and sadness that made Thanksgiving and Christmas for Jane Nook, a Presbyterian missionary in India. In a United Presbyterian magazine she wrote,
Once I was in a remote village of India and the congregation was gathered in a schoolroom for worship. From one wall, a faded picture of Gandhi smiled down benignly. There was no minister. The schoolteacher read the Scriptures and led in the long, long Tamil hymns. At the end of the service, there was a stir in the rear of the room and a young woman slipped forward -- a girl she was really - - thin and shy. She carried a tiny baby, surely not more than a day old. As she approached the battered desk that served as an altar table, she reached into the folds of her sari and drew out an egg. With utmost care, she laid it on the table and bowed her head. "For the birth of her child," whispered the teacher to me. "It's her thank-offering to God."
An egg! Not a coin, but a life-sustaining egg! The diet of the Indian villager is notoriously deficient in protein. This woman needs this egg, I thought. In the economy of her village, this one egg costs a woman like her about three hours on the road or in the fields. Even if she is lucky enough to own hens, she sells their few eggs and buys rice to fill the stomachs of her family.
Conclusion
A solitary egg
That missionary lady continued,
So this holiday season as we prepare our 18 pound turkey, stuffing, sweet potatoes, peas, cranberry sauce and mincemeat pie at Thanksgiving; as we festoon the trees with tinsel and lights or wearily shop for gifts or scowl at the assault of canned Christmas carols on our ears [or stampede the shopping malls to get our hands on the latest toy retailing at $500.00] I shall remember a solitary egg (A.D. Magazine for Dec. 1974)!
1] Diaspora is a Greek word meaning dispersion. Originally it referred to the settling of scattered colonies of Jews outside Palestine after the Babylonian exile. It’s now come to mean the migration or scattering of a people away from an established or ancestral homeland or parish!
[2]] By the “the unchurched” is especially meant not those who have left the church but those whom the church has left!
