The Abundant Life

Tiffany Curtis is the Micah Fellow at the Episcopal Chaplaincy at Harvard, through the Life Together program in the Diocese. She was raised in the Disciples of Christ tradition, and received an MDiv from HDS in 2011. In 2011, she was awarded a Sheldon research fellowship and worked in Ecuador to study the intersection of Indigenous spirituality and alternative sustainable development models. Each week she offers us a reflection from her work, past or present.

Deer Park Monastery, Escondido, CA

As the energy of elections and political posturing reaches a frenzy once more in this U.S. political cycle, I am reminded of both the opportunity for genuine voice and energy from the people, (for instance in the incredible work of organizations like GBIO--the Greater Boston Interfaith Organization, whose delegates assembly I was privileged to attend last week) as well as the vicious divisions that rise up between people of good-will. As we all struggle to bring about human and non-human flourishing in our communities, our nations, the world--the abundant life--I am reminded of that which connects us, and of the ways in which that very connectedness is what makes the abundant life possible. Pablo Neruda: 20th-century Chilean poet, activist, lover of life, is one of my truest prophets in my spiritual life, and his words from Sonnet 42 in 100 Love Sonnets are with me this week. This translation is from the bilingual edition of 100 Love Sonnets by Stephen Tapscott (University of Texas Press, 1986).

Sonnet 42

Radiant days rolling on the water, intense as the inside
of a yellow rock, its splendor like honey;
that wasn't damaged by all the turmoil.
That kept its four-square purity.

Yes, the daylight crackles like a fire, or like bees,
getting on with its green work, burying itself in leaves;
till up at the top the foliage reaches
a bright world that flickers and whispers.

Thirst of fire, scorch and multitudinousness of summer,
which builds an Eden with a few green leaves --:
because the dark-faced earth does not want suffering;

it wants freshness, fire, water, bread, for everyone;
nothing should separate people but the sun or the night,

the moon or the branches.

Soneto XLII

Radiantes días balanceados por el agua marina,
concentrados como el interior de una piedra amarilla
cuyo esplendor de miel no derribó el desorden:
preservó su pureza de rectángulo.

Crepita, sí, la hora como fuego o abejas
y es verde la tarea de sumergirse en hojas,
hasta que hacia la altura es el follaje
un mundo centelleante que se apaga y susurra.

Sed del fuego, abrasadora multitud del estío
que construye un Edén con unas cuantas hojas,
porque la tierra de rostro oscuro no quiere sufrimientos

sino frescura o fuego, agua o pan para todos,
y nada debería dividir a los hombres
sino el sol o la noche, la luna o las espigas.

A Living Epistle

 Each week our Micah Fellow writes a short reflection on some experience or reading from her time with us at the chaplaincy or with St. James in Porter Square.

On Sunday I shared a testimony of my faith at my other site placement, St. James's church in Porter Square. The piece took the form of what they call the "Living Epistle", a monthly testimony from different parishioners, which replaces the epistle reading for that week. I wanted to share that piece with you all, as well. Here is the full text, and here is a recording of it, as well.

Three years ago, I attended an interfaith vigil and rally for immigrant rights at the Suffolk County House of Corrections in Boston. There, I joined a small group of ministers and other people of faith in marching around the prison, signs and bullhorns in hand. We wove our way around to the back of the facility, to a part of the prison that had been shut down because it was considered unfit and unsafe for citizen prisoners. That area was being used as a detention center for Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

As we marched around the building, prisoners held up their hands to the windows, pressing their palms against the dirty glass.  In each new window we passed, hands would appear, palms turning white from the pressure. We circled around to the back of the building and climbed up onto the side of a highway overpass in order to see the immigrant detention center better. As we looked up, the immigrants who were being held in there began to stretch out their hands, too, pressing their palms against the windows. And then people started to make signs out of the few materials that were there, and hold them up to the windows for us to see on the outside, along with bright yellow t-shirts, emblazoned with the letters ICE across the chest—Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

Through the foggy, dirty windows I could see women and men gathered inside. Their faces indistinguishable from where we stood on the bleak highway overpass, huddled in our thick coats, with our signs:

Justice for Immigrants

Stop the Deportations

Keep Immigrant Families Together

Our thin voices pierced the heavy grey sky as we shouted and sang:

STOP THE DEPORTATIONS NOW!

Dona Nobis Pacem

I am still haunted by their captive hands

Hidden behind the thick somber walls

Of Empire, malice, indifference

In one of the prison windows a sign is painstakingly crafted from streamers of toilet paper—probably the only material they could access in there. The words form slowly as we stand there, singing: it says first just FREE, then FREE U, then FREE US.

As we all stretched our hands out towards them, and sang and shouted for justice and compassion, I felt almost as though for a split second, those big concrete walls came a-tumblin’ down, and that we were all free—Free You—Free Us--together for a moment--a moment of solidarity, of compassion, of recognition.

When I think about the lives we all lead, each in our own prisons of anxiety, fear, depression, poverty, poor health, loneliness and isolation, injustice, cruelty, I can’t imagine a more beautiful image of what God can do in our lives…God can free us, not alone, but together.

This is what God’s love can do for us. God’s love can fill our hearts, can free us from bondage, whether inflicted by others or by ourselves, or both. The Holy Spirit moves in mysterious ways, but especially through us as we live in holy solidarity with one another. As we respond to God’s call to be lights in this world, to liberate those who are imprisoned, we are facilitating the movement of the Holy Spirit—that mysterious force that releases captives and fills our hearts with love and our voices with song.

This is what I want most for the world. I want to liberate my own heart. I want my heart to beat with power and courage, that I might accompany my fellow human beings in bringing about healing and liberation in this broken and beautiful world.

It took me a long time to recognize how deeply personal this desire was. I am still discerning the complex contours of my interior landscape and the jagged edges of my life that make this plea for transformation so intimate. And that grappling, that emerging awareness of my own story within this narrative of social transformation is what makes my commitment to it that much more palpable, that much more grounded, that much more vulnerable.

The way I experience the Jesus story is that I see God walking with us, moving about in the muck and grime of daily human existence. For me, this story is about God’s presence in the ugly, in the quotidian, in the mundane, in the tragic—in the flesh. Jesus is called Emmanuel—God with us. The incarnation shows me that living as fully as possible into my complicated and messy humanity, into my fleshy, vulnerable body, is in fact the glory of God!

Jesus is called Emmanuel—God with us. God with us. How powerful that is for me. I want to know that I am not helpless, adrift in an unblinking universe. I want to know that God is indeed with me. I want to know that the captives will be released. That injustice and suffering will one day cease. I want so badly to see God’s face.  But sometimes the face of God is only refracted to me dimly through the tears I cry together with others, through the hands outstretched across cement walls and bars and highway overpasses. I feel God’s presence in the fragile hope and power of our witness as people of faith, as those who accept God’s call, to take seriously and boldly the task of healing ourselves and healing the world. That is what I most deeply desire of God. That is what I most deeply desire of myself. And I pray that this year in your midst, you will help me to do that work of transformation. In fact, I know you will.

Thank you, and Amen.

-------------------------------------------------

Related to the topics raised in my reflection, I also wanted to promote two upcoming events. 

This week is "National Welcoming Week": "a nationwide event that will promote meaningful connections and a spirit of unity between U.S. and foreign-born Americans by providing opportunities to learn about each other and work together for the greater good." More on the week's activities sponsored by the MIRA coalition in Massachusetts here. 

October 18-20 there is also a conference on mass incarceration, featuring Michelle Alexander, the author of The New Jim Crow. The conference is sponsored by Episcopal City Mission and the Boston Workers Alliance, among many other organizations. Lay leaders at St. James's are planning to attend, and are happy to sponsor registrations and give rides for students who are interested. For more information on that offer, contact me or Tom Tufts at thomastufts@comcast.net

"Who do you say that I am?"

This sermon was given by Kellogg Fellow Emily Garcia on the Sixteenth Sunday after Pentecost. Near the beginning of an Episcopal service, four pieces of the Bible are read aloud. In this case, the readings were: Isaiah 50:4-9a, Psalm 116:1-8, James 3:1-12, and Mark 8:27-38.

There’s a lot of speech in our readings today—a lot of spoken words, mostly between God and an individual. In Isaiah, God speaks to the prophet: “Morning by morning” he “wakens” Isaiah’s ear, to listen as those who are taught. Because of this, Isaiah knows “how to sustain/the weary with a word,” and is able to “set his face like flint” and not respond to those who humiliate him. His identity is in God’s words.

The Psalmist, though, finds his identity in the fact that God has heard his words: “I love the LORD because he has heard the voice of my supplication.” God hears and responds by helping the Psalmist, rescuing his feet from stumbling. Because God has heard him, the Psalmist can say confidently that he will walk in the presence of the Lord.

In James the focus is all on speech, but I think the crux of it comes when he says, “With [the tongue] we bless the Lord and Father, and with it we curse those who are made in the likeness of God. From the same mouth come blessing and cursing. My brothers and sisters, this ought not to be so.” The problem here is the hypocrisy of a Christian who uses words to establish a relationship with God, and then denies that very relationship in their words to other people.

I think “relationship” is the key word here. All of these readings are about the process of figuring out and building a relationship through speech.

In our reading from Mark, this process reaches a dramatic peak. Walking along with his disciples, Jesus asks, “Who do people say that I am?” He seems at first to just be gathering information, and they give him a survey of responses. Jesus then narrows the question; and here I imagine he’s stopped walking, and is standing in the dust, looking directly into the faces of his disciples. He asks, “Who do you say that I am?” The “you” is plural—he’s asking, “you all,” “each of you,” “Who do you say that I am?”

Only Peter responds, saying, “You are the Messiah.”

For us, this might not seem like so great a step. But remember, we have at our disposal all of the Gospels. For Peter and the disciples, this sudden statement moves the disciples’ attention from “human things” to “divine things.” It’s as if we’ve been watching a film of people walking, and the camera suddenly pans out to show us the entire landscape, fraught with forces previously unseen. “You are the Messiah.”

In asking his question, I don’t think Christ was looking to be affirmed, or to be crowned. I think he was helping Peter and the disciples figure out their relationship through speech and words. It was an invitation, an invitation to realize something true, and to come closer. I think it’s similar to how when I loved one says “I love you”, it invites us to respond with our own expression of love.

“Who do you say that I am?” asks Jesus. “You are the Messiah,” says Peter.

           

But when Christ then shows what these “divine things” will mean in stark human terms, Peter tells Christ to stop talking. He rebukes him! Peter knew the truth. He knew that Jesus was the Messiah, but—he did not know what this meant. He did not know what this would look like—for Jesus, or for himself, or his friends who followed Jesus.

Jesus picks up his first question again—“Who do you say that I am?”—and unfolds it into an invitation open to anyone : If he is the Messiah, then one should follow him, and to follow him means to deny oneself and to take up one’s cross, and in giving up our lives, we get our lives and our selves back, and we get them back more whole and more free than before.

Now, this doesn’t exactly solve Peter’s problem! He still doesn’t want Christ to suffer, he still doesn’t want him to die! He still doesn’t like the future Christ has laid out. Throughout the rest of the story, in fact, Peter will continue to resist and fumble and react to the ramifications of his confession.

However, even in this, Peter’s understanding of who Christ is guides his actions and reactions—even when he doesn’t know what’s happening. Jesus is his teacher and the Messiah, and this makes Peter devoted and loyal, a passionate partisan. Even though Peter doesn’t like what’s coming—even though he is confused by the future Jesus describes—he is pulled along by his relationship with Jesus, and by who Jesus was and is to him.

“Who do you say that I am?” Peter’s response seems to come straight from his heart—it leaps out—I imagine that when he said it, he even startled himself a little. When Christ asks him that question, we the readers are included in Christ’s direct and perhaps unsettling gaze. He is asking us, “Who do you say that I am?” But we are not physically standing in the dusty road with him; we are not physically drawn along with him. So what is it like for us to answer his question?

True, we have the Gospels at our disposal—not to mention the Nicene Creed, the Apostles’ Creed, the Eucharistic Prayers, the articles of religion, and the catechism, all found in that red Book of Common Prayer at your knees. We have also centuries of art—songs, paintings, stained glass, icons, poems, hymns—showing us how people respond to Christ’s question. But when Christ asks us—each of us—you and me—he wants to know what we say. He wants to know what answer our hearts leap to.

I’ve been asking myself, Who do I say that Jesus is? My thoughts and feelings have changed so much over the years, but now, I think I would echo the words of our Gospel hymn, and say that he is my resting place. And I would take the words of a favorite childhood hymn: Oh what a friend we have in Jesus, all our sins and griefs to bear. And I would take the words of the Jesus Prayer: Lord Jesus Christ, only Son of the Living God, have mercy on me, a sinner. This, now, is who I say Jesus is.

And now I find myself in Peter’s place, because even if I can say this, I don’t always know what this means in human terms. I can say with words, “You are my Lord. You are my friend,” but I don’t know what reply my life will give. I don’t know what’s happening tomorrow, I don’t know what’s happening next year—I don’t know exactly what my life will say to answer this question.

But this is fine. Because, like Peter, I can hope that my understanding of who Christ is will be strong enough to guide my actions, even as I am baffled and bewildered by my own life.

And since I am stubborn, and would rebuke even God if I have my mind set on what I think should happen—in the coming week, I need to pay special attention to today’s Collect: “O God, without you we are unable to please you. Mercifully grant that your Holy Spirit may in all things direct and rule our hearts, through Jesus Christ, our Lord.”

In Isaiah, God speaks to the prophet in early morning whispers. In the Psalm, God speaks with divine intervention. In the Gospel, God speaks directly to people, from a person fully divine and fully human.

We may not have the embodied Christ among us, but we are not left alone. We have Christ in our churches and friends, and Christ in our hearts, and Christ in the bread and wine we are about to share. And I trust that in these things, Christ is present, asking and answering questions, drawing us along with him.

Light of the World, by William Holman Hunt

Racist Jesus?

by Tiffany Curtis, ECH Micah Fellow
 
This past week’s lectionary reading from Mark tells the story of the Syrophoenician woman who approaches Jesus seeking healing, and of Jesus’ response to her. It is a difficult story. It portrays Jesus—the central figure of the Christian faith, the one called the Son of God—in a negative light. Not only does he deny the woman healing, but he negates her humanity by obliquely referring to her and her daughter as dogs. He shows a lack of respect and awareness for her that feels appalling, particularly unlike the Jesus we are taught to emulate. In fact, in the five or more times I encountered this story in worship this week, I found myself confronting a rather uncomfortable interpretation—that Jesus was racist. This might seem like a horrible and rather depressing conclusion, maybe even blasphemous to some sensibilities, but I want to share briefly why Jesus’ racist response to the Syrophoenician woman gives me some perhaps unexpected hope. 

In doing anti-oppression work I find it important to separate the personal from the structural, (while holding in tension the important cry of 20th century feminism that the personal is political.) In my experience around this work, I have found that too often folks who find themselves in positions of societal power feel uncomfortable talking about racism or classism or heterosexism, finding it difficult not to take the structural realities as a personal attack on their character. But I am not racist! I am nice! This story of Jesus’ encounter with the Syrophoenician woman is powerful precisely because it illustrates this difficult point. Of course I’m nice. Jesus was pretty nice, too. But we are all products of the social contexts in which we find ourselves, and the cultural oppressions that enmesh each and every one of us affect us deeply. They even affect the Son of God—a prophet, healer, and holy man, as he utters a racist response to a woman seeking his healing. 

Maybe this isn’t sounding too hopeful yet…even Jesus is racist?!  But what happens next in this passage is powerful. The Syrophoenician woman flips Jesus’ racist rhetoric on its head and talks back to him, claiming her agency from a marginal position as a woman and as a person of a different racial-ethnic group than this famous healer. And Jesus actually listens to her. He seemingly finds it in himself to practice holy listening, against the cultural ethos, and to hold the truth she professes. He heals her daughter and he affirms her publically.

A few lines down in the Mark passage, Jesus heals another man, commanding him to “be opened” (Ephphatha). This healing mirrors the way in which Jesus himself has just been opened by the bold woman he met in Tyre. Even Jesus had internalized the oppressive structures of his time, just as we all have and do: those of us who are in marginal groups, and those of us in groups of historical power, and those of us who find ourselves in complex constellations of both in different aspects of our identities. But like Jesus, we have the opportunity to radically encounter another human being, and to be moved to change. To be opened. To practice holy listening, which is open to self-transformation.

Engaging with one individual in an authentic dialogue may not alter longstanding structures that include and exclude, that invisibilize, that set norms and expectations, but it can radically change us. We can allow ourselves to be undone, to be seen, to see ourselves with more clarity, and that self-awareness and awareness of the other plants the seed for a broader societal transformation.

We don’t know the worlds of our fellow human beings. The struggles and traumas and joys and memories that mark each other’s lives are a mystery. Our histories are intertwined, but so irreducibly distinct. And yet, in a true encounter with another’s mystery a connection of hearts is possible. In the words of the anonymous Tamil poet called Cempulappeyanirar, who wrote in the time of Jesus:

What could my mother be
to yours? What kin is my father
to yours anyway? And how
Did you and I meet ever?
But in love
our hearts have mingled
as red earth and pouring rain.*

May our hearts mingle in love as we become opened, as we listen with holy presence, risking our vulnerabilities, exposing our lineages of pain and joy.


I should mention that I ran into a similar argument to this one on this blog. Please read here for a somewhat different, and longer, take on this same theme of Jesus’ racism in Mark’s account of the Syrophoenician woman.

*from the Tamil anthology “Kuruntokai”, translated by A.K. Ramanujan, in The Interior Landscape: Love Poems from a Classical Tamil Anthology (1994, Oxford University Press)

by Brother Robert Lentz

Our Micah Fellow Introduces Herself

Beginning this week, Tiffany Curtis will be writing a short reflection piece, taken from her experience in our community but intended for the wider ECH audience. An excerpt will be included in the newsletter, and the full piece will be posted here. We hope you'll enjoy this invitation to further reflection and prayer! 

Hello Everyone,
I wanted to take this opportunity to briefly introduce myself as the new Micah fellow at the Episcopal Chaplaincy!  If you want the official data on me, and haven't already, feel free to take a look at my bio on the ECH website.

On another level, I hope this space will provide an opportunity for you all to become acquainted with the issues that weigh on my heart throughout this year, and for dialogue about the intersection of spirituality and social engagement.

My position here as a Micah fellow is sponsored by the Life Together program of the Episcopal Diocese of Massachusetts. It is a 10-month fellowship rooted in the transformation of society and self through deep spiritual practice, intentional communal life, and social justice and community organizing work.

As such, my work this year will take a primary focus on connecting the Chaplaincy with opportunities for advocacy, outreach, and service. For me, this goes hand-in-hand with intentional spiritual work, and that is what makes the Life Together program so exciting for me.

This spot in the newsletter will reflect that connection, opening space around theological and practical considerations about what social engagement and transformation look like. I envision this as an opportunity for theological reflection, as well as sharing resources, ideas, and even information about upcoming events and opportunities for engagement. The general format will be a small piece in the newsletter, linked to a longer entry on the ECH blog, where there will be the option of, and invitation to, dialogue.

I would also be delighted to meet any and all of you, especially if you have ideas about ways you would like to engage this community in issues of justice, so please feel free to contact me and set up a time to meet in person or talk on the phone!

Thank you for reading, and I look forward to continuing the conversation!

Be well,
Tiffany