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One Tiny Lady, One Big Consortium of Endowed Episcopal Parishes 2019
Thank you St James for sending me to represent our congregation in Boston at the Consortium of Endowed Episcopal Parishes (CEEP). I enjoyed every minute of this very big experience. In the next few weeks I will be sharing what informed me - from the nuts and bolts of church administration to the dynamics of equity reparation from all I attended, networked, workshopped, power-lunched, power-dinnered, small-grouped, plenary-grouped.
I wore that tote bag out collecting vendor information. For now, this article is about what transformed me.
After all of that wonderful, complicated, practical, bonding, erudite, intellectually stimulating, #woke work it was time for Holy Eucharist in the immense space of Trinity Church, Copley Square.
I was prepared for the magnitude of the event. I sat in the very last row which made the altar seem far away and very small. The long procession included a vast choir prepared to sing magnificent Ralph Vaughan Williams service music. The Rt. Rev. Carlye Hughes, newly consecrated Bishop of Newark, entered with a cool factor larger than life. “Wow!”-I exhaled. After her entrance, entered someone I was NOT prepared for. “Whoa!” - I inhaled. “Is that her??”
I elbowed my brother Luke who nodded with understanding. It was The Rt. Rev. Barbara Harris, the first woman elected bishop in the Episcopal Church. This week marks the 30th anniversary of her consecration. She is 88 years of age. And she is the living breathing representative of the good news of God in Christ as yearned for and described in all that wonderful, complicated, practical, bonding, erudite, intellectually stimulating, #woke work that makes people visit Boston in February to learn nuts and bolts of church administration as well as the dynamics of equity reparation.
I began to weep.
Moments before, I had stepped into the church with a heart and mind crowded with wonderful, complicated, practical, bonding, erudite, intellectually stimulating, #woke work. From that jumble I had smugly concluded that as flawed as the church is, I would rather be part of it’s awkward clumsy compassion than sit it out safely. I had wanted to part of something larger than life. But when I saw Barbara I felt changed. I wanted to be as tiny as she is.
My heart was broken with gratitude to belong to a movement so mysterious and weird and rare that it creates community for even cynical hardened critics like me to the appreciate seeing a woman who is the symbol of a life lived faithfully. I never even met Bishop Harris or read her memoir. I only have vague memories of how important her consecration was in 1989 when I was a self-engrossed college student.
The sheer smaller-than-life vulnerability of her presence in the midst of so much big stuff was what took me heart and soul to the gospel, to the cross, and to the broken bread. Tears washed away my condescension to the church’s flaws. What I was left with is gratitude that I get to be part of a faith community to which she belongs and which she leads and she raises up other leaders. Small and strong her voice engraved this blessing in my ears:
In this season of new light,
May you live and love as a child of the Light,
Aglow with the knowledge that you are God’s belove.
And may the blessing of God -
Creator, Christ, and Holy Spirit -
Be upon you and remain with you forever. Amen.
