Watching 4

He is above all things,
and in all things,
and through all things,
and round about all things,
forever and ever.
(D&C 88:41)

Watching 3

I am the Lord your God
and will be with you
even to the end of the world
and through all eternity.
(D&C 132:49)

I am the same who leads you to all good.
(Ether 4:12)

Watching 2

O Lord,
according to their faith,
which is in you,
give them strength.
(1 Ne. 7:17)

Watching 1

He took with him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee.
He began to be sorrowful and very heavy.
He said to them:
My soul is extremely sorrowful,
to the point of death.
Stay here, and watch with me.
(Matt. 26:37-38)

When they came to the place call Calvary,
they crucified him . . .
And the women who followed him from Galilee,
stood at a distance, watching.
(Luke 23:33, 49)

Jesus—

You wanted people to watch with you at the end.
I am watching and praying, from a distance,
because apart from that—
and apart from letting them know that I am doing it—
there is nothing else I can do.

I pray that she will feel your presence accompanying her.
I pray that her pain will be controlled.
I pray that he will have the strength and discernment he needs.

Amen.

Taize service, November

I led the usual first-Friday Taize service this weekend. Here are the scriptural readings I rendered and the prayers I composed for the occasion. The service was oriented toward the feast of All Saints and therefore toward remembering all those who have served God.

Next month's service will fall in Advent. I'm working on preparing a service that will focus on Christ as the Son of Mary. Christ doesn't just drop out of heaven into the manger: he grows in a womb, he enters the world by way of a birth canal. In other words, Christ enters the world through Mary. I hope this won't prove too abstract a connection, but I want to create a service that will invite reflection on the people and communities through whom Christ enters our lives, and the ways in which God calls us to be instruments through whom Christ enters the lives of others—through whom Christ is born in the lives of others.

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PSALM 145

All your creatures give thanks to you, Holy One!
All your saints extol you!
They proclaim the glory of your reign
and tell of your power.

Your people make known to all your mighty deeds
and the splendor of your rule.
Your reign is everlasting,
and your dominion endures through all generations.

To all your promises, you are faithful, Holy One,
and all your deeds reveal your kindness.
You catch all who stumble;
you lift all who struggle under heavy loads.

All your creatures look to you
to feed them in due season.
You open your hand,
and their hunger is satisfied.

All your ways are just, Holy One;
all your deeds are done in love.
All who call to you from their hearts
will find you there beside them.

You hear the yearnings of all who worship you;
you hear their cries and take action.
For this I will praise you!
I will join with all your creatures in blessing your holy name forever!

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EPHESIANS 1:17-23

I pray that God,
by a spirit of wisdom and revelation,
will illuminate your heart
with a vision of the hope to which you are called—
a vision of the abounding glories
which God has promised to the saints.

May you glimpse the immeasurable greatness
of the power with which God works on our behalf!
It is the same power
by which Christ was raised from the dead
and elevated to sit at God’s right hand,
far above every other authority on earth or in heaven.

For our sake,
God has placed Christ above all things.
Christ is the head; we are the body.
Christ fills all—and we are that fullness.

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LUKE 6:20-23, 27-28

Jesus said:

To be poor is a blessing—
you have God’s kingdom for your inheritance!

To be hungry now is a blessing—
later you will eat your fill!

To grieve now is a blessing—
later you will laugh for joy!

It is a blessing to be hated,
excluded, reviled, or defamed
for the sake of the Promised One.
Be glad when that happens! . . .
They used to treat the prophets the same way.

But listen:
Love your enemies.
Do good to those who hate you.
Bless those who curse you.
Pray for those who mistreat you.

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PRAYERS

Holy One, we praise you for all your saints—
for all those in whom your righteousness shines.

For all who provide care to others—we praise you.
For all who speak and work for justice—we praise you.
For all who promote peace and break down walls of separation—we praise you.
For all who teach words of life and proclaim good news—we praise you.
For all who provide models of prayer and contemplation—we praise you.
For all who labor in tedious or thankless causes for good—we praise you.
For all who have been instruments of your love in our lives—we praise you.

For the grace to serve you in compassion, courage, and power,
we pray to you, Christ our God.

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CONCLUDING PRAYER

Christ our light,
your grace shines
in holy lives and holy labors;
and as far as the light reaches,
the flame of your love
is kindled in human hearts.

Protesting Packer's comments

LGBT Community to Protest Packer's Speech
HRC to Mormon Apostle: Your Statements Are Inaccurate and Dangerous

This certainly isn't the first time that people have protested LDS statements or actions around homosexuality. (I participated in one myself some years back when I lived in Salt Lake, joining other mostly silent protesters standing outside Temple Square during General Conference.) But with the caveat that what I'm about to say reflects perceptions that need to be corroborated by research, the rapidly organized protests in response to Packer's General Conference address strike me as representing something new in the history of the Mormon politics of homosexuality. For one thing, I can't think of a situation where people organized so quickly in response to a specific address. For another, I can't recall off the top of my head a time when a national organization like the HRC weighed in on a LDS sermon.

Here's an adaptation of a familiar parable (D&C 101:81-84; cf. Luke 18:1-5) that reflects, at the moment, my feeling about these protests:

There was in a certain city a small group of self-selected, middle-aged to elderly religious leaders who were highly confident that they understood God's will regarding same-sex relationships. They were men who feared only God and had no regard for the contrary opinions of mere mortals.

There was in that same city a number of people—some gay or lesbian, some straight—who were dismayed by what they saw as the insensitivity and prejudice of the religious leaders' pronouncements.

At first they wrote private letters to the religious leaders, courteously and deferentially worded, expressing their dismay and sharing personal stories of pain and heartache that they hoped might move the leaders to empathy.

Then they began to voice their heartache and dismay more publicly at quiet events such as vigils—still avoiding anything that might be construed as an attack on the religious leaders.

Then they wrote petitions calling for reconciliation and healing, and delivered them to church headquarters, carrying carnations and singing hymns about loving one another. The religious leaders didn't read the petitions, of course, but they sent public relations officers to meet the petitioners at the door, smiling politely for the news cameras.

Then the petitioners organized loud, angry protests outside church headquarters and enlisted the help of national LGBT organizations to publicly criticize the religious leaders' statements.

The most stubbornly pious of the religious leaders still didn't give a fig about critics. But some of their colleagues began to murmur, "Doctrine is doctrine; but all this bad p.r. is getting wearisome." And they began to think that it might be a good idea to back off the subject for a while.

Taize service, October

I organized the customary first-Friday service, held two days ago. We had cello and flute accompaniment, in addition to the guitar. These were the scriptural readings.

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PSALM 126

When the Lord delivered us from captivity,
it seemed like a dream.
Then was our mouth filled with laughter;
on our lips there were songs.

Foreigners said:
“What marvels their God has worked for them!”
What marvels the Lord worked for us indeed!
For this, we were glad.

Deliver us, Lord, from our captivity
like streams rushing forth into a dry land.
Those who now sow their fields in tears
will sing when they reap the harvest.

They go out, they go out, full of tears,
carrying seed for the sowing.
They come back, they come back, full of song,
carrying their sheaves.

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1 CORINTHIANS 13:1-8, 13

If I speak in tongues—even the language of angels—
but I do not have love,
my speaking is nothing more than noise.

If I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries,
and have faith powerful enough to move mountains,
but I do not have love,
I am nothing.

If I give away all my possessions—
if I hand over my very body to be martyred—
but I do not have love,
I gain nothing.

Love is patient; love is kind.
Love is not envious, or boastful, or arrogant, or rude.
Love does not insist on its own way.
Love is not irritable or resentful.
Love takes no pleasure in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth.

Love bears all things, believes all things,
hopes all things, endures all things.

Love never ends.
Prophecies? They will come to an end.
Tongues? They will cease.
Knowledge? It will pass away.
But faith, hope, and love—these three go on forever,
and the greatest of the three is love.

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JOHN 1:1-5

In the beginning was the Word,
and the Word was with God,
and the Word was God.

The Word was in the beginning with God.
All things came into being through the Word—
without the Word, not one thing came into being.

In the Word, life came into being—
life and light for all people.
The light shines in the darkness,
and the darkness could not overcome it.