Dear Friends,

One of the blessings of the Sacred Ground program that we have begun this fall is that it is inviting us to behold, acknowledge, and critically evaluate some of the attitudes and ideals that have been “hardwired” into our American DNA.  One of them is our dogged sense of independence, and the ethos of “rugged individualism” that motivated the growth of our country. 

Words like “self-sufficiency” and “autonomy” have held such positive, powerful valence in our self-understanding.  We think it is the life we prefer, going it alone, making our own private choices; our “sweet solitude” becoming isolation. We tend to place great value on being independent and free. Jesus, not so much.

In our gospel reading for this Sunday, Jesus tells of a rich man who has everything he wants and more. He dresses in purple and fine linen and feasts sumptuously every day. He has learned not to notice a poor man at his gate. Dressed in rags, longing for food and friendship, his body covered with sores, he is attended to only by the dogs who come to lick him. Both men die, that great leveler, and the scales fall away from the rich man’s eyes. From a distance, he sees his poor neighbor Lazarus now being held and soothed by Abraham in heaven. Even now the rich man wonders not about his earlier blindness or his callous treatment of Lazarus, but how Lazarus might serve him in his own distress. “Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue; for I am in agony in these flames.”

But a great chasm lies between them, too wide now to be crossed. Such is the hazard, and the bondage, of sustained separation, the depletion of our souls when we widen the zones of comfort around us and stay blind to each other’s need. Our independence ends up strangling us, cutting off the unifying breath of the life and silencing our solidarity. Every choice we make - where we live and shop and with whom we align ourselves, whether we speak up or turn and walk away - either widens or reduces the chasm between us. What we are able to see is determined by what we are striving to be. The places we go, or refuse to go; the words we use, or refuse to use; the actions we take, or choose not to take; these shape the state of our soul.

As I reflect upon all that we do together here at St. John’s, from celebrating homecomings and kicking off new programs like Sacred Ground, to hosting memorial services for those who we love but see no longer, I am reminded of one very important thing. Whether or not anyone walks beside us, we do not journey alone. Moment by moment, choice by choice, we build or bring down bridges of connection. We strengthen the bondage of our separation, or we set each other free.  Like me, I hope that you will lean into the latter in a world that is sorely in need of communal love.

In Christ,

Amelie+