Easter 2 - Year C

The anniversary of the Parish Pilgrimage of 2009 - and where were we this time last year, the second Sunday of Easter? Beautiful and special to recall, we were travelling from Edinburgh to the Holy Island, Lindesfarne, where we spent the Sunday night. Our "Journey Journal" reflection for that day - and the Sundays were prepared by parishioner Joy Lancaster - included the stirring prayer...page 19.

Lord, open my eyes to catch the truth of the resurrection splendour:
In human courage
In love
In painful acceptance of uncertainty
In the joyous living of today
In the shadow of death
In lives touched by your hand
Transformed and turned triumphantly to face the light
The stone rolled away
The tomb empty
Life ahead, beginning now:
Lord, give me the courage to reach out and take it. Amen.

And so our Easter week concluded; a week that began in worship in our home parish, with travel Easter Day to Glasgow and then onto Iona Island where a group of six of us joined the four-day "Easter Experience" program offered by the Iona Abbey. The whole venture had begun with the wish to go to Iona, becoming "let us go to Iona". For each of us, there are particular and individual stand out moments - and for all of us, particular shared moments. Of the latter, the pilgrimage around the Island on Easter Tuesday would have to stand out, singing different Alleluia's wherever we stopped, and following the text of Luke's account of Easter Day and the Road to Emmaus story. Further shared-of-grace experiences were the worship times in the beautiful Abbey, including the coming together in a candle lit Eucharist the night before we left, and then the beautiful Morning Prayer service on our departure morning, with our very own Hugh singing Highland Cathedral in the Abbey. We look forward to hearing it again during communion today.

The four Sundays of Easter on pilgrimage were indeed very special - our own parish church of Grovely, Lindesfarne church, Bath Abbey and Westminster Abbey. All uniquely different; all with the potential to be life-changing experiences if we indeed were open to that potential. For surely that is what pilgrimage is, for every person, no matter where we are physically. It is in our openness to "what could happen" and our willingness to ask Jesus Christ himself to be part of it. Christian pilgrimage is thus journeying with Christ, asking Christ to show the way, lead the way, and be with us on the way.

David Adam writes:
There are two Irish sayings that I like: ‘It is not by your feet alone you can come to God.' And, ‘Your feet will bring you to where your heart is.' Travel for the sake of it can often help you to avoid being a pilgrim. To fill your eyes and your mind with new places and new experiences will not benefit you unless the heart is touched. (from "The Road of Life").

Unless your heart is touched. Every day is a new day of place and experience if we are open to our heart being touched ... our restless hearts are seeking all the time, in our different ways, the truth of God. For Thomas, of our Gospel story today, his way of seeking was to see - and surely that has to be at the heart of all our searching. We need to know, we need to see.

And what did Thomas need to see? What did he need to believe? What would wounds of hands and side of Christ prove in the sighting? Remember, this is the Thomas who three days before had said to Christ at the last supper.... "Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?" And Jesus' simple yet life-profound response... "I am the way, and the truth and the life."

Thomas thought he needed to see and touch; he thought the journey of life, as pilgrim with Christ, was about that. But when Christ stood before him, Thomas did not touch him. He did not need to; his heart was touched, his soul was stirred and Thomas' need for God was met, his prayer was answered and in great love and response of heart, Thomas proclaims the words that began the movement of Christianity that began the church, called then The Way.... "My Lord and my God!".

It is when we proclaim those words, each of us, in our hearts and in community, that we claim the relationship God craves for with us. It is more than acknowledgement, it is indeed the declaration that will shape completely the way we will live our lives. Because for each of us, as we travel life in each circumstance, whether of joy or sorrow, whether of struggle or accomplishment, we need to be able to claim over and over... "My Lord and my God!".

Teilhard de Chardin wrote, in Le Milieu Divin (1975):
God who made man that he might seek him - God whom we try to comprehend by the groping of our lives - that self-same God is as pervasive and perceptible as the atmosphere in which we are bathed. He encompasses us on all sides, like the world itself. What prevents you then, from enfolding him in your arms? Only one thing: your inability to see him.

Our inability is the same as Thomas' - we think we need to see Jesus Christ in the way the world demands; that is, proof of glory in the same language and image the world already works with . For Thomas, and I hope for ourselves, we realise in the resurrection truth that the seeing of Christ is knowing he is with us. When Christ stood before Thomas, Thomas realised in the response of his heart that Jesus had never left him, or the others, and in that relationship, and only in that relationship, is the way, the truth and the life of living the Jesus Christ way.

It is almost incomprehensible, and even ridiculous many would say, that the Jesus Christ movement, The Way as it was first called, begins and is driven by people's, our, heart/soul response to his Word. But, when you think it through, to live the different, radical way Christ calls also needs a different, radical framework to get there.

I find the way Brian McLaren describes this as very challenging: in his book "Everything must change: when the world's biggest problems and Jesus' good news collide" he writes: page. 129......
If this world is indeed the creation of a good, holy, compassionate, wise, and just God, and if it has been conquered and occupied by this destructive, unholy, merciless, tyrannical, stupid, and devious system that we are calling the suicide machine, then Jesus came to launch an insurgency to overthrow that occupying regime. Its goal is to resist the occupation, liberate the planet, and retrain and restore humanity to its original vocation and potential. This renewed humanity can return to its role as caretakers of creation and one another so the planet and all it contains can be restored to the healthy and fruitful harmony that God desires.

He then goes onto say how the way this is to be done is also radical - and McLaren's language of insurgency is all of the heart:
But this insurgency can never use the weapons of the occupying regime; otherwise, it simply becomes another manifestation of it. So it is a merciful insurgency, a wisdom insurgency, a hope insurgency, a generous insurgency, a courage insurgency, a compassion insurgency, a faith insurgency, a peace insurgency.

A peace insurgency. When Jesus met his disciples post-resurrection and said "Peace be with you" he was not inviting his followers, or assuring them, of a quiet, non-disruptive life. Quite the opposite - it is an invitation to share an insurgent movement of disruption and discomfort. But Jesus knows we must each do that in our own integrity, in our own listening and in our own response to his word. And so he gives us the gift of many journey paths, of many ways of seeking restfulness in our restlessness.

We therefore each pilgrimage differently with Jesus the Christ. The church should be, and needs to be, a respect of that difference, a manifestation of honouring all journeys made in his name. We of this community are seeking all the time to explore those expressions so that we can not only seek our own form of spirituality, but also learn about and respect others. This week we begin a series of those expressions that we have entitled "Gracious times". We are indeed beginning with a session called "Seeking spirituality" in which we will explore the journey to travel with integrity our own spiritual framework. In two weeks time the community is invited to travel a pre-Pentecost small group experience, of three sessions, as we share and learn together the action of God as Spirit in our lives, and the life of the world. Father St John is preparing what promises to be an exciting, revelationary series that has at its heart that we together know much more than we think we do about these things. In other words, there are no pre-requisites for such small group times, just that mustard seed of faith and an openness to explore scripture and self with others.

That sounds like pilgrimage to me. We begin with our knowing of Christ's place in the scheme of things - ‘My Lord and my God!' and we continue a journey of restlessness and restfulness with him.
My Lord and my God!
Christ has risen! He is risen indeed!