You raised me to your cheek

Grace Nair (née Mary “Grace” Modale Pothen; d. 11 October 2018 at 4:25PM EST) and grandson Jayan Koshy (né Jayan Nair)

Grace Nair (née Mary “Grace” Modale Pothen; d. 11 October 2018 at 4:25PM EST) and grandson Jayan Koshy (né Jayan Nair)

“When Israel was a child, I loved him,

and out of Egypt I called my son.

The more I called them,

the more they went from me;

they kept sacrificing to the Baals,

and offering incense to idols.

Yet it was I who taught Ephraim to walk,

I took them up in my arms;

but they did not know that I healed them.

I led them with cords of human kindness,

with bands of love.

I was to them like those

who lift infants to their cheeks.

I bent down to them and fed them.”

— Hosea 11:1-4 NRSV

Spiritual disciplines and the Work

We've been on vacation in Toronto for the last week. It's been a much-needed break from the stress of my work recently—exhausting in its own way, but still salutary. This past Sunday we went to Mass at a small Anglo-Catholic parish called St. Stephen-in-the-Fields. It's in Kensington Market, a neighborhood of Toronto that's known for its... eccentricity. It has a similar feel to Christiania in Denmark: hippy shops, bizarre art installations, and open drug use (mostly cannabis, but not exclusively). It's lower income than the Toronto average and can feel a bit rough around the edges.

In the moment of the beautiful

I've been reading David Bentley Hart. Partly because of my Ortho-curiosity (to borrow a term from a @paige_smith_ on Twitter) and partly because Benji's brother highly recommended him. Despite being fairly well read in Neo-Calvinist theology, my literacy of broader conversations in Christian theology is... lacking. So I'm slowly working through Hart's work, and this bit in the introduction to The Beauty of the Infinite stuck out to me:

Loving rubble - Friday, Proper 7, Year 2 (oops)

I forgot today was a feast day until I had already prayed Matins and Twitter reminded me that today we commemorate Ss. Peter & Paul. Normally I try to be meticulous about observing the feasts of those saints who are most important to me. But getting out of bed this morning was a real struggle, and I was on auto-pilot (and honestly lucky I even mustered the willpower for Morning Prayer). So I read the "wrong" lessons.

A Collect for Pride

This past weekend was Twin Cities Pride. On Sunday, St. Mark's Episcopal Cathedral, the co-cathedral in our diocese, held a special Evensong service in the evening after the parade. Significant enough, but made all the more significant by the cathedral's position on the southern edge of Loring Park where the Pride festival sprawled into the streets. The cathedral's doors swung open welcoming queers of every flavour in from the heat to worship and be nourished.

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Race & anti-sacraments

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I’ve spent much of the afternoon pondering a Broderick’s suggestion that Black people—and I think more specifically, Black bodies—are anti-sacramental in the white imagination. Much to the chagrin of my boss, who caught me staring off into space. It is, to use Broderick’s word, an enthralling thought. And his suggestion came just after I listened to an episode of The Liturgists Podcast that played with the idea of sacramentality beyond the 7 recognized sacraments.

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dangerous unselfishness

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"Let us develop a kind of dangerous unselfishness. One day a man came to Jesus, and he wanted to raise some questions about some vital matters of life. At points he wanted to trick Jesus, and show him that he knew a little more than Jesus knew and throw him off base....

Now that question could have easily ended up in a philosophical and theological debate. But Jesus immediately pulled that question from mid-air, and placed it on a dangerous curve between Jerusalem and Jericho. And he talked about a certain man, who fell among thieves. You remember that a Levite and a priest passed by on the other side. They didn't stop to help him. And finally a man of another race came by. He got down from his beast, decided not to be compassionate by proxy. But he got down with him, administered first aid, and helped the man in need. Jesus ended up saying, this was the good man, this was the great man, because he had the capacity to project the "I" into the "thou," and to be concerned about his brother."

— The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.