The Right Reverend John Bryson Chane
Bishop of Washington

June 9 , 2007

Bishop Chane's Diaconal Ordinations Sermon: Washington National Cathedral

On June 9, Bishop John Bryson Chane ordained Timothy Boggs, Jan Cope, Virginia Gerbasi, Michelle Hagans, Nancy Hildebrand, Thomas Murphy, Cynthia Simpson, Emily Stribling and Luther Zeigler to the diaconate. His sermon is reprinted below.

It was almost 35 years ago to the day that I sat in the pew of a church in Massachusetts with two other deacons-to-be, dressed in amice/alb, preparing for my ordination to the diaconate. The preacher was my bishop, The Right Reverend John Melville Burgess. John and I had an interesting relationship. I had chosen to go to a seminary that he did not approve of. He was not happy that I had chosen to go to New Haven for my seminary studies. And yet he relented and let me go.

In those ancient days before Commissions on Ministry, bishops exerted a huge influence on the life of seminarians. A bishop could exercise his right to say no to a postulant's choice of seminary. A bishop also could exercise his right to say to a single student that he could not be marry until after finishing seminary based on the assumption that marriage could interfere with one's full time commitment to seminary study. Marriage it was believed could be a distraction to the rigors of academic life. In those ancient days in Massachusetts, there was no such institution as the GOE's (General Ordination Exams) but rather after the completion of the junior year, a seminarian was examined by diocesan examining chaplains in the areas of Old and New Testament, Church History and Patristics. It was grueling in that the examining chaplains were drawn from the faculty of Episcopal Divinity School and Harvard Divinity. If a seminarian failed in just one area of examination, he was released from his postulancy and forced to withdraw from seminary. He could not re-apply. Their journey toward ordination was terminated! I had entered seminary with seven other postulants, and there were only three of us left in 1972 to be ordained deacon. It was an unforgiving and tough process!

I was ordained to the diaconate at a time when the country was engaged in the divisive and failed war in Vietnam. The country was divided, the church was divided, and the country was experiencing the fall out from race riots, the assassinations of Bobby Kennedy and Martin Luther King and the killing of four Kent State University students by the Ohio National Guard. Our cities had burned, and our confidence as a nation was shaken to its very core. Bishop Burgess had admonished me on several occasions about my getting arrested in anti-war demonstrations with this advice: "The world had done well without you for the past 22 years and it will be do well without you for your next three years in seminary. If I see you on television again, or hear that you have been arrested one more time, I will have no other option but to remove you from the ordination process. You cannot engage the world and seek to change it from the institutional Church's point of view unless you have your degree and are ordained."

I heeded the advice of Bishop Burgess and lived my politics and passion for justice carefully veiled but still very active. I renounced my membership in the Students for a Democratic Society, joined the Episcopal Peace Fellowship, and spent summers in New Haven in the Hill District working quietly with the Black Panther Party in their summer feeding programs for children and the Panthers' free health care clinic on Dixwell Avenue, serving the most disadvantaged part of New Haven. It was during this time that I became acquainted with the Rev. William Sloan Coffin, then chaplain of Yale University who became a life long friend until his recent death. It was Bill who instilled in me a passion for the possible and who said that charity is cheap and justice is priceless!

Karen and I had been married for three years and were raising our sons Christopher and Ian, who had been born on May Day of 1972, just a few weeks before graduation and my first call as a curate in a large parish in the Diocese of Newark.

As I sat in the front pew preparing to hear Bishop Burgess preach in 1972, I felt that I had achieved something of greatness. Against all odds, I had worked hard, holding several jobs outside of seminary, with Karen working as well, and by God, we had finally "made it." I was on my way. And then Bishop Burgess began his sermon by reading from the Gospel of John, Chapter 15:16: "You did not choose me, but I chose you. And I appointed you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last so that the Father will give you whatever you ask him in my name. I am giving you these commands so that you may love one another."

It was at that moment that I realized that I had not done anything at all. The power of Jesus Christ in my life, a power I had too often denied had empowered me to be used by an all loving God to start and then finish my academic journey and was now present in the process of ordination to the diaconate. The empowerment was to continue to serve Christ and his people in ways unknown and yet still empowered by the faith that wherever I was called to serve the church, I could say with confidence; "Here I am Lord, send me." As Bishop Burgess continued his sermon, I began to weep, for it was then that the theology I had studied in the classroom had finally become a reality in my life. I realized that it was the power of the Holy Spirit, working through me that had made my academic journey possible and certainly not me. And it was on that day of my ordination to the diaconate that the Holy Spirit was empowering me, not to do my will, but the will of the one who was sending me. This morning we will once again call upon the Holy Spirit to touch each of your hearts, to empower you to be open to God's call to serve his people in the name of Jesus Christ, wherever that call might take you.

A whole lot has changed since my ordination to the diaconate in 1972. Today as an ordained person you will be entering a whole new church and world. Once again, another generation is embroiled in a war thousands of miles away, but this time it is in Iraq. The Middle East is a seething caldron of hate generated by extreme levels of violence. Religion has become the fault line in much of this unrest and indiscriminant violence. This fault line too often is co-joined by genocide, poverty, hopelessness, hunger, illiteracy, disease and a sense of the humiliation of a whole group of people most of whom speak Arabic. Our country is still attempting to recover from the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and the crash of a hi-jacked airliner in Pennsylvania. We have yet to come to terms with our mourning and loss. And so our nation's leadership has placed in the hearts and minds of its citizenry a paralyzing culture of fear.

Contributing to the marginalization of human life and the paralyzing fear of terrorism is the painful truth that half of the Globe's population lives on less than $2.00 a day. We live in the richest and most powerful county in the world, yet poverty among the very young and the elderly has grown in the United States since 2000. If the Body of Christ, the Church, does not step up to meet the challenges that are before you and me, the United Nations Development Program states that without significant debt relief, and without increased financial and human services support to Africa, 5.1 million African children will die in 2015. That is more than the 4.8 million who die each year now, and in the name of those children, we must take seriously the Millennium Development Goals. Half of all deaths among children under 5 occur in Sub-Saharan Africa, while globally half of the annual 11 million child deaths that occur are the result of pneumonia, diarrhea, malaria, tuberculosis, measles and AIDS, all of which are preventable or containable with currently available technology and medicines. This is a moral crisis that you who are newly ordained today must address with the congregations and people you will serve. Our nation and our faith communities have the resources, the authority and the leadership skills and influence to make a difference. In the name of God, let us stop talking about making a difference and let's make a difference. The march of globalization has yet to find a moral center. Help discover that center and then act upon it!

My brothers and sisters be uncompromising in your ministry as deacons to embrace justice rather than just simply doing works of charity for the sake of charity. Too often the world sees you and me as members of a charitable church, not a church that bravely speaks out and acts, seeking and then living into justice for all God's children. Charitable work is usually non-controversial. Seeking justice for God's sake and for the uplifting of all God's people will always been controversial. Be controversial! Jesus as God's son centered his ministry on caring for the poor, the disenfranchised and marginalized. Jesus challenged the political structures of his day because he was far more intent on spreading the Kingdom of God, than in and supporting the oppressive kingdoms of the secular realm.

During the Examination this morning you are called as deacons to follow Jesus Christ, and to serve God through the power of the Holy Spirit. This morning your ordination calls you as deacons to a very special ministry; a ministry of servanhood directly under the leadership of your bishop. You are called in the name of Jesus Christ to serve ALL people, PARTICULARLY the poor, the weak, the sick and the lonely. Remember who you have been called to serve, and remember in whose name you will do this ministry. This is no easy task given that you and I live in a society defined by affluence and privilege, and ordained in a church that struggles with who shall be included and who will have equal access to the sacraments. Too often it seems as if the Anglican Communion is more concerned about defining the false Gods of a limiting orthodoxy rather than claiming the living God that we know through the kerygmatic teachings of Jesus Christ.

As we celebrate this day on the feast of Saint Columba, and the missionary outreach and conversions attributed to him and the Iona Community, remember that before you were formed in the womb, God knew you and consecrated you for the great mission that is before you. And as you celebrate this day on the feast of Saint Columba, you are joining the likes of Stephan, a man full of faith and the Holy Spirit, Philip, Prochorus, Nancor, Timon, Parmenas and Nicolaus the proselyte of Antioch, who when hands were laid on their heads went out and literally changed the world and grew the church, making disciples in the name of Jesus. Imitate their ancient passion and make new disciples in Christ's name.

I close with some bits of advice shared from me your bishop that I hope you will take to heart.

The world with all of its comforts and the church with its desire too often to be all things to all people can distill a tempting brew to drink. Let Judas and Peter be reminders of your own human frailty as a human being that can tempt you to believe in your own infallibility, your own self importance and your complicity in becoming what others would want you to become, rather than what God would want you to be.

Although each of you is being ordained as a transitional deacon, remember that you will forever be a servant of Jesus Christ in the one, Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church. You will be making vows and promises this morning that are expected to be kept through thick and thin until you enter the new Jerusalem. Unfortunately these vows have come to mean very little to some within the Episcopal Church and the Anglican Communion. Always remember this day and keep well the vows you have made to the Church universal.

Remember that the authority granted to you as a servant of Jesus Christ does not come from finely crafted liturgies or by a vote of those who have called you to serve the church. But the authority vested in you is a gift given by the Holy Spirit. It is transmitted through the ancient right of the laying on of hands by a bishop. The celebration of the ordination of a deacon is a celebration of the ministry of the whole church, its laity and clergy and is NOT a celebration or elevation to a higher status of ministry within the Church.

In your journey as a deacon, you will always be guided by the Holy Spirit. Never forget that! Spend time regularly communing with the spirit of Christ through the exercise of deep, uninterrupted prayer, reflective silence and the constant study of Holy Scripture and theology in the knowledge that you are not the one who defines the journey. You will always be a "learner" or "postulant." When you stop praying and are too distracted or busy to continue learning, your spiritual journey will become as dry as a waterless and parched well. Teach all who you come in contact with during your ministry that it is the breath of the Holy Spirit that fills the sails of the church not the wind from your sermons.

Let me be clear. The authority given you to do the work you have been called to do as a deacon is not given to you by my presence here this morning, or for that matter by the ordination certificate you will soon receive. The authority that you have been given is through the breath of the Holy Spirit and is granted and confirmed by the people who have called you to minister to them. Do not use this authority as a wedge against those who have placed their trust in you, and do not exercise this authority for personal gain.

If your family, spouse or partner is not a central part of your life and ministry, then your servanthood ministry will be a failure. You are to be a wholesome example for the people you have been called to serve and that example must be initiated within the life of your own home.

Remember that when parishioners disagree with you, and become angry or combatative, it is not necessarily something to take personally. Often people exercise their anger and discomfort and direct it to the ordained office that you hold, and not to you as a person. The day that you believe that your identity is defined solely by your ordained position as deacon is the day that you will be in great danger.

Be a faithful colleague to your brothers and sisters in Holy Orders and share in the broad councils of the church. It is too easy to become insulated by the busyness of life in the parish. Such busyness too often breeds arrogance. It is a failure of your ordination vows not to extend your vision and participation in the life and work of the diocese, the larger Church and the global Communion. Today the global Communion is a close to you and your parish or school as your next door neighbor. To live an insular life and only engage in the life of your local ministry at the parish or school level is to demean the spreading of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. It builds walls that can separate you from your colleagues and your bishop.

Be clear in knowing what your special gifts and personal liabilities are. You cannot be all things to all people. Be a truth teller in all things and be a wise enough pastoral counselor to recognize when you have reached your limitations and when it is appropriate to pass on pastoral concerns and responsibilities to others who are more professionally trained.

Be less concerned about your future and career as an ordained person and remember yours is a vocation, and not a job! The future will take care of itself. Saint Matthew was clear about this when he said; "do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Let the days own trouble be sufficient for the day."

Take time to step away from your ministry and reconnect with the freedom of being one of God's own children away from the Church. By that I mean take time to be away from your office. Separate yourself from your identity as a deacon and live into your humanity with your spouse or partner, your children if you have them, and those others beyond the community that you serve. Take time to rest and break away for vacation.

With all of your heart, try never to return evil for evil and in conversation never demean another simply because they disagree with you.

Always remember the people who made it possible for you to enter the journey of the ordained ministry. Remember in prayers of thanksgiving your parents, other clergy, professors, your sustaining and sponsoring parish, your immediate family and all who placed great faith in you. They are part of the reason why you are here this morning.

Guard your health. Exercise and care for your body as much as you do for your soul. What you are entering into as an ordained person will be challenging spiritually, emotionally and intellectually. It can also take a toll on your body. Take care of your body with as much intention as you do for your soul.

John Wayne is dead and Superman is simply fiction. You cannot fix all the broken parts of the world, let alone the congregation and the broken lives that will walk through your front door of your office. Be a healer and not an enabler.

Continue your education and be sure that you get as much training as you can in conflict management, pastoral care, organizational development skills, church growth strategies and self care.

When the opportunity presents itself to participate in CREDO, jump at the chance. For those who receive the invitation to participate, it is a great opportunity for growth and reflection. It helps put things in perspective and allows you to spend time with sisters and brothers who are on the same journey.

Be an exceptionally good listener. Listening is a lost art in the Church today and being able to respond with compassion and respect to those who disagree with you is equally lost. You are called to love God's people and that means loving even those who present themselves to you as unlovable.

Be a person of great courage. Jesus always reminded his disciples not to be afraid. The times that you will be living in as an ordained person in the parish or larger Church will be times of great challenge. Believe me when I say that often your personal integrity, your courage and your commitment to the core teachings of Jesus Christ will be taxed by those who want the Church to be non-controversial. Be courageous in your preaching, your pronouncements and your actions, and remember that in all things Christ will always be with you even in the darkness of the day.

Continue to work hard on your preaching and teaching skills and to communicate the Gospel of Jesus Christ in ways that strengthen and empower the people you have been called to serve. I have always told my brothers and sisters it is so much easier to preach at the Washington National Cathedral before a packed congregation of almost 4000 souls than it is to spend the morning with a small congregation in rural Southern Maryland with 15 or 20 people, most of whom could care less about eschatology, exegesis, parousia, or when exactly did Jesus become God. They mostly could care less about the controversies within the Anglican Communion or the Episcopal Church, but none the less they are seeking wholeness in their lives and a better understanding of how God relates to the daily challenges of their earthly journey.

Be a good steward in giving not only yourself but also your time, talent and treasure. People will follow you as a leader if you ARE a leader and your leadership is defined by giving in all three areas.

And remember above everything else, that to be a deacon in the Episcopal Church and to be serving in a congregation or as a chaplain is truly an honor and a privilege, and prayers of thanksgiving need to be offered every day for this special God given gift. Use it wisely to the honor and glory of God and for the spreading of the Kingdom in Jesus name.

And finally always remember this…Jesus asked his disciples not to worship him, but to follow him.

AMEN

The Right Reverend John Bryson Chane D.D.
Bishop of Washington
Diaconal Ordinations, June 9, 2007