As though we matter to each other

Texts: Lamentations 2: 9-13; 2Timothy 1: 1-10

How perfectly fitting, it seems to me, that on this World Wide Communion Sunday we would hear, through scripture, those two voices in particular: the voice of despair, of desolation, and the voice of thanksgiving, of encouragement. Of course they aren’t the only voices we hear coming out of Christian communities and Christian people around the world today, but they are prominent voices. And to hear them, to lift them up, to attend to them …well, it is our work-- and not just our duty as members of the same family, but ultimately our strength, to care for one another, to honour and nurture our bond with one another.
That’s what this day is about … it is about appreciating this bond that is ours through the waters of our baptism … through our commitment to the way of Jesus. We may never have laid eyes on each other but we have been given to each other, in such a way that when one part of the body is hurting the whole body feels it; and so also with joy.

This morning we have these 2 bowls that, filled with water, will receive our prayer candles … our prayers of thanksgiving, our prayers of solidarity, our prayers that carry our pleading for help, for hope, for strength, for peace … our wordless prayers --our moaning, our groaning that refuses the refinement of words.

Today we affirm that bond within the whole Christian community … we affirm it perhaps most especially today through our prayers. We affirm that bond as though it was true, as though it’s real … as though we matter to each other --that it matters that we’re connected.

Prompted by that lament we heard in scripture, we take time this morning to call to mind and hold in prayer our companions in faith from Attawapiskat to Aleppo, from Pakistan to Palestine --those companions in faith who know in their bodies horrendous grief … the death of their babies, the crushing of their morale, the devastation of home, the cruelty of exile, the horrors of torture.

Through our prayer this morning, we touch into that well of sorrow, of weeping. We find each other there … we meet each other there …
we are present to each other there.

And prompted by that voice of encouragement we hear in Paul’s letter to young Timothy, we also take time this morning to call to mind and hold in prayer our companions in faith who have come alongside with guidance, with wisdom, with inspiration … those companions who have spoken right to our heart, who have lifted our spirit, raised our hope, deepened our trust, reminded us of those traces of grace we have known … those people who have helped us reconnect with that inner fire.

To experience that sense of life growing in us … re-igniting us; to come into that place where the horizon of what we thought possible is lifted; where a word spoken or an act of compassion heals us in some way, enlarges our life, calls us to some greater purpose … we know it when someone has been a conduit of God. Our heart is strangely warmed … or maybe there’s this welling up of tears -- tears of gladness, of gratitude, joy.

Though our prayers this morning we unite with those companions who have lent us courage and through whom our cup has overflowed.

Today we call upon that gift of our imagination -- that amazing capacity we have for transporting ourselves … in this case not for fantasy or fiction, but for another kind of transport. How, through the stories we’ve heard, the scenes we’ve witnessed, the encounters we’ve had, those people --through our mind’s eye-- are made present: we are present to them, they to us …
as through the mystery of the Spirit we are enabled to reach out to each other … extend our love to on another.

Through the gift of our imagination we call these people to mind today--
those people who have mentored us, strengthened us in our faith;
and those people who cry out in grief-- and we hold them in prayer.

So who are these people in particular?
Of course they are a great host of people … according to each of our awareness’s, and beyond!

This morning, for example I’m thinking of Arlette Zinck, the English prof at King’s University in Edmonton who made a connection with Omar Kadr when he was imprisoned at Guantanamo Bay. Arlette was among those who refused to believe there was no hope for Omar … for his life, his release. And so she began communicating with him by letter … not only tutoring him in English literature, but accompanying him through seasons of hopelessness which plunged her into times of great grief, only to be strengthened by Omar’s deep faith … his sense of the darkness as being those times in particular when we are called to be light.

This morning I’m giving thanks for Arlette Zinck, among others.

This morning I’m also praying for Abu wad … whose name means ‘father of flowers’ … and his young 13 year old son Ibram. Together they ran Aleppo’s last garden centre. Abu wad who poured his whole existence into nurturing and tending beauty -- such a believer in God’s gift of beauty, its power to nourish heart and soul. 5 years of war, the city around him in utter ruin … and here he is growing plants. Sometimes it’s people who come by from the hospital to buy flowers; or a young man who picks up some plants for the round-about near by -- “to make it beautiful,” he says, “so we don’t only see destruction but also construction.”

This year at the end of May, when intense bombing began again, a bomb landed near the garden centre and Abu wad was hit -- died instantly. The nursery is closed. So now there’s Ibram … this young boy, utterly bereft, lost, grieving deeply.

This morning I’m praying for Ibram and for his father, among others.

Who are these people you are holding in prayer today?

We’ll take some time in the silence now to call to mind those people so they can be brought into our communion celebration, in which, along with sharing in these gifts, we light candles, pouring out our hearts into the Healing Bowl of Prayers.