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Shema Yisreal multi-media art by Laddie John Dill
Hear,
O Israel: The Lord is our God, the Lord alone. You shall love the Lord your
God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might. Keep these words that I am
commanding you today in your heart. Recite
them to your children and talk about them when you are at home and when you are
away, when you lie down and when you rise. Bind them as a sign on your hand, fix them as an emblem on
your forehead, and write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.
Deuteronomy
6:4-9 (NRSV)
This
is (part 1 of 3 parts) of the Shema. It is the first piece of the Torah that a
child learns in the Jewish tradition, and it is one of two prayers that is
specifically commanded to be recited each day, in the morning and the evening.
It
is a prayer- part of our Holy Scriptures- that I have loved for a long, long
time.
The
Shema calls us to community and makes
us accountable as bearers of tradition: When I was a young adult, I began a
career in Christian Formation, and this prayer was my credo. The Shema directs us to teach our children
about God in every instance in which God’s glory is revealed…. to keep the
mystery and grace of God before us at all times.
And
the Shema is a deeply personal
prayer. It invites us to love God with all that we have- our
heart, our souls, our bodies, our minds.
The
evangelists knew the Shema and, in
the Christian tradition, it remained as the core of The Way:
Jesus said, “The first in importance is, ‘Listen, Israel: The
Lord your God is one; so love the Lord God with all your passion and prayer and
intelligence and energy.’ And here is the second: ‘Love others as well as you
love yourself.’ There is no other commandment that ranks with these.”
Mark 12:30-31 The Message (MSG)
Eugene
Peterson’s take on the Shema in his
paraphrase of the Bible (The Message) offers a different way to understand our
total commitment to loving God. I like
his words, “passion, prayer, intelligence and energy.” That’s how I want to
live with and love God- with everything I’ve got.
I’ve been moved this
week by two specific initiatives that invite our passion, prayer, intelligence
and energy. These are invitations that
ask us to focus on two specific issues that are vital in building God’s Kingdom
of justice, mercy and peace. I commend
them to you for prayer and engagement.
1. ENDING RACISM
Following
is a letter from The Most Rev. Katharine Jefferts Schori and House of Deputies
President Gay Jennings inviting us, in the Episcopal Church to dedicate our
prayer and worship on Sunday September 6, 2015 to ending racism. Our own UBE chapter in The Episcopal Diocese
of Central Pennsylvania will be hosting a service at St. Paul’s (Harrisburg) on
Sunday that
will include the commemoration of the life and legacy of our notable saint, the
Reverend Alexander Crummell. Canon
Annette L. Buchanan, National President of UBE and Bishop Baxter will be
preaching and celebrating.
Other congregations in our diocese are asked to participate in
End Racism Sunday and to lift this essential justice issue up in prayer.
The text of the letter from the Presiding Bishop and the
President of the House of Deputies follows:
September 1, 2015
Dear Sisters and Brothers in Christ:
On June 17, nine members of Mother
Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, South Carolina, were murdered by a white
racist during their weekly bible study. Just a few days later at General
Convention in Salt Lake City, we committed ourselves to stand in solidarity
with the AME Church as they respond with acts of forgiveness, reconciliation,
and justice (Resolution A032).
Now our sisters and brothers in the African Methodist Episcopal
(AME) Church have asked us to make that solidarity visible by participating in
"Confession, Repentance, and Commitment to End Racism
Sunday" on Sunday, September 6. We ask all Episcopal
congregations to join this ecumenical effort with prayer and action.
"Racism will not end with the passage of legislation alone;
it will also require a change of heart and thinking," writes AME Bishop
Reginald T. Jackson. "This is an effort which the faith community must
lead, and be the conscience of the nation. We will call upon every church,
temple, mosque and faith communion to make their worship service on this Sunday
a time to confess and repent for the sin and evil of racism, this includes
ignoring, tolerating and accepting racism, and to make a commitment to end
racism by the example of our lives and actions."
The Episcopal Church, along with many ecumenical partners, will
stand in solidarity with the AME Church this week in Washington D.C. at the
"Liberty and Justice for All" event, which includes worship at Wesley
AME Zion Church and various advocacy events.
Racial reconciliation through prayer, teaching, engagement and
action is a top priority of the Episcopal Church in the upcoming triennium.
Participating in "Confession, Repentance, and Commitment to End Racism
Sunday" on September 6 is just one way that we Episcopalians can undertake
this essential work. Our history as a church includes atrocities for which we
must repent, saints who show us the way toward the realm of God, and structures
that bear witness to unjust centuries of the evils of white privilege, systemic
racism, and oppression that are not yet consigned to history. We are grateful
for the companionship of the AME Church and other partners as we wrestle with
our need to repent and be reconciled to one another and to the communities we
serve.
"The Church understands and affirms that the call to pray
and act for racial reconciliation is integral to our witness to the Gospel of
Jesus Christ and to our living into the demands of our Baptismal
Covenant," reads Resolution C019 of the 78th General
Convention. May God bless us and forgive us as we pray and act with our
partners this week and in the years to come. In the words of the prophet Isaiah
appointed for Sunday, may we see the day when "waters shall break forth in
the wilderness, and streams in the desert; the burning sand shall become a
pool, and the thirsty ground springs of water."
Faithfully,
The Most Rev. Katharine Jefferts Schori
Presiding Bishop and Primate of The Episcopal Church
The Rev. Gay Clark Jennings
President, House of Deputies of The Episcopal Church
2. ENDING GUN VIOLENCE
A second invitation came to me this week in the form of an
on-line mini-course being offered on Church Next. This internet resource will feature 4 short
lectures by Episcopal bishops Eugene Sutton (MD) and Ian Douglas (CT) and will
offer opportunities for cyber-dialogue and reflection. Bishops Sutton and Douglas are leaders in the
Bishops Against Gun Violence (www.bishopsagainstgunviolence.org)
and their talks are titled
The
Unholy Trinity (Sutton), Violence and the Bible (Sutton), A Theology for
Challenging Gun Violence (Douglas) and Christian Responsibility (Douglas).
In publicity materials for this free course, Bishop Sutton says,
“This course is not about repealing
the Second Amendment. It’s about examining the roots, causes, reality, and our
response to our increasingly violent and tragic age, and offering ways for
Christians to take action.”
I know that in my Christian walk, I have been searching for a
way to respond beyond my own prayers to this epidemic of violence and the
tragedy of senseless deaths that increase week by week- sometimes day by day- in
our country. While I was in Salt Lake
City at our General Convention I was proud to march with many of our own
deputies and thousands of others against gun violence and I intend to join the
Bishops Against Gun Violence once I am consecrated. I hope that this invitation to enroll in the
Church Next lecture series will serve to engage others- in body, mind and
spirit- in this important social justice issue.
To find out how to register for the class, use this link:
I thank God every day for the gift of a strong body, an active
mind and a passion that could only be the Holy Spirit inside of me, drawing me
to action.
I pray that we might, together, use our bodies, minds and
spirits to praise God, as the Shema calls us, and to be agents of God’s transforming
love.
Love in Christ,
Audrey
P.S. Here are some additional resources for Ending Racism:
Liturgical Resources
The AME Church has developed prayers for use on Sunday, September 6
(ECCT editor's note: the litany by Bishop Adam J. Richardson,
referenced in the linked document, may be found here)
The ELCA has developed liturgical resources for
"End Racism Sunday." (click on the Liturgy
tab).
These collects from the Book of Common Prayer may also be
appropriate for use:
Almighty God, who created us in your image: Grant us grace
fearlessly to contend against evil and to make no peace with oppression; and,
that we may reverently use our freedom, help us to employ it in the maintenance
of justice in our communities and among the nations, to the glory of your holy
Name; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy
Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.
O God, the Father of all, whose Son commanded us to love our
enemies: Lead them and us from prejudice to truth: deliver them and us from
hatred, cruelty, and revenge; and in your good time enable us all to stand
reconciled before you, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
Grant, O God, that your holy and life-giving Spirit may so move
every human heart [and especially the hearts of the people of this land], that
barriers which divide us may crumble, suspicions disappear, and hatreds cease;
that our divisions being healed, we may live in justice and peace; through
Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
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