News from the Congregation July 10, 2020
Adapting to COVID-19; The Roller Coaster of 2020; Cathedral Reopens for Private Prayer, Sunday Bible Study - Genesis, 11:00 am Worship Service, Adult Formation Class - Eucharist; Digital Church Survey, YESS Bible Study, Reading Group - Doomsday Dreams, Compline, Musical Mediation, Using Realm for Online Giving
From Canon Lee
Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks, the former Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth, has a perceptive observation about Moses in the wilderness.
In Numbers 11, which I referenced a few weeks ago, the Israelite people complain to Moses that they are hungry. They remember how much "better" their lives were back in Egypt (though they were slaves), when they had "the cucumbers, the melons, the leeks, the onions, and the garlic" to eat. These complaints drive Moses to despair. He asks God to kill him at once.
What is puzzling about Moses' reaction, however, is that in an earlier moment when the Israelites complained of hunger in the desert, back in Exodus 16, Moses had not despaired. He simply helped the people receive the manna that God provided.
Borrowing from the work of Ronald Heiftez and Marty Linsky at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard, Rabbi Sacks realized the following:
"[O]n the first occasion, Moses was faced with a technical challenge: the people needed food. On the second occasion he was faced with an adaptive challenge. The problem was no longer the food but the people. They had begun the second half of their journey, from Sinai to the Promised Land. They had escaped from slavery; they now needed to develop the strength and self confidence necessary to fight battles and create a free society. They were the problem. They had to change. That, I now learned, was what made adaptive leadership so difficult."
Starting in mid-March, we have found technical solutions to the technical problem of recreating our church community on digital platforms. In my opinion (though I admit I am biased) we have done one of the finest jobs of any Episcopal church in the country.
With the recent bad news about COVID-19, however, we now confront an adaptive problem. What happens if we are truly unable to return to life as we knew it before the pandemic? How do we cope with that unwanted reality?
There is no straightforward answer or technical solution. That is what makes this problem so difficult. It may even feel as though our only choice is to cry out to God in despair.
Actually, that may be a good place to start. Such a cry of despair is a way to acknowledge, and grieve, everything that we are losing because of the pandemic. We need to acknowledge, and grieve, the death of a former way of life.
Such acknowledgment is not hopeless. For like Job, we have been given a glimpse of a deeper truth:
For I know that my Redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth: And though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God.
The Rev. Canon Steven Lee
Canon Pastor and Vicar
THIS SUNDAY, JULY 12
(To access each program on Zoom, click the link in the title.)
10:00 AM - In the Beginning: A Study of Genesis
Crises test our faith and help us see what is essential in our church life, such as reading the Bible in community. Join the Vicar for a study of the first book of the Bible. Discover Genesis, not as a collection of ancient mythological stories, but as the Word of God addressing our fundamental and deepest needs.
11:00 AM - Congregation Watch Party for Cathedral Worship Service
Watch the Cathedral worship service on Zoom with other members of the Congregation.
You can also watch the Cathedral Worship Service
On Facebook: http://facebook.com/StJohnDivineNYC
On the Cathedral website: http://www.stjohndivine.org
12:00 PM - Digital Coffee Half-Hour
Join us at this week’s Coffee Hour hosted by the Congregation’s Seniors’ Group, OPUS (Older People Up to Something)
12:30 PM - Adult Formation Class
Join Sub-Dean Malloy for the third class in a series on the Eucharist.
DIGITAL CHURCH SURVEY
Thank you to everyone who filled out the survey last week! Your answers will help ensure that the ministry being offered is sustainable and inclusive. There is still time to fill out the survey, which is just four short pages and should take about five to ten minutes. Click here to be heard.
WEEKLY CATHEDRAL CONGREGATION PROGRAMS
Tuesdays | 6:00 PM - YESS Bible Study
This Wednesday | 7:00 PM - Congregation Reading Group
Author and scholar Eleanor Heartney will join the Reading Groip on July 15th to discuss her most recent book, Doomsday Dreams: The Apocalyptic Imagination in Contemporary Art (Silver Hollow Press, 2019).
Apocalypse is hardwired into our heads. It is always just around the corner, inflaming our imaginations with the seductive dread of total annihilation. Doomsday Dreams reveals how contemporary art can help us understand the obsessive hold of Apocalypse on nearly every aspect of life today.
Eleanor Heartney is an author and scholar who has been exploring the relationships between art, religion, politics and society for over thirty-five years. You can read an excerpt of Doomsday Dreams that appeared in Art in America.
Wednesdays | 8:30 PM - Congregation Compline
Reminder: you can find a directory of weekly programs with links to each program’s Zoom by clicking here.
NEWS FROM THE CATHEDRAL
The Cathedral building will open daily for prayer, meditation, and private reflection beginning this Tuesday, July 14 from 7:30 am – 1 pm. Visitors will be able to enter through the main entrance on Amsterdam and the 6 door, accessible from the northern driveway, will also be open for ramp access. Masks, health screenings, and physical distancing are required for all who enter the Cathedral. Public restrooms in the Cathedral will remain closed for the time being.
On Monday, July 13, the Cathedral will again partner with the New York Blood Center for a blood drive. More information, including a link to make a required appointment for donating, is on the Cathedral website.
STEWARDSHIP
The Diocese recently announced that it is ending its E-Pledge Program on September 30, which means that anyone currently using this option to give will need to switch over to Realm by clicking here. For help setting this up, check out this video tutorial or email vestry@saintsaviour.org.
MUSICAL MEDITATION
Click here for a link to a performance of Florence Price's Sonata in E Minor, Andante by a member of our Congregation, Susan Sobolewski. Below you can find an accompanying reflection on the piece by Susan.
Of late, in many artistic spheres, there has been a deliberate effort to bring to the global audience voices that might not have been given a proper hearing in their own time. The composer whose work you will hear me play in this edition is one such voice. Florence Price, an African-American woman, was born in 1887 in Little Rock, Arkansas, and had a career as a pianist, organist, teacher, and composer, that spanned nearly fifty years.* Her biggest claim to fame, prior to this latter day reexamination of her prolific output was that she was the first African-American woman whose symphonic work was performed by a major symphony orchestra—the Chicago Symphony Orchestra.
The work you will hear in this edition comes from the Sonata in E Minor for piano, which like her Symphony in E Minor, won top honors at the 1932 Rodman Wanamaker Musical Contest. The second movement of the Sonata, marked Andante, typifies Ms. Price’s hymn-like melodic writing. Her harmonic language and musical syntax are conservative—especially at a time when long strides in Western Classical style had been taken toward atonality, serialism, aleatoric music, to name a few of the trendier avant garde techniques in fashion. Her adherence to a tried and tested form—the rondo form—also hearkens back to the Classical period. The main ‘tune’ is featured three times (all in the original key), in between which there are two contrasting episodes. These, too, are woven around melodies that spin and meander at their own pace—unhurriedly, peaceful, possibly prayerful. After the last climactic statement of the original theme, there is a short ‘coda’ or last rendering of the tune fragment. One can slowly exhale.
*A thoughtful background piece on Ms. Price by music critic Alex Ross appeared in the February 5, 2018 edition of the New Yorker
**You may hear some birdsong in the distance. While I cannot claim credit for inviting the collaboration, I am delighted to have been joined by those unknown voices.
From Marsha and Tim
The Roller Coaster ride of 2020
Roller Coaster…. I was on a real roller coaster once—just once. My boyfriend of the time (we were seniors in high school) loved it and bought another ticket as soon as the car returned to the starting point. I, on the other hand, was appalled. I couldn’t understand the joy he felt at the thrill of suddenly barreling down the artificial hill at what seemed like 100 miles an hour. Thrills? Chills? No, thank you!!!! These days, it seems I am on a roller coaster once again with all my friends, and I can’t avoid the ups and downs simply by not buying another ticket. Just as our little car climbs to the top of the hill--whoosh, bam, we are hurtling down to another low point of bad news.
For example, a few weeks ago the Congregation participated with Cathedral clergy and staff in a moving Black Lives Matter prayer vigil, litany, and protest march. Four bed sheets were spray painted with the words “Black Lives Matter” and “I Can’t Breathe.” This was accomplished by members of YESS with the help of the Dean and Sub-Dean. The sheets were then attached to the front of the Cathedral as a witness to our support for the newly energized civil rights movement. A litany service led by our Vicar attracted a thousand people. Our little car was at the top of the hill! A few weeks later we saw a video of a white couple, undoubtedly racists, tearing the sheets down and walking off with them. Whoosh! Bam!
New York City and State seemed to have made great progress in stemming the tide of coronavirus. The infection rate has become very low and a slow re-opening has begun. We are at the top of the hill, Yea! Then the virus spreads with alarming speed to other states. The death rate soars. Whoosh! Bam! We currently make up an island of relative health surrounded by an ocean of sickness. How long can that sickness be kept at bay? How long will people in our City be willing to wear masks, keep physical distance, wash hands? Pictures of groups of cavorting young men on Fire Island last week suggest that we are at serious risk of being overcome once again by a wave of disease. Whoosh. Bam.
Two days ago, I saw a message from a young woman who was a member of our community for several years and is now a graduate student in theology at Yale where all classes are conducted remotely. She is on a student visa and is threatened with deportation back to China if her classes are only offered remotely. The country is in a serious recession with a very high unemployment rate. People are frustrated and hungry. It is impossible for many to pay their rent. Violence spreads. The President stokes racism and seems to want to re-fight the Civil War.
We cannot avoid or look away from the pain, the insecurity, the evil. It is right there behind and before us. I personally believe our assignment is to keep our eyes open and to pray without ceasing. In the spirit of being “repairers of the breach” we must do what we can. Pray alone, pray together, take advantage of all the virtual church to bring us closer to God while supporting one another. Get politically active. VOTE! Use our resources to feed the hungry and clothe the naked. To quote the hymn,
“Lord, whose love through humble service bore the weight of human need,
Who upon the cross forsaken, offered mercy’s perfect deed,
We, your servants bring the worship not of voice alone but heart,
consecrating to your purpose every gift that you impart.
Blessings from your wardens!
Marsha and Tim