January 17, 2010
Second Sunday after the Epiphany
John 2:1-11
Holy Trinity Parish, Decatur, Georgia
The Reverend Allan Sandlin, associate rector
Let us dream God’s dream, glimpsed on the mountain,
first by the one King, then King again;
a dream deferred now, waiting the fountain
where justice rolls down and praise ascends.
It’s a funny thing. I’ve been dreaming a lot this week. Maybe I was already thinking about the last verse of the hymn we’ve just sung or maybe Dr. King’s most famous speech took up residence in my dreams.
And I dreamed of Haiti—but they weren’t earthquake dreams. It was the Haiti I knew from a visit there 15 years ago and the dream was full of friends and colors, full of homes, schools and churches we visited that today lie in ruins.
Martin Luther King dreamed of the beloved community, a community made up of people of every race, class and nation. He believed with all his heart that "We are tied together in the single garment of destiny, caught in an inescapable network of mutuality."
An inescapable network of mutuality. I wonder about that this morning as we mourn with our sisters and brothers in Haiti. We watch and wait and listen with them, as the search for missing family and friends continues; as others try to find places to bury the dead while living in cars and on the streets because the buildings that still stand are simply not safe to enter.
If we are paying attention, we can feel, palpably, that “inescapable network of mutuality” pulling us all together.
Here are a few images, memories and impressions of the Haiti I knew in 1995.
Before the earthquake, in the capital city of the poorest country in the Western hemisphere, Port-au-Prince was painted with big, bright splotches of color. Artists and would-be-artists painted big, brave, bold pictures on sidewalks and walls, on buildings and inside churches and schools, anywhere they could find an empty, flat surface. Pictures of birds and flowers, pictures of people with hats and huge, wide smiles, full of life, full of joy.
It was Sunday morning and we jumped on a tap-tap, one of the colorful, rickety Haitian buses, and rode up into the hills outside of Leogane. Five priests, one a native Haitian and four of us, Americans, stood at the altar of St. Etienne’s Episcopal Church in Buteau to celebrate the Holy Eucharist.
The place was packed to overflowing and it was very hot. But the church was built on a hillside and the turquoise painted cinder blocks had space between them to allow an occasional breeze to float through. The faces and the voices of the people were full of joy, full of hope somehow and oh how they sang. We used the French translation of the Book of Common Prayer and they dutifully said the responses in Haiti’s official language, even as we listened to a sermon in Creole and said a few prayers in English.
Outside, children drew letters and pictures in the dust that covered our car and were more than cooperative posing for photographs. I look at those slides today and wonder how they could smile so generously when they had so little. So little food, so little education, so little shelter, so little of everything. And that was before the earthquake.
The images from Haiti this week have been heart-rending and deeply disturbing, beyond belief.
If ever there was a moment when we needed to remember that we belong to a beloved community, that moment is now.
We are part of a beloved community, mindful of the myriad ways we are connected with the people of Haiti, where there are 83,000 Episcopalians worshipping in over 100 congregations. In addition, Haiti has around 200 Episcopal schools for 6,000 students. As you may have heard, the Episcopal Diocese of Haiti is the largest diocese in the Episcopal Church and it is growing.
If names help connect us, we are part of a beloved community because the Episcopal Cathedral in Port-au-Prince is called St. Trinité, Holy Trinity, and the school that lies in ruins this morning is called Holy Trinity School.
We are part of a beloved community because our rector, Bill Deneke, and friends like Ed Buckley and Damian Reeder, who have travelled to Haiti, representing us, keeping watch over the wells your dollars have helped build, wells that provide clean water for people dying of thirst.
On their trip last month, they were part of a team that secured the release from prison of a man held for months for stealing a loaf of bread to feed his children.
We are part of that beloved community, that “inescapable network of mutuality.”
In the 62nd chapter of the book of Isaiah, we have heard this shout:
For Zion’s sake I will not keep silent, and for Jerusalem’s sake I will not rest,
Until her vindication shines out like the dawn, and her salvation like a burning torch.
Isaiah, the prophet, promises to keep talking, keep preaching; he promises that nothing will make him sit down and shut up until God does what God has promised to do: restore Jerusalem and give Jerusalem a new name. No longer will Jerusalem be called desolate and forsaken. God will change her name and everyone in the whole world will know that she is the apple of God’s eye, delightful and pleasing.
Isaiah thus stands at the gate, banging on the door, insisting that God pay attention, that God remember the beloved city and restore the health and welfare of all the people. That’s Isaiah’s vision for the restoration of God’s people, Israel.
What vision, what hope can we have for Haiti today?
We can trust that God is paying attention, that God will remember the people, the beloved, in the city of Port au Prince and the surrounding towns and countryside.
Did you hear that President Obama invited two of his predecessors to the White House yesterday for a meeting about the crisis in Haiti? President Clinton and President Bush subsequently wrote an excellent piece for the NY Times. They are pointing toward the future, God’s future for Haiti.
They wrote: We should never forget the damage done and the lives lost, but we have a chance to do things better than we once did; be a better neighbor than we once were; and help the Haitian people realize their dream for a stronger, more secure nation.
And in order for there to be hope tomorrow, we can send money today, along with our prayers.
At the end of the service this morning (During the announcements this morning), Fr. Deneke will come and share his plan for what we can do at Holy Trinity.
But the question of the future hangs in the air this morning. How can Haiti recover from this cataclysmic disaster?
Bob Herbert, writing in his column yesterday, had this to say:
“Enslavement, murderous colonial oppression, invasions by powerful foreign armies, grotesque homegrown tyrants, natural disasters — all you have to do is wait a while in Haiti for the next catastrophe to strike. On Tuesday, it was an earthquake that crushed the capital city of Port-au-Prince and much of its surroundings and raised the level of suffering and death to heights that defied comprehension…
Just when you think the ultimate has happened, the absolute worst, something even more dire, comes along.
And yet.
No matter how overwhelming the tragedy, how bleak the outlook, no matter what malevolent forces the fates see fit to hurl at this tiny, beleaguered, mountainous, sun-splashed portion of the planet, there is no quit in the Haitian people.
They rose up against the French and defeated the forces of Napoleon to become the only nation to grow out of a slave revolt. They rose up against the despotic Jean-Claude (Baby Doc) Duvalier and sent him packing. Despite ruthless exploitation by more powerful nations, including the United States, and many long years of crippling civil strife, corruption, terror and chronic poverty, the Haitian people have endured.
They will not be defeated by this earthquake.” he concludes.
On Friday afternoon, I had an email from Tracy Bruce, a priest friend of mine who has been working in Haiti for 20 years. She writes about the hope and the courage of the Haitian people…
I have been particularly touched by the singing in procession in Champs de Mars, the large plaza in Port au Prince. They were characterized by CNN reporters as a spiritual people maintaining their faith and hope in the midst of despair. It reminded me of my first visit to Haiti 20 years ago, working with people living in the absolute middle of paradox and celebrating.
These beautiful people know something of celebration in the midst of great suffering!
Today, we open our arms and our hearts to enlarge our beloved community, to remember with thanks the life of the Rev. Martin Luther King, to mourn with our sisters and brothers in Haiti.
In the future, we can redouble our efforts to help build more wells, to rebuild schools and churches, to rebuild roads, to help with reforestation projects. We can send teachers and doctors and engineers to work as partners with the Haitian people.
We can work together, sing, teach, plant trees and learn from the people of Haiti the lessons they have to teach us about hope, about courage, about faith.
Let us pray.
God of the living and the dead, we wail in grief at the pain and loss and horror and distress of our brothers and sisters in Haiti.
We do not understand your ways –that those who already suffer the most,
now suffer so much more.
Where people are still breathing under collapsed buildings, give them air and hope and courageous searchers.
Where children are injured or orphaned, find them trusted friends and generous caregivers.
Where despair is infectious and disease or looting spreads, bring patience and forbearance and healing and strength to conquer temptation.
And when others look with compassion from afar, release resources, empower expertise, shape political will, and bring deliverance for your people in their distress.
Through him who was crushed and bruised for us, in the comfort of your Holy Spirit. Amen. (Prayer written by Sam Well, Dean of Duke Chapel)
One of the personal connections that draws me into a beloved community with the people of Haiti is music. I have friends in that country with whom it’s been my privilege to make music both here and there.
So when I discovered a new hymn about Haiti a couple of days ago, I knew we had to sing it this morning. Presbyterian pastor and songwriter, Carolyn Winfrey Gillette, was inspired to write a hymn for Haiti this past week. In an interview on Thursday, she said “I wrote this hymn as a way of providing a prayer that could be sung in worship, so people could express their sadness and grief at this disaster, as well as their faith in God and a commitment to serve God in the midst of tragedy," Gillette says. "The things we believe, that we sing about on Sunday mornings, need to be related to the things we see and experience in the world around us," Gillette says.
In Haiti, There is Anguish
In Haiti, there is anguish that seems too much to bear;
A land so used to sorrow now knows even more despair.
From city streets, the cries of grief rise up to hills above;
In all the sorrow, pain and death, where are you, God of love?
A woman sifts through rubble, a man has lost his home,
A hungry, orphaned toddler sobs, for she is now alone.
Where are you, Lord, when thousands die, the rich, the poorest poor?
Were you the very first to cry for all that is no more?
O God, you love your children; you hear each lifted prayer!
May all who suffer in that land know you are present there.
In moments of compassion shown, in simple acts of grace,
May those in pain find healing balm, and know your love’s embrace.
Where are you in the anguish? Lord, may we hear anew
That anywhere your world cries out, you’re there-- and suffering, too.
And may we see, in others’ pain, the cross we’re called to bear;
Send out your church in Jesus’ name to pray, to serve, to share.
Tune: Frederick Charles Maker, 1881
Text: Copyright 2010 by Carolyn Winfrey Gillette. All rights reserved.
Permission is given for use by those who support Church World Service
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