LIVING STONES AND MOTHERS’ MILK
Worship for the dispersed community of Denman Island United Church
May 10 2020
Fifth Sunday of Easter and Christian Family Sunday (Mother’s Day)
Rev. Elaine Julian
Gathering and Centering
More Voices #21:
Open our hearts, open our minds,
Open our lives to you, O loving God,
Open our hearts.
Take a moment in silence to open your hearts to God, feeling the presence of the Divine in and around you and reaching out across distance and time.
Opening Prayer
We come as one family:
Seeking your presence, celebrating our faith, supporting one another, walking together through change and separation.
Be with us all today.
Make us all aware of your never-ending love and care. Amen.
1 Peter 2:2-10 New Revised Standard Version (NRSV)
2 Like newborn infants, long for the pure, spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow into salvation— 3 if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good.
4 Come to him, a living stone, though rejected by mortals yet chosen and precious in God’s sight, and 5 like living stones, let yourselves be built[a] into a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. 6 For it stands in scripture:
“See, I am laying in Zion a stone,
a cornerstone chosen and precious;
and whoever believes in him[b] will not be put to shame.”
7 To you then who believe, he is precious; but for those who do not believe,
“The stone that the builders rejected
has become the very head of the corner,”
8 and
“A stone that makes them stumble,
and a rock that makes them fall.”
They stumble because they disobey the word, as they were destined to do.
9 But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people,[c] in order that you may proclaim the mighty acts of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.
10 Once you were not a people,
but now you are God’s people;
once you had not received mercy,
but now you have received mercy.
“The Grammar of Animacy” by Robin Wall Kimmerer in “Braiding Sweetgrass”
To whom does our language extend the grammar of animacy? Naturally, plants and animals are animate…in Potawatomi…, rocks are animate, as are mountains and water and fire and places. Beings that are imbued with spirit, our sacred medicines, our songs, drums and even stories are all animate…of apple, we must say “Who is that being?” And reply Mshimin yawe. Apple that being is.
Yawe – the animate to be…To speak of those possessed with life and spirit we must say yawe. By what linguistic confluence do Yahweh of the Old Testament and yawe of the New World both fall from the mouths of the reverent? Isn’t this just what it means, to be, to have the breath of life within, to be the offspring of Creation? …
The animacy of the world is something we already know, but the language of animacy teeters on extinction – not just for Native peoples, but for everyone. Our toddlers speak of plants and animals as if they were people, extending to them self and intention and compassion – until we teach them not to. We quickly retrain them and make them forget. When we tell them that the tree is not a who, but an it, we make that maple an object; we put a barrier between us…If a maple is an it, we can take up the chain saw. If a maple is a her, we think twice.
Reflection
I have been spending quite a bit of time lately with the astounding book “Braiding Sweetgrass”. It is full of juicy passages like the quote above, in which the author links her scientific knowledge and her indigenous knowledge of the land so that her readers experience the world around them in a new way that is both embodied and intensely spiritual.
Language is so central to how we experience and live in the world. The “beingness” and sacredness of all Creation is also reflected in the passage from the first letter of Peter:
4 Come to him, a living stone, though rejected by mortals yet chosen and precious in God’s sight, and 5 like living stones, let yourselves be built[a] into a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. 6 For it stands in scripture:
“See, I am laying in Zion a stone,
a cornerstone chosen and precious;
Question for Reflection:Imagine Robin Wall Kimmerer and Peter in conversation. What meeting of the minds might happen around the idea of “living stone”?
On this Sunday that is traditionally celebrated as Mother’s Day, I am also drawn to the first sentence in the 1 Peter passage:
2 Like newborn infants, long for the pure, spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow into salvation— 3 if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good.
4 Come to him, a living stone,
Like babies who need spiritual nourishment, we are drawn to Jesus, the living stone, the nourishing mother. In our longing and in our satisfaction, we taste the essential richness and protection of God’s love. God’s good Creation, our Mother Earth, shelters and feeds us. Our mothering God knows exactly what we need and gives it to us in lavish abundance.
Voices United #280:
Mother and God, to you we sing;
Wide is your womb, warm is your wing.
In you we live,
Move and are fed sweet, flowing milk, life giving bread.
Mother and God,
to you we bring all broken hearts, all broken wings.
Let us pray:
Loving and nurturing God, we thank you for mothers.
For all they mean or have meant to us.
We thank you for the love they have shown and the care they have given.
For the many times they gave us hugs and held us close.
Loving and nurturing God we thank you for the qualities of mothers.
For their patience, their kindness, concern and understanding, in so many ways reflecting who you are.
We thank you for the part they play in our lives,
and for this special day of saying ‘thank you’ to them.
Loving and nurturing God we thank you for the wonder of your mothering.
As a mother protects her children, you watch over us day by day.
We thank you for your arms which always encircle and protect us,
Your hands shield and deliver us from harm.
Loving God, we pray for those for whom Mother’s day brings heartache rather than celebration.
We pray for those who have never known their mother or whose mothers have died.
We thank you for your mothering heart and your tender love ,
Which nurtures all who feel abandoned and lost.
We wait with those who long to be mothers but as yet have not had their own children.
We grieve with those who ache because they will never be mothers.
We thank you for their mothering hearts which long to be expressed.
Lord in your mercy, mother us all with your love.
We pray for those who struggle with the way their children have chosen to live their lives.
And grieve with those who are orphaned or have a difficult relationship with their mother.
We thank you that when we long for a mother’s love you do not abandon us.
Lord in your mercy, mother us all with your love.
May all of us have the comfort of knowing that your mothering love is constant,
Your understanding is perfect and your compassion is never-ending.
We thank you that you gave birth to all of us with delight and joy,
Lord in your mercy mother us all with your love.
Amen
(By Christine Sine from godspacelight.com)
Blessing: More Voices #214
May God’s sheltering wings, her gathering wings protect you.
May God’s nurturing arms, his cradling arms sustain you,
And hold you in her love, and hold you in his love.
Go in peace and go in love. Alleluia! Amen.
