Ruth 1: 15-18 (NRSV)
So she said, ‘See, your sister-in-law has gone back to her people and to her gods; return after your sister-in-law.’ But Ruth said,
‘Do not press me to leave you
or to turn back from following you!
Where you go, I will go;
where you lodge, I will lodge;
your people shall be my people,
and your God my God.
Where you die, I will die—
there will I be buried.
May the Lord do thus and so to me,
and more as well,
if even death parts me from you!’
When Naomi saw that she was determined to go with her, she said no more to her.
Philippians 2: 1-4 (NRSV)
If then there is any encouragement in Christ, any consolation from love, any sharing in the Spirit, any compassion and sympathy, make my joy complete: be of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility regard others as better than yourselves. Let each of you look not to your own interests, but to the interests of others.
John 15: 9-17 (NRSV)
Jesus said,"As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you; abide in my love. If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father's commandments and abide in his love. I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete.
"This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. No one has greater love than this, to lay down one's life for one's friends. You are my friends if you do what I command you. I do not call you servants any longer, because the servant does not know what the master is doing; but I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything that I have heard from my Father. You did not choose me but I chose you. And I appointed you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask him in my name. I am giving you these commands so that you may love one another."
Blog Reflection
I have a very important message today for those who wonder if the Church should be welcoming and affirming of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, questioning and/or queer (LGBTQ) people.
Being LGBTQ is about love.
Being Christian is about love.
Our sexual orientation albeit homosexual,bisexual, pansexual, metrosexual, heterosexual is about love.
Being a Priest, Bishop, Deacon, Religious, lay member/leader etc is about love. Allowing the Church to be more inclusive of LGBTQ people in all of our Sacraments and Sacramental Rites is about love.
Aelred was one of three sons of Eilaf, priest of St Andrew's at Hexham and himself a son of Eilaf, treasurer of Durham.[1] He was born in Hexham, Northumbria, in 1110.
Aelred spent several years at the court of King David I of Scotland, rising to the rank of Master of the Household before leaving the court at age twenty-four (in 1134) to enter the Cistercian abbey of Rievaulx in Yorkshire. He may have been partially educated by Lawrence of Durham, who sent him a hagiography of Saint Brigid.
Aelred became the abbot of a new house of his order at Revesby in Lincolnshire in 1142[2] and in 1147, abbot of Rievaulx itself, where he spent the remainder of his life. Under his administration, the abbey is said to have grown to some hundred monks and four hundred lay brothers. He made annual visitations to Rievaulx's daughterhouses in England and Scotland and to the French abbeys of Cîteaux and Clairvaux.
Aelred wrote several influential books on spirituality, among them Speculum caritatis ("The Mirror of Charity", reportedly written at the request of Bernard of Clairvaux) and De spiritali amicitia ("On Spiritual Friendship"). He also wrote seven works of history, addressing two of them to Henry II of England, advising him how to be a good king and declaring him to be the true descendent of Anglo-Saxon kings. Until the twentieth century, Aelred was generally known as a historian rather than as a spiritual writer; for many centuries his most famous work was his Life of Saint Edward, King and Confessor.
Aelred's work, private letters, and his Life by Walter Daniel, another twelfth-century monk of Rievaulx, have led some writers to infer that he was homosexual. In writing to an anchoress in The Formation of Anchoresses, Aelred speaks of his youth as the time when she held on to her virtue and he lost his.[3] Nevertheless, all of his works encourage virginity among the unmarried and chastity in marriage and widowhood and warn against any sexual activity outside of marriage; in all his works he treats of extra-marital sexual relationships as forbidden and condemns "unnatural relations" as a rejection of charity and the law of God. He criticized the absence of pastoral care for a young nun who experienced rape, pregnancy, beating, and a miraculous delivery in the Gilbertine community of Watton.
Aelred died on January 12, 1167, at Rievaulx. He is recorded as suffering from the stone (hence his patronage) and arthritis in his later years (Patrologia Latina 195). He is listed for January 12 in the Roman Martyrology and the calendars of various churches. (Source: Wikipedia).
Walking With Integrity last year wrote the story of how St. Aelred became the Patron Saint of IntegrityUSA.
At the 1985 General Convention in Anaheim, CA, at the suggestion of Howard Galley, Integrity/New York, the Standing Liturgical Commission recommended Aelred, along with a number of others, for inclusion in Lesser Feasts and Fasts. When this resolution came before the House of Bishops, the preconversion Rt. Rev. John Shelby Spong informed the house that, according to John Boswell, Aelred of Rievaulx had been gay--implying this might disqualify his inclusion. With little discussion the House of Bishops approved the others on the list but sent Aelred back to the commission which sent him back to the House of Bishops where, in spite of his being gay, and with the bishops' full knowledge that he was, he was admitted to the calendar.
During the 1987 national convention of Integrity, in St. Louis, the following resolution was submitted by the Rev. Paul Woodrum and was passed: "Whereas the Episcopal Church USA meeting in General Convention in Anaheim, California, in 1985, with full knowledge, thanks to the vigilance of the bishop of Newark, of St. Aelred's homoerotic orientation, did approve for annual commemoration in her liturgical calendar the Feast of St. Aelred on 12 January and did provide propers for the same, Therefore be it resolved that Integrity Inc. place itself under the protection and patronage of St. Aelred of Rievaulx and, be it further resolved that Integrity, Inc. dedicate itself to regularly observe his feast, promote his veneration and seek before the heavenly throne of grace the support of his prayers on behalf of justice and acceptance for lesbians and gay men."
St. Aelred was one who though he embraced a life of celibacy did not discourage other forms of physical love between monks in his own community.
Aelred allowed his monks to hold hands and give other expressions of friendship (Holy Women, Holy Men, Celebrating the Saints, page 166).
Here in the 21st Century we understand that any physical relationship between consenting adults is a private matter between themselves and their Higher Power.
I am writing this particular blog post on a day that means so much pain, sadness and anger among LGBT people. The Canadian Prime Minister has dissolved thousands of same-sex marriages performed in Canada between couples who live in countries where they are not recognized. The thousands of LGBT couples in the United States who went to Canada to be married there awoke this morning with the news that they are no longer married. You can read the story of this move by the Canadian Prime Minister and the reaction of Dan Savage who's marriage in Canada has now ended here.
Undoubtedly there are Christianist groups all over the United States who are celebrating this blow to equality for LGBT people.
The Scripture readings on this commemoration of St. Aelred remind us of how important love is to our vocation as Christians. St. Paul tells us to have the mind of Christ who always put the needs of others a head of his own. Even to the point of giving his own life on the Cross. Jesus commands us in the Gospel to "Love one another as I have loved you."
The life vows of a Benedictine: Stability, Conversion of Life and Obedience are all about loving God, others and ourselves as the optional alternative Gospel reading from Mark 12: 28-34a says.
Stability means offering ourselves to God as we are. No masks on. No pretenses. No denying all that is strong and weak about us. "The vow of stability" writes Esther de Waal in her book Living with Contradiction; An Introduction to the Spirituality of St. Benedict; "tells me that I must not run away from myself." (page 49). By stability we mean anchoring everything about ourselves in God.
Conversion means allowing the God who invites me to not run away from myself, but ground everything about me in God; now I have to allow God to help me grow and "change". This means that God takes me as I am, here and now and calls me to grow in my ability to love myself, my partner and others in a self sacrificing love. I am to take on the daily challenge of learning to accept others as much as I need to accept myself. Loving myself and others is essential if I am going to live my life in a loving relationship with God.
Obedience, means that if I am going to achieve stability and allow God to help me experience conversion, I must be willing to listen to what God is calling me to do. I must be willing to set aside all else I am doing and obey God's call to be obedient to what God is asking of me. This means that I accept the struggle between my own will and the will of God. If I am to experience growth in acceptance of myself and maintaining any kind of stability in God, while God calls me to conversion, I have to be willing to say yes to God's desire.
If I accept God's will for my life as a gay man, then I must accept my sexual orientation, ground how I live it in the Gospel, the Rule of St. Benedict, and the Baptismal Covenant to serve others including my husband and many others in obedience to God's commandments. If I make the attempt to change who I am, I am already being disobedient to God.
In St. Aelred we see an interesting dynamic about being LGBT and being someone who seeks God in our lives. Instead of denying and trying to mask who we are, we are invited to be who we are and live it openly and honestly with God and others.
We cannot find stability in God if we live in denial of our sexual orientation and/or gender identity/expression.
We will experience the most wonderful conversion when we allow ourselves to be loved as we are, and to love our spouses, friends, families, and communities in the way God created us to love. God will show us how to put others needs before our own and find loves fulfillment and joy in serving others through the awesome gift of our sexual orientation and/or gender identity/expression.
When we face the reality of who we are and agree to serve others as God calls us, we are in fact obedient to God's voice in our lives and hearts.
As we use our own experiences and tell our stories of how we learned to love ourselves and yet still fell in love with the God who created us and loves us as we are and by doing so help the reign of God to be established by working for the justice, peace, dignity, equality and inclusion of all marginalized persons including LGBT people, we are not only living the way of St. Benedict, we are also fulfilling the vows of our Baptismal Covenant.
The Baptismal Covenant, the Rule of St. Benedict, the life and patronage of St. Aelred, and the meaning of the Christian Life for LGSBT people is love.
Let the inclusion and loving begun by our efforts continue.
Prayers
Almighty God, you endowed the abbot Aelred with the gift of Christian friendship and the wisdom to lead others in the way of holiness: Grant to your people that same spirit of mutual affection, that, in loving one another, we may know the love of Christ and rejoice in the gift of your eternal goodness; through the same Jesus Christ our Savior, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen. (Holy Women, Holy Men, Celebrating the Saints, page 167).
Pour into our hearts, O God, the Holy Spirit's gift of love, that we, clasping each the other's hand, may share the joy of friendship, human and divine, and with your servant Aelred draw many to your community of love; through Jesus Christ the Righteous, who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen. (Prayer taken from Lesser Feasts and Fasts).
O God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, our only Savior,
the Prince of Peace: Give us grace seriously to lay to heart the
great dangers we are in by our unhappy divisions; take away
all hatred and prejudice, and whatever else may hinder us
from godly union and concord; that, as there is but one Body
and one Spirit, one hope of our calling, one Lord, one Faith,
one Baptism, one God and Father of us all, so we may be all
of one heart and of one soul, united in one holy bond of truth
and peace, of faith and charity, and may with one mind and
one mouth glorify thee; through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Amen. (Prayer for the Unity of the Church, Book of Common Prayer, page 818).
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