New Beginnings

Although my duties as interim priest at St. Michael's Episcopal Church in Bristol, RI do not begin until the end of this month on the Feast of St. Michael and All Angels (Sept 29) I had the chance today to do a "supply" week there, and Hathy was able to be with me, for which I'm grateful. The congregation is still worshiping across the street from the church in the parish house (as is their summer habit) and we filled the room! I'm posting the manuscript of my sermon here as we enter into this new season together. Feeling very grateful. 

Good morning, St. Michael’s. My name is Rich Simpson. I have been called to serve as your interim priest for the next year or so starting on October 1. Until the end of this month I will still be the Canon to the Ordinary in the Diocese of Western Massachusetts. But since I had today open in my calendar, the vestry and I agreed it might be a nice chance to say hello today. So here we are.

I have three tasks this morning. First, I want to tell you a little bit about myself, and how I have come to be here with you for this season of your congregation’s life. And then I want to briefly preview the fall stewardship theme and say a few words about what stewardship is and is not, in my view. And third I’ll get to the Epistle of James and talk a bit about community and the core values of Christian community, which I think matters a lot in the work we will share as this next year or so unfolds. Ready?

I’m here today with my wife, Hathy. (It is “Hathy” by the way, a shortened form of Hatheway, which is a family name.) We met on a junior year abroad at the University of St. Andrew’s in Scotland in 1983-1984. We were both American students there for a full year of study: Hathy from Colby College in Waterville, Maine and I from Georgetown University in Washington, DC. We were married on May 25, 1986 at St. Anne’s in the Fields in Lincoln, Massachusetts just one year after graduating from our respective colleges.

Over the past 38 years, we have raised two sons: Graham and James. Graham will turn 34 this month and James turned 30 this summer. Graham is married to Cara and they have one son, our first grandchild, Julian, who is almost ten months old. They live in Washington, DC. James and Lindsay were married this summer in Killington, Vermont and they live in Jersey City, New Jersey. I got to officiate at both of my sons' weddings and I got to baptize Julian on Pentecost at All Saints Church in Worcester, Mass. I don’t even have words to tell you what a privilege it was to do those things.

I’m not going to give you my whole bio today. There will be plenty of time for that and I’m sure it’s written down somewhere. But for today I do want to tell you that we went to St. Francis in Holden, Massachusetts in 1998 when I was called to serve as their fifth rector, after I’d served a little over four years as Associate Rector in Westport, Connecticut. We stayed in Holden for fifteen years, until James went off to college and made us empty nesters. I loved that congregation and still do; and they loved me and my family back. A little more than eleven years ago the newly elected bishop of Western Mass asked me to join his staff as Canon to the Ordinary and I said yes.

One big part of my job over the past eleven years has been helping congregations in my diocese navigate clergy transitions from the departure of a rector, through a season of transition, and then ultimately into the call of a new rector. We Episcopalians have all kinds of jokes about change but the punchline is always the same: we don’t like it. Lots of light bulb jokes. But the jokes aside, and some of us really do find change challenging, we have to learn to make it our friend. The truth I've discovered again and again is that it's not really change we don't like; it's the grief we experience of what is lost that is challenging. But what is not changing is no longer alive. Sometimes change is slow and sometimes it’s fast but we have to find ways to navigate it and part of my work with you all will be to help us to name and then embrace the new thing God is up to here at St. Michael’s.

You’ll learn soon enough that I slip in some occasional lyrics from that American theologian from the swamps of Jersey, Bruce Springsteen. So let me dive right in with that on day one with two song references from The Boss. We Episcopalians have to move past our obsession with Glory Days in order to embrace the reality that These Are Better Days. If you aren’t a fan of Bruce that’s ok. What I’m saying in plain English is that it is not an option to go back to the days when this parish was founded, before there was even an Episcopal Church, nor to the 1950s, nor even to a pre-pandemic Church. The world has changed. Our work is to be fully present to the sacramentality of this moment and the challenges of this time and place. In so doing, we invite the Holy Spirit to lead us, like the ancient Hebrews, through the wilderness and toward the promised land. No turning back! Our work, together, is to embrace the challenges of these days.

My second point is shorter, but I was asked to “tee this up” for a four-week time of reflection that will begin on September 29 about Belonging. I’ll be back with you when we celebrate the Archangel Michael and this parish that takes its name from him on that day, at the end of this month. You’ll hear from fellow parishioners reflecting on their own journeys and have a chance to ponder their offerings. Stay tuned. 

Some folks think during an interim they will “wait and see.” This guy, Simpson, isn’t going to be here forever, after all. Let’s get through this to a new call. I get that and I don’t take it personally. But I think that transition times are invitations to lean in and get to work, not to wait and see. And I hope you all are ready to do that. It’s about deepening the ties that bind. That’s where this theme of belonging comes from. And I’ll just add this…

Stewardship is not Christian fundraising. It is true that we need to financially support the things that matter to us and I hope that St. Michael’s matters to you. It’s an expensive operation. You all get that. But faithful stewardship is about something much deeper than making sure the bills get paid, although I know we are all grateful that they are being paid. In a world that feels sometimes like it’s coming apart at the seams, where do we put our trust? Jesus said that where our heart is, our treasure will be also. Where is your heart? More on this next month.

OK, last but not least: the Epistle of James. Do you know that Martin Luther called it an “epistle of straw?” Luther was right about many, many things. But he was wrong about the Epistle of James. He was rightly focused on grace alone saving us but that made him nervous that James was too focused on “good works.” So let’s be clear: we don’t save ourselves. The good we do isn’t a scorecard for God. We are claimed and sealed and marked and loved as Christ’s own forever in Holy Baptism an outward and visible sign that God loves us. And because God loves us, we are called to love God back and love each other. So far so good, right?

But that’s a beginning, not an end. The whole epistle of James is about sanctifying grace, about how God continues to be at work in our lives one day at a time. Melting and molding and filling and using us over time. We do change; there’s that word again. We grow – more and more- into the full stature of Christ. We live and we love and we fail and we fall and we get back up and we learn. So we can’t just say, “I’m saved – I’m going to heaven. My ticket is punched.” No. We say, I need to respond to what God has done in my life by loving God back and by loving my neighbor. One day at a time.

You do well if you really fulfill the royal law according to the scripture, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself. In other words, we need to walk the talk. One aspect of our dominant American culture is we do say something like that, about inalienable rights and all being created equal. But there is also a strong thread in our culture that makes a big deal of the rich and famous and turns a blind eye to the poor. We didn’t invent that. It’s as old as time or at least as old as the first-century church.

But James calls us out on that. Loving your neighbor? Well, if you treat the rich person who walks into your church differently than you treat the poor person – then let’s just say that’s not loving your neighbor. It’s favoritism and we can do better. For if a person with gold rings and in fine clothes comes into your assembly, and if a poor person in dirty clothes also comes in, and if you take notice of the one wearing the fine clothes and say, “Have a seat here, please,” while to the one who is poor you say, “Stand there,” or, “Sit at my feet,” have you not made distinctions among yourselves, and become judges with evil thoughts? 

As a preacher I don’t need to say much more. This is not hard to understand. James is no epistle of straw because he gets to the heart of the matter. And it’s all about belonging – which we’ll be reflecting on during these stewardship weeks. It’s about the kind of community we belong to – which has some core values related to the dignity of every (every) human being.

One of my jobs over the past eleven years was to accompany the bishop to celebrations of new ministry, when a new rector settles into their new parish and the bishop and canon show up and everyone prays that things will go well. It was my job again and again and again – more than 50 times or so over the past eleven years – to offer this charge to the new rector: Having committed yourself to this work, do not forget the trust of those who have chosen you. Care alike for young and old, strong and weak, rich and poor.

I will only be with you for a season, until a new rector is found and called and headed this way. Maybe that will take a year, maybe longer. But I pledge to you that in the meantime I’ll live by that same commitment in the work I do here. And I ask you since we are all in this together to do the same. Let the world know that St. Michael’s is a place where we care alike for young and old, strong and weak, rich and poor. A place where all are welcome. No exceptions.

I’ve covered a lot of ground for an intro and there are hotdogs to be grilled. If your mind has wandered, it’s ok. Here is the cliff notes version. God loves you. Love God back. And love your neighbor. Let that love be made manifest in everything you do and say so that every person you meet sees good news coming. Look for the face of the risen Christ in everyone and let everyone you meet see the face of the risen Christ in you.

 The photo on the right is from the pulpit in the main church where we'll be for the Feast of St. Michael at the end of this month. All are welcome!