Transformers 3 and Disclosure

The full trailer for the Spielberg-produced Transformers: Dark of the Moon is now online, and the concept of a black-ops space program and even extraterrestrial Disclosure itself are central to the film's plot.

For in-depth discussion of Hollyood's utilization of Disclosure-related discourse in the UFO subgenre, see my recent article on the subject, and for an overview of Spielberg's historical fascination with UFOs, check out Spielberg's Saucer Secrets.

Hollywood and the Discourse on Disclosure

Does Hollywood really drive UFOlogy, as many sceptics suggest? What are the arguments for and against the idea that big screen entertainment fuels the UFO mythos? How has the Disclosure movement of the 21st Century influenced Hollywood's millennial UFO movies? 

Over at Bryce Zabel and Richard Dolan's A.D. After Disclosure site, I have a new article addressing these and related questions.

Happy Easter

I was finally able to catch up on a little work this week.  No ships or major weather events.  We had a group of photographers here again, but they really just like to go take pictures and don't need a lot from me.  It's been nice and sunny and a bit cool.  That's good for the albatross chicks because they won't dehydrate so quickly.  We also got a chance to go look for nets on the reef and picked up a couple of small net peices.  It was beautiful.  The water is finally starting to warm up, and was nice and clear.  I forgot to add a fish picture before I started typing my text, and this blog program is difficult with a slow connection, so I'll just have to put up a pic next week.  Alright, I'll keep it short this week and give you some pictures.   

I had a request to show the cross on the eastern end of Sand Island.  I'm not sure when the last time that there were actually Easter services here.  Here is what the plaque says:

I showed you a picture of 3 people cleaning the Monument Seep a couple of weeks ago and not getting done.  We brought back some reinforcements and finished the job.

 We pumped out all of the water and scooped out pretty much all of the muck to reduce the anaerobic conditions in which bacteria that produce avian botulism like.

 A Laysan albatross feeds its chick some squid (and probably a little plastic too).

 The chicks in the old parade field are doing pretty well.

The Short-tailed albatross chick is getting its adult feathers.

I saw the dolphins again today when I was coming back from Eastern Island today.

One of our canaries sits on a twig.  No story, just a nice yellow bird.

Exopolitics conference

I'll be speaking this August at the 3rd Annual Leeds Exopolitics Expo, where I'll be addressing the popular concept of the "Hollywood UFO conspiracy."

Lecture synopsis:

Highlighting the seriousness with which Washington has long regarded the potential of entertainment media to shape popular perceptions of the UFO phenomenon, this talk will bring together six-decades-worth of concrete cases in which the US government and military have attempted – often successfully – to shape the content of UFO-themed film and television products. In the majority of these cases, the government has sought to downplay the significance of UFOs and to massage its own public image in relation to the phenomenon.

At the opposite end of the spectrum, the talk will challenge as simplistic the popular notion that there exists an overarching “Hollywood UFO conspiracy” designed to acclimate the populous to UFO reality, and will provide an objective assessment of the evidence both for and against the idea that the ever-elusive “THEY” are using Hollywood to prepare us for Disclosure.

This three-day event will be held at the University of Leeds, UK, and will feature talks by the likes of Richard Dolan, Stephen Bassett and Nick Pope, among others. For full details, see the conference's official website.

The Resurrection: Mystery of Jesus Risen, Glorified, Sending the Spirit

Paul the Apostle, in 1st Corinthians (15:12-20) so well expresses the bottom line, the reality regarding the Resurrection: “Now if Christ is proclaimed as raised from the dead, how can some of you say there is no resurrection of the dead? If there is no resurrection of the dead, then Christ has not been raised; and if Christ has not been raised, then our proclamation has been in vain and your faith has been in vain. We are even found to be misrepresenting God, because we testified of God that he raised Christ—whom he did not raise if it is true that the dead are not raised. For if the dead are not raised, then Christ has not been raised. If Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins. Then those also who have died^* in Christ have perished. If for this life only we have hoped in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied. But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead…”

It’s unfortunate that many folks spend so much energy looking for the evidences of the physical happening, forgetting the greater importance of the meaning of the Resurrection, as John expresses it in the Gospel for Easter Sunday (John 20:1-18).  It’s a basic understanding of the Christian Scriptures that the risen Jesus isn’t restored to the normal life which he possessed before his death. He now dwells in eternal life, in God’s presence. The time and place which characterize earthly existence no longer applies to him in the risen state. From the moment that God raises Jesus up, he’s “in heaven”, in the presence of/with God.

What we call The Ascension is merely the use of spatial language to describe Jesus’ exaltation and glorification. Many early statements in the Christian Scriptures speak of the identity between Christ’s Resurrection and Ascension. “God raised up Jesus...being therefore exalted at the right hand of God.” (Acts 2:32-33) Christ Jesus “who was raised from the dead, who is at the right hand of God…” (Romans 8:34) “...the resurrection of Jesus Christ who has gone into heaven and is at the right hand of God.” (1 Peter 3:21-22)

Not only do the Christian Scriptures identify Jesus’ Resurrection and Ascension, but also the giving of the Spirit. Jesus had told his disciples at the Last Supper: “If I do not go away, the Paraclete will never come to you; whereas, if I do go, I shall send the Spirit to you.”  The Spirit’s coming follows Jesus’ death and is linked inseparably with the Resurrection and Ascension.

When Jesus speaks in John’s Gospel today of his Ascension, he’s not drawing attention primarily to his own glorification, for that process has been going on throughout his “hour”, as he calls it. Rather, Jesus draws attention to what his glorification will mean to humankind, to us: i.e., the giving of the Spirit which makes us children of God.

So, it’s not the Resurrection as Christ’s being glorified in heaven that we need to emphasize, but the Resurrection as the renewal of personal relations with the disciples and with us. Jesus has these relations in mind when he refers to the disciples as “my brothers” and describes the goal of the Ascension as “my Father and your Father, my God and your God.” Jesus identifies himself with his followers. He’s ascending to the Father who will now become the Father of the disciples and of all humanity.

Remember back a few Sundays when John told us that they alone are children of God who believe in Jesus (1:12) and are begotten by the Spirit from above (3:5). Jesus’ Resurrection/Ascension makes possible the giving of the Spirit who begets the believing disciples as God’s children. That’s why, in anticipation, Jesus now refers to them and to us as “my brothers”. Paul says that Jesus is the “firstborn among many brothers.” The writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews says, “he brought many sons to glory.” 

In the Spirit which Jesus sends, he is continually present here among us. That’s the good news of the Resurrection: that by Jesus’ being raised up, as he said he would be, and glorified, you and I are set in a new relationship with Jesus, our brother, and with God, our Father.

The mystery of Jesus risen, glorified, and sending the Spirit is truly rich and awesome. Perhaps that’s why the Church now allows us 50 days of Eastertide to reflect on, pray over, and try to absorb into our lives the reality of these mysteries.  For now, let us simply pray:

“God, it is your happiness and life

that one son of man,

of all the men born into this world,

should go on living with us

and that one name should inspire us

from generation to generation -- Jesus Christ.

We are gathered here

in your presence

to pray that we may

hear and see him

and pass on his name

to all who wish to receive it.

Let your Spirit move us

to receive him from each other

and from you, this man

who is our future,

who lives with you 

for all men and for the whole world.”

(Huub Oosterhuis) 

Waiting In Hope

"At this time in human events

The world is going through

'Her change of life.'

In this period of vast dislocation

Words are violent!

Some call it treason

Some call it freedom

Some say it's calvary

Some say it's Easter

No one says it's easy.

Damned if you do

Damned if you don't

Insecurity is a fact of life

And everyone is caught

in the cross fire of rage

In the middle of free-floating hate.

Something has died

No one knows what!

Something is born

With difficult birth! 

The faithful have scattered

To cover their hurt

Each to his own fall-out shelter

Everyone is to blame

Except the one who is to blame

God:

He is the one who has brought us out

Into this desert to die!

Or to trust!

Despite the creeds we mouth

Despite the prayers we say out loud

We are wary of what He is doing to us

By all He has let happen to us

And gingerly we follow

where He leads us

Covering our tracks

In case we want to come back.

Like a teenager the whole human race

Is being dragged screaming

To our adult place

In a world come of age.

Tell the fishers of men

The good times have come

Their God is too small

The ballgame has changed

Another brand of saint

Is sought

With soul that is world size

This cut of man is

not too large to live

He is happy washing feet

A loving servant 

Who serves God's underworld

All he knows is that he doesn't know

All that is meant by what is said

He will never claim to understand

What men mean by what men do!

Yet indeed, it is a different kind of day

When we wake up to find

Our times up to something great

Around the world

Again shall rise

The loud laugh of hope

That comes from faith in something

Greater than ourselves.

We shall live again

Like children playing

Accepting total joy

As our destined lot

We shall feel again love

come alive in everyone.

The world will be the same

Yet living here will be different.

We will celebrate in wild fiesta

The promises already made

The promises already kept.

Our blood will boil again

with gusto for a world saved.

We will dance together in the streets 

And sing together in our parks.

When once again the impossible is real

Then again shall awe and wonder reign

Fascination and surprise

Excitement will invade

The churches

jumping up and down in the pews

Waltzing in the aisles.

Cynics will melt to smiles

'Til tears run down their cheeks

We will be saved from ourselves

When we realize we are already saved

All we have got to do

Is celebrate!

And so:

And so:

The world waits,

Some for Godot!

Some for the Second Coming!

Oh! reader of words

Whoever you are

A word to remember

Is Easter!"

(Joe McCarthy, Papal Bulls and English Muffins, Paulist Press, 1974)

UFO movie montage

A huge selection of clips from UFO-themed movies and TV episodes has been put together by a YouTube poster who writes:

"I believe Hollywood and the entertainment industry at large has been instrumental in educating the public with the erroneous idea that Flying Saucers are physical craft piloted by alien beings from other planets. This montage will form part of a larger documentary I am completing exposing that UFOs and the 'alien beings' that pilot them are something entirely different and far more sinister."

... DUN, DUN, DUNNNNN!!!

Sinisterness aside, this seven-part montage makes for fascinating viewing and must have taken ages to compile. Watch it here.

The Cross: A “Bed of Hope”

“There is a legend about a bird which sings just once in its life, more sweetly than any other creature on the face of the earth. From the moment it leaves the nest it searches for a thorn tree, and does not rest until it has found one. Then, singing among the savage branches, it impales itself upon the longest, sharpest spine. And dying, it rises above its own agony to outcarol the lark and the nightingale. One superlative song, existence the price. But the whole world stills to listen, and God in His heaven smiles. For the best is only bought at the cost of great pain...Or so says the legend.” (Colleen McCullough, The Thornbirds)  What an apt description of the terror and the magnificence of Christ’s offering up of his life on the Cross!

“It is accomplished.” St. John, more than the other Evangelists, pictures Jesus as reigning from the tree. John’s Christ is the crowned Christus Victor = Christ the Victor. At the beginning of his account of the Gospel, John says: “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us...and we have beheld his glory.” Flesh refers not only to Jesus‘ taking on our human form, but to his whole observable life, reaching its highpoint in his death. 

The glory, God’s Presence, God’s nearness, is there throughout Jesus‘ whole life, and especially in his dying moment. John clues us in to this by the signs he uses throughout his account: “Behold, the Lamb of God”, recalling the Passover Lamb; Jesus‘ assurance to Mary, in Chapter 2, that his hour hasn’t yet come, and how there’s tension until his hour does come, in Chapter 13; and Jesus‘ declaration, as he cleanses the Temple made with hands, that he’ll replace it with his own body: “Destroy this temple and in three days I will rebuild it.” Jesus‘ whole life is lived under the sign of the Cross. All that Jesus announces in the passages about his identity and his revelatory work, all his great “I am” sayings, become true at the moment of his death on the Cross. There for the first time Jesus really is all that he said he was: the bread come down from heaven; the light shining out to the world; the door by which you and I enter life; the noble shepherd who lays down his life for his sheep-herd; the resurrection and the life; the true vine, giving life to the branches.

We grieve, we sorrow, over the fact that Jesus died being so misunderstood and mistreated by people he came to serve. We also rejoice because we see, especially in the Cross, the glory of God present and close and at work, bringing us to new life.

In the Solemn Collects of today’s liturgy, we lament all our sins, individual and corporate, “known and unknown, things done and left undone”. Most appropriately, however, we also share today, of all days, Christ’s body and blood, Christ’s real Presence: the beginning of true life forever. The Eucharist has been shared throughout this Holy Week in different ways. We’ve heard over and over the phrase “we proclaim his death until he comes again”. What could create more hope, more optimism, more faith than this assurance! In the meantime, we silently, prayerfully wait.

Traditionally, in Christian devotion, Jesus‘ burial after his death has been associated with the service of Compline, which “completes” the day. There’s an ancient prayer which suggests that our going to bed each night is a reminder of our mortality, but also a reminder that Jesus‘ burial on this Good Friday is a sign to us of the hope of resurrection. We might consider praying it often as we await the life-giving dawn of the Day of Resurrection:

Lord Jesus Christ, who at this [evening] hour

rested in the sepulcher, and thereby sanctified

the grave to be a bed of hope for your people;

help us to abound in sorrow for our sins

which were the cause of your passion

so that, when our bodies lie in the dust,

we may live with you, who live and reign

with the Father and the Holy Spirit, one God, 

forever and ever. Amen.      

Maundy Thursday - Giving & Receiving Love

Canon Richard Mansfield writes: "There is a story about a mother and her son having an argument at the breakfast table on Sunday morning, about whether the son was going to go to church or not. Finally, the son said, 'I can think of two good reasons why I shouldn't go to church. First of all, I don't like any of the people there very much. And secondly, none of the people there like me.' The mother answered him right back saying, 'Well, I can think of two good reasons why you should go to church. First of all, you are 45 years old, and secondly, they pay you to be the Rector.'" That story pokes fun at something which can and does become an issue in many congregations at times: a love/hate relationship between priest and people, or simply between people and people. Many times, it doesn't degenerate to that level, but there is often estrangement, distance, invisible barriers.

I'm willing to bet that at least some of us will feel uncomfortable reading the Gospel passage for Maundy Thursday (John 13:1-17; 31b-35) dealing with Jesus washing the disciples' feet. Parenthetically, ever notice how difficult it is to recruit volunteers to come forward to have their foot washed on Maundy Thursday?! This year I read of a parish which is going to have a washing of hands instead of feet! I think it's not so much the prospect of washing someone else's feet that makes us uncomfortable. It's having someone wash our feet. We're not the only ones who have felt this way. So did Peter, the leader of Jesus' followers.

It's easier to wash someone else's feet than to have them wash ours. Just as it's generally easier to serve others, than to let them serve us; or to minister to others, than to allow ourselves to be ministered to. It's a way in which you and I can avoid intimacy. It's a way to keep ourselves in a position of control. It's a way to avoid possibly getting hurt. Perhaps people in the helping professions are especially prone to this, but I think that most of us do at some time or other. I suspect that we often interpret this Gospel passage as Jesus' way of showing us that we must do, that we must serve. But maybe there's a deeper message. "What I am doing," Jesus says, "you do not know now, but afterward you will understand." 

Intimacy, closeness to another, will never come about unless you and I learn how to receive as well as give. In relationships, it's truly a blessed thing to receive as well as to give. In some way, perhaps, we need God's grace more to enable us to receive than to give.

Could it be that our greatest service to one another is in our accepting the discomfort of receiving, in allowing someone else the happiness of giving to us? The late Henri Nouwen wrote: "...a gift only becomes a gift when it is received and nothing we have to give will ever be recognized as a true gift until someone opens their hands or heart to accept it."

The saving realities which we celebrate and live into anew during Holy Week, especially on this day, remind us how utterly we're on the receiving end -- beneficiaries -- of a caring, loving, gift-giving God. The very name, Maundy Thursday, reminds us that we're recipients of Jesus' novum mandatum = his new command: "Love one another as I love you." We're recipients of his love: in the command to do to each other as he does to us; in the gift of God's Son, enfleshed in Jesus; and in the Holy Eucharist, the real Presence in sign, his abiding Presence in life-giving bread, broken, indeed, but broken so as to be taken and assimilated and to bring forth new life.

In today's Eucharist, in today's washing of one another's feet, in the symbolic stripping of the altar, in sharing an Agape fellowship, we testify to God's incomprehensible love for us, even though we feel so unworthy. But we also testify to our faith, to our acceptance of that great love, by letting ourselves receive love from one another.

"Cowboys and Aliens" full trailer

The Spielberg-produced "Sci-fi Western" hits US cinemas July 29 (and UK cinemas in mid-August). The screenplay is by Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman (Transformers, Star Trek, Alias [TV], Fringe [TV]).

Tuesday In Holy Week - The Glorifying, Judging, & Saving Word

The liturgical readings for Tuesday in Holy Week (Isaiah 49:1-7; 1 Corinthians 1:18-31; John 12:20-36) reflect on the Word of God as the expression of faith.


God living Word, incarnate in Jesus, is a glorifying Word. Glorifying, in the sense that you and I are utter servants of that Word, and as servants our calling is to glorify the Father, to make God known. The Word calls us, even in the womb, and is put in our mouths once we begin our journey of life as God’s servant. Its strength carries us through our labors in God’s behalf. It constantly reminds us that, when we try to go it on our own, it’s in vain. “I will give you as a light...that my salvation may reach to the ends of the earth”, that God may be glorified.


God’s living Word, incarnate in Jesus, is a judging Word. In Jesus God invites us to share eternal life. The one who rejects Jesus, and therefore God, is judged by the Word spoken by the Father. To reject Jesus is to reject the reign of God over our lives, to reject the possibility of having true life.


Most of all, God’s living Word, incarnate in Jesus, is a saving Word. “The message of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.” It’s a strange Word, for it doesn’t make sense by the standards of this world. It’s strange because it’s about a man crucified in behalf of others who showed that they didn’t even love or respect him. It’s strange because it’s proclaimed by people in need of salvation -- sinners -- weak people, unsophisticated people, foolish people, to all appearances. But it’s a saving and empowering Word because the source is Godself, through the Son, Jesus, whom God made our wisdom, our rightness, our way of becoming holy, our salvation.


We prepare for to celebrate Christ’s Resurrection by open our hearts and minds to this glorifying, judging, saving Word of God, and by allowing that Word to work in us the salvation which we contemplate and celebrate during this Holy Week.

Happy Songkran

 Another slow internet day yesterday, so I'm a day late with the blog.  Our new Refuge Manager, Sue Schulmeister, came out to Midway last week.  It will be nice to have the extra person out here.  The person out doing the monk seal surveys found a couple of interesting things over on Eastern Island.  She found a small turtle buried in the sand on the beach.  Only its head and the tip of one flipper was out of the sand.  She thought it was dead, but dug it out anyway.  It actually was alive, and swam away.  It could have been there since the tsunami, or it could have been washed over later, but either way, it was probably there for a while and was good that she happened along.  Another thing she found was a bucket that was labelled "Laysan Island".  It was actually washed away from the camp on Laysan during the tsunami and washed up on the beach here about a month later.  Laysan is around 500 miles away, so it got here pretty quickly.  The Laysan seal crew had brought millet out for food, and it looks none the worse for wear.  I also found a message in a bottle on the beach (the second one I've found on Midway).  I opened it at a gathering we had one night, and let me just say, if you are planning on putting a message in a bottle, make sure it's sealed well, because paper doesn't last long in salt water.  Metal screwcaps don't seal that well so we could only make out a word or two, but it was written on Hawaii Outrigger Hotel stationery.

Last week we also celebrated Songkran, the Thai New Year.  Cleansing with water is part of the tradition, which means a lot of water balloons, squirt guns, and buckets.  At least it was a beautiful, sunny day, so a great day for a beach BBQ.

This is a recent photo of Eastern Island.  It's really easy to tell exactly where the tsunami water stopped.  The salt water killed most of the plants.
 

Here's John Klavitter giving a bike tour of the tsunami damage to our new manager, our head of Refuges for USFWS, and some visitors from Hawaii.

The tour also included the hydroponics garden, which has some good cherry tomatoes ripening.

Here's one of the more recent pics of the Short-tailed albatross chick.  We haven't seen the parents yet, but the chick is still doing fine.

I came across a masked booby nest over on Eastern Island too. 

Another interesting bird was this Laysan, Black-footed albatross hybrid.  I've never seen this guy (or girl) before.

This was the Songkran parade from the Chugach office up to Captain Brooks.

Captain Brooks Tavern was decorated nicely.

Here's one of the Songkran sand sculptures.  There was also a nice turtle and seal, but I can only show so many pictures.

John is getting a good hit on the ball.

Monday in Holy Week

"...whatever gains I had, these I have come to regard as loss because of Christ. More than that, I regard everything as loss because of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things, and I regard them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but one that comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God based on faith. I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the sharing of his sufferings by becoming like him in his death, if somehow I may attain the resurrection from the dead.


Not that I have already obtained this or have already reached the goal; but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own...I do not consider that I have made it my own; but this one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on towards the goal for the prize of the heavenly* call of God in Christ Jesus." (Philippians 3:7-14)

Do You Even Give A Damn?

There’s a story about a noted archbishop who was addressing a seminary class. He told them about a young man who, years before, had come into the Cathedral one day. The young man didn’t really care much about churches or religion: in fact, he rather disdained them. To vent his disdain, as a sort of practical joke, he got the idea of lining up with those waiting to make their confession and, when his turn came, to make a confession so obviously preposterous that the listening priest would be embarrassed by it.


When the young man had finished his mock confession, there was a moment of silence, then the priest reached for a piece of paper, wrote something on it, folded it, then slipped it through the grill to the young man. He directed the young man to go out to a large crucifix enshrined in a nearby alcove, and there to read what was on the piece of paper. Taken a bit unawares, but willing to go along with the charade, the young man agreed to do so. As he looked up at the figure of Jesus on the Cross, he slowly unfolded the paper on which the priest had written: “He died for you...and you don’t even give a damn!”


The archbishop concluded his story to the seminary class by saying: “I was that young man.”


Many of us wonder at times about the whole “Jesus thing”. We wonder what it’s all really about, particularly as it applies to us. Perhaps at those times we would do well to look at a crucifix or a picture of the Crucified Christ. As we stand at the beginning of the holiest week in the Church’s year on this Palm Sunday, we might also do well to stand, at least in spirit, in front of a Cross, look at it, let the reality of it sink into our minds and hearts, and then ask ourselves: “Do you even give a damn?”


The events of this Holy Week which we’re about to recall and celebrate were destined to change the entire course of human history. It began on a note of triumph, or so it must have seemed to the crowd who welcomed Jesus into Jerusalem like some conquering hero returning to free his people from oppression. Freedom was on Jesus‘ mind, for sure, but freedom of a different kind: a freedom of heart and spirit. Just where and when and how Jesus had come to realize his calling isn’t very clear. We’d suspect that Jesus had at least thought about some of Isaiah’s visions, particularly regarding the Suffering Servant. Also, as a Jew, he surely couldn’t have been unaware of the super-zealous urgings of some of the citizens, who also hailed his coming into the Holy City, to perhaps take the opportunity to overthrow Pontius Pilate. Pilate was surely aware of the threat. It didn’t take long to see that Jesus would, indeed, confront both Pilate and Herod, though quite differently, as he would and does confront all those who wield power that is merely of this world. Jesus‘ power was different: it was the power of self-giving love, encompassing, sacrificing, enduring, like that of the All Holy.


That’s the power of love, hanging on the Cross, upon which you and I gaze at the beginning of this Holy Week. But there’s a caution. As often as we hear the story of Jesus’ passion and death, as we will several times this week, as often as we find ourselves in the place of the centurion at the foot of the Cross, the Crucified One has a way of working his spirit into our hearts and minds and lives. If we really don’t want our life changed, if we’re afraid of his presence, if we don’t want to be refashioned as a new people, to be made more aware of our injustice and inhumanity to one another, then you and I should be somewhere else than in church during this coming week.


Because Jesus befriended the poor, you and I can be enabled to see them with new eyes. Because Jesus reached out to the sick and suffering, you and I can learn how to empathize with others in their pain. Because Jesus loved all human beings so much that he actually died, even death, the inner, daily dying, and our eventual physical dying, can now be seen from a new perspective.


Sacrifice and surrender, clearly, aren’t the only truths of Christianity, as this week will show us. Nevertheless, we all have hard choices to make in daily living. In this “experience of salvation”, as Frederick Buechner calls its, two things happen. First, we lose ourselves; and secondly, in so doing, we discover that we’re more fully ourselves than ever before. The losing of ourselves is a dying, no question, and despite the promise of death and resurrection, symbolized in our Baptism, it’s still hard for us to understand how there can really be life beyond this “death”. Even worse, we’re not always sure that we want to be born to new life, if being re-born means we have to change.


“He died for you...and you don’t even give a damn!” True or false?? Only you and I, standing before the Cross, know what the answer is as it applies to us. However weak-kneed we may feel about the journey ahead of us this Holy Week, and the rest of our lives, however afraid we might be to allow God to touch us, one thing is for sure. It’s hard to stand before Jesus on the Cross and not sense that, as at the foot of that Cross on the hill of Golgotha, there is here also the sure ground of God’s presence and unconditional acceptance.


In Jesus’ Cross we learn the truth that religion has infinitely more to do with the amazing grace and love of God than it has to do with any unworthiness or success of our own; infinitely more to do with God’s purposes than with fearful and corrupt governors and religious leaders. The story of Holy Week is the story of Jesus’ giving of himself for others: a story so incredible and overwhelming, yet so real and true, that we find it reviving our faith, reborning our hope, and deepening our love.


Because, as we stand at the Cross, looking up at that tortured, dying man, we come to know that, without a doubt, he gave and gives a damn...even for you, even for me, even for every one of us!