Fifth Sunday after Pentecost, rcl yr b, 2021
2 Samuel 1:1, 17-27; Psalm 130; 2 Corinthians 8:7-15; Mark 5:21-43
she had endured much under many physicians
Before I get further into my sermon, I did want to take a moment to recognise that this week, there’s been another confirmation of children buried in unmarked graves at a Residential School, this time at the Cowessess First Nation in Saskatchewan. 751 unmarked graves this time.
I said a couple of weeks ago that this would be a long season, and sadly, this is part of what I meant. This is probably only the beginning of a long season in which more and more gravesites will be confirmed. It’s also likely only a matter of time until a gravesite is found on Six Nations, of children who died at the Mohawk Institute, an Anglican residential school. This season is likely to last longer than the attention span of the news cycle and the social media outrage cycle. I may be wrong, and we, as a country, may have the stamina to keep hearing these stories. I’m not so sure.
And this is why I’ve been reluctant to ritualize our sense of anger or grief. I hope you do feel anger, I hope you do grieve. But I’m really concerned about creating a false sense of having recognized it, or having dealt with it, and moving on. I don’t want us to quickly move on from this, because what “this” is isn’t just graves at residential schools. The graves, and the grief that comes with the confirmation of their existence, is part of a very long story of attempted assimilation, a history that neither started weeks ago nor one that will end weeks from now.
To quickly move on from this is a privilege afforded some, but not afforded others—it is not a privilege afforded Six Nations, nor to the many other indigenous communities of Canada that are experiencing just one more phase of the legacy of attempted assimilation.
But for us, for a good length of time, my hope is that we will live, and remain, with a sense of incompletion, living with a sense that we haven’t yet accomplished what needs doing. Because this is closer to the truth: we have a long season ahead of us, and one in which we will most likely not escape due judgment.
As for the rest of this sermon, I am going to very cautiously make a connection between the legacy, and ongoing reality, of assimilationist policies toward indigenous people and our gospel reading today.
If you’ve ever lived with a chronic condition, or are close to someone who has a chronic condition, you will probably recognise some patterns in how people with chronic conditions are often treated. Not universally, obviously But there is a recognizable pattern.
The medical model of disability—where impairments are considered medical problems that belong to an individual, and those impairments are treated as medical problems that need to be solved—is good and alive in our imagination. And so the world of someone with a chronic condition is often filled with well-meaning people who offer all sorts of medical advice, or not-so-medical advice, about how to cure an impairment or condition.
The trouble, though, with chronic conditions, is that there are rarely easy “solutions,” nor are there quick “cures”; and this is often frustrating to the doctors who want to be heroes, and the friends or acquaintances who want to help solve the “problem.” And when an impairment is approached as a problem to be solved, but it turns our the supposed problem is not as easily solved as one would hope, people will often give up and walk away. That is part of the reality of life for those of us with chronic conditions.
But today, Mark gestures toward a story of a chronic condition not so easily solved, and of the toll that takes on the woman who experiences it. Mark tells us about “a woman who had been suffering from haemorrhages for twelve years.” And so here we have a woman with a chronic condition, and Mark telling the truth of it: “she had endured much under many physicians,” says Mark, and that she “had spent all that she had; and she was no better, but rather grew worse.”
And while we could make the story very simple, and focus on the end, while we could say “look, all her hard work paid off, now she is healed,” while we could say “see, all she needed was faith in Jesus, and all was made well,” I’d rather dwell a bit more on those twelve years. The twelve years she “suffer[ed] from haemorrhages,” while she “endured much under many physicians,” the twelve years that were so costly that she “spent all that she had,” the twelve years when “she was no better, but rather grew worse.”
The twelve years she waited on Jesus.
If we were to think of those years, what do you think she needed then?People to say “I was just in the marketplace, and there was a merchant from Ethiopia, and he told me about some spices there that heal haemorrhages!” Probably not. Do you think that during those twelve years, she needed people to pop their head through the kitchen door, look at her and say, “well you’re sure in a bad state still, such a pity,” only to walk away again? Probably not.
Or do you think she needed people to come alongside her, to be a friend, to suffer her with her, to listen, to discover her joy even in in her sometimes difficult life, to do the sorts of things that made her life more bearable? People to take out the trash and watch the kids for a while, to do the dishes, (to find the joy that was already there too,) to do the needful things that were helpful, but wouldn’t heal the haemorrhage that appears to have needed divine intervention?
I said I wanted to be cautious about this analogy, and I still want to be cautious. But there are some similarities here. Much like a chronic condition, the legacy of assimilationist policies are not anything that will be easily fixed. And to imagine that this legacy will be easily fixed will simply cause frustration and the temptation to give up. And sometimes, when it comes to addressing the legacy of assimilationist policies, we are likely to drop in and to to say, “I just heard of this new policy intervention that will fix everything!” Or to shake our heads, and to make a public show of our pity, only to walk away when our attention passes to the next tragic story.
But my suggestion, to draw another connection, is to say that what’s really needed, or at least where we should begin, is to listen, to be attentive, and only then to act. As a country, it’s going to take some time to properly recognise treaty obligations and to unravel the Indian Act. In the meantime, we actually know what’s being asked. More recently, it’s for funds to find other gravesites. And for quite some time, it’s been for funds to get clean water onto reserves.
And if our country fails us, we have plenty we can do; we can continue to build on our relationships, where our outcomes might be much more modest, but they would grow from what is needful. And we should not be discouraged if we discover that what needs doing looks more like helping with the chores, that it’s not all that glamorous, and that it may or may not make for a good social media post. But it will be the Lord’s work, work we would do as we together wait upon the fulness of the healing of the Lord—a healing that is promised to us in Christ, a promise made in what he accomplishes for us on the cross.
In the meantime, Christ’s ministry takes place less in miraculous intervention, but more in coming alongside, in suffering with—and in finding joy together, too. In the meantime, we are given to one another, without easy or flashy solutions, given to one another that we might wait on one another as we wait upon the Lord, and in the sure hope of the resurrection.
The Revd Dr Preston DS Parsons
Angus Sinclair was appointed Director of Music of St. John the Evangelist on February 1, 2023. Having graduated in 1981 (Honours B.Mus.) in organ performance from Wilfrid Laurier University, he went on to distinguish himself as a church musician, recitalist and accompanist touring in both Canada and the UK. For over 40 years Angus has served parishes and congregations throughout Southwestern Ontario as director of music. He experiences his present appointment to St. John’s as a welcome homecoming, both spiritually and musically.
As our parish musician, he provides both support and leadership so that a variety of parish programs can find musical expression and attract participation. When our handbell choir is in season, he is one of our ringers. At parish dinners, he provides popular piano music for the guests to dine by. For both worship services and concerts, he will rehearse and accompany vocal and instrumental soloists from our congregation on piano, organ, or even accordion.
Angus Sinclair was appointed Director of Music of St. John the Evangelist on February 1, 2023. Having graduated in 1981 (Honours B.Mus.) in organ performance from Wilfrid Laurier University, he went on to distinguish himself as a church musician, recitalist and accompanist touring in both Canada and the UK. For over 40 years Angus has served parishes and congregations throughout Southwestern Ontario as director of music. He experiences his present appointment to St. John’s as a welcome homecoming, both spiritually and musically.