May 17, 2026
Easter 7
Holy Father, protect them in your name … so that they may be one.
Please be seated.
There are many sorts of preachers and many ways of thinking about preachers. That preacher is more cerebral. That one leads from the heart. That one always beginswith a good story. And some preachers use all of the readings, or just one, and some tend to dwell in the Gospel. For most of my career, I have dwelt in theGospel.
Rarely do I touch on all of the texts. Partly, I was trained that way. Partly, I play to my strengths. I can cope with Greek. It reads from left to right the way French and English do. But I am dyslexic, and I don’t cope well with Hebrew. It reads the wrong way round and my brain slows to a word-by-word crawl. And I also write poorly and form letters on a page badly, in any language. [I love fountain pens. But they’re purely aspirational. Preston and James love fountain pens. But my love is unrequited. I make a more profound mess with fountainpens. Writing poorly. Forming letters badly. And with the added bonus of getting ink all over myself. But I digress.] The point is that I stick with the Gospelbecause it works for me. Except, of course, when I don’t.During the Easter Season, all three readings are from the Greek Bible. The Greek New Testament. So, I get to play!
I spent a long time reading and re-reading today’s texts, thinking about a sermon, mostly in Gospel mode, butsomewhere along the line — I think it was Wednesday morning — I changed tack. I’ll get to the Gospel, but I decided to pick a line or two from each reading. Something which struck my ear, niggled at me, and made me want to say something you. And maybe to thestrange time we are living in.
First, from the Book of Acts. You’ll remember that the book of Acts is simply The Gospel of Luke, Part Two. It was originally one thing, a long text distributed over more than one scroll. So, it was Luke’s Continuing Adventures of the People of the Way. […] And he writes, in today’s reading, “All these (named men) were constantly devoting themselves to prayer, together with certain women, including Mary the mother of Jesus, as well as his brothers.” Yes, Jesus had younger brothers. Mary and Joseph — well Mary, for sure — had a bunch of kids. But wait. There’s more!
Acts was written in Greek. And the Greek language, like the societies in which it was used, was a gendered language, born of gendered thought, in a gendered culture. So, it’s often men, by default; masculine by convention. More than gendered, the gendering is imbalanced. Men are named. Women are not. […] So,it’s not surprising that the early Christian witness names men. It was of the time. Not surprising … but not helpful, 20 centuries on. Surely the named disciples ought to be representative of the whole people of God.The named people, who form and lead and support this community, ought to represent all of the People of the Way.
Still, any emphasis on the maleness of Jesus’ followers would not be true to this particular scripture. Today’s text lays bare the problem with the view that the first disciples were men. The first disciples are mostly menwith the exceptions of “Mary, the mother of Jesus, together with certain women.” Certain but not named.Well, named elsewhere. Think “Mary Magdalene”, the Apostle to the Apostles. […]
Now, the Christian community has had a history of predominantly male leadership. That’s been true whether we cast our minds back 2000 years or 200. Plainly, though, that truth has been changing and will likely change all the more as younger generations, in our context, worry less and less about gender. Our granddaughter, Ingrid, had a birthday, the other day. She is 11. Her partygoers were girls and boys. That’s not the way it was when I was a kid. [We travelled in packs …]Ingrid’s generation, and the generation previous, pays little attention to gender. And the same goes for race. Ingrid’s Halifax birthday party was a United Nations of colour, and of boys and girls having a good time. And I think, that’s a capitol G-T Good Thing. A few more named Mary Magdalenes, and a few fewer Peters,wouldn’t bother me a whole lot. How about equal time?Equal consideration? And, as it was in the Cheers bar, a place where everybody knows your name.
In the same breath, we have a second reading from 1 Peter, a letter written a fair few years before the Peter ofthe Acts of the Apostles. In today’s second reading, he writes “Cast all your anxiety on him, because he cares for you. Discipline yourselves, keep alert.” It’s a strange coupling: Cast your anxiety … Discipline yourselves. I worry a lot about anxiety. More accurately. I have occasion to observe a lot of anxiety. People are anxious. People in this community, long-timers and new-comersare anxious. It’s like we’re living in an age whereinwe’re always waiting for a shoe to drop. Now, I don’t want to diminish or dismiss the harm of anxiety. But you can’t control what you can’t control. And, sometime, with a little bit of discipline, you can resist payingattention to people or situations guaranteed to mobilize anxiety. Easy advice to give. Not always easy advice to take. I do get that.
You don’t have to do news 24-7. You can resist doomscrolling while your partner drifts off to sleep. You don’t have to pay attention to the last stupid thing Trump has said. Of course it will be callous. Of course it will make you angry. Of course it will mobilize anxiety. So don’t go there. Now, whether we can succeed in castingall our anxiety on Jesus, I’m not sure. I think Peter may have been a little optimistic. But I don’t have to feed the flame. With a bit of “discipline”, I can forego the opportunity to wallow in the cesspool where I know I will be feeding my anxiety. And the kicker, in 1 Peter, is that our witness — whether anxious or not — is not for ourselves. Our witness, according to 1 Peter, is for the sake of our sisters and brothers “in all the world”.
1 Peter was written to encourage Christians scattered “in all the world” [the area we now think of as Turkey] to hold to their faith during times of persecution. In the first years of the Christian community, it was always aboutpersecution. There were bad years and worse years. And there was lots of anxiety to go around. “Cast all your anxiety upon Jesus. Discipline yourselves. Keep alert.” Yes, keep alert. Pay attention to what is life-giving, life-affirming, and don’t pay attention to the crap. Don’t dwell in it. In an age of high anxiety, anything we can do to help our sisters and brothers to ratchet down their anxiety is gospel. It’s life-giving, life-affirming. It’s gospel.
[1 Peter is written in Greek. And when he wants to describe the whole Chrisian community, he uses the word “brotherhood”, which is here translated as “brothers and sisters”. A better word? Siblings. Our siblings in the faith. That’s a word I’ve learned in indigenous-settler relations. Indigenous languages do not default to binary choices. Men and women, brother and sisters…]
A third and final word. This from the Gospel of John: “Holy Father, protect them in your name … so that they may be one, as we are one.” In his prayer, Jesus prays for protection “for the sake of unity”. “Protect them so that they may be one.” Protection for the sake of the unity. I love that construction. Our project is not about me. And it’s not about you. It’s about us. And how we get along together. How we support one another in anxious times. How we lift one another up. […] How we make our way in the world that our God loves so much.
May the words of my lips and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable to the Holy One, blessèd be. Andmay the church say “Amen”. Amen.
André Lavergne CWA (Pastor)
Honourary Assistant,
Church of St. John the Evangelist, Kitchener.
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.