Who I Truly Am

John 6:51-58

Pentecost 13/Pride Sunday, August 18, 2024

Holy Trinity Cathedral

“Who I Truly Am”

Jesus has a hard time trying to persuade people of who he truly is.  And the world has a hard time accepting him.  But for all who struggle with understanding and explaining who they truly are, we have an ally.  Our community is on a journey of faith towards a God who made each of us to be fully and uniquely human, and who invites us into loving relationship.  Through Jesus, we can be all that we are meant to be.

 “I am the bread of life,” is one of the ways that Jesus self-identifies.  He then uses several methods to unpack this.  First, he shows by example.  In the miracle of the feeding of the five thousand, his action of blessing and sharing food demonstrates that there is enough for all.  The good news is of a generous God who works through the hands of those who choose to give of themselves.  Second, he reminds the people of history.  Their ancestors wandered in the wilderness and were fed by manna from heaven when they trusted God’s word.  Now Jesus has come down to earth as the living word, which can sustain us in our hunger for life and meaning.  Third, Jesus shows us by relationship.  The people think they know who Jesus is because they see his earthly mother and father among the crowd.  But Jesus points beyond biology to God’s presence.  He is Emmanuel- God with Us.  Anyone who is seeking the Creator can find God in him.  By example, by history lesson, and by relationship, Jesus points to himself as living bread for the world.

Then comes the shocker in this morning’s gospel reading: “Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you.  Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood have eternal life” (John 6:53-54).  Anyone who has not been brought up in a Christian Church can rightly be horrified by these words.  Even if they are taken in context with everything that Jesus has been trying to teach about himself as the bread of life, they are still jarring.  His first listeners were disgusted.  For good Jews, blood represented the life of the organism.  They would not eat food unless it were kosher, which included the blood being drained from the animal.  To talk about feeding on Jesus’ body and blood is too blasphemous and forbidden.  Even if you don’t read this literally, there is a part of us that shies away from getting too close to the reality of flesh. 

And yet, there’s no getting around the fact that Jesus is a human being in a human body. This is the whole point of what we call the incarnation.  It’s the enfleshment of God.  To find God is recognize God’s life in this person.  And if we want to be part of the divine, we need the courage to touch body to body in the intimacy of this sharing.  And in that touch, we know God and we are wholly known and accepted. 

In the meal that we share together as the Church, we receive bread and wine that carry the real presence of Christ.  So the question of who is allowed to bless the meal and who is allowed to participate in loving relationship is of foundational importance to Christians.  The Anglican Church in our area has been on a path of struggling to understand this mystery of incarnation. 

My own experience is as a white, cis-gender female who is learning to be a better ally with Christ’s help.  As a teenager in the 1980s, I was blind to sexual differences until I was part of the World Council of Churches Assembly here in Vancouver as part of a youth choir.  Craig, who sang countertenor beside me, didn’t fit my binary boxes.  At university, others claimed orientations that challenged the views of my evangelical parish.  Loving the sinner while hating the sin didn’t satisfy my theological questions.  When I went to seminary, the Church was operating on a “don’t ask, don’t tell” basis, although most of us recognized there were those in both lay and ordained leadership who were not heterosexual.  I could accept individuals but since the rules didn’t affect me directly, I didn’t see the need to challenge them.

That all changed within my first year of ordained ministry.  As a young priest at St. Paul’s, I was ministering in a neighbourhood that was devastated by AIDS and lovingly reaching out to those isolated by sickness, estrangement from family, and discrimination.  I was surprised by and slowly learned to appreciate a diversity of gender identities in the community.  At the same time, colleagues made the bold decision to come out to each other within our clergy clericus meetings.  The three parishes of St. Paul’s, Christ Church Cathedral, and St. Margaret Cedar Cottage started planning how to bring the issue of gender and equality forward in the Church.  After discussing the challenge of getting acceptance for people across the Canadian Church,  it was decided to start with same-sex blessings in the diocese.  If a couple’s relationship could be regarded as good and holy, then there would be lower barriers both ordination and marriage, doctrines decided at the national level.

The first motion to Synod in 2000 was both heartbreaking and prophetic.  Some delegates walked out on friends and colleagues.  Some members of parishes threatened to the communion while Anglicans from outside of the Diocese moved to condemnation or waited nervously for the next step.  Regional dialogues took place to explore more nuanced expressions of Scripture, tradition, and experience.  Legal battles over property, hate mail to the bishop, former friends who refused to speak to each other: these were not easy times. For more than two more years, our Anglican Church struggled and soul-searched as votes got slowly close to a majority that would get the support of the bishop to pass. In May 2002, I remember standing nine months pregnant and asking the gathering to work towards a faith community where my child would be accepted, no matter what their gender orientation.  Even after the vote to affirm same-sex blessings passed, congregations and clergy had to figure out how to support.  And we are still on the journey. 

I want to say that everyone is welcome here today.  Everyone is a beloved child of God, created in God’s infinitely beautiful and diverse image.  Everyone is welcome at this table, where we experience the reality of Jesus here among us, present in bread and wine.  And if we are still shocked by the carnality, the physical touch of his body and blood, that is a good reminder to us.  God loves us enough to get real and meet us, here and now and forever. 

Is the Church always right?  Heck, no.  And are Christians always kind and loving and tolerant of the diversity God has created?  Sadly, no.  But- and this is the good news- whoever eats of this bread and drinks of this wine will live because of Christ.  And as we do this together, we are part of the family, forgiven and loved.  We truly are.  Amen.