Pastoral Letter
Pastoral Letter
January, 2007
Pastoral Letter from the Bishop of San Diego
Make Glad Your Hearts…
Grace and peace to you from God our Father and our Lord Jesus Christ.
It was probably the first baby shower. Strangely enough they sent their husbands out to shop and deliver the gifts to the new mother of the king. That explains why their gifts were so impractical; gold, frankincense, and myrrh. Why didn’t they bring diapers, formula, or a baby seat for that tired donkey? Perhaps, the Christmas t-shirt is right, “Three Wise Men? You can’t be serious.” But we are serious. These three wise men or kings come because they must come. They had seen in the stars and heard in the stories that in the birth of this infant king all of creation would be made new and so they must come and be present.
In the summer and in the midst of cavitations within our church about our recent General Convention, I wrote a pastoral letter that was read throughout our churches calling us to be a community of Good News. I prayed that we might ever more live into the hope in Jesus made manifest in the resurrection, the meaning of this new life given to us as children of God in baptism, and our purpose shared in servant ministry by assuaging the hurt and suffering of the world.
As I travel throughout our diocese, I am greeted by an awakening of this community of Good News, this community of hope, meaning, and purpose. I see the hope of new life at an AIDS Day service in Escondido where people who have never come to an Episcopal Church find hope in a new family of love even as they confront a dreaded disease. In my visitations, we renew our baptismal vows and remember that we are daughters and sons of God, creations of inestimable value and meaning. I join you in Tijuana to serve children whose parents are in prison, visit with homeless at ECS’s Friend to Friend Clubhouse downtown, and go to El Salvador where our partnership with Episcopal Relief and Development is building clinics, new housing, and new lives.
As we enter into the season of Epiphany, the season in which the revelation of Jesus Christ is made manifest, we give thanks that these wise men found the baby Jesus. We remember that we are singularly about being the community of Jesus which is simply about living into being the community of Good News. We have received the three gifts of hope, meaning and purpose. Like wise men of old, they may at first blush seem impractical, but they are the eternal gifts that our King has given us and we must give them as our principle mission.
The birth and manifestation of Jesus was an occasion for travel to a sacred place to worship, to learn of Jesus, and to depart to tell the story. I invite you to make our 33rd Diocesan Convention a time of Epiphany. We will gather for two days of worship and wonder. We will learn new ways to be the community of Good News. And we will depart to carry more dearly the story of salvation to those who are lost and lonely, even each other. I feel blessed to share with you as our keynote speaker, The Very Rev. Terry White, Dean of Holy Trinity and Grace Cathedral in Kansas City. Terry is a man of great spiritual depth, prayer, and love. He has been my most valued spiritual companion over many years of ministry.
We come together as family. We come together as a community of Good News. We come together like folks for a baby shower with our own gifts. Yet in this gathering we give and receive. And that is who we are, how we are and how we are becoming. We will sing forth the words of hope, meaning, and purpose, found in that familiar Epiphany hymn:
The people who in darkness walked have seen a glorious light; On them broke forth the heavenly dawn who dwelt in death and night. And we pray the words of the Epiphany blessing as our three gifts received and given of this season and of our lives. May Almighty God, who led the Wise Men by the shining of a star to find the Christ, the Light from Light, lead you also, in your pilgrimage, to find the Lord. May God, who sent the Holy Spirit to rest upon the Only-begotten at his baptism in the Jordan River, pour out that Spirit on you who have come to the waters of new birth. May God, by the power that turned water into wine at the wedding feast at Cana, transform your lives and make glad your hearts.
Faithfully,
The Rt. Rev. James R. Mathes
Bishop of San Diego