+ In the Love of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Today we are celebrating the Feast of the Holy Name, so it was a bit of an Emmanuel Moment this past week when I read one of the vignettes from Gail Collins’ remarkable book, When Everything Changed: The Amazing Journey of American Women from 1960 to the Present.
Gail Collins tells the story of a teacher, Jo Meyer Maasberg, who taught in a small Wyoming school. For six years she taught her daughter’s class. Here’s what her daughter Jennifer said about the experience:
“It was funny because [my mom] gave me this big speech . . . how I had to show her respect and call her Mrs. Maasberg and, you know, all on the same playing field with the other kids. But I couldn’t call her Mrs. Maasberg. I called her Mom. So my whole class called her Mom.”
When I read this I thought of a similar experience that happened with me and my son, James. Almost from the time James could call me “Dad” he called me “Bill.” That was fine with me. From my standpoint, it was natural because I always encouraged people to call me “Bill” rather than “Father Bill” or “Father Roberts.”
But some people, including Ingrid’s dad, were incensed that James didn’t call me “Dad” or by some other “fatherly” title. Eventually James explained why he called me “Bill”: “Everyone else calls you ‘Father,’ so I wanted to call you by your first name.”
A second Emmanuel Moment arrived via an op-ed piece in this past Tuesday’s New York Times, titled “Want a New You? Change Your Name.” The author is a singer and writer whose name is Alina Simone. Here’s an excerpt from her op-ed:
“In June, my band performed at a party at a Lower East Side boutique that specialized in wool ankle cuffs and sheer tunics. A few weeks later, we were playing in Brooklyn when a man approached me and said, ‘I just thought you might like to know that a friend I brought to your last show changed her name to Alina Simone.’
“I laughed and said something like, ‘Well, I hope that’s working out for her,’ but the news was a strange revelation.
“Twelve years ago, I changed my own name to Alina Simone. (I used to be Alina Vilenkin, until I swapped my father’s last name for my mother’s.) So I know that whenever someone changes her name, a body gets stuffed in the closet. When I think back to my old self, I think of an entirely different person, not altogether likable, whose singular distinguishing characteristic was the chronic inability to follow through with anything she said she would do. I picked up and abandoned projects with great regularity back then, careful to always avoid the frightening terrain where my true ambitions lay.
Then I changed my name and it changed me. In my new incarnation as Alina Simone, I had no reputation, no history of unmet expectations, nothing to lose. I started singing; I formed a band. I poured my best self into my new name.”
This story, too, triggered a memory from my own life. When I was 10 my family moved from Evanston to Kenilworth. And I decided to change the name I was called, from my middle name to my first name. I, too, wanted to leave behind the “old me” and re-invent myself, and the name change helped me do it.
Final Emmanuel Moment: As I was thinking about this sermon I recalled a wonderful reflection on prayer that the late Dutch Roman Catholic priest and writer, Henri Nouwen, had written years ago, in 1980, when I was a young priest.
In his Introduction to Prayer and the Priest, Henri Nouwen writes this:
“A few months ago I went to visit a hermit-monk to ask him for his spiritual counsel. This hermit lives a very simple life of manual work, long fasts, and unceasing prayer. His clear, shining eyes radiate the living Christ, and his lips speak only about the abundant goodness of God. I told him my troubles and struggles, my sins and my guilt. He listened attentively and responded with words of comfort and consolation. But I kept prodding him, saying: ‘Yes, but . . . What about this . . . and this . . . and this . . . Don’t you think that’s pretty bad?’ Then he looked at me critically and said: ‘It might be worse than you say and it probably is, but remember, the worst has already happened in Jesus Christ. . . . And when you make his Name into your dwelling place, your burden will be light and your yoke easy.’”
May we who have been baptized into the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, make Jesus’ Name our dwelling place in this New Year.
Amen.
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