July 27, 2025: As above, so may it be below

Sermon
Full Service

John Bellaimey

As above, so may it be below

Sermon for July 27, 2025

St John’s, John Bellaimey

Jesus prayed a lot. Usually alone. What he said in his conversations with God is mostly unknown, but when he got back from his quiet time with the Holy One, his followers asked him what they should say when talking to “Our Father.”

May your reign come on Earth just as it is in heaven. May your longings be our longings. May we forgive as quickly and wisely as you do, because there is no greater justice or mercy than yours.

That’s pretty much it. All the versions of the Our Father are brief and basically say, as above, may it be so below.

Church is just a bunch of people following this rule and a bunch more rules that they have made up which we hope will help us with this rule.

We have a building. We have sacraments. We have programs for education and programs for doing justice and mercy, the two famous qualities of God from the Bible. In terms of consecutive hours spent doing something, the biggest program we have here is for teenagers: the pilgrimage.

My wife Lynnell and I came back two weeks ago from this summer’s youth Pilgrimage. We were chaperones, there to keep five sixteen-year-olds safe and accompany them on their journey. Here we are outside Nelson Mandela’s Soweto home.

A pilgrimage has a serious purpose: to go somewhere to learn something important about ourselves while traveling to a place where something valuable is there to be learned.

A year ago, our ninth graders chose to go to South Africa. Why? They said it was important to learn about how to change a racist world. That they admired the little they knew about how South Africa was able, without a war, to begin to end the cruel ways of apartheid. Archbishop Desmond Tutu and President Nelson Mandela created the famous Truth and Reconciliation Commission based on the simple idea that if people of all races confessed the evil they did, publicly, and expressed what John the Baptist called repentance, the country would forgive them. Our ninth graders thought that made a lot of sense. The pilgrims wanted to learn about how to do justice in the world, and to practice walking what we call The Way of Love. Here are some examples of what we did:

we played with children and teens in the village of Morija after they sang and danced for us.

we followed the cool young adults who took us into the poorest part of Soweto and explained how governments then and now have failed to care for their people. And then taught us how to cook chakalaka. And chicken feet.

we avoided potholes, riding bikes uphill to a viewpoint where a proud son of Soweto could show us the city he loves spread out below.

we heard the story of high school kids fifty years ago who went on strike, marching arm in arm in the streets to demand an end to minority rule. We had dinner with a woman whose 12 year old brother was killed that day by police Later, we talked about when and why we have protested and might have to again.

we stood where prisoners of conscience once endured being treated worse than animals.

we hung out with fifty little children and their loving teachers at the orphanage in Lesotho from which Heather and Chris adopted Acacia.

and we also practiced getting better at just being present by having left smart phones at home.

St. John’s never asks members for a bigger commitment than fourteen straight days and nights. The Easter Vigil is just a couple of hours. Same with making or serving dinner at First Nations Kitchen. Convention delegates go away together for a couple of days. Vestry retreats and this weekend’s camping trip are the same.

Why do we take our young people away for so long, and usually go so far away? There’s no physical ordeal to go through, really, though jet lag and flight delays are no fun, but pilgrimage is no 40 days of fasting in the desert or 4 days alone in the woods. But in another sense, this pilgrimage was a kind of initiation from my point of view. The pilgrims were squirrely, fun-loving, kind boys when we left, and now I can actually see them as adults.

They tidied without being nagged. They put dishes in the dishwasher. They were nice to strangers. They listened, and even shared during group conversations when us adults stopped jabbering long enough to listen. They tried strange foods. They even allowed me to tell them the facts of life one day before lunch: When a mommy chicken and a daddy chicken love each other very much… but then they were too embarrassed to let me finish.

I am so glad we got to share those two weeks with these five young men, and the other adult leaders. Helping the next generation is maybe the most important thing I can do in the church, in my political party, and in my family. I suspect most of you would agree. And it would be great if ten or twenty more adults would volunteer to help with youth group, Sunday School, Children’s Chapel, confirmation, the Centennial Social Justice initiative, the Christmas pageant, kids’ choirs, and all the other programs we host.

As above, so may it be below. On Earth as it is in Heaven. As St Paul says, these roots don’t simply grow themselves. This foundation has to be dug and the forms hammered together.

The next generation is the most precious resource we’ve been given.