Liberia - Day Four

Bone-jarring is the only way to describe it. Rural roads in Liberia, and over half of the urban ones, are not paved, but a reddish clay-like soil; think Georgia or Albemarle County, Virginia. Coupled with a prolonged rainy season, the roads are criss-crossed with deep, semi-permanent ruts. Think mini Grand Canyons. It's not unusual to have to back up and find an alternate route, especially if there is a disabled vehicle in the way, one that broke an axle or punctured a tire trying to negotiate the crevasses in the road.

Thursday morning's trip to Pleebo was no exception. It is nineteen miles from downtown Harper and takes about an hour to negotiate. But the trip was so worth it. For one thing we stopped at an ongoing rubber farm, one where Annie Cooper spent many of her holidays as a child. There was such a radiant look of recognition on her face as she took it all in; it was wonderful to see. At the edge of the clearing, just where the rubber trees started, there were two huge trees, which Annie identified as 'Cottonwoods,” although they are nothing like the small trees we call Cottonwoods in the plains states. These trees are huge and stately. While we were admiring them, Annie told me that they were planted especially at the boarders of villages so that those who were walking down the road would see the trees and take heart that home was not that far away.

We stopped for a time about half way to Pleebo at the rectory of St. Anthony's Roman Catholic Church to see an old friend of Paul Jones, Father Thomas Hayden, an Irishman from Boston. All this way to meet a fellow Red Sox fan; we are everywhere. Father Hayden came to Liberia as a twenty-five year old priest in 1958 and has been in Africa for over 50 years, only absent from the country during the worst of the troubles. He retired once and returned to the United States, but it wasn't home; so now he's back outside of Pleebo in a little Liberian village, pastoring a small Church. I bet he saw the Cottonwoods upon his return. Meeting Fr. Hayden was such a moving experience for me because he is a living representative of all those faithful missionaries from the west who spent their lives in places and with people they grew to love so fiercely.

In Pleebo we visited St. Stephen's Episcopal Church and School which was very uplifting. St. Stephens itself is a modest structure; it has a sound roof and new windows and doors, and it seats about 125 people. But the real exciting thing was the school. Until just a few years ago it was K-6, but has now expanded through grade 12. Although the high school is not big, it has been very successful. Last spring 14 seniors took the national exams and 12 passed; nationally, the average is about 22%. We walked around the classes; the school is laid out all on one level with each classroom exiting out into a common courtyard. Deeply concentrating on final exams, the fifth graders were bent over their papers. We were encouraged to stick our heads in and say hi. When my traveling companion Dr. Annie Cooper asked them about the first question, they were quick to recite it. When she asked for the answer we all laughed. “Don't give it away!” the teacher exclaimed.

We are leaving Harper on Friday afternoon, back to Monrovia where I will be preaching at two churches Sunday morning. There is so much to absorb about my visit in this beautiful, complicated, isolated place. I am in awe of Dr. Ajavon-Cox, who runs Smiles for Liberia. She saw 45 patients in two very long days, and she was broken-hearted to have left people untreated, some who had walked hours from their villages. There just wasn't enough time to see them all.

That there are bumpy roads ahead is a reality. Yet the resilience, the faith, the love of the Lord in this place is so strong. Those who labor in this vineyard have been challenged by the most difficult of circumstances–poverty, years of war, and chaos. They will prevail, of that I am sure. May we all keep our eyes on the Cottonwood at the end of the road.

Bumpy road ahead.

Liberia - Day Three - I am a Liberian

I am a Liberian

“Oh, you're not a Liberian,” the young woman who was checking our passports said, and it made us all chuckle. “No, but I want to be one,” I replied which brought a smile on her face, too. Dr. Ayele, Paul Jones, Anne Cooper and myself–we who make up the St. Anne's delegation–were a lot happier this morning then we were yesterday morning. Monday we arrived at the United Nations airfield in Monrovia at 6:45 with permission to hop a UN helicopter to travel to the city of Harper, Maryland County, in the southeastern corner of the country. There are no roads to speak of from Monrovia to Harper. Two priests I talked to today came back Sunday from a conference, and the last 11 hours of the trip were spent on the back of a pan-pan. So our only prospect was the UN. Dr. Ayele has come to practice two days of desperately needed dental surgery at the hospital here, and we constituted her medical team, which allowed us access to the flight. But there were so many UN military who were going down to the southern boundary of the country to help with the increasingly serious refugee situation with people fleeing The Ivory Coast, that we got bumped and drove to Cuttington University instead (see yesterday's blog).

Tuesday morning things were different. With fewer military travelers, we got on the helicopter with no problem. Sitting in a Russian military chopper in two lines just like in the war movies, with UN supplies and the personal belongings of NGO workers jammed in between, we donned our orange ear protectors and off we went. Twice we stopped at outposts to drop off personnel and supplies; finally we arrived in Harper. Flanked on two sides by the Atlantic Ocean and with one of the two largest lakes in Liberia, Harper is a beautiful city with tall palm trees and warm sandy beaches. With no one on them.

Harper, indeed Maryland County, might as well be on the moon. With the road situation so poor and no commercial airline, Harper is virtually cut off from the rest of the country. Ninety per cent of the goods coming into the city are now cut off because they come from neighboring Ivory Coast, hence the presence of the UN troops; and the border is very, very tight. A suitable road from Monrovia would solve many of the problems of this area, but the will and the funds of the government are not there. All of the Episcopal Churches in the area suffer from this problem as well. Priests don't want to come or stay, and those who are here are worked very hard. There are 39 churches, each one with satellite small chapels and seven, yes seven, priests. Each parish gets communion once every six or seven weeks; the other Sundays lay readers lead Morning Prayer. Yet so many of the people here are full of hope and expectation, and though there are rebel bullet holes in the stained glass and broken pews that were pillaged for cooking fire fuel, there is a love of Jesus in this place that is strong and firm.

Wednesday morning we traveled to the extreme southern end of the country to a place called Cavalla, where the Episcopal Church in Liberia was started in the 1830's. We visited graves of many of the America missionaries and their families who died here in the 1800's. Bishop John W. Payne, a Virginian and graduate of Virginia Theological Seminary (who the Seminary library is named after), was the first missionary bishop and served here for forty years. There are strong ties here between the Virginian Church and the one here in Maryland County, from long ago, and ones that are being formed at this very minute.

Liberia - Day Two - Tee Shirts

Dear Reader of the Rector's Blog,

After the loss of our friend and fellow St. Anne's member so suddenly last Sunday I decided to hold off on sending any blogs until today, Wednesday.

Tee Shirts

“You can run, but you can't hide.” It's a sentiment that police officers, dentists and parents have used with recalcitrants for years, and it's apparently true. I've been trying to forget a really dismal season as a faithful Redskin football team fan, when the most forgettable player of the season went zipping past me this morning, the third man riding on a motor scooter, called a pan-pan here in Liberia. Ok, so it really wasn't Portis Clinton in his #26 Redskin jersey, but it was a young Liberian wearing a replica. It made me reflect on this phenomena, which is the most ubiquitous U.S. presence throughout the developing world, the American theme tee-shirt. Wherever I have been to do this kind of work, all over the world, the most obvious things are these colorful American jerseys. This week I saw a toddler wearing a Buffalo Sabers hockey team tee much too large and a 40ish year old woman with a Little Princess tee much too small. I wonder if this is what we as a nation really want to be known around the world for, especially since all of these shirts were worn by others, indeed worn out, before they arrived in aid packages or shops selling only second-hand.

Running into Portis' shirt this morning, thankfully not actually, was while we were on our way to Cuttington University, an Episcopal school of great repute throughout Liberia, one of the shining lights of higher education. Founded in 1889 in Harper in Maryland County, the school moved from the rather isolated southeastern corner of the state to where it is now, in Bong County which is much more in the central part of the country.

With a large beautifully situated campus, Cuttington was, tragically, one of the pieces of prime real estate for the various rebel groups during (what I am calling) the reign of terror. The first of the hoodlums who took over the space as a training ground was Prince Johnson, then came Charles Taylor, and finally the property was used for over thirty thousand refugees. In complete disrepair, like so many structures and institutions, it was hard to imagine that the University could ever move out of exile (which was in Lawrence Virginia), back to the campus in Bong County. I can only imagine how disheartening it must have been for the faculty to come back and see the damage.

Today the campus is thriving once again. And it is a testimony to the perseverance of the Liberian people and the vision and perseverance of the leadership of the University. Enrollment has grown steadily in the past three years; there is now a fledgling campus television and radio station, and they are broadcasting health and other social service programs that reach widely into the community. One of the most important components to this revival is the grant awarded to Cuttington from the United States AID that allowed the University to buy three large generators. Their presence has provided power for all the needs of the school, twenty-four hours a day. In a country where electricity is scarce, this is a huge benefit. So, I thought to myself, maybe the generators balance out the tee shirts, or maybe complement them, I'm not sure. Anyway, I saw the American flags on those big heaving machines and felt proud.

Liberia - Day One

A remarkable day! Ayele, Paul and I (with a muslim driver who has four wives and twenty-five children) drove for two plus hours, the last one over some very rough dirt roads, to Robertsport to visit Marilyn Robertson, the widow of E. Bolling Robertson who was principal of St. John's school for boys and House of Bethany School for girls. He came to be a missionary in Liberia in 1945; Marilyn (everyone here calls her Mother) came in 1958. On the way back to Monrovia this afternoon Dr. Ayele told me about how the girls at the school would speculate endlessly on which female this handsome, vibrant Episcopal priest would fall in love with and marry.

When Fr. Robertson retired in 1984, he and his wife came back to Virginia. He was a Virginian born, bred, and educated; and they lived in Mechanicsville for twenty years. They visited us at St. Anne's a few times to attend funerals and other services and were always present at Diocesan events. But as Mother Robertson said they missed Liberia tremendously, and they came back in 2004. Fr Bolling was weakening, and rather then go into a nursing home, they came back to Liberia to be cared for by their friends (more like family) here in Robertsport. He died in 2006 and is buried high up on the bluff overlooking his school and the Atlantic Ocean. There could be no more peaceful spot, or fitting last few years, for this remarkable man. Now Marilyn lives alone in this beautiful place, surrounded by young people who adore her, many of whom are children and even grandchildren of students of St. John's. She seems very content in this small, beautiful corner of the world. I admire and respect this couple and their work greatly, and it is heartbreaking to see that the schools were destroyed during the war years and that there are no students there now.

On our trip back we stopped at a fishing village of Ghanians to buy dried fish. It was a wonderful place, full of children playing and women tending wood fires that were under pieces of huge oil drums covered with odd pieces of tarp to keep the smoke in. In the pungent aroma and colorful sights of adults and children alike wearing second-hand American tee-shirts, it was a thrill to watch Dr. Ayele first haggle over the price of fish, then make lasting friends by enquiring about them and their children. When he asked what they were doing to care for the health of their families, I thought Dr. Ayele was going to jump out of the car and demand that a Coca Cola truck take it's cargo back where they came from. "These children are malnourished" she exclaimed through gritted teeth, "and they give them coke!" She and Father Hipolito in the DR have a lot in common, and I again thought in wonder and gratitude about these amazing people who care so deeply.

On our way back to the city we were stopped at checkpoints twice, and it was apparent that unscrupulous individuals in uniform wanted money before we could pass. But Dr. Ayele was great, refused to be cowed, did a little dressing down of the men, and we were quickly on our way. As you can see my admiration for this woman grows by the minute.

Monrovia is a lively city teeming with people, all doing business in the streets, selling everything from knock-off designer basketball shoes to car fenders. Shanty communities all around the city are evidence of the thousands of people who moved in from the distant villages to escape the ravages of the war lords during the years of terror. As much as things have changed in the last five years (I am told) it seems like this country is holding her breath, especially now with thousands of refugees flooding across the boarder from The Ivory Coast. But more about that later, for now I need to prepare for a busy day of Church tomorrow.

Fr. Jim

Our task now is to continue to move in the direction of full equality and inclusion.

"It seems to me that love must, by its essential nature, be always unconditional. We welcome Katharine Jefferts Schori to this pulpit because we love our sisters and brothers in the Episcopal Church of the United States; not because she is female, or a woman bishop ahead of us, or has permitted a practicing lesbian to become a bishop. (As it happens she couldn’t have stopped it after all the legal and proper canonical electoral processes resulted in the election and nomination.) We welcome her because she is our sister in Christ."

These are the words of the Dean of the Cathedral of Southwark who felt compelled, and with good reason, to introduce the visiting preacher and presider of the Eucharist at the Cathedral's main service this last Sunday. An invitation to Bishop Katharine had been extended over a year ago. The Very Rev. Colin Slee went on to explain that he had not for a moment, in light of the recent events in the international Church, considered retracting her invitation.

It has been reported that the Archbishop of Canterbury asked the Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church of the United States of America not to wear her mitre, the head covering of a bishop, and not to carry the universal symbol of a bishop's authority: the staff, or crozier. Bishop Katharine has not, to my knowledge, commented on the accuracy of this statement, but it was noted by those present that she carried, but did not don, her mitre, and her crozier was not in sight. Apparently, with the approaching Synod of the Church of England, where the consecration of women as bishops will be a major topic, Archbishop Williams did not want to fan any flames. It strikes me that, with knowledge of the legend of Nero's musical endeavors as most of Rome burned, for the Archbishop to concern himself with the accouterments of our Presiding Bishop while the Church of England, and indeed the entire Anglican Communion, is facing such a monumental change is a misguided waste of energy.

Returning to Dean Slee, it comes to mind that he represents those in the Church of England who understand that power and control are not the central issues of Christianity…rather, it is seeing each other as brothers and sisters in Christ.

It might be worth recounting, briefly, how we got to this point. I am aware that there are many who did not hear my sermon last Sunday, which attempted to do just that, and that several who were there asked afterward if I would put it in print, so they could consider my description with more time.

As I said in sermon last Sunday, we can trace the kind of controversy which now absorbs the energy of the Church back to its very beginnings, with the differences between the Churches in Jerusalem and those in what we now call Asia Minor. James, brother of Jesus and a Jewish/Christian (not the best term, but will have to do), on the one side and Paul, originally from Tarsus located in modern Turkey, on the other. Inclusion was the key issue then, too. The point of contention: did followers of Jesus first have to be practicing Jews?

We can now move a good deal closer to home. Culture and the Protestant Church have always been deeply intertwined. Martin Luther, John Calvin, and Queen Elizabeth I were all leaders in the European churches that broke away in the sixteenth century from Rome. Unlike Roman Catholics and most reform Churches (Anabaptists,Quakers, Mennonites), European Churches embraced a strong relationship between the culture and religion. Accordingly, it is not surprising that many in these Churches were at the forefront of the immense, worldwide societal changes of the middle 1960's.

Yet in the Episcopal Church of that time, ardently held opinions battled with each other. Spokesmen for the two “factions” were Bishop John Hines and Bishop Stephen Bayne, each a strong contender in the 1964 election for the new presiding bishop. Hines won and in many ways the die was cast. Bayne was a conservative Anglo-Catholic who had been a major voice in the futile attempt to persuade the House of Bishops to declare the Bishop of California, James Pike, a heretic. Hines, on the other hand, was a social liberal who fought for civil rights, the ordination of women, and equality for African Americans in the Church. (Episcopal seminaries in the south had been segregated until the middle 1950's.)

Thus began a very difficult time for the Episcopal Church. In the 1970's, controversy around women's ordination and changes in the Prayer Book shook both congregations and Church leadership. When I was in seminary in the 1980's, it was the use of inclusive language in worship that created stress. It was at the same time the issue of full inclusion of gay and lesbian people became important and divisive.

Many who had felt pushed by changes they could not stop were very upset about the prominence this discussion began to take on. With the election of Gene Robinson as the Bishop of New Hampshire and the ratification of his election by Church leadership at the General Convention in 2003, many conservative Episcopalians felt they could no longer, in good conscience, be part of the Church.

So they left, but in their leaving did several significant things. They courted, and aligned themselves with, conservative Anglicans in Africa. They decided, at least here in Virginia, to refuse to leave the church buildings in which they had worshiped, forcing a wrenching and costly showdown. More on that in a bit.

Now, with international involvement - the Churches in Nigeria, Uganda, and Rwanda - the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, got involved. Fearing that the Anglican Communion worldwide (WWAC) was in danger of falling apart, as the Churches in Canada and the U.S. were moving to bring gays and lesbians into full participation in the life of the Church, Archbishop Williams called a group of Anglican leaders together to create a document called the Windsor Report. The Report would both define what it was to be part of the WWAC and provide a way to move forward in the midst of all the angst.

It was during this time that nine of the 180 parishes in Virginia decided to leave the Episcopal Church. They found a "home" in several different Churches in Africa, with several American priests leaving the Episcopal Church to be ordained bishops in these new "homes." They then returned from Africa to lead other U.S. churches that had separated from the Episcopal Church. All this in direct violation of the Windsor Report. At the 2006 General Convention, the newly elected Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church, Katharine Jefferts Schori, asked for and received a vote that effectively became a moratorium on the election of gay, partnered priests to the episcopacy (a bishop). This moratorium was honored until after the General Convention of 2009. In the spring of 2010 the Diocese of Los Angeles elected The Rev. Mary Glasspool as Bishop Suffragan and the majority of the rest of the Church affirmed her in short order.

This has created real problems for the Archbishop of Canterbury. He has tried his hardest to maintain a status quo, although his reasons for doing so are not entirely clear. It is apparent that there are major differences in fundamental issues between Anglicans, not only across continents but also within the United States, Australia, Canada, and South Africa. That many such differences have existed in the past, and that the Church has survived these times, seems to escape the Archbishop and others who find the changes that are happening a threat.

This past week a letter was issued to scholars and other leaders in the Episcopal Church who have been involved in two ecumenical study groups. They were informed that their memberships were "discontinued." Other than Bishop Robinson's exclusion from the last Lambeth Conference (an every ten-year gathering of all the Bishops in the WWAC) in England, this is the first time to my knowledge that such a thing has happened. It has created something of a “constitutional crisis” in a group which has no constitution. We will have to wait and see what follows.

Getting back to the issues of the Diocese of Virginia. When the nine congregations voted to leave the Episcopal Church they also decided to lay claim to the church buildings, even though there is canon (church) law passed by the General Convention in the mid 1970's, and centuries of tradition in hierarchical churches (those lead by ordained bishops), to the contrary. Designating themselves the Anglican District of Virginia (ADV), a district of the Convocation of Anglican Nigerians in America (CANA), these congregations rested their claim on an 1867 Virginia statute that addressed property rights determined upon a division within a church or religious society.

The Diocese of Virginia eventually had to sue these churches for access to its property. Advocates for the Diocese argued that the 1867 statute did not apply to a hierarchical church. A circuit court judge agreed with ACV; the five-member Virginia Supreme Court agreed with the Diocese. There will now be a series of proceedings to establish rights in and to the property, essentially back to where we were two years ago.

Except we're not back where we were. In reality, the landscape is continuing to change. Civil jurisdictions such as the District of Columbia and the State of Iowa are changing their marriage laws. Conservative, nationally known lawyers are arguing before the California Supreme Court to repeal Proposition 8 (banning homosexual marriage). With increasing clarity and conviction, the rightful place of gay and lesbian folks, right here in the mix with everybody, is being more firmly established.

Our task now is to continue to move in the direction of full equality and inclusion. Which for many means finding a way to include those with whom we have struggled, and those who have kept silent.

Edwin Markham, a poet and educator in California in the late early 1900s, apparently knew a lot about being left out. He once wrote a poem called “Outwitted.” Indeed.

He drew a circle that shut me out--

Heretic, a rebel, a thing to flout.
But Love and I had the wit to win:
We drew a circle that took him in!