Six weeks into the church year, I have realized that I am the minister of a church where things usually go wrong. The copy machine jams. …[The order of service] has been copied with the second page first and also upside down. No one remembered to turn on the lights in the sanctuary before the service starts, so it is dark because it's raining out. The microphone is buzzing and lets out a painful, high pitched squeal, which makes people wince. We have just started the service when someone runs up with a bunch of flowers for the altar, just as someone else runs up with a silk arrangement we keep for the mornings when no one brings real flowers. There is laughter as the two flower bearers meet at the altar. They decide on the real flowers and things settle down for a while until a baby starts crying, which sets off another baby crying.…I want it to be quiet and holy and lovely and things are definitely not shaping up that way.

The woman helping with worship gets up and …introduces the candle-lighting time [too early]. People call out, 'Not yet!'. More laughter. The organist starts playing the wrong hymn and a couple of choir members yell over the din for him to stop. A few minutes later, during the time for prayerful silence, he falls onto the keyboard by accident, causing the organ to emit horrible, gassy noises. Shrieks and snorts of laughter. All pretense of Sunday morning decorum is lost…

…I imagine God looking up or down or over or out at us from wherever God sits on Sunday mornings, slightly amazed and maybe at a loss for words because we are so funny and wonderful and odd all at the same time. In these moments I imagine God as a sturdy old woman with her hands on her hips or, perhaps, as a rabbi pulling on his long white beard. I imagine a God shaking his or her head and saying, 'What in the world are they doing over there?'…

But I also imagine a God…who is moved by our attempts to care for one another and to name the things we know as holy. There is a warmth in this congregation…a love that makes the ragged edges smooth. I have always wanted to believe that our mistakes aren't the most important parts of us. I have always wanted to believe that kindness and compassion matter more than anything. I sense that I can learn this here.

Beatitudes for a Constructive Community
Sermon by Rev. Kathleen McTigue, Homecoming Sunday, September 9, 2002

Now, I have chosen this excerpt for our reading this Homecoming Sunday for a particular reason. It isn't because I want to imply that everything goes wrong here on Sunday morning; in fact very little generally goes wrong, and about half the times when it does go wrong it turns out better than what we planned for anyway. Nor did I choose that reading to encourage us to feel smug about the differences between USNH and the congregation described (although it's true that neither Bill nor Linda has ever, ever fallen on the keyboard during our time of silent meditation).

I chose the excerpt because of the reminder it can offer us as we start our congregational year together with more than the usual amount of chaos. Our religious home is a construction zone this year, and as some of you can testify because of past experiences in your family homes, living in a construction zone is sometimes not so pleasant, to put it very politely. In even the calmest and most serene of times, things can go awry and mistakes can be made, and there is no stretch of the imagination that could let us declare that these are the calmest and most serene of times.

Mistakes will be made, and even when something is actually not a mistake but just the way things are, it will sometimes look like a mistake. Like, for instance, sometimes the sound system will be patched together with a loaner, and our coffee will arrive in boxes from Dunkin' Doughnuts, and we will have to answer nature's call in a porta-potty. Our longed-for handicapped accessibility will seem like a bad joke for a couple of weeks. Some extra mud will be tracked into the halls; some doors and windows will even be missing for a while; and as its walls slowly rise up, our new sanctuary will doubtless surprise or mystify us once in a while.

There will be times when we do not feel that we even remotely have our collective act together, and like Elea Kemler in the first weeks of her first congregation, we will feel as though almost nothing is unfolding according to plan. And that's why I wanted to use her words for our reading this morning. Because what's most familiar to me in reading about that congregation is the saving grace of their laughter together. Our foibles are different ones from theirs, but Lord knows we've got them, at least our fair share of them. And what saves us every time is exactly what saves them. We're saved by our laughter. We're saved by our love for one another, and our love for this sometimes muddled, sometimes chaotic community that keeps reaching toward what is mysterious and holy.

We've been laying big plans together for three full years now, and the realization of those plans is in the construction zone all around us. It isn't an accident and it isn't a mistake: it's a concrete testimony to what we're up to as we turn our faces toward the future. But if we're going to walk into that future singing, with joyful voices and full hearts, what will count the most is the loving attention we bring to each day, each moment that shapes our path there.

It's not easy living in a construction zone. Tempers might get short; anxiety might run high; exasperation will periodically creep into even the ministers' voices. So I want to provide you with a few reminders to carry into these coming days together, in the hope that they will guide us over the rough spots. In an attempt to reinforce the sobering importance of these reminders I have borrowed from the Christian beatitudes and created a new version. I am calling these the 'Beatitudes for a Constructive Community". *

Blessed are the greeters, for they shall lighten the hearts of the anxious and bring good tidings to those of sour countenance. They shall be as a light unto the confused and shall bring a strong arm to those who stumble. They vieweth chaos with a light heart, yea, and they respondeth, 'Well, it'll probably go better next Sunday'. They shall be called good sports.

Blessed are the patient, who standeth in line for a portajohn and weepeth not nor gnasheth their teeth. They murmur not nor do they complain at construction delays, for their faith is strong, and they refuseth to grow tense and surly. They shall doubtless enjoy good health and long lives.

Blessed are the strangers, who seek out the Great Congregation for the nourishment of their souls, who journey down the Hartford Turnpike and turn into the drive and are not dismayed. Verily, they who have eyes to see can recognize new life arising, despite appearances, and their hearts are glad within them.

Blessed are they who weareth their name tags on the Sabbath, yea, even on the days when nametags must be sought out in the high places and in the low places and are difficult to find. Blessed are they who persevere, who findeth and weareth, for they shall be called by their proper names and shall be known to many who might otherwise not have a clue.

Blessed are they who speak to a new person on the Sabbath, who fear not, yea, who stretcheth forth their hands in friendship and who then stay to chat; for they shall not lack for company. Their names shall be called blessed by those who are shy, and they shall never lack for good and cheery company.

Blessed are they who delighteth in the children, who smite their brows in sudden remembrance and cry out, 'Oh! I forgot to sign up to teach R.E.!', for they shall be called wise, and shall deepen in wisdom -- and patience -- even as they teach.

Blessed are they who arise early on the Sabbath, who attend meetings or teachers' trainings or choir practice with a light in their eyes and a smile on their lips, while yet showing kindness to those who achieveth not the goal of being morning people.

Blessed are they who lighteth the chalice and stand forth as service leaders, who tremble not, neither do they quake, who signeth up in eagerness without even being asked, who boldly show their countenance and speak their word before the Great Congregation, for they shall be listened to in gladness.

Among the very most blessed are those who hunger and thirst for the coffee hour, who arise early on the Sabbath to ensure that there shall be a coffee hour, who prepareth the morning libation with love in their hearts, for they shall be called saintly and their names shall be spoken in gladness.

Blessed are they who cleave to their sense of humor, for they shall find an island of good laughs amidst the sea of confusion, and will always get the cosmic joke.

So as we walk together into this new congregational year -- this new, chaotic, disorienting, constructive, exciting congregational year -- may we remember the Beatitudes. All of us are blessed: we are blessed by what we receive here, and we bless by what we offer of ourselves. AMEN

* I offer the Beatitudes with a nod to Rev. Dick Gilbert and all the others who have messed with the Beatitudes before me!