Pentecost XVII - Sunday September 24th, 2006
(by Rev. Glenn Brown)
Last week I told a story about a community. I don’t know what you made of the story, and I’m not going to bring it back to make a particular point, save to say that, in Biblical terms, there is purpose to community, a chosen quality, and that it is important for a church to discern that purpose, that quality. It is more than, and sometimes quite different from, the sum of the individual purposes that people bring to community. I think that, in addition to the sum of your individual purposes, there is the purpose or purposes which God has for the community.
I think that the unique quality of the church community is the presumption of trust that people feel they can have. Think about it: people bring their children to church school to be taught faith and morals and ethics by people who may be complete strangers. Why is this possible? It is because, notwithstanding all the examples of abuse that do go on in some churches, people still presume that those who would teach religion to children are fundamentally well disposed to their children, and will do good to them and teach them about God. I know that people, when you hear the appeal for teachers, may think of the task as a major drain on your time. But what an honour it is! The honour is there not necessarily because you are an honourable individual (though doubtless you are), but because you are part of an honourable religion, and an honourable church. I’m sure the same may be said of the Girl Guides and CGIT, and the volunteers for VBS this past summer.
I think often about this honourableness and I think about other life situations which could be aided by the honourable, trustworthy quality of church members. We are, almost by definition, the exact kind of group which is needed by so many people.
Let me give some examples. Footprints, as you know, provides respite care for children in the autistic spectrum. We train volunteers, and have a qualified coordinator. Children in this group have greater or lesser difficulty “reading” other people, making their conversation or other responses appropriate to communications from others, and sometimes, being comfortable with the usual sounds and noises of the daily world. What our volunteers do together with them is quite tailored and specific. It involves a very engaged level of attention to the world of each individual, on the child’s terms. (I have in past sermons compared it with God’s attention to us.)
Now it is not difficult to perceive that the children who as they grow continue to be very limited in their ability to engage the world as independent people, will need other people. It is the need for other people that I want to discuss.
This grade 4 boy has difficulty finding friends. If there are among us families who would be willing to encourage their own son to try to develop a friendship with him, that would be wonderful.
But, to look at this matter as a community, and to look at the matter in a broader perspective, consider this: what if an autistic child is a member of a family where there are no aunts, uncles, or adult cousins, and no older sibling. A terrible accident occurs to the parents, causing either death or such disablement that they can no longer carry on their affairs. What will be needed will be not only financial management, something which can be arranged through a number of legal processes. What else will be needed will be people who have already known the child, people in whose company he is comfortable and by whom he is accepted; people who will be available to help him carry on life, aside from the issues of housing and sustenance. This is a critical need for many families. Here we are, a community. An honoured community. Shouldn’t people be able to look to us for such help?
Recently I met with several families to hear a presentation by PLAN (Planned Lifetime Advocacy Networks), a group of parents of disabled children who try to find and develop such supportive communities for their children. They deem it possible to assemble such networks only for the late teen years and beyond, because families of younger children so often are highly transient. Well, that’s a long time to be lonely. Some of the families are quite bitter about how difficult it has been socially so far for their children. What they need is stable community life who will stay with them. An honoured community.
If you think about this, the need will not necessarily be this alone. Let us assume that things go well for everyone and that the child grows into adulthood and gains some significant independence, and the parents grow old and eventually need caring for, at a level that is beyond the ability of the adult child. Now there is need not only for continued monitoring of the adult child, but also of the parents, and, of course, their offspring cannot perform this role. For those who do not have family to take on this responsibility, who? Do not expect the provincial trustee to be able to do it. But what if there were, among an honoured community, people who organized themselves, with all the appropriate diligence and legal advice and financial advice and medical advice, for the purpose of making this level of care and concern available, not necessarily to just those already in the community, but those unaffiliated? (The model I have in mind was known in the early nineteenth century as the Memorial Societies, groups who joined together by subscription to ensure that proper burials were arranged for you no matter your other circumstances at the time.) Wouldn’t anyone who was in need of such care be overjoyed to know that there were such trustworthy groups around, to whom they could confidently turn over their future, confident not only that legal, medical, and financial matters would be attended competently, but that their social needs would be met as well, and their offspring’s?
Let me draw the final line leading to the honoured community. There are many people who are growing old, who have no family connection at all. Typically, such people find a law firm or friends, or younger offspring of friends, with whom to arrange their care when they are no longer independent. But you know not everyone knows a law firm they are sure they can trust; not everyone has friends who would do such a thing, nor whose offspring would. What for them? In this age when ever increasing numbers of people live alone by choice, and live longer, this will be a critical issue for some. What a joy to be able to turn to an honoured community.
Looking at Peter’s description of the church, a chosen people, a holy priesthood, once no people, now God’s people, what do we think we should make of this status? This chosenness? What should we do with this quality which God bestows upon us? Well, here are some needs we can be aware of. Would you think about these matters, and pray about them?
