hope

Following the Good Shepherd

by

The whole world watched in great anticipation as we all stared at the chimney over the Sistine Chapel in Rome. The smoke rolls out white, but then quickly turns black. No pope. Twice we lived this anticipation. And then, finally, the smoke stayed white. Roman Catholics around the world rejoiced as the new Pope stepped out on the balcony to bless the crowds around the world.

While Old Catholics do not have a pope, we watched with excitement too. The process of electing a pope is shrouded in mystery and intrigue. And who doesn’t like a good mystery and a surprise ending?

This Sunday we listen to the story of Paul and Barnabas and how they faced persecution for preaching the Gospel to the Jews. We see the moment when they decided to turn toward the Gentiles to preach the message to them. The Gentiles embraced the message almost immediately. And they embraced it with great joy.

Two thousand years after Jesus called himself the Good Shepherd, we shepherds of the church continue to follow in his footsteps. We should all strive to follow the Good Shepherd and to put our faith and trust in him. Paul and Barnabas showed us that despite the persecution they endured, they remained steadfast in their faith.

There are times when I am disheartened by the lack of faith of most people who claim to be Christians. They put their faith in money, power, personality cults, and possessions. Sadly, all those things will pass away and rot. They will not be there for you when your life is over. Only faith in Jesus remains.

And so many people claim to have faith but fail to care for one another. They fail to care for the poor, the widow, and the orphan. Instead, they seek out riches and power. They are filling to trade the eternal for the fleeting.

As a Shepherd, it is my job to call the sheep back into the fold. It is my job to call those who stray to repentance. And many people see that as judgmental, however, it is our call as shepherds. Jesus called out those who failed to live up to the Gospel. He called out the religious leaders of his day who had sold out their faith for the temporary power given them by Rome. And Jesus routinely called them out for their lack of faith.

Today, I pray you will listen and hear me. Trump will not get you to heaven. Money, power, and possessions will not get you to heaven. Only faith in the divine will get you to heaven.

So, I pray you stop focusing on the things that will pass away and heed the call to set your mind on things that are eternal!

Pax et Bonum,

Bishop Greer

A new way to be Catholic

by

Building an affirming and accepting parish in the Deep South is difficult work. And sometimes it feels like we are like the disciples in this Sunday’s Gospel. The disciples knew they were in Jesus’ presence, but they also wanted to ask to make sure it was Jesus. However, they were afraid.

It is scary to stand on the front lines of the battle being waged in our nation. People are afraid of the changes happening in our world today, and many do not feel safe to speak up. I understand that fear and it is natural. Not everyone is called to stand on the front lines. There needs to be people ready to continue the fight for the moral soul of the nation when those of us on the front lines are gone.  

Our parish has committed to being a safe space for all those who are marginalized, abused, and neglected in our world. It is not easy, but it is our commitment. We have been fighting for the rights of all people for decades and will continue to fight as long as we have breath in our lungs.

We cannot do this work without you!

I know some of you are scared to be seen in a progressive church. Some are leery to be in the church after the abuse and marginalization they have experienced in the past.  This too is understandable.

Here at Saint Francis Parish and Outreach, we are trying to build something different. We are a different way to be Catholic. We are not bound by the dogmatic nature of the Roman Catholic Church. Furthermore, we are an open, accepting, and affirming parish that seeks to be a safe space for all people.

Like I said, we need you to continue our work. We need you to come be an active part of our parish. We need you to financially support the work we do. Not only that, but we cannot continue to offer the services and safe space we do without you.

Our parish needs to raise $1200 in the next couple of weeks to pay our liability insurance, prepare for the Augusta Pride fest in June, and to continue providing the online services we offer.

Even more than that, we need you to come and support our parish in person. You can become a lector, acolyte, or greeter in our church. As we grow, there will be more and more things to do in the parish. And that is where you can help out!

Consider today becoming a part of a new way to be Catholic!

Pax et Bonum,

Bishop Greer

Pope Francis and Divine Mercy

by

As I watched the transition of the earthly remains of Pope Francis from the chapel in the Casa Santa Marta to Saint Perer’s Basilica, I am reminded of the very humble and simple man that he was. He lived the real-life version of Divine Mercy in his daily life. He was not afraid to have hard conversations with people and with the Curia.

He called on us to show love and compassion to all people, including those so marginalized in society such as LGBTQIA+ individuals, women, immigrants, and the poor and homeless. He embraced those who were disabled and those who struggled in their daily lives.

He did not shirk away from extending his hand to those who needed love the most. One of the things that frustrated the Swiss Guard and the conservatives in the church was that he would disappear from the Vatican to go out into Rome to serve the poor and homeless. He washed the feet of transgender individuals on Holy Thursday in an act of compassion and understanding.

He embraced those who were sick without concern for his own wellbeing. He was a modern version of Saint Francis of Assisi, our patron saint. He may have been a Jesuit, but to many of us Franciscans, he was one of us.

This Sunday we will honor his life and legacy at our parish. We will pray for the repose of his soul and pray that God blesses us with a new Bishop of Rome who will follow in Pope Francis’ footsteps. We may not be Roman Catholic, but as Old Catholics, Pope Francis spoke our language. He understood what it meant to be a pastor, shepherd, and still be a normal human being.

I pray you will join us for this celebration and to learn about the Divine Mercy of our Savior as Pope Francis understood it.

Eternal rest grant unto Pope Francis, O Lord. And let perpetual light shine upon him. May his soul and all the souls of the faithful departed rest in peace. Amen.

Pax et Bonum,

Bishop Greer

Do you follow Jesus or the ruler of a nation?

by

As I have watched the things happening in our country, especially the illegal and unconstitutional disappearing of American Citizens, I cannot help but see the parallels to the stories we read this week. Jesus was arrested for speaking up for the poor, homeless, widows, orphans, and those seen as less than the religious and civil leaders of his day.

His message was simple, all people deserve to be loved and are loved by God. This message so threatened the religious establishment of his day that they plotted to have him arrested and killed. And they succeeded. They were willing to lie and to twist the truth to make it happen. And the civil government at the time gave them the “legal” cover to do just that.

Rumeysa Ozturk, a Tuffs University student, was arrested by ICE agents who hid their faces so as to not be identified for the crime of writing an opinion piece for her school newspaper calling for an end to the genocide in Palestine. That was her only crime: Empathy.

Ozturk was one of dozens of students ICE has detained or deported to extermination camps in El Salvador simply for speaking out against war and genocide and standing up for peace. (See https://time.com/7272060/international-students-targeted-trump-ice-detention-deport-campus-palestinian-activism/)

The case of Kilmar Abrego Garcia is another example of the current regime using lies and false testimony to go after peaceful citizens of our nation. He is a father of a child and a husband who has no gang ties, yet the government used false information to claim that he was. Judges have rules that he was not a gang member and was not to be sent to El Salvador. However, this regime refused to obey the courts, failed to abide by the law and sent him to die in a prison in El Salvador.

Many Christians this week will stand in church and listen hypocritically to the readings about Jesus’ passion. They will fake tears over the betrayal, false testimony, and abuse Jesus suffered. All the while, they support that very same treatment against people they see as less than themselves. They will cheer on the Ruler of our nation when he calls for American citizens to be sent to those same prisons in El Salvador. And many of them will rail about how I should be sent there too for speaking the truth of the Gospel.

This week should be a wakeup call to many Christians in the former United States of America. They should see the hypocrisy of weeping for Jesus’ false imprisonment, fake trial, and ultimate murder by civil and religious leaders for the crime of calling for love and empathy toward their fellow human being.

I am calling on you today to search your heart and soul. Are you living the message of Jesus or are you giving away your birthright to a ruler of a nation? Are you standing up against war, genocide, and abuse or are you cheering it on?

Now is the time to open your hearts rather than harden them. It is time to live the Gospel, not just give it lip service.

Pax et Bonum,

Bishop Greer

Palm Sunday: Forgiveness

by

In our final part of the series on Becoming a Resisting Church, we have to ask ourselves what we should do when everything else we do to change hearts and minds fails. We can do everything right and we can still fail to make a difference in the world around us.

The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. reminds us that we are called by the Christ to forgive those who continue to walk a path of hatred and abuse. Dr. King says:

“In other words, forgiveness is not a matter of quantity, but a matter of quality. One cannot forgive four hundred and ninety times without it becoming a part of the habit structure of one’s being. Forgiveness is not an occasional act; it is a permanent attitude. This was what Jesus taught his disciples.” (Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Chapter 5: Love in Action.)

In our Gospel reading this Sunday we read about the great betrayal and denial by Saint Peter. During all his protesting that he would not deny Jesus, when called to take a stand and to be known as a disciple, he buckled and denied him. He even flew into a rage at the very idea of beings one of Jesus’ disciples.

Yet, Jesus came to him after the resurrection and forgives him and restores him to the ministry he was called to do. This is all part of the process.

We will have those who will refuse to change their ways. They will harden their hearts against the Gospel of Love and will stand opposed to the teachings of the Jesus they claim to serve. It is not our job to judge them, it is our job to love them. And we love them by giving them forgiveness.

I hope you will join me this Sunday as we look deeper at forgiveness.

Pax et Bonum,

Bishop Greer

Fifth Sunday of Lent: Confronting Evil

by

In our continuing look at Becoming a Resisting Church, we turn to the writings of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. We have spent the last 4 weeks looking at the various issues facing society and the church. Now we turn toward how we address those injustices and abuses.

In our Gospel reading this Sunday, we hear of the story of the woman caught in adultery. The religious nationalists of Jesus’ day brought her before him to catch him breaking the law of Moses. It is interesting to note, it was not Jesus who was breaking the law of Moses, but the religious zealots who did so.

The law of Moses required that both the man and the woman caught in adultery should be tried and stoned. (Leviticus 20:10) However, the religious nationalist, much like the Christian nationalists today, ignored the law and only brought the woman before Jesus.

I have long thought that when Jesus stooped to write in the dirt that he was writing the sins of the people who brought her to him. However, it could be that Jesus wrote the name of the man or even the verse out of the Torah that commanded both the man, and the woman should be stoned. Either way, it shamed them into leaving her with Jesus.

King talks about the kind of evil these religious nationalists were practicing. He states:

“We have seen evil in tragic lust and inordinate selfishness. We have seen it in high places where men are willing to sacrifice truth on the altars of their self-interest. We have seen it in imperialistic nations trampling over other nations with the iron feet of oppression. We have seen it clothed in the garments of calamitous wars which left battlefields painted with blood, filled nations with widows and orphans, and sent men home physically handicapped and psychologically wrecked. We have seen evil in all of its tragic dimensions.” (Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Sermon “The Death of Evil upon the Seashore”)

We see this evil every day in our world. The evil of removing immigrants who only come to our country to seek a better, safer life. The abuse of women who are having their healthcare taken from them. The LGBTQIA+ individuals who are being denied life-saving healthcare and having their rights taken way one by one. People of color who are marginalized and abused in the name of the Christian Nationalists racist god.

King calls us to stand up and speak out. We cannot remain silent in the face of overwhelming evil. We cannot allow these acts to be committed in our names. And even when these acts are committed in the church or by people claiming to be Christians, we must speak out and stand up to them.

The only thing evil needs to triumph is for good people to do nothing!

Pax et Bonum,

Bishop Greer

Third Sunday of Lent – Cheap or Costly Grace

by

Are we practicing cheap grace or costly grace? You may ask what I mean by that as so many have not heard of this distinction. Rev. Detrick Bonhoeffer is the one who discussed this distinction in his book titled The Cost of Discipleship.

Our readings this Sunday give us a hint. God calls the people of Israel to trust in him and to follow him no matter what. Saint Paul tells the church at Corinth that they need to set aside their old ways to follow the message of Jesus. And Jesus tells the people who followed him that one must take the time to tend to the fig tree to receive fruit.

All these point to the idea of a costly grace. A grace that requires action to be grace. Cheap grace doesn’t require anything of us. Bonhoeffer put it this way:

“Cheap grace is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism without church discipline, Communion without confession, absolution without personal confession. Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ, living and incarnate.”

On the other hand, costly grace requires us to set aside our biases, hatred, distrust, and lack of compassion to follow the message of love. Again, Bonhoeffer explained it this way:

“Costly grace is the treasure hidden in the field; for the sake of it a man will go and sell all that he has. It is the pearl of great price to buy which the merchant will sell all his goods. It is the kingly rule of Christ, for whose sake a man will pluck out the eye which causes him to stumble; it is the call of Jesus Christ at which the disciple leaves his nets and follows him.”

This Sunday we will look at how the difference between cheap and costly grace is important to know when Becoming a Resisting Church. And we will learn how to apply that as we resist the call of the world to seek power, money, and authority.

I hope you will join us Sunday!

Pax et Bonum,

Bishop Greer

Loving your enemies and holding them accountable

by

I have had many “Christians” come after me the last few weeks using this Sunday’s Gospel as a bully club against me. They seem to forget that holding someone accountable for their bad actions is also scriptural and not a violation of loving your enemy and doing good to those who persecute you.

Jesus routinely held the religious leaders of his day accountable. John the Baptist lost his head for holding Herod accountable for his adultery. Many prophets, martyrs, and patriarchs in the Bible stood up against the evil that was pervasive in their nations because they were called by God to do so.

We can love our enemies and do good to them while holding them accountable for their bad actions. Calling out those individuals who are celebrating the abuse and marginalization that is occurring in our nation is what we as people of faith are called to do. Paul even gives us a road map for how to hold those people accountable.

I refuse to be silent while my family is put at risk. I refuse to allow people to violate the sacredness of our sanctuary to abuse, disenfranchise, and even kill immigrants all because the color of their skin is darker. I refuse to allow their votes in favor of killing, imprisoning, and abusing LGBTQIA+ individuals to go unchallenged. I refuse to allow them to celebrate taking food away from children and medical care away from the elderly.

If you are one of those individuals supporting these policies, hear me well, YOU ARE NOT A FOLLOWER OF JESUS. You can call yourself a “Christian”, but you are not a follower of Jesus. Just like the “white-washed tombs” called religious leaders in Jesus’ day, you have sold your soul to the evil one in exchange of material wealth, momentary joy, and temporal power.

I will do good to you. I will continue to pray for your salvation. But I will not hesitate to hold you accountable.

I pray that you will turn from your evil ways and join us on the path to righteousness. Our door is always open and the sacraments, especially confession, is available to all people.

Pax et Bonum,

Bishop Greer

Are you a Blessed?

by
Beatitudes image showing Jesus teaching surrounded by images of others that describe those teachings.

Last Sunday, during Mass, I suffered a major anxiety issue. Those that know me well could tell that something was off. I did my best to hide what was happening, but the signs were there. This attack was likely caused by all the stress and worry that has invaded our lives since the presidential change of power.

It was also a moment for reflection for me. I may appear strong on the outside, but inside I am scared and worried about the future of our country and those that I love that are being attacked and vilified every single day.

In the past two week, my daughter has come under attack from dozens of conservative “Christians” who think it is their mandate from God to attack her for being transgender. Our church has been the target of a tremendous amount of hate online because we are “woke”. And I personally have been attacked by dozens of conservative “Christians” who believe I am a false prophet for teaching the Bible.

I preach the Gospel. The very Gospel we read this Sunday.

“Blessed are the poor. Blessed are the hungry. Blessed are you who are now weeping. Blessed are you when people hate you, and when they exclude and insult you, and denounce your name as evil on account of the Son of Man.”

Jesus was saying that those society marginalizes are blessed in the eyes of God. He even tells us in a roundabout way that if we proclaim his message we will be persecuted, reviled, and abused. Most people stop reading there because they are too upset that Jesus is “woke”. But let’s look at the rest of what he says:

“But woe to you who are rich, for you have received your consolation. Woe to you who are filled now, for you will be hungry. Woe to you who laugh now, for you will grieve and weep. Woe to you when all speak well of you, for their ancestors treated the false prophets in this way.”

Wow! Jesus’ message makes it clear that the rich, the gluttonous, those who laugh at those in need and marginalized, and those who are set up as idols and spoken well of have already received their rewards and they will suffer in the life to come.

Sadly, in today’s version of mainstream “Christianity”, people are too concerned with wealth and power. They either have wealth and power, or they think they can gain it by stepping on those who are considered “undesirable”. We need only look at the things they are promoting and accepting to see this.

I was reminded of this today when a former friend was found to have posted a video of people laughing and pointing at people wearing a mask to protect themselves from COVID or Bird Flu. They claim to be a “Christian”, yet they show a complete disregard for other’s health or concerns.

As someone who worked in the hospital 15 hours a day in the COVID ICU watching hundreds of people die from COVID, that kind of abuse is evil. As someone who has a weakened immune system due to diabetes and congestive heart failure, it is a wish that I would die.

That kind of behavior Jesus spoke about in the Gospel I just quoted! “Woe to you who laugh now, for you will grieve and weep.”

Rather than repent, so many “Christians” today think they can be forgiven by claiming, “It was just a joke” or “You can’t judge me, only Jesus knows my heart.” Jesus also spoke to this when he said that we will know a tree by its fruits.

If you are not standing on the side with the Blesseds, then you are on the side of the Woe to them. Now is the time to make a real change and become a real Christian.

Otherwise, your experience at the end of your life will be less than pleasant.

Pax et Bonum,

Bishop Greer

Will you answer the call?

by
Here I am send me image with guy with his arms outstretched.

Twenty-six years ago, last month I was ordained to the priesthood. It was a turning point in my life as I answered the call from Isaiah of “Whom shall I send?” I answered like Isaiah, “Here I am. Send me.”

Little did I understand at the time what would lay in store for me. Like Isaiah, I feel like an unprepared and unworthy servant of our Lord. Yet, he has called me and many of my brothers and sisters in ministry to be a prophetic voice to the world around us. And let me tell you, that is not as exciting as it sounds.

Sometimes being a prophetic voice in the world means that people will hate you. They will threaten you, abuse you, and might even throw you down a well like they did Jeremiah.

And standing up can get you into trouble.

But that is not a reason to back down. Rather, it is the time when we must stand up, no matter the cost. We must fight for justice, diversity, equity, and inclusion in our society. We cannot rest until the marginalized are treated with respect and dignity, the oppressed are free, and the abused are no longer mistreated.

Jesus calls us all to be the light, peace, and love in the world. Yet so many Christians believe that his message of loving everyone is too weak. They want the strong, AR-15 carrying, muscle bound, white, blond hair, blue eyed Jesus. The real Jesus, a Palestinian Jew, dark skinned, dark hair, likely brown eyed, carpenter living under an oppressive Roman occupation who taught us to love our enemies and to do good to those who persecute us is considered heresy.

Yet the real Jesus calls us to live a different life. One in which we give to others in need, care for those who are sick or hurting, and welcome the immigrant and refugee among us. He calls us to put ourselves in their place and to treat others the way we would want to be treated.

We hope you will join us this Sunday as we work to follow the real Jesus!

Pax et Bonum,

Bishop Greer