Trinity Sunday: A Day of Hope
June 7, 2020

What a gorgeous depiction of the Trinity. The serenity of the faces; the love that binds them; the sublime relationship between the three; the equanimity of person; the omniscient look in their eyes; the hope of the universe reflected in their hands.

Only — and most of you know this — it wasn’t meant to be a depiction of the Trinity when Andrei Rublev painted this icon. His inspiration was from Genesis 18 and Abraham’s visit from God in the form of three men at the oaks of Mamre. Rublev captures the moment right as Abraham brought the angels some bread in order to encourage a longer visit from them. A picture of hope? Still, yes.

But, whatever and whomever this icon depicts, its beauty captures elegance, splendor, love, and, particularly for me, hope. There’s something here that lightens my spirit and gladdens my soul. Which is why I bring it here this week.

We are now approaching our fourth month of quarantine at St. John’s. We have been praying together every day. We have been worshipping with Morning Prayer and Evening Prayer (strengthening our ties with past and future). Ministries at St. John’s have flourished and have blossomed. The school kids have finished their year (in absentia) at St. John’s and Promotion Chapel and Baccalaureate are ready to launch. Others from among us are graduating from High Schools and Colleges and are ready to take on the next challenges in life. God has been good to us. Though some injuries and illness pursue us, we have escaped the angel of darkness and have kept our eyes focused upon the Light of Christ.

And now, Governor Newsom, the County Department of Health, and Bishop Taylor have given their blessing and are allowing us to make plans for in-person worship at St. John’s. While the generalities of these plans have been worked out and have been published, the remaining details pertaining to life at St. John’s are up to us to define.

We were given the civic and Diocesan guidelines this week and they must be followed to the letter. With the help of our Bishop’s Warden, Joanne Bradshaw, there is assembling a great crowd of expertise and experience that will help us design our site-specific plan. Patrick McHonett has toiled for months over a thoughtful and elegant plan defining how the children will return in safety. Now it is our turn. The team will meet next week and review the published plans and make recommendations for how we will implement them in our setting.

One very important piece of information right up front: though we *may* get together by June 20/21, not everyone is going to come back right away, nor should they. Because of risks, concerns, and anxiety, no one is advising that we must all come back and worship in person straight away. So, we will continue to hold worship services online every day. Once we do begin worshiping inside our church, we will still broadcast our worship and continue to do so until it is safe and comfortable for you to return.

The St. John’s task force will present its readiness and recommendations to the Bishop’s office, and to you, very soon. We are not obligated to start on the June 20/21 dates, because readiness isn’t always dictated by a calendar.

So, as a reminder, we’re celebrating Trinity Sunday, June 7, online at 9 a.m. The balance of the week we celebrate Morning Prayer on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday at 9 a.m. Evening Prayer is Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday at 8 p.m. Please see my email to you earlier today; it has the Zoom logon information for all worship services. If you aren’t receiving the church e-blast, please send me an email and ask to be added: cpotter@stjohns-es.org

Christ is with us, now and always.
The Holy Spirit is in our midst, now and always.
God the Creator is creating something new, now and always.
We are always loved, always forgiven, always known to God and cannot be forgotten.
Know this, and share the Good News. Amen.

In love, Christopher+