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SERMONS

Eighth Sunday after Pentecost
Proper 9A
July 6, 2008

By The Rev. Alston Johnson

Matthew 11:25-30

About twenty-five years ago the BBC aired a mini-series that has become something of a legend in our time. It is a about an English family, a noble family, living between the two world wars. They are a Catholic family, and their story is the saga of how a younger generation seeks to make their peace with traditional Christian faith. The family’s name is Flyte, and the name of their family home is Brideshead. The BBC series was based upon a novel by Catholic writer Evelyn Waugh titled, “Brideshead Revisited.”

Evelyn Waugh said that his book “deals with what is theologically termed the operation of divine grace, that is to say, the unmerited and unilateral act of love by which God continually calls souls to Himself.”

The tale unfolds around two characters, Charles and Sebastian, who meet at Oxford in the roaring twenties between the world wars. Sebastian is the bad boy of the Flyte family, who pushes against every social convention of his aristocratic upbringing. He drinks, he is sarcastic, he dabbles in sex, he is a fop and a playboy; and in the midst of all of his bad behavior it becomes clear that Sebastian is haunted by the shadow of his deeds.

Charles is Sebastian’s friend, a partner in deviousness. Charles falls into the orbit of young playboys at Oxford; the best clothes, the best wine, the finest cars, servants, estates, villas in Venice, and perhaps more enticing than anything, a life where the boundaries of morality and religion are pushed to the fringes.

At the outset of the story, it seems as though Sebastian and Charles are untouchable and immortal. Nothing is off limits. They are like two people who defy gravity as they trespass all the boundaries of traditional English society.

The story develops: after a few years of fast living in college, Sebastian and Charles find themselves estranged, and they both remain morally adrift. Sebastian is dying of alcoholism in the Mediterranean, and Charles is in the process of divorcing his wife with the intention of marrying Sebastian’s older divorced sister. Evelyn Waugh wants to make sure we see just how “unmerited” these folks really appear to be.

In a chance meeting at family manor of Brideshead, Charles and Sebastian’s youngest sister, Cordelia, are walking in the shadow of the great mansion. Cordelia is the child who chooses not to drink the Kool-Aid of hedonism, so to speak. Cordelia explores a vocation in a convent, and then becomes a nurse in prisoner of war camps in Spain, and is generally the most cheerful of the family.

It hurt to think of Cordelia growing up 'quite plain'; to think of all that burning love spending itself on serum injections and delousing powder. When she arrived, tired from her journey, rather shabby, moving in the manner of one who has no interest in pleasing, I thought her an ugly woman.

. . Charles, the worldly wise and Cordelia the faithful servant have a conversation: And then, as we moved on towards the house, Cordelia said 'When you met me last night did you think, "Poor Cordelia, such an engaging child, grown up a plain and pious spinster, full of good works"? Did you think "thwarted"?'

It was no time for prevarication. 'Yes,' I said, 'I did; I don't now, so much.'

'It's funny,' she said, 'that's exactly the word I thought of for you and Julia. When we were up in the nursery with nanny. "Thwarted passion," I thought.'

This little sliver of conversation between these two “kinds” of persons caused something to finally line up in my own mind and my heart about the life of faith.

What struck me is that it is obvious that the urbane and sophisticated Charles would certainly pity this devout girl; what with all her simple clothing, daily prayers, earnest belief, pious and plain living. Humming hymns, going off to Church rather than the soiree, talking about prayer as though it actually meant anything other than wishful thinking. What an absurd way to live. What a thwarted and missed opportunity in the eyes of someone like Charles.

What caught me some twenty-five years ago is how this young, devout girl’s words turn the tables on someone like Charles; as seen through the eyes of her own faith and discipline, his avant guard and decadent sophistication appear just as thwarted, and just as pitiful; just as lost.

Draped in fine clothing, fed with the best food and wine, recently at the best parties, plays, and salons, and oh so current and up-to-date in their opinions, Charles and his playboy set seem stunted and thwarted as they maintain an illusion that life can be lived without conscience and an ultimate reconciliation with God.

This devout girl and dashing man are like two people waving at one another across a great and deep chasm. So close, yet so far away from one another.

The story of Charles and Sebastian is so much like the story many of us have lived, or are still living. We too can hope that if we stoke the bonfire of the vanities long enough, then the weight of guilt and conscience will not settle upon us. What Evelyn Waugh describes in his book is that the divine operation of God’s grace, God’s love, is an unrelenting hunter; not even the most selfish and extravagant lives can outrun his grace; in the end our souls tend toward God.

The burden of conscience settles upon us all, no matter how much we would like to avoid facing the truth, and maintaining our pet illusion with money, alcohol, sex, and drugs, and a variety of other pastimes that would seem pleasant, but that become painful in the end. In the places we would defy gravity, we discover our greatest burden - ourselves.

Jesus would have us rest from such pitiful labor. Jesus would give us rest from the illusion that we can outrun our conscience and God. That is his invitation. Unhook yourself from living a lie, and bind yourself to me in the truth. You will find my burden far easier to carry; ultimately you will find that it brings you rest. Don’t run from me. Don’t maintain a splendid isolation. Bind yourself to me and learn to really live. And what does this yoked life look like?

More often than not it looks like daily prayer, daily reading of scripture, attending to God in our lives exactly in the moments we might like to believe are our own. It looks like patience with others when we might rush in with judgement. It looks like forgiveness and great heartedness towards others for the very folly and foolishness that dwells in our own souls. It looks like hope in the darkness, and peace at the end. It will certainly look like transformation.

Taking the yoke of Christ into our lives does not produce a “result” as though we are painting by numbers; the effect of Christ’s yoke in the midst of our lives will have as distinct a look for each of us individually, just as we all look distinctively unlike any other person in this room.

Haven’t we dreamed of laying down the burden of our fears and our shame? Haven’t we dreamed of courage and love taking us by the hand? Haven’t we dreamed of what it might feel like to stop the running from conscience and from God? Our Lord has the same dreams for us.

We are not created to walk alone and unguided through this life.

In the final scene of Brideshead Revisited, Charles kneels in the old family chapel, mumbles some sort of prayer about beautiful buildings and God, and then walks briskly to rejoin the world.

“Your looking unusually cheerful today,” says a friend.