I was a witness on Sunday at Trinity Episcopal Church on Melrose Ave. in Los Angeles when the Holy Spirit came down and confirmed a band of brothers — or at least one rocking family duo.
Diego, 14, plays the bass. At our service, he had stood up to be confirmed. Then we sat down together at lunch. When Diego told me his influences, I can’t tell you I knew them all. In turn, he listened politely as I told him about John Entwistle and Phil Lesh and ventured to say that musicians from the sixties and seventies had probably influenced his influences.
His future brother-in-law, Giovanni, nodded as I spoke. Next weekend at Trinity, Giovanni, also a guitarist and a new confirmand, will marry his longtime girlfriend, Anna, Diego’s older sister. Giovanni’s influences are Metallica and the Red Hot Chili Peppers. What made him nod was my telling Diego that the Peppers’ bassist, Flea, almost certainly grew up listening to John and Phil from the Who and Grateful Dead. As Giovanni seconded this, you may imagine the sense of affirmation that coursed through these ancient boomer veins.
This is standard coffee hour and luncheon fare around the Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles. What’s different this year is that the neighborhoods from which Trinity draws its members are living in daily fear now that our government has gone to war against the people of God.
Trump’s cruel workplace roundups may have eased thanks to a U.S. district court judge’s ruling. But no one thinks the crisis is over. Trinity members are from all over the U.S., Mexico, and Central America. They have watched as one generation of politicians after another has failed to take the humane and logical step of providing residence security for our 12 million established immigrant workers. One can only pray that the American people’s outrage at racist roundups and medieval detention centers named for deadly alligators will finally impel us to demand common sense reform.
For now, in our secure faith in grace and reconciliation, the work of the church of the Risen Christ goes on. Six from Trinity were confirmed and received on Sunday, and three celebrated their first communion. I also had the blessing of mediating the Spirit’s work as Enzo, a delightful boy of one year and two months in a snappy white suit, was baptized and marked as Christ’s own forever.
Overseeing everything was Trinity’s priest, the Rev. Jose Luis Garcia, whose deep, secure faith is a comfort to two of our congregations these days, even as he and his spouse, choir member Lulu, run their family business. Jose Luis also coordinates our diocesan Cursillo program.
In my still evolving Spanish, I presided and preached; Jose Luis celebrated Holy Eucharist. The abundantly friendly Lilian Chiclan is senior warden, Julio Manzanarez the devoted long-time junior warden. Jorge Ara was my superb chaplain. He’s Anna and Diego’s dad, so he’ll be busy Saturday with father of the bride duties. Don’t tell anyone, but Anna and Giovanni’s first dance will be to Green Day’s “Last Night on Earth”:
I walked for miles till I found you
I’m here to honor you
If I lose everything in the fire
I’m sending all my love to you.
The people of Trinity prepared succulent braised beef, Mole chicken, and an array of salads and desserts. I can’t imagine anyone wandering into Trinity’s open arms who wouldn’t want to stay.
Our readings were all about hospitality, Abraham’s to the three desert visitors, one of whom proved to be the most high God, and Mary and Martha’s to Jesus that day in Bethany on the Mount of Olives. Christianity makes no sense without the value of welcome. That doesn’t mean open borders. It means that we treat everyone made in the image of God with kindness, especially when we have been deriving benefit from their labor without representation for the better part of a century. We don’t turn against them for political advantage, lie and call them criminals, and take pleasure when confining them to cages.
These times also helped me understand Mary and Martha better. Perhaps Martha stayed in the kitchen to work because she thought she already knew everything about Jesus’s teachings. When she complained about Mary sitting at his feet and not working, it wasn’t as though she was petitioning the God of the universe. She was talking to an old friend, perhaps someone she took for granted just a little.
But Mary knew Jesus always had something new to say. So does everyone we meet, whether relative and friend or stranger. When we stop welcoming and learning from one another, when we take advantage of one another and put ourselves first all the time, we stop growing as individuals. It can happen to countries, too.
