A Good Priest

I entered bed one evening last week and said, "Greg, you were a good priest today." I believe everyone, regardless of job or profession or career can feel the satisfaction of a job well done. Let me tell you about my own discovery of being a good priest.

My feeling of satisfaction nothing to do with bulletins, blogs, websites, cleaning my office or my cluttered desk. It had nothing to do with my creativity or preaching. My joy and satisfaction derived from my interaction with people in which I exercised courage and spiritual insight. I'll share one of the three encounters I had that day.

During the Men's Bagel and Bible study on Wednesday morning I posed a question to be answered from the heart. It was intended to elicit a personal response. A person answered in a way that seemed to me to avoid the task. So, I stopped the person and said, "But what about you?" A second attempt was made to answer and again I stopped the person and said, "Can you answer it from your heart." This little back-and-forth played out 3-4 times. There came an awkward moment of silence and tension. As often happens in such a situation, someone attempted to rescue the individual and group from the silence and tension. I turned my attention and said to this person, "I'm sure we would all feel better talking about something else. Let's just sit with this one right now."

I turned my attention back to the person and said again, "Would you like to answer the question in a way that speaks from your heart?" The person leaned a bit forward, keeping steady eye contact with me, and said, "To answer that I'd probably shed tears." I said, "I know I'm okay with tears and the rest of us have shed them in this place."

Then, and only then, after a lot of social interaction aimed at gauging the safety in the room, did the person reply, "To answer I would have to accept I am my father's son." I cannot do justice to what happened next. A sacredness came over the room. It was as if the floor opened up and spirit rushed in. Someone had dared to speak the most timeless and courageous word anyone can utter, "I am my parent's child--the apple doesn't fall far from the tree." We had arrived at our work for that morning.

I could have sat silently and let the gentleman regale us with a great story. The group is polite enough to have listened along. However, as a priest I knew that was not why we gathered that morning. As a priest I knew what brought these men out was a desire to encounter the living God and God's spirit in each of us. As a priest I've come to know that such encounters require a gentle and deft hand in easing the nervous and easily frightened human being (me) to such an encounter.

I don't know what you, Trinity Cathedral, want in a priest. I know that in me you have someone with clear weaknesses and liabilities. If you are wise you will surround me and shore me up in such areas. However, what you do have is what I believe you most need--a person whose life bears witness to encounters with the living God and who is willing to help you and lead you and point to your own encounters.

Shalom, Greg