Fr Alex Swain

Beloved in Christ,

This past week I was at the University of the South in Sewanee, Tennessee.

I was there not just for cooler temperatures and a glimpse of green trees and grass; but for the Episcopal Latino Ministry Competency Course, an intensive week of learning to “gain practical knowledge and cultural competency for Latino ministry.” (For more information on Latino Ministries at the National Church, click here).

During this week, we heard from multiple speakers about demographic changes, cultural shifts, and the manifold challenges and wonders of Latino Ministry. We asked how are we the Church responding to the very different needs of a vast group of very different peoples – both nationally and generationally – who tend to be lumped together as a singular voice within the United States?

It was complicated, inspiring, invigorating work.

And I think this is a broader reflection of the challenge Christ’s most holy church in the 21st century:

How are we living and preaching the Gospel to a world which desperately needs the Good News of Jesus Christ?

The diatribe of St Stephen found in the reading from Acts today might well be aimed as a critique of how we as a people, a nation, a church, have historically pillaged, kept a stiff heart, and been unkind at best and deeply abusive at worst to many people from many different parts of the world.

The people to whom St Stephen is preaching to are so upset to hear about their history that they gnash their teeth and ultimately stone him (he is the first known martyr of the faith, known as the protomartyr).

But the sad truth is we have not lived up to who God has called us to be.

And the hopeful truth is that we continue to be invited to live up to who God is calling us to be.

In Christ we have “passed from death to life.” And if we really believe we have passed from death to eternal life, as we really have, how might we live our lives? How might we tell and invite others into the marvel which is the love of God?

How might we tell the people we pass that they are loved by God in Jesus Christ.

This is at least one aspect of living the Gospel. May we offer ourselves to Jesus’ work!

Yours in Christ,

—Alex+