Holy Moments

Holy Moments! The Beauty of the Broken!

Sirah 15:15-20;I Corinthians 2:6-10; Matthew 5:17-37

6th Sunday in?Ordinary Time

The Gospel readings for the 6th Sunday of Ordinary Time focus on the commandments. Jesus revisits the Jewish Law offering another way of thinking about them. Jesus does not condemn those who do not follow the commandments. He recognizes that we as humans are not perfect beings. Instead, he gives us a lesson on humility by pointing out that we are all broken in some way. He urges us to understand the imperfections in ourselves, which allows us to understand the imperfections in all broken human beings. If we want to follow Jesus, we must love each other despite our brokenness. We have a very, very difficult time loving our brothers and sisters. We judge, we criticize and when I judge I am reminded when am pointing one finger toward another, there are three which point back at me. "Holy Moments!"

Recently I was eating on Mission Street, and a lady spoke to me, I did not recognize her, a stunning woman. "You do not recognize me? I am Delila, one of the working girls?", laughing. "You saved my ass on Polk Street many a time?" We talked, and she shared her work with sex workers in the Mission, and handed me this poem laughing, the girls and I call you the "rent boy priest", you are our priest:

Rent Boy

I used to have a room

Somewhere I could call all mine

I was alive and happy

I was doing fine.

I turned to my Dad and told him I was gay

He beat me, scolded me and threw me away

ashamed?and disgusted that

I his son was gay.

Cast aside like yesterday’s trash

Once a loved child until that day

I came out and told him, ‘Dad, I’m gay’

Shunned?by religion

Told by the Church of England to go away

I slept on the streets

I sold my body for food

Yeah I bought a sandwich

For which I let myself get screwed

You may find my language wrong, or think I am crude

Well, I make no apologies,

Living on the streets you have to be shrewd

Come on captain, vicar, teacher, and whoever you are

Sure you can wear your shoes

You don’t have to pay me more

I am a boy that cannot refuse

After all sex with you

Buys me my food.

I used to be someone’s child

Yes someone’s?son, a brother,

cousin, nephew and so on

Here I am selling myself to you for sex

But hey ho its the way life goes,

Working the streets yes the sluts, whores, rent boys and

Ho’s

Come on minister

You can wear your shoes

Your office, home, a hotel you choose

If you are paying for me

I ain’t gonna to refuse

I can even do a bargain discount

on a blow job up against the wall

You choose Sir

Anyway at all.

I used to have a home

I used to be someone

Now all I am is a rent-boy

Homeless

A nothing

A Nobody

That’s right

No one. . .!!!

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Billy De-Vere

"Holy Moments!"

Yes, this morning brought back memories, very painful memories, and good memories. I have learned that happiness is not black and white but comes together in the middle and you see both feelings, simply as one entity complementing the other. One can come to simply see life in the present, and each moment is a Holy Moment, bringing a transformation to our lives.?I was raped, physically and emotionally abused, and yet I experienced much goodness in my fellow sex workers, 'johns', and many others. "Holy Moments!"

It was through the process of coming out of sex work. Jesus was present and brought me back to a new life, and ministry that is far more rewarding than my ministry before. Each moment is a "Holy Moment!"

?Coming to San Francisco I was divided, resentful of the Church, depressed, anxious, and afraid, as I began this ministry. And into my life came a psychiatrist, Dr. William Anderson.

Dr. Anderson simply listened to me through the years and guided me into seeing the wounds that I suffer, as a part of one broken jar, healed together, making a beautiful piece of work. For his patience, giving me a low fee, and most of all love I will always be thankful!?Each moment is a "Holy Moment!"

I am proud to be called the "rent boy" priest, for in woundedness comes healing for others. Ha! Holy Moments!

My former denomination literally crucified me for being gay, making up rumors, to cover their tracks. I have one friend now from those days who could not have been my friend before he retired. I was thrown out on the streets, and I hated, literally hated the Church, and God. "Holy Moments!"

But in allowing myself to let the Spirit of God move, my love for the Church has returned, the Church I serve like John Wesley is "outside the Gates". "Holy Moments!"

Each week as the Eucharist is celebrated on Haight Street with homeless young people and adults, and in my apartment with individuals who work the late shift in the surrounding hospitals the Church is present. "Holy Moments!"

Sitting with a family whose brother has just been found dead in a storage container he rented, and was locked , the Church is present. "Holy Moments"!

The following Ode is a reminder the Church is made up of broken people:

Ode to the Church.

How much I must criticize you, my church, and yet how much I love you!

How you have made me suffer much and yet owe much to you.

I should like to see you destroyed and yet I need your presence.

You have given me much scandal and yet you alone have made me understand holiness.

Never in this world have I seen anything more obscurantist, more compromised, more false, and yet never in this world have I touched anything purer, more generous, and more beautiful.

Many times I have felt like slamming the door of my soul in your face – and yet how often I have prayed that I might die in your sure arms!

No, I cannot be free of you, for I am one with you, even though not completely you.

Then, too – where would I go? To build another church?

But I cannot build another without the same defects, for they are my own defeats I bear within me.

And again, if I build one, it will be my Church, and no longer Christ’s.

No, I am old enough to know that I am no better than others.

I shall not leave this Church, founded on so frail a rock, because I should be founding another one on an even frailer rock: myself.

And then, what do rocks matter?

What matters is Christ’s promise, what matters is the cement that binds the rocks into one: the Holy Spirit.?The Holy Spirit alone can build the Church with stones as ill‐hewn as we. Carlo Carretto.

Life is a "Holy Moment!" Deo Gratias! Thanks be to God!

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Fr. River Damien Sims, sfw, D.Min., D.S.T.

P.O. Box 642656

San Francisco, CA 94164

www.temenos.org

415-305-2124

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Dr. Anderson, I hope you are reading my blog, for I want to truly thank you for all the Holy Moments you gave to me.