Bring a Friend To Church

Sunday
Welcome to St. James

Bring a Friend To Church

Sunday

Welcome to St. James. As many of you know, on Sundays, I always preach on the Bible
readings, and, try to identify the main themes of the readings .
Today, however, is our bring-a-friend-to-church Sunday, so, rather that talking about the readings I want to
speak about our church: introduce our church to our new friends, and invite the old timers to reflect on who
we are and what we stand for. So, who are we? What do we stand for?

1. First and foremost we are Christians, and so we welcome Christians of all denominations to
pray with us and worship God with us.
There are churches who believe that communion should be given only to those who are free of sin, and
therefore require private confession before communion We are not one of those churches.
We believe that the Eucharist is the spiritual nourishment and the medicine we need to keep us free from
sin, and help us grow. Everyone here, starting from me, is a sinner. All human beings are flawed creatures:
this is reality. We are sinners and Jesus becoming a human beingto free us from sin and reconcile us to God.
So, if you are a fellow sinner, ask Gods forgiveness in your heart, and receive communion with us. Anyone
baptized is welcome to receive communion. And if you are not baptized, come on up anyway, cross your
arms as a signal to me that you are not baptized, and I will bless you in the name of God of all.
We believe that God loves us, not because we are good, not because we deserve his love, but because God
is good, and, as disciples of Jesus, we are called to respond to Gods love by loving everyone else.

2. St. James is an Episcopal church, we are members of the Anglican Communion.

We are proud of our traditions, but we are not particularly brand-conscious: we welcome believers of any
denomination to join us in in worship, in prayer, in the study of the Bible, and in helping us help our
neighbors in need.
We are not Roman Catholic, but we are Catholic in the true sense of the word: open to all.
1. Catholic means universal, and our Church is present all over the world.
2. In addition the term universal means also open to all those who seek God. Thus the Episcopal church is a
big tent church that literally welcomes everyone, just as Jesus welcomed the sick, the sinners, the
publicans, and all who were marginalized by self righteous Pharisees.

Bring a Friend To Church

Sunday

The Episcopal church has a long tradition of inclusivity, and here at St. James we welcome all
regardless o race, national origin, gender, sexual preference, age, economic condition, or political
persuasion. We come together to worship God and support each other.
in the Episcopal church we ordain men and women to be deacons, priests, and Bishops. In fact, our
presiding bishop is a woman. Her mandate will expire in November and the next presiding Bishop will
be a black man.
We not only respect differences, we strongly believe that each person has something to offer, and that
our church is enriched by the unique gifts and experiences of each of its members

3. We are united by faith, and we welcome all who doubt.

We believe that faith is a gift from God. God has taken the initiative to put in us a curiosity or a desire
or a need to come to church: that is Gods gift of faith. After that it is up to us to accept Gods
invitation or ignore it. The response we are are expected to give to Gods gift of faith is action: we are
called to change our lives and our values and follow Jesus example.
Faith is not absence of doubt. We believe that faith can and does coexist with doubt. Reasonable
people have questions and doubts and disagreements. Only people who do not use their brains never
have doubts. We believe that God is close to anyone who cant see, and yet is struggling to find the
light. So, if you have doubts, welcome to the Episcopal church.
In todays Gospel, we read that Jesus cured a blind man who persisted and kept pestering Jesus asking
to see the light. Jesus restored his sight, but even Jesus was unable to show the light to the Pharisees,
who had no doubts and were sure they were right and everyone else was wrong.

4. St. James is a place of spiritual healing: many of our members have had negative
experiences with churches and denominations in the past, and have a lot of scar tissue.
Jesus did not reject anyone. He went out of the way to include all the social outcasts of his day. His
was a mission of inclusion: healing those who were sick and calling all those who were hurt and
rejected by society
St. James strives to follow Jesus example and to be welcoming and inclusive. We welcome gays and
straight, those who are divorced and remarried, those who live in sin", and we share the Eucharist
with everyone.

Bring a Friend To Church

Sunday

Jesus too welcomed everyone and was turned off only by the self-righteousness of Scribes and
Pharisees. So, if you are a fellow sinner, a believer with doubts and with scars, you are not an evil
person, but a child of God, God loves you, and you are welcome among us.
We try not to be judgmental, we are not holier than thou, and dont make anyone feel guilty.

5. What do we do here at St. James?

1. We pray and worship God together: Gods grace comes to us through the Sacraments, and so we
celebrate the Sacraments
2. We listen to the word of God as He speaks to us though the events of our life and as He is revealed
in the Bible. We study the Bible in its proper cultural and historical context in order to understand
the message of God as it was delivered to the original audiences, and then learn to apply it to our
lives.
We are not Bible-thumping fundamentalists. We do not read the Bible literally. The Bible contains
Gods revelation but, along with it, the Bible also contains a lot of cultural baggage from 3,000 year
old middle eastern cultures. It is our responsibility to sort out Gods message from the cultural
biases.
3. We believe that Jesus taught us to love of God and love of neighbors. So we practice our faith by
sharing what we have with our neighbors in need. We are not a mega-church: we have very limited
resources, but we share our building with various 12 step groups, we share our meager resources with
soup kitchens and programs that help the poor.

6. So, to our new friends: welcome to St. James, and if you feel Gods presence here, if you
like what you see and what you hear, come back and be one of us: we pride ourselves in
being the little stone church with a warm heart
.We welcome everyone who comes through our doors, and we do our best to make them feel a part of
our family
.So, welcome to St. James. Join us in our worship, and then join us for coffee, and rest assured that Jesus
who said, when 2 or 3 of you are joined in my name, I will be there, is here with us now and blesses
us.