Themes of this summer:

Love God.
Love your neighbor as yourself.
Forgive.
Pray to be forgiven.
Give thanks that you are forgiven.

Today I am sitting in a café trying to get some diocesan work done. It’s not going well, so I’m catching up on email, and I just read the weekly offering from Recovery Ministries of the Episcopal Church, the organization in our church for those recovering (or hoping to recover) from addiction. I love these weekly reflections.

The reflection made me laugh out loud, and I decided to delay my diocesan work just a little longer to share the joke (mostly on me, but sort of on all of us) with you.

The writer talks about how they started AA to stop drinking, but not to actually change. Maybe the writer thought that to stop drinking was change enough. The thing is, Twelve Step work is comprehensive, more than merely stopping the addictive behavior. It is about being honest about the whole person you are, exploring the why and wherefore behind the addictive behavior.

I’ve posted the whole RMEC piece below so that you can read it in the author’s own words. But I will add two of my own stories that immediately came to mind as I was laughing.

First, when I taught East Asian religions I would begin each class session with a practice we were studying to put flesh and bones on the materials we were reading. One of these practices was metta, the “loving-kindness” meditation of Buddhism. In metta meditation, you practice expanding your compassion for others in a series of prayers. You begin by praying for yourself (which should be easy), with these words, “May I be healthy. May I be happy. May I be free of mental and physical distress…”—a whole litany of prayer and well-wishing. Then you slowly increase the challenge. You bring to your mind’s eye a series of others, one at a time, making the same prayer for them. You begin with beloveds, then those you love but who aggravate you, then bring to mind people you are neutral about, then people you dislike, then those you despise. If, in the course of the words of well-wishing and compassion you can’t yet open your heart compassionately to one you despise, you modify what you are praying, “To the extent that I am able, I wish that you be healthy…To the extent that I am able, I wish that you be happy… To the extent that I am able I wish that be free of mental and physical distress…” and so on. It is a great practice, central to the Mahayana Buddhist tradition, and central to Christian practice as well, a way to draw ever closer to embodying Jesus’ words in the Sermon on the Plain (Luke 6:27-36 ) and Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5:43-48) that we must pray for our enemies. Metta meditation shows us the baby steps that build a loving heart and spiritual strength, truly a way to move this world to the Kingdom.

Metta meditation makes me remember a moment of challenge many years ago and helps me laugh at my own grinchy heart. I love to swim laps, and often process the good and the bad of my life as I swim. Some years ago, I was nursing a grudge against another mom for something that was a pretty small matter but really hurt me. The pool was my place of solace, back and forth, back and forth, repeating to myself my indignation, hurt, anger, and righteousness, back and forth, back and forth, day after day. After several days of this, I was swimming laps and the thought drifted through my head, “The worst thing that could happen is that she and I would become friends.” I was so startled by this petty thought—and by the realization that actually it would be a GREAT thing to happen—that I abruptly stopped swimming and popped my head up out of the lane. I hope I laughed at myself, but if I didn’t then in the water, I do now. It surely began the change of softening my heart toward this mom, cultivating compassion even if on a micro scale.

Friends, loving our neighbors as ourselves is the work of a lifetime. Practice, practice, practice. Do whatever you can. Think about the drills you hated for sports but sweat through anyway, the fingering exercises you railed against in learning music but continued to practice even as you were bored and frustrated out of your mind. Be kind and patient with yourself, and push yourself. Be brave: dare to pray that you will love your enemy. Or if you can’t do that, to pray that one day you may be able to ask that your heart may be big enough to pray that you will love your enemy. And if you can’t do that to pray that one day you may want to ask that one day you may be able to pray for your heart to be big enough to pray for your enemy. Do what you must. Be honest about your shortcomings. But practice, practice, practice. That is true kingdom work:

it changes you,
it changes the world,
It is the Way of Love.

In peace,

Jen+

From RMEC, Feast of the Transfiguration (August 6), 2025
https://www.episcopalrecovery.org/reddoor/13529117

I Didn’t Come Here to Forgive

Changing my thinking, behaving differently, or becoming an instrument of love and peace—none of that was on my radar when I stumbled through the doors of twelve-step recovery. I came to stop drinking and avoid more consequences. That’s it.

Miserable on the inside and desperate to stay sober, I became willing to take actions contrary to what I believed—including the direction to start praying.

Each morning, I’d shut my eyes and say, “God, please keep me sober today. Thy will, not mine, be done.” I didn’t mean the last part—not really—but I hoped that if I kept saying it, eventually I might feel it.

After a few weeks of this routine, it seemed like I should probably add something more. I’d heard about the St. Francis Prayer and decided to try it. Reading it for the first time, I was confused by its paradoxes: better to comfort than to be comforted, to understand than to be understood, to love than to be loved.

Was it better? I didn’t think so.

I wanted to be comforted. I wanted to be understood. I wanted to be loved.

Still, I kept reciting it. The words sounded a little ridiculous and weak—but they also sounded incredibly peaceful.

Driving to a meeting one afternoon, my phone rang. It was my divorce attorney—with infuriating news. I was seething by the time I reached the clubhouse. I sat down next to an older gentleman named Dave and unloaded everything.

“You should pray for him,” he said gently.

Had he heard what I said? I stared at him in disbelief.

“Pray for him? You’ve got a better shot of being hit by lightning.”

He didn’t flinch. He nodded thoughtfully and asked, “Well, then, do you think you could pray to some day have the willingness to be able to pray for him?”

It took me a minute to wrap my head around what he was asking.

“Probably not. Maybe. Maybe at some point I could pray for the willingness to pray for him. But not now.”

For the next few weeks, I didn’t give it much thought. But the seed had been planted. And one night, as I was saying my prayers, I could hear Dave’s voice. With a sigh and an eye roll, I muttered, “And may I someday have the willingness to pray for him.”

I was aghast. Did those words just come out of my mouth?

Nearly two years later, my phone rang again. This time, it was my son—calling in tears to tell me his father’s engagement had ended.

The next day, as I heard my ex-husband’s truck in the driveway, I felt a pull to go outside.

He looked terrible—His once confident posture was deflated, he was pale, gaunt, sickly—like the air had been taken from him. Though I had never seen him look this way, I recognized the pain. It was the same reflection I’d seen in my own mirror when he left me.

We had slowly moved past the bitterness, but standing there in that moment, it struck me how different things had become. We weren’t enemies anymore, just two people who had once loved each other and shared a life.

“How are you doing?” I asked softly.

“Not great,” he replied.

“I’m really sorry you’re going through this.

We stood there for a moment in silence before he lifted his head and said, “If I ever made you feel this way, I’m really sorry. Really.”

“You did,” I replied gently. “But I forgave you a while ago. It wasn’t easy, but it was necessary—for both of us. When I found out what happened last night, I prayed for you. I prayed that you would find love and peace and happiness.”

His head had been hanging low. At my comment, he slowly lifted his gaze until our eyes met. In that moment, I saw disbelief married with a sense of peace. I could see the question he was asking himself in his eyes: How could this woman possibly be offering me such kindness?

“Thank you,” he murmured.

I knew what he didn’t. It wasn’t of me.

“And while we’re at it,” I added, “I’m sorry for the mistakes I made in our marriage. I know I wasn’t always the best wife.”

As if struck by lightning, I found myself doing the previously unimaginable. Reaching out, I hugged him.

“It’s gonna be alright,” I said. “I just can’t tell you when.”

Forgiveness had opened the door to the peace that comes from letting go.

Jaime Hrobar

Rev. Jen has set her office drop-in day as Wednesday of each week from 9:30 – 11:30 a.m. and 1:30 – 3:30 p.m. for anyone who would like to stop in and visit. You are always invited to make an appointment for a time convenient for you. Mondays are her Sabbath day.

TUESDAY BIBLE STUDY

The Book and Bible Group has begun again, meeting at 4:30 p.m. most Tuesday afternoons with Evening Prayer celebrated at 4:00 p.m. The next one will be Tuesday, August 26.

ALTAR FLOWER CALENDAR

An altar flower calendar is posted in Hamilton Hall. Sign up to sponsor the altar flowers to commemorate a birthday or anniversary, remember a loved one, or in thanksgiving for an important event. We ask a donation to help offset the cost of the altar flowers and other worship expenses. Be sure to tell the office your dedication so that it can be printed in the bulletin. Please make checks payable to St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church and in the memo field please put this information: Altar Flowers, person’s name, occasion, Sunday date you’d like for the flowers to be on the altar.

VESTRY MEETING MINUTES

If any of you are interested in what your Vestry is doing, there are two copies of each month’s minutes on the music stand in Hamilton Hall. Feel free to read and return!

SHOPPING LIST FOR NON-FOOD PANTRY

Please add Adult Pull-Ups (all sizes) and bed pads to your shopping list for the NFP for the month of August. If you are donating adult pull-ups/briefs, they should be the ones without tabs. We are currently overstocked in adult diapers and period products. Meals and conversation in Hamilton Hall are going well. Patrons are now able to pick out items they most need. Your contributions help our budget go farther in helping meet the needs of those in Putnam County. The next Non-Food Pantry will be Saturday, August 30 from noon – 2:00 p.m. If you can help with this ministry in any way, please contact Harriet Moore or Carl Huffman.

KROGER COUPONS

If you have any unwanted Kroger coupons, please bring them to Hamilton Hall and place in the window ledge near the “Little Library”. We would like to make them available to our Non-Food Pantry recipients so that they might be able to take advantage of them to help extend their food budget. Thanks in advance!

FREE DAILY DEVOTIONAL

We have some large print Day by Day daily devotionals in the sanctuary that you are free to take home for your personal devotions–and if we know that people would like copies, we can order the right amount. Many of you may also appreciate the on-line version of Day to Day. Click here.

ON-GOING COVID PROTOCOL

We continue to respond to both our county’s current CDC designation and to the current variant. Masking is optional. Decisions on COVID policy have moved from the Reconvening Committee to Rev. Jen and the Wardens.

We have heard that the daily reflections and scripture readings provided during Lent were appreciated. The meditations are written by persons from Gobin UMC and Beech Grove UMC. They will be in the newsletter each week. Whether you enjoy these every day or as the Spirit moves you, may this resource continue to bring you spiritual food for the journey. Blessings!

Click here to view the readings and accompanying links.

Your prayers are asked for: