I'm currently writing a kind of spiritual memoir. Not sure if I'll finish it or even publish it. But this felt like a section worth sharing here. For context, starting at age 10 I was involved with the audio visual crew at the large Baptist church where I grew up. I ran sound boards and other such equipment. This story comes out of that work. —Charles

One of the major events of our year was “the Singing Cross.” So, like several Baptist churches of a certain size, we had a Christmastime play and choral performance known as the “Singing Christmas Tree” which involved the choir dressing up in like colonial-era costumes, positioning themselves inside an enormous multi-story Christmas tree built on the stage area of the church, singing various Christmas carols and hymns while actors (church volunteers) re-enacted the Nativity story. As far as I know, the First Baptist Church of Pine Hills was the only church to apply this same concept to an Easter-time performance that featured a set of wooden risers built into an enormous cross that dominated the stage. Flanking it on either side were sets built to look like an ancient Middle-Eastern town and house interior on one side and the tomb and Calvary of Jesus’ crucifixion and burial on the other.

It was very elaborate. And a tad corny. The choir would wear former bed-sheets turned into Biblical costume, singing medleys and hymns while actors (church volunteers) performed a Passion Play. While the roles of Jesus and Pilate and Mary Magdalene were generally fixed (because the latter two were singing parts, but Jesus was played by a guy who happened to look a lot like the Caucasian images of Jesus one sees; he was one of the only people allowed to have a beard in our church), the other roles were sought after. I kind of always wanted to be one of the performers (I liked the Roman soldier costumes), but because I was one of the “Sound Guys” I always had backstage duty.

When I was around 17, I had been given a bit of a promotion for this performance: I was to be in charge of lighting. The cross itself was trimmed in rope lights and there were lights for the various sets on the stage. My job was to be positioned underneath the cross and run a box. I’d wear a headset and Ed would call out my cues and I’d hit the requisite switches to adjust the lights according to what was happening.

The area under the cross was cozy. It looked like the area underneath bleachers or an unfinished basement with wooden beams all around. Above me were the stepped platforms that our 100-member choir would be occupying during the performance. The wood would creak and crack from the weight, the same sounds as if someone is working on your roof. I had a little puka at the transept area of the cross where I would sit. I pretended that I was in a space ship, receiving commands from mission control in my headset. We had a week of rehearsals and I got very comfortable in my little capsule, the cues becoming second nature.

Day of the first performance I bring my mom backstage to show her everything and to show her where I’d be stationed. My mother is a bit… let’s say “overprotective.” Since I was an only child she worried and fretted over lots of things. I could tell she was uneasy seeing where I was. Are you safe? was the question in her eyes.

Around that time my friend Eric showed up. He was playing one of the thieves crucified next to Jesus, the one who didn’t have any lines. He was 6’2”, lean, and wearing only a white cloth around his waist. He looked around the underside of the cross and said “I wonder what would happen if this collapsed?” My mom’s eyes widened.

Thanks, Eric.

The show was about to begin. The lights dropped, Eric returned to his area off-stage and my mom joined my grandparents in our usual balcony front-row pew. I tucked into my space, donned my headset, and waited for my cue.

The beginning of the performance left me with little to do. There was some narration and then the choir would be processing in and making their way up and into the cross. Once the lights were set for that section, there was a stretch where I had nothing to do but listen. I began to lay down, which had me going long-wise to the cross, my head underneath the stage-right section. But I worried that I might fall asleep and miss my cues, botching the first night of the performance. So I sat up, leaned forward, and cupped my hands to the headset, listening to the music. I could hear the creaks and cracks of Biblically-dressed bodies ascending the hard wood of the cross.

Then there was a different sound. Deep. I felt shaking.

I opened my eyes and instinctively looked to my right, where I had laid my head moments ago. It was there that I saw a mess of splintered wood and a pile of polyester Bible robes writhing around. One guy was dangling from above, holding on to dear life. Not sure if the whole thing was coming down or not, I threw off my headset and ran out from under the cross, stage-left. The side door was blocked by a plywood representation of the Upper Room. There was a gap between that and the cross. I saw a sea of stunned faces. I was about to head out when I heard my boss Ed’s mantra in my head, the mantra of all stage-hands: You are not to be seen. So I went back toward the cross. But there was no getting through the moaning disoriented mass. I decided that Ed’s words did not apply here and so began to make my way toward the stage.

That’s when I heard it. When everyone heard it. What would become a sort of meme that followed me for years and still makes the occasional appearance when I’m around old church friends.

Sharon had stopped playing the organ by the time I made my way to the stage. She was a consummate professional and had continued playing even as maybe thirty people vanished into a cruciform void before her eyes, as she tried to process the event as it transpired. It so happened that we had a camera trained on her at this moment. We recorded the Singing Cross every year and sold tapes of it. The footage of Sharon playing through disaster lives forever in my mind. But even Sharon knew that the performance was over and quit playing, leaving behind the sheerest silence I have ever heard in my life. Interrupted by a single voice, shrill and panicked.

The voice of my mother.

Most people know me as Charles. In school I was Chuck. But at home, to my grandparents and my mother, I was Chuckie. It was this name, screamed out from some primal maternal space within my mother, a scream that still echoes somewhere in the cosmos, emitted from the corner of Pine Hills Road and Powers Drive, that resonated the cavernous silent space that was the sanctuary of the First Baptist Church of Pine Hills.

She stretched out the vowels to their auditory conclusions. That night, the name Chuckie both died and was born anew.

I ran to center stage. To my surprise my mother was already making her way there. I thought she had lept off the balcony. She did not. But she did later admit she considered doing so. I reached out for her, she hugged me then grabbed my hand, squeezing it with adrenaline and making me understand those stories of mothers lifting cars to grab infants from underneath them. The only person who made it down as quickly as her was my grandfather. He was “Chuck.” I’m named after him, receiving the diminutive version of my name only as a matter of clarity and convenience in my family.

“Daddy!” my mother said. “I’ve got him.”

I don’t know if this is accurate, but the image I have of my grandfather from this moment is of him standing next to the pile of fallen choir members. He’s using a wide-leg stance and is holding a Bible robed choir member by the back of their collar and the back of their rope belt, chucking them to the side in a manner fitting of his name as he tried to get to what he believed was his grandson buried under the rubble.

My mother yanked me out the side door, sat me down on a curb outside and demanded that I tell her I was okay.

“I’m okay.”

She was shaking and crying. I can’t blame her. I had just been inches from death. The section of the cross that collapsed was maybe two feet next to me. Had I laid down my kids would not be currently arguing about video games in the next room.

Amazingly, no one died. Some broken bones though. 911 was called. The news showed up. They reported that a large “crucifix” had collapsed. This irritated me at the time, but now I wonder if wasn’t accurate in a way. After all, there were bodies on that cross.

The next day I arrived at the church to help salvage what we could. It was there that we learned what caused the collapse. The cross was kept in storage and reused every year, reassembled according to instructions. Someone had put on a brace backward and so drilled a new hole into it to make it fit. This single hole affected the structural integrity enough to cause a collapse, even though it had been fine for all the rehearsals in the days prior.

The church decided that the show must go on. The choir, of course, did not return to the cross. But it remained on stage for the remaining performances. Empty, broken, a string of lights dangling into the chasm on the left-hand side when viewed from the pews. All the result of a single mistake that compounded. This would turn out to be evocative of things to come, but I’m getting ahead of myself.

***

The Rev. Charles Browning II is the rector of Saint Mary’s Episcopal Church in Honolulu, Hawai’i. He is a husband, father, surfer, and frequent over-thinker. Follow him on Mastodon and Pixelfed.

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Today is the Feast of the Annunciation, a pretty substantial observance in the Christian world related to the Blessed Virgin Mary.

It is observed on March 25 because it is nine months away from Christmas, which underscores its traditional importance: the Feast of the Annunciation is associated with the Incarnation.

One of my acquaintances from seminary once posted on social media that Christmas is not the “Feast of the Incarnation,” rather the Annunciation is. Because, according to tradition, this is the day that Our Lady, Saint Mary, conceived Jesus—the day that He first took on human flesh, incarnate as God in the womb.

I like this reminder for a variety of reasons (not least my own particular “pro-life” leanings that I seldom talk about; the New Wave Feminists are probably the closest articulation to my convictions on this subject, if you must know). What a powerful notion, that God dwelt in the womb of a woman for nine months and some change. This is even more theologically rich when we consider the traditional Jewish belief that a fetus is not its own life while still in the womb, meaning that Mary herself (for a time) actively participated in the Incarnation of God.

However, I have a bit of a nit to pick with all of this: I’m not convinced that the Annunciation is when the Incarnation happened.

The Church has long observed two key feast days related to Our Lady’s pregnancy: the Annunciation and the Feast of the Visitation. The former recounts the time the Archangel Gabriel announced to Mary that she would be the mother of God; the latter is the story of when Mary visited her cousin, Saint Elizabeth (who herself was already pregnant with Saint John the Baptist), and both recognized Mary as the mother of God and the incarnation of God taking place in her womb.

Both stories are recorded in Saint Luke’s gospel. Now, Luke is a very detailed evangelist (that is, gospel writer). Of all the known gospels, his has the most historical detail. The tradition is that he traveled around and interviewed the surviving disciples of Jesus, while also reviewing other written materials (like, perhaps, Saint Mark’s gospel), in order to give a fuller account of the life of Jesus. As a result, Luke’s gospel is the only one that contains an actual birth narrative for Jesus; it’s also the only one that gives us any real details of Saint Mary. Saint Matthew’s gospel focuses a bit on Saint Joseph (Mary’s husband), but the actual birth of Jesus is merely referenced, not told.

This is all to say that Luke has an eye for detail and tries to give us as much detail as he can. All the major events of the life of Jesus have an actual story in Luke’s gospel. If the Annunciation is meant to be the story of Jesus’ conception, it’s an odd way of telling it because it seems to happen “off camera.”

Take a look:

God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a city in Galilee, to a virgin who was engaged to a man named Joseph, a descendant of David’s house. The virgin’s name was Mary. When the angel came to her, he said, “Rejoice, favored one! The Lord is with you!” She was confused by these words and wondered what kind of greeting this might be. The angel said, “Don’t be afraid, Mary. God is honoring you. Look! You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you will name him Jesus. He will be great and he will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of David his father. He will rule over Jacob’s house forever, and there will be no end to his kingdom.”

Then Mary said to the angel, “How will this happen since I haven’t had sexual relations with a man?”

The angel replied, “The Holy Spirit will come over you and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. Therefore, the one who is to be born will be holy. He will be called God’s Son. Look, even in her old age, your relative Elizabeth has conceived a son. This woman who was labeled ‘unable to conceive’ is now six months pregnant. Nothing is impossible for God.”

Then Mary said, “I am the Lord’s servant. Let it be with me just as you have said.” Then the angel left her. (Luke 1:26-38, Common English Bible)

Notice that the language is all in the future-tense. It’s the language of expectation. So, right off the bat we can see that, based solely on the text of the Bible itself, the Annunciation does not capture the when of Jesus’ conception.

The next thing to happen in the story is that Mary up and leaves to see Elizabeth, where Elizabeth notes that her baby (the fetal Saint John) “leaps” in her womb at the sound of Mary’s voice. Modern English translations tend to phrase Elizabeth’s greeting to Mary like this: “God has blessed you above all women, and he has blessed the child you carry.” (Luke 1:42, Common English Bible) So, if we follow the tenses of the language we’ve been given, we are led to believe that somewhere between Saint Gabriel’s announcing and Saint Elizabeth’s greeting is when Mary became pregnant. Again, the Annunciation is not the place where the conception of Jesus takes place.

Now, Elizabeth’s greeting is elsewhere enshrined in one of the most beloved prayers in Christianity, the “Hail Mary:”

Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou among women and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death. (emphasis mine)

This is actually the literal translation of the Greek words. Why English translations don’t like using figurative language anymore is a topic for another time, but this phrasing does not necessarily imply that Mary is currently pregnant since “fruit of the womb” is not necessarily tied to time the way “the child you carry” is.

So here’s my assertion: it is during the Visitation that Mary conceives Jesus. I base this entirely on the language of the gospel text and what we know of Saint Luke. As already noted, it would seem out of character for Luke to include such foreshadowing language from Gabriel and not give us the pay-off. But I do believe he gives us the pay-off.

Look back to what Gabriel says to Mary when she asks “How will this happen?”

The Holy Spirit will come over you and the power of the Most High will overshadow you.

Luke uses similar language in the first chapter of Acts. In the midst of the risen Jesus giving instructions to His disciples as He is preparing to ascend into Heaven, he tells them:

You will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you. (Acts 1:8 Common English Bible)

In the very next chapter this is fulfilled when tongues of flame alight on the heads of the disciples and they begin to speak in different language, filled with spiritual ecstasy.

So, let’s look again at Mary’s story. She’s been told that she will become a virgin mother, the Mother of God; the sign for this will be when the Holy Spirit comes over her and she is overshadowed by the power of the Most High—language quite evocative of what Luke says about Pentecost in Acts.

Now, consider what happens after Elizabeth’s greeting. We’re told the Holy Spirit has filled Elizabeth, herself uttering an ecstatic proclamation, recalled in that first half of the Hail Mary prayer. So the Spirit is present and what does Mary do? She has an ecstatic Spirit-filled proclamation herself.

We call it the Magnificat.

It is my conviction that the Magnificat is intended by Saint Luke to evoke the moment that Mary conceives Jesus. I also think that it is no coincidence that he has this happen at a moment where there are only two women present, perhaps underscoring the miraculous nature of this. There’s no man to be found, or even suggested (as some like the heretical bishop, the late John Shelby Spong might, with his assertion that Mary was raped, perhaps by a man named Gabriel, and that this is the church’s way of trying to turn tragedy into triumph). Rather, God enters our world in the presence of two women, both enraptured by the Holy Spirit.

So, if this is the case, what are we celebrating today? Why bother with the Annunciation?

Because the Annunciation is still good news. It’s the good news that our sins have not left us abandoned. God still chooses to be born among us, even knowing our wickedness. It is the good news that God has chosen a poor young woman to be the one from which God will take on our flesh. Not a person of wealth and power and influence. But someone of meager means, marginal and innocent.

Today we hear the good news that God refuses to be separate from us.

I think of this old tweet every year on this day. Credit to OP

***

The Rev. Charles Browning II is the rector of Saint Mary’s Episcopal Church in Honolulu, Hawai’i. He is a husband, father, surfer, and frequent over-thinker. Follow him on Mastodon and Pixelfed.

#Jesus #Church #Anglican #Episcopalian #Catholic #Christian #Bible #Mary