I was having a conversation last Sunday with one of our parishioners about some of the particulars of our church architecture. It was fun to be able to point out the symbols of our patron, St Francis de Sales and the stories behind some of the stained glass windows.
So here's my question for you: Can you find the rainbow in our stained glass window in the sanctuary?
Ever since I've been a kid, I've loved colors and I've loved the beauty of a rainbow, both in real life and in pictures. Color just helps me breath better. It make me feel calm and whole. Sometimes I'll go into Home Goods just to admire the way the set their displays according to color schemes. Still today, a brand new box of crayons can make me smile.
All of which is to say how wonderful it is that in Genesis 9 we learn that God uses the symbol of a rainbow to seal his promise with his chosen ones. With the arc of the rainbow God reminds God self and all of humanity of the Creator's love for all creatures. God promises with that rainbow never again to destroy the world.
It's hard to admit to ourselves that we have found way too many ways to do harm to one another in our history and in our present day. We have institutionalized racism, misogyny, and so many of our prejudices and hatreds. We don't need to worry about God destroying the world again, we're well on the path to doing that on our own.
But there is, I have to believe, a goodness in our human nature too. There is a spirit of hope that keeps striving for peace and justice. Sometimes that spirit has a whole lot of ignorance to overcome, but when that happens, and someone is newly WOKE, watch out! Once we have seen and understood injustice, than everything in our souls calls us to work in big and small ways towards equality and justice, fairness for those who have been overlooked for so long.
It's been a long year since Covid 19 hit our shores. In addition to a terrifying pandemic, we've dealt with a most divisive election season where we were shown how conflicted we are as a nation, and the Black Live Matter Movement that forced us to confront our complacency. That's a whole lot of hurt for us to deal with.
We can't go back to things the way they used to be. We have to be better when we come out on the other side of this pandemic.
How we do that is up to each of us.
So, I'm encouraging each of us to look to the rainbow (can you hear the music from Finian's Rainbow?!)
Let the rainbow remind us that God loves each of us: Black, White, Brown, Purple, all the colors of the rainbow, and that God loves us EXACTLY as we were created, in God's image! We don't have to be anything we are not, in fact, as St Francis de Sales said, we should "Be who we are and be that perfectly well!"
We might be a church that is 125 years old, but I'll bet we're the only church in NYC with a rainbow in its sanctuary window!! Can you find it?
