SERMON PREACHED BY THE REV'D ALLAN B. WARREN III AT THE CHURCH OF THE ADVENT,
SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2008, THE LAST SUNDAY AFTER EPIPHANY

I’d like to begin this morning by telling you about a rather saintly and impressive man, George Hendric Houghton, who was the founder of one of the churches I served in New York City, the Church of the Transfiguration. Fr. Houghton was a New Yorker, and as a very young man, just out of seminary, in fact before he had even been ordained a priest, he was given permission by his bishop to begin a new church. He chose the site for the church quite deliberately and carefully: East Twenty-Fourth Street, later to move to East Twenty-Ninth Street. This was a seedy section on the outskirts of town in 1848, an unlikely place to start a new parish. But Fr. Houghton chose it precisely because it was seedy, a shantytown, and because the large and relatively new public hospital, Bellevue, was nearby. For, you see, George Hendric Houghton had an aim for his life and ministry, a devotion to work among the poor, the outcasts, those whom society used but rarely cared for. Fr. Houghton made that his purpose and the purpose of his parish, and in fulfilling that mission the story of the Church of the Transfiguration is glorious and exemplary. It was the first church in New York actively to invite black children into its Church School. Before the Civil War it was a stop-over on the Underground Railroad - escaped slaves were hidden there on their way to freedom. During the war - in July of 1863, to be specific - when the Draft Riots convulsed the city for nearly a week and as many as a thousand people were killed, several hundred black people were given refuge in the church. At one point a mob gathered outside. Fr. Houghton stood in the doorway - holding a crucifix - and stared them down, and the crowd broke up.

Most of his ministry was much quieter than that, attracting the attention only of neighboring clergy, who found it peculiar, if not bizarre - “all sorts and conditions,” a motley crew up there on Twenty-Ninth Street. He’d even hired a Jewish sexton.

In 1870, however, something happened which put the church on the map. An actor died, an Englishman, and as an act of kindness to his family one of his colleagues offered to make arrangements for the funeral. He stopped at a church some blocks away, spoke to the rector, and set the day and time for the service. But as he left, he made the mistake of mentioning that the man to be buried was an actor. (Remember that in those days theatre people were considered to be dishonorable, dishonest, and immoral by “polite” society.) He was rebuffed and refused: “I’m sorry. Those plans will have to be cancelled. We don’t perform services here for such people.”

“But, what can I do?”

“Go to that little church around the corner. They do that kind of thing up there.” Well, that’s been the nickname of the parish ever since - “The Little Church Around the Corner” - first uttered scornfully, now affectionately - a name that came to be because of a simple act of Christian charity to an outcast, one whom most people considered to be beyond the pale.

But let’s return to Fr. Houghton. An influence which had a profound impact on his life and the style of his ministry as a priest was the Oxford Movement, the Tractarians. You probably remember that this was a movement begun in the Church of England in the 1830s with the purpose of restoring to Anglicanism part of its heritage - the Catholic part. The Tractarians understood the Church to be a supernatural society with its own particular ways of doing things and not a this-worldly institution subject to secular standards. They sought to revive the teaching and understanding of the doctrine of the Church and to transcend the arid rationalism of the day. Their emphasis was on Christianity as a mystical and sacramental religion - a faith which lives as much in the next world as it does in the present one. And, like the founders of this parish, they sought to restore dignity and beauty and glory to the worship of the Church, which in those days was more often than not sloppy and dull and strictly pro forma. Fr. Houghton was one of the first Americans to be influenced by the Oxford Movement, and his church on Twenty-Ninth Street was one of the earliest Tractarian parishes in the country.

I’ve told you about this rather saintly man this morning not just because his is an interesting and inspiring story, but also because of the name which he chose for his church. It was a dedication never before used in all of the Anglican Communion, the Church of the Transfiguration, and we heard about this - the Transfiguration - in the Collect and in the Gospel this morning. This event in our Lord’s life was for Houghton an icon, an expressive symbol of the mission of Christians and the Church. It made clear, he felt, the individual, the societal, and even the cosmic implications of Christianity. And since his new church was very much about mission, he dedicated it to the Transfiguration of Jesus.

Think back to the Gospel today. We heard from Matthew (17:1 - 9), but Mark and Luke are very similar in their accounts. Jesus took three of his Apostles, Peter and James and John, to the top of a mountain. There, a very strange and visionary experience was granted to them. Jesus’ appearance was changed. He was transfigured. “His face shone like the sun, and his garments became white as light.” They saw Him as He really is: dazzling and bright with the glory of God. And beside him appeared Moses and Elijah, indicating that He Himself was the fulfillment and end of the Old Covenant, and the source of a new one. “And a bright cloud overshadowed them, and out of the cloud a voice spoke and said, ‘This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased; listen to him.’”

Many in the Church - and as I said, Fr. Houghton was among them - many have seen this as an epitome of the Christian life. Christians are those who have seen and who continue to see the glory of God revealed in the face of Jesus Christ. Jesus is the lens, so to speak, that focuses the eye of the soul on God’s glory.

And that glory is catching. Let me say that again: glory is catching. Christians have discovered their own lives transfigured, transformed by the vision of the glory of God in Jesus. We heard about that in the Collect this morning, which is an echo of St. Paul. He tells us, “And we, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being changed into his likeness from one degree of glory to another.” (II Cor. 3:18)

Glory is catching - to see it, that is to say to know the love, the forgiveness, the acceptance, the Risen Presence of the Savior and His splendor is to be changed into His likeness, to be like him. Changed as far as it may be in this life and changed fully in the life to come. From St John: “we know that we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is.” (I John 3:2) Christian life is and must be a transfiguration into the glory of Christ. We become alive with his glory … again, that is his love, his forgiveness, his acceptance, his risen presence, and his splendor.

And what is evident from the lives of people like Fr. Houghton and so many of those whom we call saints is that glory, once caught, demands to be spread. Again, glory, once caught, once seen, becomes active in one’s life and demands to be spread. Why else would people give up their whole lives in service and charity? Fr. Houghton founding a church for those whom no one else wanted. Francis of Assisi making the Gospel known by the example of his simplicity and absolute poverty. Joseph de Veuster, known as Father Damian, among the lepers in Hawaii until he too died of leprosy. In our own time, Mother Teresa, bringing hope and love to those who in the reckoning of the world are most hopeless, abandoned, and rejected. And there are many others like them. It is because of this - this impulse to spread the glory, to transfigure human life - that Christianity, in spite of many lapses, has been the most potent influence and agent for positive social change in the history of the world.

How strange: that those who have had the greatest good effect on this world are those whose hearts and souls are set on the next world.

Glory is catching, and glory demands to be spread. The King of glory comes to us in Jesus, and he commands us to extend his kingdom and make his glory known. Transfigured into his likeness, we become his agents, his instruments for the transfiguration of the whole world.

And to him be ascribed love, forgiveness, honor, majesty and glory,

King of Kings, and
Lord of Lords,
Our Savior Jesus Christ.

Amen.