hedged in by a wall of cecil bruner roses

Fr. Carioca is trying his best to save the whole of the Anglican communion. Personally, I think he could do it. His intellect and heart, both huge, are in the right place. He eagerly debates, encourages, interacts. And though he occupies a place in the whole continuum that is definitely to the right of center, he can listen to the opposite point of view so thoroughly that he can paraphrase the heart of it back to them, accurately. His ideal world would include a communion of much more than just a bunch of folks who easily agree.

It would be a giant understatement to say I process things differently from him. At the time of our General Convention last June, with some very weighty things going on there (and Fr. C right in the middle of it, being one facet of a cross-section on an important committee), I wrote a spontaneous (note: don't try this at home when you've had a bit too much sake) e-letter to him, posted on our diocesan blog, using our dining room as an imaginary point of Episco/Anglican reconciliation. 'Let the community come to the table.' With a current crisis now threatening, I set out on a different journey.

As I walk through our neighborhood, I'm keenly aware of its grand past, its reconstructing present, and a future of probables and possibles. Formerly one of the finest areas of town, time and the natural propensity of life to eventually level things out caused it to decline. Yet, it has evolved into something perhaps greater than what it was at its inception. Originally mono-chromatic in all respects, it is now mixed in every way possible: economically, racially; types of dwellings, nearly mansions and far-reaching apartments; residents as renters, owners, rich, poor. The hospital I was born in is two blocks away – big, still a respectful part of the surrounding community. Our house is a few feet away from the shadow of the Roman Catholic cathedral – glorious, yet not pompous, a stable, beautifying presence for us. As I walk Lucy each morning, parishioners arrive for the first mass of the diocese. It feels good.

Yet, our neighborhood is not immune from expressions of unhappiness from our city's troubled youth. Along with other ‘unthinkables’ in its illustrious past: graffiti. It isn't rampant in our area; but when such self-expression is carried out, something new is usually the target. Across the street from the cathedral, newcomers to the neighborhood put up a lovely fence of beautiful, natural finished wood. It was quickly tagged. The fence was then painted. Tagged, again. Areas with the offending scrawls were covered with splotchy paint, a painful testimony to an act borne of human alienation. There it sat, seemingly defeated. Yet, over time, a unique countering strategy unfolded. Slowly, in the flower bed bordering the fence, roses were planted. Later, nails and string combined to form a twisted support, graffiti still part of the effect. Climbing roses have now reached the top of the fence, and some are quite full. There will soon be no room for 'new art'.

A few days ago, I detoured from my usual morning walking route to get a closer look at the area: Wow –bountiful bushes of Cecil Bruner roses are about to burst into bloom!! My heart leaped: 50 years ago, when my parents built a house on a humble country road north of here that ironically became one of the best streets in this town, our Cecil Bruner bushes were my secret garden. Their miniature beauty, symbol of sweetness, youth and happiness, captured my heart and imagination. Time was spent surrounded by legions of small, delicate, pink buds, which were cut and carefully woven into our braids or 'buns'. Now, my adult heart was bursting with remembrances of wonder and grace, immediately extended back to this moment in time.

Standing there, on that corner, my heart pictured another community gathered – this time, not by a polite dinner invitation extended, but rather by a forced corralling of all in a certain world-wide Communion. Closed in and encircled by a wall of Cecil Bruner roses, past, present and future would work their primal magic, bonding together until hearts are bound by strands of roses in sweet grace.

Through human hands, climbing roses cannot make a hedge or a wall. But in God’s hands, they may.

Photo courtesy of http://digitalfieldguide.com/blog/