Journals (8/28 backup)

God Is Change

National BIPOC Month
The Final Judgment

31 “When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit on his glorious throne. 32 Before him will be gathered all the nations, and he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. 33 And he will place the sheep on his right, but the goats on the left. 34 Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. 35 For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, 36 I was naked and you clothed me, I was sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came to me.’ 37 Then the righteous will answer him, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? 38 And when did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you? 39 And when did we see you sick or in prison and visit you?’ 40 And the King will answer them, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers,[a] you did it to me.’
41 “Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. 42 For I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me no drink, 43 I was a stranger and you did not welcome me, naked and you did not clothe me, sick and in prison and you did not visit me.’ 44 Then they also will answer, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not minister to you?’ 45 Then he will answer them, saying, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me.’ 46 And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.”

Throughout my life, especially the last 35 years, God has brought change in my life, for God is change! In Christ change will continue to come!

From being experienced as a God of only those who are Christian I have come to experience God as of appearing in many faces through out the world! God is a God of absolute love! And it is this God in Christ who continually leads me on the journey of seeing the broken body of Christ in every person!

Several days ago I sat with a young fifteen year old girl whose pregnancy led her dad to beat her to a pulp, and she lost her baby. He quoted Bible verses to her, as he hit her with his belt.

Sometime ago sitting in a restaurant in Marin I questioned a wealthy woman about the apartments in Marin City housing multiple Hispanic families, working minimum level jobs, and he growing homeless in the area. Her answer was that she preferred not to think about the poverty three miles away from her.

This month "BIPOC Mental Health Month", 'I hear the stories of their communities which continue to face discrimination, systemic inequalities, and social injustices which have profound impacts on mental health.

Stigma is present in many communities. but it is especially complex in BIPOC communities due to critical factors and historical trauma. Breaking these stigmas requires open dialog , cultural sensitivities, and ongoing community support.

If we work together to break mental health stigma, we can help create a more supportive, inclusive environment for everyone.

In following a God who changes us to people of inclusive love we leave our past of prejudice of people of race, creed and color; share our wealth, and most importantly share our time!

Go out on the streets of your town, and you will find suffering people, and change into a person of love!
---------------------------------------
Fr. River Damien Sims, sfw, D.Min., D.S.T.
P.O. Box 642646
San Francisco, CA 94164
www.temenos.org
415-305-2124
[email protected]

August, September, October, 2023

Temenos Catholic Worker
P.O. Box 64265
San Francisco, CA 94164
415-305-2124
www.temenos.org
Fr. River Damien Sims, sfw, D.Min., D.S.T.

Journal of An Alien Street Priest:

Growing up in the South, August was a time called the "Dog Days", a time of severe heat and humidity. I slept on the front porch in the cool of the evening with my dog.

August: a time for outdoor movies, concerts, beach visits, and nature hikes (if you don’t mind mosquitoes). And if your summer is anything like mine, it also means interruptions, unreachable colleagues, and unfinished business. Summer is also a time of tension. Yes, there are joyful outings and abundant picnic tables, but also devastating losses in our neighborhood and record-high temperatures. Supreme Court decisions are taking away our rights, gun violence is taking away our babies, governments are zealous to take away food aids from our tables and healthcare from our neighbors. We need more than cool drinks to refresh our souls.

So use the “Dog Days” of August as a time of simply relaxing, playing, reading, and loving your neighbor. With me meditate on the words of Richard C. Schwartz daily: “Many of our religions have thaught us through spiritual practices we will be able to escape from the Earth plane. The paradoxical truth how ever, is just the opposite. In mediation we do not escape from this plane. Rather, we merge our consciousness with the planet, so that we know reality, know the cosmos, in the fluid, vast and expansive way that Earth does!

Deo Gratias! Thanks be to God!

On the Parable of the Sower!

Matthew 13:1-9,18-23.

The “Parable of the Sower,” as the story from our Gospel reading is commonly known, always has confounded me.

From the time I first learned the parable about a farmer who sows seeds that meet different fates depending on the kind of soil they reach (or don’t), external conditions, and how the seeds are tended, I wasn’t sure what I was meant to understand.

In the United Methodist Church of my adolescence, we were taught that the seed was God’s truth (i.e., scripture), that we were the soil, and that whether the planted seed flourished and produced fruit was somehow up to us and an indication of our spiritual health/God’s approval.

But in real life, isn’t the farmer the one responsible for how and where seeds are planted, tended, and harvested? If seeds are planted in rocky soil, choked by weeds, or carried away by birds (or stolen by “the devil”), doesn’t the fault lie with the farmer and not the seeds or the ground?

Throughout much of my life, each time the Parable of the Sower would appear in the ecclesiastical cycle, I’d find myself crankily listening with a furrowed brow. I didn’t understand. The not-knowing made me uncomfortable.

Am I the ground and the seed? Is God the farmer? If not, who is?

Part of the problem might lie in what’s not included in today’s reading — the bits in between Matthew 13:1–9 and verses 18–23 — where the disciples ask Jesus why he chooses to teach in parables.

Hey rabbi, why not just give them a list of clear commands, they seem to imply, or better yet, a manual with step-by-step instructions for how to live?

“You’ve been given insight into God’s kingdom,” Jesus begins his response in The Messager para-translation of verse 11 and onward. “You know how it works. Not everybody has this gift, this insight; it hasn’t been given to them. Whenever someone has a ready heart for this, the insights and understandings flow freely. But if there is no readiness, any trace of receptivity soon disappears. That’s why I tell stories: to create readiness, to nudge the people toward a welcome awakening.”

Jesus says he uses stories because he doesn’t want a repeat of what the prophet Isaiah foretold:

Your ears are open, but you don’t hear a thing.
Your eyes are awake, but you don’t see a thing.

Biblical scholars (of which I am certainly not one) debate whether Jesus, in his parables, employed allegory — a literary device where characters and plot points reveal hidden moral or political meanings.

Whether allegorical or not, to my eyes and ears, Jesus’ stories contain wisdom and mysteries that continue to unfold over time and eternity, to and through our interactions with them.

It’s impossible to ensure with total certainty what the results of a literal planted seed will be, no matter how carefully it is tended and cultivated. Likewise, no one can predict the ultimate result of a seed planted in someone’s imagination.

Through the years I have always been asked "how many young people have you gotten off the street or off drugs and so on?"

And all I know is that I plant the seed, and it fruition may come long after I am gone, but I plant the seed.

I’m pretty sure Jesus knew this. Perhaps that was his point.

There is mystery, yes. And people have agency. We have the power and ability to choose what to do with what we have received, whether it’s information and talents, peak experiences or traumas.

The boundary-shattering science-fiction novelist Octavia E. Butler grew up Black and Baptist in the racially segregated Pasadena, California, of the 1950s, where the seeds of Bible stories and Jesus’ parables were planted in her young heart. While she eventually walked away from the Christianity of her youth, some of those same seeds grew into her 1993 novel The Parable of the Sower.

I walked away from the Christianity of my youth, the traditional Christianity of my adulthood, and the institutionalized church, but the seeds planted in my childhood have flourished into a Christianity that sees all as our brothers and sisters.

Butler’s Sower is set in a dystopian (but not by much) 2024, where the United States is on the brink of annihilation thanks to cataclysmic climate change, rampant social inequality, unfettered corporate greed, and inexorable political corruption. It also features a political candidate championed by far-right Christians, whose slogan is, “Help us make America great again.”(Sound familiar!)

The heroine of Sower is Lauren Olamina, a Black teenager and daughter of a Baptist minister who has a medical condition called “hyper-empathy” that makes her physically experience the suffering of others. Convinced that humanity will not survive much longer without radical change, Olamina develops her own belief system, where the only enduring truth is “God is Change.” It grows to becomes a religion of its own called Earthseed.

My own experience is"Christ is change", he is the Cosmic Christ, in a world that is so separated by all sorts of divisions. I am seeing more and more homeless on the street and people not caring. A professor in a course I have taken on adolescent psychology talked of driving around and seeing more and more people on the street and how sad it is. She appeared not to give one a care. I have not seen one politician in the City care for the poorest the poor working twenty dollars and hour job in a City where rent is sky high!

[Butler] doesn’t say that religion is good or bad, but she says that we use it to try and articulate our role in life and in the universe, my spirituality gives me meaning and purpose in life. It is why I serve God and see God in everyone. Theologian Tamisha Tyler told journalist Kimberly Winston in a fascinating Religion Unplugged article about the rise in Butler’s popularity during the COVID era.

Butler’s Parable of the Sower became a bestseller in October 2020—nearly two decades after it was published and 14 years after the author’s untimely death in 2006 at the age of 58. She didn’t live to see the harvest, but when it finally came, it was as abundant as it was unexpected.

Butler’s Parable of the Sower has even been made into an opera that has reached audiences around the world. On March 7, 2020, the opera, which was adapted by mother-daughter musicians Bernice Johnson Reagan (one of the founders of Sweet Honey in the Rock) and Toshi Reagon, was performed at UCLA just days before COVID sent the world into an unprecedented lock down.

I’ve lost all my fear and exchanged it for a clear vision in the last five years as I have struggled with a shoulder injury, seeing young people die from COVID and violence,being beaten and cripple for an extended time.
As we open our hearts and eyes we see
the whole world’s gone crazy.

Stories find their audiences and audiences find the stories.

Read this novel, see our much our world is similar, and how our fears and actions are similar. Raise the issues within yourself and move towards becoming new.

May we each have ears to hear the stories we need most, embrace awakening as it comes, and remain open to the unfolding mystery.

May we see each other as human beings, struggling, suffering, whose end will be the same death, and work as hard as we can to provide health care, housing, food, and equality for!

October 4 will the 29th Anniversary of Temenos Catholic Worker! I asked you to remember we have been here that long because of the response to our begging, and we beg now for support and know that it will feed, provide pastoral care, and a ministry of harm reduction to our homeless brothers and sisters! Thank you!

Temenos Catholic Worker
Fr. River Damien Sims. D.Min.
P.O. Box 642656
San Francisco, CA 94164

The Freedom of Being Indifferent!

Memorial of Saint Kateri Tekakwitha, Virgin

" . . .You will be hated by all because of my name. ."

Saint Kateri was our first Native American Saint. Her family, and her tribe put her through hell for converting to Christianity. Her tribe fought against her conversion, but she simply was "Indifferent" to them, and followed Christ.

Indifference, defined by St. Ignatius, is the ability to live in the moment, and hear other people without making judgment. This is the way I try to work.

Indifference allows us to hear, and see whatever the issue is, with mutual respect. Indifference allows us to see through whatever action, and see the pain of the individual's humanity.

The young men on death row, homeless boys and girls, homeless men and women, the tons of people with vicious anger against the church, non-believers and those who believe in other religions, people who revile, criticize, and ignore us, are all children of
God.

Each person has their own story to tell with severe hidden pain, and each person deserves to be listened to with out judgment.

Edward, not his real name, in our photo tells me in listening that he is ignored, lectured, condemned to hell, and it brings him so much pain, for he is simply a child of God who is struggling to survive.

In this age of constant social media, which spreads so much file news, and allows us to gossip and criticize others seeing their face, and pain. In this age of very little social interaction on the personal level, indifference brings us freedom to talk one on one with each other, without fear or judgement.

To love, to be unpretentious, to simplify our lives--to go joyfully, seeking nothing for ourselves, in complete abandonment is the joy of being indifferent!
=========================
Fr. River Damien Sims, sfw, D.Min., D.S.T.
P.O. Box 642656
San Francisco, CA 94164
temenos.org
[email protected]
415-305-2124
-----------------------------
We are Beggars! We desperately need money!

Fr. River Damien Sims, sfw, D.Min., D.S.T.
P.O. Box 642656
San Francisco, CA 94164
415-305-2124
www.temenos.org

We Are Beggars! Please Give as You Can!

Mouth of the Donkey

Laura Duhan-Kaplan
Re-Imaging Biblical Animals!

"Wolf and Lamb Together: Peace Is Possible"

The Work of A Lifetime!

Gospel Mt 9:14-17
The disciples of John approached Jesus and said, "Why do we and the Pharisees fast much, but your disciples do not fast?"

Jesus answered them, "Can the wedding guests mourn as long as the bridegroom is with them? The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast. No one patches an old cloak with a piece of unshrunken cloth, for its fullness pulls away from the cloak and the tear gets worse. People do not put new wine into old wine skins. Otherwise the skins burst, the wine spills out, and the skins are ruined. Rather, they pour new wine into fresh wine- skins, and both are preserved.

As I have gotten older, have arthritis, limp from my injuries, and find myself depressed some days, along with feeling like a failure after my work of a lifetime, I remember the reflection of Martin Luther King Jr. that

"the arc of history bends towards justice, but it bends slowly."

In her book, Mouth of a Donkey Laura Duhan-Kaplan portrays a number of Biblical animals simply as smart, gentle, kind, and able to communicate with humans illustrating King's view point--no matter how bad it may look, history bends towards justice.

A new wine skin, or a new behavior, has to be able to hold the gritty and beautiful reality of this day and be open to its future. It has to hold the complexity and breadth of what is actually needed--for justice, for compassion, for care of the Earth. It needs to be resilient and tenacious because new behavior is often met with resistance and fear. The new wine skin has to possess the integrity and consistency of ordinary people who bring the best of themselves to daily relationships and needs--poverty, homelessness, racism-around them people who are willing to grow and expand with the mystery of God's presence.

New wine skins look a lot like people who know that commitment to bending the arc is the work of a life time and that fidelity and perfection are two different things.

I have spent nearly thirty years on Polk and Haight, holding the hands of Jamie, Cindi, and others. Many, and I mean many, have remained on the street a result of lack of housing, drug treatment, and apathy of many. We need the touch of human beings, not the touch of government!

I have held the hands of too many to count who have died, sleeping in doorways, and out in the Park; I see every day the mistreatment of our homeless by every day folk. They walk to church this morning ignoring their brothers and sisters around them. Afterward go to the nice restaurants or home to a nice meal, not even remembering those under their feet who are starving.

Yet the arc is "bending slowly!"

Sometimes I picture large groups of people hanging on to the arc with all their lives, slowly bending it with the sheer force of their integrity and the full weight of their love for "Love doesn't just sit there like a stone, it has to be made like bread (Ursula Le Guin)--new wine skins slung over the shoulders of all."

"The Wolf and the Lamb" is seen through these new wine skins, and I know that The Work of My Lifetime" has not been in vain! Deo Gratias! Thanks be to God!

Fr. River Damien Sims, sfw, D.Min., D.S.T.
P.O. Box 642656
San Francisco, CA 94164
415-305-2124
www.temenos.org

We Are Beggars! Please Give as You Can!

Grasshoppers and Locusts!

Matthew 9:9-13: (NRSVeu)

"As Jesus walked along, he saw a man called Matthew sitting at the tax collector's station, and said to him: "Follow me!" And he got up and followed him. And as he sat at the dinner table in the house, many tax collectors and sinners came... And he said: "Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick.. for I have not come to call the righteous but sinners."

Jesus came as a simple man, he came without judgment but with care and love. He sat down with the "tax collectors" and "sinners" or in our day with the homeless, the black, the brown, the poor whites and sees them simply as people, people in pain, and he loves them.

Have you ever paid much attention to grasshoppers? They can be an annoyance when one is sitting on the ground.

These are gentle creatures; looking at them closely, one can see beauty and peace as they look for food in the grass. Or as you sleep on the ground, wake up with them hopping all over you—just beautiful!

When grasshoppers get together in groups, they become locusts with one thing in mind: the destruction of crops and other plants.

When people sit down with one another and talk, when the neglected are treated with kindness, we become as gentle as grasshoppers, loving and caring.

But when we get into groups, our tribes, and begin to see each other as aliens, as different, fearing for ourselves, we become locusts.

We make our targets the homeless, alien immigrants, people of color, and the poor.

I remember a minister friend telling the story of a group of ten- to twelve-year olds in his church. He said in working with them they were fun and gentle, like grasshoppers.

One day they were together, and an older teen showed up and stirred them up against a black man who had moved into their white neighborhood.

He stirred up their fears, and suddenly these kids became locusts—they mounted their bikes and rode to this man's house screaming, shouting, and throwing rocks, telling him to move out or die.

As you see our homeless brothers and sisters or hear of an undocumented immigrant or a person of color who moves into your neighborhood, what are you going to be: a grasshopper, loving and caring, or a locust, caught up in a group mentality of hatred?

You see, we are all made up of both forms: grasshopper or locust, and we choose!

Choose life; choose being the loving grasshopper!

"May you listen to the voice.
beneath every voice,
that so softly and gently, like
the kindest love,
speaks unceasingly within you.
saying "you are mine",
and may you make it your life's
ambition to return as if it were
your breath,
unending until you're made
perfectly one."
Deo Gratias! Thanks be to God!
(Strahan Coleman)

-----------------------
Father River Damien Sims, SFW, D.S.T., D.Min.
P.O. Box 642656
San Francisco, CA
94164
415-305-2124
www. temenos.org
---------------------------
We are beggars! Please Give!

The Coldest Place I have Ever Been In My life in the Summer is San Francisco! Mark Twain

Today as I moved serving people, I found it difficult, both emotionally
and physically.

Physically, it is cold, and with the wind blowing it is colder than 59 degrees, and emotionally I see hundreds of people huddled on the street, without much covering. All I can do is listen, give them socks, food, and harm-reduction supplies.

They are ignored by the people who walk past them in jackets and sweatshirts, talking on their phones, laughing!

They are judged over and over, and many are afraid when someone speaks to
them.

ore people than ever say nasty things to me, I am threatened by nicely
clothed people for feeding the homeless.

Thomas Berry once said:

"We should be clear about what happens when we destroy the living forms of this planet. The first consequence is that we destroy modes of divine presence."

By ignoring, mistreating our brothers and sisters on the street we are
destroying them. We are destroying "modes of divine presence."

The one thing I believe with all of my heart, given my life to, and will die for, is that God in Christ calls each us to a resurrection, one that unites and heals people. And that resurrection begins now, not in the "ever after".

John Boorman says to each one of us:

"What is passion? It is surely the becoming of a person. Are we not for most of our lives marking time? Most of our being is at rest, unlived in passion, the body and the spirit seek expression outside of self. Passion is within us and calls out for expression".

There was a time, a lifetime ago, when after failing in conversion therapy, I as offered a choice going to a State Hospital, where I would continue that therapy and possibly have electrotherapy or losing my salary and benefits.

An older man who had been in the hospital for ages said to me one day, "Hey kid, don't let them fool you, get out and live, so what if you don't
want to have a girlfriend." (People wonder why I am not very trusting of the mental health system and always question, this is why, I suffered immensely).

I slipped away one night, and never looked back as I headed to LA. The rest is history; my passion was born!

So I invite each of you to move out in passion to work with the suffering around you! Thousands are freezing tonight! Deo Gratias! Thanks be to God!

"Creating God, your reign of love makes all things new; Plant seeds of confidence and gladness in our hearts, so that trusting your word we may
live no longer for ourselves but for him who died and was raised for us, Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen."

Gorillas In Our Midst!

Six Days of Creation and the Sabbath

In the beginning God created[a] the heavens and the earth. The earth was without form and void, and darkness was upon the face of the deep; and the Spirit[b] of God was moving over the face of the waters.

And God said, “Let there be light”; and there was light. And God saw that the light was good, and God separated the light from the darkness. God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And there was evening and there was morning, one day.

And God said, “Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it separate the waters from the waters.” And God made the firmament and separated the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament. And it was so. And God called the firmament Heaven. And there was evening and there was morning, a second day.

And God said, “Let the waters under the heavens be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear.” And it was so. God called the dry land Earth, and the waters that were gathered together he called Seas. And God saw that it was good. And God said, “Let the earth put forth vegetation, plants yielding seed, and fruit trees bearing fruit in which is their seed, each according to its kind, upon the earth.” And it was so. The earth brought forth vegetation, plants yielding seed according to their own kinds, and trees bearing fruit in which is their seed, each according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. And there was evening and there was morning, a third day.

And God said, “Let there be lights in the firmament of the heavens to separate the day from the night; and let them be for signs and for seasons and for days and years. And let them be lights in the firmament of the heavens to give light upon the earth.” And it was so. And God made the two great lights, the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night; he made the stars also. And God set them in the firmament of the heavens to give light upon the earth, to rule over the day and over the night, and to separate the light from the darkness. And God saw that it was good. And there was evening and there was morning, a fourth day.

And God said, “Let the waters bring forth swarms of living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the firmament of the heavens.” So God created the great sea monsters and every living creature that moves, with which the waters swarm, according to their kinds, and every winged bird according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. And God blessed them, saying, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the waters in the seas, and let birds multiply on the earth.” And there was evening and there was morning, a fifth day.

And God said, “Let the earth bring forth living creatures according to their kinds: cattle and creeping things and beasts of the earth according to their kinds.” And it was so. And God made the beasts of the earth according to their kinds and the cattle according to their kinds, and everything that creeps upon the ground according to its kind. And God saw that it was good.

Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness; and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps upon the earth.” So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. And God blessed them, and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it; and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air and over every living thing that moves upon the earth.” And God said, “Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit; you shall have them for food. And to every beast of the earth, and to every bird of the air, and to everything that creeps on the earth, everything that has the breath of life, I have given every green plant for food.” And it was so. And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, a sixth day.

========================

The Creation story is a myth, a story which describes how we evolved over millions and millions of years.

In the movie, "Gorillas in Our Midst!" Susan Saran played a zoologist who fought to protect the gorillas in Africa, resulting in her being murdered for those efforts. She showed how really brilliant gorillas are, how loving and tender, our ancestors.

Through studying gorillas we learn of how our own intelligence evolved, they take care of their whole family, of all gorillas, and they are kind and gentle. They have no "rights" just the obligation of caring for their brother and sister.

We are animals, yes, but in our evolution, God has chosen to place his spirit within us. To make is 'sapiens' wiser creatures.

Meryl Streep says "The great gift of human beings is that we have the power of empathy."

In Jewish Law, we see that we have no "right" to claim anything from the community of faith. Rather the community is built upon the obligation to take care of each other.

The community is obligated to provide food, health care, equal housing, mental health care, equality, and inclusion.

This is our modern obligation whether we are Christian, Buddhist, etc. We are told "To Love our neighbors as ourselves," to provide for each human being as we take care of ourselves.

On Facebook I never hear anything hardly about homelessness; poverty; racism; homophobia.

In the San Francisco Chronicle, we read about the good times and crime, but little about homelessness, unless you want to clean them off the street.

To "cure" homelessness is a "community effort", an effort where we all pitch in, give of our time, money, and provide for our neighbors. Until the day where we are willing to treat each homeless person as our own brother and sister, get out of our tribes, and face individuals, touch them, look them in the eye homelessness, pain, and suffering on the street will continue.

"The great gift of human beings is that we have the power of empathy."

======================================
Fr. C. River Damien Sims, sfw, D.Min., D.S.T.
P.O. Box 642656
San Francisco, CA 94164
www.temenos.org
415-305-2124
--------------
Our finances are down! So please we beg send us what you can!

Are Birds Getting Louder?

This all reminded me again of Matthew 6, when Jesus says,
“Do not worry about your life, ….Look at the birds of the air. They neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? And which of you by worrying can add a single hour to your span of life? And why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not clothed like one of these.!"

Wednesday I had a meeting with a newly ordained priest, who shared with me his plans for the future.

Sounded like me—I was going to have a large church, and then twenty-nine years ago, coming to San Francisco, imagining a large agency being well known and respected. (LOL)!

Lately there have been threats on Facebook, phone, and mail, homophobic, the majority from Christians, and criticism from others over not "doing enough!" Like I was told when I first came here, I would be like a guy standing on a rail road track with ten trains coming at him, blinded by their lights! And how true that is! And I am reminded of the words of Mother Teresa: "If you judge people, you have no time for them."

Recently, while walking around a mall in Palm Springs, I noticed a bird walking beside me, eating the crumbs from my sandwich. For the next hour, he followed me in my walking, dropping him food. We talked to each other, and in those moments, my ears were opened to the many birds singing.

The birds are singing, whether we notice it or not. Hearing them is a pleasure we can ignore or indulge in. It is difficult to tune in and pay attention when I am also wondering why someone isn't returning my texts, phone calls, etc. It is difficult to tune in when you are "ghosted" by reading comments people write that are negative.

This all reminded me again of Matthew 6, where Jesus said:

"Do not worry about your life, ….Look at the birds of the air. They neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? And which of you by worrying can add a single hour to your span of life? And why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not clothed like one of these.!"

I think that maybe Jesus gets that the beautiful items of creation are meant to be enjoyed today! No judgment! But appreciated and loved!

So I like to think that Jesus' thing about not worrying and then inviting us to consider birds and notice lilies is both permission to let go and an invitation to joy and even pleasure!

Deo Gratias! Thanks be to God!
----------------------------
Father River Damien Sims, sfw, D.Min., D.S.T.
P.O. Box 642656
San Francisco, CA 94164
www.temenos.org
415-305-2124
=================

Befriend the Process!

Pride Month!

National Gun Violence Awareness Month!

Wear Orange on June 2 Symbolizing Every Town for Gun Safety!

Sirach 42:15-25: says all is beautiful: "even to the spark and fleeting vision."

---------------------------------

Many of us are past full bloom now. Presently we're on a new quest: to make peace with our diminishment. Sirach tells us we all are beautiful! It was glorious to be young, but there is glory in our aging, even with its losses, aches, pains, disabilities.

Nothing's made in vain, Sirach insists. Each in its turn is good. Embracing the splendor of youth is easy. We must also make friends with the graceful, gracious surrender of our lives to aging, and of our wishes for a changed universe to the slowness of time as well, and to struggling generation after generation.

All aspects of creation is a changing universe! Thus we are changing in every way!

We surrender in the sense of seeing life as a part of one great universe and seeing ourselves as a part of one Great Rainbow.

As Eric Fromm says:

“Love means to commit oneself without guarantee, to give oneself completely in the hope that our love will produce love in the loved person. Love is an act of faith, and whoever is of little faith is also of little love.”

As we enter Pride Month, and remember tomorrow wearing orange to symbolize "Gun Safety in Every town let us remember love is an "act of faith!"

Father River Damien Sims, sfw, D.Min., D.S.T.
P.O. Box 642656
San Francisco, CA 94164
www.temenos.org
415-305-2124

"May I have the strange courage
to embrace a world
I know will hurt me,
offering myself to people
I know will let me down
and giving the best of my energies
to plans that will not work out.

I want to choose
to love the world as it is,
just as I know I am loved as I am.

Justin McRoberts

Reflections! on Othering

The Original Sin of Humanity!

I am a "grocers" son, and I learned from my dad the lesson of not practicing "othering".

He ran a grocery business and Dad told me from the very beginning that we did not talk about religion, race, and political views in the business or outside on the street. He said: "All who come through our doors are equal and deserve the same service." At his funeral were people of all races, economic status, and religions. He did not practice "othering".

The word "othering" is a trendy term in academic circles, an updated version of words such as prejudice, discrimination, difference, bias and scapegoating.

Othering defines and secures one's identity by distancing and stigmatizing another. Its purpose is to reinforce notions of our own "normality" and to set up a difference of an "other" as a point of deviance. It is a process of being 'other-ed", meaning marginalized, dis empowered, and excluded socially.

Othering is very visible in our nation in all of our divisions. We see it now in the political ads. The "haves' and the "have nots", all racial discrimination and so on.

In San Francisco it is seen as bright as the sun in the treatment of homeless, poor, people of color; especially in the Mayor' s statement on the drug use in the Tenderloin: "It is time we throw out compassion and use force to solve the problem," not looking at the causes around drug use, and compassionately working in that realm.

In the Haight my young adults are simply and completely ignored. Personally I experience "othering" day in and day out.

We begin "Pride Month" the first of June, raising up the LGBTQ and Questioning community. I will wear a LGBTQ tee shirt each day to remind others of our "othering".

So what can we do to bring us into a circle of differences, caring for each other, and working out all of the problems, from climate change to extreme poverty?

A prayer by Justin McRoberts says the best way of action of all:

"May I have the strange courage
to embrace a world
I know will hurt me,
offering myself to people
I know will let me down
and giving the best of my energies
to plans that will not work out.

I want to choos
to love the world as it is,
just as I know I am loved as I am.

Deo Gratias! Thanks be to God!

Father River Damien Sims, sfw, D.Min., D.S.T.
P.O. Box 642656
San Francisco, CA 94164
www.temenos.org
415-305-2124

----------------------------------
As of now I am planning to attend the following course, as my sabbatical as I enter our thirty years of ministry. Would love for someone to join me in this adventure:

The thirteenth Annual INTERNATIONAL COURSE in INDIA
“Gandhian Nonviolence: Theory & Application”

COST: Tuition, Room & Board FREE (though donations are accepted); all other expenses regarding travel to & from India, visas, healthcare, & other spending is the responsibility each course participant. Once in India, a total personal expense budget equiv. of $300 per month would be reasonable (less, if one is very frugal).

DURATION: 4 months (Sept. 30 th , 2023 thru Jan 30 th , 2024). A Course Diploma will be issued in a final graduation ceremony at Gujarat Vidyapith.

LOCATION: Gujarat Vidyapith, a university founded by Mahatma Gandhi in 1920, (see: www.gujarat vidyapith.org) will host the first 2 months of the course during which International Students attend classes weekdays, have housing on campus, are provided vegetarian meals, and are given access to exercise facilities including a large indoor swimming pool (free of charge). Centered in the historic city of Ahmadabad (pop. 7.7 million), the urban campus enjoys a mild autumn climate and is near Gandhi’s Sabbatical (Satyagraha) Ashram where the 1930 Salt March began. Faculty associated with India’s oldest Gandhi Studies Program will teach the course while assuming little or no prior knowledge of Gandhi or India. To better understand the application of Gandhian nonviolence theory to practice, December and January will include course field trips involving 5-10 days each at a Nephropathy Center, an Organic Farm, the Institute of Total Revolution at Vedchi, the Gandhi Research Foundation at Jalgoan, and other experiential learning travel opportunities. Students will be accompanied by the Course Coordinator and/or another faculty member with transportation & on-site expenses free of charge.
ACADEMIC CREDIT can be earned via arrangements that may be made by each student with an educational institution in their home country. Examples of mechanisms which may exist to be utilized have included credits awarded for “Independent Study”, “Cooperative Education”, “Service Learning Internships” or other devices negotiated by a student with their home institution prior to their departure to India. Such arrangements need not require MOUs for credit transfer.

APPLICATION
SEND TO: [email protected] with cc to: [email protected]
NAME (First, Middle, Last): ____________________________________
Address: __________________________________________ Country: _________
Email: ___________________________ Cell Phone: ________________________
Brief Bio (including educational background & activist profile):
Why I am interested in taking this course:
SIGNATURE: __________________________________ Date: ____________
DUE DATE: May 31, 2023.
(If accepted, a $20

A Different Definition! Give Glory to God!

Acts 1:12-14; 1 Peter 4:13-16; John 17:1-11!

National Mental Health Month!

There is a motto on one of the buildings at the Jesuit college in Santa Clara that reads: For the Greater Glory of God! I often asked my self the question: "What Doe It Mean to Glorify God! In our Gospel today Jesus talks of glorifying God.

Is glorifying God simply singing praises or playing loud music?

What if we define glory in a different way? What if glory is the revelation of God's inclusive love for all? Glory in the inclusive love of God for every creature!

If glory is clapping and joyous music we can glorify God in quiet ways. The purpose of the Church,to be the Church we pray, meditate and go forth and do justice.

We give glory by speaking to a homeless person, a neighbor, we give glory by sharing food with a person who has none, we give glory by our protests against injustice. We give glory by loving, and giving to someone in need!

There is no dictionary needed. Pentecost is God pouring out the Spirit of Inclusive Love to all! Good Mental Health is the ability to share inclusive love to another! Glory to God! Glory to God! Glory to God!

Father River Damien Sims, sfw, D.Min., D.S.T.
P.O. Box 642656
San Francisco, CA 94164
www.temenos.org
415-305-2124

As of now I am planning to attend the following course, as my sabbatical as I enter our thirty years of ministry. Would love for someone to join me in this adventure:

The thirteenth Annual INTERNATIONAL COURSE in INDIA
“Gandhian Nonviolence: Theory & Application”

COST: Tuition, Room & Board FREE (though donations are accepted); all other expenses regarding travel to & from India, visas, healthcare, & other spending is the responsibility each course participant. Once in India, a total personal expense budget equiv. of $300 per month would be reasonable (less, if one is very frugal).

DURATION: 4 months (Sept. 30 th , 2023 thru Jan 30 th , 2024). A Course Diploma will be issued in a final graduation ceremony at Gujarat Vidyapith.

LOCATION: Gujarat Vidyapith, a university founded by Mahatma Gandhi in 1920, (see: www.gujarat vidyapith.org) will host the first 2 months of the course during which International Students attend classes weekdays, have housing on campus, are provided vegetarian meals, and are given access to exercise facilities including a large indoor swimming pool (free of charge). Centered in the historic city of Ahmadabad (pop. 7.7 million), the urban campus enjoys a mild autumn climate and is near Gandhi’s Sabbatical (Satyagraha) Ashram where the 1930 Salt March began. Faculty associated with India’s oldest Gandhi Studies Program will teach the course while assuming little or no prior knowledge of Gandhi or India. To better understand the application of Gandhian nonviolence theory to practice, December and January will include course field trips involving 5-10 days each at a Nephropathy Center, an Organic Farm, the Institute of Total Revolution at Vedchi, the Gandhi Research Foundation at Jalgoan, and other experiential learning travel opportunities. Students will be accompanied by the Course Coordinator and/or another faculty member with transportation & on-site expenses free of charge.
ACADEMIC CREDIT can be earned via arrangements that may be made by each student with an educational institution in their home country. Examples of mechanisms which may exist to be utilized have included credits awarded for “Independent Study”, “Cooperative Education”, “Service Learning Internships” or other devices negotiated by a student with their home institution prior to their departure to India. Such arrangements need not require MOUs for credit transfer.

APPLICATION
SEND TO: [email protected] with cc to: [email protected]
NAME (First, Middle, Last): ____________________________________
Address: __________________________________________ Country: _________
Email: ___________________________ Cell Phone: ________________________
Brief Bio (including educational background & activist profile):
Why I am interested in taking this course:
SIGNATURE: __________________________________ Date: ____________
DUE DATE: May 31, 2023.
(If accepted, a $20

"Mental Health Month!"

"Mary: Untier of Knots"

"Being A Ghost!

"But Jesus on his part would not entrust himself to them, because he knew all people." John 2:14.

============

"Being a Ghost"--Have you ever thought of yourself as a "Ghost?" For each time we simply stop speaking to another we are a "Ghost".

Before the word "ghosting" came into existence as "cutting people out of our lives by no longer talking to them and simply walk away without a word." I experienced "ghosting" by a denomination, and have through the years here been "ghosted" by long-time "friends" simply ceasing communication.

It hurts, hurts like hell, and at first you never want to speak to that person again

In John 2 we hear: "But Jesus on his part would not entrust himself to them, because he knew all people." John 2:14.

My approach is expressed in those words, and in doing so I can see the broken humanity as well as my own, and find healing and keep my heart open to always receive the person back with open arms.

You can be truthful with yourself. What is the truthfulness with yourself? It is you are an infinitely precious broken person. The infinite love of God permeates your brokenness through and through. It is with you unexplainably forever.

All of us "ghost", sometimes we are unaware: when we walk past a homeless person sleeping on the sidewalk outside Walgreens, and we come out with food and simply pass walk past not even seeing the person--that is being a "ghost"! How often are we ghosts in that way?

We are all broken human beings, we all need the infinite love of God, which starts with our love towards another!

The essence of good mental health is found in having a healthy relationship without judgement! Deo Gratias! Thanks be to God!

Father River Damien Sims, sfw, D.Min., D.S.T.
P.O. Box 642656
San Francisco, CA 94164
www.temenos.org
415-305-2124
----------------------------------
As of now I am planning to attend the following course, as my sabbatical as I enter our thirty years of ministry. Would love for someone to join me in this adventure:

The thirteenth Annual INTERNATIONAL COURSE in INDIA
“Gandhian Nonviolence: Theory & Application”
COST: Tuition, Room & Board FREE (though donations are accepted); all other expenses regarding travel to & from India, visas, healthcare, & other spending is the responsibility each course participant. Once in India, a total personal expense budget equiv. of $300 per month would be reasonable (less, if one is very frugal).

DURATION: 4 months (Sept. 30 th , 2023 thru Jan 30 th , 2024). A Course Diploma will be issued in a final graduation ceremony at Gujarat Vidyapith.

LOCATION: Gujarat Vidyapith, a university founded by Mahatma Gandhi in 1920, (see: www.gujarat vidyapith.org) will host the first 2 months of the course during which International Students attend classes weekdays, have housing on campus, are provided vegetarian meals, and are given access to exercise facilities including a large indoor swimming pool (free of charge). Centered in the historic city of
Ahmadabad (pop. 7.7 million), the urban campus enjoys a mild autumn climate and is near Gandhi’s Sabbatical (Satyagraha) Ashram where the 1930 Salt March began. Faculty associated with India’s oldest Gandhi Studies Program will teach the course while assuming little or no prior knowledge of Gandhi or India.

To better understand the application of Gandhian nonviolence theory to practice, December and January will include course field trips involving 5-10 days each at a Nephropathy Center, an Organic Farm, the Institute of Total Revolution at Vedchi, the Gandhi Research Foundation at Jalgoan, and other experiential learning travel opportunities. Students will be accompanied by the Course Coordinator and/or another faculty member with transportation & on-site expenses free of charge.
ACADEMIC CREDIT can be earned via arrangements that may be made by each student with an educational institution in their home country. Examples of mechanisms which may exist to be utilized have included credits awarded for “Independent Study”, “Cooperative Education”, “Service Learning Internships” or other devices negotiated by a student with their home institution prior to their departure to India. Such arrangements need not require MOUs for credit transfer.

APPLICATION
SEND TO: [email protected] with cc to: doctorjhaveri@gmail.com
NAME (First, Middle, Last): ____________________________________
Address: __________________________________________ Country: _________
Email: ___________________________ Cell Phone: ________________________
Brief Bio (including educational background & activist profile):
Why I am interested in taking this course:
SIGNATURE: __________________________________ Date: ____________
DUE DATE: May 31, 2023.

National Mental Health Month!

"Good mental health is a state of well -being in which every individual realizes his or her own potential, can cope with the normal stresses of life, can work productively and fruitfully and is able to make a contribution to his or her community." World Health Organization."

================================

"Good mental health is a state of well being in which a person can cope with the stresses of being homeless, sleeping on the streets, not having family or have society to care for one as a person and is able to measure one's worth not by successes or failures, but simply but by one's ability to survive day to day ! (Fr. River Damien Sims).

---------------------------

"But I do not count my life any value to myself, if only I may finish my course and the ministry I received from the Lord Jesus, to testify to the good news of God's grace!" Acts 20:24.NRSVeu

=======================

Good mental health outside of our present system is found in a quote used by me some time ago:

"Good mental health is a state of well being in which a person can cope with the stresses of being homeless, sleeping on the streets, not having family or have society to care for one as a person and is able to measure one's worth not by successes failures, but simply but by one's ability to survive day to day ! (Fr. River Damien Sims).

This is essentially the definition our author, Heather Masco, demonstrated in The Thread of Life through the poetry of her journey through the healing of sexual abuse.

Masco demonstrates how through her faith in Christ she begins the healing of her trauma, and learns to forgive the man who abused her. Her faith sustained continues to hold her in the arms of Jesus, and through that holding of her life finds wholeness.

As I looked at Heather's story I thought of the mental health of LGBTQ kids and adults.

In my story on the our website of www.temenos.org, I glorify my years on the street, and coming out. The truth is the years on the street, and coming out have been pure hell, and it was Christ who is my foundation. I only found one therapist, a psychiatrist, that for ten years lead me through my coming out process.

There is so much homophobia in our churches, even the ones that pride themselves on being open and affirming that it is impossible to truly be open. I know of no church that have youth groups for LGBTQ kids.

No place in the institutional churches for their meeting to discuss their issues.

People often say "You are against the Church!" LOL! What I am against ARE churches not being open to youth, especially LGBTQ youth. I love the Church. I am a priest and very honored and proud to be one!

Today our ability, to "survive day to day" is the mental health gift we can give to youth and adults. Personally, for me that is enough!

Walking the way of the Kingdom is truly being open and in doing so assisting others on their journey of mental health

Like Paul, my time is coming to an end as all of our times are, and like Dorothy Day I feel each day that "I try". So join together in that "trying", and in walking, with others day to day. We are all clinging to The Thread of Life!"

"But I do not count my life any value to myself, if only I may finish my course and the ministry I received from the Lord Jesus, to testify to the good news of God's grace!" Acts 20:24.NRSVeu.

Deo Gratias! Thanks be to God!

Solitude and Standing Alone!

"Jesus said to him, 'Feed my sheep. Very truly, I tell you, when you were younger, you used to fasten your own belt and to go wherever you wished. But when you grow old, you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will fasten a belt around you and take you where you do not wish to go." John 21:19.

=====================
The past few days I have spent in solitude reflecting on the death of Banko Brown, whom I have known through the years.

My sister, whom I have not spoken to in years, recently sent a text message, in which she spoke very harshly, with extreme judgment on homosexuality and me having a Satanic ministry. Her words hurt, even after all of these years. And I thought of all the people hurt by such views in the Church, one of which was Banko Brown.

A priest in the Roman Catholic Church announcing a rally for the coming Sacred of Heart of Jesus in June yells, "Let us turn the thoughts of people away from the homo- sexual celebration (Pride Month) to Jesus."

All of this leads to harm of others. This is not the Jesus we know.

The Dodgers have withdrew the invitation of the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence in response to the complaints of religious people. Again this is not the Jesus I know.

For our faith journey entails many "not as before" experiences. A child's faith gives way to a more nuanced faith of the adult. It is the same faith, yet different and deeper.

We are like Mary Magdalene, who on that first Easter morning was so concerned about finding the missing body of Jesus that she failed to recognize the risen One even when face to face with him. But when he spoke her name, she underwent a "not as before" change of awareness. Her heart turned from love of the dead Jesus to love of the living One. It is the same love, but so much deeper than before.

Through the years of our journey we have traveled a life of a changing, evolving faith. A faith that views a rainbow of many colors.

It is a rainbow with the colors of many faith expressions of which Christianity is but one, all expressing the presence of a God of love. It is a rainbow of many colors of people, and many colors of sexual expressions.

Today is the Ascension and I believe it signifies Jesus becoming the Cosmic Christ, who embraces all in many Names. There is One God, but a God who meets people where they are. All are welcome into the arms of God.

In The Instruction Manual for Receiving God, we read:

"The Whole program of creation is to bring us back into contact with God.
Within each one of us is the eternal program of repair. Do not ever forget that left to your own devices, left to your natural inclinations, your body desires, to heal. To be broken is the only way to understand wholeness. To be separate is the only way to return to the One. Your whole life is about your repair and return. Whether you sit in meditation facing a wall or pray in the sanctuary to God your soul already knows that all brokenness leads back to home, that "brokenness" and "home" arise together, like sun and sky, like river and water. All creation was made for this purpose. Everything else is commentary on the search for the eternal."

And so we continue our journey as the disciples of old, hearing the words of Jesus to Peter:

"Jesus said to him, 'Feed my sheep. Very truly, I tell you, when you were younger, you used to fasten your own belt and to go wherever you wished. But when you grow old, you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will fasten a belt around you and take you where you do not wish to go." John 21:19.

----------------------------------

Deo Gratias! Thanks be to God!

May, The Month of Our Lady!

National Mental Health Month!

We Are Never Alone!

"I will not leave you orphans, I will come to you; In a little while the world will no longer see me, but you will see me, because I live and you will.. . .John 14:15-21.

I remember my mom, she was gentle, kind and driven to push me through school. In my worst moments I see her in the Great Cloud of Witnessing pushing me forward. She once told me, "You will always be more of a mother than a father to people in your ministry."

On Mother's Day I was across the street at "Toast" eating breakfast, and "Diego" walked up to me with a bouquet of flowers, smiled, and said: "River these are for you, for you have been more of a mother than I have ever had"

Diego walked across the border from Guatemala when he was 15, and was given asylum, the local gangs wanted him dead; for 12 years he has lived in San Francisco, needing support along the way. It has been rough, but he continues to tough it out. His mother kicked him out of the house, and so he survived on the streets until he came to the U.S.

The majority of youth on the street have no parents, they have been abused, sold, and simply kicked out because the parents had no money.

Steven Kierkegaard comments :"Life can only be understood backward but it can only be lived forward."

This Mother's Day I vow to live my "life forward", being a "mom ", caring, seeing each as a child of God.

I close with a prayer sent to me by my friend Jay Swanson that summarizes theology in a nutshell:

commoners_communion. True compassionate prayer stands with God, and before God as the other.

It cries their tears, grieves their pain, repents for their sins, seeks their healing.

Christ often ministered from compassion(co-suffering) and his ministry had power precisely because he entered into the pain of the world.

Love is what made his prayer powerful.

When we pray for others we should pray from the heart, not from the head. Allowing ourselves to enter into another's experience where we feel God's desire for them, then pray from there.

When we do we co-labour with God.

We not only intercede for another but go deeper into God himself."

Deo Gratias! Thanks be to God!

Father River Damien Sims, sfw, D.Min., D.S.T.
P.O. Box 642656
San Francisco, CA 94164
www.temenos.org
415-305-2124

Our Endless Shadow!

This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. No one has greater love than this, to lay down one's life for one's friends" (John 15:12-13). NRSVue

=====================

On this day, May 12, many years ago, my second year in seminary, I was driving home from my rural church's youth group on a rainy night. My car slid off the road, killing, Stacy, 15, and injuring myself. An accident that haunted me for years.

Several days later a minister friend shared with me some advice that has never left my mind:

"In time you will have two decisions you are faced with:

1. Continue in the ministry, close yourself into the institution, never question anything else in live;

2. Let yourself loose, questioning, challenge, everything and do something crazy like another friend who suffered a similar situation: he went out and raced cars with young adults."

Ultimately the second was chosen, bringing freedom of living a life of ministry, looking at all sides. A life of good mental health.

In Evie Yoder Miller's book, Volume 1: Shadows, Scruples on the Line, Miller presents a nation at the beginning, and the next two years of the Civil War, as divided in so many ways, culturally, politically, religious belief with many, many different denominations. Jumping a 160 plus years later we see the same in our society.

Character, J. Fritz-Chicago, responding to a partners comments:

. . .He would rather talk about a new repeating rifle being made to kill more people, rather than discuss freeing slaves. .

...white people specifically are supposed to save the world.. .when death comes they go to a higher place."

He still believed "making money is a sacred trust, do it to the best of your ability. ."

I am sitting in the midst of "Toast" restaurant as I write, and around me people are simply talking, about money or politics! Not much has changed!

This book is an excellent start to a three volume series.

My own resulting life from the aftermath of Stacie's death were horrible. At the time the Church simply wanted me to move, finish school, and "be strong" as an example to others.

Two quotes come to mind as I remember that time, and the journey through the years:

"Resilience is the ability to brush off pain," Kristen Roupenion,"

and James Baldwin:

"You can not love, without until you truly love yourself within."

Mental health is made up of these two quotes, and
and working with others with them. We all have a shadow, and we need to work on it all the time!

Happy Mental Health Month!
Happy Our Lady of Mary Month!

a blessing for those who care about strangers

What a waste.

That wasn’t going to get you a nicer apartment.

Bless those who give their health in service of patients who might not even deserve it.

What if that patient took unnecessary risks or was selfish or was never going to say thank you? You could have been protecting yourself or God forbid, sleeping through the night.

Bless those who listen to long, winding stories from lonely hearts.

Instead of rushing off to more interesting friends.

You picked boredom or patience instead of the warmth of being known.

That was your time and you’re never going to get it back.

Bless those who loved people who weren’t grateful.

The sick who endangered your health,

The deeply boring, who know you have things to do.

Loving people can be the most meaningful thing in the world, but it can also be hard and scary and boring and disgusting or sad or anxiety inducing with zero overtime.

Thank you to all those who make these bad investments.

Those acts of love that are not going to add up to success in the way that the world sees it.

You, my darling, are the definition of love.

This blessing was inspired by my conversation with nurse and writer Christie Watson

Fr. River Damien Sims, D.Min., D.S.T.
Temenos Catholic Worker
Society of Franciscan Workers, Inc
Po. Box 642656
San Francisco, CA 94164
[email protected]
www.temenos.org
415-305-2124

River's Creed:
"I write because this is the way I protest".
Ministry on the streets is the way I resist, dong what I can to proclaim the Gospel of Love to every human being with out judgment."

"Now I hand down to you what has been revealed to me: that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures and he was raised on the third day according to the scriptures."

"A Wider Rainbow!"

National Mental Health Month!

Damien of Molokai:
"I make myself a lepers to gain all for Christ!"

John 2:24:
"But Jesus, on his part, would not entrust himself to them because he knew all people."

John 15:1-15:
"I am the true vine, and my Father is the vine grower... This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. No one has greater love than this, to lay down one's life for one's friends."

A blessing for those who care about strangers.

What a waste.

That wasn’t going to get you a nicer apartment.

Bless those who give their health in service of patients who might not even deserve it.

What if that patient took unnecessary risks, was selfish, or was never going to say thank you? You could have been protecting yourself or, God forbid, sleeping through the night.

Bless those who listen to long, winding stories from lonely hearts.

Instead of rushing off to more interesting friends.

You picked boredom or patience instead of the warmth of being known.

That was your time, and you’re never going to get it back.

Bless those who loved people who weren’t grateful.

The sick who endangered your health, the deeply boring, who know you have things to do.

Loving people can be the most meaningful thing in the world, but it can also be hard, scary, boring, disgusting, or sad, or anxiety-inducing with zero overtime.

Thank you to all those who make these bad investments.

Those acts of love that are not going to add up to success in the way that the world sees it.

You, my darling, are the definition of love.

This blessing was inspired by my conversation with nurse and writer Christie Watson.

Newly published CDC data found that 1 in 4 teenagers identified themselves they were attracted only to the opposite sex; this does not include transgender, non-identifying numbers of youth.

Suicide is the second leading cause of death for young people ages 10-24 and the Trevor Project found that LGTBTQ youth are four times as likely to attempt suicide, 1.8 million and at least one every 45 seconds, and 45% LGBTQ considered attempting suicide this past year.

Messages such as the one I received today from my sister is similar to the message many youth receive from others. I have not talked with her in forty years, and she has refused to talk with me:

"River Sims You are my brother. But the sin you live in and condone goes against what Paul wrote in Romans 1:26-27, which was inspired by God. God does not accept homosexuality. You were not born this way. You made a bad choice."

One's sexual orientation is not "chosen," it is one we come with at birth. And after ten years of tough therapy with a well-known shrink, I came to truly understand the words of Jesus:

"This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. No one has greater love than this, to lay down one's life for one's friends."

And true mental health as:

What is good mental health? In his book, Ash Wednesday, J. R. Mabry has the Sheriff say: "If I have learned anything from my mother, Jake, it's there are no good people. There are only people in various stages of being fu. .cked up. Some less, some more."

Good mental health is the ability both to value life and to engage in a life of affirming other people and creatures and value their lives as we do our own, seeing them as independent from us.

Good mental health means the ability to behave differently depending upon the circumstances and not expect every thing go our way.

Good mental health is our ability to see everyone, regardless of social status, sexual identification, and color, simply as a fellow human being.

Messages like the one I received can truly hurt people, and push some towards suicide. I have had kids become suicidal, and they truly do not forget them. What I have learned to do is the message of Jesus:

"But Jesus, on his part, would not entrust himself to them because he knew all people." John 2:24

Words hurt more than a knife. My friend and Spiritual Director Jay Swanson sent me this poem to close with:

A blessing for those who care about strangers.

What a waste.

That wasn’t going to get you a nicer apartment.

Bless those who give their health in service of patients who might not even deserve it.

What if that patient took unnecessary risks, or was selfish, or was never going to say thank you? You could have been protecting yourself, or God forbid, sleeping through the night.

Bless those who listen to long, winding stories from lonely hearts.

Instead of rushing off to more interesting friends.

You picked boredom or patience instead of the warmth of being known.

That was your time, and you’re never going to get it back.

Bless those who loved people who weren’t grateful.

The sick who endangered your health, The deeply boring, who know you have things to do.

Loving people can be the most meaningful thing in the world, but it can also be hard, scary, boring, disgusting, or sad, or anxiety-inducing with zero overtime.

Thank you to all those who make these bad investments.

Those acts of love that are not going to add up to success in the way that the world sees it.

You, my darling, are the definition of love.

This blessing was inspired by my conversation with nurse and writer Christie Watson.

River's Creed:
"I write because this is the way I protest."

"Ministry on the streets is the way I resist, doing what I can to proclaim the Gospel of Love to every human being without judgment."

"Now I hand down to you what has been revealed to me: that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures and he was raised on the third day according to the scriptures."

Fr. River Damien Sims, D.Min., D.S.T.
Temenos Catholic Worker
Society of Franciscan Workers, Inc
Po. Box 642656
San Francisco, CA 94164
[email protected]
www.temenos.org
415-305-2124

"You can measure your worth by your dedication to your path, not by your successes or failures." Elizabeth Gilbert

"Compassion is not a relationship between the healer and the wounded. It's a relationship between equals. Only when we know our own darkness well can we be present with the darkness of others. Compassion becomes real when we recognize our shared humanity." Pema Chödrön

".es, the most fundamental harm we can do to ourselves, is to remain ignorant by not having the courage and the respect to look at ourselves honestly and gently.” Pema Chödrön

America's Loneliest Era!

(from the Washington Post)

Our Lady of Mary's Month!
Pray the Rosary!

Mental Health Month!
Jesus the Way to the Father

“Do not let your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. 2 In my Father’s house there are many dwelling places. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? 3 And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, so that where I am, there you may be also. 4 And you know the way to the place where I am going.” 5 Thomas said to him, “Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?” 6 Jesus said to him, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. 7 If you know me, you will know my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him.”

8 Philip said to him, “Lord, show us the Father, and we will be satisfied.” 9 Jesus said to him, “Have I been with you all this time, Philip, and you still do not know me? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? 10 Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on my own, but the Father who dwells in me does his works. 11 Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in me, but if you do not, then believe[e] because of the works themselves. 12 Very truly, I tell you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do and, in fact, will do greater works than these, because I am going to the Father. 13 I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. 14 If in my name you ask me[f] for anything, I will do it. (John 14:1-14 NRSVEU)

Mental Health Awareness Month
What it is: May is mental health awareness month, making mental health and suicide prevention bigger topics than ever. #mentalhealthmatters has around 42 billion views on TikTok, and #mentalhealthawareness has racked up 20 billion.

Why the conversation is changing: The CDC’s Youth Risk Behavior survey showed that suicidal ideation, especially for teenage girls, is continuing on a concerning trajectory. In 2021, 30% of girls said that they had seriously considered suicide in the past year, and 24% said they had an actual plan to end their life. According to data published by Mental Health America, 16.4% of youth reported experiencing a major depressive episode within the last 12 months. This news comes at a time when adults are feeling so lonely that the US surgeon general has declared loneliness a public health emergency. Stigma around mental health topics appears to be eroding, but that isn’t necessarily leading to better mental health outcomes for teens and for the population at large.

Conversation Starter: What do you think are the biggest contributors to mental health issues for your generation? (Check out our new video series on Mental Health for more help having this conversation!)
-----------------------------------------------------------
What is good mental health? In his book, Ash Wednesday, J. R. Mabry has the Sheriff say: "If I have learned anything from my mother, Jake, it's there are no good people. There are only people in various stages of being fu. .cked up. Some less, some more."

Good mental health is the ability both to value life and to engage in a life of affirming other people and creatures and value their lives as we do our own, seeing them as independent from us. Good mental health means the ability to behave differently depending upon the circumstances and not expect every thing go our way. Good mental health is our ability to see everyone, regardless of social status, sexual identification, and color, simply as a fellow human being.

"In Christ there is no east or west. in him no pride of birth, the chosen family God has blessed now spans the whole wide earth. For God in Christ has made us one from every land, race, and sexual orientation, has reconciled us through the Son, and met us all with Grace."

We live in America's loneliest era. Our country is so divided, we stay buried in our social media and do not talk to one another, and most importantly listen. Good mental health means to"shelter our souls." For me it means to dwell in Jesus. "Dwelling in Jesus", means to be open to all, to listen, letting them find good mental health, and a "dwelling in whatever their belief in the Higher Power."

Recently a young man came to my place. He was well dressed, and he said don't you remember me, and I said, "Well, I am not sure," "You knew me as "Chaos", who at fifteen had been high on fentanyl and knocked me down, sending me on a two year journey of recovery. He said:

"You simply forgave me, and continued to be my friend...and for the next year you simply listened when I came to your house, even in pain you listened." Through our listening I found a Higher Power in AA." I went home to my parents, and am now in college. I keep a photo of you in my wallet to remind me you care and you listen, never judging."

Listening saves lives, simply listening with out judgment.

The word "dwell" is related to an old English word for "heresy" or "madness". Perhaps it is a sort of insanity to believe that God dwells here, with us.

Or that, somehow, resurrection is an end to our exile, and an invitation to come home to God. If so, the madness is the long-lingering hope of the human race, the dream to dwell. Not only a hope, however it is hard work, this effort to shelter our souls.

To "dwell" means we struggle as a family with all people in finding safety in life, in finding "good mental health".

None of us are "good", but we try as hard as we can and move from the stage of evil ultimately into the fullness of God, the fullness of accepting all as a reflection of Jesus of Nazareth--black, white, brown, blue, Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Questioning and all in between. The fullness of good mental health.

In the midst of our fears and uncertainty and old Methodist hymn, one upon which I was raised and one that will be sung at my funeral rings out:

"O God, our help in ages past,
our hope for years to come,
our shelter from the stormy blast,
and our eternal home."

Deo Gratias! Thanks be to God!
--------------------------

Practice Resurrection: Book Review of J.R. Mabry's Ash Wednesday

Acts 2:42-47

New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition.

They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers.

Life among the Believers.

Awe came upon everyone because many wonders and signs were being done through the apostles. All who believed were together and had all things in common; they would sell their possessions and goods and distribute the proceeds to all, as any had need. Day by day, as they spent much time together in the temple, they broke bread at home and ate their food with glad and generous hearts, praising God and having the goodwill of all the people. And day by day the Lord added to their number those who were being saved.

I have known John (JR Mabry) for many years now. When I first met him we attended a Holy Communion Service, and he took his dog for the Sacrament, shocking people, and lead me on my journey of being a vegan. He truly practices the resurrection!

Mabry's story is situated in Central California, where he describes a variety of people from conservative Christians to Satanists, and Witches not unlike our population. in San Francisco.

I am going to focus on Peg, a Congregational minister, who once was a drug addict and prostitute.

Peg's approach to ministry can be described in the way her daughter Julie expressed humanity:

"There are only people in various stages of being fucked up. Some less, some more!

Peg summed up ministry in these words:

Ministry is like riding a toboggan in a blinding snow storm. You have no idea what is coming, and there are no brakes on the thing" or "There are seven trains coming at you on a railroad track, blinding you." (Counselor for Fr. River's ministry)....

Peg lived her ministry with a strong faith in Jesus, but leaving the door open for all religions.

Five years ago Stephen Patterson and in his writings gave his summary of how the early Christians "practiced the resurrection."
Their creed:

"For you are all children of God in the Spirit. There is no Jew or Greek. There is no slave or free. There is no male nor female, for you are all one in the Spirit."

This is a creed of human solidarity for the newly baptized Christians.

Practice Resurrection. It is not a long to -do list. It is not the work we have to do. It is a call to live. It is a call to live as humanly as we possibly can with and for one another and for the life of God in the world. This is the story of John's book, read it!
Deo Gratis! Thanks be to God!

=======================================
Fr. River Damien Sims, D.Min., D.S.T.
P.O. Box 642656
San Francisco, CA 94164
[email protected]
415-305-2124
River's Creed:

"I write because this is the way I protest".
Ministry on the streets is the way I resist, dong what I can to proclaim the Gospel of Love to every human being with out judgment."

"Now I hand down to you what has been revealed to me: that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures and he was raised on the third day according to the scriptures."

Fancy Boy!

Success!

"You can measure your worth by your dedication to your path, not by your successes or failures." Elizabeth Gilbert

“You’re lost in the desert with nothing but a map and a compass. To the north, there’s a city just an hour away—salvation. To the east, you’ll find a train station that will eventually get you home. There’s an oasis to the west (but it’s in the middle of nowhere) and nothing but certain death to the south.

So which direction are you walking? It seems simple enough: Walk north for an hour and you’re saved. Everything else is a waste of time and/or resources—or worse.

The Life Compass is the tool that can point you in the right direction for you and your life. Find your north (The Desire Zone) and enjoy ample time to grow your good life and have a life outside outside of your job. Get caught up at the oasis (Distraction Zone) and you’re just wasting your time not making progress toward your goals. The train station (Disinterest Zone) might eventually get you where you need to be, but you’re going out of your way to get there. The Drudgery Zone is death for your productivity and life balance.”

Read More

I get frustrated when I am asked, "How can the homeless situation be solved?

A recent study has shown that the present situation with the Mayor and Governor-- bringing the National Guard in to solve the fentanyl "crisis" and the sweeps by the police taking the possessions and moving the homeless to other places lower the life expectancy and increase mental health issues for those who live on the streets.

"Success", is best explained in this quote by

Michael Richard Green Lauts whom himself was once homeless:

"I repeat this so often …. Love thy neighbor as thyself! I try and try to live this as I have taken so many people into my home and fed them and bathed them and housed them in hopes to help them…. Until we all realize we are one family, the children of God, we will continue this destructive spiral of hate…. Our love can change the world, but our love is too passive…. We are too cowardly to commit our heart and soul to our family and therefore we fail." Deo Gratias! Thanks be to God!

Fr. Christian River Damien Sims, sfw, D.Min., D.S,T.
P.O. Box 642656
San Francisco, CA 94164
[email protected]
415-305-2124

"I write because writing is the way I protest.

Ministry on the streets is the way I resist. doing what I can to proclaim the Gospel of Love to every human being with out judgment--All Are Welcome!"

River's 2023 Mission Statement!

Backside of the Cross: A Book Review!

Fear is a powerful motivator in the Church.

But fear functions in unproductive ways. We, humans, have long feared the behavior that is within all of us around sexuality.

The questions we need to ask: Is this a real fear or a manipulated one? Is the threat genuine or ginned up? Does my fear of this particular thing make me give up in despair or feel empowered to make a difference? Is my fear based in reality or not? Is fear real or faked?

This book brings out the fear the Church has towards facing sexual abuse and sexuality in honesty.

Read More

Think about how many churches offer support groups for people who have experienced sexual abuse. How many churches have a youth group that is open, really open to discussing sexuality? To discussing in all honesty LGBTQ issues? How many Churches are open to discuss these issues with adults? Frankly I have been in a lot of churches and few have youth groups, and certainly will not mention the word sex in the ones that do. Sexual abuse issues are certainly not discussed, and victims find themselves suffering on the backside of the cross.

The Backside of the Cross brings this vividly into the light of day, and points out that the Cross is redeeming to all people, and that redemption must be found through the Church truly working with victims of sexual abuse and have youth groups that work on the same issue and sexuality.

This is an excellent book, sad in many ways, and goes into vivid detail, really an excellent book! Deo Gratias! Thanks be to God!

The Backside of the Cross may be found on Kindle as well as hard copy!

Fr. River Damien Sims, sfw, D.Min., D.S.T.
P.O. Box 642656
San Francisco, CA 94164
415-305-2124
www.temenos.org

The Ground of Our Being!

"God is not found in the soul by adding anything, but by a process of subtraction." — Meister Eckhart, sermon on Romans 8:18

In his writings and sermons, medieval mystic Meister Eckhart (1260–1327) counseled detachment from anything that would separate us from God, whom he understood as the very ground of our being.

I am coming to the end of my three-week break, a time of weeping over four young men who died, and weeping over how the crackdown by the Mayor and Governor are effecting people on the street.

My colleague Rev. Keenan Kelsey use to say to me, "You have a different message than me and others." What she was saying in other words is that I am called to "Bear witness!

Read More

To bear witness to the words of Philip Berrigan, "The institutional church is a major bureaucracy and major bureaucracies are disobedient to the Gospel." Bearing witness of one who is "outside the gates", as the book of Hebrews tells us.

I bear witness in saying that "presence" and truly "listening" are the cornerstones of spirituality.

Simply living in the present moment, being present, and "listening" to others deeply.

We live so far in the future worrying about "everything" and we spend all of our time on social media we lose sight of the pain of the person next to us.
Finally, bearing witness that we should be present to the people on the street, and stop counting on the government, National Guard and police of "solving the problem."

Instead go out, see people as simply human beings and listen to them, simply listen. As Jesus tells us "Become like a little child," and listen deeply.

I close with a poem of unknown origins that sums up a way of life, a way of being present, of finding the "ground of our being.":

"Dance as if no one were watching, sing as if no one were listening, and love everything as if were your last day."

Fr. River Damien Sims, sfw, D.Min.
www.temenos.org
415-305-2124
P.O. Box 642656
San Francisco, CA 94164

Practicing Resurrection!

Luke 24:13-35

"The two were walking in the wrong direction but they were on the right path."

"There have been crucifixions, too, in our town — innocents gunned down in their doorways or in school halls; or radiations black outlines, three crosses marked a sisters chest: no wonder we walk in quiet rage, musing. Or the tents in every doorway on the street, or the endless homeless hid in Marin? And who, on this road, will join us, seeming unaware of the worst news in the neighborhood, but spelling out the history of the prophets and a future: Ought not Christ to have suffered these things and to enter into his glory? Could our hearts still burn within us?

Will we ask the stranger to stay? Break bread? And how will our well-hammered and nailed kitchens and bedrooms appear to us when we understand who he is just as he steals away?"
— Sandra R. Duguid, “Road to Emmaus”

Read More

The scene of Emmaus has the men walking in the wrong direction, but on the right path.

In the midst of homelessness growing throughout the nation, the repeated violence on the streets and in our schools let us invite the--the homeless person at our door in for a meal, the immigrant, the people of whom we are afraid; let us open our eyes in our neighborhoods and see ourselves as a part of the problem, in our greed, and endless need for money and big houses; how do we treat youth, as persons or objects to be moved; do we lift our faces from our social media and and talk to one another; let us ask ourselves the question of "Who are we?"

"Only the truth of who you are will set you free."

Eckhart Tolle

For me the question of the heart, the uppermost question in my mind for years now, is how can I "break bread" and be an example of Jesus to every individual I meet of rich, medium income, the homeless, the person of color, the immigrant, and all in pain? By taking the binders off my eyes do I practice the resurrection.

And the question for you the reader to ask yourself, and answer for yourself is:

How Do I Practice the Resurrection?

Fr. River Damien Sims, sfw, D.Min.
www.temenos.org
415-305-2124
P.O. Box 642656
San Francisco, CA 94164

As we approach the summer it appears we will need a new van, ours is breaking down, to carry food, socks etc, to the Haight!

Our funds are short, and people are desperate in need of food etc. So please give from the bottom of your heart!

Fr. River Damien Sims, D.Min., D.S.T.
Temenos Catholic Worker
Society of Franciscan Workers, Inc
Po. Box 642656
San Francisco, CA 94164
www.temenos.org
415-305-2124

The Magic Kingdom of Weeping and Love!

"Which commandment is first of all?. . ." you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength. The second is this: "You shall love your neighbor as yourself. There is no other commandment greater than these." Mark 12:29.

Through the years reading books on St. Francis, one is taken by his weeping daily. People would question him daily about weeping worrying about him.

I cry a lot, and throughout Lent and Easter and now I weep more than ever, but have learned my weeping, like that of Francis is different from a method of fixing.

I have let go of my mode of fixing, and am growing in the mode of letting go, of seeking to understand, and simply forgiving and see every person as a broken body of Jesus.

I understand why Francis wept so much. When we go to the place of tears it is an inner attitude where when I can't fix it, when I can't explain it, when I can't control it, when I can't even understand it. I learn I can only forgive it. Let go of it, weep over it.

It is a different mode of being. To forgive the man who murders one's son, all the criticism and hate thrown our way, the young men who have beaten you up, that is freeing, and worth weeping for! Weeping frees us!

Read More

This is the year of the Water Rabbit in the Chinese Lunar New Year, a year of hope, a time to slow down and strive for balance. A symbol of peace. And it is my time to strive for balance, to slow down, and be peaceful.

Lent, with four deaths, so much pain on the street, and an ordination literally wore me out. I have been at home accept for two days the last two weeks, and on the ocean in Pacifica resting, praying constantly, and simply just being and weeping.

One night, watching the Pacific Ocean through my motel window I fell a sleep and found myself surrounded by so many people I have known through the years, those who hate me, those who do not give a damn, and those who love me. Suddenly there was love all around me, with every one smiling.

I knew in those moments like the Water Rabbit I move deliberately and slowly in my ministry, and all is well. St. Therese of Lisieux tells us to do the"little things," and

Winston Churchhill, "We make a living by not what we get, but we make a living by what we give."

And most importantly from weeping, one learns to love and respect everyone , to attend to their needs, to be ready to respond and to understand.

The most difficult part of spiritual practice is to open our hearts and suffer with all people including our enemies.

And our greatest teacher is Jesus:

"Which commandment is first of all?. . ."you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength. The second is this: "You shall love your neighbor as yourself. There is no other commandment greater than these." Mark 12:29.
Weep and, let everything go, and care for others

He Is Risen!

John 20:1-18

Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb and saw that the stone had been removed from the tomb. So she ran and went to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one whom Jesus loved, and said to them, “They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid him.” Then Peter and the other disciple set out and went toward the tomb. The two were running together, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first. He bent down to look in and saw the linen wrappings lying there, but he did not go in. Then Simon Peter came, following him, and went into the tomb. He saw the linen wrappings lying there, and the cloth that had been on Jesus’ head, not lying with the linen wrappings but rolled up in a place by itself. Then the other disciple, who reached the tomb first, also went in, and he saw and believed; for as yet they did not understand the scripture, that he must rise from the dead.

Read More

Then the disciples returned to their homes. But Mary stood weeping outside the tomb. As she wept, she bent over to look into the tomb; and she saw two angels in white, sitting where the body of Jesus had been lying, one at the head and the other at the feet. They said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping?” She said to them, “They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him.” When she had said this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not know that it was Jesus. Jesus said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you looking for?” Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.” Jesus said to her, “Mary!” She turned and said to him in Hebrew, “Rabbouni!” (which means Teacher). Jesus said to her, “Do not hold on to me, because I have not yet ascended to the Father. But go to my brothers and say to them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’” Mary Magdalene went and announced to the disciples, “I have seen the Lord”; and she told them that he had said these things to her.

In the early church little else was preached except the news of Jesus’ resurrection. For the first Christians, who were the poor and disenfranchised, it was the one central theme heard over and over again. The resurrection wasn’t just a part of the faith, it was the central content of the faith. It is important to realize the early followers of Jesus didn’t believe in the resurrection because they believed in Jesus. Rather, as Martin Marty said, "they believed in Jesus because they believed in the resurrection." And yet, 2000 years later I think there are many modern Christians who almost feel embarrassed to talk about the resurrection.

It is too supernatural, too out of the ordinary, too far out. But the message – Jesus Defeated Death, Jesus rose from the grave, Jesus lives, and we too will live with him – is central to our faith. There is no Christianity without it. There is only the interesting story of an interesting man who lived once upon a time long ago.

Quite honestly, every bit of hope I have is wrapped up in this day. Today is the reason I can stomach reading the newspaper or watching the news on television. Today is the reason I can still have hope when precious, innocent children are shot and killed at school, when tens of thousands die in earthquakes, when thousands suffer because of war. The resurrection is the reason I can walk the streets each day and see the pain of the homeless.

This is what holds many homeless together, who will never have housing.
The lady above fines joy in her life, even though she lives on the street.She shares that joy in that dress and decorating her dog. She goes and sleep in Golden Gate Park at night.

The good news of Easter day declares that suffering and death, disease and injustice, are not the way things are supposed to be, nor are they the way things will be forever. As

Jurgen Moltman once said: “Our Easter faith recognizes that the raising Jesus from the dead provides the great alternative to this world of death.”

87
Our faith understands the risen Christ as God’s protest against death, and against all the people who work for death. For those of us who claim the message of the empty tomb as our own, who find good news in the promise of Easter, our job is to live in such a way that the miracle of this day can be seen in our lives.

Remember, when you forgive your enemy, when you feed the hungry, when you defend the weak – you proclaim the resurrection.

When you work to repair broken relationships, when you sacrifice for the sake of others, when you take time to support a friend – you proclaim the resurrection. When you stand up for the truth, when you refuse to compromise your integrity, when you love the unlovable – you proclaim the resurrection.

This is our job as Christians – to declare with our lips and live with our lives the hope of Easter in a world, where for many, hope can be difficult to find. He is risen!

Thank you for your gifts. River+

Fr. River Sims, sfw, D.Min.

Holy Saturday

On Holy Saturday, we find our selves in a liminal space between the already and not yet. That is the Jonah story, my story and your story in one way or another.

Jesus used the Jonah story to tell of his on fate and as the pattern of death and resurrection, that each of us must walk as Jesus did.

It is that story that describes my life. Yesterday in the middle of the "Stations of the Cross", seen above, I received a phone call from a friend, and he was asking me how who I saw the crucified Christ in.

The truth is I see the broken face of Jesus in every person I encounter, rich, poor, caring,uncaring, criminal or non criminal. I do not like every one, but I show them the love I have for each person.

Read More

I entered into the "belly of the whale" when I was kicked out of the Church, family turned on me, and totally alone becoming a whore on the streets of L.A. I wanted to run away from God for years, and through a slow process came back, and am still in that process. We are all broken people on the journey.

There is no judgment, and I see only the broken body of Jesus, try to love it in each person with all my heart, mind, and strength.

In the coming out I encountered Jesus, in whom I placed my complete trust, and through whom the two chief Scriptures that I believe in and seek to practice are:

"Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy mind, heart, and soul and your neighbor as yourself." and Matthew 25-31-46.

So on this day of days and on Easter Sunday come to faith in God, not through an institution but through your heart. I am presently wearing a sweat shirt saying, "Jesus I Trust in You." He is all I have to truly trust in! Deo Gratias! Thanks be to God!

Fr. River Damien Sims, sfw, D.Min.
www.temenos.org
415-305-2124
P.O. Box 642656
San Francisco, CA 94164

The Twenty Second Annual Stations of the Cross "Our Haunting!"

April 7, 2023
Civic Center
Noon-2 p.m.

Food Provided By:

AUNT BARBARA’S KITCHEN
GOOD FRIDAY IRISH SODA BREAD BLITZ ON POLK STREET
In alliance with Fr. River Damien Sims of Temenos.
https://www.temenos.org/
Please help support a Good Friday initiative. Fr. River Sims aims to serve 200 folks with Irish Soda Bread, the food that supported many Irish during hard times. It’s in the spirit of community and nurturing.

Read More

There’s a legend that when a cross is made in each loaf before baking, all the good fairies are released. We like to believe in that.

$15/loaf payable through www.temenos.org , pay pal, or Aunt Barbara’s Kitchen/Temenos Catholic Worker, P.O. Box 642656, San Francisco, CA 94164

Aunt Barbara’s Kitchen is a Cottage Food Operation from a home kitchen in Marin County.

The business started with $10 and Aunt Barbara’s great grandfather iron skillet with the intention to build a business model that feeds the hungry and revenue that goes to youth in college. The owner volunteers her time to this endeavor and takes no revenue for herself, at this time. She hopes to reshape the model of what businesses can create for communities, especially our youth, to cultivate and showcase the power of human investment. 415 7170151
https://barbaramcveigh.com/aunt-barbaras-kitchen/

Christian discipleship is a way of life--doing and undoing, a going and an undergoing.

No ritual practice can match the majestic symbolic sweep of the Triduum undergone in three short days, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday.

Since March of 2020, with the virus, injury, and much pain, I have found that there is no logic in understanding that the Siren-Spirit was calling me into the heart of the Pascal mystery with its odd thinking that the way of new life goes through and around our disabilities and fears.

The First Act Holy Thursday: we are going to serve sandwiches as our Holy Communion to avoid the anger of so many have against the Church, with a blessing and pair of socks. In doing so, reminding them that the Lord's Supper is about love, not division and condemnation.

The Second Act Good Friday: We will lift up the cross in the Tenderloin, reminding ourselves of the Haunting that we turn away from in the persecution of homeless individuals. We call people to become one with them as Christ is one with us and all people.

The Third Act: In the great Vigil of the Spirit, we walk the Tenderloin and Haight Street in early morning, giving candy, a blessing, and close with a service of celebration, the Holy Eucharist, and breakfast in the Haight!

And so we stumble into the dawn of Easter morning--under the weight of fear, homelessness, aging, and illness to bask in the promise of the resurrection that is indeed our inheritance.

He is risen! And so shall we be! Deo Gratias! Thanks be to God!

Fr. River Sims, D.Min., D.S.T.
Temenos Catholic Worker
P.O. Box 642656
San Francisco, California 94164-2656
www.temenos.org
415-305-2124

"You can measure your worth by your dedication to your path, not by your successes or failures." (Elizabeth Gilbert)

"Compassion is not a relationship between the healer and the wounded. It's a relationship between equals. Only when we know our own darkness well can we be present with the darkness of others. Compassion becomes real when we recognize our shared humanity." (Pema Chödrön)

"The most fundamental aggression to ourselves, the most fundamental harm we can do to ourselves, is to remain ignorant by not having the courage and the respect to look at ourselves honestly and gently." (Pema Chödrön)

“Could You Not Watch with Me One Hour?”

Dear Friends,

“Could You Not Watch with Me One Hour?”

These words of Jesus were affixed artistically to a poster board. Below them was a sign-up for the annual Holy Thursday all-night prayer vigil at my parish. Something stirred in my 16-year-old heart, and I wrote down my name to fill the early morning hour at 3 AM.

I’m not exactly sure how my father felt when I told him I needed a ride to church in the middle of the night that Holy Thursday, but he got up, and he drove me. We were silent in the car, but it was an attentive, prayerful silence. When we arrived, I walked quietly to the front of the Church and, kneeling down, prayed my hour before the altar of repose as my dad sat in the back. I am sure he was praying, too.

Read More

You never know what a simple invitation may stir in someone’s heart—even if it is by way of a poster board!

We are at the threshold of the holiest days of the liturgical year. Jesus is speaking the very same invitation to us that he spoke to his apostles over 2,000 years ago: “Watch and pray that you may not undergo the test” (Matthew 26:41).

Let us watch and pray with Jesus—not only to be safe from the powers of sin and death, but most of all to adore Jesus, to love him with all our heart, mind, soul, and strength! Let us together keep watch with him: in the garden, in the prison, along the streets of Jerusalem, on Calvary Hill, and in the silence of the tomb and in that silence let us be haunted by the homeless on the street, ignored, forgotten about going hungry as we sit down to our tables of ham and trimmings

415-305-2124
The Twenty Second Annual Stations of the Cross "Our Haunting!"

April 7, 2023
Civic Center
Noon-2 p.m.

Food Provided By:

AUNT BARBARA’S KITCHEN
GOOD FRIDAY IRISH SODA BREAD BLITZ ON POLK STREET
in alliance with Fr. River Damien Sims of Temenos
https://www.temenos.org/
Please help support a Good Friday initiative. Fr. River Sims aims to serve 200 folks with Irish Soda Bread, the food that supported many Irish during hard times. It’s in the spirit of community and nurturing.

There’s a legend that when a cross is made in each loaf before baking, all the good fairies are released. We like to believe in that.

$15/loaf payable through www.temenos.org , pay pal, or Aunt Barbara’s Kitchen/Temenos Catholic Worker, P.O. Box 642656, San Francisco, CA 94164

Aunt Barbara’s Kitchen is a Cottage Food Operation from a home kitchen in Marin County.

The business started with $10 and Aunt Barbara’s great grandfather iron skillet with the intention to build a business model that feeds the hungry and revenue that goes to youth in college. The owner volunteers her time to this endeavor and takes no revenue for herself, at this time. She hopes to reshape the model of what businesses can create for communities, especially our youth, to cultivate and showcase the
power of human investment. 415 7170151
https://barbaramcveigh.com/aunt-barbaras-kitchen/

Here in Dust and Dirt

In 2006, John Dominic Crossan and Marcus Borg published The Last Week. The book begins with an unforgettable image:

“Two processions entered Jerusalem on a spring day in the year 30. . . One was a peasant procession, the other an imperial procession. From the east, Jesus rode a donkey down the Mouth of Olives, cheered by his followers. . . On the opposite side of the city, from the west, Pontius Pilate, the Roman governor of Idumea, Judea, and Samaria, entered Jerusalem at the head of a column of imperial calvary and soldiers.

Jesus’s procession proclaimed the kingdom of God; Pilate’s proclaimed the power of empire.”

Read More

I’ve no idea how many thousands of sermons have been preached on this passage in the years since. In the last fifteen years, I’ve never not heard a Palm Sunday sermon allude to it, borrow the image, or quote it directly. The “two processions” have become nearly a commonplace in liturgical and liberal churches.

This year, I’ve wondered about the crowds watching the processions. Matthew depicts the throng cheering, waving branches, and singing hosanna. The author interlaced the Jesus procession with a prophecy from Zechariah. In the Hebrew scriptures, Zechariah envisioned a humble king who arrives in Jerusalem on a donkey and a colt. That king will end all war. No more chariots, warhorses, or battle-bows. This king commands peace.

Of course, Pontius Pilate wasn’t a king of peace. He commanded an army on behalf of Caesar. But he and that legion were there to keep the peace during the holy days of Passover — making sure the Jews caused no trouble for their Roman rulers. As his procession made its way to the city gate, most likely no one cheered him. The crowds hated and feared him.

Perhaps a few paid supporters were sent out to shout Ave Pilate — Hail Pilate — as he entered — to soothe his imperial ego. Maybe a few powerful people in Jerusalem actually approved of him, or wanted something from him, and shouted their praise. Chances are, however, the road to the west gate was relatively deserted as the Romans approached. The only sounds were the dreaded clomp, clomp of armored horses and chariot wheels traversing the cobblestones. Pilate, in regal splendor, probably wanted to be home in his seaside villa instead of here, with the unruly Jews.

Meanwhile, at the eastern gate, Jesus’ noisy supporters were crying out Hosanna! Save us! Please save us now! They weren’t asking for some sort of spiritual salvation, for a place in heaven, or for eternal life. They wanted to be saved from Pilate, from the legion entering the other gate, from Caesar, and that faux peace of Roman swords. They knew there was no Pax Romana, it was nothing but misery and death.
Hosanna Jesus! Free us, we pray you! Deliver us! Save us from Pilate and Caesar and the misery of Rome! Hosanna, hey sanna, sanna sanna ho! Now, Jesus, now!

There isn’t an ave or an alleluia to be heard. These branch-waving protesters were begging to be rescued from oppression and injustice, shouting for liberation from the forces of violence and death.

Palm Sunday has always confused me. When depicted as a jubilant crowd, it doesn’t make a lot of sense. But, if the crowd is understood as desperate subjects of a bloody empire, Palm Sunday comes into better focus. Why do they later turn on Jesus? Well, once the Roman soldiers enter the fray, and once their hoped-for savior is arrested, the reality of their situation sets in. No amount of hosannas can free Jesus from his Roman fate. But they could still save their own hides and hope for better when the next promising savior arrived. They didn’t really betray him. They did what fearful subjects of a brutal regime usually do — they capitulated to their overlords who had thousands of chariots, warhorses, and battle-bows at their command. The Romans essentially forced them into the imperial procession. By Friday, they weren’t begging Jesus for salvation; they were praying they could avoid being crucified with him.

We are frail people after all.

But Jesus will save them from violence and death — although not as anyone hoped or expected — by drinking Rome’s bloody cup. The journey to the anti-imperial kingdom will be marked by a cross. Palm Sunday is the first step along a way that will end with a stunning event in a cemetery garden.
And yet, even after the tomb: hosanna still sounds. In a week, we may shout our Easter Alleluias, but the truth is that our days cry out hosanna. Children and teachers die in pools of blood at school, homeless people lay in the dirt on the street, lies pervade and divide a desperate people, the rich steal everyone’s share, courts unwind decades of justice, and even a poisoned earth and sky rage against us. Pax Americana? We may have believed that once, subject to its deceptive promises. But the mask comes off and a faux peace makes itself known. A peace enforced by fear and violence, a peace of privilege and guns. Hosanna, Jesus, hosanna! Save us, NOW!

Honestly, I’m stricken by the bodies and blood, the price of empire. I’ve got no alleluias left. But I can wave my palm in protest, and I can still shout: Hosanna, hey hosanna, hosanna hosanna ho / Sanna, hey, sanna hosanna!
And that chorus is needed now more than ever. The road to the eastern gate beckons, opening to the commonwealth of God. Sing with me.

Two processions entered Jerusalem on that day. The same question, the same alternative, faces those who would be faithful to Jesus today.

"Which procession are we in? Which procession do we want to be in?
This is the question of Palm Sunday and of the week that is about to unfold."
— John Dominic Crossan and Marcus Borg, The Last Week.

We all are in the dust and dirt! Shed Your Fears! Hosanna in the Highest! See your brothers or sisters before you in the dirt, remember the day is coming for each of us to be dirt!

Let us talk to God, or anything with which we find union! Let us let go, feel the pain and exhaustion and take a chance on being loved, and in so doing remember the words of Dorothy Day: "In each person I find the Christ." Deo Gratias! Thanks be to God!

Fr. River Damien Sims sfw, D.Min, D.S.T,
P.O. Box 642656
San Francisco, CA 94164
www.temenos.org
415-305-2124

The Twenty Second Annual Stations of the Cross

"Our Haunting!"

April 7, 2023
Civic Center
Noon-2 p.m.

Food Provided By:

AUNT BARBARA’S KITCHEN
GOOD FRIDAY IRISH SODA BREAD BLITZ ON POLK STREET
in alliance with Fr. River Damien Sims of Temenos
https://www.temenos.org/

Please help support a Good Friday initiative. Fr. River Sims aims to serve 200 folks with Irish Soda Bread, the food that supported many Irish during hard times. It’s in the spirit of community and nurturing.

There’s a legend that when a cross is made in each loaf before baking, all the good fairies are released. We like to believe in that.

$15/loaf payable through www.temenos.org , pay pal, or Aunt Barbara’s Kitchen/Temenos Catholic Worker, P.O. Box 642656, San Francisco, CA 94164

Aunt Barbara’s Kitchen is a Cottage Food Operation from a home kitchen in Marin County.

The business started with $10 and Aunt Barbara’s great grandfather iron skillet with the intention to build a business model that feeds the hungry and revenue that goes to youth in college. The owner volunteers her time to this endeavor and takes no revenue for herself, at this time. She hopes to reshape the model of what businesses can create for communities, especially our youth, to cultivate and showcase the power of human investment. 415 717 0151 https://barbaramcveigh.com/aunt-barbaras-kitchen/

“…And now, after the crucifixion, just when they feel that the dream is dead, that their faith is only fantasy, they are told to go back to the place where it all began: “Go back to Galilee. He will meet you there!” Fr. Ronald Rolheiser

Easter Sunday

April 9, 2023
My dearest friends,
"Christ is risen! Christ is risen indeed!
This past year has not been easy dealing with the brokenness we find in the world and in our own neighborhoods. In the struggle with my own pain—both physical and emotional—with my loneliness and fear—my own demons—I have found myself recalling the words of Fr. Ronald Rolheiser, and I return to Galilee:

"Whenever we are discouraged in our faith, whenever our hopes seem to be crucified, we need to go back to Galilee, back to the dream that we had embarked upon before things went wrong."

I return to the Galilee of the Tenderloin and Haight Street, and I simply do what I was called to do some twenty-eight and six months ago now—to be a friend in the lives of the homeless young adults and older adults.

For in each person, you see the broken body of Christ!

Each pair of socks, every sandwich made, and in the minutes and hours spent with each of these persons, the pastoral care we give shows our respect and appreciation for each one!

I invite you, personally, to see in each of the faces on the next page the face of Jesus and to join me on this journey into Galilee and provide the finances needed for our work!

In Jesus, Street Person, and Rebel,

Fr. River Sims

"Whipper”

"Brandon"

"Damien"

"Birdman"

Dear fellow companions along the way,

I am the Rev. Michael Mallory. On April 5, 2023, the second Sunday of Lent, I was ordained a priest of The Society of Franciscan Workers by Fr. River Sims. It was an outdoor ordination hosted by the San Francisco Night Ministry Open Cathedral at the UN Plaza. I was so blessed to have so many people attend and give me encouragement to continue on with that insistent calling from God—to simply be friends and find family in the people that the world has declared unworthy—the hungry, the stranger, the penniless, and the imprisoned.

“For I was hungry, and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.” Matthew 25:35-36

The Rev. Lyle Beckman, preaching at the ordination, said that being a priest is like being a gardener. The daily task of tending, nurturing, and patiently waiting for the garden to grow As a person of God, I have experienced firsthand how God has tended, nurtured, and patiently waited for me, as God does for all of Creation. I believe the realm of God to be the same as that beloved community that Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. proclaimed and that no one will reach it until we all do.

When will that day come? No one knows the day or the hour. But I believe that every time we see in strangers’ eyes an image of ourselves and recognize ourselves as brothers and sisters, that day draws closer.

May God bless you this Easter season! Be bold and have no fear, for we belong to him who created us all. When the journey seems long and unforgiving, remember that we are together in Christ, and only together will we reach that distant shore.

With all my heart,

Fr. Michael Mallory

"River On the Street"

Temenos Catholic

P.O. Box 642656

San Francisco, CA 94164

We are beggars!
Please Give!
PayPal
or www.temenos.org

Gift from the Rev. Eric, Jessica, and Robby Metoyer

Thank you to all who have called, given gifts to Temenos, and provided me with a wonderful birthday!
--------------------------------------------------------------
John 11:25ff

“Unbind him and let him go". We see in John's account of the raising of Lazarus the power of Christ to bring life out of death. It was Jesus who gave Lazarus his life back, who created for his friend the possibility of a new beginning. But it was not Jesus who unwrapped the shrouds of death from Lazarus, it was instead Lazarus' friends, the members of his community, who unbound him and let him go. Let me share with you a story.

One day, a man wanders into a Cathedral in LA. It is the middle of the morning during the week, but the weekly celebration of the Eucharist is taking place inside. Not quite knowing why, he sits down and begins to listen to the liturgy unfolding around him. His life is in shambles. He was kicked out of church for being gay, became a prostituted.. Since that time, each day has been a struggle. He stays through the entire service, not because he wants to, but because this seems like a safe quiet place. After the service, as he is leaving, a woman of the parish approaches him and invites him to the weekly Bible study that follows the service. Having a few free minutes, and glad to be able to spend some time with people older, he agrees. During the Bible study, he meets other members of the parish who show an interest in him and who seem pleased that he has joined them.

Read More

This celebration of the Eucharist was for this man a kind of new beginning. He returned to the church and after some time, he learned to like and eventually love this parish and the people in it. They helped Him to cope, they gave him their love, and they shared with him their lives. Just as Jesus saved Lazarus and gave him new life, I believe Jesus saved this man and gave him a new life. It was Christ's redeeming grace that directed him to the church that morning. Grace brought him to the church, but it was up to the members of the church, to unwrap the shroud and the bandages from him so that he could live. It was the men of the parish who first approached him, and the members of the Bible study, who first began to unbind him. Christ made his new life possible, but it was the people in the church.

to take off his cord and unbind him.
The good news is that through Christ there is indeed always the reality of new beginnings, of new life. Christ's own journey to the cross has made that possible. But as members of Christ's body, we must take that new gift, given to each of us, and unwrap its glory. Ask yourself this morning, how do I need to be unwrapped? Moreover, what can I do to help another to realize their new beginning, their new life. In Christ, everything is possible, in Him life abounds. But it is only through our love for each other that this gift of new life can be fully unwrapped and fully realized. Amen.

"Today I choose.

Today I bear witness to grace.
Today I practice kindness.
Today I choose love over fear.
Today I am not afraid to be generous.
Today I belong to the whole world, not merely a portion of it.
No matter what others around me choose, today I choose to live in peace."

Steven Garnaas--Holmes

Fr. River Damien Sims sfw, D.Min, D.S.T,
P.O. Box 642656
San Francisco, CA 94164
www.temenos.org
415-305-2124
The Twenty Second Annual Stations of the Cross
"Our Haunting!"

April 7, 2023

Civic Center
Noon-2 p.m.

Food Provided By:

AUNT BARBARA’S KITCHEN
GOOD FRIDAY IRISH SODA BREAD BLITZ ON POLK STREET
in alliance with Fr. River Damien Sims of Temenos
https://www.temenos.org/

Please help support a Good Friday initiative. Fr. River Sims aims to serve 200 folks with Irish Soda Bread, the food that supported many Irish during hard times. It’s in the spirit of community and nurturing.

There’s a legend that when a cross is made in each loaf before baking, all the good fairies are released. We like to believe in that.
$15/loaf payable through www.temenos.org , pay pal, or Aunt Barbara’s Kitchen/Temenos Catholic Worker, P.O. Box 642656, San Francisco, CA 94164

Aunt Barbara’s Kitchen is a Cottage Food Operation from a home kitchen in Marin County.

The business started with $10 and Aunt Barbara’s great grandfather iron skillet with the intention to build a business model that feeds the hungry and revenue that goes to youth in college. The owner volunteers her time to this endeavor and takes no revenue for herself, at this time. She hopes to reshape the model of what businesses can create for communities, especially our youth, to cultivate and showcase the power of human investment. 415 717 0151 https://barbaramcveigh.com/aunt-barbaras-kitchen/

Fr. River Sims, D.Min., D.S.T.
Temenos Catholic Worker
P.O. Box 642656
San Francisco, California 94164-2656
415-305-2124

"You can measure your worth by your dedication to your path, not by your successes or failures." Elizabeth Gilbert

Compassion is not a relationship between the healer and the wounded. It's a relationship between equals. Only when we know our own darkness well can we be present with the darkness of others. Compassion becomes real when we recognize our shared humanity.
(Pema Chödrön)

The most fundamental aggression to ourselves, the most fundamental harm we can do to ourselves, is to remain ignorant by not having the courage and the respect to look at ourselves honestly and gently.” (Pema Chödrön)

Self-esteem is the commitment to treat yourself in a kindly, loving manner when you're alone. This is an active process that requires effort and energy.
-- David Burns, Intimate connections, 1985.

A Kid On the Street!

The Judgment of the Nations

31 “When the Son of Man comes in his glory and all the angels with him, then he will sit on the throne of his glory. 32 All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats, 33 and he will put the sheep at his right hand and the goats at the left. 34 Then the king will say to those at his right hand, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world, 35 for I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, 36 I was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me.’ 37 Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry and gave you food or thirsty and gave you something to drink? 38 And when was it that we saw you a stranger and welcomed you or naked and gave you clothing? 39 And when was it that we saw you sick or in prison and visited you?’

Read More

40 And the king will answer them, ‘Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did it to me.’ 41 Then he will say to those at his left hand, ‘You who are accursed, depart from me into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels, 42 for I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, 43 I was a stranger and you did not welcome me, naked and you did not give me clothing, sick and in prison and you did not visit me.’ 44 Then they also will answer, ‘Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison and did not take care of you?’ 45 Then he will answer them, ‘Truly I tell you, just as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me.’ 46 And these will go away into eternal punishment but the righteous into eternal life.”

I finished Dr. Planter's book with much sadness, for in many ways, it is a memory of what was, and a memory of my life.

Li Po, 8th-century poet, once said:

"The birds have vanished into the sky, and now the last closed cloud drains away.

We sit together, the mountain and me, until only the mountain remains."

I live on Polk the mountain, in the midst of a world where I feel very uncomfortable--upper-class, white people, for the most part, who knows nothing about what has been, and want the homeless moved out. I am not well-liked by many of these people, in fact I am a threat by my presence.

I am a threat by my going up and down the street feeding, and caring for the older homeless, taking them into restaurants to eat, and being their friend. I am threatened, hated, or simply ignored. The mountain and I remain.

And so, not much has changed in my life through the years. I grew up in a small town, where I was taught to have any other sexual feelings accept for a girl was wrong, and where one friend of mine was murdered because he at 14, was caught having sex with a guy. I had a son at 15, to have him adopted out, and the secret kept. I entered the ministry, and for 17 years suffered in the closet, and then kicked out, and found myself on the street, a prostitute.

When I came back it was as an Old Catholic/Anglican priest, for outside of the Metropolitan Community Church, all other denominations were basically homophobic.

My calling was to work with youth, and as a result I found myself being 'promoted' to a Bishop in the Old Catholic tradition because like all churches my church of ordination was afraid to work with kids, which is why the established church is dying.

I have friends ordained in the Old Catholic tradition who remain in their other denomination, never fully coming out for who they are, and wanting to be a part of the mainstream, even when I could have come back, I refused, for I am as the book of Hebrews tells us "outside the gates", the kids on the street are. Therapy never really works with them, for like me, they too are a
square peg that will not fit into a round hole.

That is the main reason I do not apply for grants, they are from the establishment that desires based on the idea of the established upper class, and I can not lie, and take money it is impossible for me to use in line with their goals.

Yesterday, on Haight Street, I visited with two 19 year old, Craig, and John, from
South Carolina. Young, "travelers", no interest in services, simply traveling around the country, living a 'hippie' lifestyle.

One called me later, and we met again in the Haight, and shared with me of sexual abuse by his stepfather, discrimination for liking both boys and girls. He loves traveling. The boy gave me a huge hugged and took off.

Polk Street has older men who sleep in the doorways at night, they are "the ones who are dangerous to customers" these guys are struggling to stay a live, not harm to anyone.

Today is the Feast of St. Oscar Romero he exemplified what it means to be a disciple of Jesus in the modern world of poverty and violence, and challenges both the church and the world to stand for justice for the poor, those on the street, those without housing, He calls us to pay up personally:

One who is committed to the poor must risk the same fate as the poor. And in El Salvador (and San Francisco!) we know what the fate of the poor signifies: to disappear, to be tortured, to be captive, and to be found dead.

Plaster gave me the highest compliment, one that I strive for every day, with every inch of my soul and body:

"River is the surrogate Holy Father to the "lost boys" and "Lost Girls."

Following is this years Stations of the Cross, entitled "Hauntedness" and I invite to join me the rosary every day praying that your "Hauntedness" may lead you to enter into the lives of the "Forgotten Ones!":

Tenderloin Stations of the Cross
“Our Journey With Our Brothers and Sisters
Who Live on the Street"

“Our Hauntedness!”

“The street transforms every ordinary day into a series of quick questions and every incorrect answer risks a break down, shooting or pregnancy."

Ta Nehie Contes
April 7, 2023
Noon
Meet In Front of City Hall

Sponsored By: Temenos Catholic Worker and Society of
Society of Franciscan Workers

(1)

The Stations of the Cross

Introduction
People, who live on the streets, the homeless, have haunted me all of my life. From the time I was six years old, driving late night through Sequoia National Park, seeing an old homeless woman walking up the road, and when I was seven walking across the street with a homeless person begging for money.

Haunting is the relentless remembering and continue reminding that will not be appeased the propaganda of assistance and care or the promises of our city, state, and national Governments that all will be well. In over twenty years in San Francisco we have seen the problem grow immensely, with tons of money being spent.

Haunting is both acute and generally are haunted, but that haunting comes from the haunting of society. The (2) United States is permanently haunted by the homeless, its massive population of poor and the violence intertwined in its past, present and future days.

Haunting’s aim is to wrong the wrongs, a confirmation that the rich and middle class hope to evade.

On Good Friday the cross call’s us to look at its “backside”, the side that points us seeing the homeless from their perspective, not one judgment, but one of love, and to work to end homelessness.

The First Station

The Agony of Jesus in the Garden of Olives

Leader: We adore you O Christ, and we praise you.

All: Because by your Holy Cross you have saved all of creation.

32 They went to a place called Gethsemane, and he said to his disciples, “Sit here while I pray.” 33 He took with him Peter and James and John and began to be distressed and agitated. 34 And he said to them, “My soul is deeply grieved, even to death; remain here, and keep awake.” 35 And going a little farther, he threw himself on the (3) ground and prayed that, if it were possible, the hour might pass from him. 36 He said, “Abba,[a] Father, for you all things are possible; remove this cup from me, yet not what I want but what you want.”

Jesus felt sorrow and dread over what lay ahead of him of him. He prayed for the burden to be lifted and the cross to be removed. He accepted his future, “:Not my will but your will.”

We are haunted by the pain of the homeless, and as we see them around us we feel dread and fear. In our haunting we are pushed to walk with them and help them. “Not my will but thine be done.” (Mark 14:43-46).

All: Jesus declares: “If anyone wants to become a follower, let them deny themselves and take up their cross. And follow me.”

The Second Station

The Betrayal and Arrest of Jesus

Leader: We adore you O Christ, and we praise you.

All: Because by your Holy Cross you have saved all of creation.

43 Immediately, while he was still speaking, Judas, one of the twelve, arrived, and with him there was a crowd with swords and clubs, from the chief priests, the scribes, and the elders. 44 Now the betrayer had given them a sign, saying, “The one I will kiss is the man; arrest him and lead him away under guard.” 45 So when he came, he went up to him at once and said, “Rabbi!” and kissed him. 46 Then they laid hands on him and arrested him. 47 But one of those who stood near drew his sword and struck the slave of the high priest, cutting off his ear. 48 Then Jesus said to them, “Have you come out with swords and clubs to arrest me as though I were a rebel? 49 Day after day I was with you in the temple teaching, and you did not arrest me. But let the scriptures be fulfilled.” 50 All of them deserted him and fled.1 A certain young man was following him, wearing nothing but a linen cloth. They caught hold of him, 52 but he left the linen cloth and ran off naked.” (Mark 14:42-46)

Rejection always hurts. It tears at our self-esteem, makes us feel like we are nothing, and leaves us doubting who we are. Homeless people are rejected all the time. When people walk by and do not even see the person on the side walk they feel like they nothing. May we be haunted by the feeling of rejection, as we look at our neighbor before us.

All:   Jesus declares: “If anyone wants to become a follower, let them deny themselves and take up their cross. And follow me.”

(4)

The Third Station

The Sanhedrin Condemns Jesus

Leader: We adore you O Christ, and we praise you.

All: Because by your Holy Cross you have saved all of creation.

53 They took Jesus to the high priest, and all the chief priests, the elders, and the scribes were assembled. 54 Peter had followed him at a distance, right into the courtyard of the high priest, and he was sitting with the guards, warming himself at the fire. 55 Now the chief priests and the whole council were looking for testimony against Jesus to put him to death, but they found none. 56 For many gave false testimony against him, and their testimony did not agree. 57 Some stood up and gave false testimony against him, saying, 58 “We heard him say, ‘I will destroy this temple that is made with hands, and in three days I will build another, not made with hands.’ ” 59 But even on this point their testimony did not agree. 60 Then the high priest stood up before them and asked Jesus, “Have you no answer? What is it that they testify against you?” 61 But he was silent and did not answer. Again the high priest asked him, “Are you the Messiah,[k](5) the Son of the Blessed One?” 62 Jesus said, “I am, and      you will see the Son of Man seated at the right hand of the Power’ and ‘coming with the clouds of heaven.’ ”
63 Then the high priest tore his clothes and said, “Why do we still need witnesses? 64 You have heard his blasphemy! What is your decision?” All of them condemned him as deserving death. 65 Some began to spit on him, to blindfold him, and to strike him, saying to him, “Prophesy!” The guards also took him and beat him.(Mark 14:55-63),

Envy and jealously can be like a cancerous disease, They haunt us, spreading through our bodies leading to destruction. Gossip and false accusations, leads us to push aside the homeless, in much the same way the Sanhedrin pushed aside Jesus. We are haunted by only listening to gossip, accusations, and the fear of others in pushing homeless individuals aside.
All: Jesus declares: “If anyone wants to become a follower, let them deny themselves and take up their cross. and follow me.”

(6)

The Fourth Station

Peter Denies Jesus

Leader: We adore you O Christ, and we praise you.

All: Because by your Holy Cross you have saved all of creation.

66” While Peter was below in the courtyard, one of the female servants of the high priest came by. 67 When she saw Peter warming himself, she stared at him and said, “You also were with Jesus, the man from Nazareth.” 68 But he denied it, saying, “I do not know or understand what you are talking about.” And he went out into the forecourt.[a] Then the cock crowed.[b] 69 And the female servant, on seeing him, began again to say to the bystanders, “This man is one of them.” 70 But again he denied it. Then after a little while the bystanders again said to Peter, “Certainly you are one of them, for you are a Galilean, and you talk like one.”[c] 71 But he began to curse, and he swore an oath, “I do not know this man (7) you are talking about.” 72 At that moment the cock crowed for the second time. Then Peter remembered that Jesus had said to him, “Before the cock crows twice, you will deny me three times.” And he broke down and wept. Mark 14:66-72.”
We are all like Peter. We deny our friends and lie when placed in a fearful situation. We are always for ourselves. We are haunted by these denials. We are haunted by the denials of caring for homeless people on the street. Like Peter if we return in faithfulness to Jesus, he will use our haunting on raising people on the streets into a new life.

All: Jesus declares: “If anyone wants to become a follower, let them deny themselves and take up their cross. and follow me.”

The Fifth Station

Pilate Condemns Jesus to the Cross

Leader: We adore you O Christ, and we praise you.

All: Because by your Holy Cross you have saved all of creation. (8)
15 As soon as it was morning, the chief priests held a consultation with the elders and scribes and the whole council. They bound Jesus, led him away, and handed him over to Pilate. 2 Pilate asked him, “Are you the King of the Jews?” He answered him, “You say so.” 3 Then the chief priests accused him of many things. 4 Pilate asked him again, “Have you no answer? See how many charges they bring against you.” 5 But Jesus made no further reply, so that Pilate was amazed.

“6 Now at the festival he used to release a prisoner for them, anyone for whom they asked. 7 Now a man called Barabbas was in prison with the insurrectionists who had committed murder during the insurrection. 8 So the crowd came and began to ask Pilate to do for them according to his custom. 9 Then he answered them, “Do you want me to release for you the King of the Jews?” 10 For he realized that it was out of jealousy that the chief priests had handed him over. 11 But the chief priests stirred up the crowd to have him release Barabbas for them instead. 12 Pilate spoke to them again, “Then what do you wish me to do[a] with the man you call[b] the King of the Jews?” 13 They shouted back, “Crucify him!” 14 Pilate asked them, “Why, what evil has he done?” But they shouted all the more, “Crucify him!” 15 So Pilate, wishing to satisfy the (9) crowd, released Barabbas for them, and after flogging Jesus he handed him over to be crucified” Mark 15: 1, 6-15.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer critiques unconditional forgiveness in his book, The Cost of Discipleship as “cheap grace” and tells us, “cheap grace is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism with out church discipline, communion without confession, and forgiveness without absolution.

Forgiving someone without requiring repentance in action, allows them to continue their abusive behavior and allows continued suffering.”

As we see Jesus condemned, and our condemning by cheap grace let a remember the words of St. Oscar Romero: “There are many things that can only be seen through eyes that have cried.”

Leader: Lord, may we looking at the cross hear the voice of Jesus calling us to turn our eyes to the sidewalks, the alleys, and street corners, and see your children, and our brothers and sisters. Amen. (10)
All: Jesus said: “If anyone wants to become my follower let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me!”

The Sixth Station

Jesus is Scouraged and Crowned with Thorns

Leader: We adore you O Christ, and we praise you.

All: Because by your Holy Cross you have saved all of creation.

“Then they took Jesus and had him scourged. And the soldiers wove a crown out of thorns and placed it on his head, and clothed him in a purple cloak, and they came to him and said, ‘Hail King of the Jews!’ And they struck him repeatedly.” John 19:1-3

Pilate had Jesus scourged, a truly brutal punishment. He was probably stripped to the waste and bent over a short pillar. The pain was excruciating.
James, 55, was in a doorway, with his belongings and a policeman told him to move, James said ‘It is raining’ and the policeman struck him with his baton. (11)

All: Jesus said: “If anyone wants to become my follower let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me!”

Seventh Station

Jesus Is Mocked by the Soldiers and Given His Cross

Leader: We adore you O Christ, and we praise you.
All: Because by your Holy Cross you have saved all of
creation.

“The soldiers lead him away inside the palace, that is the praetorian, and assembled the whole cohort. . They begin salute him. . .and beat him. . . And when they had mocked him they stripped him of his purple cloak, dressed him in his own clothes and led him out to crucify him.” Mark 15:16,18a19-20.”
The City has proposed to build some housing for homeless people, small houses in several of our neighborhoods, the residents are screaming, “No homeless housing in our neighborhood.”
(12)
The homeless remain silent, so different from us who are housed and have money.

All: Jesus said: “If anyone wants to become my follower let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me!”

Eighth Station

Simon the Cyrenian Helps Jesus Carry the Cross

Leader: We adore you O Christ, and we praise you.
All: Because by your Holy Cross you have saved all of
creation.

“They pressed into service a passer-by, Simon, a Cyrenian, who was coming in from the country, the father of Alexander and Rufus, to carry his cross.” Mark 15:21

Those in charge of the crucifixion of Jesus compelled Simon, a man from the country. They had to compel (13) Simon, he knew little of Jesus, but what about us? We know all about Jesus, and his ministry of serving the poor, and yet we have to be compelled to house, feed, clothe, and provide health care to our homeless neighbors, and little at that.

All: Jesus said: “If anyone wants to become my follower let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me!”

The Nineth Station
Jesus Meets the Women of Jerusalem

Leader: We adore you O Christ, and we praise you.

All: Because by your Holy Cross you have saved all of creation.

“A large crowd of people followed Jesus, including many women who mourned and lamented him. Jesus turned to them and said: ‘Daughters of Jerusalem, do not weep for me; weep instead for yourselves and for your children.’” Luke 23:27-28.
(14)
Compassion means literally, to suffer with someone. Empathy means to feel with them. These women displayed both qualities as they accompanied Jesus. We are called to show both of these qualities in our accompanying our homeless neighbors on their journey.

All: Jesus said: “If anyone wants to become my follower let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me!”

The Tenth Station

Jesus Is Crucified

Leader: We adore you O Christ, and we praise you.

All: Because by your Holy Cross you have saved all of creation.

“They brought him to the place of Golgotha (which is translated Place of the Skull). They gave him wine drugged with myrrh, but he did not take it. Then they crucified him and divided his garments by lots for them to see what each should take.” Mark 15:22-24 (15)

First they drove nails through his hands and feet. Then they raised him on the cross, where he hung painfully for three hours. Pope John XXIII had a crucifix on his bedroom wall. He prayed in front of it before retiring, upon arising, and whenever worries awakened him during the night. “A cross,” he said, “is the primary symbol of God’s love for us.”

I wear a silver cross with an Amherst in the middle. The Amherst was given to me by a young man, sitting on Haight Street. James place the Amherst in my hand after turning down a man’s offer of $100.00, saying, “River this is for your love for us street kids,” and I placed it on a silver cross to remind me that serving homeless kids is more valuable than money, power, prestige and security.

All: Jesus said: “If anyone wants to become my follower let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me!”

The Eleventh Station

Jesus Promises Paradise to the Penitent Criminal

Leader: We adore you O Christ, and we praise you.(16)

All: Because by your Holy Cross you have saved all of creation.

“When they came to the place called the Skull, they crucified him and two criminals there, on his right, and the other on his left. . Now one of the criminals hanging there reviled Jesus. .The other, however rebuking him,
said, ‘Have you no fear of God, for you are subject to the same condemnation?. .And we are condemned justly.’ Then he said: ‘Jesus, remember me when you come into your Kingdom,’ and Jesus replied, ‘Today you will be with me in Paradise.’

One criminal said, ’no’ to Christ, the other ‘yes”. To the one who said ‘yes’ he promised immediate entrance into “Paradise”. We are asked today to say ‘yes’ to caring for our homeless neighbors, and Christ’s promise is we enter into the reign of God here on earth. For the Kingdom of God is here now, and in service we have a taste of Paradise.(17)

All: Jesus said: “If anyone wants to become my follower let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me!”

The Twelfth Station

Jesus Speaks to His Mother and to His Disciples

Leader: We adore you O Christ, and we praise you.

All: Because by your Holy Cross you have saved all of creation.

“Standing by the cross of Jesus were his mother’s and his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary of Magdala. When Jesus saw his mother and the disciple there whom he loved he said to his mother, “Woman behold your son.” Then he said to the disciple, ’Behold your mother.’ And from that hour the disciple too her into his home.” John 19:25-27.

With these words Jesus gives Mary to us, making her our mother, who reminds us to unite our sufferings with her son on the cross and her at the bottom of the cross. In so (18) doing we share in Christ’s work of serving others. Jesus calls us to serve the those who are most ignored in our society, and we see the homeless on our streets. Let us bring Christ’s love and grace to our homeless brothers and sisters.

All: Jesus said: “If anyone wants to become my follower let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me!”

The Thirteenth Station

Jesus Dies on the Cross

Leader: We adore you O Christ, and we praise you.

All: Because by your Holy Cross you have saved all of creation.

“At noon darkness came over the whole land until three in the afternoon. And at three o’clock Jesus cried out in a loud voice, ‘My God, My God, why have you forsaken me.’ .. .Jesus gave a loud cry and breathed his last. (19)

Jesus, as faithful Jew, would have prayed the Psalms regularly. It is no surprise that these words from Psalm 22 are in his mouth in those painful last moments. Shortly afterward he surrenders his total self to God with these words: “”Father into your hands I commend my spirit.” May these words at our last be on our lips when we breathe our last. And may they come after a life of service to him in the broken body of Christ as seen in those who sleep on the street. For each day we see the broken Christ in each homeless person we meet.

All: Jesus said: “If anyone wants to become my follower let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me!”

The Fourteenth Station

Jesus Dies on the Cross

Leader: We adore you O Christ, and we praise you.

All: Because by your Holy Cross you have saved all of creation.(20)

“When it was already evening, since it was the day of preparation, the day before the Sabbath, Joseph of Arimathea, a distinguished member of the council, who was himself awaiting the Kingdom of God. . .courageously went to Pilate and asked for the body of Jesus. Pilate was amazed that he was already dead. .he gave the body to Joseph. Having bought a linen cloth he took him down, wrapped him in the linen cloth and laid him in a tomb that had been hewn out of the rock. Then he rolled a stone against the entrance of the tomb.” Mark 15:42-46.

Starting on Good Friday we enter into a period of silent grief, a time of mourning that looks with hope to the joy of the resurrection that begins at mid-night on Sunday. We grieve in much the same way when someone we love dies. There are tears and sorrow, of course, but rays of hope and belief in new life in Christ that is to come.

On this day as we return home, let us look at Christ dead in our midst, in those on the street, and let us pledge to (22) bring them new life in our care of them in the days ahead.

All: Jesus said: “If anyone wants to become my follower let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me!”

The Fifteenth Station

Jesus Rises from the Dead

Leader: We adore you O Christ, and we praise you.

All: Because by your Holy Cross you have saved all of creation.

“. . . .When they looked up, they saw the stone had been rolled back; it was very large. On entering the tomb they saw a young man sitting on the right side, clothed in a white robe, and they were utterly amazed. He said to them, “Do not be amazed! You seek Jesus of Nazareth. He has been raised, he is not here. Behold the place where they laid him.” Mark 16:1-6

Hallelujah Christ is Risen! He is Risen Indeed! (23)

His triumph is ours as well. On Easter Sunday, and in the many other Easters of our lives, we rise above our failures, our burdens, and our struggles, we too emerge victorious. Throughout our own Good Fridays, the risen Lord is by our side, pledging that we too, will rise again, and enter his Reign on earth, and unto eternity.

Through the years I find the majority of youth and adults who are on the streets have poor experiences with Christians. Christians are the unseen. Not welcome in local churches, and the direct persecution through trying to remove them from their neighborhoods.

As we enter the new life of Easter let us hear the words of Jesus, and asked ourselves do we honor his commands:

31 “When the Son of Man comes in his glory and all the angels with him, then he will sit on the throne of his glory. 32 All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate people one from another as a shepherd (24) separates the sheep from the goats, 33 and he will put the sheep at his right hand and the goats at the left. 34 Then the king will say to those at his right hand, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world, 35 for I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, 36 I was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me.’ 37 Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry and gave you food or thirsty and gave you something to drink? 38 And when was it that we saw you a stranger and welcomed you or naked and gave you clothing? 39 And when was it that we saw you (25) sick or in prison and visited you?’ 40 And the king will answer them, ‘Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did it to me.’ 41 Then he will say to those at his left hand, ‘You who are accursed, depart from me into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels, 42 for I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, 43 I was a stranger and you did not welcome me, naked and you did not give me clothing, sick and in prison and you did not visit me.’ 44 Then they also will answer, ‘Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison and did not take care of you?’ 45 Then he will answer them, ‘Truly I tell you, just as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me.’ 46 And (25)
these will go away into eternal punishment but the righteous into eternal life.

All: Jesus said: “If anyone wants to become my follower let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me!”

I would like to invite any one to come forward if you would like to be anointed with oil, and given the body of Christ in the Eucharist.

Thank you for coming and may you have a Happy Easter!

"Today I choose.
Today I bear witness to grace.
Today I practice kindness.
Today I choose love over fear.
Today I am not afraid to be generous.
Today I belong to the whole world, not merely a portion of it.
No matter what others around me choose, today I choose to live in peace."

Steven Garnaas--Holmes

Fr. River Damien Sims sfw, D.Min, D.S.T,
P.O. Box 642656
San Francisco, CA 94164
www.temenos.org
415-305-2124

The Twenty Second Annual Stations of the Cross

"Our Haunting!"

April 7, 2023
Civic Center
Noon-2 p.m.

Food Provided By:

AUNT BARBARA’S KITCHEN
GOOD FRIDAY IRISH SODA BREAD BLITZ ON POLK STREET
in alliance with Fr. River Damien Sims of Temenos
https://www.temenos.org/

Please help support a Good Friday initiative. Fr. River Sims aims to serve 200 folks with Irish Soda

Bread, the food that supported many Irish Soda Bread 2.5 lb. loaf image 1 during hard times. It’s in the spirit of community and nurturing.

There’s a legend that when a cross is made in each loaf before baking, all the good fairies are released. We like to believe in that.

$15/loaf payable through www.temenos.org , pay pal, or Aunt Barbara’s Kitchen/Temenos Catholic Worker, P.O. Box 642656, San Francisco, CA 94164

Aunt Barbara’s Kitchen is a Cottage Food Operation from a home kitchen in Marin County.

The business started with $10 and Aunt Barbara’s great grandfather iron skillet with the intention to build a business model that feeds the hungry and revenue that goes to youth in college. The owner volunteers her time to this endeavor and takes no revenue for herself, at this time. She hopes to reshape the model of what businesses can create for communities, especially our youth, to cultivate and showcase the power of human investment. 415 717 0151 https://barbaramcveigh.com/aunt-barbaras-kitchen/

Short Shifted!

John 5:1-16

THE EIGHTH STATION Simon the Cyrenian Helps Jesus Carry the Cross
MARK 15:21

Leader We adore you O Christ, and we praise you.
All Because by your Holy Cross you have saved all of creation.
They pressed into service a passer-by, Simon, a Cyrenian, who was coming in
from the country, the father of Alexander and Rufus, to carry his cross.
Leader Those in charge of the crucifixion of Jesus compelled Simon, a
man from the country. They had to compel Simon, he knew
little of Jesus, but what about us? We know all about Jesus, and
his ministry of serving the poor, and yet we have to be
compelled to house, feed, clothe, and provide health care to
our homeless neighbors, and little at that.

All Jesus said: “If anyone wants to become my follower let them
deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me!”

10

THE NINTH STATION Jesus Meets the Women of Jerusalem
LUKE 23:27-28

Alien Street Priest Journals

God Is Change

August, September, October, 2023

Journal of An Alien Street Priest:

On the Parable of the Sower!

The Freedom of Being Indifferent!

Mouth of the Donkey

Grasshoppers and Locusts!

The Coldest Place I have Ever Been In My life in the Summer is San Francisco! Mark Twain

​Gorillas In Our Midst!

Are Birds Getting Louder?

Befriend the Process!

Reflections! on Othering

A Different Definition! Give Glory to God!

"Being A Ghost!

National Mental Health Month!

Solitude and Standing Alone!

We Are Never Alone!

Our Endless Shadow!

"A Wider Rainbow!"

America's Loneliest Era!

​Practice Resurrection: Book Review of J.R. Mabry's Ash Wednesday

Fancy Boy!

Backside of the Cross: A Book Review!

The Ground of Our Being!

Practicing Resurrection!

The Magic Kingdom of Weeping and Love!

He Is Risen!

Holy Saturday

The Twenty Second Annual Stations of the Cross "Our Haunting!"

“Could You Not Watch with Me One Hour?”

Here in Dust and Dirt

The Twenty Second Annual Stations of the Cross

Easter Sunday

Gift from the Rev. Eric, Jessica, and Robby Metoyer

A Kid On the Street!

The Twenty Second Annual Stations of the Cross​

​Short Shifted!

Gorillas In Our Midst!

Practice Resurrection: Book Review of J.R. Mabry's Ash Wednesday

The Twenty Second Annual Stations of the Cross

Short Shifted!