On Our Own Terms

Beloved in Christ,

The mystery of the Incarnation is that God meets us on our own terms, in all the uniqueness and particularity of our identities. God meets and embraces us as we are, in order to fold us fully into who God is.

Yesterday was the feast of Enmegahbowh, one of the saints by and through whom our diocese was established. Enmegahbowh was the first Indigenous person to be ordained a priest in the Episcopal Church, and his whole life bears witness to the God who always crossed barriers to meet us where, and fold us fully into the love that is God. In a Minnesota that was cut by deep divisions of race, language, culture, and broken promises, Enmegahbowh was incarnating the love of God between different bands of his own Ojibwe people, between the Ojibwe and the Dakota, between the indigenous spiritual path and his own Christian faith, and between the tribes and the federal government. His was a life of crossing boundaries of division with the love of Jesus. 

As Minnesota Episcopalians and the heirs of Enmegahbowh, he is our gift, and he is our calling. In the midst of the ongoing legacy of the divisions of his day, as well as entirely new fault lines in our common life, we are called, like him, to the incarnational work of entering into the experience of others, meeting them where they are, in order that we all might be folded fully into the healing embrace of God’s love. 

Often, when I am fishing in all the beautiful places around Minnesota, I am mindful that Enmegahbowh and Bishop Whipple may very well have fished together in the same spot, as they often did. I take a minute to feel them there with me, to imagine their deep friendship and affection across all that complex difference, and thank God for the great gift we all have of being invited to follow in their footsteps, offering what small gifts we have to the God who is always working to heal our broken, fractured world, full of suffering and betrayal and loss, with the perfect balm of love. 

Blessed Enmegahbowh, pray for us. 

The Right Reverend Craig Loya