O82408  WHAT’S ALL THIS ‘IDENTITY THEFT?’

            A question: Have any of you present today had a personal experience with what is beginning to be known as ‘Identity Theft?’  That is, has someone used one of your credit cards or debit cards to make charges to your account that you did not authorize?  I ask this because two of our rectory staff people have had such an experience recently.  One has had the experience twice totaling almost two thousand dollars of charges.  The other a single occurrence for five hundred dollars.  In each case the person was notified by their Card Company asked if they had made a specific purchase of an unusual kind.  When they said that they had not the card was immediately cancelled so that no new charges could be made on it.  Eventually they received their money back but the whole experience was very disconcerting to say the least.
            What each experienced was not exactly “Identity Theft’ or theft of their actual identity so much as it was a violation of their very self, their person, exposing their vulnerability, putting them and even their families at risk.  All of that and the gospel for today got me thinking about identity, what it is, how it works and why it is so important.
            I learned something very inadvertently about identity from my mom these last few years before she died.  She was not at all conscious of teaching me anything at all.  As a result of her two strokes she suffered short term memory loss.  Sometimes in the morning before I would go into her bedroom to waken her she would awaken but not know where she was.  And she couldn’t remember.  She thought she might be in a hospital or a Nursing Home or somebody else’s home.  She couldn’t remember and couldn’t get clarity about her situation or about herself.  She not only couldn’t remember where she was; she couldn’t remember who she was.  When I would stand by her bed I would tell her each day that she was in her own bedroom with her own things about her.  She lived here at the rectory and she had done so for five years.  I would tell her what day it was, what month, what the weather outside was and so forth.  I would remind her that we had an aide with us each day and then tell her the name of the aide.  She would become visibly more secure the more the information flooded into her.  I would then tell her that she had had a stroke and it had affected her short term memory but that I would now be her memory and tell her everything she needed to know.  That seemed to be enough for her. 
            But here’s what she taught me.  Without her memory her identity went.  I know who I am because I stand before you with all my memories up to this point supporting me in this moment.  I am priest and pastor and sixty one years old and a brother and so forth.  That is all very relevant to my identity.  If I can’t remember all of that then I begin to lose hold of myself.  Our memories are key to our identities.
            Perhaps that is why Jesus emphasized memory so much in his Last Supper institution of the Eucharist.  “Do this in memory of me.”  That is what he said.  But perhaps it is because he knew that if we did not gather to remember what he did we would soon enough begin to forget who he was and what he did for us.  We gather here each week and we see the crucifix and we are reminded of the depth and length of his love.  We see Stations of the Cross and we are reminded of the sorrowful journey.  We reach into the holy water fonts and are reminded that we are baptized into Christ.  We hear the Scriptures and are reminded of the story of Christ throughout the centuries.  We go to communion and we are reminded that we have no better nourishment than the Bread of Life which fills us in Eucharist.  Perhaps Christ got more than we get when he bid us to remember him.  Perhaps he knew that if we stop gathering then the fiercely loving God of forgiveness and sacrifice is lost sight of and replaced with a much softer God a God much more to our liking, a God who will simply accept us as we are no matter what we do or do not do.  The danger is that we begin to turn the whole creation process on its head and we create a god in our own image and likeness.  What is the matter with that?  That god, as attractive as it may be, cannot save.
            I dare say that God has an identity in mind for each of us.  Our charge is not so much to make or create our own image or identity as it is to discover or uncover it.  Mary shows us the way in the moment of the Annunciation when Gabriel says to her, “Hail Full of grace, the Lord is with you.  Do not be afraid, Mary, you have found favor with God and are to bear a child who will be called Son of the Most High God.”  “How can this be since I do not know man?”  “The Holy Spirit will come upon you and overshadow you and the one born shall be called the Holy One of God.”  “I am the maid, the servant of the Lord.  Let it be done to me as you say.”  It was God who had Mary’s identity in mind and God presented it to her.  She had her own identity in mind and when presented with God’s version she accepted it, all of it—as better than what she could ever have hoped. 
            Peter thought that he had found his identity as a fisherman.  Close but not exactly.  He was called to be a fisher of men.  That was the identity offered him by Christ.  Far better than what he could ever have hoped—but related.  Thirty-five years ago I was ordained a priest.  I thought I had found my identity.  Close but not exactly.  Somewhere along the line God spoke this word to me: “Do not be afraid to be holy.”  Not just a priest.  Be a holy priest, Stephen.  But how do I become a holy priest?  Becoming holy is not something I can attain on my own.  It is not something I can achieve or earn or merit or accomplish.  Becoming holy is a gift that God gives.  I can only desire it, hope for it, want it, open to it, receive it gratefully and gracefully.  I have to empty myself so that the Lord can fill me what his own good stuff, better than my stuff.  In order to become holy I have to remember that that is what I am called to and I must pray—a lot—every day to remember.
            God does not seek to steal our identity.  It is God who bestows our identity.  Turn Jesus’ question to the apostles around.  Go to your prayer tomorrow and ask the Lord, “Lord who do you say that I am?”   The Lord definitely has an answer to that question.  He did not give us the DNA he did, fill us with the gifts and blessings and talents he did, give us the parents he did and the siblings and friends he did and surround us in the circumstances he did without having a very distinct notion of our identity in mind.  We have to listen to his answer, listen for his answer.  To do that we have to become still, silent for he answers only in a whisper.  But answer he will.  And what the Lord says is our very best identity, far better than anything we could dream up for ourselves.  And that identity is real, and that identity cannot be taken from us by anyone—ever.