In our community there are several radio stations which are directed towards the youth. The programs that they air and the music that they play seem designed to reach adolescents between the ages of 16 and 18 years. Having three youngsters in our house I find it is difficult for me not to listen occasionally to these stations.

     A series of announcements, over and over, day after day, caught my attention. In the station break came the announcer, first of all, saying that for draft counseling, an individual could go to a certain address. Secondly, for drug problems he could go to another one and, finally, he gave the number to call for the suicide prevention center. This trilogy of the draft, drugs and suicide is symbolic of the crisis that in our time many a young man has to pass through in order to reach maturity, and to illustrate the necessary place of the clergy in their role of being fatherly guides to all.

     This was drawn home especially to me when a young man, whom I had known in Sunday School a long time past, came to me to ask for some help in dealing with his problem with the draft. He only talked to me once and I tried, in the best way I could, to hear his side and to guide him. I didn't see him again, nor did I ever hear from him again. It was with great sorrow that I learned some time later that this young man had taken his life. Obviously, I had failed in my efforts to get through to him.

     Life is a crisis and we cannot escape this fact. We hear Christ in the Bible saying, "I am come that they might have life." The Church is organized around Christ and his Word. Therefore, the Church's task in each generation and in each age must be to be ministers of that life.

     Today is the Sunday on which we commemorate the ministry of Christ's church. We clergy are meant to be the stewards of the mysteries of God, communicating the life-giving Spirit that Christ brought into the world.

     The stewards of the mysteries of God is the term that St. Paul uses for the ordained clergy. In ancient times every culture has had stewards of the mysteries of the various gods in which they believed. Their purpose has been to initiate the youth of the community into adulthood and in so doing bring to them the fullness of life.

     In a similar way the primary function of the ministry of the Church is to serve as a kind of a catalyst or doorkeeper through which everyone can pass in order to more truly fulfill themselves. It is too bad that so much of what has been taught as the message of our Lord has been either judgmental, which has driven people away, or has been sentimental, which has failed to give life-giving power.

     The distinction, however, of the Christian ministry is that the priest himself knows he is not the mediator. That is the difference between all pagan religions and Christianity. The Christian priest knows that he is only a figure for the one who is the real means of initiating humanity into maturity. The Christian priest is a messenger or servant of the true high priest who is Christ Himself.

     One way to look at the gospel is to see Jesus Christ as the person through whom each individual comes to maturity and to real fulfillment in life. Jesus Christ is not a shadowy authority figure who says, "don't do this and don't do that," nor is He a far off spiritualized reality who will greet us in the afterlife. He is the principal and the power whereby a human being develops into the fullness of his own nature, and becomes able to face both life and death with confidence. The symbolism around Him from the Old and New Testament can be seen to run parallel to what the best psychologists are telling us today about the life stages experienced by every human being with their struggles to become adult and mature. We read the glorious prophecies of the Old Testament speaking of the desert blossoming into roses as a way of saying that when we have become mature, life will blossom for us. The desert of materialism we live in will begin to bloom. The still waters of joy and peace will flow in our hearts both now and forever.

     What the ordained clergyman is meant to do in every way possible through the Word and through the Sacraments is to help convey the healing life-giving maturing power of our Lord to the individual human being. There are times when we fail to do this, when something doesn't go right, when this power does not appear. Then the individual is in mortal danger, as in the experience I have related to you. Every human being has to pass through the darkness, the danger, and the fear of growing up. There are many people who are trapped by their childhood demons and destroy themselves in one form or another. They are never able to realize their true potential.

     One of the characters in ancient literature who expresses this priestly role is the figure of Merlin in the ancient stories of Britain. He was not only a priest, he was a wise man, a man of mystery, a man of power, who was able too bring the young boy, Arthur, through the perils of adolescence, and to guide him to the stage where he could become the Christian king. This pre-scientific understanding of human development finds a parallel in modern psychological writing and is spelled out for us in the gospel.

     Martin Luther understood this. It was his realization of the power of faith in Jesus Christ, which he taught to the people in his day, that helped to prepare the way for the Reformation, and released a whole new life-giving spirit to medieval Europe. He, himself, experienced this new life-giving power of faith in Christ. Cowed and browbeaten by a very authoritarian father, his tendency always was to retreat back into the security of his infancy, and to the protection of his mother. This security became largely symbolized for him by the mother Church, leading to his retreat into a monastery and his reliance on religious rules and meaningless rituals. Always the drive to become a creative and mature man was in conflict with his tendency to retreat into infantile security. The realization came to him, in the depth of his depression, and near mental illness that faith in Jesus Christ was the way to union with the Father, which is the symbol for maturity. To break away from his infantile dependence on the mother image, and to find an adult manly relationship with the whole world and with God the Father through faith in Jesus Christ was Luther's great achievement.

     Luther wrote about this discovery in relation to the Creed. The second paragraph of the Creed speaks of the revelation of Jesus Christ. Luther referred to the phrase, which says "Born of the Virgin Mary," as representing infancy. The struggle to break free from infantile dependence is expressed by the way of the cross. We must experience the purgative power of the cross with our Lord in order to experience the Resurrection. The creedal paragraph ends with "sitteth on the right hand of the Father" representing maturity and fulfillment. The Creed describes the spiritual pilgrimage we all must pass through in order to leave our childhood fears and fantasies and come to a point where we can be reconciled with our Father.

     This is fulfillment. This is adulthood. Life is a dangerous, perilous pilgrimage and we need help as we pass this way. We need guidance. We need forgiveness. We all need on occasion to be encouraged. The only power by which we can do this is through the power of Jesus Christ who walked this road and who is the way, the truth and the life. The Christian ministry reminds us over and over again that Christ's Spirit is always present and the He will help us.

     The clergy also administer the words of forgiveness from Christ. Sin is really a denial of maturity. It is a terrible irony in the English language to refer to pornographic films as "adult". They are just the opposite. Sin involves gross fantasies of the nursery entrapping people in an infantile emotional and mental condition, which prevents them from becoming mature. Maturity is a wholesome relationship with all of life, with men and women, with nature and with God. What Christ's words say to us through the sacred ministry is, "You are forgiven. Go on to a better and stronger life."

     The ministry is set apart and ordained to be the stewards of the initiating mysteries of God leading all of us into maturity. This is a high and holy profession. If you have never done so, I think every Episcopalian should read the pastoral charge to the new Priest in the Ordination Service in the back of the traditional prayer book. It describes this pastoral, healing, ministering, guiding role of the priest of God who stands as a means to help bring the boy, or the girl, or the man, or the woman to a higher and deeper and more mature adulthood. This involves our coming closer and closer to God, which is expressed, as Luther pointed out, in the symbolism of being at God's right hand. The goal is to become a healthy, strong person, rather than a lost soul wandering around like an overgrown infant in the sloughs of despond and the swamps of despair in this life. The priest always must realize that he is only a representative person. He has no power of himself. As St. Paul says, "We are fools for Christ sake." It is Jesus Christ alone who has the power to save us.

     I will never forget an experience that occurred years ago when I was asked to hold a service one evening at Fort Ord. The chaplain became ill. He called me and said there was a special service at 5 o'clock and would I take it for him? There was a great crowd of young draftees in the Chapel, and at the conclusion of the service as I was just about to leave I noticed one young man sitting there all alone. I went up to him and began to talk to him. I found him in a state of shock and anxiety. The new experience of leaving his comfortable home in the Midwest and of moving into an environment of disruption and difficulty was too much for him. He was at the point, he finally told me, of running away, of going AWOL, as many of them do. In talking to him I found out that he had gone to a small Midwestern college, and by God's grace, one of our own clergy here on the Peninsula had graduated from that college. I said, "Don't do anything now. Just wait another day. I want to talk to you again."

     I called this priest and we went out the next day to see the young draftee, and to become further acquainted with him. We invited him off the base and included him in some social activities. We helped him decide to stay and to tough it out. It was difficult for him, but he did it. He made it. He finished his training and did his military service overseas.

     One day a beautiful carved German crucifix arrived in the mail for St. Matthias Church in Seaside. He had sent it back as a thank offering to God for what had happened to him. Christ had helped him to become a man. As simple as that. I do not remember his name nor do I know where he is now. A spiritual influence passed to him and by the power of Christ he was able to break through his fear and his weakness and to reach a deeper level of commitment and strength.

     It is unfortunate when some clergy do not understand this pastoral role. It is too bad when some of our lay people try to make something else out of the ministry by turning their priest into a sacramental technician or some kind of a glorified social worker in one way or another. The clergyman has to be all things to everyone. He has to know a little bit about everything. He has to be able to communicate with all of the different individuals who come into his presence who are seeking to become spiritually mature adults.

     One of the most beautiful descriptions of this pastoral role of the ministry comes out of the Eighteenth Century. Oliver Goldsmith in the "Deserted Village" wrote about the parish priest, the parson, "At church, with meek and unaffected grace, his looks adorned the venerable place; truth from his lips prevailed with double sway and fools who came to scoff remained to pray." The poet spoke of the priest's healing influence with the youth and the children of the parish.

The service passed, around the pious man,
With steady zeal, each honest rustic ran.
Even children followed, with endearing wile,
And plucked his gown to share the good man's smile.
His ready smile a parent's warmth expressed;
Their welfare pleased him and their cares distressed;
To them his heart, his love, his grief were given;
But all his serious thoughts had rest in heaven.

     The people coming to him with wrongs and sins and weaknesses found Christ's forgiving grace. "Careless their merits or their faults to scan, His pity gave ere charity began. Thus to relieve the wretched was his pride, And even his failings leaned to virtue's side." Finally, when the perils of sickness and death surround them, they are assured that Christ is there with His healing power. "Beside the bed where parting life was laid, and sorrow, guilt and pain by turns dismayed, the Reverend Champion stood: at his control, despair and anguish fled the struggling soul."

     This is a perfect description of the pastoral work of the priesthood. To be able to represent for little children, for the youth, for adults and older people the healing, saving grace of God is truly a high calling. Perhaps, someone today in this congregation hears that call. Perhaps, God is calling you to be a steward of the mysteries of God. May you be moved to say, as Isaiah did so many centuries ago, "Here am I Lord, send me."