HELLO!

If you missed our All Saints Sunday service, here is the link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hiDRffTTK1Y

Did you know Jacques Plante was the first goalie in professional hockey to wear a mask on November 1^st 1959? I thought of this as 20 young people knocked on our door last night, in masks, saying “trick or treat”. I also include this photo of Richard and Ian from our church, in their “masks”.

Even if you have never worn a goalie mask, or dressed up for Halloween in recent years, most of us wear psychological masks, often in response to realities we would like to forget or shield from others. These are behaviours we adopt seeking security and stability, trying to avoid hurt. Common masks are being the clown, the bully, or the people-pleaser. But these behaviors can prevent us from authentic relationships where we are known and loved for our true selves. Psychological masks may protect us, but they also prevent us from being vulnerable in a good way, the way necessary for wholehearted living, loving, trusting ourselves and others.

I also know circumstances where a mask helps us lean into something new, helps us explore parts of ourselves we push down or away. Masks can allow us to connect with the sacred, to explore parts of ourselves that otherwise remain hidden. Masks can help us celebrate and cut loose.

A faith community helps us learn and grow in all ways, mentally, physically, emotionally, and spiritually—mind, hands, heart and spirit. At its best, a faith community offers a place where we can try on identities, seeking to know ourselves more deeply, learning to share our true selves. When we hold space for each other to learn and grow, to accept each other for who we are—not despite who we are, but because of who we are—we build the beloved community. A faith community is also where we can come together to identify and remove masks that are imposed by bias, masks that are oppressive, like racism and transphobia. This is our work for justice, action grounded in our values and beliefs, putting our faith in action, working to make the world a better place for all people

Author James Baldwin also had something to say about masks. Baldwin, a black gay man, born in Harlem, NY in 1924. Baldwin, who emigrated to France in the 1940’s to escape the bigotry and racism of the US, and where he died in 1987 at age 63. Baldwin, who wrote The Fire Next Time. In that book, Baldwin wrote: “Love takes off masks that we fear we cannot live without and know we cannot live within.” It comes back to love. Matthew 22:37-39 “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the greatest and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbour as yourself.” There is a love that holds us all, a love that is there when we seek it. Our work is to keep on until we find it, together.

Peace, Kevin