Worth the Struggle

Let's make the sermon into a conversation

2007-12-16T06:54:00.000-06:00

I really appreciate the comments shared by Jessica, Jen and Tom on the lectionary passages for today's service. They helped a lot as I thought about today's sermon. Given more time and the chance to preach three different sermons, I could have made better use of them!

Whenever I hear a sermon, I often think of things I'd like to say to or ask of the preacher. Ever feel that way? Here's your chance. This is an invitation to anyone who attended the service on Sunday to comment on the scripture readings and the sermon. Also, feel free to comment or ask questions about the liturgy, as well.

(Of course, speaking to me in person or by phone is fine, too, but in this forum, everyone can participate together.)

And you don't need to agree with everything. Challenge is good. So are illustrations from your own experience or reflections. Readers may get more out of your examples than they did from my preaching.

Link here if you'd like to read the sermon text: Hope and Transformation

With Advent hope and expectation,

Arlie

Mourning the death of Anthony: God Save Us from Some of Those “Well-intentioned Religious Believers”

2007-12-13T11:42:00.000-06:00

I want to share a column with you written by Dr. Susan B. Thistlethwaite, President of Chicago Theological Seminary.

The column was originally written for the "On Faith" feature of the online version of the Washington Post. (By the way, "On Faith" is an unusual example of a much-needed venue for intelligent and respectful conversation among religious thinkers of all faiths on today's crucial issues: Washington Post: On Faith.

Susan re-published her column at Wide Open Thinking, the CTS Blog, where access is a bit easier.

Anthony Hollins and I were classmates, and I learned a lot from him because he was not afraid to tell it like he saw it. Because of the world we live in, he saw things that would have been forever invisible to me.

Advent, preaching, and finding something new to say...HELP!

2007-12-11T18:27:00.000-06:00

I'm preaching again this Sunday. And I'm wrestling with the lectionary scriptures this week. Wanna get in on the wrestling?

It would be particularly pleasing to know what folks in the Broadway congregation would care to contribute. What would we want to say just now if we were to follow Jesus' advice to "Go and tell John what you hear and see!" Of course, there's Bible study Wednesday evening during which we'll consider these same passages. All are welcome to come join in the conversation then, as well. Come for the Advent reflection "Blue Christmas" at 6 and stay for the potluck and study from 6:30 until about 8:15. Broadway United Methodist Church

The full text of all lectionary readings in New Revised Standard Version is available at
Lectionary Readings for third Sunday in Advent

Isaiah 35:1-10 Isaiah speaks to an exiled and defeated Israel proclaiming a hoped for future where all is transformed into abundance and justice and the way will be wide and inclusive for all God's people. There are repeated images of water in the desert causing new life to spring up from bone-dry ground.
Matthew 11:2-11 John the Baptist is in jail. He sends his followers to ask Jesus, "Are you the one?" Jesus answers, "Go and tell John what you hear and see!" and names all the ways that he is turning things upside down, all to the good of the most vulnerable and marginalized. Then he talks about John and asks whether people are ready to hear from such a wild, uncouth person or whether they expected someone in "soft robes."

What do these passages bring to mind for you in personal, congregational or public life just now?

Good thing it's Advent, because I'm waiting and expecting. Short and sweet is as good as long and complex. Concrete examples are good, too. But don't be surprised if your ideas are referenced in Sunday's sermon!

Arlie

Advent: Why LGB needs T

2007-12-04T19:36:00.000-06:00

In November, the U.S. House of Representatives passed the Employment Nondiscrimination Act (ENDA). If it passes the Senate and becomes law, it will protect employment rights of lesbians, gay men and bisexual persons. Though the bill originally included transgender persons, that language was stripped from the bill because supporters in the House felt it would not pass with the gender identity inclusive language intact. Representative Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin fought to the end to keep the bill inclusive; Human rights Campaign (HRC) said it would not support the less-inclusive bill, but it did not actively oppose the new version of the bill, either.

ENDA is a promising development and, in a way, a monumental step forward. For all of us, the possibility of having workplaces that don't discriminate based on sexual orientation means more openness, more honesty and less fear. Many more people will be able to do their work free of the fear that they may lose their jobs if someone finds out they are gay. Individuals will have some protection against discrimination in hiring.

But for our transgender sisters and brothers, the passage of this less inclusive version of ENDA must feel like being left behind. The door to the party has been slammed in their face before the party even got started. Jamison Green and Donna Rose, two transgender members of the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) Business Council, resigned in protest, saying they cannot continue working with HRC, citing the organization's "apparent lack of commitment to healing the breach it has caused." (see Two Transgender HRC Members Quit over ENDA) HRC, on the other hand, argues that this was a politically necessary compromise and that passage of ENDA, even without the gender identity protections, will move us closer than defeat would have to full inclusion in the long run.

It's interesting that this disappointment is being felt so acutely now, during the season Christians celebrate as Advent. Advent is a time when we remember how God breaks into our world and brings the unexpected, the transformative. The nativity of Jesus, as told in Luke, describes the birth of a baby that seems to be nothing but a poor child living under the occupation of the Roman empire, experiencing the mess of birth in a really inconvenient place and situation. But in some mysterious way, the writers proclaim, this child is breaking into the world, into normality, and bringing something new and radical. The gospel stories that describe Jesus' life and teaching portray him as always on the side of the outsider, extending a radical welcome to those who made other people uncomfortable. He welcomed all and he did not hesitate to challenge the oppressive systems that had seemed ordinary in a brutal world. What the followers of Jesus discovered was a powerful, creative and transforming reality brought about when Jesus kept opening doors, broadening boundaries, making room at the table and building communities that could live free even in the face of the brutality.

We could spend a lot of time discussing the vulnerability of the trans community. In our mainstream culture, there are few allies for this group of God's children. While it's hard enough being, say, a gay man, there are layers and layers of privilege that separate my experience from that of my transgender sisters and brothers. But it's also true that the workplaces will be the poorer. I don't mean to exoticize transgender persons. Transgender individuals are who they are, from odd to ordinary, like the rest of us. But each time I meet a trans person, my life is enriched through a new connection to someone without whom I would know less about the reality of the richness of God's world.

For the transgender community and their supporters, it is a time to cry and rage and critique. This is a wrong-headed and mean-spirited act of exclusion, a door slammed in the face of people who should be invited in. And workplaces will be less diverse than they could be, less authentic, less rich, less expressive of the true diversity of God's people.

Is there anything of the Advent experience in this? Perhaps not, since Advent will bring us the gifts of the very outsiders that would help us correct our myopic and limited vision. (Remember the Kings from the East?)

Masen Davis, Executive Director of the Transgender Law Center, believes that the unprecedented solidarity of organizations that joined forces in a strong effort to keep gender identity in the ENDA House Bill will not be wasted. Though the end result was disappointing, Davis believes that the critique that will now follow, the solidarity that was built throughout that fight, and the educational efforts that were made will eventually make a difference as people keep working, speaking out, and strategizing. Masen Davis on ENDA
and
Transgender Law Center Disappointed by ENDA Passage

And Advent is like that, too. Always opening a door where another has been shut. Always calling us to look to the future, hoping, working, building the radically inclusive kin-dom of God, a God who is too big and too holy to be limited by the lines we humans draw so insistently between the genders.

See Trans-cendental, the Website of my seminary classmate, Cindi Knox

Advent: Seeing beyond the big screen gospel

2007-12-02T17:33:00.000-06:00

This week I was required to view The Passion of the Christ, Mel Gibson's aggressive poke in the face of progressive, peace-oriented Christian theology. Until then, I had avoided it. I don't do well with graphic movie violence. Few of my friends agree with me, but I find something morally numbing about watching people blown to bits and torn apart on a movie screen. Anyway, I'll concede that Jesus' death as described in the scriptures was violent. But Mel and I don't see eye-to-eye about the meaning of that violence. I don't believe violence is redemptive and I still get chills up my spine when I remember the night I heard George W. Bush using the words "washed in the blood" in a speech that hinted at the eventual attacks on Afghanistan and Iraq.

Gibson claimed that he was simply portraying what was written by the gospel writers. (Really? The gospel writers described a feminized version of Satan wondering among the Jewish leaders as they heartlessly witnessed Jesus being butchered? And the Bible tells of Mary repeatedly looking out at the crowd, as if to remind us that we were responsible for this bloody outrage?) Come on, Mel. Editorializing about the gospel happens all the time. It's called preaching (or teaching). But if you're going to do it on the big screen and make millions of dollars at it, you owe people something more than a claim that you're simply illustrating the Bible without a point of view.

It's important to be able to claim our theology—and perhaps our Christology in particular--and see clearly what it will say to and for us. Scriptural interpretation and theology are not neutral. We bring our baggage and we bring the baggage of centuries of argument. The arguments were always won by someone and the argument losers often lost their lives. (And lots of people, like women, were rarely if ever invited into the arguments in the first place.) Today, we don't get executed for teaching heresy, but the point is that theological disagreement is nothing new and marginalization of the views of the less privileged is not new, either. Progressive Christians must not apologize for the fact that we may come up with a different argument and/or outcome than did the theologians of past centuries (even the twentieth). It may be that the time has come when our global context and our intimate community life reveal to us that we can no longer afford to hold onto a belief in an angry God whose thirst for a blood sacrifice drives him to facilitate the murder and torture of his own Son so that he does not have to murder and torture all of the rest of us for breaking the law or for being tainted by original sin. I accept the potential criticism that I am oversimplifying the concept of substitutionary atonement. And, as a pastor I must say that I know and love many people for whom the idea holds a lot of meaning.

However, theological choices have consequences in our churches and in our culture. Perhaps no one knows that better than women, people of color and lgbtq folks. The title of this entry suggests that Advent invites us to expect and to seek that which may not be easy to see at first. In a response to my last blog entry, Phil remarked that the earliest versions of the meaning of the crucifixion and the resurrection arose out of the crucible of the experience of those first followers of Jesus. They had witnessed the torture and execution of their teacher, brother, rabbi, friend, the One who had changed their lives, the One whose transformative witness to God’s love and justice and liberation had inspired them to take great risks and to move into a fuller experience of life and of community. Now, given the new and devastating reality of the crucifixion, from where would their sense of meaning come? That struggle to understand has played itself out now for two millennia. The enduring nature of the struggle to get our minds and souls around that question indicates its vital importance for Christians.

We, in our current context, continue to witness and experience devastating violence which causes many of us to ask this same vital question: From where shall we derive our meaning now? For those of us still in church, back at church again, or discovereing church for the first time, we are constructing answers to that question or to equally gripping questions, whether we realize it or not.

What answer will we receive this Advent? How will our own understanding of the significance of Jesus change or become clarified this season?

Here is what the Advent Spirit has surprised me with over the past two and a half decades or so. And this year, as in all years past when I've been paying attention, something new will come to flesh out a bit of the story. I own this Christology and do not demand allegiance to it. Rather, I share it and invite others to tell of their own understandings:

The life of Jesus is what matters, not his death. His very incarnation as a human being is God’s proclamation that human beings are good and beloved of God. The incarnation does not bring God down to our level but, rather, pulls us up out of our mistaken notion that we are alone and that our lives are either meaningless, hopeless, or evil. The crucifixion was not God’s intention for the world. It was a result of an audacious life of love, justice, inclusion and liberation. The Empire could not tolerate this life, and some of the religious authorities were complicit with the Empire for all kinds of reasons. But the end of the story is not death. The end of the story is the resurrection of the body. This affirmation that the good that God creates, the life that God so loves in us, the love from which we cannot be separated will not be obliterated by death. Whether you believe in the resurrection as a literal one or as the way in which we embody Christ in community now as we work for the Reign of God, it proclaims first and foremost that we are loved by the God through whose creativity we came into being and through whose life we will be raised up from every death.

It's not that we're not broken. I do believe in sin. How could I witness endless war and abuse of women and children, and enduring racism, and heterosexist exclusion and hate crime and grinding poverty and the simultaneous exploitation and persecution of immigrant workers and the stingy refusal to secure quality health care for everyone, and NOT believe in sin? But perhaps it's the goodness that God knows is most basic in us because we are made in God's image, perhaps that is what brought the Christ into the mess of the world. God with us. A God who suffers with us . A God who desires to reconcile and heal, to liberate and transform, who comforts the oppressed and challenges the oppressor and still insists on relationship and community.

Advent points to a new reality, a reality that has come to us but, mysteriously, has not yet fully arrived. And so we keep the vision alive. Not through empty hope, but by our hopeful engagement with one another and with this world, a world that is good and, in many ways, quite ugly and badly broken. But it is God's world and, therefore, much loved. The incarnation of the Christ tells us that God is with us in the beauty and the ugliness, and that we--all of us--matter.

Waterboarding and Crucifixion

2007-11-12T17:23:00.000-06:00

Vague answers to questions about the legality of water boarding, an interrogation technique that has at least sometimes been viewed as illegal torture in the U.S. and had been prosecuted as a war crime after World War II, did not finally block senate approval of Michael B. Mukasey to the post of attorney general of the United States last week. After expressions of widespread concern over his noncommittal answers, he declared that he thought the practice "repugnant" but did not have the information to determine if the practice is illegal. (If a lawyer with his qualifications would not know, who would?) Water boarding has been called "simulated drowning," but I am inclined to agree with someone who recently declared that there is nothing simulated about it. Unlike drowning to death, this drowning is prolonged for as long as necessary to get the information or for as long as considered tolerable by the torturers, though it often leads to a confession--true or made-up--in a short amount of time. The lungs take in water and the victim has the terrifying experience of being unable to breathe anything but water, becoming unconscious and sometimes regaining consciousness. The appeal of waterboarding in a democratic society, apparently, is not that it is not torture, but that it does not leave traceable evidence like scars and broken bones as other forms of torture do. (See an article on the history of waterboarding at NPR.org: Waterboarding: A Tortured History.)

I've been struggling with the meaning of the crucifixion lately. I recently read a chapter of the compelling book, Proverb of Ashes: Violence, Redemptive Suffering, and the Search for What Saves Us by Rita Nakashima Brock and Rebecca Ann Parker. In the first chapter "Away from the Fire," Reverend Parker, a United Methodist pastor, describes how her experience counseling and pastoring with women and children who are victims of domestic violence has brought her to a place at which no redemptive meaning can be ascribed to the brutal violence of the crucifixion. (I'm betting she did not like Mel Gibson's telling of the story. Neither do I. Not because I don't believe Jesus' suffering was extreme, but because I believe Gibson's version of the crucifixion revels in blood and gore but is inexplicably removed from the ongoing experience of crucifixion among God's abused and tortured children. It also leans dangerously close to projecting blame onto a group of people who have suffered at the hands of Christians who have viewed them as "Christ-killers" time and again over nearly two millennia.)

Reverend Parker's conclusion about crucifixion is that the saving grace in the story of the gospel is not in an act of sacrificial violence. She does not even buy into the argument that I have found most comforting, that in that violent and painful death, God experienced the worst of the human experience and so is intimately present with us in our own worst suffering. For Parker, even this sanctifies violence rather than liberating from it. Rather than a sacrifice of son by father to meet a legal debt made necessary by original sin and rather than an image of how pain and suffering bond us with God, another way of understanding the heart of the gospel is in the way Jesus lived. His death was also a result of that way of living. Jesus may not have chosen to be an enemy of the Roman state for the sake of being an enemy, but by choosing to be radically obedient to the Reign of God. By living the way of peace in the shadow of a regime for which violence was an idol, Jesus at once offered hope to those who had lost hope and caused suspicion among those who would rather rule over the hopeless. By violating all kinds of societal restrictions that separated the sexes, the religious groups, the rich and the poor, the sick and the well, the "righteous" and the suspect, by at once honoring the religious law and at the same time recognizing that it was only valid so far as it affirmed human beings, by humanizing people whom the empire would rather keep dehumanized, Jesus put himself in harm's way. The occupying empire could not tolerate his subversive behavior and his popularity among those who responded with the whole of their beings to the affirming and liberating and saving message he taught and lived.

Waterboarding is a crucifixion and there is nothing redeeming about it. Torturers might get truth from someone by using it, but they are also likely to get lies, even self-incriminating lies, otherwise known as coerced confessions. The electric chair is a crucifixion, too. And so is detention of suspects without trials and without access to judicial review of their cases for months and years at a time. At various times, each of these has been found to be against what a strong secular, democratic society stands for. For me, they must always be unequivocally un-Christian. Reprehensible to a God who we claim is ultimately concerned with human good. And when we stand against crucifixions used in the name of our nation or our security or our freedom, we are not simply protecting the crucified. We are protecting ourselves from the distortion and violence the practice works on the perpetrators. Am I justifying terrorists, you ask? No. I'm arguing that if we become terrorists ourselves, claiming that the victims are too evil to be given the normal rights we give to the more "ordinary" criminals on the home front(even though many suspected "enemy combatants" who are detained and tortured for information have no damning evidence of their guilt), then we de-humanize ourselves. We profane the high vision of our highest national ideals. And we are "lost," unable to envision the Reign of the God of Jesus.

Tears for My Late Brother Tom on National Coming Out Day

2007-10-12T01:49:00.000-05:00

I'm ashamed that I forgot the double significance in my life of October 11. It's been a crazy week. Today was no exception. I left work at 9:15PM after working on my annual report and then hurried home to participate in the online course I'm taking and do some other homework, but on the train ride home I remembered: October 11, National Coming Out Day. There are a lot of memories that should remind me why this day is so special and so important: The sad, lonely feeling I had one Sunday when I was 12 when the young minister I adored said the word "queer" in a sermon; The day when I was sixteen and I lied to my father when he gently (for him) asked me if I struggled with "homosexual desires"; the sick-with-fear feeling I had the first night I went to a gay bar and dared to have a conversation with another man; the day a Methodist minister told me I needed to change my theology so that I could be myself; the exhileration of my first March on Washington; the knowing smile and warm hug shared with Cindy when I ran into her on a visit home (the now "all grown up" lesbian had been a childhood pal); the first time I really believed what the poet wrote in Psalm 139--I am fearfully and wonderfully made; the pride I felt while being driven off to jail along with my pastor, Greg Dell, and the United Methodist Bishop in Northern Illinois at the time and James M. Lawson, Jr., a civil rights preacher and activist who worked with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. back in the day. (We were being taken off to jail for participating in a protest against anti-gay denominational policies at the General Conference of the United Methodist Church.) But most importantly, I remember my brother Tom, whose birthday is October 11, National Coming Out Day.

When I am tempted to get smug and tell myself that the days of fear and self-loathing and oppression are over for gay people, I remember the day, when he was 43 and I was 36, that my brother Tom whispered these words to me on the phone: "I'm tired of hiding. You're the first person I've ever told." The sound was like air spewing out of an overinflated tire. I can't imagine the pressure that had built up over the decades that he kept that secret. I had been out to him for thirteen years and to the rest of my family for over six. But he had been married, raised two daughters, worked like a dog, and then gotten quite sick in his late thirties of kidney disease and other complications from diabetes. After that painful but freeing phone conversation, Tom came out to everyone he knew in his small southern Illinois town and elsewhere: our parents, his ex-wife, his daughters, his best friend (a straight guy), the women that he'd dated since his wife left him...everyone. He even managed, in spite of some pretty daunting health problems, to date a man or two. And then, six months later, he died suddenly of a heart attack as he was getting dressed to meet my father for a visit to the family farm. He made it out of that damned closet, if just barely. But what if things had been different for him? What was there about his life, the culture, the church--possibly even my own lingering shame--that could have kept him in that closet for so long?

It's easier for some of us, in some places, in some circumstances. But there's still an awful lot of lies and condemnation out there. Like, for example, in the United Methodist Church Book of Discipline and other rule books of major denominations, with precious few exceptions.

Please, if you are celebrating Coming Out Week or Month and I am therefore not too late, raise a glass or have a dance or kiss that precious person you've found the courage to love, and remember my brother Tom, whose birthday ended about 90 minutes ago, and whose only gay brother forgot.

I love you and miss you, Tom. Peace to you, my out and proud brother, and may you rest in the arms of God who always knew that you were wonderfually and fearfully made, even if it took you a long, long time to figure it out for yourself.

Readers, do you have coming out stories to share?

Kill, Kill, Kill Evangelism

2007-10-09T21:39:00.000-05:00

The New York Times last Sunday ran a story entitled: Though Shall Not Kill, Except in a Violent Video Game at Church.
According to the story, scores of church youth directors all across the U.S. are offering access to the video game Halo3 as a way of attracting youth, particualarly boys, to church youth group meetings. One youth minister defended the use of the games to parents concerned about the game's M (Mature) rating: “We want to make it hard for teenagers to go to hell.” So, first, teenagers get their adrenalin pumping by symbolically destroying "the enemy" using weapons the likes of which you wouldn't even see in Iraq. Then, at some point in the evening, the games are turned off and the attention of the youth is directed toward the message of "salvation." Apparently, even the ultra-conservative and cruelly anti-gay organizationFocus on the Family can't make up its mind on whether or not this new evangelism tool is okay. (All that's missing to speed up their decision on this one is an out and proud gay warrior character.)

According to the story, the Southern Baptist denomination has encouraged 50,000 young people on their email lists to consider the potential the game offers for "discussing good and evil." So, what's the message? First, identify the evil ones and then blow their brains out, annihilating them with devastating fire power?

I really need help here. I'm not a parent. I'm odd. (Hey, I'm in seminary.) I probably don't seem especially with it to anyone under, um, 40. (The fact that I just used the term "with it" probably illustrates my point.) And I don't claim to have any expertise on the behavioral effects of popular and highly realistic video games. But if all we're offering to young people is what Microsoft agressively markets to them already, plus some propoganda about "getting saved," then why bother? What are we saying, implicitly, about the message of peace that is essential to the gospel? What are we saying about religious tolerance and understanding? What are we saying about what matters in life? About relationships? How are we being culturally critical in the way that Jesus was when he preached the message that loving one's neighbor is the only way to please God or the way the prophets constantly challenged the system by instisting that God demands social and economic justice? How can we help young people recognize that "evil" is not simply something external to ourselves and our own institutions--or nations--that can be clearly identified and wiped out through violence? Where is religious education on conflict resolution?

I risk sounding like a prude, but I did have to laugh at the comment of James Tonkowich, president of the Institute on Religion and Democracy: “If you want to connect with young teenage boys and drag them into church, free alcohol and pornographic movies would do it.” Seriously, though, I'm not convinced that young people are going to be corrupted for life by Halo3 or any other video game, necessarily. Given a rich range of educational, developmental and spiritual experience and healthy mentoring relationships with caring adults, perhaps most kids can maintain a pretty healthy perspective on games as purely entertainment.

But my experience of what was life-giving, sometimes, at church was that it was NOT identical with the surrounding culture. It challenged me to see the world differently and it offered something alternative to what the dominant culture offered, something that wasn't just fun and that wasn't just about avoiding eternal punishment. It was instead about that which mattered most deeply, not just for me personally, but for the world that God loves.

What do you think?

Road Rage, War and Perishing by the Sword

2007-10-07T14:26:00.001-05:00

I have a confession. I made a fool of myself on Michigan Avenue recently. I was driving along, trying to get from the office to a class I was taking. I was late and uptight and then, I was cut off by a driver who swerved into my lane with no warning. (Yes, I should have taken public transportation.) Anyway, I laid on the horn, actually sped up hoping to gain back my rightful place in the traffic queue, and ended up yelling at the driver, cursing even. I was surprised by how angry I was, by how easily the vile words came out of my mouth. Perhaps I was finding a release for a lot of pent up stress. I did have a lot on my mind. But my behavior was not only immature, uncivil and insulting, it was dangerous. By speeding up, trying to regain my position, surrendering to my rage, and evoking rage in the other driver, I come close to causing a serious accident. Why didn’t I just let up on the accelerator, take a deep breath, and try to keep myself and everyone else safe? I can tell myself, “Don’t worry about it. Everyone is affected by road rage,” but that’s not good enough. Choosing to behave in such a way, even for a few brief seconds, could have been costly. In fact, I think it was costly, especially after seeing the angry, scared face of the person I had called this name and the passenger trying to persuade the driver to watch the road ahead instead of yelling back at me. I honestly felt like less of a human being once I thought about my behavior and what it led to in those few short seconds.

Believe it or not, it made me think of how we got ourselves into the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. I know it’s a leap, but remember the early days, the first months and then years after 9/11 when the fear and rage and righteous indignation we felt were so easily exploited to persuade us to take action? We wanted to strike out at something, no matter how weak the connection between this act of violence and our safety. Many of us, in spite of our fear and anger, were able to stand back, take a breath, and think reasonably, but our administration insisted on fanning the flame of rage. We took action without taking time to use our heads, without allowing our hearts to stop pounding, without having a thoughtful strategy that considered honestly the greater good. We wanted revenge, but we did not want to think about the blood price that the innocent would be forced to pay, both our own and the innocent of those foreign lands. In fact, we still don’t want to think about it. When was the last time you heard an honest report on the number of dead Iraqi’s since the U.S. first invaded that country?

But we’re citizens of a democratic country. And just like the licensed driver has a responsibility to drive safely IN SPITE OF her feelings at any given moment, we had a responsibility to insist that our lawmakers and the administration use restraint, reason, and statesman-like behavior, not fear and rage and “our bombs are SO much better than your bullets” rationale. Remember “bloodless war?” Remember “shock and awe?” I remember how it felt to scream, “You A******!” to the other driver. This driver would absorb my rage, even though the rage I was feeling had little to do with him. And for one second, it felt so good to put that rage somewhere. And maybe I was imagining my own bloodless act of violence, even if small and, I told myself, inconsequential.

“Then said Jesus unto him, “Put up again thy sword into its place: for all they that take the sword shall perish with the sword.” Matthew 26:52

For a fabulous essay on Christian nonviolence, see Walter Wink on Christian non-violence.

Hang in there, Randy! (Discouragement over the stuggle for LGBTQ rights in the Anglican Church)

2007-09-29T16:55:00.000-05:00

Earlier this week, a dear friend of mine emailed me. He was upset because his denomination, the Episcopal Church, which is the American wing of the world-wide Anglican communion, appeared to be backtracking on their progressive stance in support of gay clergy and the blessings of same-sex weddings. As many of you will know, the Episcopal Church consecrated Gene Robinson, an openly gay man and a fine priest, as an Episcopal bishop in 2003. This action, one that I thought at the time to be simply doing publicly what had been done in the Episcopal Church more quietly for many, many years, caused a great outcry from the extreme conservative wing of the Episcopal denomination. So much so that there has been talk of a schism. Very conservative churches in the United States have threatened to break off and follow Anglican bishops in African churches. Keep up with the story at www.episcopalchurch.org

Randy did not grow up in the Episcopal Church. He found it as an adult. Having come from a fundamentalist religious upbringing, he found in his new denomination an intelligent, progressive and inclusive understanding of the gospel, and a community diverse enough and welcoming enough to make him feel not just tolerated, but truly included in the community of faith. Now, he wonders if this Church will be brave enough and capable enough to maintain that openness in the face of tremendous pressure. He fears that this extended family of faith where he had felt at home may not be the safe haven it had seemed to be.

Now I’m a United Methodist. Without going into a long conversation about what that means, our denomination-wide conversation came out on the other, more conservative side of that debate, which is galling for many like me who delight in the social justice heritage of the denomination. Personally, I have found overwhelming acceptance and inclusion in the churches I’ve been a part of for the past 25 years on university campuses and now, in my urban congregation. In fact, it was at the UMC student foundation at the University of Illinois in 1985 where I was supported by compassionate clergy as I made my first steps out of the closet. One of the most special people in the world to me is the man who was my pastor for over 10 years, Rev. Greg Dell, who underwent a church trial and endured a suspension from ministry because he refused to stop blessing the committed relationships of same-gender couples.

So Tony and I commiserated. And here’s what I think I’ll tell him:

1) Pray. Not because you are deluded and think that prayer will magically transform the state of your denomination in the short term, but because prayer will direct your grief and your waning hope to the God who made you and loves you and to whom you ultimately answer. Prayer will also connect you to all those other outcasts and marginalized folks who dare to seek support and comfort and challenge and life from a liberating community of faith and a loving God.
2) Get involved. The truth is, there are few places to run to. There is no perfect church to be a part of on this issue. Why not stay in your denomination and get connected to those organizations within your church that are working to change the way things are? For all of us, this depends on finding a congregation that can accept and include us. I don’t believe one should remain faithful to a denomination only to be abused and insulted, but if you’ve found a good church home, don’t leave until you have to. (For the record, the two most open Christian denominations for LGBTQ people are the Metropolitan Community Church and the United Church of Christ.)
3) Stay and make noise. Be yourself. Be loud. Be yourself with the person you love. Talk about your identity and your family just as others do. Your church needs you to be present and to be noisy, because it’s just too easy for the heterosexist world—especially the church--to forget you exist or to assume that your silence equals your shame. Like the woman who pushed into the Pharisee’s house to wash Jesus’ feet, bring the gifts you have, don’t let anyone bar the door, and, when you get the chance, share your gifts extravagantly, just as she did. Jesus did not push her away or shame her. And who else should get the last word in this church that is supposed to be populated by his disciples? [See my sermon on this at http://dognamedboo.tripod.com/extravagentgifts.html

A Congregation Stretches, Daring to Imagine La Comunidad Verdadera

2007-09-23T21:06:00.000-05:00

Today, I had the rare experience of worshipping in a language other than my own. In honor of Hispanic Heritage Month, Broadway United Methodist Church in the Lakeview neighborhood of Chicago worshipped almost entirely in Spanish during the 11:00AM worship service. Now many Roman Catholics and other people of faith--including many United Methodist congregations in Chicago--will be unimpressed by this since regular services in Spanish and other languages are natural--even essential--responses to their demographic context. But in our case, this experience was a stretch. In recent years, however, in addition to our openly celebrated diversity in terms of sexual orientation, we have made conscious efforts to recognize, nurture and celebrate other kinds of diversity in our midst. Fortunately our congregation has been blessed with participation by more and more people of color. This growing diversity in our church is a joy, but also a struggle as we attempt to move beyond our apparent comfort with diversity to the harder reality of being truly, profoundly, radically inclusive. We are beginning to examine issues that are raised by diversity--issues like privilege, power, visibility and voice. The folks who planned today's service worked to demonstrate their passion for true community; they care deeply about our struggle to grow in true diversity, the diversity we believe the God of Jesus created and continues to create. So this morning we sang and prayed and preached and then sang some more in the beautiful language called Español. Some of us listened as best we could and then read the English translation where it was available; others of us, students of Spanish as a second language, enjoyed varying degrees of comprehension of and satisfaction with our grasp of this language we will wrestle with all our lives; and then there were those who, after the service, spoke with such heartfelt joy of experiencing their mother tongue as the main medium of communication in a sacred worship service in the place they have come to know as a spiritual home, the place where they come together with people they care about each week to worship God and support one another in love. It often impresses me how an action like this one, a simple symbolic act, can be a kind of incarnation, a way of putting flesh on the bone of our aspirations. Suddenly we catch a brief and imperfect but rather vivid glimpse of what true community might look like. Not comfortable for everyone all the time. Not always familiar and re-assuring. But engaged, sometimes beyond our comfort zones, in the working and singing and praying to be more the kind of community God wishes for us to be. How did a world, so obviously and richly diverse, ever get confused by calls to so-called "purity" and homogeneity, to separation and discrimination? I am convinced, not just rationally, but experientially, that when Jesus prayed, "that they may all be one..." he understood, profoundly, that unity needs, even requires, the inclusive diversity evident in God's beloved creation and in the skin tones, cultures and, yes, languages of God's good world.

Click here for a look at Broadway's Servicio en Español.

God's hospitality, American ideals, and the INS

2007-09-12T16:57:00.000-05:00

A few thoughts on immigration:
From the Bible:
Exodus 22:21, You shall not wrong or oppress a resident alien, for you were aliens in the land of Egypt.
Leviticus 19:34, The alien who resides among you shall be to you as the citizen among you; you shall love the alien as yourself, for you were aliens in the land of Egypt; I am the Lord your God.
From the inscription inside the base of the Statue of Liberty:
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.
"Keep ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she
With silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"
("The New Colossus" by Emma Lazarus, a descendant of Portuguese Sephardic Jewish immigrants)

In response to the higher law of God and in support of the highest ideals of our country, faithful believers in the U.S. must not support harsh, aggressive and abusive treatment of undocumented immigrants who are here to work, provide for their families, support their relatives and communities back home, and support our economy through their labor and consumption. We also must do more than just let things be. Rather than building walls, arresting people, breaking up families and raiding workplaces where people are doing their best to make a humble living, why not find a way to facilitate--in an above-board manner--the way our economy--currently through underground means--incorporates undocumented foreign labor. It is the least we can do for the good of the poor who have long lived just beyond our borders gazing across--often via the telescope of television--at our affluent lives. They have been mostly ignored by us in their mother countries except as characters in our travel photos or servants for our winter vacations. For our own good, if we want to remain the kind of country that has found many ways over the past couple of centuries to put meat on the bones of some of our highest ideals, we must find humane ways to reach out and deal with our immigrant brothers and sisters respectfully as human beings and children of God, not as menacing, criminal scapegoats.

Just as the Hebrew people were commanded not to forget their alien status in the land of Egypt, U.S. Citizens, particularly those who claim to be part of a faith tradition that uses the scripture as a locus of authority, would do well to remember that the vast majority of us are descendants of immigrants ourselves.

Be sure to check out this great Op-Ed piece in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer by Anthony P. Robinson, author and UCC Pastor: Bible Has Lots to Say on Immigration

The United Methodist Church General Board of Church and Society on Immigration:
"We pledge ourselves as followers of Christ to stand with our immigrant neighbors who have come to the United States from throughout the world. We recognize immigrants as human beings made in the image of God and we prayerfully commit ourselves to support laws that affirm their dignity, preserve their families, and acknowledge the value of their presence among us." Responding With Faith on Immigration

For more on the Statue of Liberty and "The New Colossus" see the National Park Service site: http://www.nps.gov/stli/

Troubling texts and discipleship

2007-09-08T00:00:00.000-05:00

Can you struggle with me to understand this text and its relevance for contemporary people of faith?

[Read the sermon that resulted from our struggle with this text at: Hard Words of Hope ]

Luke 14:25-33
Now large crowds were traveling with him; and he turned and said to them, "Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself, cannot be my disciple. Whoever does not carry the cross and follow me cannot be my disciple. For which of you, intending to build a tower, does not first sit down and estimate the cost, to see whether he has enough to complete it? Otherwise, when he has laid a foundation and is not able to finish, all who see it will begin to ridicule him, saying, 'This fellow began to build and was not able to finish.' Or what king, going out to wage war against another king, will not sit down first and consider whether he is able with ten thousand to oppose the one who comes against him with twenty thousand? If he cannot, then, while the other is still far away, he sends a delegation and asks for the terms of peace. So therefore, none of you can become my disciple if you do not give up all your possessions.

This is a troubling text, and I, a liberal, middle-aged, middle class, gay, white man in seminary, have to preach on it on Sunday. What do YOU think it means for us? Was the meaning only useful in the context of the early church, in which people lived in voluntary poverty and shared all their possessions? Or is there a more contemporary relevance for us? At a recent Bible study at my church the answers ranged widely from "It means just what it says, at least the 'give up all your possessions' part. You can't be a disciple and have wealth" to "By comparison to our love of God we must 'hate" family, possessions, our own lives" to "The word 'hate' is used as hyperbole, we simply have to keep our priorities clear." One person commented that Americans, in particular, need to take this call to poverty seriously because we have about 5% of the world's population, use about 50% of the world's goods, including food, and that there are around 840,000 million malnourished people in the world according to the organization CARE http://www.care.org/campaigns/world-hunger/facts.asp . (My original number of 250,000 was wrong by over 300%.)

So what do you think?

And if you're really into it, compare it with a passage in Matthew that probably came from the same source material: Matthew 10: 34-39.

Check out how I finally dealt with this passage in my sermon at http://dognamedboo.tripod.com/sermonhardwordsofhope.html .

Multiple lenses and struggling with meaning

2007-09-07T23:04:00.000-05:00

A basic assumption of this blog is that diverse points of view are necessary to a richer understanding of issues. By "point of view" I don't mean conservative vs. liberal (I'm a progressive, no apologies) but that women and men must be involved in the conversation, and transgendered persons when available; lgbt and queer people must be included; people of color must be included as well as white people; poor as well as affluent folks; immigrants and international voices; the differently abled, etc. In any given discussion, of course, there will be some limits to the variety of voices, but the assumption here is that "normal" is a myth, and that only by hearing the voice of the "other" do we begin to understand our own biases and unearned privileges. And since this blog will, at least partly, consider scriptural considerations (Hebrew and Christian scriptures, in this case), it's helpful to remember that the scriptures themselves contain, both explicitly and in the silences, a variety of voices with different interests, concerns and religious themes, not to mention literary genres and styles.

Another assumption is that struggling with ideas is good, especially in the case of religion, faith and public issues. I'm not so interested in struggling with "conservative" vs. "liberal" (see above) as I am with what we can get from scripture to help us find responsible positions on public issues, positions that bless the world and support us in our work for peace, health and social justice for all. Part of this struggle, of course, is in discerning the damaging cultural biases and negative human impulses that often appear in the scriptures themselves. But more importantly, how can we apply the overarching and central commandment to love of God and neighbor as not only the greatest commandment but, perhaps, the prescription for human survival?

Jacob once wrestled with an angel (or person, depending on the translation you read). He refused to let go until the angel (or person) blessed him. Then the angel asked his name, said his name, changed his name, and pulled his leg out of socket. Jacob left limping, but transformed and blessed. He had refused to let go when the struggle was so important.

I'd like to find transformation by struggling with this dangerous and powerful thing we call scripture and bringing our own experience in contemporary culture to the discussion. Will you join me?