Kierkegaard’s Ghost

(News that’s fake, but credible)

The Ghost’s newest commentator, Phucker Sharlitan, recently had the opportunity to interview Congressman George Santos. Mr. Santos was questioned extensively on his extraordinary record and responded with answers and information we here at the Ghost can verify absolutely with a low confidence level. 

Sharlitan: It’s a pleasure having the opportunity to interview you and give you an opportunity to respond to the scurrilous and inflammatory accusations made against you by the Democrat party and the lame stream media. And now we hear that you are under congressional investigation. How does it make you feel to have so much unjustified criticism coming your way?

Santos: I don’t let it get to me, Phucker. I always say that when they go low, I go high.

Sharlitan: A lot of people attribute that saying to Michelle Obama.

Santos: Yes, but she got it from me. I was the ghost writer for her books and speeches. I also wrote for Barack. Ever heard of Audacity of Hope? That was essentially my work.

Sharlitan: Wait! You worked for a Democrat?

Santos: You bet. Just goes to show that I can work in a bipartisan fashion. My experience goes far beyond my financial savvy. In the military, I fought side by side with people of every race, class and background.

Sharlitan: You were in the military?

Santos: Yes, I served with the United States Marines during the second world war. I fought in the battle of Iwo Jima. Ever seen that memorial at Arlington of the marines raising the American flag? I’m the third one in.

Sharlitan: You never mentioned that in your memoirs.

Santos: Well, if I tried to fit all of my accomplishments into one book, it would take several volumes. At some point, you have to leave room for a sequel. But my military record was known to Barack Obama. That’s why he called on me to lead the seal team that took out Osama Bin Laden. Taking him out with a single shot was one of the high points of my military career.

Sharlitan: I thought that was Robert O’Neill.

Santos: Well, Rob thinks he fired the kill shot and I never bothered to correct him. I mean, the guy’s got serious self esteem issues. He needed this more than I did. But since you bring it up, I feel I have to correct the record. You know, the truth is very important to me.

Sharlitan: Well, I must say it was mighty generous of you to keep that quiet for so long, George. It takes real humility to forego the glory that goes with taking down the most notorious terrorist of the century.

Santos: Humility is one of my finest attributes, Phucker.

Sharlitan: So of all your great accomplishments, which would you say is the one you are most proud of?

Santos: I have a lot of good work about which I am extremely proud. But the achievement that has given me the most satisfaction was my death on the cross for the salvation of the world.

Sharlitan: Jesus Christ! Was that you, too?

Santos: And they question my Jewish roots. Go figure.

Sharlitan: That was indeed a great accomplishment!

Santos: Yes, well, as I said when I first stepped out onto the surface of the moon, ‘One small step for man; one giant leap for mankind.’

Sharlitan:  Well, it has been a pleasure interviewing you, George.

Santos: Pleasure is all mine, Phucker. Thanks for giving me the chance to set the record straight.

**************************************************************

FAKE NEWS ALERT: The above article is satirical. The events it describes didn’t happen.  “There are people who will say that this whole account is a lie, but a thing isn’t necessarily a lie even if it didn’t necessarily happen.” John Steinbeck

THIRD SUNDAY IN LENT

Exodus 17:1-7

Psalm 95

Romans 5:1-11

John 4:5-42

Prayer of the Day: Merciful God, the fountain of living water, you quench our thirst and wash away our sin. Give us this water always. Bring us to drink from the well that flows with the beauty of your truth through Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.

“Jews do not share things in common with Samaritans.” John 4:9.

Disputes over how, where and by whom God is to be worshipped are as old as they are heated and bloody. The first murder recorded in the Bible grew out of a dispute about the right worship of God. See Genesis 4:1-16. That is what the Samaritan woman’s question is all about and it reflects animosity going back for almost one thousand years. Recall that the Israelite kingdom built up under the leadership of David split following the death of his son, Solomon. The Southern Kingdom of Judah continued to be ruled by descendants of David and worshipped in Jerusalem at the temple built by Solomon. The Northern Kingdom of Israel ultimately established its capital in Samaria and was under the control of several successive dynasties. In 722 B.C.E. the Northern Kingdom of Israel was invaded and destroyed by the Assyrians. Judah fell to the Babylonians more than a century later in 587 B.C.E.

Though many Israelites were displaced as a result of these conquests, a substantial number remained in the land. Among them was an ethnic group claiming descent from the Northern Israelite tribes of Ephraim and Manasseh as well as from the priestly tribe of Levi. These “Samaritans” had their own temple on Mount Gerizim. They believed this mountain, rather than Jerusalem’s Temple Mount, to be the location chosen by God for worship. When some of the exiles from Judah (now properly called “Jews”) returned from Babylon to Palestine in order to rebuild Jerusalem and the temple, they met with hostility and resistance from the Samaritans and other inhabitants of the land. Both Jews and Samaritans regarded themselves exclusively as the one true Israel. Thus, the very existence of each represented an existential threat to the other.  The depth of Jewish animosity toward Samaritans is reflected in at least one daily prayer used in some synagogues pleading for God to ensure that Samaritans not enter into eternal life. Ellis, E. Earle, The Gospel of Luke, The New Century Bible Commentary, (c. 1974 Marshall, Morgan & Scott) p. 151 citing Oesterley, W.O.E., The Gospel Parallels in the Light of their Jewish Background, New York, 1936, p. 162. Of course, the Samaritans were equally ill disposed toward Jews.

Nevertheless, in spite of their mutual hatred, Jews and Samaritans had much in common. Both were Israelites. Both claimed lineage from Sarah and Abraham. They shared the same language and the same scriptures. Both had far more in common with each other than with the Roman overlords enslaving them.  As much as they might have wished it otherwise, these two peoples were inescapably bound up together in a common history. That conflicted history comes to a head in Jesus’ encounter with the woman of Samaria.

This story has a contemporary ring to it. After all, we in this country who identify as white are only now coming to grips with our own tortured history shared with indigenous peoples murdered and dispossessed by our colonial ancestors. We are only now beginning to understand the essential role played by African slaves whose forced and uncompensated labor built up the back bone of our nation’s industrial power and wealth. We are only now learning the full extent of our exploitation of the Mexican and Chinese laborers we imported from abroad to build our railroads and then quickly moved to deport once we had no further use for them. We are only learning now that the American history we were taught in school was, at best, woefully incomplete. At worst, it was pure propaganda.

So how do we proceed in the face of our tortured history? I suggest we follow Jesus’ lead. He does not begin by engaging the Samaritan woman in a theological debate. He does not question her morality or the legitimacy of her faith. He does not begin by addressing “the issues.” Jesus begins by asking for a drink. He does not disguise his vulnerability and dependence on the woman. Instead, he tells her “I need you. I need your help.” What this woman might have expected of Jesus, if anything, we can only guess. But it is clear that she is taken by surprise. “How is it that you, a Jew, ask a drink of me, a woman of Samaria?” The woman launches into the longstanding dispute over which of their respective temples is the proper place for worship. Jesus will have none of it. God seeks worshipers-Jew, Samaritan or gentile, who worship God in Spirit and in truth. Again, we can only guess what was going through the woman’s mind as she raced back home to tell her people of that remarkable Jew who asked to share her water jar and spoke to her as a fellow Israelite.

The interchange between Jesus and the woman of Samaria concludes with a small detail that you might have missed if you were concentrating only on the heady theological issues. The woman leaves her water jar at the well before returning home-an act of compassion and kindness for this strange, thirsty traveler. She quenched the thirst of this odd prophet who promised to quench her thirst with living water. Amazing things happen when we allow ourselves to be vulnerable, lay aside our defensiveness and humbly ask for the help we need. God knows those of us faced with troubling realities that threaten to undo the myths by which we have learned to live need help. God knows that our overwhelmingly white mainline churches need help seeing themselves-ourselves-as we are seen by God. We need the patience of Jesus to hear the stories of those victimized by our claims of privilege without defensiveness, without judgment and without the need to be right. Only after we have heard, understood and taken responsibility for the truth do we dare speak.

Poetry offers us, among other things, an opportunity to listen for and hear voices that have been too long excluded from the telling of the American story and ignored by the church. Here is one by June Jordan.

1977: Poem for Mrs. Fannie Lou Hamer

You used to say, “June?

Honey when you come down here you

supposed to stay with me. Where

else?”

Meanin home

against the beer the shotguns and the

point of view of whitemen don’

never see Black anybodies without

some violent itch start up.

                                       The ones who   

said, “No Nigga’s Votin in This Town . . .

lessen it be feet first to the booth”   

Then jailed you   

beat you brutal   

bloody/battered/beat   

you blue beyond the feeling   

of the terrible

And failed to stop you.   

Only God could but He   

wouldn’t stop   

you

fortress from self-

pity

Humble as a woman anywhere   

I remember finding you inside the laundromat   

in Ruleville   

                  lion spine relaxed/hell   

                  what’s the point to courage   

                  when you washin clothes?   

But that took courage

                  just to sit there/target   

                  to the killers lookin   

                  for your singin face   

                  perspirey through the rinse   

                  and spin

and later   

you stood mighty in the door on James Street   

loud callin:

                  “BULLETS OR NO BULLETS!   

                  THE FOOD IS COOKED   

                  AN’ GETTIN COLD!”

We ate

A family tremulous but fortified

by turnips/okra/handpicked

like the lilies

filled to the very living   

full

one solid gospel

                        (sanctified)

one gospel

                (peace)

one full Black lily   

luminescent   

in a homemade field   

of love

Source: Directed By Desire: The Collected Poems of June Jordan (C. 2005 by The June M. Jordan Literary Trust; pub. by WA: Copper Canyon Press, 2005). June Millicent Jordan (1936–2002) was an American poet, essayist, teacher and activist. She was in 1936 in Harlem, New York, the only child of immigrants from Jamaica and Panama. Her father was a postal worker for the USPS and her mother was a part-time nurse. When Jordan was five, the family moved to the Bedford-Stuyvesant area of Brooklyn. She began writing her own poetry at the age of seven. Her poetry and other writings explore issues of gender, race and immigration. Jordan was passionate about using Black English in her writing and poetry, teaching others to treat it as its own language and an important outlet for expressing Black culture. You can read more about June Jordan and sample more of her poetry at the Poetry Foundation websilte.

SECOND SUNDAY IN LENT

Genesis 12:1-4a

Psalm 121

Romans 4:1-5, 13-17

John 3:1-17

Prayer of the Day: O God, our leader and guide, in the waters of baptism you bring us to new birth to live as your children. Strengthen our faith in your promises, that by your Spirit we may lift up your life to all the world through your Son, Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.

“Now the Lord said to Abram, ‘Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you.’” Genesis 12:1.

As an institution, the church in America is in free fall. Numerous trees have been felled and gallons of ink spilled by learned observers of religion on books and articles explaining this phenomenon. Discussion of these explanations is far beyond the scope of a single blog post. Suffice to say that, whatever the reasons, the decline of the mainline American church is a fact we simply cannot ignore. That has been clear to me for some time, but it became concretely so at the congregational meeting of my own congregation this last Sunday. Several people expressed concern over rising expenses, decreases in financial support and stagnant to declining membership. “We can’t go on this way!” one exasperated individual remarked. She is correct-but if not “this way,” then “what way?”

Adding to all of this is the fact that we are generationally top heavy. There is much work to be done simply to maintain the ministries we have going, to say nothing of the new ones we would like to initiate. Yet most of us are at a point in life where we feel as though we are entitled to slow down, let go of some responsibilities and allow the upcoming generation to take the reigns. Problem is, there is no upcoming generation. We have but a hand full of younger people with families. That seems to be the case with a lot of our churches these days. So, as much as we would like simply to sit out in front of our tents, look up at the stars and enjoy our golden years in peace, that is not an option. It seems God is not finished with us yet.

It strikes me that we are finding ourselves in much the same position as Abram and Sari. They, too, were old and seemingly faced with limited time, limited potential and limited energy. There seemed to be no room for anything new to happen in their lives. I can well imagine Abram replying to God’s call to leave home, family and community with the suggestion that God find someone else, somebody younger, somebody with some fire in their belly. But Abram did what most of us in our church are doing-leaving (often reluctantly) the old ways of doing things that have served us so well for so long without knowing where we are going or what we are supposed to do next.

Let me say at this point that I am not the least bit anxious or concerned about the demise of the church. I am convinced that there will be a church for as long as God needs a church. It won’t be the church we have grown to know and love. It probably will not be the church for which we hoped and which we expected. But whatever shape the church takes in the next generation, it will be the kind of church God needs. Thus, our concern should not be whether there will be a church in the next century, but whether we are being the kind of church God desires in this one.

Once we turn the discussion away from anxiety provoking questions of ecclesiastical survival and toward the issue of faithful discipleship, the issues become a lot more hopeful and interesting, if not easier. If expecting seminarians to incur substantial debt to complete their education only to receive calls from churches that cannot pay them adequately is not sustainable, how do we train ministers of word and sacrament without compromising the depth, commitment and oversight required for this essential work? If we cannot provide a full time pastor for each congregation, how do we raise up and train lay leaders to assume responsibility for aspects of pastoral ministry that can be delegated? Most importantly, how do we transition from a consumer model under which the church is a producer of religious goods for its membership to a model under which the church is a manufacturer of faithful disciples of Jesus? None of these questions admit of an easy answer. Struggling with them will not stem the demise of the institutional church in America. In fact, it might well accelerate the process! But this is perhaps a time in which it is of particular importance to hear Jesus’ assurance that those who lose their lives for his sake will surely gain them. Matthew 16:25.  

At times like these, we are particularly vulnerable to the siren song of hucksters who claim to know the way forward. During the near forty years of my active full time ministry, a week did not go by without an advertisement coming across my desk promoting a program promising to grow my church. There were variations of method and approach, but they all had one thing in common. None of them worked-at least not in terms of reversing congregational decline. I am reminded of Jesus’ warning about listening to those who cry out, “Look! Here is the Messiah!” or “There he is!” Matthew 24:23. It would be nice if we had a leader who could show us the path ahead, assure us that the end is near and bring an end to our uncertainty. Hence, the appeal of preachers who pretend to know God’s timetable for the end of time and populist political leaders who offer us simplistic solutions to difficult and complex problems. But God gave no such assurances to Abram. Neither does Jesus offer them to us. We don’t get an itinerary, we don’t get a schedule, we don’t get a road map. What we get is a call to leave the comfortable and familiar and venture out into an unknown future.

The good word for a dying church is that we follow a risen Lord. We cannot see the path ahead, but we know who walks with and before us. We have no idea where we are in time, how much further we need to travel or what will meet us on the road ahead. We have only the promise of a land, a people and a blessing at the end of it all. We get just enough light to put one foot in front of the other. It is not as much as we want. But it’s enough.

Here is a poem by Fenton Johnson articulating the kind of vision that can sustain us on our long journey through the dark wilderness-with a reminder that we are, in fact, still in the dark wilderness.

A Dream

I had a dream last night, a wonderful dream,

I saw an angel riding a chariot-

Oh, my honey, it was a lovely chariot,

Shining like the sun when noon is on the earth.

I saw his wings spreading from moon to earth;

I saw a crown of stars upon his forehead;

I saw his robes algleaming like his chariot.

I bowed my head and let the angel pass,

Because no man can look on Glory’s work;

I bowed my head and trembled in my limbs,

Because I stood on ground of holiness.

I heard the angel in the chariot singing:

“Hallelujah early in the morning!

I know my Redeemer livet-

How is it with your soul?”

I stood on ground of holiness and bowed;

The River Jordan flowed past my feet

As the angel soothed my soul with song,

A song of wonderful sweetness.

I stooped and washed my soul in Jordan’s stream

Ere my Redeemer came to take me home;

I stooped and washed my soul in the waters pure

As the breathing of a new-born child

Lying on a mammy’s breast at night.

I looked and saw the angel descending

And a crown of stars was in his hand:

“Be ye not amazed, good friend,” he said,

“I bring a diadem of righteousness,

A covenant from the Lord of life,

That in the morning you will see

Eternal streets of gold and pearl aglow

And be with me in Paradise.”

The vision faded. I awoke and heard

A mocking-bird upon my window-sill.

Source: Poetry, December 1921. Fenton Johnson (1888 -1958) was an American poet, essayist, author of short stories, editor, and educator. He came from a middle-class African-American family in Chicago where he spent most of his career. His father, Elijah Johnson, was a railroad porter and owner of the State Street building in which the family lived. Johnson received his secondary education at various public schools in the city, including Englewood High School and Wendell Phillips High School. Johnson earned his bachelors degree from the University of Chicago and later attended the Columbia University Pulitzer School of Journalism. After completing school, Johnson worked for a short time as a messenger and postal employee. Shortly thereafter, he secured a teaching position at the State University of Louisville, a private, black, Baptist-owned institution in Kentucky later re-named Simmons College. There he taught English until he returned to Chicago in 1911 to concentrate on his writing career. Johnson published his first volume of poetry, A Little Dreaming, in 1913. Thereafter, he published two others books, Visions of the Dusk and Songs of the Soil in 1915 and 1916 respectively. His work is included in many anthologies of 20th-century poetry. Johnson is considered by many to be a forerunner of the Harlem Renaissance. You can read more about Fenton Johnson and sample more of his work at the Poetry Foundation website.

FIRST SUNDAY IN LENT

Genesis 2:15-17; 3:1-7

Psalm 32

Romans 5:12-19

Matthew 4:1-11

Prayer of the Day: Lord God, our strength, the struggle between good and evil rages within and around us, and the devil and all the forces that defy you tempt us with empty promises. Keep us steadfast in your word, and when we fall, raise us again and restore us through your Son, Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.

“Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor; and he said to him, ‘All these I will give you, if you will fall down and worship me.’” Matthew 4:8-9.

The devil does not waste time tempting the wicked. He can trust them to find their own way to hell. The devil tempts good people, people with high ideals, people longing for a better world. And he accomplishes that purpose by offering them the tool they need to achieve their noble purposes, namely, coercive power.

It is tempting to buy into the notion that the power of the nations and their splendor is neutral. It can be used for good or ill, in the service of justice or oppression, for altruistic or selfish ends. But that is not what the gospel tells us. According to the gospels, the power and splendor of the world’s kingdoms belong to the devil. You cannot make use of them without paying the devil his due.

The demonic nature of coercive power is often obscured by all that power promises to deliver for the cause of good. I want my children to be successful in life and so I use parental power to punish and reward, to restrict and permit in order to steer them into the paths I believe are best for them. I want my congregation to be focused on outreach and service to my community. So I influence the nomination committee to select for leadership positions people I know share my vision. And why not? If I know what is good and what is right and I have the power to make it happen, why not use it? My children will thank me someday for what they now resent. God will surely overlook a little manipulation of pastoral relations and a few procedural irregularities in congregational process if the result is a powerful witness of justice, peace and service to my community. Coercive power gets results-or so the devil would have us believe.

Of course, things seldom work out as well as one hopes. I wish I could tell you how many unhappy people I have met over the years damaged by and estranged from parents who exercised excessive control under the rubric “I’m doing this because I love you.” A pastor who knows the ropes of church politics can run almost any proposal through a church council and get it approved by the congregation. But to make it work, pastors need the trust and confidence of their people, something they lose once it becomes clear that they have abused their influence to get their way. The splendor and power of the nations is not all that it seems. It is not as effective as it appears. Worse still, it comes with a heavy hidden price and the devil is a merciless creditor. The words of poet Paul Laurence Dunbar ring true:

Slight was the thing I bought,
Small was the debt I thought,
Poor was the loan at best-
God! but the interest!

The costly failure of coercive power is evident. The guns marketed by the gun industry promising protection and safety for our homes are killing our children. The militarization of the police in the name of “law and order” has served only to inflame the fault lines of racial injustice in the United States. Elections imposing the will of the majority on the minority have neither resolved the issues dividing us as a nation nor united us as a people. In the name of saving and/or liberating Ukraine by flooding it with arms and fighters, the nations of the world are destroying it-along with the peoples dying of starvation in the horn of Africa due to the resulting disruption of grain transports. The greatest military power on the planet failed spectacularly in Iraq and Afganistan. The power of the nations is illusory. It cannot deliver the peace, security or prosperity it promises. The devil knows this well. That is why he is willing to part with his so-called power so freely. The devil knows very well how attractive is all the good such power promises to deliver and how blind we are to its cost. So also does Jesus. That is why Jesus tells the devil to keep his power and take a hike.

According to Saint Paul, God’s power appears to the nations of the world as “weakness.” The cross is folly to the nations. It has no place in their struggle for dominance and control. I Corinthians 1:20-25. Our way of exercising power is not God’s way. God loves the world too much to impose God’s will upon it. God will rule the world through love-or not at all. That means God sets aside God’s power of coercion-even if it means that the best God has to give us will be rejected, ridiculed and nailed to a cross. God will not avenge the murder of God’s only Son. Instead, God just keeps raising him up and offering to us again for as long as it takes to win our hearts. God’s power is God’s patience, God’s refusal to be suckered into the devil’s game of intimidation, violence and retribution.

During this Lenten season I think we would do well to meditate on the kind of power exercised in our families, in our work, in our schools and in our churches. What are the practices of coercion that need to be rejected along with all the other works and ways of the devil?

Here is the full poem by Paul Laurence Dunbar cited above expressing the consequence of incurring indebtedness to evil.

The Debt

This is the debt I pay
Just for one riotous day,
Years of regret and grief,
Sorrow without relief.

Pay it I will to the end-
Until the grave, my friend,
Gives me a true release-
Gives me the clasp of peace.

Slight was the thing I bought,
Small was the debt I thought,
Poor was the loan at best-
God! but the interest!

Source: Johnson, James Weldon, The Book of American Negro Poetry (c. 1922 by Harcourt Brace & Company). Paul Laurence Dunbar (1872–1906) was one of America’s first influential African American poets. He grew up in Dayton, Ohio where he lived with his widowed mother. His poetic skill became evident already in high school. The only black student in his class, he was elected class president and class poet. Though he was never able to obtain a college education, he read voraciously. His early poetry gained the admiration and respect of influential poets such as James Whitcomb Riley. With the support of Orville Wright, then in the publishing business, Dunbar was able to publish his first book of poetry. His popularity continued to grow and in 1896 he was invited for a six month reading tour in England to present his poetry. He returned in 1897, married fellow writer Alice Ruth Moore and took a clerkship position in the U.S. Library of Congress, a job that left him time to continue his writing career. Tragically, Dunbar’s physical and psychological health began to deteriorate in 1902, leading to his eventual divorce. He became fatally ill in 1905 and died in February of the following year.

You can find out more about Paul Laurence Dunbar and sample more of his poetry at the Poetry Foundation Website.

Kierkegaard’s Ghost

(News that’s fake, but credible)

The Conservative Political Action Committee (CPAC) and the Republican National Committee (RNC) have conferred to produce a theme song for the Republican Primaries, calling for Republicans to unite behind the only declared Republican presidential candidate, Donald J. Trump. The tune for this new promotional anthem is that of the hymn, “Softly and Tenderly.” Said RNC chair, Rona McDaniel, “We know that a lot of Republicans are wavering in their support for Donald Trump. Some might be thinking of challenging him and we want to get out in front of that.” CPAC chairman, Matt Schlapp, told Ghost reporters, “We recognize that white evangelical support for Mr. Trump has been slipping and we want to reverse that trend asap.” He added, “We think a theme song with a good solid evangelical melody might be just what we need to turn the tide.” The full text of the song is as follows:  

Loudly and vengefully Donald is Calling (Approved by CPAC and the RNC. Can be sung to the tune of “Softly and Tenderly”)

TRANSFIGURATION OF OUR LORD

Exodus 24:12-18

Psalm 99

2 Peter 1:16-21

Matthew 17:1-9

Prayer of the Day: O God, in the transfiguration of your Son you confirmed the mysteries of the faith by the witness of Moses and Elijah, and in the voice from the bright cloud declaring Jesus your beloved Son, you foreshadowed our adoption as your children. Make us heirs with Christ of your glory, and bring us to enjoy its fullness, through Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.

“For [Jesus] received honor and glory from God the Father when that voice was conveyed to him by the Majestic Glory, saying, ‘This is my Son, my Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.’ We ourselves heard this voice come from heaven, while we were with him on the holy mountain.” II Peter 1:17-18.

Any way you look at it, we who follow Jesus stake everything on second hand information. Unlike Saint Peter, we were not there on the mountain top where “Jesus received honor and glory from God the Father.” We did not witness his transfiguration or overhear his conversation with Moses and Elijah. We were not enveloped under the bright cloud or brought to our knees by the divine voice. What we do have are the sacred writings of the apostles and their disciples passed on over the last two millennia first through oral tradition, then in written form and finally canonized by the church as faithful and reliable witnesses to Jesus and the reign of God he proclaimed. The immediacy of Jesus’ transfiguration-as is the case with the rest of his life and ministry-is forever beyond our reach.

Or is it? Do we still experience what the New Testament calls “Kairos” time? Instances when time and eternity intersect? Occasions when centuries of chronological time collapse into a single moment? Intense experiences of God’s presence to us in the present moment? I think that most believers can describe experiences of that kind. Many of us who have spent weeks of our childhood at Christian camps have memories of deep friendships formed, intimate worship experiences that deepened our faith and moments of intense spiritual joy. Some of us have experienced a rebirth and deepening of our faith at some crisis point in our lives that has imprinted itself on our hearts and minds.

I, for one, frequently sense a foretaste of the new creation when I see dancers defying the power of gravity and hinting at our final release from the gravitational pull of sin and death. I sometimes experience the timelessness of the communion of saints at the funeral of a loved one when, through tears, the congregation finds itself singing as one with the saints in light. I experience the immediacy of God’s inbreaking kingdom when poets stretch human words and images to the breaking point making room for mysteries too big for words. These are just a few ways God’s Spirit breaks through the ordinary rhythms of life and transfigures our vision, letting us know that there is more, so much more.

The thing to remember is that these transfiguration moments are transitory. Most of our days continue to flow in plain old chronological time where one thing follows another. Most of our weeks involve going to work or school, preparing and eating our meals, reading the mail, taking out the trash and singing the liturgy on Sunday. I do not mean to denigrate the ordinary. There is holiness to be found in the humblest task and joy that flows from the routine work of living and serving others. Indeed, I would say that the joyful work of discipleship is always done in the ordinary and that the ordinary is where our focus ought to be. Transfigurative experiences are not intended to free us from the ordinary, but to drive us back into it with a renewed sense of urgency and purpose.  

Transfiguration moments can be transformative. They can sustain one’s faith in times when it is being sorely tested. They can broaden one’s vision and remind one that beneath the smallest subatomic particle the Spirit of God is throbbing with unlimited potential, the Word of God is tenaciously holding creation together against the powers of evil that would rip it apart and the parental providence of God is drawing it toward its proper end in God’s Trinitarian Self. Life is not directionless. It is going somewhere. Every so often, the Spirit of God gives us a glimpse-but no more than that-of the final destination. That is often just enough to keep us putting one foot in front of the other.

At this juncture in the gospel narrative, the disciples needed the Transfiguration. Jesus had just told them what was about to happen to him in Jerusalem. He told them that the cross he was to bear would be theirs to share. The gospels tell us the disciples did not understand what Jesus was saying and were unwilling to accept it. How could they have reacted otherwise? Who can blame Peter for wanting to prolong the moment of Transfiguration and drown in the light of Jesus’ glory his call to take up the cross? Who can blame us for wanting to turn off the frightening news of war, deadly earthquakes, unidentified objects flying over us and ever new permutations of Covid 19? Who can blame any of us for wanting to tarry in the sunlight rather than take up the cross and follow Jesus into the darkness of death? How is it possible to believe that this dark path leads finally to a new creation?

Thank God for artists and sculptors who open our eyes to what is not yet, but might be. Thank God for musicians who lift our spirits, joining our hearts and voices in song, giving us a brief taste of the unity God desires for all humanity. Thank God for dancers and athletes whose bodily antics prefigure the freedom of the resurrected body from the gravitational pull of sin and death. Thank God for poets who stretch our minds and our imaginations beyond what we typically observe. Thank God for preachers who open the letter of scripture, making it a portal into the new age toward which we are being led. Thank God for transfigurative moments, great and small. May they give us just enough light to make once again the journey through Lent and into the mystery of the Resurrection!

Here is a transfigurative poem by James Weldon Johnson inviting us to “Look up, and out, beyond, surrounding clouds.”

Sonnet

My heart be brave, and do not falter so,   

Nor utter more that deep, despairing wail.   

Thy way is very dark and drear I know,   

But do not let thy strength and courage fail;   

For certain as the raven-winged night

Is followed by the bright and blushing morn,   

Thy coming morrow will be clear and bright;   

’Tis darkest when the night is furthest worn.   

Look up, and out, beyond, surrounding clouds,   

And do not in thine own gross darkness grope,   

Rise up, and casting off thy hind’ring shrouds,   

Cling thou to this, and ever inspiring hope:

   Tho’ thick the battle and tho’ fierce the fight,

   There is a power making for the right.

Source:  Complete Poems (c. 2000 by Penguin Publishing Group). James Weldon Johnson (1871-1938) was a lawyer, teacher and civil rights leader in the early part of the twentieth century. As head of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) during the 1920s, Johnson led civil rights campaigns aimed at eliminating legal, political, and social obstacles to black advancement. Johnson was appointed under President Theodore Roosevelt as U.S. consul in Venezuela and Nicaragua from 1906 to 1913. In 1934, he was the first African American professor to be hired at New York University. Later in life, he was a professor of creative literature and writing at Fisk University in Nashville, Tennessee, a historically black university. In addition to these achievements, Johnson was also a gifted author and poet. He established his reputation as a writer and was known during the Harlem Renaissance for his poems, novel and anthologies collecting both poems and spirituals of black culture. His poem, “Lift Ev’ry Voice and Sing,” was later set to music and came to be known as “the Negro National Anthem.” It is found in many Christian hymnals today, including Evangelical Lutheran Worship (ELW). See ELW # 841.You can read more about James Weldon Johnson and sample more of his poetry at the Poetry Foundation website.

SIXTH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST

Deuteronomy 30:15-20

Psalm 119:1-8

1 Corinthians 3:1-9

Matthew 5:21-37

Prayer of the Day: O God, strength of all who hope in you, because we are weak mortals we accomplish nothing good without you. Help us to see and understand the things we ought to do, and give us grace and power to do them, through Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord. Amen.

“Do not swear at all, either by heaven, for it is the throne of God, or by the earth, for it is his footstool, or by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the great King. And do not swear by your head, for you cannot make one hair white or black. Let your word be ‘Yes, Yes’ or ‘No, No;’ anything more than this comes from the evil one.” Matthew 5:34-37.

How often haven’t you heard some one say, “Well, frankly….” Or “To be perfectly honest with you…” Someday I will work up the courage to say, “Wait! You mean you haven’t been frank with me for the last ten minutes? You mean that, ordinarily, you are less than honest with me, but now you are deciding to be “perfectly honest?” If and when I ever pull a stunt like that, I suspect the response will be that, no, my conversation partners are not implying that they are being dishonest. They only mean to say that what they are now telling me is important, that they are making a strenuous effort to be accurate and that I should pay close attention. Be that as it may, should we not always strive to be accurate? Should we not always pay close attention to each other? Is any communication so unimportant that we can afford to be less than scrupulously truthful? 

I do not believe Jesus is suggesting that oaths requiring truthful answers under pain of perjury are wrong in themselves. Oaths required by law are designed to put those taking them on notice that false or misleading statements are subject to criminal prosecution. Jesus seems to be making an oath like statement when he appeals to the testimony of his Heavenly Father. John 8:17-19. I took an oath to defend the state and federal constitutions when I was admitted to practice law before the courts of New Jersey, Pennsylvania and the United States.[1] The problem comes with invoking the name of God on one’s own behalf, which is a tacit admission that without the oath, one’s representations would be less than credible. Disciples of Jesus should have no need for such oaths. They should know that everything they say is said in God’s presence and under God’s judgment. They should know that the truth matters, whether it pertains to matters great or small. “Yes” or “no” in their mouths always means yes or no in the presence and hearing of God.

Playing fast and loose with the truth is sadly common place in our civil discourse. Who can forget former President Bill Clinton’s rationalization to the grand jury attempting to explain why he wasn’t lying when he said to his top aides that, with respect to Monica Lewinsky, “There’s nothing going on between us.” Here’s what Clinton told the grand jury according to footnote 1,128 in Starr’s report:

“It depends on what the meaning of the word ‘is’ is. If the—if he—if ‘is’ means is and never has been, that is not—that is one thing. If it means there is none, that was a completely true statement. … Now, if someone had asked me on that day, are you having any kind of sexual relations with Ms. Lewinsky, that is, asked me a question in the present tense, I would have said no. And it would have been completely true.”

Lame as this linguistic gobbledygook surely is and as preferable as “coming clean” with the truth may have been, give the man credit at the very least for understanding that lying is wrong and something about which one ought to be ashamed (along with a good many other things). Furthermore, a fib over one’s sexual indiscretions pales in comparison to the over thirty thousand lies told by former President Donald Trump who, when caught, simply doubles down, repeating them more loudly and emphatically. But the prize for most outrageous prevaricator goes to newly elected Representative George Santos who sold himself to the voters as a self made millionaire, grandson of Holocaust survivors, honors graduate of a prestigious college and the grieving son of a mother who perished in the September 11, 2001 attacks. Of course, it is now known that he was neither rich, Jewish or a college graduate. Nor did his mother die in the 9/11 attack. Nonetheless, Mr. Santos was seated in the house of representatives, thereby demonstrating that the truth is now entirely without value in our government.[2]

The church, the Body of believers in Jesus, are called to truthfulness in the extreme. Truthfulness that begins with ourselves. After all, the most dangerous lies we tell are the ones we tell about ourselves to ourselves. That is perhaps the source of all dishonesty. If you have a false view of yourself, that colors the way you understand the world, the way you form opinions about others and the way you express yourself. Honesty begins with learning to know ourselves as we are known by God. We call that repentance, something we cannot do on our own. To see ourselves as we really are-as we are seen by God, we need to see ourselves through the eyes of others, particularly those who live with and observe us, those who can point out our blind spots and those we have harmed. There is no other way of getting a clear picture of ourselves. Until that happens, there is little hope for change.

What applies individually also applies corporately. The church has much over which to lament and repent. We need to understand our instrumentality in the cruel legacy of colonialism. We need to recognize the grip of white supremacy and patriarchy that have permeated so much of our ecclesiastical life. We need to acknowledge the shameful presence of predatory behavior in our midst and our long held practice of covering it up and silencing its victims. We need to confess our demonization, exclusion and complicity in the hatred, violence and persecution of LGBTQ+ folk. It is tempting to deny all of this, minimize it or pretend that it is all in the past and that we can march into the future as though it never happened. To that, Saint Paul has a blunt response: “Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have stripped off the old self with its practices and have clothed yourselves with the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge according to the image of its creator.” Colossians 3:9-10. One could say that truthfulness is the foundation for all Christian ethics. Unless we get that right, the rest will be hopelessly skewed.  

Can a community as fragmented and morally compromised as the church really be “salt” to the earth or a “light” to the world? My answer is a qualified “yes.” I believe that the church, like every individual, is capable of redemption, reform and renewal. When we can stop imagining ourselves as the righteous few preaching to a sinful world and instead see ourselves clearly as recovering sinners struggling for our own sobriety, we will finally have something of value to say to that world. But it begins with each baptized member, each congregation and the leadership of each ecclesiastical tradition taking an honest look within, making a fearless inventory of our sin, corporate and individual, and openness to being made new-however painful that process might be. Until we address the sin in our midst, until we are ready to be the change we call for in our many social teaching statements, the rest of the world will continue to dismiss all of our bold, well articulated ecclesiastical proclamations as preachy screechy moralism.  Again, in the words of Saint Paul, “putting away falsehood, let all of us speak the truth to our neighbors, for we are members of one another.” Ephesians 4:25.

This being Black History Month, I plan to post poems of Black American poets for the next severa weeks so that we might begin to see more clearly ourselves, our nation and our churches through their unique artistic perspectives. Perhaps that is a good place for learning truthfulness to begin. Here is one such poem by Langston Hughes.

I Look at the World

I look at the world

From awakening eyes in a black face—

And this is what I see:

This fenced-off narrow space   

Assigned to me.

I look then at the silly walls

Through dark eyes in a dark face—

And this is what I know:

That all these walls oppression builds

Will have to go!

I look at my own body   

With eyes no longer blind—

And I see that my own hands can make

The world that’s in my mind.

Then let us hurry, comrades,

The road to find.

Source: Source: Poetry (December 2008; c. by New Haven: Beinecke Library, Yale University). Langston Hughes (1901-1967) was an important African American voice in the “Harlem Renaissance” of the 1920s. Though well-educated and widely traveled, Hughes’ poetry never strayed far from his roots in the African American community. Early in his career, Hughes’ work was criticized by some African American intellectuals for portraying what they viewed as an unflattering representation of back life. In a response to these critics, Hughes replied, “I didn’t know the upper class Negroes well enough to write much about them. I knew only the people I had grown up with, and they weren’t people whose shoes were always shined, who had been to Harvard, or who had heard of Bach. But they seemed to me good people, too.”  Today Langston Hughes is recognized globally as a towering literary figure of the 20^th Century. You can read more about Hughes and discover more of his poetry at the Poetry Foundation website (from which the above quote is taken).

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[1] To be precise, the New Jersey oath allows one to “affirm” rather than swear. That might alleviate the consciences of some who are uncomfortable with the biblical language. But it is really a distinction without a difference. In either case, you are representing your awareness that if the statements you make turn out to be false, you are subject to legal prosecution. In other words, you are saying, “OK, now I am really telling the truth.” 

[2] House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy rationalized the seating of Mr. Santos by pointing out that, after all, the voters elected him and, if they find his behavior offensive, they can deal with it in the next election. In my view, that is a little like telling the victim of a scam perpetrated by someone claiming to be an IRS agent that the scammer should not be prosecuted because, after all, the victim willingly paid him money. Just as the victim paid the scammer because he was convinced he was dealing with the IRS, so the voters thought they were electing a self made millionaire with a compelling story of heroism and achievement. What both actually got was a shameless scammer.

FIFTH SUNDAY AFTER EPIPHANY

Isaiah 58:1-12

Psalm 112:1-9

1 Corinthians 2:1-16

Matthew 5:13-20

Prayer of the Day: Lord God, with endless mercy you receive the prayers of all who call upon you. By your Spirit show us the things we ought to do, and give us the grace and power to do them, through Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord. Amen.

“Is not this the fast that I choose:
   to loose the bonds of injustice,
   to undo the thongs of the yoke,
to let the oppressed go free,
   and to break every yoke?
Is it not to share your bread with the hungry,
   and bring the homeless poor into your house;
when you see the naked, to cover them,
   and not to hide yourself from your own kin?” Isaiah 58:6-7.

Last week’s lesson from Micah posed the question: what does the Lord require of the chosen people? The answer: do justice, love kindness and walk humbly with God.  Micah 6:8. This Sunday’s lesson from Isaiah spells out exactly what that means. The bonds of injustice were made painfully clear to us this week with the release of police body cam videos showing the brutal, fatal and unprovoked attack by several police officers upon Tyre Nichols. This, the latest in a string of such attacks, underscores the cultural assumption woven into the fabric of our justice system that black men are inherently dangerous and that the default approach in dealing with them is a readiness to employ lethal force. That the officers in this case were all African Americans only serves to demonstrate how deeply ingrained that assumption has become in the mentality of law enforcement.

As horrible as these graphic instances of overt violence against black Americans surely are, more disturbing still is the corrosive effect of the more subtle, but quite real discriminatory actions and comments black persons experience on a day-to-day basis. Douglas Jacobs points out in his editorial in the New York Times that “[m]ore than 700 studies on the link between discrimination and health have been published since 2000. This body of work establishes a connection between discrimination and physical and mental well-being. With all of these effects, it is no wonder that more than 100,000 black people die prematurely each year.” “We’re Sick of Racism, Literally,” New York Times, November 11, 2017.[1] Jacobs concludes by observing that “[w]e shouldn’t need the specter of disease to denounce hatred in all its forms. Racism, bigotry, sexism, anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, homophobia, xenophobia, should have no place in our society. But the illness associated with discrimination adds injury to insult and magnifies the suffering of these times.”

Similarly, the American Academy of Pediatrics recently issued a statement warning of the alarming detrimental effects of racism on children:

“Racism is a social determinant of health that has a profound impact on the health status of children, adolescents, emerging adults, and their families. Although progress has been made toward racial equality and equity, the evidence to support the continued negative impact of racism on health and well-being through implicit and explicit biases, institutional structures, and interpersonal relationships is clear. Failure to address racism will continue to undermine health equity for all children, adolescents, emerging adults, and their families.” See “The Impact of Racism on Child and Adolescent Health,” Pediatrics, Vol. 144, Issue 2 (August 2019).

Almost daily young people are exposed to images of police beating defenseless black men and boys, public expressions of racial hate by white supremacy groups and open hostility by government representatives like Florida governor Ron DeSantis to any mention of their ancestors’ role in our nation’s history. It is hard to imagine how, in this environment of fear and violence toward people of color, black children can possibly feel safe and secure. For these children, our streets, playgrounds, schools and workplaces are areas of danger.

Those of us who have lived our lives as white, straight males find it easy enough to view America as the land of opportunity where the degree of our success is determined solely by our strength, intelligence and ambition. That is what we have been told by our parents, our churches and our schools. Because we have never had to worry about how a classmate, team member, neighbor or perspective employer might react to our race, we cannot imagine what it is like for those who are compelled to consider these questions every minute of every day. Because we have always breathed a sigh of relief at the sight of a uniformed police officer when passing through an unfamiliar neighborhood, we cannot begin to fathom how that same uniform strikes terror in anyone’s heart. Having eyes, we do not see and having ears, we still do not hear. It is as though we were tone deaf to the minor chords in the musical score that is our national history and culture. Until we learn to see the world, ourselves and our churches through the eyes of people of color and, particularly, black people, we are hardly in a position to “to loose the bonds of injustice, to undo the thongs of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free…”

For those of us who identify as white, the first step to breaking the yoke of white supremacy and racism is acknowledging its existence. It is a seemingly small step, but a necessary one and one that too many of us have refused to take:

“We fought the bloodiest war this nation has seen to set them free. They have nothing to say to us but, ‘thank you.’”

“We got rid of Jim Crow in the sixties.”

“We elected a black president. That proves we aren’t a racist country.”

“The government bends over backwards for minorities.”

“I’m sick of being made to feel guilty for being white.”

These are all statements I have overheard at synodical assemblies of my own Evangelical Lutheran Church in America-a place where one typically finds lopsided representation of progressive members. When people of color hear remarks like these (and I have no doubt that they do jjust as I did), what else can they conclude but that this church still does not hear them or believe their stories? That goes a long way toward explaining why, in spite of strenuous efforts to achieve more racial and cultural diversity, my church remains one of the whitest in America. After all these years of talking about race, antiracism training, social statements and diversity protocols, we still don’t get it.[2]

Sometimes change comes from changed hearts and minds. But I think just as often hearts and minds change with changed directions and new habits. Sometimes the church needs leaders like the Apostle Paul who made concrete his conviction that there is no distinction between believers of different origins and cultures by challenging his gentile congregations to contribute generously to the relief of believers in Judea. As a matter of equity, Paul argued, the gentile churches, so richly blessed by the gospel grown from the fertile soil of Israel’s history and traditions, should be eager to share their material wealth to meet the needs of the church in Jerusalem. Romans 15:26-27. By the same token, we who have been enriched by the deep well of black spirituality, hymnody and prophetic theology-influences that shaped theologians like Dietrich Bonhoeffer-should not be reluctant to contribute materially and substantially to African American churches in the trenches and on the front lines of the battle against white supremacy and systemic racism. We might call this a model for reparations that should rightly be made by our government for centuries of slavery, decades of segregation and the continuing effects of systemic injustice. [3] In so doing, the American church might truly become what Jesus terms “a city on a hill” or a lamp shedding its light over a dark room. Matthew 5:14-16.

Here is a poem by Christopher Soto that speaks to the reality of life on the receiving end of systemic racism more eloquently than any set of statistics.

All the Dead Boys Look Like Me

Last time I saw myself die is when police killed Jessie Hernandez

                                      A 17 year old brown queer // who was sleeping in their car

Yesterday I saw myself die again // Fifty times I died in Orlando // &

                        I remember reading // Dr. José Esteban Muñoz before he passed

I was studying at NYU // where he was teaching // where he wrote shit

                        That made me feel like a queer brown survival was possible // But he didn’t

Survive & now // on the dancefloor // in the restroom // on the news // in my chest

                        There are another fifty bodies that look like mine // & are

Dead // & I’ve been marching for Black Lives & talking about police brutality

                        Against Native communities too // for years now // but this morning

I feel it // I really feel it again // How can we imagine ourselves // We being black native

                        Today // Brown people // How can we imagine ourselves

When All the Dead Boys Look Like Us? // Once I asked my nephew where he wanted

                        To go to College // What career he would like // as if

The whole world was his for the choosing // Once he answered me without fearing

                        Tombstones or cages or the hands from a father // The hands of my lover

Yesterday praised my whole body // Made angels from my lips // Ave Maria

                        Full of Grace // He propped me up like the roof of a cathedral // in NYC

Before we opened the news & read // & read about people who think two brown queers

                        Can’t build cathedrals // only cemeteries // & each time we kiss

A funeral plot opens // In the bedroom I accept his kiss // & I lose my reflection

                        I’m tired of writing this poem // but I want to say one last word about

Yesterday // my father called // I heard him cry for only the second time in my life

                        He sounded like he loved me // it’s something I’m rarely able to hear

& I hope // if anything // his sound is what my body remembers first.

Source: Bullets into Bells: Poets and Citizens Respond to Gun Violence, (c. 2017 by Christopher Soto) Christopher Soto (b. 1991) is a poet now living in Los Angeles, California. In 2022, he was honored with Them’s Now Award in Literature for representing the cutting edge of queer culture. He was also honored as part of Out100 celebrating the year’s most impactful and influential LGBTQ+ people. Boston Globe named his debut collection, Diaries of a Terrorist, one of the best books of 2022. Soto currently works at UCLA’s Ethnic Studies Research Centers and teaches at UCLA’s Honors College. You can learn more about Christopher Soto and sample more of his poetry at the Poetry Foundation Website.

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[1] The findings on African American mortality were published in the National Library of Medicine, Public Health Rep. 2001 Sep-Oct; 116(5): 474–483.

[2] I am using the pronoun “we” very intentionally. I don’t pretend to understand or comprehend fully the experiences of people of color, nor am I suggesting that my own judgment is free from the systemic grip of white supremacy. I am, as much as anyone else, in bondage to this sin from which I cannot free myself. At best, I am a “recovering racist” following something like a twelve step program toward sobriety.  

[3] For a specific proposal, see Open Letter to the ELCA Presiding Bishop and Synodical Bishops: A Modest Proposal for Reparational Tithe.

FOURTH SUNDAY AFTER EPIPHANY

Micah 6:1-8

Psalm 15

1 Corinthians 1:18-31

Matthew 5:1-12

Prayer of the Day: Holy God, you confound the world’s wisdom in giving your kingdom to the lowly and the pure in heart. Give us such a hunger and thirst for justice, and perseverance in striving for peace, that in our words and deeds the world may see the life of your Son, Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord.

“Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God.” Matthew 5:9.

“He has told you, O mortal, what is good;
   and what does the Lord require of you
but to do justice, and to love kindness,
   and to walk humbly with your God?” Micah 6:8.

Jesus calls his disciples to peacemaking. But the peace to which Jesus refers is not the peace so many of us long for. It isn’t the kind of peace we imagine would follow if black folks would just stop harping on slavery and Jim Crow and let bygone be bygones. It isn’t the kind of tense peace that follows after Mom tactfully changes the subject when Uncle Ned makes a crude and sexist remark about a neighbor at Thanksgiving dinner. The peace of Jesus is not the kind of peace those of us in safe, affluent and homogenous communities experience when we crow about how God has blessed us, even as a substantial part of the world experiences want. The peace of Jesus is not ecclesiastical tranquility achieved by a system that permits some of its congregations to discriminate against LGBTQ+ folk and the rest of its churches to identify as “welcoming” to ensure they don’t wind up sitting in the wrong pew.

Peace without justice is no peace at all. Jesus made this painfully clear when he told his disciples that he had not come to make fragile, artificial and superficial peace:

“Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth; I have not come to bring peace, but a sword.
For I have come to set a man against his father,
and a daughter against her mother,
and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law;
and one’s foes will be members of one’s own household.” Matthew 10:34-38.  

There can be no peace as long as systemic injustice creates and maintains relationships of inequality and oppression. Efforts to dismantle these reigning “principalities and powers” often requires us to disturb the false peace of the status quo which is, in reality, a more subtle kind of war against the poor, the outcast and the persecuted. Ironically, Jesus, the Prince of Peace, was crucified for disturbing the peace.

There are many angles from which to think about peace. I would like to focus on the global angle because I believe it determines so much of what goes on locally. I begin with the United Nations, an institution through which numerous conflicts have been prevented or resolved and by which many global humanitarian crises are being effectively addressed. Obviously, the UN is responsible for doing a great deal of good in the world. Many faithful, courageus and dedicated people have and continue to do great humanitarian work through its many agencies. Yet, for all that, I would argue that its chief function is to maintain a ruthlessly unjust status quo. Though made up of six organizational divisions, the National Security Council is by far the dominant center of power, being responsible for recommending the admission of new UN members to the General Assembly. It is also the body holding final authority to approve any changes to the UN Charter. Its powers also include establishing “peacekeeping operations,” enacting international sanctions and authorizing military action. The Security Council is the only UN body with the authority to issue binding resolutions on member states.

Tellingly, the Security Council is made up of the following nation states: China, France, Russia, United Kingdom and the United States. The common denominator here is a military with overwhelming nuclear capability that cannot be matched by anyone outside “the club.” At the same time, it is tacitly admitted that members of “the club” cannot afford to fight an all out war with each other. To do so would amount to mutual annihilation. So they engage each other through carefully managed “proxy wars,” such as the one currently raging in Ukraine. Throughout the years of the Cold War, such conflicts were waged in Africa as well as South and Central America. World wars have thus never been eliminated. They have simply been managed such that their carnage takes place in some distant corner of the world allowing citizens of Security Council members and their close allies to “live in peace.”

Of course, there is more to all of this than military dominance. The Security Council members are also home to the most powerful economies on the planet. The vast disparity in wealth between the northern and southern hemispheres mirrors representation in the UN hierarchy. With their national fates under the military and economic control of Western Europe, North America and China, the countries of Central America, South America, Southern Asia and sub-Saharan Africa, still struggling with the ruinous effects of centuries of colonialism, find themselves still at the mercy of the military strategic and economic interests of the National Security club and its allies.

On the lowest rung of hell are those who have no nation. I speak of refugees whose countries of origin offer nothing but death by starvation or violence. These folks find themselves eking out a miserable hand to mouth existence in refugee camps or traveling long distances over sea and land hoping against hope to find a decent life in one of the many countries that don’t want them. They have absolutely no voice or vote in the global order and no rights of citizenship to invoke. They are, in effect, non persons. These people, so hated and feared that we are prepared to spend billions sealing our border against them, are paying the price for the peace and security we enjoy. World peace in our day, as was the case in Jesus’ day under the Roman Empire, is maintained through organized, systemic brutality for the privileged few at the expense of the many.

This global hierarchy of oppression works its way down to everyday life in our neighborhoods. Dying communities throughout the rust belt plagued with crime, addiction and poverty are products of a system valuing the needs of commerce over the needs of community. Toxic wastelands in our midst testify to the priority of corporate profits over the health and safety of our people. The vicious resistance on the part of government and industry to efforts addressing climate change testify to the determination of a few to hang onto an unsustainable way of life with callused disregard both for the many others and for the well being of their own children and grandchildren. True peace, the kind of peace to which Jesus calls us, requires dismantling structures of oppression maintaining the status quo of global inequality. There will be no peace until “justice roll[s] down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream.” Amos 5:24. Peacemaking is a tall order that some might call impossible. But Jesus never calls us to anything easy.

The temptation here is to become overwhelmed by the enormity of the task and throw up our hands in despair. If peace and justice were solely our own responsibility, that temptation would become overwhelming. But the call to peacemaking is not an onerous obligation God lays upon us. It is God’s work in which we are invited to participate. The kingdom of God, Martin Luther reminds us, comes without our participation. But what fun is that? I think the worst consequence for those at the left hand of the Son of Man on the day of judgment lies not in any future torment, but in realizing the wasted years of their past. God was appealing to them every day of their lives in the eyes of the poor, naked, persecuted and imprisoned. But they never recognized the image of their Maker. They never learned the reason for their being. They never learned to be human. The reign of God slipped in right under their noses-and they never noticed.

Perhaps the first step to peacemaking is shattering the false and superficial peace in which we live. Only then will it be possible to recognize the crucified God dwelling just outside of our redlined neighborhoods, gated communities and secure borders. Here is a poem by Mary Oliver which I believe does just that.

Of The Empire

We will be known as a culture that feared death
and adored power, that tried to vanquish insecurity
for the few and cared little for the penury of the
many. We will be known as a culture that taught
and rewarded the amassing of things, that spoke
little if at all about the quality of life for
people (other people), for dogs, for rivers. All
the world, in our eyes, they will say, was a
commodity. And they will say that this structure
was held together politically, which it was, and
they will say also that our politics was no more
than an apparatus to accommodate the feelings of
the heart, and that the heart, in those days,
was small, and hard, and full of meanness.

Source: Red Bird, by Mary Oliver (c. 2008 by Mary Oliver, pub. by Beacon Press). Mary Oliver (1935-2019) was born in Maple Heights, Ohio. She was deeply influenced by poet, Edna St. Vincent Millay. Her work received early critical attention with the 1983 publication of a collection of poems entitled American Primitive. She is a recipient of both the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry and the National Book Award. You can read more about Mary Oliver and sample some of her other poems at the Poetry Foundation Website.

THIRD SUNDAY AFTER EPIPHANY

Isaiah 9:1-4

Psalm 27:1, 4-9

1 Corinthians 1:10-18

Matthew 4:12-23

Prayer of the Day: Lord God, your loving kindness always goes before us and follows after us. Summon us into your light, and direct our steps in the ways of goodness that come through the cross of your Son, Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord.

“From that time Jesus began to proclaim, ‘Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.’” Matthew 4:17.

“For the message about the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.” I Corinthians 1:18.

“The kingdom of heaven has come near,” says Jesus. Yet as we will learn as Matthew’s gospel unfolds, that kingdom takes the shape of the cross in a world determined to reject it. The cross, Saint Paul tells us, is “foolishness” to those who are perishing. And, truth be told, it does sound foolish to insist that the earth belongs to the marginalized rather than to the nation states claiming sovereignty over it. It does seem foolish to claim blessedness for the hungry, the poor and the persecuted. More foolish still is the way of love for enemies, forgiveness for wrongs done and the refusal to take up the sword-no matter how just the cause. The reign of God resembles nothing so much as a kingdom of fools.

In the days ahead, we will be graced with gospel readings from the Sermon on the Mount, teachings that, if followed, seem destined to ruin us. For that reason, the church has struggled mightily with them. In the early period of imperial Christianity, the Sermon was deemed suitable only for monastic communities set apart from the commercial, social and geopolitical pressures of the world where the rest of us live. Protestant theologians have sought to distinguish the Sermon, which governs only one’s own personal morality, from the duties of public life that require a different ethic. For example, my own Lutheran tradition espouses the “Two Kingdoms Doctrine” under which it is understood that God works in two distinct ways. Under God’s right hand are the preaching and practice of the church through which people are led to faith in Jesus Christ and trained in personal righteousness. God’s left hand works through the institutions of government, education and commerce to maintain a semblance of order in a sinful and broken world. Thus, if my neighbor strikes, defrauds or otherwise harms me, my response is turning the other cheek, refraining from seeking restitution and forgiving the wrongs against me. However, if I happen to be a soldier, police officer or judge, it is my duty to use force and inflict even death on my neighbor to further the cause of justice. Only our anabaptist siblings have taken the extreme and “foolish” view that Jesus meant what he said in the Sermon.

In this instance, I lean toward the anabaptist reading. I do not believe the Sermon on the Mount represents only a personal morality divorced from the rough and tumble realities of the world. Nor do I believe it is an unachievable ideal, the function of which is merely to show us how sinful we are and how much we need forgiveness.[1] The Sermon is not a goal to be achieved, an ideal to which one should aspire or a tool for spiritual introspection. It is rather a blueprint for the life Jesus actually lived, a life which brought him ultimately to the cross and to which he invites his disciples to participate.

For much of our existence in the United States of America, our churches have been prominent institutions. We have seen our role largely as a supportive one. Along with the local school board, the chamber of commerce and the various lodges and civic organizations, we made our contribution to the public good. Sometimes we served as the conscience of the community. Sometimes we lent our support to upholding the community’s public values and mores-which were not always in sync with the priorities of God’s reign. We offered invocations and benedictions at civic events, blessed everything from babies to battleships and gave our tacit support to the nation’s wars with memorial gardens and participation in military funeral rites. I do not mean to suggest that the contributions made by the church in America over the centuries were without value or that congregations were not doing faithful ministry for Christ and the kingdom he proclaims. But I think it is fair to say that we have often confused the life of discipleship to which Jesus calls us with the duties, privileges and loyalties imposed on us as the nation’s dominant, if not official, religion. We have often lived more by the wisdom of the world than the foolishness of the cross. Now that our dominant role is slipping away, we find ourselves wondering who we are and what to do next.

Institutional religion has been in decline throughout my years of ministry. I have been asked many times whether I believe that the church is dying. My response is always the same: Of course the church is dying. How else can it be resurrected? Behind what you might consider a glib response is a truth as old as the church itself. Jesus told his disciples that following him meant taking up the cross and that all who seek to save their lives will lose them. The flip side is that all who lose their lives for Jesus and the reign of God he proclaims will save it. That is true both individually and communally.

Much of what Jesus has to say in the Sermon on the Mount sounds foolish on its face. But perhaps not as foolish as the pervasive belief that free access to fire arms is the only way to keep us safe and free, even as six-year-olds gun down their teachers. Maybe the way of Jesus is not as foolish as the proxy war between two global powers systematically destroying the nation they both claim to be saving. Maybe the way of Jesus is not as foolish as sheepish faith in political strong men promising “make America great again-” whatever that means. Maybe the way of Jesus is not as foolish as the ancient creed of nation, blood and soil that gave us the carnage of two world wars, the greatest genocidal program of the Twentieth Century and promises the same for the Twenty-first. Perhaps, like alcoholics who finally hit rock bottom, we are ready to acknowledge our toxic and symbiotic relationship with a world that is perishing. Maybe once the haze of our intoxication with privilege has worn off, we will be able with new eyes to see the kingdom of heaven which, Jesus tells us, has drawn near.

How much longer will this trend of ecclesiastical decline continue? How much smaller will the American church become? Perhaps we will become so small that our voice will no longer carry any weight in the halls of power and we will have been consigned to the margins of society-only to discover that this is precisely where we should have been all along. Perhaps we will become so small that we can no longer allow our cultural, historical, doctrinal and denominational differences to divide us-because we need each other too much. Perhaps we will become so poor that we have nothing left but the Word of God-which is really all we ever had to begin with. Perhaps we will become so marginalized, so weak and so impoverished that God can finally make good use of us again. Maybe our decline isn’t decline at all, but simply our being “prune[d] to make [us] bear more fruit.”  John 15:2. Maybe we are losing our life only to gain it. Maybe we are dying only to be reborn. Maybe the old is perishing only to make way for the new. Maybe the reign of God has drawn near. Or maybe I am just being foolish.

Here is a poem by Amanda Gorman sounding a hopeful note for dark times. Foolish? Maybe. But perhaps Ms. Gorman is giving us a glimpse of what God’s dawning reign looks like.     

New Day’s Lyric

May this be the day

We come together.

Mourning, we come to mend,

Withered, we come to weather,

Torn, we come to tend,

Battered, we come to better.

Tethered by this year of yearning,

We are learning

That though we weren’t ready for this,

We have been readied by it.

We steadily vow that no matter

How we are weighed down,

We must always pave a way forward.

This hope is our door, our portal.

Even if we never get back to normal,

Someday we can venture beyond it,

To leave the known and take the first steps.

So let us not return to what was normal,

But reach toward what is next.

What was cursed, we will cure.

What was plagued, we will prove pure.

Where we tend to argue, we will try to agree,

Those fortunes we forswore, now the future we foresee,

Where we weren’t aware, we’re now awake;

Those moments we missed

Are now these moments we make,

The moments we meet,

And our hearts, once all together beaten,

Now all together beat.

Come, look up with kindness yet,

For even solace can be sourced from sorrow.

We remember, not just for the sake of yesterday,

But to take on tomorrow.

We heed this old spirit,

In a new day’s lyric,

In our hearts, we hear it:

For auld lang syne, my dear,

For auld lang syne.

Be bold, sang Time this year,

Be bold, sang Time,

For when you honor yesterday,

Tomorrow ye will find.

Know what we’ve fought

Need not be forgot nor for none.

It defines us, binds us as one,

Come over, join this day just begun.

For wherever we come together,

We will forever overcome.

Source: “Amanda Gorman Releases a Brand New Poem,” Eyewitness News, January 3, 2022. Amanda Gorman (b. 1998) is an American poet and activist. Her work focuses on issues of oppression, feminism, race, and marginalization, as well as the African diaspora. She was born in Los Angeles, California and was raised by her single mother, a 6th-grade English teacher. Her twin sister, Gabrielle, is an activist and filmmaker. Gorman has said she grew up in an environment with limited television access, describing her young self as a “weird” child who enjoyed reading and writing. She was the first person to be named National Youth Poet Laureate. She published the poetry book The One for Whom Food Is Not Enough in 2015. In 2021 she delivered her poem “The Hill We Climb” at the inauguration of U.S. President Joe Biden. You can read more about Amanda Gorman at the Poetry Foundation website.

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[1] Though, of course, it might function that way.