Category: Grace

The Ten Commandments, Separation of Church and State, and Cultural Change

Louisiana passed a law that mandates the Ten Commandments to be hung in every public classroom in the state. On the face of it, if you exclude the first four of the ten commandments, the other six express what most people would regard as ethically desirable: Honor your parents, do not murder people, be faithful to your spouse, do not steal, do not bear false witness against your neighbor, and do not covet what belongs to your neighbor.

The first four are of a more religious nature. The first two call us from idolatry (the worship of images, extensions of our imaginations, and therefore of ourselves). The third has to do with not taking God’s name in vain and the fourth with keeping the seventh day holy by making it a day of rest.

The first four commandments clearly make this a religious document, that and the fact that these commandments are expressions of the Judeo-Christian tradition. It is disingenuous to treat them otherwise in a nation that calls for the separation of church and state. It does not work to define the Ten Commandments as an historical and foundational document in the formation of the nation. They remain an expression of ecclesial traditions.

Furthermore, it is clear from the comments made by the mandate’s supporters that the intentions behind this law are directed to infusing a particular Christian worldview into the culture of the state. Clearly, there is a problem with the state espousing a particular religious view. It is a problem for the state and for the religion. We have had a nationalist Christianity from our nation’s inception which was capable of supporting slavery and the dispossession of the land from people indigenous to it. This was a Christianity without Christ—a civil religion, supportive of nationalist goals, and wrapped in Christian rhetoric.

Also, the idea of mandating or forcing a particular Christian view onto a nation and culture has nothing to do with the ways of Christ. This mandating of laws as a way to reform culture was not the way Christ operated. He proclaimed the nearness of God, of God’s reign or governance, and called people to turn to God. He called them to trust their lives to God. He focused on the first commandment that calls us to turn from idols to serve a living and true God. (Along with common idols such as power, money and pleasure, we can make an idol of the Bible, our particular beliefs, our forcing our beliefs on others, our self-made-righteousness, etc.)

The other commandments, within Jewish and Christian scripture, mean very little without the first. Jesus said the central call of God, as the Hebrew Scriptures express it, was to love God with all our heart, soul, and mind and our neighbor as ourselves. From a place of trust in and love of God everything else about being truly human, made in the image of God, follows.

The reality of Christ and of God’s presence come not from politicians crafting legal mandates but from those who are light in the world. To his followers who were coming to know the reality of God’s presence, Jesus said, “Let your light so shine before others that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven” (from whom all good works flow).

Jesus reserved his harshest judgment for religious leaders who hammered people with their laws. He said, “Woe to you experts in the law! For you load people with burdens hard to bear, and you yourselves do not lift a finger to ease them.”

Jesus represents an entirely different approach to people and to personal and cultural change. He said, “Come to me, all you who are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.” Jesus operated by invitation, not mandates.

The change we need is a deep change in the human heart that laws do not reach, but which love does. This change cannot be forced. Mandates crafted by politicians, arrogant in their ability to force through legislation, do nothing to heal and liberate. Love and mercy bring true healing and transformation.

Filed under: Discipleship, Grace, Society, WitnessTagged with: , , ,

A Christian View of Christian Nationalism

By “Christian,” I mean a follower of Jesus who has come to view the world from the experience of “being in Christ.”

By follower of Jesus, I mean one who is being led to:

  1. Bear suffering in order to serve others. 1
  2. Serve rather than seek dominion over others.2
  3. Love rather than judge or condemn others.3
  4. Love enemies and pray for them.4
  5. Love our neighbor as ourselves, no matter who our neighbor is.5
  6. Do justice, love mercy and live faithfully.6

By the experience of “being in Christ” I mean that we:

  1. Participate in the reality of the crucified and risen Christ so that we die to the old in-turned self and rise to “walk in newness of life.”7
  2. Participate in Christ’s love.8
  3. Be led by the Spirit, rather than by religious rules, principles and beliefs which the “flesh” (the ego-centric self) loves.9
  4. Operate by God’s grace through faith, rather than legalistic moralism.10
  5. Trust ourselves, others, and all creation to God, rather than act like we are the ones who have the answer.

When Christian nationalism is viewed from the vantage point of following Jesus and participating in the reality of Christ, it is seen merely as nationalism with a Christian facade. It is an idolatry of the nation undergirded by Christian rhetoric, particularly in the form of “Christian” laws and principles.

Those who seek to bring back the “Christian foundations” of our nation hearken back to an earlier Christian nationalism, one, at least in part, inherited from Europe. They hearken to a kind of Christian morals and mores that existed as a dimension of our nation alongside its constitution, a Christian morality that for many included the institution of slavery and the dispossession of the peoples indigenous to the land. In other words, a Christianity far removed from the message and life of Christ—a Christianity quite capable of horrendous evil.

The present Christian nationalism carries forward the elements of this earlier nationalism, above all in its White (and male) supremacy. It downplays our history of racism, oppression, and injustice and discounts the primary roots of the American revolution and constitution in Enlightenment values.

Of course, there has been another much smaller stream of Christianity (which included European American Christians) that engaged in movements for the abolition of slavery, pressed for peace among nations, and sought social justice.

Above all, it has been African American Christians who, from their lived experience, brought radical clarity to the unchristian reality of our nation. Frederick Douglass called the Christianity of the slave-holding South and those Northern churches that continued to support their Southern counterparts as “sham religion.“

Black Christians continue to offer a critique and an alternative to White Christian nationalism. White Christians must listen to their voices—which means we must repent of our arrogance. By listening with open hearts, we will receive from those who experience the oppressive nature of White Christian nationalism.

The call to follow Jesus and participate in the Christ reality is a call to repent from all Christian nationalism, from all idolatry of nation and of whiteness and of ourselves, and all attempts to have dominion over others. Freed from idolatry, we are freed from feeling like we must secure “our Christianity.” We are freed from safeguarding what we have built (our false Christianity) and therefore freed to serve others.

Jesus calls his followers, not to dominate and bully others, but to be salt and light in the world, to be witnesses to God’s love and mercy in word and in action. At the heart of our witness is a welcoming love toward others that does justice, loves mercy and walks humbly with God.

  1. “If any wish to come after me, let them deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me.” Luke 9:23 ↩︎
  2. “But Jesus called them to him and said, “You know that the rulers of the gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones are tyrants over them. It will not be so among you, but whoever wishes to be great among you must be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you must be your slave, just as the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve and to give his life a ransom for many.” Matthew 20:25-28 ↩︎
  3. “Do not judge, so that you may not be judged.” Matthew 7:1 ↩︎
  4. “Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.” Matthew 5:44 ↩︎
  5. “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” Matthew 19:19 ↩︎
  6. “The weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faith.” Matthew 23:23 ↩︎
  7. “We were buried with him by baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we also might walk in newness of life.” Romans 6:4 ↩︎
  8. “God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us.” Romans 5:5 ↩︎
  9. “For all who are led by the Spirit of God are children of God.” Romans 8:14 ↩︎
  10. “For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God.” Ephesians 2:8 ↩︎
Filed under: Discipleship, Grace, Justice, Racism, Society, WitnessTagged with: , ,

Who Are Our Enemies?

There is this tendency to identify the bad guys with the assumption that we are the good guys: If we (the good guys) only got rid of all the problem people, all the vermin, things would be so much better. If we simply excluded or neutralized certain kinds of people, maybe whole categories of people, the ones we view as threats, who are the enemies of our communities and our nation, then things would be made right.

Running for president a second time is a man who makes a pledge: “We pledge to you that we will root out the communists, Marxists, fascists and the radical left thugs that live like vermin within the confines of our country that lie and steal and cheat on elections.”

He tells us that there are people who are “poisoning the blood of our country, it’s so bad and people are coming in with disease, people are coming in with every possible thing that you can have.” “Nobody has any idea where these people are coming from, and we know they come from prisons, we know they come from mental institutions, insane asylums, we know they’re terrorists.”

It has been noted that this kind of rhetoric has similarities to the language that Hitler used to enthrall the crowds that came out to hear him.

Donald Trump is often accused of creating divisions in our nation, when he is mostly stoking the divisions that are already there. The fear of others, the experience of threat from this or that group of people, the identification of our major problems as being outside of ourselves (those others) rather than within, sets us up for manipulation. Trump simply hooks into our tendency to ignore our own sin and make the place of evil external. The truth, as Paul tells us, is that “we have all sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” We are all a problem. We are all in need of spiritual transformation.

We have this tendency to see the problem as being mainly out there in “those people.” Exclude them or get rid of them and things will be okay. This tendency runs deep; it can be tapped into and is tapped into by wannabe authoritarians who need us to have an enemy they can promise to vanquish.

Jesus speaks to this tendency to see the problem mostly outside ourselves: “Why do you see the speck in your neighbor’s eye but do not notice the log in your own eye?” He makes it clear that until we take the log out of our own eye we are in no condition to help our neighbor, to see the speck in order to take it out of their eye.

When we operate with this kind of blindness and “have religion,” we are particularly dangerous. We are the good ones. We have God on our side. We are the ones who know where the problem comes from and what must be done.

It was religious leaders that handed Jesus over to Pilate to be crucified. When given the opportunity to choose the release of either Barabbas, an insurrectionist, or Jesus, they chose the insurrectionist.

When we remain unaware of the depth of our broken condition and project our disorder on others, blaming others for the very things we are guilty of, blaming them for the state of our nation, then we may seek judgment upon them. We gravitate to a leader who will put them in their place. And then, whatever afflictions they experience, we deem those afflictions as something they deserve.

The divisions we maintain with these attitudes run deep. They are ideological, cultural, ethnic, religious, and political. The attitudes that support these divisions are moralistic, judgmental, hardhearted, resentful, merciless, oppressive, and unloving.

The truth is we are all related, children of God, made in God’s image. We are all siblings of the same humanity whatever the differences of culture, ethnicity, religion, and vocation. And we are all broken. And the decisions we make affect others, all children of the same Creator. Therefore, St. Paul writes, “Let each of you look not to your own concerns but to the concerns of others.”

We must stop listening to someone in a position of power or desiring power badmouth our siblings. We must listen to our siblings, far and near, living under different circumstances from ours, facing difficulties, some of which, as with us, are of their own making and some of the making of others. Some experience societal forces pushing them to the margins. Others experience forces that ease them toward the center.

Whoever and wherever they are, we must seek to understand what others are going through, what forces affect their lives and their relationships. Get to know their needs. Get to know them. Have them on our minds, in our prayers. When a so-called leader tells us who threatens us, who we must be afraid of, who must be eradicated, we must refuse to listen. He or she is talking about our siblings. Even if there is someone who makes themselves our enemy, Jesus tells us to love our enemies and pray for them.

When we make decisions that will affect others (when we vote, for example), “let each of us look not to our own concerns but to the concerns of others.” Therefore, get to know the experiences and concerns of others. Hold them in our hearts so that, rather than trample over them, we respond to their concerns.

“Here I am, Lord. Is it I, Lord?
I have heard you calling in the night
I will go, Lord, if you lead me
I will hold your people in my heart.”

Filed under: Compassion, Fear, Grace, Humanity, Mercy, SocietyTagged with: , , ,

Politics Won’t Save Us

When traveling recently, I saw a very large sign that read, “Save America. Vote Republican.” I can imagine a similar sign from a Democrat.

I believe that politics matters and therefore who we vote for matters. When I consider who to vote for, I look for those who demonstrate some sense of social justice, mercy, and faithfulness. I have in mind the prophet Micah’s words about what God requires of human beings: “Do justice, love mercy and walk humbly with your God.”

I expect that those who are committed to justice will have some understanding of what is unjust in our society, what government policies and actions are unjust, and what steps a government can take to address injustices. I also want people in government who demonstrate mercy and compassion, who are not entirely self-absorbed and out for personal power. As far as walking humbly with God, I will settle for a demonstration of some humility. I tend to avoid politicians who do a lot of God-talk.

Politics are important and I take voting and participation in the political process seriously. But I expect very little from politics when it comes to salvation. The unethical ways that political campaigns are run and the ways that many voters are manipulated by appeals to the worst in us do not indicate much in the way of a rescue from what is tearing us apart.

We have ways we talk about our torn selves and society. We use psychological terms (repression, suppression, denial, avoidance, wishful thinking, rationalization, anxiety, obsession, addiction, etc.) and sociological terms (systemic racism, ethnocentricity, discrimination, sexism, power structures, class conflict, etc.). But there is another term that, outside religious circles, gets little mention. And that is the word, “sin.” It points to the underlying spiritual condition of our fragmentation.

In the New Testament letters of Paul, “sin” is often used to refer to the underlying power that affects our lives. Indicative of this are various phrases he uses: “power of sin,” “enslaved to sin,” “freed from sin,” “captive to the law of sin,” “sin that dwells within,” living “under sin,” and not letting “sin reign.” With this language, Paul indicates that sin is at the root of all human brokenness. He, therefore, rejects the idea of listing various sins that we must then work on eliminating in order to better ourselves. Our problem goes much deeper than something we can simply work on.

The problem of sin is the problem of our alienation from the source and center of our being and identity. Ultimately, the change that is necessary is spiritual. All other solutions to this fundamental problem are simply ways of managing our emotional, mental, and physical brokenness so that we can, on some level, maintain relationships, employment, daily business, some semblance of “success,” and the ability to “carry on.”

That is why scriptures, in one form or another, call us to the recentering of our lives. Our deepest need is to be reconciled to God. And, given the depth of our problem, only God can do this. So, Paul writes, “In Christ God was reconciling the world to God’s self.” (2 Corinthians 5:19)

The Gospel of John points to an enlightening that must happen for us to begin to acknowledge the depth of our problem. We are told that the Spirit of truth comes to prove us wrong about sin (It is worse than we think). The Spirit brings us to a point where we acknowledge that our problem is something we are unable to manage. It is more than all our psychological and sociological descriptions and solutions.

Furthermore, the Spirit must prove us wrong about sin, “because we do not believe in [Christ].” (John 16:8-11) We do not believe in the need for God as our Rescuer. We think we can solve our problem. We do not need outside help. We do not need the work of reconciliation that God has accomplished for us in Christ Jesus. So, the Spirit comes to enlighten us.

When we find ourselves giving up on ourselves to fix our problem; when we come to recognize our radical need for help and begin to turn to God, our Liberator, it is the Spirit proving us wrong about the nature of our condition and drawing us toward the help we truly need. Spiritual change is on the way.

Filed under: Grace, Humanity, Spirit, TruthTagged with: , ,

Where Is The Resurrected Life Found?

A reflection on Acts 10

Peter, a Jew, found it in a Roman soldier, who, as a soldier, represented the oppression of the Roman empire.

It took a vision and the leading of the Spirit to bring Peter to the point where he invited three Gentiles sent by a Roman centurion named Cornelius into his house and “gave them lodging.” And then went with them and entered into the home of Cornelius.

Peter shared with Cornelius the change he underwent: “You yourselves know that it is unlawful for a Jew to associate with or to visit a Gentile; but God has shown me that I should not call anyone profane or unclean.”

The distance Peter traveled could hardly have been greater: He was in the house of a Gentile, a soldier (in Christ, Peter had become a man of peace) and a Roman who represented the occupying power of Rome. Because the distance was religious as well as political in nature, it was a longer way to travel than that of a progressive ideologue sitting down with a conservative ideologue.

What made it possible was a spirituality that recognized the humanity in all. Peter had his eyes openned by the power of the Spirit. He had died to the old way of seeing others and made alive to what God was doing in places where he had not expected to see the resurrected life. The new life that he had found was not far from anyone, if they would turn to receive it.

Peter shared with Cornelius and his household what he had come to see: “I truly understand that God shows no partiality, but in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him.”

Peter speaks of “what is right” as a sign of God’s work in a person’s life. He also refers to the fear of God. But here it is not a slavish fear of punishment, but rather fear understood as taking God seriously, having reverence. The “fear of God” in Cornelius was seen in his life of prayer and care for the poor. This was a man who was open to what Peter had to share concerning Jesus of Nazareth who “God anointed with the Holy Spirit and with power; how he went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with him.”

Where is the resurrected life found?

It is found where love is practiced, where there is goodness and healing. Peter says nothing about what Cornelius believed but about what he did. The resurrected life is not, first of all, about beliefs or a particular Christian theology. It is about the lived life. Above all, it is about openness. One who thinks of themself as an atheist but is implicitly open to Incomprehensible Mystery and to our true humanity is closer to God than a Christian who has a well-worn Christian ideology, but whose heart is closed to others, particularly to others very different from themselves.

We have seen Christian ideologues operate by falsehood and manipulation, who live for power and are far from “how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power” for “doing good and healing all who were oppressed.”

Resurrection to new life is open to all who will receive, wherever and whoever they are. It is not far away. As with the reign of God, new life is near.

Filed under: Grace, Humanity, SpiritualityTagged with: , ,

Christmas Reflections 2021

Jesus came into the same world we live in, with the same pressures and fears and brokenness. He was born in an occupied land, a province of the Roman empire. Like us, the nation in which he was born was occupied by oppression, injustice, and violence. He was born as an outcast. There was no room for him in the inn.

We who have come to know Jesus, who have become his followers and have a taste of God’s reign, are not surprised by how the Messiah and Savior came into the world, how he came to us vulnerable as an infant born in a stable. Everything about his birth points to his life as a whole. He came to outcasts, to the poor, the broken, the sick, the leper, the deaf, and the blind. He came to those that the self-righteous put on their list of sinners. He did not come to condemn people, but to seek and to save the lost.

If we have experienced God’s grace through Messiah Jesus, if we who were lost are now found, we know this is the way God is. We are not surprised that the Savior’s birth is announced to shepherds in the field, rather than to those in positions of wealth and power or to religious leaders who make much of their righteousness and talk down to others.

Shepherds were among those at the bottom rung of society and as far as the religious leaders were concerned, they were ritually unclean. The announcement of the Savior’s birth is made to them. Is not this the way it is with God our Rescuer? God proclaims good news to those who have been marginalized. Our Liberator comes to us in our brokenness and need.

Shepherds in the field “keeping watch over their flock by night” are told that “this will be a sign for you: you will find a child wrapped in bands of cloth and lying in a manger.” The sign that this child is the liberator the world needs is that he is wrapped in rags and lies in an animal trough. And this is good news for us!

God our Savior, who comes to us in Jesus, comes where we are, in our low places, when things have gone wrong, when there is no room for us, when everything has broken down. In fact, when we are at our most vulnerable, most broken, we know, right then and there, that rescue and liberation is present for us.

Of course, when we are full of ourselves and thinking we have it together pursuing life on our own terms, our salvation is still near, but we hardly know it or experience it—until we are knocked off our high horse and perhaps blinded like Paul on the road to Damascus. He went from being full of himself and his self-appointed mission to being vulnerable, broken, and open. At that point he started to let God his Liberator direct his steps, and his mission completely changed.

Jesus described this spiritual reality. He said, “The humble are exalted and the exalted are humbled”—which is good news for both the humble and the exalted. The Savior meets us where we are. God will bring us down from our high horse in order to get us to a place where we will receive what God gives. And when we have hit rock bottom, God will raise us up. Either way it is grace. God’s grace is sufficient in every situation and time of need.

Because God has come to be with us in Christ Jesus, we are finding that we can rejoice in all circumstances. God our saviour is near, whatever we face. With the shepherds on that first Christmas eve, we join “a multitude of the heavenly host, praising God and saying, ‘Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace among those whom he favors!'”

Filed under: Grace, Mercy, Society

Reflections On Lent

We have difficulty admitting weakness. We tend to cover up our fears and feelings of vulnerability, not only before others but within ourselves. We all put up fronts before others and ourselves, in one form or another. Some put forward a front of confidence and strength. Others put up a front of neediness in order to get something from those who appear strong and self-sufficient. In either case, we attempt to control and manipulate situations and others, as if we were the source of our lives. In this denial of weakness, we run from our fundamental need which is our need for God.

The truth is that we are profoundly powerless, helpless, and weak. That we are these does not mean that there is no power, help, and strength for us. But denying this reality of helplessness (or acting like all we need is the strength someone else appears to have) cuts us off from our true power, help, and strength—the “grace that is sufficient” and “the power that is made perfect in weakness.” (2 Corinthians 12:9)

One of the aspects of Lent for Christians is the experience of silence and self-examination that puts us in touch with our weakness. We take a step toward our true selves when we acknowledge our cover-ups and our brokenness. We take another step when we willingly share our weaknesses and fears with others. It is at that point that we truly meet one another. We find that we are all in need of God’s grace.

In the season of Lent, we draw near to the cross of Christ which is both the symbol of our brokenness and of our deliverance. At the foot of the cross, we find true fellowship with one another. Gathered around the one who, in dying, took our sin upon himself, our cover is blown; our weakness is exposed. And we find that we all share the same condition. We are a fellowship of broken, needy people, needy for God and God’s liberation through Christ.

Lent is a season for getting in touch again with our weakness, that in our weakness we may discover strength and help and the empowering that is ours in God. We discover that “God is our refuge and strength a very present help in trouble.” (Psalm 46:1) The wording of this psalm does not have God giving us strength, but rather that God is our strength. It is in union with God that we experience power. Acknowledgment of weakness and loss opens the door to the power of God available through Christ. Baptized into Christ, we are united to Christ’s weakness, loss, and death. In Christ, we die to our attempts to be strong in ourselves apart from God, and we are released into the power of God, raised with Christ, and made alive to God and God’s will. Thanks be to God.

Filed under: Faith, Grace, Spirituality

Gifts In A Time of Pandemics: Anger

Anger follows hurt. We experience pain, then anger. We expect fairness. We expect welcome rather than rejection. We expect to be seen, to be acknowledged, and our basic needs recognized and affirmed. We expect our lives to be valued. Our humanity expects these things. At the heart of all these expectations, we expect love—to be loved and to love. From love flows mercy, justice, and faithfulness. Our humanity is trampled upon when these are not present. And we respond with anger and a desire and a need for what is wrong to be made right, that “justice roll down like waters and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream.” We cannot go on under conditions devoid of justice without taking action.

When Jesus came into the temple, he saw the injustice. He saw that what was meant to be a house of prayer had become a “den of robbers.” In anger, he made a “whip of cords” (John 2:15) and “drove out all who were selling and buying in the temple, and he overturned the tables of the money changers and the seats of those who sold doves.” (Matthew 21:12-13) In the streets of our cities, police cars have been overturned.

We learn what replaced the selling and the buying and the money changers, in the next verse (Matthew 21:14): “The blind and the lame came to Jesus in the temple, and he cured them.” Envision for our present moment: Police violence against black and brown bodies replaced by acts of healing.

Anger, of course, can simply lash out and accomplish little more than additional pain. And those on the outside of the pain can simply judge its futility. But if the pain underneath the anger is received with compassion (rather than with judgment and self-righteousness) healing is available. I think of the judgment that gets directed at looters and those who damage property when openness to the pain would provide another view. (Take a step toward being open and the help for being open will be there because the Spirit of God is about opening our hearts and giving us eyes to see.) Rather than simply seeing the destructive behavior of individuals, we will see a society that has been crafted and structured by white supremacy and racism, from slavery to Jim Crow to the present “new Jim Crow.” We, who are white, will see our racism rather than be fixated on broken store windows. We will see the racism and greed and indifference that have historically robbed people of ownership within our society, disenfranchised them, cut off opportunity, brought death, and provided a framework within which destructive action makes sense. I saw a video clip of a couple of protesters, seeing a man with a bat in front of a store window, go over to the man and gently lead him away from the action he was contemplating, and then put their arms around him in an act of understanding and solidarity. Compassion has an altogether different mode of operation from that of self-righteous judgment.

When compassion responds to and takes up misdirected anger and redirects it, healing and liberation happen. A little compassion, like a little faith that can move mountains, is powerful. God is in it.

Love can use anger in powerful and purposeful ways. It can help focus on and target what needs to be addressed. Anger is a strong and urgent emotion carrying within it the pain from which it arises, and harnessed by compassion zeros in on the present moment with imperativeness. It takes what love clarifies and gives it emotional urgency. Love—caring enough to attend to the depth of the problem and to gain knowledge—gives rise to solutions. Anger presses us with “why we cannot wait” for the solutions. Change must come now! Jesus saw the temple turned into a den of robbers and immediately acted.

A police force (along with carefully manufactured laws) that historically has been used to “dominate” (using our president’s term) black lives, must be dismantled. It needs to be replaced with that which can truly serve. I am grateful for those who have been rethinking what makes for public safety, who are “dreaming dreams and seeing visions” for something radically different from what we have now. “Defund the police” puts before us, with urgency, the kind of change that must happen: Defund the present police organizations with their militarization and their “us against them” mentality and their opposition to reform. Funds freed up by decreasing police functions become funds for social services, mental health care and housing for the homeless (rather than have police break up their encampments), treatment (rather than criminalization) for those with addictions, and health care, education, job training, community organizations, and community mediation. My local grocery store was one of the few grocery stores on the southeast side of Chicago that was not looted. It was not the police that stopped the looting, but neighborhood residents who essentially talked potential looters out of looting. And this was going on with other stores, as well. They were saved from being looted by the mediation efforts of the community. Contrast this with what we have come to expect from police in such situations, with their oppositional relationship to the community. It is time to defund the present “public safety” institutions and build and fund something more holistic and compassionate and embedded in the community.

For those who would immediately dismiss “defunding” as an impossibility, a sign of hope came from the Minneapolis city council when they voted to dismantle the police force. They decided that the “current policing system could not be reformed.” They pledged “to begin the process of taking apart the Police Department as it now exists.” (New York Times)

The pandemics of the coronavirus and racism have both brought forth anger, in different ways. In either case, we are helped by becoming aware of the pain underneath the anger, acknowledging it, and recognizing where that pain is actually coming from, so that we do not misdirect our anger. Love of ourselves and others helps us with that. The freedom of love gives a healing, liberating direction to our anger as we address the causes of the pain.

Filed under: Grace, Justice, Love, RacismTagged with: , ,

Gifts in a Time of Pandemic: The Freedom of Love

Consider two different responses to the pandemic:

  1. A group of people protests in front of a state capital building, some carrying assault weapons providing an image of threat and intimidation. They are protesting the infringement on their “freedom.” Social distancing orders have deeply affected their lives, their freedom of movement, and, for many, their employment. They have framed their losses as bondage.
  2. An elderly man is given a ventilator by people who love him, in a nation where there are not enough ventilators for all who need them. A band of people has found a way to pay for and obtain a ventilator for this man they love. It is a gift to him. He receives it and then gives it away to a young man who also needs a ventilator. He then succumbs to the COVID-19 virus.

Which of these two responses to the pandemic is an expression of freedom? Is freedom found in my ability to do what I want (do my thing) even when it infringes upon the lives of others, disregards their ability to live? Or, is freedom found in the ability to freely give up my life for the life of another?

Freedom is often expressed in terms of our ability to do what we want. But, as theologian Karl Rahner expressed in one of his essays, there are spheres of freedom. When it comes to our freedom of choice, one person’s sphere of choice is larger or smaller than another. Our spheres of freedom impinge on or affect the freedom of others. One person’s sphere of freedom can diminish another’s. Historically, the “privileges” given to white people by racism have limited the choices available to black people (choices regarding schools, vocations, health care, freedom from violence, etc.). The present economic disparities in our nation depict different spheres of freedom to make various choices. Those who are wealthy have many more choices for escaping the effects of the coronavirus than those who are poor.

The only thing that truly begins to address the disparities and injustices is the freedom that is love. Martin Luther King, Jr, understood this with great clarity: “I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality. This is why right, temporarily defeated, is stronger than evil triumphant.” This is true because love enters into the sphere of the other, even when that may mean diminishing one’s own sphere of choices. The elderly man, in giving up his ventilator, narrowed his choices. Again, Martin Luther King: “Love is the active outpouring of one’s whole being into the being of another.”

Love may have us narrowing our choices, but it also may have us expanding them. Love calls people beyond the limitations placed on them by others. It has us pressing forward, expanding our sphere in order to live out our calling in the compassionate use of our gifts in relation to others.

Whether our choices narrow or expand, love freely gives itself. It is the reality that cannot be coerced. We cannot make another person love us and we cannot keep another person from loving us. Even our evil actions against another cannot undo love, for love forgives. (Jesus from the cross: “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.”) Love, compassion, mercy, justice (making right what is wrong), bring true life-giving change and liberation.

The pandemic that we are enduring calls out for compassion and love. The disparities, along with leadership that ignores the poor and props up Wall Street, cry out for radical acts of love. When we see people answering this call, we see them freely giving themselves for the sake of others. Their actions heal and restore, do justice and liberate. We see genuine human freedom in these acts.

Regarding the two responses to the pandemic that I began with, each has a different feel to it. The first feels like the bondage of self-absorption. It does not feel like freedom to show up with weapons to demand that you get your way even at the cost of others’ well-being. The second feels like freedom, the freedom of giving oneself, one’s life, for another.

The opportunities to love are always there. But, in this time of a pandemic and the new situations it has created, it may be that the call to love—to the freedom that is love—is more easily distinguished from other voices. A gift is being offered to us: the call to love. Therefore, paraphrasing Jesus, “Let those who have ears to hear, let them hear and obey the call.”

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Gifts in a Time of Pandemic: Darkness

Hello darkness, my old friend
I’ve come to talk with you again
Because a vision softly creeping
Left its seeds while I was sleeping

Paul Simon

If I say, “Surely the darkness shall cover me,
and the light around me become night,”
even the darkness is not dark to you;
the night is as bright as the day,
for darkness is as light to you.

Psalm 139:11-12

God is present in the light and the darkness. In joy and sorrow. In success and failure. In gladness and affliction. God is in the darkness and darkened future of the present pandemic.

This year, I started growing plants for my vegetable garden from seeds. I had the opportunity to observe what many others have known: Seedlings grow faster at night. They capture the energy of the sun during the day and much of their growth happens in darkness. I am considering this as a metaphor for our growth into our true humanity. Growth often happens in the darkness and in the midst of trials.

The psalmist says, “Weeping may linger for the night, but joy comes with the morning.” (Psalm 30:5) Our lives include both night and morning, weeping and joy. Both darkness and light are necessary. God is in both.

I recall entering a time of trial and darkness. Because of previous experience, I was desirous of receiving what God had to give me through what I was enduring. When I came out of that period of struggle, I had mixed emotions, wondering if I had received everything from it that was meant for me. (Likely not, but I was grateful for what I did receive.)

Some trials are personal, some communal. We are presently enduring a global pandemic. It is a dark night that we share with others—although not all in the same way. Those who have lost loved ones to the virus experience the darkness acutely. Health workers on the front lines experience the depth of this pandemic in ways that most of us escape. And there are great societal disparities in the way this pandemic is experienced.

There are pandemics in the midst of pandemics. The pandemic of racism has a long history that continues alongside the coronavirus pandemic. The recent shooting death of a young black jogger by two white men (who were not charged until a video surfaced two months later) is a manifestation of this brutal pandemic—as are the historic inequities that are exacerbated by the virus. One pandemic affects the other. Will the darkness of the one help us to enter, in some manner, the darkness of the other? Because of the great unevenness of this virus’ impact, mainline news has had more to say about disparities than we are used to hearing. Will we stay with the hearing and go deeper?

The COVID-19 pandemic may be heightening our awareness—as the darkness often does. If we are open, we may no longer be able to ignore these other pandemics. We may gain hearts that move us to do justice and love mercy. We may find ourselves working to overcome the divisions that we have erected. We may receive an elevated sense of community that calls us to action, as we share with others during this pandemic.

In the darkness of this pandemic, there is great potential for change and growth. In the darkness, we may become more self-aware and engaged in inner work, acknowledging our false attachments, motivations, and attitudes. In the quietness of the night, we may wonder about our purpose. What is our true calling? What is truly essential for our growth as human beings? In the darkness, we become still and wait. We become open and receptive. In the darkness, we let go of trying to secure ourselves and, in letting go, we gain our true humanity made in the image of God.

God is in the darkness as well as in the light. We find God there if we do not attempt to fill the darkness with something foreign to it: binge-watching videos or drowning ourselves in social media or dulling our fears and insecurities with various addictions. And yet, even our addictions may play a part. Their enchainment may bring us to our knees and have us crying out to God for deliverance. When that happens, we have allowed ourselves to enter the darkness to receive its gift: The gift of growth and change and greater awareness of our need and the needs of others and the sharing of ourselves in the building of true community.

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