Category: Society

Choosing War Again

We are at war again! How easily we go to war! It is as if, having prepared for war with all manner of sophisticated weaponry, we cannot help ourselves but to use our weaponry. Is that because we have to prove how powerful we are?

I am referring to us as a people. Abraham Lincoln reminded us that we are “a government of the people, by the people, for the people” with the hope that our democratic form of government would “not perish from the earth.” We choose our representatives and president. We can choose presidents who are problem solvers for the American people or we can choose a president who is needy for power and make him our commander in chief, making available to him all manner of military power.

We the people have again gone to war. We have attacked Iran, and as with all wars, a rationale has been given by our president and many of our legislators. Apparently, we are going to be the Iranian people’s savior. We are doing regime change again. (How well has that worked in the past?) Or, at least, we will open the way for the people of Iran to make changes, as if we consulted them for what they needed. Iranian organizations working for change in Iran know, on the ground, what is necessary for change. We are not it. Nor does the destruction we bring help them: the loss of life, the children killed in an elementary school, a hospital bombed.

We the people are at war. By a majority, we chose our president and representatives, and the government we have chosen has taken us to war. Yes, our president has acted lawlessly. (There were no “imminent threats from the Iranian regime.” Politico) Nor did he consult with congress. But then we chose a lawless president. We knew he was lawless, if we were paying attention.

Each of us are responsible for the decisions we make, the actions we take, the leaders we choose, the witness we present. We witness from values we hold, from our sense of purpose in life, from what we live for. There are alternatives to war. Yet, we keep choosing war.

The prophet Isaiah envisioned a day when “nation shall not lift up sword against nation; neither shall they learn war any more.” For that day to come he exhorted us: “Come, let us walk in the light of the Lord!”

Inherent to our humanity is the potential to decide to walk in the light of our Creator (the light is there for us) or pretend we are our own god and walk in the darkness of our deceit and make life hard for those we live with. A government of the people means that the decisions of a nation come through the people rather than a king. The people choose their representatives and their president. We do so in light or darkness (or some measure of both).

In this moment, we can make decisions about our government. We have agency. We can take stands, speak out, press for change, be witnesses to another way of operating, the way of “doing justice, loving mercy and walking humbly with our God.” We can be light in the darkness, if we will be open to the light.

There is an alternative to war. We have had difficulty accepting it or signing up for it. Jesus speaks it: “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God.”

Filed under: Justice, Leadership, Peace, Society, War, WitnessTagged with: , , ,

Can ICE Agents Be Saved?

”Can they be saved?” is a question that could have been asked of tax collectors in Jesus’ time and place. These traitors who collected taxes in Judea for the occupying power of Rome were at the top of the list of sinners. Religious leaders certainly saw them outside of God’s mercy. They asked Jesus’ followers, “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?”

Can tax collectors be saved? Can ICE agents be saved? Can those occupying cities in this nation, pulling people out of their homes and cars, beating them, shooting them, confining them in inhumane detention centers, deporting them to nations they are not from, separating parents from their children, racially profiling and abusing them be saved? Can White supremacists be saved? (A White pastor who had been detained by ICE was let go with the words, “Well, you’re White. You wouldn’t be fun anyway.” Clearly, White supremacists have been recruited for this activity.)

Can ICE agents be saved?

Can tax-collecting traitors who got rich off the oppression of others be saved?

Jesus was passing by a man named Zacchaeus who was a chief tax collector and was rich. Jesus said to him, “Zacchaeus, hurry and come down, for I must stay at your house today.” People grumbled at Jesus’ going “to be the guest of one who is a sinner.” But Zacchaeus demonstrated repentance, “Look, half of my possessions, Lord, I will give to the poor, and if I have defrauded anyone of anything, I will pay back four times as much.” Jesus said, “Today salvation has come to this house…for the Son of Man came to seek out and to save the lost.”

Another tax collector, Matthew, became one of Jesus’ twelve core disciples. Jesus “called Matthew sitting at the tax-collection station, and he said to him, `Follow me.’ And he got up and followed him.” And Jesus made it clear to Matthew, and to all, that following him meant that they “deny themselves and take up their cross and follow.”

Jesus’ central message was “repent and have faith for the reign of God is near.” Let go and let God reign in your lives.

Salvation is open to all. Relationship with God is open to all. The way is repentance. Turn around. Do not continue down the path you are on. Relinquish your life to God. Let God direct your steps.

The message to ICE agents is: “Do not continue to bully and terrorize others. But turn to the God who is Love and have your life turned around, so that you exist for the uplift of others and for seeing other’s needs and serving them.”

Salvation comes to the house of an ICE agent when they repent. Salvation comes to those who oversee ICE, when they repent and bear fruits of repentance. Fruits of repentance are seen when leaders in government no longer center their decisions on holding on to power, but instead take responsibility for leading our nation with compassion and care for all.

By God’s grace repentance, change of direction, and new life is available to all.

Filed under: Grace, Justice, Mercy, Repentance, Salvation, SocietyTagged with: ,

Martin Luther King Jr: “Why Jesus Called A Man A Fool”

In 1967, Martin Luther King Jr. preached a sermon entitled, “Why Jesus Called A Man A Fool.” His text was Luke 12:16-21, the parable of the rich man who had a bumper crop and decided to pull down his old barns and build larger ones where he would store all his grain and goods.

Pastor King notes that the man was not called a fool simply because he was rich. Things had come together for this man in such a manner that he had far more than he needed. What made him a fool was his assumption about himself and his relationship to others. With his riches, he said, “I will do this: I will pull down my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods. And I will say to my soul, Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry.”

The point of the story: “But God said to him, ‘You fool! This very night your life is being demanded of you. And the things you have prepared, whose will they be?’”

King notes that the man made relaxing, eating, drinking and being merry the goal of his life. King further notes the use of the word “I.” The man assumes that it is all about him. He does not acknowledge his dependence on others, those who worked his land and built his barns.

King talks about our interdependence. Those who are rich in our nation did not become rich without the work of others. He also reminds us of the way “the black man made America wealthy.” The wealth the nation derived from cotton was produced on the backs of an enslaved people. That work remains unpaid.

Pride and arrogance make us blind to our dependence on others. Ultimately, it makes us blind to our dependence on God for our very being and for our purpose in life, which is to love one another as God has loved us.

King applies this blindness to the kind of religion we make up for ourselves:

“Any religion that professes to be concerned about the souls of people and is not concerned about the slums that cripple the souls—the economic conditions that stagnate the soul and the city governments that may damn the soul—is a dry, dead, do-nothing religion in need of new blood.”

King echos Jesus who calls us to feed the hungry, welcome the stranger, clothe the naked, care for the sick, and visit those in prison. And the prophet Micah who tells us what God requires of human beings: We are “to do justice and to love mercy and to walk humbly with our God.”

Filed under: Humanity, Justice, Racism, Serving, SocietyTagged with: , ,

We Do It Because We Can

Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to such and such a town and spend a year there, doing business and making money.” Yet you do not even know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. Instead you ought to say, “If the Lord wishes, we will live and do this or that.” As it is, you boast in your arrogance; all such boasting is evil. (James 4:13-16)

Come now, you who say we will go into such and such a nation and, having the military power to do it, will take hold of their government to bend it to our will which is to have their oil.

“Yet you do not even know what tomorrow will bring.”

Never mind that over a hundred people are killed by our actions, families robbed of their loved ones. Never mind the loss of life. It is necessary to obtain access to the oil. After all, it is our oil. We lay claim to it. And we have the means to take it.

“Yet you do not even know what tomorrow will bring.”

And while we are at it, having the military power we have, why not make Columbia bend to our will and Mexico as well? Why not take over Cuba and Greenland and Canada?

“Yet you do not even know what tomorrow will bring.”

“For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?” (Mark 8:46)

Filed under: Evil, Society, War, WitnessTagged with: ,

Who Is Responsible For Global Warming?

Lately, my wife and I have been wearing masks when we go outside, as smoke from the forest fires in Canada have reached the area in which we live. We understand that climate change is making these events more likely with drier conditions, increased wind and lightening strikes.

Many scientist are calling the time in which we live the anthropocene period. We, humans, are the creature that is having the dominant effect on the earth, bringing great change to the environment and to the earth’s climate. For years, we have pumped carbon into the atmosphere, trapping heat and warming our planet with the subsequent change of our weather patterns.

This change effects not only ourselves but all creatures on this planet. We are making our planet-home increasingly inhospitable to life. This situation is an issue for all creatures, but responsibility resides with humans to take the actions necessary to stop the destruction.

These actions will involve nations working together to bring about an end to the huge amount of carbon gases we are releasing into the air. The United States is the second worst emitter of CO2, China leading the way. As a step in the right direction, the United States joined with other nations in signing the “Paris Agreement,” from which President Trump, with his “drill baby drill” speech and attitude, has ordered our withdrawal in both of his terms, and has pushed against wind and solar energy in favor of oil, gas, and coal.

And yet our responsibility remains. The first chapter of Genesis, drawing from human experience, recognizes this responsibility. We read there that we “have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air and over every living thing that moves upon the earth.” It is clearer than ever, in this anthropocene period of our planet, that we have “dominion.” With this power, we can be good stewards or bad. We can decide for life or death. We have a responsibility, whether we exercise it or shirk it.

Clearly, we have many leaders who refuse their responsibility. Nevertheless, we all remain responsible whether we choose to be or not. We are responsible for the leaders we choose. We are responsible for how we contribute to global warming. Each of us is responsible for gaining knowledge of the effects of our personal behavior on our environment and taking actions for reform.

Jesus called his followers to be witnesses whose witness can take many forms. We must join with others in witnessing to God’s care for life on this planet. We must exercise our calling to be good stewards of the earth and encourage others to respond to the needs of all creatures who share our planet-home. We must acknowledge that our life-styles must change. We cannot continue to operate the way we have. People of faith know about the necessity of repentance, of turning around, changing our minds, changing direction. That is what this moment calls for—for the sake, not only of ourselves, but of all creatures that share our home.

Filed under: Climate Change, Environment, Humanity, Society, WitnessTagged with: , , ,

Christian Leaders and the Priorities of Jesus

When Peter James and John, who were fishing on the Sea of Galilee, were called by Jesus to follow him, we are told that they left everything to follow him. They went where he went, into small towns and across the countryside where people in large numbers came out to him.

They went to people who were marginalized by sickness, lepers who had to stay outside the community; they went to people in need of God’s healing and deliverance. Jesus led his followers out to welcome “the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind.” These followers became part of Jesus’ mission “to bring good news to the poor…to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set free those who are oppressed.”

Jesus still comes to needy people today through his followers. In fact, you can recognize followers of Jesus by their compassion for those who are pressed to the margins of our society and who care for others regardless of their station in life. Followers of Jesus—when they are following Jesus—look beyond people’s faults and see their needs. With the grace and transformation they have experienced in Christ, they serve, most of them out of the limelight. They themselves are broken people reaching out to other broken people with the mercy and healing they have received.

You know Jesus’ followers by their actions, not by their doctrines and theologies. You know them by their compassion. Not all who name the name of Christ, know Christ. And not all who do not go by the name Christian are distant from Christ. In their actions, it can be seen that they have touched the Christ reality.

Jesus said, “They will know you by your love.” They will not know you because you prospered and became rich—and praised God for your status in a world that makes much of the rich and powerful. They will not know you by a politics that judges others and categorizes the “sinners” of our age. (The religious leaders of Jesus day ridiculed Jesus for eating with sinners. And Jesus did not hold back words of judgment regarding the actions of religious leaders whose religion operated far from the heart of God.)

James, who was very possibly a brother of Jesus, sounds like Jesus when he calls out those who have made themselves rich by the impoverishment of others. James wrote:

Come now, you rich people, weep and wail for the miseries that are coming to you. Your riches have rotted, and your clothes are moth-eaten. Your gold and silver have rusted, and their rust will be evidence against you, and it will eat your flesh like fire. You have laid up treasure during the last days. Listen! The wages of the laborers who mowed your fields, which you kept back by fraud, cry out, and the cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord of hosts. You have lived on the earth in luxury and in pleasure; you have nourished your hearts in a day of slaughter. You have condemned and murdered the righteous one, who does not resist you.

There are many who put themselves forward as Christian leaders who avoid this text from the Bible. And yet it is a word for our times. We have leaders with money and power who craft legislation that furthers their riches and power on the backs of those who struggle to get food on the table and get the health care they need. They judge others for their poverty while giving handouts to themselves, taking from those we came to see as “essential workers” during the COVID health crisis.

What do we make of the “big, beautiful bill” our president is pushing through congress? How do we understand its meaning and discern its impact? Who is it crafted for? What kinds of rationalizations and justifications are being promulgated to sell the bill to people it will not help? How are people viewed in this bill? How are the rich viewed? How are the poor viewed?

To leaders, especially religious leaders, Jesus said, “They tie up heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on the shoulders of others, but they themselves are unwilling to lift a finger to move them.”

Filed under: Compassion, Discernment, Discipleship, Justice, Leadership, Mercy, Society

Hope in the Midst of Despair

Hope does not disappoint us, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us. (Romans 5:5)

Hope is powerful. It makes both inner peace and outward action possible in the most distressing situations. When we lose hope, we lose peace and the ability to act. When we have hope, true life-giving change is possible.

Hope is not the same as optimism. I find myself looking for signs in our culture and politics that would give reason for optimism. Some days are better than others. One day provides circumstances and situations that give some measure of optimistic outlook only to have the next day’s occurrences shatter the previous days optimism.

Hope is different. Hope reaches beyond all situations and circumstances. It transcends our limited views and actions. It is an aspect of our infinite openness. It finds its source and resting place in God.

Hope is like the faith that moves beyond our personal capabilities to the One who holds our lives together. It is like the love that can have us saying, “I will love you forever” because we experience a forever, unconditional love that looks beyond faults—a “love poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit.”

Hope has that same kind of transcendence. That is why Paul names faith, hope and love as eternal. They abide when everything else falls away—or fails.

Optimism, dependent as it is on circumstances, has little power for action and for bringing about change. It can quickly move to pessimism and despair. Hope, on the other hand, is not governed by present situations. It views the present difficulties before the expanse of what could be, of what truly brings life and makes room for love and trust. It comes with vision for a future with hope, for love that reigns in human hearts, and with a faithfulness to a higher calling—the call to our true humanity made in the image of the God who is Love.

When I see people bringing life-giving change, I see people with hope. I also see that they love people, that they exhibit compassion and therefore look beyond others’ faults in order to act for their uplift—and for the transformation of our world situation. I also see trustworthiness. They do not simply talk the talk, but walk the walk. They have the staying power of abiding faith, hope, and love.

The trinity of faith, hope, and love is available to all. It is near to all. It is as near as our true humanity which is as near as the reign of God. Jesus said, “Repent, for the kingdom of God is near.” That is, turn to what is near. Turn to God’s presence and let God reign in your heart. Turn to your true self in the God who is near, and receive a self that grows in trust, hope, and love.

”May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.” (Romans 15:13)

Filed under: Compassion, Hope, Humanity, Love, Society, Spirituality

Refugees In Our Midst

God enacts justice for orphans and widows, and he loves immigrants, giving them food and clothing. That means you must also love immigrants because you were immigrants in Egypt. (Deuteronomy 10:18-19)

These words from Deuteronomy, in the Bible, were directed to those who “revere the Lord your God” and who “serve him, cling to him,” a people who themselves had been immigrants. They had been immigrants who then were enslaved. They knew what it was to be received into a land and then mistreated.

God says to them that they were not to be like that with those who came into their land. They were to love immigrants because they had been immigrants and because God loved and welcomed them.

This message from the Bible is especially for those who read the Bible as their sacred text, who hear in these words a word of the Lord.

For those who believe in the God who loves immigrants, it is impossible to support what is happening in our nation and the actions of our leaders in regard to immigrants. We are to care for the sojourner in our land. It makes no difference how they came here. They remain human beings made in the image of God in our midst, with needs. We are not to turn away from them. We are not to add to their burdens. We are not to demean them, treating them all as criminals, so as not to feel we have a responsibility for their welfare.

This is a word especially for those who see themselves as people of the Book, of the Bible and as Christians. If we are unwilling to welcome the sojourner, if we refuse care and a place for those who have fled from harm, if we would only add to their harm, it would be better not to call ourselves Christian, that is, persons who have come to be in Christ.

If we have come to be in Christ, the Christ in us does not allow us to disregard other human beings created in God’s image. The love of Christ compels us to respond to their needs—which means getting to know them and their actual needs.

Whatever the laws of our land are or become, we have to live by the law of love which we have come to know in Christ. We must not make of our nation or its laws an idol. We are children of God, before we are citizens of a particular nation. That is why St. Paul calls us “fellow citizens with God’s people.”

We have learned to recognize fellow citizens of a common humanity across national borders and ethnicities who we are called to love with the love of God poured into our hearts by the Spirit.

Filed under: Compassion, Justice, Mercy, SocietyTagged with: ,

Discerning the Signs of the Times

Speaking to the religious leaders of his day, Jesus said, “You know how to interpret the appearance of the sky [whether fair weather or threatening weather], but you cannot interpret the signs of the times (Matthew 16:3).”

Religion does not enable us to discern the signs of the times. Laws, morals, and principles to live by do not enable us to discern the signs of the times. Philosophies, theologies, and ideologies (conservative or progressive) do not enable us to discern the signs of the times. The most helpful of our theologies and ethics speak in generalities and may provide some help in broad strokes, but offer little help for discerning the signs present in the specific situations of our lives and times.

Discernment for what is happening in our world and for the actions we are to take is ultimately a spiritual activity with a prophetic element.

The Pharisees and Sadducees, to whom Jesus was speaking, had a well-developed and rational theology and moral philosophy that made sense within their systems of thought, but they were blind to the signs of their times.

There is much religion and moral thinking that operates within closed systems of thought. Religions often operate with the assumption that from their theologies and ethical thinking they can speak to virtually anything. Religious leaders can give the impression that they speak for God as they give answers from their particular theology or ethical philosophy.

People who make decisions from a particular theology or set of moral principles may feel secure in their theology, morality, and decisions. They may also be self-righteous and judgmental toward others who do not share their way of thinking. The morality of moral people can blind them to their own immorality. Paul writes of those who judge others: “In passing judgement on another you condemn yourself, because you, the judge, are doing the very same things (Romans 2:1).”

It is possible to say we live by the Bible (or some other sacred text) or act from a clear set of moral principles but, in actuality, live far from the truth—all the while judging others who do not share our views. For all our moralizing and reading the Bible and having a theology, we operate blind. As with the religious leaders of Jesus day, we do not discern what is happening around us (or in us).

Discernment is a spiritual activity. Having a well-developed theology and morality will not help us discern the signs of the times. We cannot discern the signs without discerning God’s will. (Of course, we have to pay attention to the times, to what is going on around us, but paying attention has a spiritual aspect as well.) We must discern God’s will in order to discern the times in which we live.

Paul gives a very succinct description of what is involved in discerning God’s will. He tells us to “present your bodies as a living sacrifice” (relinquish your lives to God) and “do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God (Romans 12:1-2).”

Having a morality or principles to live by (no matter how we got them) will not enable us to discern. Spiritual discernment comes with submission to God and therefore to God’s will and therefore excludes conforming to a world caught up in arrogance and self-absorption. It involves allowing ourselves, our ways of thinking and deciding, to be transformed by the renewing work of the Spirit. It involves the leading of the Spirit.

Only then can we begin to discern the signs of the times.

Furthermore, we cannot turn over the exercise of discernment to others: to religious leaders and “prophets.” There have always been far more false prophets than true prophets. We cannot give over to others the discernment that we are responsible to exercise. We must, each, submit our lives to God and grow in openness to God’s will, so that we “are no longer children, tossed to and fro and blown about by every wind of doctrine, by people’s trickery, by their craftiness in deceitful scheming (Ephesians 4:14).”

Jesus would have his followers discern the signs of the times, so that they may speak and operate from that discernment. He would not have us secured by and bound to a theology as the Pharisees were, but rather open and still before the living God, waiting for the still small voice.

Prayer becomes critical for true discernment—prayer as submission to God and God’s will. Prayer does not consist in the practice of providing a list of things for God to do for us that we believe will make our lives better. Prayer is submission of our lives to God for the leading of the Spirit, for eyes that see and ears that hear.

There is no substitute for the contemplative life, for life open to God, open for truth in the inward being. We are called from the noise of our world, including the religious noise. We are called to a letting go of ourselves, or, as Jesus says, to a losing of ourselves that we may gain our true selves, selves that are open and discerning and therefore receiving direction.

Filed under: Prayer, Society, SpiritualityTagged with: ,

Grief, Healing, and Action

Many of us are grieving the reelection of Donald Trump to the office of president of the United States of America. We have seen his cruelty. We remember his separating children from their parents at the border. We have seen how he demeans and taunts others. We have seen his racism, sexism, and xenophobia. We have seen how he hooks into people’s fears, grievances, and prejudices. He manipulates and abuses human weakness for his own purposes.

So we grieve. We grieve the state of our union, our relationships to one another, our divisions.

Joe Biden has often said “That is not who we are,” when speaking of the kinds of actions and attitudes expressed by Trump. And yet the extent of our embrace of Trump makes him a mirror that reflects us as a nation. He certainly is not the only mirror, but he is one that reveals something of what is valued and pursued in our nation and how we view one another.

The truth is we are all broken. We need healing. We need deliverance. From anger. From self-absorption. From fear. From grievances. From the way we view and judge one another. We need to be freed from the hooks that a Trump can hook into.

We need to love one another. Those of us who are followers of Jesus have learned from Jesus that we are to serve one another with compassion and to witness to the love that is near and available.

When Jesus saw the crowds, he had compassion for them because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. (Matthew 9:36)

Harassed and helpless describes the human condition. In our helplessness, we need compassionate action in our lives. When we have come to know that compassion, we must share it. We must exercise it.

Compassion does not judge others; it does not write them off. But it does discern. And it does not remain silent. We must speak the truth in love. We must speak to the underlying egotism and self-absorption that alienates us from one another, alienates us from knowing or caring about what others are going through, confines us to our own felt needs and agendas and views of the world. Alienates us from Love. We must speak deliverance.

And then the compassion we experience must continue to move us outward in doing justice. When, for example, Trump starts rounding up millions of undocumented people, putting them into internment camps, separating them from spouses and children, in order to process them out of the country, we must stand in the way. We must speak out. We must call others to give witness to the injustice and work to make right what is wrong. Rather than add to the darkness, we must be light in our society.

Filed under: Compassion, Healing, Love, Serving, Society, WitnessTagged with: ,