The (Good) News—A Sermon on Preaching and Power

School is out at UC Davis, so my weekly Wednesday beat is on hiatus until September; I preached this sermon to the good people of Lutheran Church of the Incarnation, as part of a handful of Sundays of sabbatical coverage throughout the summer.

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Grace and peace from God our Creator, hope our Redeemer Jesus the Christ, and the promised gifts of the Holy Spirit are with you, always.

Preparing a sermon each week is an interesting task. It’s one of my favorite things about my job, and it can be the most difficult part of my job. There’s always so much to say, and each week, I get to say it through the lens of the lectionary. And as the three-year cycle of the lectionary rolls through, even though we get the same texts, the sermon is never the same. And that’s because the world is never the same. The preacher is never the same. The congregation is never the same.

If years have passed, and a preacher has nothing new to say, I’m just not quite sure how that could be. I think, sometimes, that I could preach on the same scripture every week and still have something new. Because the Spirit is always moving. I am participating in the world around me, and I am reading literature, and I am talking with my friends and family, and I am scrolling through twitter, and I am listening to the news, and there is never a dull moment around here. Sometimes the constant movement of the world around us is overwhelming, and it causes preachers—myself included—to scrap a sermon and start over. This happens, in particular, in the wake of national tragedy or a major global event or even the results of a sports game, especially if it’s your local team. And especially if it happens on Saturday.

There’s a saying, attributed all over the place, but we’re pretty sure it was Karl Barth who said it: “Take your Bible and take your newspaper and read both.” He meant it for everyone, but it is most critical for religious leaders. So critical for preachers. In my life as a preacher, newspapers have been fewer and farther between, but I carry the whole internet in the palm of my hand. I sat down to write this sermon—like I do each one—having perused the news of the day on twitter, and taking into account the non-stop nature of our cultural development. Sometimes, someone tweets something that inspires me. Sometimes, someone tweets something that angers me. Sometimes, my entire timeline is dedicated to a breaking news story, and I know that that will dominate our hearts and minds for a while.

This week was one such week. On Wednesday, I awoke to news of a raging apartment fire in London, the official death toll of which has risen to 58. I kept scrolling to see that congressmen had been shot while practicing for their annual softball game, and that a UPS employee had killed three of his co-workers in San Francisco. On Friday, Amazon announced that they’re buying Whole Foods, and a lot of folks in the grocery industry—like Safeway, and Costco, and other giants of food in our nation—are wondering what this might mean for their jobs. Also on Friday, a jury in Minnesota acquitted Jeronimo Yanez of last summer’s murder of Philando Castile.

All of these news stories swirled around in my head as I read through this week’s lectionary texts, but none so heavily as this verdict. There have been so many black men and women killed by police in the last few years, that I have absolutely lost count.* Some of them stand out more clearly in my memory, like this one in particular, because it was broadcast on Facebook Live by Mr. Castile’s fiancée, who was in the back seat with her 4-year-old daughter. I didn’t watch it live, but it eventually made its way into my feed and it broke my heart.

Yesterday was the two-year anniversary of the murder of the Charleston Nine, black church leaders and Bible study participants who were gunned down by a white terrorist. That violence touched us directly—the shooter was a member of an ELCA congregation, and two of the pastors had graduated from our Lutheran Theological Southern Seminary—and so we acknowledged it more openly, including our Presiding Bishop Elizabeth Eaton.  

It is hard, as a white leader in a predominantly white denomination, to know what to say from the pulpit about another instance of racist violence in our nation.

In the case of Dylann Roof, he has been tried and convicted and sentenced; he is accountable for his crime in Charleston. In the case of Jeronimo Yanez’ acquittal, no one has been held responsible for this crime. Philando Castile was a beloved child of God, and he was murdered, live online. 

The injustice of it all renders me speechless—and not a lot renders me speechless. Fortunately for me, the Spirit moves—and others speak. I have many clerical colleagues that I only know from the internet, and I turned to them this weekend for guidance. One such colleague, the Rev. Marcus Halley, is a black Episcopal priest in Minneapolis. He tweeted, on Friday, about not being scheduled to preach this morning: “I want so badly to articulate a new world, and my anger over the senseless deaths of POC at the hands of police prevents me from seeing it. So, until I can see it, I will commit myself to praying for it, hoping my words can paint a world I'm not sure I believe in some days.” Father Marcus folds his hands in prayer, and for a moment, I stop wringing mine.

Fortunately for me, and for Father Marcus, we have Jesus to turn to, to help us see. We have stories of compassion, and justice, and healing, and liberation, and resurrection to turn to. In the most serious of manners, I exclaim “hallelujah!”

The Gospel story we are given this week is very lengthy, and, in it, Jesus is far from speechless. He gathers his disciples and friends and sends them out, empowered to continue his work in the world. He sends them to “proclaim the good news”—the kingdom of God has come near—and to “cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons.” When we feel rudderless, Jesus’ instructions set the course. There is good work to be done. There is good news to be shared.

In his letter to the Romans, the Apostle Paul makes it so clear. “Therefore, since we are justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have obtained access to this grace in which we now stand; and we boast in our hope of sharing the glory of God” (Romans 5:1-2). Again, I say, “hallelujah” because grace abounds. There is nothing that we have done, nothing that we have left undone, nothing that we can do, nothing that we can fail to do, nothing whatsoever that will affect the grace in which we now stand. We can sometimes get antsy here, as Lutherans, because we’re so nervous about the slippery slope of works righteousness. As Martin Luther reminds us, good works do not cause our salvation—we have obtained access to this grace through Jesus the Christ. Our good deeds are not a necessary component of some cosmic transaction—but they are necessary.

In our life together, we respond to the grace we have been given with gratitude to our God and by showing God’s love to our neighbor. Paul’s letter to the Romans continues: “God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us” (Romans 5:5); and because of this, because of the grace we have received, because of the love we have been shown, because of the power that has been shared, we are moved beyond our own understanding to love and to serve and to bring forth the kingdom of God. 

You may have noticed, though, as I was reading the Gospel text, that there were some caveats and some warnings. This good work of loving and serving and healing is not without its challenges. Some folks do not want to hear the good news, if it means they have to do something differently. (Some of us do not want to hear the good news, since it means we have to do something differently.) Some folks do not want to be healed, if it means they have to do something differently. And no demon is agreeable to being cast out, so that’s probably going to take some work.

There are a lot of stories of people reacting negatively to Jesus entering their communities—the folks who try to run him off a cliff earlier in Matthew’s gospel, being a shining example—and so he knows the disciples’ triumphal entries will be few and far between. He does not discourage them from going, or tell them to go only where it’s safe, or somehow make a way for them that has no trouble. He says, “See, I am sending you out like sheep into the midst of wolves; so be wise as serpents and innocent as doves” (Matthew 10:16).

The Rev. Alexia Salvatierra is an ELCA clergyperson and a community organizer in Los Angeles. She wrote a book about faith-rooted organizing, and devotes a lot of words to the ideas of Serpent Power and Dove Power, concepts developed right from this verse. “Serpent Power,” she writes, “is evident and measurable. It is the power of force, wealth, social influence, and numbers. There is nothing wrong with the use of serpent power with integrity….however, if all we use is serpent power, we have lost our unique call and contribution—the capacity to embody the power of the dove….When we take dove power seriously, we take seriously the best in people, the reality of the image of God in each of us, and the transforming work of the Holy Spirit.” We, as disciples of the risen Christ, must rely on our deeply held dove power. “We believe in the power of prayer. We believe in the power of truth and the power of love. We believe that there are contexts and moments in which moral authority is real, tangible, and effective" (74).

Jesus knew that the power at work in the world was mostly serpent power, and so the disciples would have to know how to maneuver through that. But they would also need to challenge serpent power with dove power. They did not need to be imbued with serpent power—their humanity and their society gave them that resource freely—but they needed the power of the Holy Spirit to be given to them, and the encouragement of Jesus to push them out into the fray. We do not need to be imbued with serpent power—our humanity and our society gives us that resource freely—but we need the power of the Holy Spirit to be given to us, and the encouragement of Jesus to push us out into the fray.  

Again, I say, “hallelujah” because that has been done for us! As members of the body of Christ, we have all the power we need. We can, as humans interacting with other humans, use our power for good or for ill. And when folks use their power to hurt us, it can be hard to turn that around and just “shake off the dust” (Matthew 10:14). But it is my prayer, for all of us, that we will rely on our dove power, and that we will “be brave enough to be kind." [2]

Amen.

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* — Dear reader, you can peruse excellent statistics and reporting on this from mappingpoliceviolence.org and the Washington Post's Fatal Force.

 

 

#YesAllWomen

I've been a little busy (you know, graduating from seminary) and so I haven't been here, addressing all the things that have caught my attention in the last few months. My newfound freedom (this week has already been sprinkled with "what now?" and "I think I'm bored" more than once) allows for some words on #YesAllWomen, and what that has to do with me.

I've been mulling over just how I want to talk about it, and a lot of that has to do with how everyone else has chosen to talk about it. If you've been on the internet in the last week, you've seen a lot more think pieces about misogyny than you're used to (unless you're me and you follow feminist writers who rarely put down the subject). You've seen the responses from men and women in support and in opposition. I don't really want to give you the scoop on who thought it was great and who thought it was stupid--you have the rest of the internet for that information. What I want to tell you is how I experienced it. Because this is my blog and that's what I do here.

On Saturday night (5/24) I crawled into bed after a wonderfully busy day of graduating and celebrating. I checked Facebook and Instagram to like some more of my classmates' pictures, and then perused twitter to see what had gone on that day, since I'd been largely absent. My feed was full of tweets and retweets tagged #YesAllWomen, sharing stories of harassment and trauma and the added terror of never being heard.

Women empowered each other to tell the world just what it is that we suffer day in and day out. We talked about everyday street harassment: catcalls, demands for smiles, lewd gestures, being followed, additional harassment for refusing advances. We talked about bars: unwanted chatter, drinks that demand something in return, being anonymously groped, additional harassment for refusing advances. We talked about dates: fear of the semi-stranger we'd agreed to meet, escape plans, "got home safe" text messages.

We talked about things like the number of men who hadn't called us for a third date after we'd said "no" to sex on the second. We talked about male friends who regularly use "rape" in sentences that are not about rape. We talked about male friends who think catcalls are compliments. We talked about talking to our friends and partners about our experiences, and about their less-than-thoughtful responses. We talked about how we hadn't necessarily thought about all of these things as misogyny before, but recognized the implications that our bodies were something to which those men felt entitled, and their ability to brush off our worst fears.

In addition, of course, to talking about all of our fears, we talked about why we have these fears in the first place. We talked about stranger rape, and date rape, and partner rape. We talked about intimate partner violence of all kinds. We talked about being attacked on the street and having onlookers literally look on. We talked about stalkers and about police departments who couldn't help until there was a crime committed.

The point is that we talked. We learned more about each other, we learned more about our common lives, we learned more about how to talk to children and adults about the realities of violence. I learned about how common my experiences (and the experiences of my friends) have been. It's hard to explain how gross it feels to feel lucky that I have never been raped. It's a little bit grosser to debate with myself about putting a "yet" in that sentence.

If you're male, think about the ways in which your behavior could be perceived as scary to women. If you can't think of any examples, ask a female friend or your female partner, if you have one. She may love you, but she can probably think of one. And when she next tells you about the harassment she received on her way to your house, worry about that. And when you're next with your male friends and one of them says or does something you think even borders on sexism or misogyny or harassment, say so. That's what it takes.

If you haven't spent time in the #YesAllWomen hashtag, mosey on over and read for yourself what's up. Think about the ways in which you interact with your fellow humans. I know, right? That's really all I'm asking.

There's been a lot happening with regard to rape in our world, lately. It's been a fascinating and disgusting public debate and I have been struggling to decide what my two cents are and if they're worth adding to the cacophony. But it comes down to the fact that crying out in public against rape and against the public perception of rape is, at present, the only defense we've got. 

So. 

There was this gang rape in India in January, and then another earlier this week. The nation is looking at harsher punishments for perpetrators of rape. 

Then there was the incredible documentary The Invisible War, a story about which I heard on NPR this morning. This documentary looks at the incredible patterns of sexual assault in the US military.

On Monday, we heard the guilty verdict in the Steubenville, OH case of two high school boys who raped a female classmate after she was drunk to the point of unconsciousness.

There are no cases of rape that are not tragic.

The way that we as a nation and world respond to these instances, though, is what has been very painful this week. You've probably seen a bunch of stories about how CNN sympathized with the rapists and how plenty of Americans  lashed out at the victim, too.

What drives me up a wall in these instances is that the rape culture in which we live allows for us to place blame on these women/girls for the deplorable actions taken by these men/boys. That the "education" initiatives surrounding rape are victim-centered rather than perpetrator-centered. We teach our young girls that rape is practically inevitable (which is hard to argue with, as 1 in 6 women have been sexually assaulted).

What we're not teaching our young people is to respect themselves and to respect one another, and to value each others' lives. In this Steubenville case in particular, the terrifying reality is that these boys did not understand completely that what they were doing was illegal or wrong or even that it was rape. They and countless other teenage boys across this nation do not understand that the bodies of their female friends/classmates/neighbors/etc do not belong to them. 

Yes, for all of us avid Law and Order: SVU watchers, there are serial rapists out there who are violent criminals whose problems are larger than these. But there are plenty of date rapists and spousal rapists and rapists like these boys who are not convinced that anything they have done is wrong. 

This must stop. 

It seems absolutely insane to have to keep repeating that any non-consenual sexual activity is rape. And that anyone who has not said "yes" has, therefore, not consented. And that anyone who is physically incapable of saying "yes" has, therefore, not consented. And that what someone is wearing or how much someone has had to drink has no bearing on their consent. And that someone who has said "yes" before (like a partner or spouse) does not automatically consent in all times and all places.

It just doesn't seem that complicated to me.

If you want to read some very passionate responses to our dear nation's epidemic of rape, check out my two favorites from this week:



And then don't rape anyone. And then don't let anyone get away with raping anyone. And then never stop talking about rape culture. And then teach your children not to be rapists. Cool. Thanks.