"Like a Flag Flown at Half-Mast to Mark a Tragedy"

Eric Reid and Colin Kaepernick kneeling during the National Anthem last season

He emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness. And being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death— even death on a cross. Therefore God also highly exalted him and gave him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bend, in heaven and on earth and under the earth.
Philippians 2:7-10

In a Tuesday morning tweet, theologian Diana Butler Bass wrote:

Preaching on Sun & just checked assigned lectionary text:  "At the name of Jesus, every knee should bend."

I kid you not.

Apparently even the Apostle Paul has something to say about NFL players “taking a knee during the National Anthem on Sunday.

The protest began in the 2016 preseason when Eric Reid and Colin Kaepernick chose to sit on the bench rather than stand during the national anthem to protest racial injustice and police brutality. A week later they decided that they should kneel rather than sit in order to make clear that their protest was meant to be respectful of the anthem and the flag.

In an op-ed piece in the New York Times, Reid writes:

“After hours of careful consideration, and even a visit from Nate Boyer, a retired Green Beret and former NFL player, we came to the conclusion that we should kneel, rather than sit, the next day during the anthem as a peaceful protest. We chose to kneel because it’s a respectful gesture. I remember thinking our posture was like a flag flown at half-mast to mark a tragedy.”

Like a flag flown at half-mast to mark a tragedy. 

Hardly a sign of disrespect.

“It baffles me that our protest is still being misconstrued as disrespectful to the country, flag, and military personnel,” Reid wrote. “We chose it because it’s exactly the opposite. It has always been my understanding that the brave men and women who fought and died for our country did so to ensure that we could live in a fair and free society, which includes the right to speak out in protest.”

Other players around the league joined Reid and Kaepernick in their silent protest, but it did not gain widespread attention until the President put it front and center in a speech on behalf of Senator Luther Strange in Huntsville, Alabama. He asked the crowd if they would “love to see one of these NFL owners, when somebody disrespects our flag, to say, ‘Get that son of a bitch off the field right now, he’s fired’?”

He also called for fans to boycott the league until the protest was stopped.

Which resulted in many more players choosing to take a knee during the anthem, and many of Mr. Trump’s fans reacting with anger toward the players.

We might pause for a minute to think about the language Mr. Trump used. The Nazis and White Supremacists in Charlottesville were carefully described with the generalization that there were good people on both sides. But (mostly) black football players taking part in a peaceful protest are called “sons of bitches.”

When the “Black Lives Matter” protests began, a major part of the criticism was that the protests were not sufficiently peaceful. But it is hard to think of anything more peaceful than kneeling.

In his “Minority of One” column in the Chicago Tribune, Steve Chapman writes:

“. . . if you don’t like how Black Lives Matter pursues its agenda, you should welcome the NFL players’ approach. It’s silent; it’s not disruptive; and it’s entirely nonviolent. It doesn’t block traffic, occupy police or frighten bystanders. . . That the display evokes so much fury and disgust among whites, from the president on down, confirms what was evident 50 years ago. The problem is not how blacks raise their complaints about American society; it’s that they raise them.”

  

Thank you for reading. Your thoughts and comments are always welcome. Please feel free to share on social media as you wish. 

Thoughts on The Uniting Methodists Movement (Can the Center Hold?)

"Blessed are you when people revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.”
Matthew 5:11-12

It hardly qualifies as persecution, and it would be hyperbole to say that they have been subjected to “all kinds of evil” utterances, but Ginger Gaines-Cirelli and Adam Hamilton have certainly gotten a lot criticism for their leadership in the United Methodist centrist movement. 

Hamilton has national recognition as the founding pastor of a mega-church  of more than 20,000 members and Gaines-Cirelli is the Senior Pastor the most visible church in the  Reconciling Ministries Network.

The “Uniting Methodists” say that they are “Called to be a unifying and clarifying voice in a divided conversation and a polarized culture.”

It is a worthy vision.

Heaven knows the diagnosis is accurate. We are divided and polarized as a culture and there are deep an painful divisions within United Methodism. It remains to be seen whether this new group can be a unifying and clarifying voice.

They believe that faithful Christians can different views on same sex marriage and the ordination of LGBTQ persons. In simplest terms they want us, as a denomination, to agree to disagree.

I confess that I cannot accept the assertion that the exclusion of LGBTQ Christians from full participation in the life of the church is faithful to the Gospel. This does not mean that I believe that everyone who holds that position is an evil person. And it does not mean that we cannot have fellowship with one another. It does not mean that we cannot “agree to disagree,” but I cannot see the two perspectives as being equally valid interpretations of Christian faith and ethics.

In this argument the two sides do not have an equal claim on the truth.

And before we go any further it should be stated that although it has often been said that “there is pain on both sides,” that pain is not equal. 

United Methodist policies and positions over the last four decades have caused great harm to our LGBTQ siblings. For traditionalists to claim that the “pain” they feel at knowing that there are pastors in our denomination who celebrate same sex weddings and conferences that ordain gay clergy is somehow equivalent to the pain of exclusion and marginalization is disingenuous at best.

The Uniting Methodists Movement makes six affirmations:

• Disciples: Despite our differences, we are committed to remain a part of, and support, The United Methodist Church and to fulfill its mission of making disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world.
• Evangelism: We are committed to both evangelism and social justice as essential to the expression of vital United Methodism.
• Standards: We accept and uphold the Doctrinal Standards and Theological Task of The United Methodist Church as stated in our Discipline.  
• Interpretation: We believe our differences on the questions of same-sex marriage and ordination stem from differences over biblical interpretation, not biblical authority.
• Officiation: We call for disciplinary changes so that clergy are neither compelled to officiate at same-sex weddings, nor prohibited from doing so.
• Ordination: We call for disciplinary changes so that annual conferences are neither compelled to ordain LGBTQ persons, nor prohibited from doing so.

The first three affirmations are pretty straight forward. We might argue about how we interpret our Doctrinal Standards, and some traditionalists are still pushing for a literal interpretation of the Nicene Creed as a normative theological standard, but those issues are not new and they are probably not deal breakers.

On interpretation, we can expect some serious pushback from traditionalists, who have been adamant that the issue is biblical authority.  I have addressed that issue numerous times, so I won’t go into it here.

The most controversial of the affirmations are the last two.

It will be hard for traditionalists to accept same sex marriage and LGBTQ clergy within “their” denomination, even if they are not required to participate directly. 

As the pastor of a Reconciling Congregation who is committed to the full inclusion of LGBTQ persons, I am more concerned with the issue from that perspective.

The United Methodist Queer Clergy Caucus lists their primary concerns:

• By trivializing LGBTQIA+ justice, the UMM does further injury to those who have already been harmed;
• The UMM does not fully take LGBTQIA+ voices into account;
• LGBTQIA+ persons could not sign on to the UMM plan without participating in our own oppression or that of other members of our community;
• The UMM is built on the delusion that the perpetuation of injustice is as moral as seeking of justice;
• The UMM breaches our principle of connectionalism – where all persons can “participate in every level of connectional life and ministry.;”
• It is as though we have become the Laodicean church described in Revelation: “So, because you are lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I am about to spit you out of my mouth” (Rev. 3:16). To seek a middle ground between inclusion and discrimination is to place institutional preservation before our call to follow the way of Jesus, in whom we have the freedom “to resist evil, injustice and oppression in whatever form they present themselves.” (UMC Baptismal vows)

The Reconciling Ministries Network issued this assessment in their press release:

“The foundational statement of the UMM is another example of fellow United Methodists advocating for changes ‘about us, without us’ and once again asserts the false notion that a unity of substance can be achieved while discriminatory policies remain in place. The proposal joins a long tradition of prioritizing a surface level kind of unity over the well-being of LGBTQ people, particularly those most vulnerable in the South, and fails to embrace an unprecedented opportunity to set our church on a new course toward justice, reconciliation, and health.”

The most faithful and just “way forward” would be for the whole United Methodist Church to embrace the full inclusion of LGBTQ persons in every aspect of our life together. 

Sadly, that is extremely unlikely.

And there is no way that those of  us in favor of an inclusive church would agree to stop celebrating same sex weddings or ordaining qualified candidates regardless of their sexual orientation or gender identity.

That leaves two options.

We can split into two (or more?) denominations, or we can embrace a future like that envisioned by the Uniting Methodists Movement.

Whether we split or remain united, the traditionalist churches and pastors and conferences will continue to do what they are presently doing, and the inclusive churches and pastors and conferences will also continue to do what they are presently doing. 

The only short-term difference is that if we split, then the folks on the other side will not be doing what they are doing in “our” name.

We will no longer be responsible for their unfaithfulness.

At this point, Adam Hamilton’s example is useful. Over time his position changed from traditionalist to favoring inclusion. That happened because he came into increasing contact with faithful Christians who happened to be gay. That happened in spite of the cost. When he came out to his congregation in favor of inclusion something like 800 members left the church in the next week. That is no small thing, even in a mega-church.

The culture is shifting on this issue. 

People are changing. 

One of the key questions we need to ask as we consider the future of the church is how we can best facilitate that change in the church and in the wider world.

Thank you for reading. Your thoughts and comments are always welcome. Please feel free to share on social media as you wish.

Progress and the Bending of the Moral Arc

When the Egyptians treated us harshly and afflicted us, by imposing hard labor on us, we cried to the LORD, the God of our ancestors; the LORD heard our voice and saw our affliction, our toil, and our oppression. The LORD brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm, with a terrifying display of power, and with signs and wonders; and he brought us into this place and gave us this land, a land flowing with milk and honey.
Deuteronomy 26:6-9

Senator Dianne Feinstein

In a recent blogpost on the Juicy Ecumenism blog of the Institute for Religion and Democracy, the Rev. Dr. David Watson commented on remarks by Senator Dianne Feinstein directed at Roman Catholic judicial nominee Amy Barrett addressing the role which

Professor Amy Barrett

Barrett’s faith might play in her judicial decisions.

“Dogma and law are two different things,” said Feinstein. “I think, whatever a religion is, it has its own dogma. The law is totally different; in your case, Professor [Barrett], when you read your speeches, the conclusion one draws is that the dogma lives loudly within you, and that’s of concern when you come to big issues that large numbers of people have fought for, for years, in this country.”

Watson’s indictment is scathing. “Let’s be clear,” he writes. “Senator Feinstein’s statement cannot mean, ‘You are dogmatic and I am not.’ Rather, it means, ‘I prefer my dogma over yours.’”

Although the term “dogma” is often used negatively as the description of a rigidly held system of beliefs that is impervious to rational inquiry, it can have a more neutral meaning as an established set of opinions. Watson defines it as “a body of accepted teaching.”

Secular liberals, he argues, have their own dogma.

“Secular liberalism is not a value-neutral position. It is a value-laden position with its own set of moral and philosophical underpinnings. One of those presuppositions is the idea of “progress,” that human beings are becoming better and better as time goes on. . . . We are becoming better in our understanding of the natural world and in our mastery of it. We are learning to understand human behavior and human flourishing better than we ever have before. We are developing a keener sense of morality than those who came before us in history. We know better than they did.”

For Watson, “the idea of human progress . . . is an untenable myth, at least with regard to our moral and spiritual development.” And then he lists the evidence for his assertion:

“Two World Wars, the Holocaust, the development of nuclear weapons, the Vietnam War, the Khmer Rouge, the Rwandan Genocide, ethnic cleansing in Bosnia, 9/11, chemical warfare, the rise of global extreme poverty… It was a bloody hundred years.”

Yes. It was a bloody hundred years. But it was also an amazing hundred years: the rights of women, the advancement of race relations, the end of segregation and apartheid, advances in worker rights, advances in the rights of the handicapped, giant leaps in our global standard of living, the end of colonialism, increases in life expectancy and healthcare, and that's just a partial list.

A lot of good things happened in the twentieth century, but the belief in human progress is not based on a single century; it is based on the observation of human history over thousands of years. 

The belief in human progress grows out of a fundamental biblical idea, that God is at work in human history. That’s why, as Dr. King said in his sermon after the march from Selma to Montgomery, the moral arc of the universe is long, but it bends toward justice. This is the central claim of the Exodus. And it is the theology of the Kingdom of God.

In the rich symbolic language of Deuteronomy, "The LORD brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm . . . and he brought us into this place . . .”

Shiphrah and Puah Resist the Transgender Decree

The king of Egypt said to the Hebrew midwives, one of whom was named Shiphrah and the other Puah, “When you act as midwives to the Hebrew women, and see them on the birthstool, if it is a boy, kill him; but if it is a girl, she shall live.” But the midwives feared God; they did not do as the king of Egypt commanded them, but they let the boys live. So the king of Egypt summoned the midwives and said to them, “Why have you done this, and allowed the boys to live?”
Exodus 1:15-18

In the modern day version of this story Pharaoh tells the women that they should enforce his decree that transgender men and women should be forced out of his army, but here as in the original, they do not do as the king commanded them.

In today’s story the women are United States Senators rather than Hebrew midwives, but like the women in the ancient text, they love justice more than they fear the king (or his political operatives). 

Justice is a bipartisan issue.

Republican Susan Collins and Democrat Kirsten Gillibrand have proposed a joint amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act that would prevent the Department of Defense from enacting the President’s ban on transgender persons serving in the military.  

In July, Mr. Trump issued the ban in a tweet that came as a surprise to his own administration, including the Secretary of Defense, James Mattis.

Senator Gillibrand tweeted in response, "To all trans men and women serving bravely in the military: I plan to introduce legislation to fight back. We'll keep raising our voices." Senator John McCain, the chair of the Armed Services Committee called the decree a "step in the wrong direction."

The amendment introduced on September 11 would prevent the Department of Defense from discharging current transgender service personnel "solely on the basis of the member’s gender identity.”

“Any individual who wants to join our military and meets the standards should be allowed to serve, period. Gender identity should have nothing to do with it,” said Senator Gillibrand in her statement.

“If individuals are willing to put on the uniform of our country, be deployed in war zones, and risk their lives for our freedoms, then we should be expressing our gratitude to them, not trying to exclude them from military service," said Senator Collins.



Thank you for reading. Please feel free to comment here or on Facebook. Please share on social media as you wish.

The End of the World as We Knew It

“When you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies, then know that its desolation has come near. Then those in Judea must flee to the mountains, and those inside the city must leave it, and those out in the country must not enter it; for these are days of vengeance, as a fulfillment of all that is written. Woe to those who are pregnant and to those who are nursing infants in those days! For there will be great distress on the earth and wrath against this people; they will fall by the edge of the sword and be taken away as captives among all nations; and Jerusalem will be trampled on by the Gentiles, until the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled. “There will be signs in the sun, the moon, and the stars, and on the earth distress among nations confused by the roaring of the sea and the waves. People will faint from fear and foreboding of what is coming upon the world, for the powers of the heavens will be shaken. Then they will see ‘the Son of Man coming in a cloud’ with power and great glory. Now when these things begin to take place, stand up and raise your heads, because your redemption is drawing near.”

Luke 21:20-28

(This is the sermon I preached 

on September 16, 2001, 

the Sunday after 9/11.)

"When these things begin to take place, 

stand up and raise your heads,
because your redemption is drawing near." 

The Scripture reading is actually an advent text in our lectionary. It is also a Holy Week text, since it comes from the last week of Jesus’ life in Jerusalem. He is talking about the second coming. I chose it for today because it speaks of disaster and catastrophe, and I believe it is useful to remind ourselves that this is not the first time that people of faith have faced such things. It is useful to remind ourselves that such catastrophe was not unknown or unanticipated in biblical times.

The events of this week have been tragic and catastrophic. The pain endured has been immense. Our lives have been shaken. there is a real sense in which this kind of war in our global village has changed our world forever. What Jesus tells his disciples is that in times such as these, precisely in this kind of situation, we are called to respond with faith and courage. In the last verse, he tells them, "When these things begin to take place, stand up and raise your heads, because your redemption is drawing near."

Stand Up

This is a time for people to stand up; to stand up and think; to stand up and question; to stand up and pray. People have a lot of questions. Obviously, there are a host of questions. There are questions of security and politics, but I am thinking about theological questions. I hear people asking, “How could this happen?”

That question has been asked of many religious leaders in television interviews this week, and most of the answers have been awful. I understand that Billy Graham did a great job at the service in Washington, and I thought the Roman Catholic Bishop of New York was wonderful, but most of the responses were poor. 

The low point for me came when Ann Graham Lotz, Billy Graham's daughter, was asked how God could let this happen, and she said, “You have to understand, we have spent years driving God out of our lives,” and she went on to talk about taking prayer out of our schools. Apparently, she believes that God killed three thousand innocent people to teach us that we ought to make kids pray in school. I don’t know what kind of barbarian god she worships, but that is not the God that I know.

Some of us wish that God would work the way King Kong did in the old movie. Do you remember King Kong on the Empire State Building, grabbing the planes out of the air and smashing them on the ground? Some of us wish that God had done something like that last Tuesday, perhaps snatching the planes out of the air and then setting them gently on the ground. But God simply does not work that way.

As I contemplated the events of last Tuesday and began to think about coming together on Sunday morning, I asked myself, “What can I possibly say? And what difference does it make anyway? After something like this, what’s the point?” And then I remembered that this is not the first time that something like this has happened. Twenty-six hundred years ago, when Jerusalem fell and many of the people were carried into captivity in Babylon, the people of Israel still gathered to sing and pray and worship. The faithful gathered for worship after Gettysburg and during the London Blitz. We can think of dozens of examples. People of faith have gathered for prayer and worship in crises large and small all across the centuries.

For many years, we Americans have enjoyed an unprecedented sense of personal and national security. For more than twenty-five years we have been almost untouched by the threat of war. Desert Storm happened far away and with few American casualties. The threat of nuclear war has been almost non-existent for more than a decade. This week we have suffered a huge loss in that sense of security. And some of us have been tempted to equate that loss of personal and national security with a loss of God’s presence. But that is not the security that God provides. At the end of his life, Moses blessed the people of Israel with the promise that “underneath are the everlasting arms.” The promise is not that God will protect us from every evil deed, but that God will always be there.

The reality is that God gives freedom to human beings, and we can use that in a variety of ways. Today I wore my “Palm Sunday” tie. You can see the handprints or palm prints of children. I wore it in part because it feels to me like Palm Sunday. I feel that somber sense that I experience in Holy Week. I also wore it because I have been thinking about what hands do. God gave us hands, and we can use them to do good things or evil things. We have seen both this week.

And Raise Your Heads

"When these things begin to take place, stand up and raise your heads . . . ." This week we have seen human beings at their best and at their worst. Obviously, what the terrorists did on Tuesday was beyond the scope of what most people had contemplated. When I heard that a plane had crashed into the World Trade Center, I immediately assumed it was a tragic accident. Even after the second plane, my mind was searching for an explanation. It was literally incomprehensible.

We have also seen people at their best. What amazing courage it must have taken for people to crash that plane near Pittsburgh, rather than let it go on toward a major population center. The heroism of the rescue workers was magnificent. And was it not a minor miracle that the evacuation of the towers was as orderly as it was. In the face of imminent danger, reports say that people were polite and brave. If even a small number had panicked, the death toll might have been doubled or tripled. One man fell and broke his ankle, and four strangers picked him up and carried him down fifteen flights to safety. Seldom have we seen so many individual acts of caring and kindness in such a small space and time.

We have seen people at their best in our nation, but we have also seen them at their worst. There have been hundreds of attacks on Arab-Americans and on people who looked like Arabs. Molotov cocktails have been thrown into business, guns have been fired, threats and epithets have been shouted.

That is not who we are and that can never be who we are. To put it crudely, we are not them. (To be grammatically correct, I should say, “We are not they,” but it doesn’t sound right.) We are not terrorists and we must not let this tragedy turn us into something less than what we are called to be, as Christians and as Americans. We have an obligation to raise our heads, to lift our vision, and to raise our standards.

The Apostle Paul said that we must “hate what is evil and love what is good.” And he’s right. If we only love the good and do not hate the evil, we become merely sentimental. But William Sloan Coffin was also right when he said that we must love the good more than we hate the evil. If we do not love the good more than we hate the evil, we will simply become good haters. We must not become good haters. We must love the good more than we hate the evil.

Because Your Redemption Is Drawing Near."When these things begin to take place, stand up and raise your heads, because your redemption is drawing near." After describing a great crisis in the most vivid language, Jesus then tells them that the time of crisis will also be a time of redemption. He can speak with confidence about the future because he knows this has happened in the past.

When Jerusalem fell and the people of Israel were taken into captivity, the prophets and great religious thinkers asked themselves, “How could this happen? How can it be that the holiest city of the very people God has chosen to bring his message to the world has fallen? If this can happen, then how can we trust God?” 

This was the greatest challenge that Israel had ever faced. And Israel responded to this theological crisis with some of the most brilliant and beautiful literature that human beings have ever produced. The wisdom and depth of thought were amazing. Israel responded, in the words of Professor Walter Brueggemann, “precisely against the data.” It was out of this crisis, says Brueggemann, that Israel gave birth to the concept of hope. It was in these great reflections on the crisis of exile that the concept of hope was first introduced to the world. Hope was Israel’s gift to the world.

Hope is always “against the data.” It is not an analysis which says that things will get better. It is not the cheerful assertion that every cloud has a silver lining. Hope says we trust in God, regardless of the data; regardless of the presence or absence of a silver lining.

You and I are called to reaffirm our hope: our hope in human beings, our hope in our nation, and underneath it all, our hope in God. One of the many posters placed near the destruction at ground zero quoted Paul’s letter to the Philippians:

“Finally, beloved, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasing, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think on these things.”

This is a time for people of faith to stand up and raise our heads. This is a time for people of faith to raise our standards higher than they have ever been. This is a time for us to reaffirm the gift of hope and this is a time for us to love the good.

Thank you for reading. Please feel free to comment here or on Facebook. Please share on social media as you wish.