You’ll
notice that the tagline for this blog is “Wishing & working for a world
transformed.” While that tagline works
well with the title of this blog (Father Prime) and comes from the first line
of issue #1 of Marvel’s Transformers
comic that debuted 30 years ago (“It is a world transformed…”), I sincerely
wish that it were a world transformed. And
the past two weeks have shown why.
I
am speechless with the recent news out of Staten Island that the police who
killed Eric Garner were not indicted. No,
I don’t have a dog in the fight, so to speak.
But as a Christian I believe that all humanity is united as children of
God, that that’s what Jesus came to show us.
Eric Garner was my brother. So
was Michael Brown. What I fail to
understand is how anyone who calls him/herself a Christian cannot be outraged
by the death of a brother or sister. The
only image that pops in my head is the image of Jesus standing there, watching
his children kill each other, and weeping.
Yet
there is also something else that has been at play in my heart and mind in the
wake of the recent news: I am more and
more acutely aware of my own privilege. I’m
a heterosexual, cisgender man. I’m white. I’m from a small mountain town where my
family, while not wealthy, got by with relative comfort. And while I was the only Episcopalian in my
school and was sometimes mocked for it, I am a Christian and have been afforded
all of the “benefits” that that label affords.
I have a comfortable job—I write this blog from a cozy chair on the
third floor of our cathedral—and besides the bills for my phone and the house I
rent, I have no great financial responsibilities. Based on all of the labels that I carry, my
life is really, really good. So why care
about low-income black men who are killed by police, or a Muslim teenager run
over by a car displaying anti-Muslim rhetoric in Missouri, or a young gay boy
who killed himself after endless bullying for being who God made him to be? Why should I care?
Because
that is what Jesus would have me do. The
wandering rabbi that I call my Lord did not look upon people with labels. He ate with tax collectors and the worst
kinds of sinners (Matthew 9: 10), he
healed Gentiles, even those who he himself did not initially welcome (Mark 7: 27), and, when faced with an
adulterous woman who should rightfully be stoned to death by the laws of her
day, he called the one without sin to cast the first stone upon her (John 8: 7).
Here’s
the thing about being a Christian: it’s
about more than just Jesus! Yes, Jesus
is our Lord, and yes Jesus is the pioneer and perfecter of our faith, but it is
up to us to be Jesus’ hands, feet, and heart in the world right now! The earthly form of Jesus of Nazareth is not
walking through the door anytime soon, and so it is up to those of us who have
the audacity to say that we are his followers to carry on what he set out. The tired adage of What would Jesus do? is not enough.
That mindset leads us to say, “Sure, Jesus would do this. But I can’t.”
If that’s the case, then maybe this Christianity thing isn’t for
you. If you cannot see the Other as your
brother or sister, if you cannot bring yourself to care for the least of these,
if you are satisfied with the economic and social disparities in this country, if
you can’t take Jesus’ words seriously, then maybe you shouldn’t call yourself a
Christian. We look at the frustrations
and sadnesses of our world and say, “It is the way it is.” Jesus did the same thing in his time and
said, “It doesn’t have to be this way.”
See the difference?
So
what can Christians do? Pray. And work.
Saint Augustine of Hippo once said, “Pray as though everything depended
upon God, work as though everything depended upon you.” Pray for peace. But when we are faced with the opportunity to
act, we must act. If Christians are not
on the frontlines fighting for equality for our brothers and sisters, fighting
for an end to the labels, an end to the disparities, then who will?!
Maybe
if enough of us did just that, showing the world that the kind of love shown to
us by that baby whose birth we claim to honor in two weeks’ time, then maybe,
just maybe, we really can transform this world.
Until
then, I leave you with this prayer from page 823 of the Book of Common Prayer. It is the prayer that I used for the
concluding collect of the Prayers of the People this past Sunday.
O God our Father, whose Son forgave his enemies
while he was suffering shame and death:
Strengthen those who suffer for the sake of conscience, especially in
Ferguson, Staten Island, and all areas of civil disparity; when they are
accused, save them from speaking in hate; when they are rejected, save them
from bitterness; when they are imprisoned, save them from despair; and to us
your servants, give grace to respect their witness and to discern the truth,
that our society may be cleaned and strengthened. This we ask for the sake of Jesus Christ, our
merciful and righteous Judge. Amen.