This weekend I attended the wedding of two beautiful young women that I had the privilege of ministering with in my previous call as curate of the Episcopal cathedral in Lexington, Kentucky. The two of them were filled with so much love for each other, and that love was palpable in the wonderful gathering of family and friends who came to lift them up and stand with them as they made promises to one another in God's house.
As news broke that a gunman had killed 50 people at a club in Orlando early Sunday morning, I thought of my friends Ellie and Caroline. They could have been among those folks. I thought of a good friend who performs regularly in drag shows at her local bar. She could have been among those folks. I thought of my faithful gay and lesbian seminary classmates who showed me what it means to live with pride and to preach God's love with abandon. They could have been among those folks. I thought about all of my LGBT brothers and sisters and non-binary folks who have changed my life. They could have been among those folks. I thought about them and cried. How long, O Lord, how long??
The sub-title to my blog is "wishing and working for a world transformed." Okay, it's a cheeky play on my love of Transformers, but it's actually true. I do wish and work for a world transformed. I want to see a world where the love of God in Jesus Christ is what stirs our hearts into action, rather than the man-made barriers that we have erected between us. I wish for a world where no one will bat an eye when two people commit their lives to each other. I wish for a world where people do not have to live in fear. That is my prayer, and it is one that I will not stop offering to God, in spite of the hatred, the bigotry, the violence, and the fear-mongering that I see all around me.
Ultimately, we have a choice. We have the choice to live in fear or love. Fear is what killed those 50 folks in Orlando--fear of LBGT people. Fear is what causes us to find a scapegoat--fear of Muslims and immigrants. And fear is what is keeping us from doing anything about it--fear of losing our freedom to own firearms. It is all about fear.
The writer of the First Letter of John tells us that "perfect love casts our fear" (4: 18). This is the love that Jesus embodied for us. It was a love that welcomed anyone and everyone who came to him, a love that echoed the dream of the prophet who longed for a world where swords were beaten into plowshares (Isaiah 2: 4). This is what he gave us, this was the work he charged us to do. And quite frankly, brothers and sisters, we did not listen! We chose fear over love, and because of that choice some of God's beloved, beautiful children are dead, an entire branch of the family of God is being blamed, and humanity once again refuses to turn its swords into plowshares.
This is a tragedy. It is a hate crime. It is an act of terrorism. It is also, sadly, nothing new. But that doesn't mean we stop praying and working for a better world! Christians, especially, are called to stand up to a world that beats them down and continues to tell them that this love thing won't succeed. We know better, though. We know that love always wins, that Jesus has already won, and that he will win again. As our Presiding Bishop reminds us, the Jesus movement keeps going forward, and there is NOTHING that will stop it! Bigotry won't stop it. Violence won't stop it. None of the excuses will stop it. Still, that does not give us a pass to just sit back and do nothing. We are partners with Jesus in this crazy love thing, and it is up to us to transform the world into something that looks like what Jesus spoke about.
If we really want that, though, there is work to be done. We cannot remain quiet. We must stand up for those who have been beaten down for so long, namely our LGBT brothers and sisters. We must renounce hate, bigotry, and violence. We must show the world a better way, a way of plowshares, not swords. Dietrich Bonheoffer summed it up when he said, ""silence in the face of evil is evil itself."
We have the choice. I choose to use my position to speak up, even though I know there is always more that I can do. I choose love over fear, and I pray that you will, as well. Whether you are a member of my congregation, a fellow minister, or just someone who saw this post on a friend's social media page and thought about checking it out, I pray that you will choose love over fear. Stand up! Speak loudly! Preach with abandon! Show the world that NOTHING will stop the Jesus movement because to be rooted in Jesus is to be rooted in love.
So for the martyrs of Orlando, who were killed simply for being the beautiful people God made them to be, I pray. For those with hate in their hearts, I pray. For a nation and a world that puts human lives ahead of the right to so easily own a device meant to destroy those lives, I pray. For the grace to stand up and do something, I pray. For a world truly transformed, I pray.
