Homily for the Feast of
the Christ the King 20 November 2016
The Rev’d John R. Clarke, Rector
The Rev’d John R. Clarke, Rector
“And
the people stood by, watching.” Luke 23:35a
Ask Gene Kelly and Cyd
Charisse in “Singin’ in the Rain.” Sometimes you “gotta dance, gotta dance,
g-o-o-o-tta dance.”
Proof? I’m not sure Teresa
of Ávila could hold a candle to Cyd Charisse, but one gray day in the bone-chilling
cold of her unheated convent ─ during the one hour she
allowed the sisters to gather for recreation ─
Teresa shocked the life out of every last one of them.
Without introduction, without
warning, without so much as a “five-six-seven-eight,” Teresa jumped to her feet, grabbed her castanets
(it appears, even saints are allowed castanets), and launched into a “DWTS”-worthy flamenco.
The look on the other
nuns’ faces? “Well, that was unexpected.” Teresa’s defense? “Some days, you’ve
got to do something to make life bearable!”
“You’ve got to do something.
Someone has got to do something to make life bearable.”
Certainly, that was on the minds of those who witnessed Jesus ─ innocent Jesus ─
being led to Jerusalem’s “killing field” (the Place of the Skull), nailed to
the cross, then hoisted high for maximum, prolonged murderous effect.
“Someone has got
to do something.” That someone, in some of the onlookers’ minds, was God. Surely God
would intervene. God would do … something.
But that “something”
just didn’t materialize that day. And that day, reality prevailed. Resistance
was futile.
Result? Luke the
Evangelist tells us, “The people stood by, watching.”
Just as we’re now caught in our own standing-by, watching moment. What are we standing-by, watching? A post-election
rise in hate crimes.
Between the day after
the election and Monday morning, November 14, the Southern Poverty Law Center ─ the go-to people for classifying hate groups and other extremist
organizations ─ collected 437 reports of hateful intimidation
and harassment. Among them:
99 reports from schools,
grades K-12. 76 from businesses. 67 incidents on university campuses. 40
instances of vandalism and white-nationalist leafleting on private property. 38
epithets and slurs hurled from moving vehicles.
Some reports were local.
The fallout? People are afraid
─ and I’m one of them ─
that white supremacists, pumped up by the election results and feeling immune
from prosecution (given the line-up of the in-coming administration’s appointments),
we’re afraid that white supremacists are being given license to physically and
emotionally abuse minorities, immigrants, women, and the LGBT community.
And of mounting concern
to people of faith are reports that the President-elect is considering plans
for a national registry of Muslims. People he will be bringing into the Oval
Office have openly suggested that internment camps quarantining Muslims are a
good idea. Internment camps. Like the forced relocation and incarceration
of between 110,000 and 120,000 people of Japanese ancestry in the days
following the attack on Pearl Harbor. 62 percent of the internees were US citizens.
One of the darkest
moments in our history, this internment program was condemned in 1982 by the Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians. The Commission's report found little evidence of Japanese
disloyalty at the time, and concluded that the incarceration had been driven by
racism.
Do we have any reason to
believe that racism isn’t behind calls for forced incarceration ─ or a national registry ─ of all Muslims this time around?
After all, [cue the
opening bars of Deutschland über Alles], a comprehensive list of people
based on their religion. What could possibly go wrong?
Is it unreasonable,
then, for our Muslim neighbors, other minorities (including Jews), immigrants,
women, and LGBT persons to suspect that in the next four years, conditions may
become unbearable?
Leading us to side with
Teresa of Ávila. “Some days, you’ve got to do something to make life bearable.”
Or, as Elie Wiesel said (and
he knew a thing or two about the consequences of scapegoating): “We must
take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence
encourages the tormentor, never the tormented.”
Factoid: Neutrality was never
Jesus’ strong suit. Jesus took sides. Jesus’ project was a study in dissent ─ nonviolent dissent ─ with
the exception of his highly-publicized attack against the moneychangers in the
Temple. Yes, out … of … control. But, it could be argued, that anomaly was more
street theater than a cruisin’-for-a-bruisin’ riot.
Pushing us to conclude:
As followers of Jesus ─ Jesus, who relentlessly
advocated for the rights of all our neighbors ─
we have no other option than to resist. We have no other option than to resist nonviolently
when our neighbors’ well-being, freedom, and rights are being threatened. Standing
by and watching is not an option now … because when we sing “Lift every voice
and sing till earth and heaven ring, ring with the harmonies of liberty,” we ain’t
just whistlin’ ‘Dixie.’
Read: Against those who turn
bigotry into action, activism is the answer.
What, then, will we do?
Let’s make it easier. What one thing will each of us do?
Well, where can you push
back to overcome bigotry, racism, misogyny, homophobia … even anti-science, such
as utterly fact-free and pro-Big Oil climate-change denial?
This Thursday is
Thanksgiving, but it applies always: When a bloviating uncle (it’s often the
uncle) ─ in the throes of alcoholic euphoria ─ makes a degrading comment about a minority or
women, push back. Don’t let it slide. Call it offensive. Call it what it is:
racism, sexism, homophobia, anti-Semitism, anti-Muslim bigotry … whatever fits.
Name it. Name where you stand as a follower of Jesus. Do something.
Or up your charitable
giving to make sure, as we say in Evening Prayer, that the needy aren’t
forgotten and that the “hope of the poor” isn’t taken away … amid gratuitous tax
cuts for the over-the-top wealthy in the next four years.
And then, there’s this:
We don’t have castanets (or my hunch is most of us don’t). But we do
have safety pins.
The safety pin ─ intentionally affixed to a shirt, lapel, blouse,
jacket, hat ─ it’s a meme now, a form of resistance … a show
of resistance. Not necessarily resistance to a political party, or an administration
(existing or in-coming) … but resistance to threats made against our neighbors,
even ourselves.
The safety pin. It’s a
sign that you are a safe person and that, in real time, a minority neighbor or
woman who is being attacked by bullies can look to you for help. The safety pin.
It’s your pledge to create a safe place.
Sure, it sounds trendy,
gimmicky. Easy as American pie to locate one. And yet, while not a fashion
statement, it is a political statement. But it would be a hollow
political statement ─ an even more
hollow moral statement for a follower of Jesus ─ if it weren’t backed up by Jesus-type activism.
Not backing up the wearing
with the acting: that’s called “slackerism.” A mash-up of “slacker” and “activism.”
Slackerism. Meaning: wearing the safety pin doesn’t necessarily translate into getting
off your duff and doing something.
Not to mention the fact that ─ channeling my father here ─ no one likes a slacker.
Now, truth-in-advertising: Standing
up in real time for our at-risk neighbor? It’s not without risk itself. It requires
training, for example, in de-escalation and self-defense techniques.
That is, if you come to
the aid of, say, an immigrant who is being harassed on the Orange Line (“Go
back to where you came from!”), and the aggressor turns on you, can you
hold your own long enough for the authorities to get there? Risky. It takes Moxie.
But, of course, Jesus had Moxie. But even more than Moxie, it takes training, planning.
If there is sufficient
interest, then, here at St Paul’s in promoting the Safety Pin Movement, I’ll contact
the Diocese about offering deanery-wide training needed to reduce risk, while allowing
us to give bite to our activist impulse.
… because Captain
Jean-Luc Picard and the crew of the Starship Enterprise got it right and proved
the Borg wrong. Resistance isn’t futile.
Amen.
