Happy Pride

This week, I am dipping my toe into waters that can be troubled at times.  This is something that I do not do easily as it is against my nature to be controversial.  However, sometimes that is where I am called to journey. 

Last Saturday, Lorna and I marched in what was the first Gay Pride Parade that we have participated in.  This one marked the twenty-fifth Gay Pride Parade in Charlottetown, PEI, so, it was an occasion we both wanted to participate in.  We both found it to be a lot of fun and very positive. 

We joined the contingent of parishioners from St. Paul’s Anglican Church in Charlottetown which has been represented in the parade for quite a few years.  Our participation was welcomed by them and I felt quite at home as part of that group which was led by Archdeacon John Clarke.  I inquired about the history of the parade and found out that the first one was more of a protest rather than a parade, protesting unjust laws in Canada and PEI.  I wasn’t able to find out much about the first 

parade/protest, however, I’m sure this year’s event was in sharp contrast.  There were approximately one thousand people who marched in the parade with participants which seemed to cover many aspects of life on PEI including community groups, businesses, political parties including the newly elected Progressive Conservative Premier Dennis King, and of course churches.

Police were included in the event, with the RCMP, who do much of the policing on the Island, ensured things went smoothly for participants, and traffic control on the streets was handled by the Charlottetown Police – a division of duties that seemed to work well.  I asked Archdeacon John about the relationship between the Parade organizers and the police and he informed me that it was a positive one.  This is, unfortunately, different from the relationship between the Pride Parade in Toronto and the police who have had a less than positive relationship with the parade over the years. 

The general atmosphere was one of joy and celebration with a very positive feeling between those in the parade and the bystanders who lined the route.  There was no one along the route who seemed to be in active opposition to the event.  I’m sure this would have been a sharp contrast to the parade twenty-five years ago.

I was very glad to have been part of the contingent from St. Paul’s Church and equally glad that the participants of churches were welcomed by the Parade organizers.  The relationship between organized religion and the Gay and Lesbian Community (as I first knew it) or 2SLGBTQIA as they inclusively self-identify – has been and continues to be a troubled one.  The Anglican Church of Canada continues to struggle with the issue of same-sex marriage/blessing.  The national meeting, General Synod, recently did not pass an amendment to the Marriage Canon (law) which would have included same-sex couples.  This failed by the slimmest of margins passing with strong majorities in two of three houses of Laity and Clergy but barely failing to reach the required two-thirds majority in the House of Bishops.  However, General Synod also passed a motion which allowed for a “local option” for Dioceses to permit same-sex marriage with the agreement of the Bishop.  Perhaps this was the latest example of Anglican middle way.

This continues to be trouble waters and perhaps it is a case of a fool rushing in whether or not angels fear to tread.  To make my position clear, I have strongly supported enabling same-sex couples to marry both civilly and in the church based on many years of knowing gay and lesbian people and their struggles to live full and fulfilled and God-filled lives in our culture.  Same sex marriage has been allowed civilly in Canada since 2005 and the results of this has been, in my view, very positive for those involved and for the country.  It is indeed still an issue which generates strong feelings on all sides of the issue.  My hope and prayer is that we in the Anglican Church and beyond can strive to “disagree in love” as our just retired Primate (head of the Canadian Church), Archbishop Fred Hiltz called for us to do.  Perhaps if we take this approach, we can find that bridge over those troubled waters that Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel sang about so beautifully. 

Blessings on your journey

Into Deep Waters

The Gospel appointed for yesterday in the Book of Common Prayer was Luke 5: 1-20.  This is the account of Jesus calling the first disciples.  Jesus preaches to the assembled on the shore from Peter’s fishing boat.  I thought this was a great strategic move by Jesus to gain the best position to assure the full attention of the people assembled.

From this vantage point, Jesus addresses the assembly–we could say he was delivering a sermon in today's context.  Unfortunately, Luke does not record what Jesus said so it is lost in the mists of time.  We can only speculate and use our imagination to fill in this significant gap in Jesus ministry. 

Once he finishes speaking to the assembled, Jesus urges Peter to go out into the deep water and let down his nets.  Here is Peter’s journey in a nut shell.  Here are the things that he will face in his life as a disciple.  He would need Jesus to channel all that energy he had.  Peter would want to run off in all directions; he would get into deep waters many times in his life as a disciple but Jesus would always be there to guide him.  He would declare that Jesus was the messiah and then go too far and try and forbid Jesus to go to Jerusalem and fulfill his divine calling.  Jesus would declare, “Get thee behind me Satan.” He would see Jesus transfigured on the mountain and wants to build a booth to contain that vision – as if Jesus could be contained.  He would declare that he would follow Jesus to the death but then deny him three times.  And yet he would be one of the first to see the risen Jesus. 

Have you ever taken the leap of faith and gone into deep water?  This is making more of a commitment than staying close to the shore.  If you are in deep water you may be out of your depth and have trouble getting back to dry land if you run into troubled waters.  However, you can get results that you don’t get by staying close to shore and do not take a risk.

It is a great temptation for many of us to stay close to the shore where solid ground is never out of reach.  If we push ourselves into deep water who knows what might happen.  We might run into troubled water.  We might fall overboard and not be able to get back to the boat or reach the shore.  I am the kind of person who does not take risks easily.  I am caution by nature.  I do not like to go against the flow.  However, I have found that often when I do this and take a risk, it can be very rewarding.   It does take a leap of faith and the rewards are often not immediate.  But they have led me to very rewarding places.

I am not suggesting that you should blindly leap into the unknown.  Don’t push into the deep waters without a life preserver; don’t be reckless.  However, sometimes that leap of faith is where we are being called to go.  Above all don’t forget to seek guidance from someone you trust as your guide. Be it a trusted friend, a counselor, a clergy person.  And don’t forget to pray to whomever is your ultimate concern (in Paul Tillich’s phrase) for divine guidance.

Blessings on you journey, especially if it takes you into deep waters. 

Saying Yes to God

Some years ago, I had the privilege of attending a lecture/talk by Herbert O’Driscoll.  Unfortunately, I did not take notes, or in any case, I cannot find a record of them.  I don’t have a detailed recollection of what Herbert said. The internet was no help in this case so, with apologies to Herbert for misunderstanding his message and possibly going completely off the rails, here is my reconstruction and interpretation of what I believe was Herbert’s message. 

What I recall is that for Christians to live in relationship with God and the world requires three things.  At this point I am only able to remember two of those things.  First, we must be in an intentional community which is seeking to understand God’s intention for the world.  Second, we must say “Yes” to something that we believe God is calling us to. 

That, I believe, is what we are called to be and do as Christians.  We are called to be in community – as a part of a Christian Community in some form.  This is not necessarily a formal church community.  Church has taken many forms in the past and continues to take many different expressions of what happened at Pentecost.  As the established churches are struggling to continue, the Holy Spirit is moving and inspiring people to seek new ways of being the people of God in the world.  We, therefore, need to be open to where the Spirit is calling and leading us, always conscious of the need to try and discern if it truly is the Holy Spirit and not just the devices and desires of our hearts and minds and egos and wish-fulfillment. 

This is true also of our response, our “Yes” to God.  It is not enough to only sit back and be observers.  We must respond with a yes that is love-in-action.  We need to try to ensure what we are discerning where the Spirit is actually leading us and are not following those pesky devices and desires of our hearts and minds.  We must also seek to understand how best we can say “Yes”.  That can take many different forms and we may be surprized in where the Spirit leads us if we actually say “Yes” and are open to those possibilities. 

Jesus gives us the Great Commandment to love one another, I believe that this is the essence of that commandment.  We are to respond to people in love and not hate or indifference.  AS Leonard Cohen said, “let’s talk of love not hate, things to do It’s getting late, there’s so little time and we’re only passing through.”  I must turn from my go to guy for lyrics to anther go-to guy, Richard Rohr and his understanding of this.  He notes that love in not just actions but, it is actually who we are:  

·         The love in you—which is the Spirit in you—always somehow says yes. (See 2 Corinthians 1:20.) Love is not something you do; love is something you are. It is your True Self. Love is where you came from and love is where you’re going. It’s not something you can buy. It’s not something you can attain. It’s the presence of God within you, called the Holy Spirit or what some theologians name uncreated grace. You can’t manufacture this by any right conduct, dear reader. You can’t make God love you one ounce more than God already loves you right now. You can go to church every day for the rest of your life. God isn’t going to love you any more than God loves you right now.  Richard Rohr May 22, 2019

Blessings on you journey

Jesus Christ the Innocent Scapegoat (part 3)

The last two week I have been writing about Jesus as scapegoat, drawing on the theory of Rene Girard.  In brief, Girard theorized that human culture is founded on the scapegoat theory of mimetic (copycat) violence in which all violence originates in the mimetic desire to, in effect, obtain what other people have.  This violence would have destroyed humanity if unchecked and was only kept in check by the scapegoat mechanism which found a common victim – the scapegoat – who was accepted as being the cause of a crisis such as a famine or plague which was consuming the community.  

However, one of the critics of Girard has put forward an argument that Jesus was not innocent.  He was therefore no different that other scapegoats,  Richard Landis, in his essay, A Millennial critique of Rene Girard’s thesis on scapegoating, http://www.theaugeanstables.com/2008/09/01/a-millennial-critique-of-rene-girard%E2%80%99s-thesis-on-scapegoating/, proposes that Jesus was indeed guilty of believing he was the Messiah and was therefore deserved to be crucified by the authorities, Roman and Jewish:

(Jesus) was wrong about the imminence of the apocalypse and, whatever his intentions, dangerous to those who brought their demotic millennial hopes to the surface in a prime divider society profoundly hostile to such sentiments, in the case of Jesus, during the pax romana, whose peace the Romans nailed down, literally, with crucifixion.

There is some justification for this position in my analysis.  Jesus made what could be seen as political moves such as the triumphal entry into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday.  This had all the accouterments of the Messiah in Jewish tradition.  This was the fulfillment of the prophecy in Zachariah, "Rejoice, O people of Zion! Shout in triumph, O people of Jerusalem! Look, your king is coming to you. He is righteous and victorious, yet he is humble, riding on a donkey -- riding on a donkey's colt." (Zechariah 9:9). 

As Jesus and his followers approached Jerusalem, they began to proclaimed his great works, “As he was drawing near—already on the way down the Mount of Olives—the whole multitude of his disciples began to rejoice and praise God with a loud voice for all the mighty works that they had seen” (Luke 19:37).  This could be seen as an effort to incite the crowd. 

This was recognized by the crowd who welcomed him, “They saw Jesus riding the colt and a throng of people singing, "Blessings on the King who comes in the name of the LORD! Peace in heaven, and glory in highest heaven!”   This was a quote from Psalm 118:26, “Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord.” However, that same crowd who hailed him as Messiah on Pam Sunday, turned and called for his execution fitting Girard’s analysis of the scapegoat mechanism.  

So, let us grant the argument that Jesus was not innocent in that he went to the cross to fulfill the will of his Heavenly Father as the messiah.  This, in no way, means that he was guilty of what the Roman and Jewish authorities accused him of i.e. trying to overthrow the existing earthly authority.   As the thief on his right declared his innocence.  Indeed, as Jesus proclaims to Pilot, "My kingdom is not of this world. If it were, my servants would fight to prevent my arrest by the Jewish leaders. But now my kingdom is from another place."  (John 18: 36).

There is no doubt that Jesus was a scapegoat, fitting perfectly the definition as developed by Girard.  What then is the implication that he is the first scapegoat who is recognized as innocent, which as a Christian, I believe?  If this truly is the beginning of the end of the scapegoat mechanism which has enabled the structure of human culture to develop and thrive throughout history, what is to replace it?  The answer of course if to fulfill the great commandment of Jesus to love one another as he loves us.  This, especially the command to love our enemies does seem to be an impossible task. 

However, the key to this is contained within this revelation that Girard has uncovered.  If we are to love one another, we must stop making scapegoats of the “other”.  We must stop blaming the wrong that is present in the world and in ourselves on those easy targets and believe that if we only deal with them all will be well.  We must recognize the innocence of those victims even if they are not perfect just as we are not perfect.  That is what we are called to do as Christians, to love one another. 

Blessings on your journey