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| Episcopalians at the Iowa Statehouse for a hearing on the death penalty bill |
”Well, here we go again! Looks like the legislature will
indeed begin considering the death penalty reinstatement within the next few
days. I hope you, and your people, will want to join me in expressing our
Church’s opposition to this measure.” These were the words of Bishop Epting,
sent out to the clergy of the Diocese on January 31, 1997! And yet today, in
2018, they are as applicable as they were twenty years ago.
“Here we go again.” On February 1, members of the Diocesan
clergy sought to make the case against the reinstatement of the death penalty
at a bill hearing at the Capitol. I am appreciative to hear that the bill seems
to be stopped in committee, thanks to their testimony and that of others. Building
the kind of society we value is a difficult task. Our efforts are guided by the
message and person of Jesus and yet we reach differing conclusions at the
implementation level. Each of us also have different elements of human
inter-connectedness that grip us as worth more of our energy and commitment than
expressing our grocery line opinion.
In 1998, we had at our disposal the legislative watch of the
Ecumenical Ministries of Iowa. Through that organization we could share our
passionate interests and also keep each other from growing weary in our
well-doing across denominational lines.
I am grateful today for the work of Connie Ryan of Interfaith Alliance
of Iowa, and our own Wendy Abrahamson who serves as our eyes and ears on
Capitol Hill. I invite you to join Wendy and me for the second annual gathering
of Episcopalians on the Hill over breakfast at 8:30am on Thursday February 15th.
About the time, in the late nineties, Iowa was wrestling
with the question of the death penalty reinstatement, we in California were
talking about the impact of immigration on our culture and the value or not of
English only propositions. Even more locally, at my home parish of St
Barnabas’, we were engaging in a motion made
at a vestry meeting that “the homeless were to be discouraged from our parish
functions.” We agreed to spending two months for vestry members to engage
church members on the issue, and then we decided that we would take it up again
at the third monthly vestry meeting.
During the two months the lectionary happened to be from Year C. and we were
hearing readings from Luke’s Gospel. Time after time the causes of the poor and
the lost, the Prodigal and the Samaritan, were being put forward by Jesus. I
was accused of “cooking the books” and yet I was following the Gospel readings
of the day.
Luke is above all the gospel written among the Gentiles. It
seeks to apply the significance of Jesus words and actions as they find living
expression in the expanding world of a Gospel that Jesus sent out through us to
the ends of the world. It is about hospitality and welcoming, leaving your own
comfort zones and seeking the lost stranger. The parish, I am glad to say,
heard Jesus through Luke, and our active ministry with the homeless stretched on
for more than thirty years. Nevertheless, there came another generation that
raised the same question, and, from what I hear, it seems Luke was not part of
the response. Sadly, a different conclusion was reached, and a most significant
ministry has been lost.
Good things can be undone quickly by well-intentioned
people. We must not stop listening to the Gospel. This Lent, Presiding Bishop
Michael Curry is inviting us all to read along with him the Gospel of Luke. Let
us join him and find the strength to answer the words “Well, here we go again.”
In the peace and love of Christ,
+Alan
The Rt. Rev. Alan Scarfe
Bishop of Iowa
