My sisters and brothers in Christ,
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| A plumb line hangs in St. Peter's Episcopal Church in Bettendorf, IA |
You may recall these words from Sunday’s Hebrew Scripture reading. The phrase “never again pass them by” was the link with the Gospel passage for the day—the story of the Good Samaritan. That is probably one of two parables of Jesus most of us can tell ourselves; and, if we are honest, tell on ourselves. The question, who is our neighbor, was dropped over the plate in every pulpit across the Church, on a weekend when the entire nation was asking that very same question. The image of the plumb line and of God standing, interestingly “beside a wall,” begs another question: how upright is this society we are building? Against the backdrop of the demands of justice, the upholding of the dignity of every human being, the seeing Christ in each other, the insistence of the Way of Love, against this plumb line of baptismal promise—how does what we are building fare?
We all face moments, situations and people which we pass by at our peril. One such moment was created this very same weekend, with the President’s outrageous and race-baiting calls for four elected Congresswomen of color to go back to where they came from, and the very public, fear-mongering declaration of increased deportation activity, specifically in ten American cities. Of course, the Congresswomen are citizens of the United States and this is their home. And the fear-mongering was precisely that, fanning the divisions among us as we try and work out a just approach to the inevitable movement of people in a world ravaged by war, crime and climate displacement.
Last Friday evening, I stood with more than three hundred others outside the Polk County Jail, participating in a vigil for those who have died in detention centers as they sought asylum in the United States. We heard written testimony of those who were experiencing life separated as families, or vulnerable in under-resourced and overcrowded centers. High School students cited their own poetry about the inner and outer conflict faced as Mexican Americans in a country that “loves tacos but hates the people who make them or serve them.” Standing next to me was a clergy person from the Diocese whose placard read “Prophet not Profit.” And this is the Good Samaritan challenge for us as Christians—dare we hold God’s plumb line in our hands and ask the question it begs of our representatives, institutions and of one another?
We as a Diocese are not untouched by the stuff that is swirling around us. At one Convention, I had guests at the banquet table including the Bishop of Nzara, the retired and current bishops of Swaziland, our guest speaker, an African American Bishop of the United Methodist Church, and my wife and daughter. “Looks like you have to be black to be at the bishop’s table,” someone was overheard quipping. If I had heard, my response would have been, “And you have to be black to be a member of my immediate family.” Being told to go back home can come from any direction—I have received such invitations from the liberal side for not following their form of correctness, and I have received them from conservatives for my “liberal ways” and especially my approach to gun safety.
So, where and how do we hold the plumb line? How do we find the courage not to pass by the suffering on the road? Love is an act of will not emotion. And one simple act of love for the human condition is not to let this moment pass us by.
There are people who can help us. One of the most impactful diocesan institutions to be established in recent years is the Beloved Community Initiative located in Old Brick, Iowa City. Its founders, Meg Wagner and Susanne Watson-Epting, have gathered a broad range of advisors from the diocese and the community to create a multi-faceted community initiative that embraces our racial past, asks the questions of reconciliation and reparation to native and former enslaved peoples, and seeks to educate the Diocese on how we might work at dismantling racism. Visit their web-site and see their great work. Sign up for the dismantling racism workshops when they come to your Chapter. Others, like young people at the Cathedral in Des Moines, have joined hands with partners like the American Friends Service Committeewho were the chief organizers of the vigil last Friday. Or look out for the next “We are Church Confessing” gathering. These young people from the Cathedral simply offer to accompany members of the community on their appointments to the immigration office. Visit IowaShare.org for resources to support you and church in action.
Some of you joined me in 2016 as we gathered in chapters around my visitation schedule to look at how totalitarian states on the right and left, in the Twentieth Century, coopted the mainstream Churches and national traditions and pride for their own end. We studied the thinking and evolving response of men like Dietrich Bonhoeffer who were setting up a plumb line for their time. The teaching may have seemed alarmist, and its implication to be a lack of trust and understanding of the power of democracy. But it was and remains a plumb line; and one which marks the current state of affairs to be tilting dangerously.
Jesus responded to every question of the lawyer who wanted to know how to live the perfect life with his own question. He asked the lawyer to delve into what he already knew—what does the law say? “Love God with all of your heart. And with all of your soul, and with all your strength, and with all you mind; and your neighbor as yourself.” This was what the lawyer’s own understanding already told him. These were his values; but they were limited through partisanship. Hence when Jesus affirmed his initial response, he gave his bias away by asking, “Who is my neighbor?” We are all each other’s neighbor across the planet, not just across our backyard fence or in the PTA or at Church. Those are the places we may nurture our capacity to neighborliness, but the range of the invitation is much vaster.
The early Church knew what they were doing when they called Jesus “Lord.” They lived in a time when only one person was entitled to that name—and that was the Roman Emperor. He was a man who ruled by fear, kept politicians in his back pocket, loved triumphal processions, and distracted the people by encouraging them to enjoy as sport seeing their enemies and their despised denigrated and destroyed in the amphitheater. To say “Jesus is Lord” was to hold up another standard by which even the Emperor was to be judged. It also got you into that amphitheater.
God did not pass by, neither did God’s people; nor does God today nor, can we. In the end Jesus made the lawyer a simple request. Having clarified who was his neighbor, and having identified him, through story, to be the anyone, regardless of where he came from and his personal identity who acted in compassion and mercy to the anyone, regardless of where he or she came from, found beaten and discarded at the side of the road, Jesus said “Go, do likewise!” And so He says to us—you know what is written, to what you have promised, now go do likewise!
In the peace and love of Christ,
+Alan
The Rt. Rev. Alan Scarfe, Bishop of Iowa
