Year A
\nNumbers 11:24-30
\nPsalm 104:25-35, 37
\n1 Corinthians 12:3b-13
\nJohn 7:37-39<\/p>\n
May the words of my mouth\u2026 O God\u2026 speak your Truth\u2026<\/p>\n
This past Monday\u2026 on Memorial Day\u2026 George Floyd\u2026 a black man\u2026 was apprehended on suspicion of passing a counterfeit $20.00 bill\u2026 to pay for cigarettes\u2026 when he was detained\u2026 by three white policemen\u2026 and one Asian American policeman\u2026 he ended up on the ground\u2026 with a knee on his neck\u2026<\/p>\n
On June 17, 2015\u2026 Dylann Roof\u2026 a young white man\u2026 murdered nine African-American Christians\u2026 at Mother Emanuel Church in Charleston, SC\u2026 he said he was hoping to start a race war\u2026 and when he was apprehended\u2026 also by white policemen\u2026 he told them that he was hungry\u2026 and even though he had been placed under arrest\u2026 even though he wasn\u2019t on the ground with a knee on his neck\u2026 the police took him to Burger King\u2026<\/p>\n
George Floyd is dead\u2026 Dylann Roof is alive and in prison\u2026 and the most egregious comparison between these two crimes\u2026 is that they continue to highlight\u2026 time after lamentable time\u2026 the systemic racism in which we live and move\u2026<\/p>\n
In October 1705\u2026 the state of Virginia passed a law\u2026 saying that\u2026 if a Master happened to kill a slave who was being corrected\u2026 [that is punished\u2026]\u00a0 <\/span>it was not a crime\u2026 in fact\u2026 the murder would be viewed as if it had never occurred\u2026 further\u2026 the legislation said that\u2026 when slaves were declared runaways\u2026 it was lawful for any person\u2026 to kill and destroy\u2026 by such ways and means as he shall think fit\u2026 I wonder if Travis McMichael felt empowered in just this way when he shot down Ahmaud Arbery\u2026<\/p>\n After Nat Turner\u2019s Rebellion in 1831\u2026 one of the most infamous slave rebellions in Virginia before abolition\u2026 state legislatures passed new laws prohibiting the education of slaves\u2026 even prohibiting the civil liberties of freed black people\u2026 restricting their right to assemble\u2026 and requiring white ministers to be present at all worship services\u2026 afterwards\u2026 the ongoing prospect of rebellion was such an ongoing source of fear in the American South\u2026 that many of these laws were enacted simply to quell white paranoia\u2026 or perhaps even white guilt\u2026<\/p>\n Amy Cooper and Christian Cooper may have the same last name\u2026 but they don\u2019t have the same skin color\u2026 and on Memorial Day\u2026 as Christian videotaped her\u2026 Amy threatened to call the police because Christian questioned her letting her dog run free in an area of Central Park that was set aside for birders\u2026 Amy chose to weaponize the established relationship between white women and men and the police\u2026 against men of color\u2026<\/p>\n I’m going to tell them there’s an African American man threatening my life<\/i>\u2026 she threatened\u2026 not just a man\u2026 but an African American man\u2026 and as the video spread widely\u2026 Amy told CNN that she wanted to apologize to everyone\u2026 that she is not a racist\u2026 and didn\u2019t mean to harm Christian\u2026 or the African American community\u2026 in any way\u2026 I wonder whether Amy felt the same white paranoia which compelled those in Virginia a few hundred years before\u2026 to pass laws against those whose skin color was darker than comfort\u2026<\/p>\n In Matthew 3:11\u2026 John the Baptist said: I baptize you with water for repentance\u2026 but one who is more powerful than I [am]\u2026 is coming after me\u2026 and he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire<\/i>\u2026 baptism by fire is a phrase commonly used to describe a person who is learning something\u2026 the hard way\u2026 through a challenging or difficult circumstance\u2026 and now\u2026 both the figurative and the actual fires of Pentecost\u2026 are burning in Minneapolis and throughout this country\u2026 now\u2026 right now\u2026 we are reaping the seeds that we\u2019ve sown over these hundreds of years\u2026 maybe not individually\u2026 but collectively\u2026 corporately\u2026 I mean\u2026 in the Jewish scriptures\u2026 time after time\u2026 God spoke against the nation\u2019s sins\u2026 not those moral peccadilloes which most Christians these days love to focus on\u2026 but on the corporate failures of the nation to ensure justice for all people\u2026<\/p>\n In Minneapolis and Detroit and Chicago and Grand Rapids and other cities\u2026 the violence\u2026 and the looting\u2026 and the fires\u2026 and the injury\u2026 and especially the deaths of those who are protesting\u2026 don\u2019t help anything\u2026 don\u2019t further the cause of justice\u2026 and I would never advocate for them\u2026 but if you feel disturbed by the looting of a Target store\u2026 because your idea of our social contract has been violated\u2026 then you can also understand what black people feel every day\u2026 and The Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr\u2026 hit the nail right on the head when he said that\u2026 a riot\u2026 is the language of the unheard<\/i>\u2026 what are we supposed to do when we try over and over again to be civil\u2026 and our cries fall on deaf ears\u2026 how long O Lord, how long\u2026 and too many people of color\u2026 have not only been unheard\u2026 but we have neither sought justice for them\u2026 nor respected their God-given dignity\u2026 in too many cases\u2026 we have done just the opposite\u2026<\/p>\n Several weeks ago\u2026 in response to the pandemic\u2026 I began to notice messages of both instruction and hope\u2026 which reminded and affirmed\u2026 that we\u2019re all in this together\u2026 we are all in this racism together too\u2026 and this country is being given a golden opportunity\u2026 to focus on\u2026 to repent of\u2026 and to name and acknowledge not only the sins of our ancestors\u2026 but the sins which we continue to perpetuate\u2026 against people of color\u2026 and part of the reason I think\u2026 that we fail to acknowledge them\u2026 is because these sins are so egregious\u2026 so completely against the message for which Jesus died\u2026 that among our deepest fears\u2026 is that in facing them\u2026 we would be crushed\u2026<\/p>\n So much of the national chatter in the last month or so\u2026 has been focused on states\u2019 opening up again\u2026 returning to business as usual\u2026 people are talking about returning to normal\u2026 but author\u2026 and poet\u2026 Sonya Renee Taylor wrote\u2026 We will not go back to “normal.” Normal never was. Our pre-corona existence was not normal\u2026 other than we normalized greed\u2026 inequity\u2026 exhaustion\u2026 depletion\u2026 extraction\u2026 disconnection\u2026 confusion\u2026 rage\u2026 hoarding\u2026 hate\u2026 and lack\u2026 We should not long to return\u2026 we are being given the opportunity to stitch a new garment\u2026 one that fits all of humanity and nature<\/i>\u2026<\/p>\n According to an article in The Atlantic magazine\u2026 in June of 1961\u2026 Ambassador Malick Sow of the nation of Chad was en route<\/i> to Washington to present his credentials to President John F. Kennedy\u2026 and he stopped for coffee at a diner along Maryland\u2019s Route 40\u2026 the diner\u2019s white female owner greeted him\u2026 with the announcement that black people were not welcome there\u2026 but when she was asked about the incident by Life magazine\u2026 she felt no need to apologize\u2026 explaining\u2026 He looked like just an ordinary run-of-the-mill \u2013\u2013\u00a0n-word \u2013\u2013\u00a0to me\u2026 I couldn\u2019t tell he was an ambassador<\/i>\u2026<\/p>\n Other black statesmen\u2026 who were similarly slighted\u2026 received apologies\u2026 but more than 50 years later\u2026 black Americans still haven\u2019t received a state apology for the subjugation and discrimination at the hands of their own country\u2026 but this is not because of some stance against apologies\u2026<\/p>\n In 1988\u2026 for example\u2026 Ronald Reagan signed legislation \u2013\u2013 complete with reparations \u2013\u2013 extending a formal apology for Japanese-American internment on American soil during World War II\u2026 in 1997\u2026 Bill Clinton offered a presidential apology for the infamous Tuskegee syphilis study\u2026 in which the U.S. Public Health Service purposely infected hundreds of black men with syphilis\u2026 in order to study the disease\u2019s effects\u2026 while falsely claiming\u2026 to be providing them proper treatment\u2026<\/p>\n By contrast\u2026 congressional resolutions apologizing for slavery\u2026 passed separately by the House in 2008 and the Senate in 2009\u2026 but were never reconciled or signed by the president\u2026 and far from constituting a state apology\u2026 they carry all the weight of resolutions passed to congratulate Super Bowl winners\u2026<\/p>\n But yesterday\u2026 New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo signed a bill that gives death benefits to the families of frontline workers who died battling the coronavirus pandemic\u2026 he said\u2026 It\u2019s the least we can do to say\u00a0thank you\u2026 and we honor you\u2026 and\u00a0we remember you\u2026\u00a0you gave your lives for us\u2026 and we will be there to support <\/i>your<\/i>\u00a0families going forward\u2026<\/i><\/p>\n I don\u2019t know how many families\u2026 and businesses\u2026 and yes\u2026 even churches\u2026 made unimaginable fortunes on the backs of kidnapped human beings who were seen as soul-less beasts<\/i>\u2026 but if New York can acknowledge the sacrifice made by these front-line workers\u2026 why can\u2019t this nation acknowledge the sins of our ancestors\u2026 and apologize for them\u2026 I wonder if it\u2019s because too many people think that if you apologize\u2026 you\u2019ve also got to put your money where your mouth is\u2026 and what would be so wrong with that\u2026<\/p>\n But little by little\u2026 we must face our egregious corporate sins\u2026and I would echo Moses\u2019 words when he said\u2026 would that all the Lord’s people were prophets\u2026 and that the Lord would put his Spirit on them<\/i>\u2026 and the words of the Psalmist who wrote\u2026 You send forth your Spirit\u2026 and so you renew the face of the earth<\/i>\u2026 and the words of Paul in 1 Corinthians\u2026 we were all made to drink of one Spirit<\/i>\u2026 and the words of Jesus and the prophet Amos\u2026 out of the believer\u2019s heart\u2026 shall flow rivers of living water<\/i>\u2026\u00a0 <\/span>and let justice roll down like waters\u2026 and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream\u2026 Jesus has been glorified\u2026 and the Holy Spirit is here\u2026 the question of our day\u2026 is how in this nation\u2026\u00a0 do we become willing and able\u2026 to drink the waters it brings\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Year A Numbers 11:24-30 Psalm 104:25-35, 37 1 Corinthians 12:3b-13 John 7:37-39 May the words of my mouth\u2026 O God\u2026 speak your Truth\u2026 This past Monday\u2026 on Memorial Day\u2026 George Floyd\u2026 a black man\u2026 was apprehended on suspicion of passing a counterfeit $20.00 bill\u2026 to pay for cigarettes\u2026 when he was detained\u2026 by three white policemen\u2026 and one Asian American policeman\u2026 he ended up on the ground\u2026 with a knee on his neck\u2026 On June 17, 2015\u2026 Dylann Roof\u2026 a young white man\u2026 murdered nine African-American Christians\u2026 at Mother Emanuel Church in Charleston, SC\u2026 he said he was hoping to start a race war\u2026 and when he was apprehended\u2026 also by white policemen\u2026 he told them that he was hungry\u2026 and even though he had been placed under arrest\u2026 even though he wasn\u2019t on the ground with a knee on his neck\u2026 the police took him to Burger King\u2026 George Floyd is dead\u2026 Dylann Roof is alive and in prison\u2026 and the most egregious comparison between these two crimes\u2026 is that they continue to highlight\u2026 time after lamentable time\u2026 the systemic racism in which we live and move\u2026 In October 1705\u2026 the state of Virginia passed a law\u2026 saying that\u2026 if a Master happened to kill a slave who was being corrected\u2026 [that is punished\u2026]\u00a0 it was not a crime\u2026 in fact\u2026 the murder would be viewed as if it had never occurred\u2026 further\u2026 the legislation said that\u2026 when slaves were declared runaways\u2026 it was lawful for any person\u2026 to kill and destroy\u2026 by such ways and means as he shall think fit\u2026 I wonder if Travis McMichael felt empowered in just this way when he shot down Ahmaud Arbery\u2026 After Nat Turner\u2019s Rebellion in 1831\u2026 one of the most infamous slave rebellions in Virginia before abolition\u2026 state legislatures passed new laws prohibiting the education of slaves\u2026 even prohibiting the civil liberties of freed black people\u2026 restricting their right to assemble\u2026 and requiring white ministers to be present at all worship services\u2026 afterwards\u2026 the ongoing prospect of rebellion was such an ongoing source of fear in the American South\u2026 that many of these laws were enacted simply to quell white paranoia\u2026 or perhaps even white guilt\u2026 Amy Cooper and Christian Cooper may have the same last name\u2026 but they don\u2019t have the same skin color\u2026 and on Memorial Day\u2026 as Christian videotaped her\u2026 Amy threatened to call the police because Christian questioned her letting her dog run free in an area of Central Park that was set aside for birders\u2026 Amy chose to weaponize the established relationship between white women and men and the police\u2026 against men of color\u2026 I’m going to tell them there’s an African American man threatening my life\u2026 she threatened\u2026 not just a man\u2026 but an African American man\u2026 and as the video spread widely\u2026 Amy told CNN that she wanted to apologize to everyone\u2026 that she is not a racist\u2026 and didn\u2019t mean to harm Christian\u2026 or the African American community\u2026 in any way\u2026 I wonder whether Amy felt the same white paranoia which compelled those in Virginia a few hundred years before\u2026 to pass laws against those whose skin color was darker than comfort\u2026 In Matthew 3:11\u2026 John the Baptist said: I baptize you with water for repentance\u2026 but one who is more powerful than I [am]\u2026 is coming after me\u2026 and he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire\u2026 baptism by fire is a phrase commonly used to describe a person who is learning something\u2026 the hard way\u2026 through a challenging or difficult circumstance\u2026 and now\u2026 both the figurative and the actual fires of Pentecost\u2026 are burning in Minneapolis and throughout this country\u2026 now\u2026 right now\u2026 we are reaping the seeds that we\u2019ve sown over these hundreds of years\u2026 maybe not individually\u2026 but collectively\u2026 corporately\u2026 I mean\u2026 in the Jewish scriptures\u2026 time after time\u2026 God spoke against the nation\u2019s sins\u2026 not those moral peccadilloes which most Christians these days love to focus on\u2026 but on the corporate failures of the nation to ensure justice for all people\u2026 In Minneapolis and Detroit and Chicago and Grand Rapids and other cities\u2026 the violence\u2026 and the looting\u2026 and the fires\u2026 and the injury\u2026 and especially the deaths of those who are protesting\u2026 don\u2019t help anything\u2026 don\u2019t further the cause of justice\u2026 and I would never advocate for them\u2026 but if you feel disturbed by the looting of a Target store\u2026 because your idea of our social contract has been violated\u2026 then you can also understand what black people feel every day\u2026 and The Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr\u2026 hit the nail right on the head when he said that\u2026 a riot\u2026 is the language of the unheard\u2026 what are we supposed to do when we try over and over again to be civil\u2026 and our cries fall on deaf ears\u2026 how long O Lord, how long\u2026 and too many people of color\u2026 have not only been unheard\u2026 but we have neither sought justice for them\u2026 nor respected their God-given dignity\u2026 in too many cases\u2026 we have done just the opposite\u2026 Several weeks ago\u2026 in response to the pandemic\u2026 I began to notice messages of both instruction and hope\u2026 which reminded and affirmed\u2026 that we\u2019re all in this together\u2026 we are all in this racism together too\u2026 and this country is being given a golden opportunity\u2026 to focus on\u2026 to repent of\u2026 and to name and acknowledge not only the sins of our ancestors\u2026 but the sins which we continue to perpetuate\u2026 against people of color\u2026 and part of the reason I think\u2026 that we fail to acknowledge them\u2026 is because these sins are so egregious\u2026 so completely against the message for which Jesus died\u2026 that among our deepest fears\u2026 is that in facing them\u2026 we would be crushed\u2026 So much of the national chatter in the last month or so\u2026 has been focused on states\u2019 opening up again\u2026 returning to business as usual\u2026 people are talking about returning to normal\u2026 but author\u2026 and poet\u2026 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-772","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sermons"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/twochurches.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/772","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/twochurches.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/twochurches.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/twochurches.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/twochurches.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=772"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/twochurches.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/772\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":780,"href":"https:\/\/twochurches.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/772\/revisions\/780"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/twochurches.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=772"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/twochurches.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=772"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/twochurches.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=772"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}