Preaching
about current affairs can be tricky, and the reason is because everything is so
politicized these days. Take war, for example ... you'd think that preaching against war would be a
no-brainer, considering that we follow a guy called, you know, the Prince of Peace and all, but no. If
you preach against a specific war, you're automatically accused of being
political, because there's always a political party associated with any given
conflict. In the case of Iraq, preaching against that got you accused of being anti-GOP and
George W. Bush, despite the fact that most Democrats in Congress voted for it
as well. And when Bill Clinton sent missiles raining onto the Middle East to
detract from his infidelities, well, preaching on that would've won no accolades among the
Hamilton County Friends of Bill.
Politics
is like the third rail of religion, and pastors are generally really leery of
emitting even a whiff
of it, particularly from the pulpit. This is especially true these days, when
declining membership and budgets make the loss of just one disgruntled member
really painful. But the events in Charlottesville last weekend keep weighing on
my mind . . . all sides in that conflict say they are Christian, yet they have
radically different views of the country, and indeed the world. Somebody said
90% of white nationalists profess to be Christian, and that seems awful high,
but if you go to any of their websites, it isn't long before the word
"Christian" pops up. Their cause is to "restore America for
white rule," though some use the leads-inflammable code-word
"European." Some advocate partitioning America into whites-only zones,
and use that wonderful word "secession." Others describe cleansing
the land of minorities, of scouring the streets of people who don't meet their
criteria of skin color, religious faith, sexual orientation and/or gender
identity. Oh yeah, I almost forgot: they are overwhelmingly male.
The
organizers of and participants in the "Unite the Right" rally in Charlottesville illustrated all this. The old guard of white supremacy was
there, represented by David Duke of the Ku Klux Klan, which has historically
claimed to be a Christian organization. The action--and violence--was driven by
the "new guard," epitomized by Jason Kessler, organizer of the rally,
and Richard Spencer, president of the white supremacist think tank National
Policy Institute, the face of the new white supremacist movement. Spencer calls
it a movement of support for "European heritage," he became
well-known for his use of Nazi rhetoric and symbolism.
Indeed,
on the Friday night before the start of the rally, America was treated to the
spectacle of about a hundred young men marching down a Charlottesville street
in lock-step, carrying torches, giving the straight arm Nazi salute, and
yelling seig heil, and I wonder: what would World War II veterans who fought
against the Nazi horror--like my late father-in-law Bud--think about it all? I
wonder what our Jewish sisters and brothers thought as they recalled the ovens
in which their ancestors were baked by predecessors of those goose-stepping
young men. I know
what the Tiki company thought ... they felt it necessary to disavow white
supremacy due to the fact that the men were carrying their torches. (I can see
the commercial now: "Tiki: the choice of Neo-Nazis everywhere. If it ain't
Tiki, it ain't genocide.")
Many
among the counter-protesters the other side claimed religious faith
as well. I think it fair to say that the
counter protests were driven by clergy, both Christian and Jewish, and I know
that they were sheltered by churches. Their
major organizer was a Charlottesville-based network of clergy members and
racial-justice activists called Solidarity Cville. One of its associates, the
Reverend Brittany Caine-Conley, called attention to the rally, saying “There is
an extremely high potential for physical violence and brutality directed at our
community,” she wrote. “We need your help — we don’t have the numbers to stand
up to this on our own.”
That,
of course, was prophetic: the morning after the torchlight march, over a
hundred armed white nationalists streamed into Emancipation Park, the site of
the rally. One onlooker, a student at the University of Virginia, said it
looked like an invading army. They were met by well-organized lines of
protesters . . . clergy, students, and anti-racism activists. An armed group of
about 20 anti-fascists called the Redneck Revolt formed a defensive perimeter
around the counter protesters. The Rev. Dr. Cornel West, of Harvard Divinity
School, said that they saved their lives, that they would have been
"crushed like cockroaches" without their protection.
When
the dust had settled, there were scores of wounded: two troopers killed in a helicopter crash and a female counter-protester, murdered when an
Ohio man plowed his car into the crowd. I find the debate over whether that was
an act of domestic terrorism ironic considering that he borrowed that
particular tactic from ISIS.
In
our lectionary reading for today Jesus tells us that “it is not what goes into
the mouth that defiles a person, but it is what comes out of the mouth that
defiles.” When the disciples--obtuse as ever--ask him to explain what he means,
he continues: “Do you not see that whatever goes into the mouth enters the
stomach, and goes out into the sewer? But what comes out of the mouth proceeds
from the heart, and this is what defiles." So let's hear what has come out
of the mouths of the principals in the Charlottesville rally
The
white nationalists chanted "Blood and soil," a Nazi-era slogan, and
"Jews will not replace us." David Duke said: “This is only the
beginning, believe me - Whitey is done being pushed around by
Marxist/Anarchist/Leftist anti-White scum, time for pushback!” Christopher
Cantwell, co-organizer of the rally says he is disgusted that the president
"let a Jew steal his daughter," referring to Ivanka Trump's marriage
to Jared Kushner. He added that he thinks "a lot more people are going to
die" before they are finished.
It's
harder to find quotes from the counter-protesters, especially the clergy,
because, let's face it: our media thrives on controversy, and there's nothing
more controversial than white males saying hateful things about blacks, gays
and Jews. The clergy, who linked their arms together in the face of armed
nationalists, began chanting "love has already won, love has already
won," joined immediately by members of Black Lives Matter. Brittany
Caine-Conley of the clergy group Congregate Cville said "I want to follow
the Way of Jesus. For that reason, I must show up with my body to work for
justice and counteract white supremacy." And author and seminarian Lisa
Sharon Harper said "It really felt like every step you take could be your
last,” adding later that “With each step, I just kept holding on to the call to
love.”
Most
of the Christian clergy at Charlottesville were moderate to liberal mainline
Protestants; our evangelical brothers and sisters were largely absent. Two
notable exceptions were Ms. Harper and prominent author and pastor Brian
McLaren, who joined in the counter-protests, but seems to have been most
effective helping the hurt and wounded. When the white nationalist plowed his Dodge
Charger into the crowd, he and other Christians ran into the fray, arriving
even before police and ambulances. McLaren believes there were more injuries
than just those reported; he recalls helping a woman who'd been hit, thrown
into the air and dislocated her shoulder. "She just wanted to get
away," he said, "so I helped her get some water and ice."
I wish I could say all the violence was on the side of the white nationalists,
but it wasn't so. As I mentioned earlier, about 20 armed anti-fascists helped
protect the counter-protesters, and some others of the so-called antifa
movement returned push for push and shove for shove. And as understandable as
it is, responding to violence with violence is never the answer. In fact, a
recent study looked at over two hundred confrontations over the last century,
both large and small, and found that non-violent succeeded twice as often as
violent resistance. And in some ways, meeting violence with violence,
intimidation with intimidation, hate with hate, plays right into white
nationalist hands
And
the fact is, Jesus didn't want his followers to not resist . . . Turn the other
cheek, go the extra mile, shake the dust off your feet and give the coat off
your back are all teachings on non-violent resistance. Mahatma Gandhi, the
great Hindu teacher who led India to independence, famously said that he
learned all he knew
about non-violent resistance from Jesus. It's telling that the relatively few
violent resistors were from secular groups, not the pastors and rabbis and
Mennonite peace workers.
I
think that equating white supremacists and the counter-protesters, saying that
there was fault in both sides as some observers have, is dangerous. It draws a
false equivalence between the views of the white nationalists and counter-protesters,
it helps normalize actions and beliefs that are 180 degrees opposite from those
of Christ. Jesus stood up against exclusivist, segregated, forms of
religion--aka, his own Jewish faith. He saved the Canaanite woman, healed the
Gerasene demoniac and gave life and succor to the Samaritan at the well. All
people considered unclean, and thus outsiders, by the powers that be. And yes,
as Nancy Kahaian pointed out last week, the man many white nationalists say
they follow was one of those hated Jews.
We're
told that God is love, not hate, and that the very substance of love is
relationship, and thus a certain unity, without losing the individuality of
the lovers. Scholars and thinkers like the Reverend Doctors Teilhard de
Chardin, Cynthia Bourgeault and Ilia Delio tell us that love is the very drive toward unity, toward
the paradoxical state of diversity within unity, which, again, is 180 degrees
away from the pure, white society longed for by the nationalists.
Finally--and
again, perhaps, paradoxically--separating the protesters into two dueling,
dualistic sides,
each one vilifying and castigating the other, each one regarding the other as other, is wrong as well,
it is against the design of the God who created us all in the image of of the divine: left, right,
center ... white nationalists, anti-fascists and black lives matter, our God don't make no trash.
As
Christians we are called by God to resist the evils of racism, homophobia and
sexism, and certainly to confront it wherever it raises its head. But I believe
we're to do it in a constructive way, passively, showing that there is another
way, the way of Christ, the way of a God of love. In other words, I believe
we're there for conversion,
to change hearts and minds.
Author
and seminarian Lisa Sharon Harper exemplifies this in her interaction with one
supremacist. She stood for hours facing him in his line of militia, and when
she turned to leave, she spoke to him one last time: “I just want you to know,
we love you,” she said. She said the man’s face, grizzled and tired from the
day, suddenly softened. After a moment, he replied: “I love you, too.”
At
that moment, what came out of that man’s heart did not defile. Amen.
