Homily – 8/20/17
Opening Prayer:
I speak to you in the name of God…
Father, Son, and Holy Spirit…
Amen…
Introduction:
“No one is born hating another person…”
“Because of the color of his skin…”
“Or his background…”
“Or his religion…”
“People must learn to hate…”
“And…”
“If they can learn to hate…”
“They can be taught to love…”
“For love comes more naturally to the human heart…”
“Than it’s opposite…”
Nelson Mandela…
A quote that had recently been “tweeted” by Former President Obama…
Quickly surging to become the most “liked tweet” in Twitter history…
I find comfort in that…
The response…
Well…
Well, I had a homily that I had got a jump on…
Nearly completed ahead schedule in preparation for today…
And then…
And then Charlottesville happened…
It was a funny one too…
I thought so anyway…
Yes…
Charlottesville happened…
A gathering of various hate groups…
White supremacists…
Neo-Nazis…
White nationalists…
A veritable crucible of hate…
Of evil…
And in their ignorance…
From that crucible…
From that crucible violence bubbled over…
It poured over…
Body One:
I have little doubt…
Little doubt that it was not…
That it was not exactly what was intended…
I myself have participated in several marches and demonstrations through the years…
And not once did myself…
Or any of the other participants arrive with shields…
With sticks, batons, bats…
Projectiles…
With high-powered semi-automatic rifles on display…
No…
No, I would imagine that if you show up with such items…
There must be some intent for their use…
Especially…
Especially if you are seeking to be insightful…
Donning Nazi memorabilia…
Chanting anti-sematic…
Anti-black…
Anti-Muslim…
Anti-LBGTQ…
Anti-Immigrant slogans…
And…
And when the situation went as according to plan…
When that crucible poured over…
Three souls lost their lives…
Heather Heyer…
Whose parents have been inspirational in their loss…
Lieutenant H. Jay Cullen…
And…
Trooper Berke Bates…
The two law enforcement gentlemen each left behind a wife and two children…
Physically…
Physically many more were injured…
The images have been tough to see…
The accounts hard to hear…
Emotionally…
Mentally…
Our nation…
All of us…
We all have been injured…
Injured by the ignorance…
The hate…
The evil…
Injured by the realization…
The realization that these vessels of ignorance…
Of hate…
Of evil…
That these vessels do not only exist within the fringes of our society…
But evidently…
Substantially throughout the fabric of it…
Now…
Prior to last weekend…
Prior to last weekend I do not think us naïve enough…
Naïve enough to have collectively believed that such hate had ceased to exist…
I think we are aware of how it presents itself in our culture…
The subtle…
The overt…
The systemic…
However…
However, I do believe that actions in Charlottesville…
The actions caught us off guard…
The sheer spectacle of it…
Caught us off guard and allowed us to see just what had been standing before us all along…
We learned something last weekend…
Through hundreds of torches marching through the night…
We learned something…
Through shields…
Through sticks, batons, and bats…
Through a speeding vehicle…
We learned something…
We learned…
We learned that we…
That we have so much to learn…
That so many…
So many have so much to learn…
Body Two:
“No one is born hating another person…”
“Because of the color of his skin…”
“Or his background…”
“Or his religion…”
“People must learn to hate…”
“And…”
“If they can learn to hate…”
“They can be taught to love…”
“For love comes more naturally to the human heart…”
“Than it’s opposite…”
As the Gospels tend to be…
This week’s is right on time…
And not for the lesson in persistence of faith…
But because…
But because Jesus…
Jesus in his ignoring of…
His belittling of…
His hurting of the Canaanite woman…
He learned…
He was “taught to love…”
Having previously withheld his compassion for her as she was not a “lost sheep of Israel…”
She taught him…
She taught him how to love…
Opening his compassion and care…
His love…
His love was open to all peoples…
Profoundly changing his ministry from that moment on…
Body Three:
“No one is born hating another person…”
“People must learn to hate…”
“No one is born hating another person…”
“People must learn to hate…”
Learn hate…
Where do we learn to hate???
We learn to hate from our parents…
Our families…
Our peers…
We learn to hate from history…
From media…
Perpetuated false stereotypes and generalizations…
We learn to hate from misguided belief systems…
That somehow our color, our culture, our nation, our God…
That we…
That we are superior…
And the other…
The other is inferior…
We learn to hate from our fears
Afraid of the unknown…
Of not being dominant…
Of not being superior…
We learn to hate from our own disappointments and short comings…
Blaming others for why we did not…
Why we cannot achieve…
Making others responsible for our lot…
Sources of hate…
They surround us…
It is in that space…
In being surrounded…
That is for us…
That it is for us to be mindful as to our teachers influence…
That we do not allow those teachers to indoctrinate us with ignorance…
That we do not take on their hate…
That we are not infected by that evil…
It is for us…
It is for us to question what we have been told…
What we supposedly know…
Our values…
Even if…
Even if they had been handed down to us by those that we admire…
Those who love us…
And that we love the most…
It is for us…
It is for us to question information…
Our sources…
To challenge stereotypes…
To challenge generalizations…
It is for us…
It is for us to examine our belief systems…
It is for us…
It is for us to find comfort in our fears…
It is for us…
It is for us to take responsibility for our own lot…
It is for us…
It is for us to learn…
To learn about ourselves…
To learn about ourselves just as Jesus did…
Closing:
“If they can learn to hate…”
“They can be taught to love…”
“For love comes more naturally to the human heart…”
“Than it’s opposite…”
If they can learn to hate…
They can be taught…
They can be taught to love…
And here it is…
Our mission…
Our response to Charlottesville…
Those that hate…
They can be taught to love…
They can be taught by surrounding…
By surrounding those same sources of hate…
Surrounding them with love…
The love of not accepting a racist joke…
The love of denouncing a slur…
The love of not perpetuating stereotypes…
The love of offering comfort to fear…
The love of personal responsibility…
The love of seeking tolerance in bigotry…
The love of enlightening ignorance…
The love of calling out…
The love of not validating racism, prejudice, or hatred…
This morning…
This morning I pray…
I pray that through the tragedy in Charlottesville…
That we…
Like Jesus…
That we learn…
That our compassion and care…
Our love…
Our love is open to all peoples…
I pray that our ministries are profoundly changed from this moment on…
I pray that we are teachers of love…
I pray that loves surrounds hate…
I pray for Helen Heyer…
For Lieutenant H. Jay Cullen…
For Trooper Berke Bates…
For their families and all those who mourn them…
I pray for our nation…
“No one is born hating another person…”
“Because of the color of his skin…”
“Or his background…”
“Or his religion…”
“People must learn to hate…”
“And…”
“If they can learn to hate…”
“They can be taught to love…”
“For love comes more naturally to the human heart…”
“Than it’s opposite…”
The most “liked tweet” in Twitter history…
I find comfort in that…
The response…
Amen…