Reconciling Ministries Network

Relationships

by Kara Crawford

“God loves queers!” Wouldn't it be wonderful if this were a more commonly-heard message in the public sphere than its infamous converse, à la Fred Phelps and the Westboro Baptist Church? Believe it or not, it actually is a majority sentiment in Mainline Protestant Christianity. According to a Pew Forum Religion and Public Life survey conducted in 2007, 56% of Mainline Protestant Christians agreed that homosexuality should be accepted, and I am virtually positive the percentage has only increased since then.

So, not all Christians are anti-queer. In fact, many genuinely believe in, and a fair number act on, the sentiment that “God loves queers!” Some Christians are out queers; some queers are out Christians. Many signs point to positive changes in favor of queer acceptance by Christians.

However, this doesn't account for unsupportive Christians. Some of us know all too well who they are, have been repeatedly hurt by their hateful sentiments, some of us even left the churches of our childhood because of the hatred we felt from them. For some of us, they are former pastors and Sunday school teachers, even grandparents and parents. Can't we just ignore their hatred and pretend it doesn't exist, or better yet, only pay it attention when we're protesting and counterprotesting it and mocking their rhetoric?

I would argue no. In fact, I would argue that simply ignoring them is counterproductive to our looking for inclusion and acceptance. How's that, you may ask? Well, most simply, even unsupportive folks are part of the society in which we live. So if we, as queers and company, want to genuinely work to transform and challenge society's heterosexism, I believe it is critical that we work to build genuine relationships with unsupportive folks. Sure, it will be difficult. We will face challenging and even hurtful conversations, but I believe this is key to bringing about transformation.

Beyond the Hatred: First Love, First Loyalty

by Peter L. DeGroote

If any come to me and do not hate their own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters—yes, even their own life—they cannot be my disciples.Luke:14;26 (SV).

1. About 50 pastors in a continuing education class were asked if they had ever preached on the above verse. Few hands went up. Nevertheless, Jesus appears to have said something very close to those words so we are obliged to look further.*    Two guidelines for biblical interpretation can help:

A. The first guideline: Variations in Jesus’ words from gospel to gospel often reflect the conditions in the communities out of which the various gospels came. 

• Many early Christian communities were racked with emotional turmoil over lost family relationships. Ancient peoples had no identity without family. Orphans often became beggars or bandits; some sold themselves into slavery in order to be part of a household, household often being a synonym for family.**

• Many early Christian converts were disowned by their families and persecuted by their communities. Some LGBT people have experienced similar rejection by family, friends, and congregation and we have struggled with the power or our emotional responses. 

• A harsh, even hateful reaction toward those who reject or persecute us is not uncommon, particularly when we have to go through the trauma of having to find new relationships and form new families. That is true for many LGBT folks, for many groups through history, and certainly for the early church.

B. The second guideline: Jesus' teachings are logically consistent, even if they challenge our understanding (or wishes). For this reason, use of the word "hate" raises a red flag.

• Recall Jesus’ prime directive, the rule of love . 

• Primary to the rule of love is the forgiveness of others. (Forgive us…as we forgive them…). Hatred forfeits forgiveness and contradicts the rule of love.

2, Any who have experienced rejection and persecution from families, friends, and congregations understand the emotional turmoil that can lead to the feelings of “hate” expressed in this verse. It is reasonable to conclude that this use of the word “hate” arises out of the emotional turmoil of broken relationships and subsequent persecution of those early community members. 

3. But something remains; a spiritual message at the heart of the verse. Where Old Testament prophets spoke of idolatry in the form of pagan religious images, Jesus spoke of idolatry in the form of human values and loyalties interfering with his Way of living in harmony with God and God’s creation. 

4. Today we are challenged by loyalties demanded by our employment, social class, neighborhood, political party, nation, and even our religious denomination or community. More often than not, these create divisions between people, even hatreds. (The daily news is sufficient evidence.) 

6. We are called to choose a Way of life that is often costly for our relationships, careers, and personal security. We can easily doubt that calling because living in harmony with God and God’s creation can seem unrealistic when many about us are doing otherwise. But we are called to learn to live in harmony even with those who would criticize, demean, and persecute us. That’s called reconciliation. It’s easier to write about than to do.   

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*   The saying appears in Luke and twice in Thomas (55 & 101. That suggests its source is in a lost collection of sayings that the authors of Mark, Matthew, and John were unaware of or chose not to use. However, there is a significant variation in Matthew (55:1): Those who love father and mother more than me are not worthy of me…  Perhaps Matthew’s authors knew the saying source but were also uncomfortable with the word “hate.” However, Matthew’s context is much different from Luke’s. 
There are, of course, other passages which call us to first loyalties but I find this one worth noting because so many LGBT folks can identify with the emotions involved.

**The ancient family could:
• Demand absolute loyalty and obedience in a patriarchal structure.
• Often aggressively competed with others as many businesses do today.
• Were often the source of hatred and violence directed toward other families in what we call clan warfare.

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Peter is a second career pastor who has served in several churches in the Baltimore-Washington Conference. Prior to his ordination, he was a secondary-school teacher, a university lecturer in Government, an Associate in a government related professional association, CEO of a national financial institution. Peter was involved in Mid-Atlantic Affirmation, served on the National Council of Affirmation, and sat on the Board of the Reconciling Congregations Program, the predecessor name for RMN and has worked with BWARM (Baltimore-Washington Reconciling United Methodists).

Call to Truth

by Joey Heath

I have just finished my first year of seminary. One-third of my theological education is now behind me and what a journey it has been so far. The passion I had for social justice has been magnified ten-fold. If I have taken anything from this semester it is that we as Christians must live out social justice and we must reach out to the oppressed and needy in all the ways we can. This is our calling “we love because he first loved us. Those who say 'I love God' and hate their brothers and sisters are liars; for those who do not love a brother or sister whom they have seen, can not love God whom they have not seen.” (1 John 4:19-20). This is our truth from Jesus Christ “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbor as yourself” (Luke 10:27). The message of the Gospel is love and redemption two things I very much believe in. So in that spirit I have written this call to truth.

We are called to be a witness to that which we believe to be truth. Truth may cost us but that is what is demanded for the practitioners of faith. It is this push that may result in a violent push back but in that push back the victory is already won. Jesus came and was crucified in an act of violent push back. At first glance this may seem to make Jesus weak. As the story goes the powerful Roman Empire has destroyed the Savior who meant to bring redemption and if that was the end of the story it would be it would be defeat. But that is not because Jesus rose again on the third day. Jesus gave us the model for witness to truth and now we are called to witness. The time of sitting just back in our pews on Sunday mornings is over. We must continue to push back as the vocal minority until we find ourselves in the majority. Changing hearts and minds will not happen overnight but it will happen if we continue to speak up and speak out. If we truly begin to Believe Out Loud.

Today there is a powerful change underway, with a great amount of push back against inclusion of the LGBTQ community. But people of faith are coming together and saying enough is enough, our LGBTQ brothers and sisters have been treated as second class citizens for far too long. We all must join the chorus of voices crying this message. So I implore you, Speak Out. Come Out. Tell your stories. Because I tell you this truth, if we stand in solidarity we can and will create change and bring the world just a little closer to looking like the Kingdom of God it was intended to be.

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Joey Heath is a 26 year old life long United Methodist. He is currently a graduate student at Wesley Theological Seminary completing his Masters in Divinity. Once an ordained pastor, Joey hopes he will be able to bring real change to the UMC on the issues of sexuality and gender identity at the broader church level, but also with individuals, so that one day the church will truly be a place that is inclusive of all people.

76 Ash Wednesdays and 76 Lenten Seasons !

by Rev. Gilbert Caldwell

I have sought, with the assistance of the words attributed to Ellzabeth Kubler-Ross, "To live until I die".  I, like many of my colleagues ran some risk of life and limb as I participated in the southern and northern racial freedom movements. I like many of them have know arrest and detention. In my case because of my acts of civil disobedience at the headquarters of a national chain of Super Markets in 1971, protesting apartheid outside the South African Embassy in 1985 and protesting legislation of the United Methodist Church that punishes same gender loving clergy and those who perform unions of same gender loving persons; at the Cleveland General Conference in 2000.

All of the above flashed through my mind as I read the rich and powerful Ash Wednesday prayer of Leland G. Spencer, IV. At the end of this prayer, I read his brief biographical information and found out that he "withdrew from ministerial candidacy in the United Methodist Church because of its opposition to the ordination of LGBT persons".

It is because of this bit of his biographical information that I take the liberty of paraphrasing a portion of his prayer as a way to be in solidarity with Leland and to say that his prayer has become my prayer. This is how the inspiration of Leland shapes my prayer life as I begin my 76th Lenten Season:

Creator God, many, many times I have asked that you forgive the Methodist/United Methodist Church for its sins of racial exclusion and close-mindedness and hardness of heart. It did not exclude me from ordination because of my race, but it did make it necessary for me to begin my ministry in North Carolina in a racially segregated church, district, Conference and Central Jurisdiction. But although persons like myself were separated and segregated, we were on the "Methodist Bus", even though we had to sit in the back of that Bus. But today in 2010, there are persons who because of whom they love, are not even allowed on the "United Methodist Bus", and clergy who are on that "UM Bus" are penalized if they enable same gender persons to celebrate their love and commitment in a United Methodist Church.

God I was recently reading again those words of Dietrich Bonhoeffer that remind us that "we are all sinners and how foolish it is for self-acknowledged sinners to keep other sinners off of the Church Bus." (If Bonhoeffer is one of the angels now in heaven, please apologize to him on my behalf God, for my paraphrase of his words). God Creator, help all of us to acknowledge that an honest awareness of our imperfections makes us beggars. And that we are called to be "Beggars telling other beggars where the bread line is and that Jesus is passing out the bread."

Therefore God, I with your unordained but God-endorsed minister Leland, pray; "Continue to call your church to embrace the inclusive heart of its Creator." God you wrapped yourself in flesh and bones and came to us in the one called Jesus. 54 years ago when I was ordained a Deacon in the Methodist Church I would never have imagined that in 2010 I would have to join with Leland and pray that the United Methodist Church stop kicking people off the Bus because of sexual orientation and gender reasons. I thought that in 1968 when the denomination declared that I no longer had to sit in the back of the Bus, separation, segregation and exclusion were over. But since I was wrong, I pray that during the Lenten Season of 2010 some hearts will be warmed and some of the folk who have stood in the Church door to keep some folk out as Governor Wallace sought to keep some folk out of the University, will begin to pray and prepare for a United Methodist Church that is not afraid to be an authentically Open Church. Let the Church say, Amen and Amen.

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The Rev. Gilbert H. Caldwell is a retired United Methodist Minister who lives in Asbury Park, N.J. He was active in the Massachusetts unit of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) and participated in the civil-rights movement throughout the nation. In 2000, he, with others, organized the RMN Extension ministry United Methodists of Color for a Fully Inclusive Church (UMOC), an organization committed to the full inclusion of LGBT people in every aspect of church and society. His recent book, Something Within: Works by Rev. Gilbert H. Caldwell is available from Church Within A Church.

Called By God

by Joey Heath

To have a prophetic voice. To speak with the authority of God. To speak the truth of God. To show the love of God in everyday. These are part of who a pastor should be.

I have been learning about the reformation in my church history class and how the people hungered for the word of God. One woman stood up because she was called by God when others were not willing to stand up and speak out with a prophetic voice. This woman was a contemporary of Martin Luther named Argula von Grumbach and if you ever get the chance to read her Letter to the University of Ingolstadt I highly recommend it. In this letter she took on the corrupt Roman Catholic establishment of the time and the persecutions of the reformers and used scripture to back up everything she said. In doing so she preached the word of God. That is what I call prophetic voice. She spoke out because she felt called by God to speak out.

God calls us all to do certain things. For some it may be to be a teacher. For some it may be to practice law. For some it may be to be a stay at home parent. And for some they are called to preach and share the love of God from the pulpit on Sunday mornings and wherever else they might be throughout the week. A calling from God, particularly to be a pastor, is a high calling to follow.

I have a calling and I hope those who read these blogs or hear me speak hear the prophetic voice of God coming through. I am called to be a pastor, an ordained elder in the United Methodist Church. Sadly I am not sure I will be able to become one at least for now. You see, because of the things I write about on here and my openness about who I am and the fact that I refuse to stop trying to be a prophetic voice particularly on the issues of sexuality and gender identity my candidacy will most likely be rejected. Sadly the United Methodist Church recognizes the call of many but not all. You see if you identify as lesbian, gay, or bisexual (thank God there are no rules against being transgender, though some protection would be nice) then your candidacy is in jeopardy. The United Methodist Church actually actively rejects these that are called by God. They will recognize the gifts the person has and acknowledge they would be a great pastor and then reject them based on their sexuality. How can we a church who follows God reject those called by God? If a person is called by God shouldn't that be good enough for us to accept them?

Right now the church is losing good pastors who could have been the future leaders in the UMC. I know of several who have left the UMC for other denominations for this exact reason. They love the United Methodist Church and they feel called to be a pastor but because the UMC views them as a person of sacred worth who is unfortunately “incompatible with Christian teachings” they are rejected and in order to live out their calling they have left. Why are we letting this happen? When are we going to reject this notion that some how because someone loves a person of the same gender that they are damaged and unworthy? When are we going to stop riding the fence on this issue and speak as a church with prophetic voice claiming that all are equal and truly of sacred worth because they were created by God and called into God's service? When will we recognize the calling that God has placed on so many of the lives of LGBTQ people?

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Joey Heath is a 26 year old life long United Methodist. He is currently a graduate student at Wesley Theological Seminary completing his Masters in Divinity. Once an ordained pastor, Joey hopes he will be able to bring real change to the UMC on the issues of sexuality and gender identity at the broader church level, but also with individuals, so that one day the church will truly be a place that is inclusive of all people.

Comfort

by Violet Fenn

Advent and Christmas has always been my favorite time of year. My favorite part of the four weeks is the performance of Handel’s Messiah that I attend annually. The Christmas portion begins with an overture and then a beautiful tenor aria that starts with text from the 40th chapter of Isaiah: “Comfort, O comfort my people, says your God.” This incredible verse speaks volumes and has spoken the loudest to me this year.

In a recent sermon, the senior minister at the church I attend said: “Friends are sometimes God’s apology for your family.” Many people can relate, but to the LGBTQ community it has particular meaning. When our parents, siblings, aunts, uncles, grandparents and other blood relatives hear the news from us that we are lesbian, gay, bisexual or queer, the reaction is not always what we expect. There is often shock, anger and judgment. So when we are rejected by our families, we turn to others in the LGBTQ community who can relate. We can also turn to others who are our allies. Not only can we turn to others, we can turn to God. To some, this seems like a contradictory statement. We who are Reconciling know differently. We can turn to the one who created us exactly like we are.

This Advent, those words from Isaiah have a new meaning for me. I take comfort in knowing that Christ is present but I also take comfort in knowing that God is with me despite the heartache I experienced when much of my family rejected me. We in the Reconciling movement who are lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender or queer can take comfort knowing that when we are open and accepting of ourselves, God is pleased even though our families may not be.

If this Advent seems to be lonelier without family, we can look to the family we choose: friends. We can also look to God, the friend we all have. Take comfort in that.

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Violet Fenn, a United Methodist for 5 years, is a senior at Northeastern State University in Broken Arrow, OK majoring in English with a minor in Psychology. Violet became involved with RMN in April after attending a Call to Witness training. She is now part of leadership with MOSAIC as well as its TransJustice work group.

The Inconvenience of Advent

by Adrienne Trevathan

A couple months ago, I went to a hymn festival at Northwestern.  It was a chilly night, and as I stood on the steps outside the chapel waiting for a friend, I was thinking about how good it would feel to be mesmerized by beautiful music, surrounded by stained glass windows and friends.

After about 10 minutes of waiting for my friend, I anxiously checked the time.  Who wants to show up late for a concert?  I didn’t want to make an appearance.  A few seconds later, I saw a man approaching from the left in my peripheral vision.  I turned my head and saw an elderly man wearing a faded suit.  To my surprise, the man suddenly dropped to his knees and began to crawl, with great struggle.  I stood in shock for what felt like an hour as I watched this elderly man climb the first step up toward the chapel, his whole body shaking with effort.  After I got over my initial shock, I asked him if he wanted help.  He gently said, “Yes, please,” so I put one hand in his and the other on his arm and helped pull him up to the top of the stairs.  He slowly stood up, still shaking, balanced himself, and said, “Thank you.”  “Are you okay?”  I asked.  “Yes,” he replied.  He entered the chapel and I stayed outside.

I didn’t really know anything about him.  Why was he by himself?  Was he homeless?  Was he just determined to go sing hymns?  What I can’t figure out is that he could have walked on the grass next to the steps; there was only a small incline, and he wouldn’t have had to get on his knees.  Maybe he didn’t think about walking on the ground instead, or maybe he didn’t notice.

The hymn festival was beautiful.  It was the sort of occasion that I really enjoy: a group of performers entertaining me and offering me an emotional, intellectual experience that I could appreciate.  After all, I do have seminary training.  I know why those hymns were written.  I know their context; I can tell when something is off key.  “I had a right” to be there, to be enamored with it all.  And yet, although I tried to focus, I still had the image of this man in my mind.  I could see him in my mind’s eye with every minor chord I heard.  I was uncomfortable.  There was irresolution.

For weeks, I’ve been trying to wrap my mind around Advent.  I know and have used the language we've adopted to talk about it, at least in United Methodist Speak: “Already, not yet,” “Bringing in the kingdom” and “active waiting,” to name a few.  These are all ways we try to understand the season.  They are also ways we explain the struggle for full inclusion.  But for me, none of these explanations have been honest enough.

I just found a letter earlier today that I wrote since I've been in seminary.  I have no idea how long ago I wrote it.  I don’t really remember what was going on, but as I read the words, I know it’s a prayer.  Without quoting it entirely, here is the struggle at the heart of the prayer: “I wait for you all day long…but my heart is overwhelmed by sorrow when I least expect it…I find disappointment, embarrassment and guilt that only I am somehow supposed to understand.  I am empty, unsatisfied by the hope that people tell me I should have.  You inconvenience me with your presence when I least expect it.”

I wish I could remember the circumstances behind that prayer, but it doesn’t really matter.  “You inconvenience me with your presence when I least expect it.”  As I read this, I finally realized what Advent is to me: annoying.  It annoys me to have to wait for the kin(g)dom.  It annoys me to know the celebration at the other end of the church year and not see any more change in the world than the previous year.

Advent is foolishness and ridiculousness.  Here we are proclaiming a kingdom while the world is crawling on its knees.  Would the the reign of God come if we were not so in love with our own ideas of what a kin(g)dom is?  Would the reign of God come if we could ever learn to let go of our notion of control long enough to let the Holy Spirit inconvenience us?  Would the reign of God come if we learned not to be shocked by the suffering of the world?

For better or for worse, we have a God who climbs up the stairs with us.

Once More Into the Battle!

Reported by Peter L. DeGroote

Dean Snyder, Senior Pastor at Foundry UMC in Washington, DC has been a supporter of reconciling ministries since before there was any organized reconciling effort. During his State of the Church sermon this year he included a statement of three personal goals, one of which is focused on changing the UMC Book of Discipline. Below is that portion of the sermon with only minor editing, reproduced with his permission. You can see the entire sermon at:  http://www.foundryumc.org/sermons/11_15_09.htm.

From Dean Snyder's Sermon:

The claim that “the practice of homosexuality is incompatible with Christian teaching” was put into the UMC Book of Discipline in 1972, the year I graduated from seminary and served my first full-time appointment. It happened on my watch and I intend to do everything possible to fix it on my watch.

The way ahead is not clear. We have worked so hard for so long to change the United Methodist Church and the progress doesn’t feel anywhere commensurate with the effort.

I’ll be honest. I can’t see the way anymore. I can’t see how we will get to where we need to go.

I can’t see it but I do believe this: if we continue to work, if we continue to educate, to legislate, to agitate, to protest, to dialogue, to love… a breakthrough will come. I think it is going to be a breakthrough that will surprise us and I am believing it will happen during the next five years. 

I don’t know what it will be but I believe it will happen.

Did you know that Rosa Parks was not the first African-American to get arrested for refusing to give up her seat on a bus in the South to a white person?  Irene Morgan was arrested in 1946; Sarah Louise Keys in 1955. Nine months before Rosa Parks 15-year-old Claudette Colvin refused to move from her seat on the same Montgomery, Alabama bus system.

Rosa Parks was not the first, but, for reasons no one completely understands, when she did it there was a breakthrough. No one could have known it in advance.

In 1964 African-American Methodists had been working for 24 years to end the central jurisdiction—the structure of segregation in the Methodist Church. They had educated, they had dialogued, they had organized, they had legislated, they had protested. Then during the 1964 annual conference Methodists were voting on a resolution to merge with the Evangelical United Brethren Church. A young reserve delegate from west Texas got up to the microphone and offered an amendment to the merger resolution saying that the Methodist Church should not take the structures of segregation into the merged church, and the resolution won. It was a breakthrough. No one would have ever predicted it would happen. By the way, the young reserve delegate who made that resolution was William Astor Kirk, our own Bill Kirk.

(Many did not know this about Bill. In attendance at the 11:00am service, the congregation rose as one in a long and grateful ovation.)

There is a story in the book of Judges in which God sent the Israelites into battle against the Benjaminites. The Israelites lost; twenty-two thousand Israelites died in that battle—in a battle God sent them into. The Israelites mourned and wept that night.  

The next day God sent the Israelites to fight against the Benjaminites again. The Israelites wept before the Lord and they inquired of the Lord, “Must we go up against the Benjaminites again?” The Lord told them to go into battle again. They lost again. 18,000 Israelites died.

The Israelites wept and mourned and asked the Lord not to send them into battle again. The Lord said, “Go up, for tomorrow I will give them into your hands (Judges 20: 19-48).”

Sometimes God sends us into battles we will lose. Sometimes we lose the battle again and again. There are casualties. We weep and mourn and ask God to not send us into battle anymore. I don’t know why God sends us into battles we will lose.

But then God says, “Go up one more time, for tomorrow I will give them into your hands.”

There will be a breakthrough. I know we are tired. We are grieved, but tomorrow God will give them into our hands.

It is because of this kind of commitment that I am both glad and proud to regard Rev. Dean Snyder as a leader, a co-worker, and a friend.

The Cause of so much Pain...

By Joey Heath

This is a part of a conversation I have been having with friend who happens to believe that homosexuality is against God's will. After I wrote it to him I felt like it was something worth sharing with other cause I realized I had just poured my heart out to him. I would also like to note that out of respect for him these are only my words and nothing he has said.

For me I am simply told to be celibate and alone because I know I will never be attracted to women. I'm told because of that fact, I must turn my sexuality off. That is why I see it as so different. You are not being told to turn your sexuality off just channel it to a proper place. There is no option like that for me. I tried to turn it off and many people I know have as well, spending years trying to do just that only to meet with defeat. It cant be that they didn't try hard enough or believe enough because I know people who have done some really crazy things, I'm talking extreme measures, in the name of turning it off. Do you know what the result was? For me it was that so much of my life became consumed with staying focused on not allowing my attraction that it took over. My focus was not on God anymore and I saw it happening but felt powerless to do anything because I felt to only other option to fighting my "sinful desires" was to let them roam free. All this led to was depression and separation from God. I was a mild case. I have heard of so much worse, things like people attempting to cut off their own genitals because they felt like that was the source. Where is God in this pain that is experienced by so many of God's children? Since when was being obedient to God so painful all you want to do is die because you don't feel like you have the strength to even lean on Christ? Why would God allow such suffering in God's people who are only trying to be obedient?

Those are questions that are tough to answer. Those questions are why I do what I do and why I want to be a minister, so that I can help easy the pain and suffering of others. God is love not pain and suffering. I didn't originally intend to write this much but I hope it helps you see why i am so passionate about this. It has never been about my own sexuality. I would give it up in a heartbeat if I felt that was God's will. For me it is about the pain and suffering I see that I know God has called me to ease, and use that to bring hope and joy back to the LGBTQ people of faith and those who have wandered from their faith.

Reconciling Tools: Prayer for Enemies

By Peter L. DeGroote

To you who are listening I say, love your enemies. If you love those who love you, what merit is there in that? After all, even sinners love those who love them. And if you do good to those who do good to you, what merit is there is that? After all, even sinners do as much” (Gospel of Jesus 7:2-4)*

It is a bit troubling to discover that Jesus did not share the common view that God agrees with our opinion of others.  Instead, he invited us to pray about joining in God’s high expectations and hope for all humanity .

It remains a revolutionary idea. Our traditional social and political arrangements reflect tribal loyalties based on our instincts for self-preservation. They provide us with a safe “home base” to explore our world. Jesus called us to replace those tribal loyalties with a more universal loyalty that finds a “home base” in honoring and respecting (loving) all of God’s creation. (See Reconciliation and Love's Definition).  

Jesus’ call for this new loyalty offers a far more likely foundation for human self-preservation than the tribal loyalties we usually rely on. Unfortunately, both biblical tradition and history are full of examples that illustrate a broad unwillingness to respond to Jesus’ call. A few examples: Both Hebrew scripture and significant portions of the New Testament model hostility and even hatred toward enemies. When the church burned heretics it was identifying enemies while using fear to assure at least outward loyalty to its tribal ways. In 1961 Fidel Castro declared that continued loyalty to the Cuban revolution required an enemy. Contemporary political campaigns are often based on describing its opponents as enemies and targeting them with falsehoods and partial truths. Likewise, we can hear church leaders propagate an “us versus them” world view as a tool for creating loyalty to their group and personal leadership. Many LGBT people have experienced the negative consequences of that strategy.

The danger in being someone’s enemy is in returning the favor by accepting their enmity and labeling them as our own enemy. In a real world sense that dynamic is probably inescapable but the danger is in responding in kind. When that happens we give the enemy the power to define who we are and set the rules of our relationships. (More in a later posting.)

The instruction to pray for our enemies has often been understood as a prayer that somehow God would intervene in their values, world view, and behavior so that they would come to accept our perspectives and be more like us. The arrogance of that notion is the assumption that we have “the right way;” that we understand God’s views; or that we have the sole understanding of how creation is supposed to work—the implication being that all other views are wrong.

Over the years I have come to understand that praying for our enemies is less about them than it is about me. Jesus’ Prime Directive is to love or honor and respect all that God has created. To pray for an enemy is to seek insight and understanding sufficient to honor that person’s creation. (Perhaps meditation is a better contemporary word than prayer.)

Any increased insight or understanding does not compel me to agree with such a person, only that I come to understand.  Once understood, what do I do about it? Everyone will agree that it is a struggle. Likewise, we cannot focus only on understanding our enemy. We have biases, prejudices, and structures in our world view that have to be examined in relation to our own spiritual health and willingness to honor and respect others. Jesus’ teachings also include strategies to pursue those objectives.

Obviously, there is much more to live and talk out. This is not a solitary adventure. Your comments are welcome.

*The Gospel of Jesus. Robert W. Funk and the Jesus Seminar. Santa Rosa, CA, Polebridge Press, 1999.