Seek and Serve Christ in All Persons

Celebrant: Will you seek and serve Christ in all persons, loving your neighbor as yourself? People: I will, with God’s help.

On the morning of January 2, students and faculty arrived at the Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion in Cincinnati to find a swastika painted on the entrance sign to the campus. For 140 years, HUC-JIR has peacefully co-existed with its neighbors. Those who saw the swastika, both Jews and non-Jews, instantly recognized it as a reminder of the profound evil visited on Jews, gays, gypsies, disabled people, and other marginal groups during the Holocaust. The next day, about twenty-five people gathered at the sign in freezing temperatures. Many of them were members of Call to Action, a progressive Roman Catholic organization. Faith Kemper, the organizer of the event said that her father had fought in World War II, and that for her the swastika represents leaders who are power-hungry and hateful. She was joined by several members of her St. Monica-St. George Parish, whose church is on nearby McMillan Avenue. One carried a sign that said, "We support our Jewish neighbors."

Reflecting on the vandalism at HUC-JIR and other similar events, another participant wondered whether the recent presidential campaign had suggested that such acts were OK. Cincinnati Mayor John Cranley said, "I am deeply offended and disturbed by these actions. The City is committed to using all of our resources to bring these criminals to justice. As we work to build a more welcoming and inclusive City, we will not stand for this intimidation." Alan Dicken, a Disciples of Christ pastor, went further. In a letter dated January 5, Dicken reminded his fellow Christians of what their response to such acts of vandalism should be: “I can reach out to those who need to hear a gospel of love and acceptance,” He wrote. “I can do my part to show the world that the Christ that I follow, who for the record was Jewish, [was] a leader of love and a prince of peace. I can listen to my friends who are rabbis and leaders in the Jewish community and respond in ways that they feel would be helpful and supportive to them. It may not seem like much, but it is a hell of a lot more than doing nothing. Doing nothing gives permission for this culture to continue.”

Twenty-eight hundred years before the events at HUC-JIR, an Israelite prophet reflected on the state of his people. They were no strangers to violence and desecration. Their holy city of Jerusalem had been overrun by the Babylonians, and their sacred temple had been destroyed. The elite of the country had been forced into exile, while the peasants were left to scratch out a living in a drought-ridden land. And yet, as the prophet reflected on the fate of his people, he heard God whispering a new message to him, one of hope, rather than despair. He heard God promising that the community would have a new leader, indeed that the whole community would be a leader among the nations. Led by the new leaders, they would be loving servants, who would treat all with gentleness and compassion. They would follow a leader who would “not cry or lift up his voice,” who would “faithfully bring forth justice,” and who would help them to be “a light to the nations, to open the eyes that are blind, to bring out the prisoners from the dungeon, from the prison those who sit in darkness.”

Eight centuries later, another prophet reflected on the state of his people. Like his forebear in faith, John beheld a people suffering under the oppressive rule of both the Romans and their local collaborators. He saw religious leaders focused on punctilious observance of sacrificial ritual and not the welfare of ordinary people. He called people of all walks of life to change their way of life. To reflect their commitment to change, he invited them to undergo a traditional Jewish ritual of cleansing, through immersion in flowing water. Into this scrum of people gathered on the banks of the Jordan, walked an itinerant rabbi from Galilee, who asked his cousin John to administer the ritual cleansing to him. As the writer of today’s gospel tells us, John demurred. He knew there was something special about his cousin. But Jesus insisted. “Do it,” he said. “God’s work, putting things right all these centuries, is coming together right now in this baptism.” So John did it.

As Jesus came up out of the Jordan, he experienced a deep sense of acceptance by God, a sense of God’s affirmation of him as God’s own beloved. He knew himself to be empowered for ministry by God’s Spirit. Almost immediately after his baptism, God’s Spirit drove him into the Judean hills for a period of reflection and discernment. During those weeks in the wilderness Jesus knew that he had to forego all forms of coercive power. Reflecting on the Scriptures that he knew so well, i.e., the Hebrew Scriptures, he came to understand himself as the leader foretold by Isaiah, as the one who would not break a bruised reed or quench a dimly burning wick, who would bring forth justice and release those in prison. In his first recorded sermon in the gospel according to Luke, Jesus reminded his hearers of those words of the prophet. He read from the scroll of Isaiah, “God’s Spirit is on me; he’s chosen me to preach the Message of good news to the poor, Sent me to announce pardon to prisoners and recovery of sight to the blind,
To set the burdened and battered free, to announce, “This is God’s year to act!” Then Jesus said, “You’ve just heard Scripture make history. It came true just now in this place.” The evangelist even echoes Jesus’ self-description. Further along in the gospel of Matthew, the evangelist uses this very passage from Isaiah that we just heard to describe how Jesus was doing what God expected of him.

Since 1963, volunteers in the Simon Community in the UK have been ministering to homeless people on the streets of London. They provide two houses with shelter for the night and a day center to connect homeless people to available social services. In addition, every night volunteers carry flashlights into the dark corners of the streets to bring soup and sandwiches to those who, for whatever reason, do not want to come to the shelters. Young and old, representing all ethnicities, church members and non-members, these volunteers seek out the needy in derelict buildings and back alleys, on the streets, and under bridges and overpasses. They keep in touch with the latest news on the streets, and monitor how many people are sleeping outside at different times of the year. They also keep in close contact with as many people as possible, and respond as far as they can to people’s needs. They recognize that each homeless person has different needs, but to all they offer hands of friendship and welcome without judgement. Many of the volunteers work with the community fulltime. They receive room and board but no stipend. Why do they do it? A volunteer named Joe Bailey described why he marched with the community in support of help for the homeless. “In the face of diminishing availability of support accessible to vulnerable people,” he said, “we see the effects of austerity measures run deeper and deeper into society, and it can make us feel helpless. But albeit a small shout out in protest, there is hope in the work that we do, and we are not alone in our dedication to offer support to those who need it.”

My brothers and sisters, the waters that rolled over Jesus have also rolled over us. We too went down into the Jordan with Jesus, and we too came up out of the water with him. The baptismal font is our River Jordan. Whether we were brought to the font by someone else, or whether we came of our own free will, whether we were immersed or sprinkled, Jesus was standing beside us as those waters flowed over us. As we rose from the water, the Holy Spirit descended on us, and God proclaimed us to be God’s beloved sons and daughters. In joining ourselves to Jesus, we too are affirmed, empowered, and commissioned. And we are called to model our lives after his.

It is still God’s year to act – perhaps even more urgently now than in many other years. With Jesus we too are called to embrace Isaiah’s vision of compassionate leadership and a just and peaceful world. We too are called to remember and celebrate our solidarity with Jews, and also with Muslims, with Hindus and Buddhists, with all people of all faiths and no faith. We too are called to resist any attempt to demean, harass, or persecute people of any community, even if they are wearing a yarmulke or a hijab. We too are called to seek out the least, the lost, and the left behind, and to minister to their needs, whoever and wherever they are. We too are called to love God, love ourselves, and care for all those – all those – whom God has called beloved.

Celebrant: Will you seek and serve Christ in all persons, loving your neighbor as yourself? People: I will, with God’s help.

What's in a Name?

“Lord, you are in the midst of us, and we are called by your Name: Do not forsake us, O Lord our God.”

What’s in a name? The old English major in me couldn’t resist going back to the second scene of act 2 of Romeo and Juliet. Juliet has seen the conflict between her family, the Capulets, and the Montagues, the family of Romeo, with whom she has fallen in love. She asks herself this question in a poignant speech, unaware that Romeo is standing under her balcony listening to her. If you studied Romeo and Juliet in high school, or saw Franco Zeffirelli’s lovely rendering of it on film, you can probably say Juliet’s plaintive speech with me:

“O Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou Romeo?
Deny thy father and refuse thy name.
Or if thou wilt not, be but sworn my love
And I’ll no longer be a Capulet.
‘Tis but thy name that is my enemy:
Thou art thyself, though not a Montague.
What’s Montague? It is nor hand nor foot
Nor arm nor face nor any other part
Belonging to a man. O be some other name.
What’s in a name? That which we call a rose
By any other name would smell as sweet;
So Romeo would, were he not Romeo call’d,
Retain that dear perfection which he owes
Without that title. Romeo, doff thy name,
And for that name, which is no part of thee,
Take all myself.”

We might question whether we would actually dare to experience the sweetness of a rose if it were called a skunk cabbage instead. But Romeo can no sooner give up his name than Juliet can hers. For Romeo, his name, his identity as a Montague, is more than a title. Rather, his name reflects his place within a particular family, with their particular history, and especially with their history of conflict with other noble families. Sadly the play ends in tragedy, as the young lovers discover how difficult it is to shed the identities their names reflect.

What’s in a name? What’s in the name of today’s feast? If we were still using the 1928 Book of Common Prayer, today we would be celebrating the Feast of the Circumcision. Using the same gospel portion that we heard today, the day commemorated Jesus’ circumcision after his birth, and his inclusion, according to the Law of Moses, in God’s covenant with Israel. This day became the Feast of the Holy Name with the adoption of our current prayer book. However, this is not a new observance. Actually, it was popularized by a 15th century Franciscan who was looking for a way to overcome the class struggles and family rivalries in the Italian city states. In 1721 Pope Innocent XIII extended it to the whole church, though it was celebrated on other dates. The change in our current prayer book from Circumcision to Holy Name reflects our recognition that in this gospel Luke’s emphasis is on Jesus’ name, i.e., the name affirmed at his circumcision, not on the circumcision itself.

What’s in a name? If we listen closely to our Scriptures for today, the answer is “a lot.” Just as “Romeo” and “Montague” embody the history and relationships of a family and suggest how the individual man Romeo fits into that history, so too does the name that we venerate today. What kind of a name is it actually? The name given the holy child derives from the Hebrew Yehoshu’ah, Joshua in modern English. It means “God saves or delivers God’s people.” The name became Yeshu’ah in Aramaic, the language of Jesus’ earthly family, iesus, in Greek, the language of the New Testament, and finally Jesus in English. In whichever language, the name recalls the many saving acts of God, and especially God’s deliverance of Israel from Egypt. We heard echoes of that history two weeks ago, in the angel’s instructions to Joseph in the gospel of Matthew: “She will bear a son, and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.”

Luke’s mention of the angels in today’s gospel reminds us again of that saving history – and more. We hear again what the angel Gabriel said to Mary when he announced that she was to bear a son: “And now, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you will name him Jesus. He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Most High, and the Lord God will give to him the throne of his ancestor David. He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end.” Just as Romeo’s name proclaims his family history and identity, so for Luke and for us, Jesus’ name also makes a proclamation. Jesus’ name proclaims his place within a particular human family, i.e., as a descendant of royalty, his place within the Godhead, i.e., as God’s Son, and the hope of the Christian community to which Luke writes, for Jesus’ eventual consummation of God’s reign.

What’s in a name? We hear another answer to that question in Paul’s advice to the Christians at Philippi. Alluding to what may have been a hymn of some kind, Paul counsels the Philippians to venerate Jesus’ name. However, through the hymn Paul admonishes them that Jesus’ name also embodies the God who joined Godself inseparably to the human condition. Jesus’ name reminds us that this is a God who experienced all the limitations of human life, and especially all the worst that humans could do, even unjust execution and agonizing death. God as all-vulnerable and all-suffering, as Richard Rohr puts it. The glory and exaltation due to Jesus, the veneration of his name, comes from all that he suffered as a human person. And why has Paul taken such pains to remind the Philippians of the reason for venerating Jesus’ name? “Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus:” they – and by extension we – are called to venerate Jesus by modeling our own lives on his model.

There’s yet one more promise embedded in our Scripture. In much of the Bible, God’s name is unknown or not spoken. You remember that, before the Exodus, Moses asks God for God’s name. God gives an answer that has puzzled us ever since: “I am Who I am.” The four Hebrew letters of that name were not pronounced as they were written. Pious Jews substituted another word, “Adonai,” and translated any passages with the original name as “the Lord,” not with the name revealed to Moses.

In the name of Jesus, we now have a name for God. We can be as it were on a first-name basis with God. As one preacher suggests, “The point here is not that we’re celebrating the fact that Jesus was named “Jesus” instead of, say, “Floyd” or “George.” Instead, today we celebrate the fact that God has again spoken his name to his people – and not just as a word, but as the Word made flesh. God has spoken his name to us a person.” Now we have a name for the great mystery that has made itself known to us in human form. Through that name we – all of us – are invited into deeper and greater intimacy with God.

What’s in a name? Is all this talk of Jesus’ name just interesting head-stuff, the kind of intriguing word-game that preachers like to play? Just as with Romeo, just as with us, Jesus’ name embodies an identity and a history. Jesus’ name is a kind of shorthand for who he was, who he is, and who he will be. As his followers, we dare to call ourselves by his name – Jesus and Joshua are still common names. We dare to proclaim ourselves as members of his family. We dare to pray in his name. We may even dare to use his name as part of our practice of breath prayer or centering prayer.

Today is the first day of a new civic year. As we go back into the world, into the places to which we have been called, into the places where we meet Christ in other people and other creatures, we are called remember in whose name we go, whose name we carry. We are called to acknowledge that our identity as his followers supersedes all our other identities, and that it is the most important identity that we have. We are called to imitate him in all that we do. We are called to remember that Jesus lived, died, and rose again for all us, and that we are all – each and every one of us – members of his family and therefore connected to each other. We are called to see him in everyone we meet. And we are called to open our hearts to him in deeper and deeper relationship.

What’s in a name? In the name of Jesus, all that we are, and all that we are called to be.