Gospel and Gaga

I admit from the start that I am not a biblical scholar. In fact, I am the thing most biblical scholars fear most- a pastor who attempts to interpret scripture outside of the carefully defined boundaries of the pulpit. So with apologies to my biblical scholar friends and no intention whatsoever of giving up this enterprise, I want to share a few words about a biblical figure and a modern prophet who figure centrally into my life and ministry at the moment. The apostle Judas and Lady Gaga.


That sound you hear is the branch of my job creaking beneath me!

In a recent article posted on the Huffington Post, theologian Patrick Cheng wrote about the theological nature of Lady Gaga’s new video for her song Judas. I have not seen the video, but I did have an a-ha moment while reading Cheng’s article. These two figures (or at least what they have come to mean for me) have begun to figure into my ministry recently in some important ways.

Let’s start with Judas. (Amazing when that is the safer place to start!) I have a soft spot in my heart for Judas. I have not forgotten what I was taught in Sunday school and even seminary about Judas and his betrayal of Jesus and the idea that he stands for the triumph of greed over principle and faithlessness over faithfulness. I remember well the instruction to not be or do like Judas. But, I can’t help myself.

The more time I spend in ministry the more I realize how Judas must have felt. Hedging his bets, trying to get a feel for what was to come and working the angles to minimize the damage, thinking preservation before proclamation. Far too often I will print a first draft of a sermon that is bold and daring and almost shouts from the mountain top right off the page just to pick up the red pen of pragmatism and start the editing.

“Nope, can’t say that. Stewardship season is coming up.”

“Can’t say that either. Got in trouble for that one a few weeks ago.”

“I might be able to say that one, but only if X,Y and Z are all on vacation at the same time.”

“Sorry, Jesus, I know you called us to be bold and proclaim these things, you know that whole ‘Go therefore…’ bit from Matthew, but I need to pay the mortgage. Can't afford to lose this gig in THIS economy. Let's talk when the Dow recovers."

I don’t think any of us who betray Jesus like this do it out of a desire to become “a Judas.” I think we do it for the same reason Judas did; fear. We are afraid of what will happen if we don’t hedge a little or if we let things get too controversial. We fear what might happen if we get too far off script.

Of course the truth is, at least if we believe Augustine's account of things, it is not a matter of just choosing to betray Jesus or failing to live into our calling as disciples. As my grandmother would say, bless our hearts we can't help it. Thanks to our first parents Adam and Eve, we were born that way.

Enter Lady Gaga-prophetess. (I’m going to pay for that.)

Made a phenomenon by a recent episode of Glee, Lady Gaga's song BornThis Way has become a new anthem for a generation of young people; especially GLBTQ youth. In a nutshell, the song says I am who I am and I am lovable and loved just the way I am made. When the Glee cast performed the song, each cast member wore a t-shirt with a word or phrase that summed up what that individual found least lovable about the way they were made.  Together they performed the song as an homage to their differentness and to the things they had difficulty accepting about themselves.

My shirt would say "scared." Of the legion of faults that find a home in me, that is the one I most try to hide from the world and especially from God. Of course I am only kidding myself. God sees it. Hell, the whole world sees it. Every time I give Christ the "Judas kiss" by my silence or my reticence or my plain old cowardice. It is right out there for the world to see. I guess I was just born that way. And yet, despite my inability to hide it, my friends, my family and my God love me anyway.

That was my a-ha moment reading Cheng's article; my Judas/Gaga epiphany. Yes, I am born that way; the Judas way. We all are. It is our human condition or, as Calvin said, our total depravity. But at the same time you and I and everyone of God's children are born another way. We are born loved. Born loved by God. And whatever else is true about us, whatever fault we print on our t-shirt, nothing in the world can or will change the fact that we are beloved children of God.

Bless our hearts.

We cant help it.

We're just born that way

"All Too Human" A Sermon on Psalm 137 following the death of Osama bin Laden

All Too Human
Psalm 137

Dr. Robert Wm Lowry
First Presbyterian Church of Batesville, AR

15 May, 2011

Easter 4

Bleary eyed, I looked at the screen and saw that I had a text message. Normally messages later on a Sunday night do not contain good news At first my mind went to the church and dreaded images of smoke billowing from the steeple. After a moment I realized that the message came not from Batesville but from a friend in Little Rock and I sighed a big sigh of relief.

Turn on your TV, it said. Obama is going to announce that they killed Osama bin Laden.

I did just that. I turned the TV on just in time to watch the President deliver his nine minute speech telling the world that the man whose own brand of bile and hate had defined the last decade of our lives was no more.

I heard the news and I thought, “Good. Good riddance to bad rubbish.”

As a Minister of Word and Sacrament, the first ordination vow we take, in fact the first vow that all church officers take, is “do you trust in the Lord Jesus Christ your Savior, acknowledge him Lord of all and Head of the Church and through him believe in one God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit?” When asked that question at my ordination ten years ago next week, I answered, "yes, he is Lord of all." Sitting in bed watching this news unfold, I answered yes he is Lord of all except for that sorry son of a bitch.

In that moment, watching that news, I found myself feeling very human in a way not unfamiliar to the biblical witness. Psalm 137 is a very almost all too human Psalm. It is tough. We just heard it's harsh words. We did not hear them all though. The Psalm we read this morning has one more verse. After verse 8 and its declaration, “happy shall they be who pay you back what you have done to us!” comes verse 9 which underscores the satisfaction in the defeat of an enemy. In fact, it goes one step further and celebrates vengeance against an enemy. Verse 9 reads, “Happy shall they be who take your babies and dash them against the rocks!”

That too is the word of the Lord.

Psalm 137 uncovers a very real, visceral, human feeling; the desire for vengeance against one who does nearly unspeakable wrong against us. This is not an eye for an eye; this is a head for an eye.

When the news came that Osama bin Laden was dead, some part of me turned to a feeling of Psalm 137. Somewhere in my soul a voice was saying, “Good.”

There is a school of thought that says I should not have shared any of that with you. I should have stuck to the lectionary text for today from First Peter and ignored this personal lapse. As a pastor, so the thinking goes, I have an added responsibility to model the moral and theological expectations I have for myself and for you. So I share that with you out of no sense of pride in myself for realizing the problem with my thinking or to suggest that this is in any way a faithful Christian response to the death of even such an abhorrent person as this. I share it because I am guessing that I am not alone. My guess is that there are a few of you sitting out there today who, when the news made its way to you, heard and may still hear that little voice from inside saying, “good. Good riddance to bad rubbish.”

Enter Psalm 137.

A professor of mine referred to the Psalms as the poetry of human experience. He would dare a student to name a human emotion not contained in the psalms. Try it. They’re all there. Somehow these words from a civilization 2500 years ago hold up a mirror and show us a glimpse of whom and where we are now.

The psalms laugh and they cry. They shout with joy and moan with grief. They give praise to God and they ask God why.

And, yes, at times these holy words are very, very human.

When the ancient Israelite poet penned the words of this Psalm, he must have been feeling something akin to this kind of anger. And in his anger he prays for vengeance. But it is not vengeance born first of anger but of tears. His prayer is remarkable for the tender poignancy of the first six verses and the bitter imprecations of the last three. What begins as a tearful remembrance of days plagued by misery ends with the angry predictions of revenge.*

Like the poet, the wrath and vengeance many of us found answered in the death of one man began not in anger but in tears as we watched helplessly as airliners and buildings full of people came crashing to the ground. Anger may have come quickly on its heels, but i would wager to say that for most of us the first thing we felt was lament; sorrow; anguish.

The writers of the psalms were no strangers to the roller coaster of human emotion. They knew vengeance through tears. They cried out in pain and shouted out in joy. They knew, just as we know, that to be a child of God in a broken and sinful world is no easy task. In the face of such unspeakable evil, our human nature draws us so easily into a posture of anger and revenge.

In 1963, theologian Martin Neimoller preached from the pulpit in Duke Chapel. In his sermon he related part of the story of his time as a captive of the Nazis.

In the last year of my imprisonment in one of Hitler’s ill-famed concentration camps, at Dachau, a gallows was transplanted, transferred from the general camp in to the courtyard of the “bunker,” the prison inside the camp. And the upper part of this gallows looked into my solitary- confinement cell, through the window bars. How often has this gallows induced me to pray for my comrades who were hanged on it, and how often every day I had to control myself, when the idea arose: If these people will pull me out of my place here to that gallows, I shall shout at them, “You criminals, you murderers, wait and see- there is a god in heaven and he will show you!” And then the torturing question: What would have happened if Jesus, when they nailed him to his gallows, to the Cross, had spoken like this and had cursed his enemies? Nothing would have happened, only there would be no gospel, no Christian Church, for there would be no message of great joy; for then he would have prayed against his enemies, not for them, and would have died against them and not for them. Thank God! He prayed, he died a different way, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do!”**

“Happy are they who dash your babies against the rocks.”

“Forgive them for they know not what they do.”

They are both in there. Both find purchase in the rich soil of God’s holy book. And from time to time both find a home in us.

When I mentioned that I was thinking about preaching this sermon, a colleague replied to my email saying, “I keep seeing quotes from MLK Jr., and one or two from Jesus on loving your enemies. I'm coming to realize, yet again, that MLK Jr. and Jesus are better and bigger men than am I. That is why two things will not happen: (1) I will never die on a cross or be assassinated (2) I will never really be relevant. Now, question to myself--can I live with that?”

It’s a good question. Can I live with it? Can you? Are we content to reside solely in the lament and anger of psalm 137 or is there still journeying left to do? Do we honor and embrace the message of Christ if we willingly stop short of, "forgive them?"

The truth of our 24 hour news culture is that wherever we reside each of us has a view of the gallows through the window. None of us can escape the reality of evil and suffering and oppression throughout our world. It is enough to make you cry out in anger and anguish, “Happy are they who dash your babies against the rocks!” It is enough to bring your soul to the boiling point.

In the end though, the world has plenty of cries of anger and anguish. There are plenty of voices in the chorus demanding vengeance The lot that we who are disciples of Jesus Christ have drawn in this life is that we are charged with proclaiming not “happy are they” who seek revenge but “forgive them for they know not what they do.”

Like my colleague, I often find myself feeling weak and ineffective because the witness I can muster in the world is not as bold or as confident or even as faithful as those of King and Bonheoffer and the other Christian martyrs who went to their deaths proclaiming, “Forgive them for they know not what they do.” I find myself feeling my ministry irrelevant and my words futile.

Nonetheless, as Neimoller reminds us, even though we, from time to time, forget to forgive, Christ continues to call us to proclaim it. Though we lapse into the vengeance of Psalm 137, Christ continues to proclaim the salvation rather than the damnation of human kind. As the old hymn says, “I am weak but thou art strong.” Because Christ died a different way, we are freed to live a different way; to live beyond the gut reaction of vengeance to the faithful words of forgiveness.

Like many others who surrendered their lives to hate and anger, that man of evil and hostility knows now that he had it wrong the whole time. God is not hate. God is in fact love. And we who know God, know the love of God, and are called to shout it from the mountain tops.

In a world so full of hate and anger, may we who so recently stood outside the empty tomb and shouted “He is risen! He is risen indeed” be continuously resurrected in hope through the life and witness of Jesus Christ. And may our moments of anger and surrender to the desire for vengeance be quickly supplanted by the promise of hope in Jesus Christ. The hope that empowers us to live and even to die a different way.

Sola Deo Gloria! To God alone be the glory! Amen.


*  Although it is old (1970), Mitchell Dahood's volume on Psalms 101-150 in the Anchor Bible series is very insightful. 
** The full text of Niemoller's sermon and many others from Duke Chapel can be found in "Sermons from Duke Chapel: Voices from A Great Towering Church," ed. William Willimon, (Durham: Duke Press), 2005.

Reclaiming Our Relevance in the Wake of 10-A

Yesterday, May 10, the Presbyterian Church (USA) finally removed the language in its church constitution that banned faithful GLBTQ Presbyterians in committed relationships from being ordained or installed to the offices of the church.  The ammenment, known as 10-A, will go into effect in July.  This change that comes after nearly four decades of debate begs the question,


Who cares?

Who gives a damn what the PC(USA) does?

Is there anything more irrelevant than the internal machinations of an American Mainline Protestant denomination?

Fifty years ago, what happened in the church was big news. Now it rates little more than a wire service report and a file photo buried with the news release about filling potholes. What changed?

During the fight for civil rights in America it was the preachers who led the struggle for civil rights in the South. From Dr. King in Montgomery to the hundreds of clergy who risked their livelihood and even their lives to proclaim the Gospel message that each and every one of God’s children is due the compassion and respect of the church and society. Pulpits served as the starting line for a movement tha twould change the world.  Many churches were safe havens for those working for change and daring to stand in opposition to bigotry and hate.

Today, the church is scrambling to catch up. While debates nationwide continue over the question of same-sex marriage, the reality of same-sex relationships and the role of GLBTQ men and women is rapidly becoming a non-issue for most people. With the exception of a few paleo-conservative corners in American society, the kind of exclusion and bigotry the church’s ban represented is no longer tolerated. Once upon a time the church was a prophetic voice for the world, now the world has become the prophetic voice to the church. No wonder no one cares what the church has to say!

My hope is that this change in the PC(USA) will be a wake-up call for the church. Despite the prognostications of gloom and doom, the sky did not fall, the sun did rise and God did not strike vengeance and wrath upon those of us who have worked for this essential change. Perhaps there is a message in that. It is time for the church to get back out front and lead the charge into a future where none of God’s children want for food or water, clothing or shelter, respect or dignity.

It is a new day in the PC(USA) and not only is what we have to say relevant, it is essential. Hopefully we will not waste the opportunity to keep proclaiming the radical love and inclusion of God in Jesus Christ now and forever more.

What is left to protest?

October 31 marks the 493^rd anniversary of Martin Luther's disputation of the practice of selling indulgences and the symbolic (though hardly actual) beginning of the Protestant Reformation. Throughout the Lutheran and Reformed worlds, many churches will make at least some tacit acknowledgement of this day. In an era of increasing ecumenical dialogue and cooperation, why would we want to emphasize an era that tore the church apart? The Protestant churches are firmly independent of Rome, so what do we have left to protest?

The Protestant churches and denominations are like the rings of suburbs surrounding an urban center. While families may have started in the city, many wind up "moving out to the burbs." And over time, those suburbs begin to forget about the urban center that connects them all. They become discreet self-sufficient communities with their own city councils, fire departments, schools and even shopping malls. After a while, we forget that we were ever in the city to begin with. One of the lessons of the last two decades in urban planning is that the health of the suburbs and the health of the city are connected in many ways. The same is true for the church. However far we may seek to move from our historical center, we are still connected in Christ one with the other.

The metaphor is not perfect, but you get the point. We Protestants moved out to the ecclesiastical burbs nearly 5 centuries ago and now few of us ever go back to the city at all. We stand at a distance and proclaim what is wrong but you will never catch us moving back.

To be sure, there are still many doctrines and policies of the Roman Catholic faith with which I take issue. I agree with Luther and Calvin and other Protestant thinkers that the Catholic Church fundamentally misunderstands the grace of God. I disagree with their stance on the role of women in the church, the nature of the priesthood and the role of bishops. There are many things that I believe still need protest. However, I think that we contemporary Protest-ants can take a lesson from our Reformation era forebears. Martin Luther never intended to separate from the Roman Catholic Church. He intended to protest its practices not abandon it all together.

One lesson for us this Reformation Sunday is that while there is much to still protest about the historic practices of the church, we make our protest not from the outside looking in but from within the larger body of Christ. Our protests are not (or at least should not be) to change a church outside the body of Christ but to reform part of our shared community as the body of Christ.

After all, it is
Reformation Sunday and not Protestant
Sunday.

It Shouldn’t Have to Get Better

Tyler Clementi 18

Billy Lucas 15

Asher Brown 13

Seth Walsh 13

Theirs are the names that made the news but they are not the only ones. Each year hundreds of youth and young adults take their own lives. In response to a recent rash of suicides among youth who identified as GLBTQ or were perceived to be by their peers, writer Dan Savage filmed a short video message called "It Gets Better." The "It Gets Better" phenomenon has spread across the nation to include politicians, celebrities, clergy, parents, teachers and others from nearly every walk of life telling GLBTQ youth and young adults that they are not alone. The project is a great one, but it raises an important question about the state of our society…why have we created a world where it has to get better?

It would be overly simplistic to draw a straight line between religious intolerance and the tragic deaths of GLBTQ youth and young adults. There is certainly a connection between theologies of intolerance and the culture of despair surrounding far too many youth and young adults; however it is not the only factor. Not even the only religious factor. Mainline Protestant traditions have played a part in creating a world where it has to get better by contributing to the conspiracy of silence on issues of sexuality. Our absence on issues of welcome and justice and our failure to publically and vocally advocate for the full inclusion and embrace of GLBTQ men and women of faith makes us silent accomplices.

Civil rights for GLBTQ men and women around the world is one of the defining issues of our time. It is certainly the defining issue of American culture today. For many youth and young adults, it has quite literally become a matter of life and death. It is not enough to shake our heads and lament the tragedy of their despair. We must speak up. Simply rejecting theologies of intolerance and hate is not sufficient. We must actively proclaim the Gospel of radical inclusion that is the Gospel of Jesus Christ. If we are to be true to the calling of Christ to care for all God's children, the church cannot be silent any longer. We can no longer contribute to a world where it needs to get better by offering nothing more than indifference. Each and every life- male and female, rich and poor, old and young, GLBT&Q- is a cherished treasure in the eyes and heart of God.

The hope we know in Jesus Christ gives us the strength and courage to not only dream of a world better than the one we share today, but the imagination to bring that world into being for all of God's children.

Yes, it does get better.

But it shouldn't have to.

Be glad of life

Not much more to say than that. 

Be glad that life, even in the most difficult moments, gives you the opportunity to love and hope and dream and be. 

I am not very good at it most of the time, but today I am glad of life and fully satisfied with what it has to offer.  And my day is better for it.

More than yellow stripes and dead armadillos.

Texas politician Jim Hightower wrote a book a few years ago titled “There’s Nothing in the Middle of the Road but Yellow Stripes and Dead Armadillos.”   There are two opposing camps on every issue and never the twain shall meet.  Or so the argument goes. I would add one more thing…me.  More often than not I find myself in the middle of the road politically and theologically. 

According to the mainstream press (and some of the religious press) we are a society that is sharply divided between left and right with little or no room for moderation.  The church is often characterized the same way along liberal/evangelical lines.  Voices on the extremes dominate our public and theological debate to a degree that any possibility of moderation is squashed.  Moderate voices in politics and theology are viewed with suspicion and even hostility.  Once, when being interviewed by a Committee on Ministry in a presbytery I was hoping to join, a member of the COM actually accused me of being “untrustworthy” because I would not take an absolute stand on a particular divisive issue.  For whatever reason, “I’m not sure” has become an unacceptable answer.  Our churches and communities are fast allowing minority voices on the fringe to take over the debate.

This summer I had the opportunity to attend the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (USA) in Minneapolis.  The city was gracious, our hosts were wonderful and the leadership of the GA did an admirable job.  Nonetheless, I came away from GA feeling a deep sense of trouble.  Everywhere you look at General Assembly there is another affinity group pressing one cause or another.  I went to GA to work with one of those groups, however half way through I resigned my post as a volunteer.  I could not stomach it anymore.  I still support the goals of the group.  However, I was left feeling troubled by the persistent all or nothing view on theology.  It is a mentality that you are either with us or against us on every issue and for the right reasons.  Arriving at the same theological conclusion for different reasons is eyed with suspicion and even a measure of disdain.  Theological disagreement becomes absolute with a winner and a loser and little room for compromise.  Theological discernment is reduced to political strategy.  This tendency is as true on the left as it is on the right.  The dominance of such thinking leaves little room for moderation.  As a moderate at GA, I found myself feeling like a new kid in the cafeteria at school without anyone to sit with at lunch!

In 2006 the Baylor Religion Survey found that 17.6% of respondents consider themselves theologically conservative while 13.8% consider themselves theologically liberal.  So what happens to the other 68.6% of us who claim neither label?  We are right there with the yellow stripes and the dead armadillos in the middle of the road.