Here's this week's video chapel message, with transcript below for those of you without speakers on your computer.
Opening Prayer:
God of the still, small voice, quiet us within.
Help us to understand your guidance.
Let the words of the scripture inform us:
“Be still and know that I am God.”
In weakness, help us know our strength.
In depression, help us know our joy.
In apathy, help us know our love.
We pray all his with grateful hearts and in your name, Amen.
A Complicated Task
It is inauguration week, and as many of you know I grew up in Washington DC.
So, it all brings to my mind memories of freezing in the cold just to catch a glimpse of the next president and first lady in the Inauguration Day parade.
My mother absolutely refusing to change the channel on the television, eyes glued to the ceremonies and coverage of the many inauguration parties. It all seemed very fancy, always imbued with a sense of hope.
The message to me always being, “With this leader, this time, it will all be better.”
Or at least that was the impression of it all in my young mind. It did not seem to me as a child to matter what party the leader represented. I hardly knew what a political party was at that time.
Perhaps this demonstrates the wisdom imparted by Jesus, “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.”
This year, from what I read on the news, it will all be very scaled down. For reasons of national security and to control a skyrocketing infection rate from COVID 19. That saddens me, but of course I understand all the reasons. At least I will not shiver in the cold while watching on television as the general public has been asked to do by government officials.
You may wonder why I might even bring it up, as many of those involved in spiritual leadership chose to not to get political, citing the need for separation from church and state.
But I am all for hope, and that has always been what the inauguration seemed to be about to me, no matter what party the president-elect was from. It was more of an inward hopeful experience for me as a kid. The hope springing not so much from the outward events themselves but from my heart and mind, perhaps inspired by the pomp and circumstance, but something truly all my own.
There are those who have mingled the spiritual and politics across history, when the time and circumstances called for it, I would say rightly so.
I might be tempted to say one of the very first to do so was Jesus. Keeping company with the outcast and downtrodden, prostates and lepers, and in parable, a voice for social justice.
But read up in the Hebrew Scriptures (or Old Testament) on the Prophets, and you will find even earlier voices for social justice, such as Amos:
“You oppress the poor and crush the needy. You trample on the poor and take from them taxes of grain. You trample on the needy and bring to ruin the poor of the land.”
For more information on the Prophets as the earliest advocates of social justice, I highly recommend the book, “Reading the Bible Again for the First Time” by Marcus Borg, where this idea was first brought to my attention.
So, where does this leave us? How do we know when, where, and how the spiritual and the political should mingle? Well, I say allow your conscious to be your guide.
These words from Professor of Islamic Studies at Duke University, Omid Safi, have helped guide me, “Spiritual leaders and followers have a complicated task in being involved in politics. But there does come a time when it’s not about liberal or conservative, Republican or Democrat, blue state or red state, but about right and wrong. Each time we stare at a hungry child, a fleeing refugee, a weeping mother, an agonizing father, we know where that line is. There comes a time when we must decide that we will not be compassionate by proxy but will take direct action to alleviate the suffering of one another, and our own selves. It is a messy walk, this walk of the spirit in the polis. But walk humbly we must, so long as it is to do justice and love and mercy beginning with the “least of God’s children.”
I might also say that if hope is kindled in you by the pomp and ceremony of new leadership in government, there is nothing wrong with that, either.
I thank you for listening and may the God of your understanding bless you this day.
Just because we are not meeting in person does not mean we cannot make prayer requests. You can do so in the chapel on the first floor of the hospital, or by email to jshawker@connallymmc.org Your requests are kept confidential and prayed over for a total of sixty days.
The Prayer for Protection (Rev. James Dillet Freemen)
The light of God surrounds us.
The love of God enfolds us.
The power of God protects us.
The presence of God watches over us.
Wherever we are, God is.
Amen.
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