Peace with Justice
The following Homily was given by our Administrative Council Chairperson, Beth Corrie on Peace with Justice Sunday 2008:
“Caring for Creation as an Act of Justice and
Peacemaking”
Texts: Gen 1; Ps 8
In our readings for today, we are reminded of a story
with which we are very familiar, the Creation Story.
We know this story very well — God works really hard
for 6 days making everything in Creation — we won’t
worry today about how long those God days are, or
whether we can map this story onto evolutionary
history — and then God rests on the 7th day,
completely pleased with this awesomely “good” thing
God has spoken into being. God creates Day and Night,
Earth and Sky, plants and trees, the Sun and the Moon,
the water creatures and the sky creatures, the cattle
and the creeping things (I could have done without the
creeping things, but oh well), and finally, God
creates humankind, male and female, in God’s image.
And God blesses the animals and the humans, and gives
us both instructions to “be fruitful and multiply.”
But humans are special. To the humans alone, God
gives this charge: we are to “have dominion over”
these animals, and we are to subdue them. This
special charge is re-emphasized by the Psalmist in our
responsive reading today as well — unlike the rest of
Creation, we have been “made a little lower than God”
and, “crowned with glory and honor,” we have been
given “dominion over the works of” God’s hands — all
sheep and oxen, all beasts of the field, all the
birds, all the fish — everything has been put under
our feet.
Now, with all this glory and honor being showered on
us, I guess it is not surprising that we let our
specialness go to our head. But who can blame us,
really, I mean subduing creation isn’t easy — turns
out some of those creatures don’t so much like being
subdued, so it took a whole lot a fences, razor wire,
cages, spears and guns to make that happen.
At least, that has tended to be the way we’ve
approached our special charge — having dominion has
made us dominators. And this, as some theologians
have claimed, has given Christians the justification
to treat the earth as one big trash can, full of
disposable creatures we can use up and toss away when
they no longer serve our needs.
And yet, as some of you may already know, this term
“dominion,” or “radah,” in Hebrew, is more
consistently used throughout the Bible in conjunction
with descriptions of the humane and compassionate rule
of a king or nation — the kind of leadership that in
fact brings peace and prosperity to ALL within the
realm, the kind of rule that takes seriously the
responsibility of caring for what has been entrusted
to the ruler. To help us get past our more
authoritarian associations with the word “dominion,”
therefore, some theologians have suggested the term
“stewardship” as a more fitting translation for
“radah.” Stewards are very different from dominators
– stewards know that what they are ruling is not
theirs, but something they have been given
responsibility for, and for whose care they will be
held accountable when the true owner — God — returns
to check in on them.
And this interpretation fits with our Psalm reading
today as well. Recall that in the beginning, the
psalmist is amazed at God’s creation — when he looks
at the work of God’s fingers, the Psalmist is humbled.
He asks God, why do you even bother with mere mortals
like us when you are so glorious and have brought into
being such an awe-inspiring creation? It is only out
of THIS HUMILITY that the psalmist recalls his charge
of stewardship over creation. Humans are a “little
lower than God,” which makes them pretty high up the
chain, but they are LOWER than God — they really are
NOT GOD, and Creation is really NOT their possession.
We are just taking care of things on behalf of God –
the God who saw that all things were GOOD in their own
right, days (or millenia) before we came onto the
scene.
OK. Well, this is not a congregation that hasn’t
thought of this before. The very fact that we already
have a “green team” of folks looking into how to make
our church an embodiment of good stewardship of
Creation, the fact that we have already had an energy
audit and we are trying, as we make improvements to
our physical plant, to implement its recommendations,
the fact that we have an incredible vision for the
future that includes ideas for an organic garden, for
adding trees to our parking lot and making the
pavement more permeable for rainwater to reach the
soil — all these things happening in our church are
exciting examples of how we as a church already “get
it.”
So, I am not going to tell you that in order to be a
good steward of creation you need to recycle. You
know that. You know that you need to be carpooling,
that you need to stop letting the water run while you
brush your teeth and start limiting your showers to 5
minutes, you know all that.
And anyway, this is “peace with justice sunday,”
right? Probably, when you saw on the bulletin that it
was peace with justice sunday you thought you were
going to hear a sermon about how we need to end war,
and stand up for the oppressed. You probably
expected to hear scriptural references to “blessed are
the peacemakers” and “blessed are the poor” and
“beating swords in ploughshares” and all those other
passages that are about the only ones I actually have
committed to memory, because I pull those out every
time I want to talk theologically about peacemaking.
So, let’s try something new. What makes the words of
the Psalmist, “you have given them dominion over the
works of your hands,” an appropriate passage for peace
with justice sunday?
Well, it is the finitude of resources like water and
food, and the desire of groups to hoard these
resources rather than share them that is one of the
most common factors in violence, war and oppression.
Let’s think about the drought we’ve been having here
in the Southeast. In response to this drought, our
legislators began pushing for a redrawing of the
border with Tennessee in order to gain access to the
Tennessee River and try to quench Atlanta’s insatiable
thirst. While the Governor and legislature of
Tennessee have rejected this attempt, Georgia’s
politicians are still pursuing it. Now, we might
laugh at the absurdity of this crass attempt to gain
water, it is important to imagine what would be
happening if Tennessee and Georgia were separate
countries, rather than States, with no higher
authority to appeal to or intervene to make sure they
resolve their disputes nonviolently. It is not
difficult to imagine the countries of Georgia and
Tennessee amassing troops along the Tennessee River,
willing to kill and die for this precious resource of
water.
Now let’s think about an area that IS plagued by
violence. There is a reason that the Israeli
settlements built on Palestinian land in the West Bank
are built directly on top of all the major water
aquifers that supply water to the entire region,
including not only the areas that are designated to be
part of a Palestinian state, but also parts of Syria,
Jordan and Lebanon. The control of water is essential
to survival in the region, and it requires military
outposts and the occupation of another people’s land
in order to maintain this. Although this aspect of
the conflict is rarely brought out, the ability of the
Israelis and Palestinians to arrive at a lasting peace
settlement depends in no small part on whether a just
distribution of water and access to water can be
worked out.
There have been food riots in Haiti, Egypt,
Bangladesh and Mozambique because the cost of rice has
risen 75% in two months, and the cost of wheat has
gone up 120% in a year. Although there are no doubt
several different factors contributing to this, the
fact that we in the US are driving up the cost of food
by converting food crops into ethanol for our cars has
led Jean Ziegler, the United Nations Special Rappatuer
for the right to food to condemn the practice a “crime
against humanity.”
There is an obesity epidemic in our country, and,
although this would at first seem paradoxical, it is
the poorest communities — and disproportionally,
communities of color — that are the hardest hit.
Why? Because highly processed junk food is easier to
obtain and cheaper to buy than healthy fresh foods,
owing to the bizarre effects of government subsidies
provided by our Farm Bill. With this obesity, we see
an upsurge in diabetes, heart disease, and other
illnesses that might be avoided were healthy food
accessible to all.
The fact that some people have access to healthy food
and clean water and others do not is a justice issue;
the fact that some people are willing to kill and
oppress others to gain or control access to food and
water is a threat to peace.
And so, it appears we humans ARE in fact, taking
dominion over creation — using it as tyrants who have
come to subdue the earth and all its inhabitants –
rather than accepting stewardship over creation –
receiving the gifts of the land, the plants and trees
and animals, as sacred trusts that we are to take care
of and share with our brothers and sisters. This is
serious. And recycling alone ain’t going to do it.
On “peace with justice sunday,” we have in the past,
as we will today, say the World Methodist Social
Affirmation. When we say it, we will be rejoicing “in
the abundance of God’s gifts entrusted to us that all
may have enough,” and we will be committing ourselves
“individually and as a community…to seek abundant
life for all humanity.” So, before we say this
together later in the service, I want to spend just a
few moments thinking about what that might really look
like.
How do we reclaim our roles as true stewards rather
than dominators of creation? How do we seek justice
and make peace through the way we relate to the earth?
First, we can become conscious, educated consumers.
We should be asking questions about where our food
comes from and who has made sacrifices for us to have
it. Is our food fairly traded? Locally or
organically grown? Are the workers that process our
food making a living wage doing it? What are the
trade policies that affect other countries that supply
our food?
Second, we can, as individuals and as a church,
translate our knowledge into action. The United
Methodist Church and other denominations have had
success in implementing selective boycotts of
corporations such as Taco Bell and Mt Olive Pickles in
support of the struggle of migrant workers for fair
wages. We can have success in other arenas as well
when we turn our faith into action and engage in
nonviolent strategies to make real change.8
Third, we can move forward in helping to green our
church so that we can embody our care for creation and
love for God and neighbor right here. Imagine the
witness we can make in this neighborhood as our
church, standing on one corner of the worst traffic
intersection in Atlanta, becomes greener and greener,
with trees, an organic garden, and a congregation that
is committed to being stewards of the gift that God
has entrusted to us for the abundant life of all!
[Yes — this is a shameless plug for support of our
capital campaign!]
Will this be challenging? Yes. But we weren’t made
only a “little lower than God” for nothing. God not
only gave us the responsibility to care for creation,
God gave us the ability to do it. And indeed, God saw
that it was very good.
Amen
The following Homily was given by our Lay Leader Dan Browning on Peace with Justice Sunday 2007:
Traditionally here at Druid Hills, the Discovery Class has a Peace with Justice study each spring, leading up to this Sunday, and our Class takes responsibility for designing the service and bringing the message. You might wonder how the topic of world religions and pluralism fits this theme of Peace with Justice. But really, when you think about it, religion and clashes between religions are the cause or catalyst of so much of the war and injustice and destruction in our world throughout history and even today.
Of course, it’s easy to classify religion that leads to violence and warfare as “bad” religion. Some say the answer or antidote to bad, destructive religion is NO religion. No religion, or atheism, is an increasingly popular alternative, according to today’s bestseller lists. With books by such notable authors as Daniel Dennett, Richards Dawkins, Sam Harris, and yes, Christopher Hitchens all bestsellers, one could be forgiven for thinking that there is a Great Revival of atheism sweeping across the nation.
And we all want to escape from bad religion, the accusatory kind of religion that points a finger and says, “If you don’t believe and act exactly like I do, you’re going to hell in a handbasket. Many of you probably had some encounters, in college or elsewhere, with the guy who always tried to corner you and say “God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life‚ have you accepted Jesus Christ as your personal Lord and Savior yet?” While YOU were trying to get AWAY from that guy in college, as many of you know, I WAS that guy.
Some of you have heard this story before, but one of the ways I began to change my beliefs away from what I now consider to be “bad religion” was when I spent a summer in Malta working on converting a bunch of Libyan Muslim college guys. But the more time I spent with them, the more I came to think “Hey, these guys seem to be doing pretty well without my Christianity‚ they’re trying their best to love God and love their neighbor, maybe the fact that they were born and grew up in Libya and were raised as Muslims isn’t so bad after all?”
One of the main things we’ve been studying in Discovery these last several weeks, as we examined various religions of the world, is whether there is some sort of underlying unity among these religions, or at least whether they have more in common than not. Is it possible, perhaps, that all the great religions are attempting to describe the same singular truth, and they just have different ways of going about it?
According to Buddhist teachings, the notion of separateness is an illusion altogether. This means not only that the separate religions with their separate teachings and traditions and theological statements of belief are illusory, but even that our separateness from each other and from the world around us is illusory.
But this isn’t just a Buddhist idea. Maybe you remember from one of my previous sermons, if you were one of the handful of folks I didn’t put to sleep at the time, some ramblings about quantum theory, and how everything is made of atoms, which in turn are made of subatomic particles like electrons and protons and neutrons, and protons and neutrons are composite particles made of quarks, and that the only difference between objects is how these particles are organized, put together, and which molecules they wind up forming. Furthermore, at their most basic all of these particles are really just energy, so everything we call matter is really just energy organized in different ways, all tied together in this one big underlying field.
In case you’re worried that this is just something I’ve come up with on my own, let me reassure you that I consider this to be very much in line with our United Methodist teachings. John Wesley himself taught the doctrine of prevenient grace, whereby the Holy Spirit lives and move in and among and through ALL of us, even if we don’t recognize it.
Recall the passage from Proverbs that we just read, about how Wisdom is the expression of God’s very Self: When God established the heavens, Wisdom was there. When God drew a circle on the face of the deep, when God made firm the skies above, Wisdom was right there beside God, like a master worker, and was God’s daily delight, rejoicing in God’s inhabited world and delighting in the human race. And then in the Gospel lesson, Jesus talks about the Holy Spirit being the Spirit of Truth, coming to guide us into all truth, taking what is God’s and declaring it to us. What I take from these passages is that wherever there is Wisdom and Truth, there is God.
So this idea of there being some kind of underlying unity to all spiritual seeking and wisdom isn’t just a Buddhist idea or some crazy quantum theory idea. It’s also, I believe, very much of a Christian one, at least the kind of Christianity that I consider to be “good” religion. Look at the symbols of our faith, right here on the communion table, there is one loaf. When Rex celebrates communion in a few minutes, he’ll recite those familiar words: “Because there is one loaf, we who are many are one body, because we all partake of the same loaf.”
So maybe there is something to the notion that the religions of the world are similar in value, similar in Wisdom, and their distinctive thoughts and ideas and patterns and teachings have been shaped by the cultures in which they arose. Most of us were born and raised, to one degree or another, as American Christians. Chances are, if you had been born in India, you probably would have been raised as a Hindu, and if you had been born in Indonesia, you probably would have been raised as a Muslim. Is it possible to consider that maybe these are simply various names for the attempts to grasp the ineffable, eternal common truths about the Divine?
We made some very intentional choices of songs for today’s service. There’s the word Shalom, meaning peace in Hebrew, and the word Salaam, meaning peace in Arabic. And if you were an Arabic-speaking Christian, do you know what you’d call God? That’s right, you’d use the Arabic word for God, which is Allah. So isn’t it possible that when billions of faithful Muslims call on Allah, they’re not worshiping some competing deity, but are in fact calling on the same God that we are when we say God?
As well as being Peace with Justice Sunday, today is also Trinity Sunday in the liturgical calendar. On Trinity Sunday we attempt to grasp the Christian mystery of recognizing three Persons in one, three expressions or manifestations of the triune God, and yet we still proclaim that God is one. If we Christians can call God Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, then why can’t others call God “Allah”? Does the name we human beings assign to God really matter? Does our naming of the ineffable divine somehow change its nature and character? I seriously doubt it.
Our first hymn, “Bring Many Names” by the great contemporary hymn-writer Brian Wren, reflects this understanding: Strong mother God, warm father God, old aching God, young growing God. Notice that God is always God. The descriptions of God in this hymn are merely the author’s attempt to describe the indescribable Divine. As the saying goes, “God is one, but the sages call God by many names.
I want to close here with some lyrics from my favorite contemporary hymn-writer, an Irishman by the name of Paul Hewson, though most of you know him better as Bono of U2. The song is called One, which is also the name of Bono’s campaign to combat global AIDS and end extreme poverty, particularly in Africa. I actually didn’t know the full background of this song until I looked up the lyrics for this sermon. As Bono describes it, and I quote:
It’s a father-and-son story. I tried to write about someone I knew who was coming out and was afraid to tell his father. It’s a religious father and son. I have a lot of gay friends, and I’ve seen them screwed up from unloving family situations, which are just completely anti-Christian. If we know anything about God, it’s that God is love.
Hear these words from the song:
One love, one blood, one life
You got to do what you should
One life with each other
Sisters, brothers
One life but we’re not the same
We get to carry each other, carry each other
One
