In the tender compassion of our God * the dawn from on high shall break upon us, To shine on those who dwell in darkness and the shadow of death, * and to guide our feet into the way of peace.
In the Philadelphia of 1964 police brutality was a serious problem. Then, and in the years to follow, it was a problem that had official protection, especially in the form of Frank Rizzo as he moved from Deputy Police Commissioner, to Police Commissioner, and finally to Mayor. That doesn’t mean that every cop was brutal. The leadership of CORE, and the other civil rights groups, had a working relationship with the Civil Disobedience Squad (would you believe?). We’d work at not surprising them and they mostly treated us with respect. But we weren’t having much success with the matter of police brutality. The strategy of having teams follow the red police cars wasn’t working.
In the neighborhoods of the city there was deep frustration and anger. The Philadelphia Tribune had run a series of articles on police misconduct. Several officers were charged and then acquitted. The riot, insurrection, rebellion began on August 28 when Odessa Bradford got in an argument with two police officers, one black and one white. The interracial teams of officers and a new civilian review board were steps the city had taken to address the issue. Too little, too late. There in North Philadelphia, as the police tried to remove Ms. Bradford from her car a crowd gathered, and a man attacked the officers. Rumors spread about a Black woman being killed by the police. Three days later 341 had been injured, 774 arrested and 225 stores damaged or destroyed. Frank Rizzo used the disturbance in his political rise to power. The statue of Frank Rizzo was finally removed this month.
The question
As a parish priest – “Do you understand your task in relation to social ethics to be one of informing members of the proper answer to ethical issues and dilemmas or to help members learn how to think like Christians?
Yes, I know that it’s not really either/or. Except in practice it often is. The easy ways are to avoid it or repeat the conventual wisdom of the moment. The more difficult way is to take the parish into the passion of a moment and the wondering that comes after; into the places of moral ambiguity and necessary decisions.
There’s a ceramic handmade plague on my wall. It’s from Bonhoeffer’s writings,
I believe that God can and will bring good out of evil
I believe that even our mistakes and shortcomings are turned to good account
I believe that God will give us all the strength we need to resist in all time of distress
I believe that God is no timeless fate. But that he waits for and answers sincere prayers and responsible actions
In this moment there will be times to speak uncomfortable words and inconvenient truths to congregations that may want to close their eyes. And there will be times to walk with their congregations as they sort out sincere prayer and responsible action from calculating prayer and false action. Each priest will need to work out how best to do both.
An act of love[i]
Prayer forms us. Prayer changes how we see things. Prayer opens our eyes and ears. Prayer shapes our hearts and minds.
So, priest. One thing you can do is teach people how to pray. I don’t mean exhort them to pray or tell them that prayer will reduce their blood pressure or that prayer will allow them to exercise control over God. Teach them to pray in all conditions and circumstances—in times of the virus and times of political change.
Teach them in how to find the “inner core of silence” and to be in conversation with God. Help them find methods that fit their temperament and circumstances. Teach them to bring to their intercessions the oppressed and all victims, the police and political leaders, those who protest and seek justice.
Teach them on how to say the Daily Prayers of the Church (the Office). Help them explore various ways in which they can participate in the “ancient cycle of prayer”, the continual pulse beat of the church. Assist them to see how the daily saying of the psalms can bring their heart closer to the cry of the oppressed; how the daily praying of the scriptures and collects can allow them to see more clearly, with more compassion.
Teach them to participate in the Holy Eucharist. Help them to learn how they might live a Eucharistic life, “a natural life conformed to the pattern of Jesus, given in its wholeness to God, laid on His altar as a sacrifice of love, and consecrated, transformed by His inpouring life, to be used to give life and food to other souls.” Teach them to bring to the altar all of life--pain and joy, oppression and the struggles for freedom, confusions and dilemmas—to lay it all upon the altar, to let go and give it to God, and to know that they will be blessed, broken and made a means of grace.
I’m still caught off-guard by how the psalms and readings of the Office, or the celebration of a feast day, speak to my life and the struggles of our time. In this time of political posturing, anger and arrogance, isolation and hostility, I find myself pointed to humility, truth and honor by today’s reading from Matthew and the witness of Father Cornelius Hill.[ii]
Tell the daughter of Zion, Look, your king is coming to you, humble, and mounted on a donkey, and on a colt, the foal of a donkey.
And how the commemoration of the day can intersect with the voices of my inner life. In earlier postings I’ve mentioned that music comes to mind when I awake and when I walk. I don’t seem to select it. It’s just there. For weeks it’s been Lift Every Voice and Sing. Yesterday’s saint was James Weldon Johnson.
Do you have something like that going on within you? Do others in the parish? If you don't know--ask them.
Down into the mess
For the real saint is neither a special creation nor a spiritual freak. He is just a human being in whom has been fulfilled the great aspiration of St. Augustine – “My life shall be a real life, being wholly full of Thee.” And as that real life, the interior union with God grows, so too does the saints’ self-identification with humanity grow. They do not stand aside wrapped in delightful prayers and feeling pure and agreeable to God. They go right down into the mess; and there, right down in the mess, they are able to radiate God because they possess Him. Evelyn Underhill
Sometimes I want to offer people a clear narrative. A story that hangs together, is compelling, and easy to remember—from suffering and death to resurrection and life; or from today’s readings, “You know all the adversity that has befallen us: how our ancestors went down to Egypt, and we lived in Egypt for a long time; and the Egyptians oppressed us and our ancestors; and when we cried to the Lord, he heard our voice, and sent an angel and brought us out of Egypt” (Numbers 20:14b-16a)
And other times I want to go with people into the ambiguity and complexity; I want to go down into the mess—from slavery to freedom through the Red Sea, oops-lots of dead Egyptian first born and soldiers; into the wilderness, oops-“we should have stayed in Egypt”; into the Promised Land, oops-“we need to defeat the people already in the land
For myself, I think it’s useful to help people enter into the mess of prayer, thought, and action. Might be the high school social studies teacher in me.
I want our people to pray the Eucharist and the Office, to develop a reflective spirit, and to hold on ther hearts, and in their intercession list, those with masks and those without, the police and the protesters, the non-violent and the violent, their political allies and their political enemies. To go right down into the mess.
I also want us to contemplate fully. To contemplate the reality as it is in itself. And then, to contemplate it through the eyes of Mercy and Justice.
A few examples of how clergy might help people broaden and deepen their reflection.
A few days ago, I was pretty clear within myself about what the police in Atlanta had done when they engaged one of God’s children who had too much to drink and had been driving. He wanted to sleep it off, he wanted to walk to his sisters houes. Why didn’t they let him do that?
Then I watched two men being interviewed and I wasn’t as sure as I had been. Paul Butler, from Georgetown Law School who works on criminal law and race, and David Thomas, a retired police officer who is now a professor of forensic studies and criminal justice at Florida Gulf Coast University. Thomas said something I hadn’t thought about, “If I let him go, there’s nothing to keep him from returning to that vehicle and driving it. And he’s impaired.”
Then I thought about what’s referred to as the militarization of the police.—assault rifles, armored personnel carriers, flashbang grenades, tear gas. Many police groups see it as a matter of safety, the officers and the public. However, some studies suggest these tools and methods get used more often in African American communities and were generally likely to increase the likelihood of violence. And then there’s the story of The 1997 North Hollywood shootout and its impact on law enforcement agencies. The bank robbers carried fully automatic weapons with high capacity drum magazines and ammunition capable of penetrating vehicles and police Kevlar vests. They fired approximately 1,100 rounds at officers and civilians before being killed. The police were responding with pistols and shotguns and were unable to penetrate the robbers' body armor. The police were badly out-gunned. Seven months after the incident, the Department of Defense gave 600 surplus M16s to the LAPD.
Then I think about the cry to defund the police. Yes, I know, it means different things to different people. And, it’s clear we are going to see some needed changes. All good. In this particular conversation I find myself very concerned to hear the voices of the Black community. The voices range from abolition proposals to shifting funding to calls for significantly increasing funding. In polling a few years ago Black Americans had a favorable opinion of the police 58% to 27% unfavorable. Hiring more officers was supported by 60% vs. 18% opposed. A 2015 Gallup Poll indicated that one aspect of the mistreatment was in the inadequate protection and service levels being provided in their neighborhood. Here’s a webpage on the issue and some earlier polling. Two recent polls on defunding came up with rather different results. In one a majority of Black Americans support defunding the police (57%) and putting the money towards other community programs (64%). Here’s the website. The polling on defunding is under that on the coronavirus. Another poll found that 49% of Black Americans opposed defunding vs. 29% that favor.
My hope is that parish priests will seek the kind of conversation that assists people to engage in sincere prayer, nuanced thinking, and responsible action. To allow them to be better citizens in the present. Made better by using methods that help them pray, think and act as citizens who are instruments of the Divine Love. And alongside that is another hope—that priests will nurture the parish’s apostolic center. Shaping the kind of organic strength that will serve the Body of Christ over the long-term.
Surrender it all to love
There’s a parish in which the congregation was split 50-50 between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton; both communities were in pain because they did not get to have the world and society entirely on their own terms. Each believing that how they see things is what is true and just. The priest of that parish works with compassion and wisdom to hear all the voices, to acknowledge the pain and longings, and to offer a gospel that speaks of a new society that neither side can quite imagine even as they hope it to be true.
I imagine that in that parish there are two narratives on the American story.
One goes something like this—The American story is one of the genocide of native peoples and slavery of Black people. The oppression of both continue through a variety of laws and culture into the present.
The other is along these lines—The American story is of people seeking freedom and opportunity; and establishing a nation based upon principles of equality and liberty. That story continues into the present.
Some lean toward one or the other. A few are firmly in a camp. Others seek some kind of balance between the two. There are people who move between them and others who hold that both are true.
This morning I participated in the ordination and consecration of now Bishop Glenda Curry of Alabama. It was a holy, moving, traditional, and odd liturgy—masks, some social distance, lots of hand sanitizer. The live-streaming allowing me in Seattle to join others online in Alabama. The preacher was the Reverend Becca Stevens.[iii]
Becca had words, and the Word, for this moment in our nation’s life. One of the best sermons I’ve heard.
I've been very aware of how each Christian, and the whole Body of Christ, experiences this pressure to move to one side or another of the narratives. For some the temptation is to act as though we are experts in the matter of policing, race, and the use of force. For others there’s a search for balance. I often hope for balance. Becca helped me see more clearly.
The preacher mentioned the pressures, to come together or to stay apart, tradition or justice, anger or hope. She then said,
The call is not to try and keep everything in balance.
The call is always to surrender it all for love.
Good, reasonable people will be working on the issues and dilemmas we face. Citizens will seek to be heard, some political leaders will seek to serve the common good, experts will offer what they know. Many of these people will be the baptized who carry that identity and mission into the dialogue, debate, and decision-making. My hope is that as they do this holy work they will bring to the task the needed nuance, facts, and creativity. And, will, at the same time, hear the Divine Compassion—"The call is always to surrender it all for love.”
Lord, let our eyes be opened.” Moved with compassion, Jesus touched their eyes. Immediately they regained their sight and followed him.
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Red cars
Red cars 2
Red cars 3
[i] A phase use by Bishop Peter Eaton in his reflection of June 26, “To pray for someone with intention is to place oneself on the altar of the sacrifice of that person’s daily living alongside that person. It is a dangerous place to go. But prayer is a dangerous business, for it is nothing less than an act of love. Perhaps that is why prayer can be so hard sometimes.”
[ii] Cornelius Hill, 1843-1907; Ordained to diaconate June 27, 1895 and to the priesthood in 1903.
Everliving Lord of the universe, our loving God, you raised up your priest Cornelius Hill, last hereditary chief of the Oneida nation, to shepherd and defend his people against attempts to scatter them in the wilderness: Help us, like him, to be dedicated to truth and honor, that we may come to that blessed state you have prepared for us; through Jesus Christ, who with you and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns, one God, in glory everlasting. Amen.
[iii] The sermon is worth hearing. Becca Stevens is an Episcopal priest and founder of Thistle Farms to heal, empower, and employ female survivors of human trafficking, prostitution, and addiction.