(This is a sermon I have not yet given before a congregation. But I present it here, with the hope it may be of value to the congregation of friends, religious or not, I am privileged to know. -R)
The Lord be with you. (And also with you.)
Today’s story comes from the headline news. On Monday night, Anderson Cooper interviewed Andrew Shirvell, who is an assistant attorney general for the state of Michigan. Mr. Shirvell has created a blog, in which he singles out and attacks the student body president of the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor, a 21-year old openly gay man named Chris Armstrong. On his blog, titled “Chris Armstrong Watch”, Shirvell has called him a “radical homosexual activist”, a “racist, elitist, and liar”, and “Nazi-like”. Shirvell has also called him “Satan’s representative on the Student Assembly”, and depicted him with a multicolored peace flag on which appears a Nazi swastika. He attacked the reputation of Armstrong’s friends and family, and protested outside of his residence.
I am not a student of the law. But I have good friends who are – good women and men, who remind me that Atticus Finch, was, of all things, a lawyer. As a group, they have had a horrible reputation at least since the time Jesus chastised the Pharisees. What my friends tell me, by their words, and by their deeds, is that we depend upon not only the letter of the law, but the spirit, which is shaped and uplifted by the wisdom and character of those who serve.
It is true of all professions, to be sure – but here is a profession upon which is moored our sense of conscience, of right and wrong, of the imperfection of man and our shaky, yet persistent, efforts to combine compassion and consequences into justice.
As Christians, who challenge and are challenged by scripture, our leaders, and our daily lives, we know this road. We struggle to reconcile the Old Testament message of law and punishment with the Gospel of forgiveness and clemency. We struggle to learn and practice strength without aggression, wisdom without pretension, hope without greed. And through it all, we struggle to retain clarity of purpose, our sense of duty, our very sense of self.
No one said this road would be easy. Our path is not for the weak of heart. But, through grace, we are granted the courage and the wisdom we do need. We must but ask, and listen, like Elijah, and find the strength and patience we need in the silences that, too infrequently, enter our lives.
God is still listening. Are we?
CNN’s legal analyst, Jeffrey Toobin, later stated that the letter of the law is fairly clear – public officials do not possess the full First Amendment rights as ordinary citizens. This is by virtue of their position, their role as public servants.
It does not matter that Shirvell wrote and protested on his off hours. As a public official and employee, he is held to standards that are somewhat higher than that of ordinary citizens. It also doesn’t matter whether Armstrong did do anything that Shirvell claimed he did.
It doesn’t even matter that Armstrong did praiseworthy work to freeze tuition hikes, keep dining halls open later to help curb binge drinking, and provide new housing options for transgendered individuals.
What ultimately matters is whether we want to live in a society where someone in power can attack someone else solely for their membership in a group because, as it is claimed, their very existence threatens the identity of others.
After listening to the chatter of 24-hour news, I proceeded to listen in the silence. In the silence, memories come to us, and speak to us.
I remember being a graduate student, living with a gay man who was my landlord, who ended up leaving his position as a professor to move to Germany, for love. I remember how he helped me in my struggles to come to terms with my father’s mental illness and absence – he, too, had challenges finding acceptance and a workable relationship with his father. I remember watching him introduce his partner’s son to tempera fingerpainting – together, the three of them created a wonderful, playful array of red swirls and aquamarine shapes. I remember too the kindness of the next owner of the house, also a gay professor, who was no less kind and conscientious. I remember the friends whom I have been privileged to meet and learn from whose most memorable and defining quality was not their homosexuality, but their love of life.
They taught me what family was.
This is a new story. Yet it is an old story. It is a story of men in power attacking those they deem a threat. It is a story of men using God and scripture, when it is convenient, to crucify, and the conventions and standards of the times to justify their crude tactics.
It is a story of fear overwhelming courage, and expediency prevailing over what justice and the arc of human history tell us to be true – that man was born free, and that he willingly submits as small a portion of his freedom to higher authority that all may remain free, and that he questions and challenges corruption in times of darkness that he, or his children, may be free again, someday.
Gays, lesbians, bisexual and transgendered individuals are the African-Americans, the Japanese, the women, the Mormons, the Mexicans, the Scotch-Irish, the Jews, the feared and demonized “other” of our generation. It is not that the other groups have found full equality and emancipation – justice remains an evolving, unending struggle. But their plight is the most conspicuous and egregious form of discrimination in my memory against our fellow citizens, spanning gender, religious, class, and color lines.
So it is that I ask you to break this silence, not through protests or anger, but constructive wisdom. Let others tear down – we will build and heal.
I ask you to consider what we can do for this group, represented in our congregation and in our community.
As a church, we have discussed expanding our shelter program – in spite of and because of the present and foreseeable economic hardships. I humbly propose that the church consider that we dedicate the planned four-unit extension to focus on LGBT individuals, especially youth, who have nowhere to go.
In order to nourish the spirit as well as clothe and feed the body, I also propose we add a part-time shelter assistant position focused exclusively on serving LGBT clients in our shelter and food pantry.
I am also mindful that there remain lots of questions and concerns by members of our congregation and greater community about what it is to be gay, lesbian, bisexual, or transgendered.
To this end I have proposed to the clergy of other denominations and faiths represented in our area a series of open discussions and study meetings that will discuss the history, culture, and personal stories of LGBT individuals, led by members of our church and to include guest speakers.
Should any of us have lingering fears or questions, I hope that an open, honest, and frank dialogue, coupled with opportunities to learn, may help all of us. The positive reviews of our interfaith forum included celebrations of some rather heated discussion and disagreement; for this reason, I welcome disagreement even as I encourage us to enter with open-mindedness and civility.
Finally, I also humbly suggest, subject of course to congregational approval, that we propose at the next United Methodist General Conference a study of how we, as a denomination, can create a model policy and process for marrying LGBT individuals.
I expect these to be very controversial. Some of us might be tempted to leave it to politics. But, as students of history, even, as a dear octogenarian once described herself, “living artifacts of history”, we remember that the faithful often lead social progress as often as they fight against it. The faithful supported and helped lead women’s suffrage, the abolition of slavery, and the Civil Rights movement in this nation, and Indian independence, Polish solidarity, and a hundred fights against tyranny and dictatorship across the world.
Let us do this not to remind the world that Christ’s legacy is about salvation, not the Inquisition. Let us do this because the greatest commandment is to love our neighbor, to remind ourselves about what Christ is, and what we must strive to be.
We must do this not for Chris Armstrongs of the world, nor for the Andrew Shirvells. We do this for the nameless, the fameless, the weak LGBT young men and women who struggle in the shadows, with no voice and no hope. We seek to be nameless Samaritans, whose anonymity we bear not out of shame for who we serve, but out of humility for the gift we are given by service, and out of solidarity with those who currently have no name but those others spit with hate and ignorance.
Give hope. Give light. And as Christ’s servants, give new life to those who, in the end, will help us more than we can help them, by reminding us of who we really are.
Let us pray.
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