“Am I My Brother’s Keeper?”

How many of us remember the question, “Am I my brother’s keeper?”  Despite being a bit of a bible geek, I did not remember where it was found in the bible and did a google search to figure it out.  Much to my surprise, it wasn’t a trigger that inspired a parable by Jesus, nor was it a question asked by the Pharisees, or even a phrase that Paul had coined in one of his letters.  It was, however, in Genesis 4.

The last time I read that story was as a kid in my illustrated story bible.  ‘Cain and Abel’ is a tale of common humanity.  Jealousy of a sibling is something many people are familiar with although not many will admit it.  Even more common is making an excuse when caught red-handed.  Cain defensively and angrily tried to deflect God’s question. 

God told Cain to let go of his anger and jealousy, but Cain hung onto it, and nursed it, according to the scriptures.  As James wrote in his letter, “let everyone be quick to listen, slow to speak, slow to anger; for your anger does not produce God’s justice.”  Cain’s anger did indeed not produce God’s justice.  Cain fed his anger until it boiled over into violence.  And then he refused to take responsibility by deflecting God’s question.

We’re not murderers, as far as I know, but the question of “Am I my brother’s or sister’s keeper?”, feels central to the tension we are now seeing in many conversations.  It is a difficult ethical question to ask of ourselves.  The people who are covid deniers or anti-vaxxers are ready to accuse us of being sheeple and worse at the slightest opportunity.  They promote medications that are proscribed for livestock, as if that is safer than a vaccine developed by some of the most educated and dedicated medical experts in the world.  Their anger does not lead to justice, which at this time would be vaccinations distributed to more than just 2% of the world’s population.  Nor does it build up love and community in this country.

“Am I my brother’s keeper?” is a justification for not taking care of one another, not taking responsibility for how our actions impact others.  Remember the first Star Wars movie when Han Solo delivered R2D2 and Princess Leia to the Rebel Camp after escaping Darth Vader and the Death Star?  She says to him, “It’s not over yet”, and Han says defiantly, “It is for me, sister. Look, I ain't in this for your revolution, and I'm not in it for you, Princess. I'm in it for the money.”

That is where a lot of people are right now.  They are in it for themselves, and no one else.  They struggle to deal with change or with being asked to do something like wear a mask or get a vaccine that doesn’t benefit them or their bank accounts.  They are coming from a place of defensiveness that says “I don’t want to do anything someone else tells me I should do” or “I don’t need to care about others getting sick”.  They are coming from a place of entitlement, or anger or shame or fear or denial.  Ultimately, they don’t want to have to change for someone else.  They fear being controlled by someone else.  And their fear of being controlled is so strong that they do irrational things.

It’s always easy to see when it’s them out there that are stuck in the question of “Am I my brother’s keeper?’  But what about us who want to follow Jesus?

Christians are not called to judge our neighbors, as tempting as that might seem.  Or as widespread as that might appear – judging those who have vaccines, those who don’t, those who are staying home, those who went to the Calgary Stampede, those who have Covid, those who don’t believe in Covid, those who sanitize their hands, those who hug everyone they meet, those who know who they will vote for, those who don’t know if it will make a difference whether they vote or not.

As Jesus said, “Let he who is without sin cast the first stone.”

We are to look within, noticing the times we resort to anger or respond with greed or jealousy or pride or denial or resentment.  The times we lie, or say nasty things about people behind their backs, the times we don’t listen to someone with a different point of view.  The times we lash out or the times we fail to speak up.  Especially now, the times we need make changes and accommodations that we feel are unnecessary or unimportant.  More now than ever, change will be hard and resented and rebelled against.  Clinging to human traditions when they no longer help us connect with the holy can lead to the exact kind of Pharisee thinking Jesus was condemning.

It’s not how our church is set up, or how we feel about wearing masks in church, or being asked if we are double-vaccinated or where we sit that makes us unclean.  It is the anger and resentment, or stubborn clinging to what we think is the right way of doing things that can break down our relationship with God.

Ultimately, we are called to be more than our brother’s keeper.  We are not to enable or abandon them, but to love them.  Jesus taught that we are to love our God with all our heart, with all our soul, with all our strength, and with all our mind; and love our neighbor as much as we show compassion to ourselves.  That is what is truly important.  Loving God, loving neighbor, loving self.  We can do this, and when we do, we are following the way Christ calls us to be, turning back on what makes us unclean and worshiping God in ways that make a difference in the world.  May it be so for us all.

Hard words in Hard Times

Cannibalism and military outfits!  That’s what is in our scripture lessons this morning.  Talk about hard words in hard times.  

Hard words like Jesus speaking about drinking blood was extremely offensive to the people of his day.  Leviticus 17 talks about God cutting all connections with people who drank blood, “I will set my face against them and cut them off from the people” Whether it’s animal or human, blood was seen as the spiritual essence of life so this was deeply offensive to the followers.  And yet Jesus told them that drinking blood, his blood, was the only way to connect to God.  That was such a hard teaching that it alienated many of his followers. We understand that this is a metaphor about the ritual of eating communion together.  Or is it?  Because this was not about the Last Supper, or about how to share communion, it was about who Jesus was, the Word made flesh.  

Add to this the shock of hearing Jesus talk about his being a sacrifice, willing to give up his body and blood, was also a hard word to swallow.  Sacrificing one’s own life for the sake of others is pretty high stakes at any time.  It’s almost unimaginable in this day and age.  And it would have been very distasteful back then.

We are not good at sacrifice.  We like to do things that feel right or comfortable or customary.  We like to go with the flow, fit in, feel like we belong.  We want the latest fashions, or the nicest car, or the softest furniture, the most delicious food.  We can’t imagine giving our lives away for someone else’s benefit.  Yet that is what Jesus did.  He offended people.  He shocked people.  He went against what the rest of the country thought was proper or appropriate.  He used hard words because it wasn’t about winning the popularity contest or gaining friends and influencing people.  He used hard words because he was developing a strong, resilient and visionary group of followers who would carry his ideas forward despite all the world would throw at them.  Despite how offensive the message was of a state-tortured holy man who had the power to overthrow even death itself.  Hard words that would cost him his life.  

We are living in hard times that seem to be getting more complicated, rather than less.  Afghanistan is once again in turmoil, despite many people of many nations sacrificing their blood and their lives.  Haiti is also going through another crisis.  The UN announced a code red for humanity, which seems more believable than ever given the state of the fires in BC, melting of glaciers and record-breaking heatwaves here at home.  And now we have an election to wade through where words will be used to convince us to vote.  Some parties will use emotional words to scare us, others will use logical words to convince us.  And words will be used to confuse us and mislead us.  This summer we were supposed to be free from all Covid restrictions and were told that events like the Calgary Stampede would be safe.  Now we know that rapid testing isn’t foolproof, and cases in Calgary outnumber the cases in other areas of the province.  Vaccination rates have plateaued, and words have convinced many of conspiracy theories and promoted vaccine hesitancy.

Too many words.  Too many angry opinions and confusing ideas.  Too many difficult situations.  Too many tragedies.  Too many wars.

What do we do at times like these?  That’s where Paul’s writing comes in handy.  He was writing in hard times to a congregation that was struggling to know who it was and how it would follow Jesus.  He talked about how difficult it was when the world was full of strife, dissent, conflict and confusion.  He said that it wasn’t about physical wars between nations, but wars about ideas, about values, about passions, and about loyalty to one’s beliefs: 

“For our battle ultimately is not against human forces, but against the sovereignties and powers, against the authorities, against the rulers of this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.”

He used a military image because it was a common image that everyone was familiar with. 

Today, he could have used football protective gear.  Think about all the padding they must wear, the helmet, the shoulder pads, the cleated running shoes! Or the masks and chest pads a catcher wears behind home plate, or the shin pads of the goalie.  All those layers of protection are what we are more familiar with.  And doesn’t it sound comforting to know that God provides us with protection from the mental, emotional and spiritual challenges we face?

I like Eugene Peterson’s version of this passage: 

Be prepared. You’re up against far more than you can handle on your own. Take all the help you can get, every weapon God has issued, so that when it’s all over but the shouting you’ll still be on your feet. Truth, justice, peace, faith, and salvation are more than words. Learn how to apply them. You’ll need them throughout your life. God’s Word is an indispensable weapon. In the same way, prayer is essential in this ongoing warfare. Pray hard and long. Pray for your brothers and sisters. Keep your eyes open. Keep each other’s spirits up so that no one falls behind or drops out.

We use the Word of God to strengthen ourselves and our community in times of difficulty.  We are charged to do that with truth, justice, peace, and faith, and with two primary tools – scripture and prayer.  Words for tough times, words for staying strong and resilient and courageous. Now is the time for us to put on the whole uniform of God and use our words to follow the Bread of Life and the Word made flesh, who for us is the Holy One of God.

Prove it!

 

Sounds like Jesus was having a bad day.  First, he was tested by the Pharisees, then by the lack of foresight by his disciples.  He was speaking about faith and using a metaphor to do so, and his disciples completely missed the point and took his words literally.  Not only that, but they were coming from a very defensive position, assuming that he was blaming them for their lack of preparation.

Nobody was getting it.  The Pharisees wanted signs, the king wanted absolutes, the disciples wanted their bellies full and no one wanted to think about God or mission or higher purpose.  Here they were in the presence of Jesus, and had seen and experienced marvelous things, but all they could do was stay fixated on their own perceived needs and their own sense of what was proper.

Like a mobile, the three groups were used to a certain way of living.  Herod was used to having uncontested power over the country and influence with the Roman Empire.  He was a figurehead and knew it.  He was also plagued with guilt over the death of John the Baptist and wondered if Jesus was John reincarnated.  He had been manipulated by his wife and stepdaughter into executing John, from which we get the phrase, “serve his head on a platter”.  He was a dangerous and volatile man, easily swayed, and a wily politician.  He was not afraid to kill people to keep his power.

The Pharisees were, as Robbie the Dragon said, the ‘status quo’.  The religious people who ran the temple.  They were used to being upper managers in the institution of religion, which was a big thing in Jerusalem.  They liked their systems, their debates, their logic and their many rules. 

They liked the superiority they had in knowing that they had the truth all wrapped up and that they were better than the rest of the people they saw.  They were sure they were right.  They ‘knew’ they were in God’s good books.

Then there were the disciples.  Fishermen, farmers, day laborers.  They knew their place in the society’s hierarchy.  It was at the bottom.  They knew the constant struggle to find enough food to eat every day.  They knew grinding poverty, and they knew that they were not good enough to deserve the best seat in the temple.  Like Tevye in Fiddler on the Roof, they only dreamed of one day having a seat of honor in their most sacred institution.  Survival was the best they could hope for.

Imagine that this society was like a mobile with the strings and sticks balancing the different people at each level.  You remember the kinds we made with our kids as school projects, or maybe hung a store-bought one over a baby’s crib.  I had one festooned with plastic butterflies that entertained my children, especially when they realized the butterflies moved when they kicked their feet on the crib mattress.

The mobile that was the society of the people was committed to being still, calm and static.  It hadn’t been that long ago that there had been two nasty sieges of Jerusalem that had led to wholesale massacres of people hiding in the Temple, less than 100 years earlier.  Power imbalances had led to civil wars and thousands of people dead. So status quo and peace was very precious to all.  It was a matter of life and death.  People didn’t want more war, more death, and more disaster.  They wanted stability.  They wanted safety.  They wanted security.

Jesus wanted equality.  He wanted people to share their abundance with people who didn’t have abundance.  He wanted fair play and justice, so that poor people wouldn’t be the oppressed and the marginalized.  He wanted healthy community, where all, young and old, were treated with compassion and respect.  Where status was not based on what one owned or who one controlled, but on how well one served, and loved the people who could least repay a kindness.

He wanted a community that laughed together, played together, worked together and experienced God together. A community freed from the fear of not having enough or being enough.  A community of love and joy.

To get there would take much change.  The mobile would have to move and bounce and whirl to get that change.  Herod and the Pharisees were not having it.  They wanted the mobile to stay still and peaceful for them.  They were prepared to sacrifice the people under them to maintain that peace.  They certainly weren’t going to let some upstart Galilean preach to them how to practice their faith and upset the peaceful mobile.

So they demanded signs, not because they wanted signs, but because they wanted to keep the mobile from moving.  And Jesus realized the game they were playing.  Jesus realized they kept moving the goal post and would keep moving the goal post as a way to discredit him in front of his followers.

When he tried to communicate this to the disciples, once again, they didn’t have a clue what he was talking about.  They were fixated on their assumptions that there wasn’t enough food around because they could only believe in that which they could touch or taste.  They didn’t trust in this new community, they only trusted in what they knew.  They needed bread, not just once in a while but daily, like the rich folk could afford.  And that need was enough to erase their memories of the loaves and fishes that were in abundance whenever they met in community in the presence of Jesus.

Where do you find yourself in this story?  Are you worried about your daily bread? Are you worried about upsetting the status quo?  Are you stressed out about what other people might think if you do something different than everyone else?  Have you forgotten the special moments in your lives when you had a sense of community, of support, of the divine awe that inspired you and connected you to something bigger than yourself?

I hope amidst the challenges and the shifts of our world, that we remember to hold to the vision of a community and a society where all are valued, where all have found a bigger purpose to hope in, where all are committed to spinning the mobile until all know the joy and the glory of being beloved children of God.

Who’s got the power?

When I read Paul’s story, I immediately thought of that commercial with the pink energizer bunny, and the jingle, “I’ve got the Power”, resonating with the drum beating.  And on days like we’ve had, with the heat beating down on us like an everlasting drum, well, it’s hard to feel energized.  I remember a few years ago hearing that it was so hot in Italy, people were burning their hands when they went to touch their doorknobs.  Not so hard to imagine after this week.  The energy to work in such temperatures is hard to muster.  Even construction crews are working shorter shifts on the rigs and ending their days early to prevent heat exhaustion.  The power has gone out of us as we wait and pray for rain and a break from the sun.

Power is one of those things we don’t like to talk about much.  We are fine with talking about power in terms of electricity, and about power of politicians way over some place far away.  We’re much less comfortable with the power we might have.  Or might need.  Or might be abusing or might have abused in the past. Psychologists talk about three needs that every person has, competence, connection and autonomy.  Autonomy is the power to make decisions and choices for oneself.  But sometimes that power can step towards making decisions and choices for others.  Which is a good thing.  I don’t want to make decisions on where to build a generating station in the neighborhood, and I’m quite glad to delegate that to provincial and municipal leaders.  Where the danger lies is when the folks we delegate the power to make choices forget that they are to make choices for all and think only about the best choices for themselves.

We saw that in our previous town council.  I fear we are seeing that in our provincial leadership that ignores the call to have residential school history in our curriculum, public parks for people who can’t afford resorts, protected areas like our Rockies to stay safe from coal mining, accessible health care, fair dealings for health professionals and teachers and more.

But what does that have to do with us?  And more importantly, the scriptures?  Jesus had power to heal those who needed healing and yet when he was back home where he had grown up, in the midst of all the negative, critical, verbal attacks, his power was lessened.  The home crowd had power over him.  With their nitpicking, they exerted their power over Jesus.  They wanted to put him in his place.  They wanted him to remember he was nothing special, just a small-town boy with delusions of grandeur that he didn’t deserve and certainly shouldn’t inflict on them.

Can you imagine telling someone that they shouldn’t make the world a better place, or even worse, that they can’t and will never make the world a better place?  We would never do that, especially not to a loved one.  And yet, we often do.  I find something wrong in the way this person waters their plants or how that person drives their car.  I easily slip into judgement and when that judgement is spoken without any loving intentions, it robs the power from the person hearing it.

Judgement is addictive and judgement is easy.  It leaves me feeling more powerful than the person I am judging.  I meet my need for autonomy but in a way that competes with my neighbor and erodes my love for my neighbor.  Judgement is why the residential schools were so toxic for so many, and why the conversation about them is so hard today.

Paul talked about another way.  Instead of competing for power, he recognized that it was a competition he could never win.  And he would know.  As Saul, the persecutor of the Christians, he had a fierce reputation for being so judgmental and disparaging that the Temple authorities gave him a letter empowering him to go out and not just judge, but condemn any who were corrupting their faith with the teachings of Jesus.  They saw their faith as competing for power over people’s souls and sent Saul to stop it.  To say he was knocked off his high horse is putting it mildly.  Saul went blind and had to humbly ask for healing from the very people he had been sent to judge.  The people he thought he had power over, were the ones with the power over him.

He learned firsthand that it wasn’t his power, or the power of Ananias, his healer, that made him able to see again.  And it wasn’t a competition between him and Ananias over who had more power or more holiness.  It was God’s power that healed him.  This was the key.  

God used Paul more when Paul was weak, than when Paul tried to do it all himself.  God’s power flowed through Paul, transforming his weakness into a testimony for this different way of living that continues to inspire and transform.

There are days when I feel as weak and judgmental as Paul, and I wonder if I am making a difference.  There are days when I hear stories about the abuse of power that break my heart.  And then there are the stories that encourage and empower me.  The fellow who drove all the way from Edmonton and ended up coming back for seconds, buying 11 strawberry shortcakes!  The angel in our congregation who shared 8 shortcakes with her apartment complex, the neighbor who bought three to say thank you to friends despite being uncomfortable with this different way of doing our tea, the folks who paid so others could eat and the many saints who worked hard not just to serve up 80 desserts, but also to stay patient and calm despite the hustle and bustle and dreadful heat.  Especially them who worked hard to be nice to each other, apologize when necessary, and keep focused on loving and serving.

Jesus didn’t want power over his family and hometown.  He didn’t want power over his disciples.  He didn’t give up his power to the naysayers and complainers, and he didn’t punish them for their insolence.  He gave his power to all in the form of stories and healings.  He gave his power to his disciples, telling them to go out and share the power of love with everyone they met.  He told them that nothing could take that power of love from them, not even the dust of a judgmental community.  If you want to read a great article on the power of that love, and how it continues today, check out Wilma Derksen’s interview in this month’s Broadview Magazine.

And ask yourself, where do you get your power?  How are you doing with the struggle to not be competitive?  And who will you empower to go out and make a difference in the world?  God has sent you to the people, just as Jesus sent the 12, and just as Paul in his weakness was sent to empower all who heard or read his story.  May we find many opportunities to do just that.  Amen.

Grabbing for the Holy

 https://www.magdala.org/duc-in-altum/ 

There is a piece of art in the church at Magdala in the Holy Land that shows the hemorrhaging woman reaching through a crowd to touch Jesus’ hem.  What a surprising image!  We don’t often think about how she managed to make her way through a crowd of people and how she was able to touch his hem.  I have often imagined it being more like touching the back of a suit jacket, and an easy reach that could be surreptitiously done in passing.  But down at the ankle level is a whole other challenge.  Did she get stepped on?  Did she get kicked?  Why didn’t anyone notice her?  How could you not see someone crawling on the ground, squirming through people, past their stinky toes and walking sticks, getting your hands and knees grimy from the dust in the road, wondering if she would manage to make her goal before someone noticed?  Knowing that being in public risked her very life for breaking the taboo laws around women’s blood.

And there’s the desperation of an important man who, when he isn’t busy being an official and leader of the town religious institution, finds himself simply a heartbroken father throwing himself down on the ground, begging for help. 

What kind of desperation does it take before someone is prepared to lower themselves to such a level?  Losing a child is supposed to be the greatest pain a parent can face, and it doesn’t matter whether that child is a miscarriage, a 12-year-old or a 70-year-old.  When my son fell off his motorcycle last year and I got a call from his friend telling me that he was okay but that something had happened, the world stopped for a moment, and I forgot to breathe.

How many parents have gone through this desperation and not had the good fortune to have Jesus come to their rescue?  How many women crawling in their pain to get to Jesus’ sandals didn’t find the healing they prayed for?  The numbers are legion.  This congregation has lost two beautiful people in 2021 already that we prayed hard for.  Sometimes the cure doesn’t come.  Sometimes the healing comes when the cure does not.  Sometimes the community is humbled, silenced in the face of this great mystery.  Jairus came home to chaos, grief, and noise.  He heard mocking, cynicism, and disbelief.  His friends and family told him to turn away from Jesus.  He chose not to.

Just like the storm that Jesus stilled in last week’s reading, the storm of anguish and anger stilled in this story about Jairus.  The storm of isolation that the unnamed woman had endured for years also stilled.  The storm of anger, denial and cynicism stilled.  The pain of the world was not cured, but it was healed.

What is the difference between being cured and being healed? Cured is in my mind more of a physical thing, a relief from symptoms and diseases.  It may be done through scalpels or medication; it may be temporary or permanent. 

Healing can be physical, emotional, spiritual, mental, or psychological.  It is not something that the doctor can do for the patient, or the parent for the child.  Certainly we can help support healing, and encourage healing, but doctors will be the first to say that they are facing a profound mystery when they see their patients regain health.  They will say that they don’t know why one person recovers while another one doesn’t, and that they can’t even predict which person will be which.  I have seen people thrive while very sick, building community and loving family even while failing steadily in health.  And I have seen people who are very healthy tear down their relationships without even being aware of it.

These stories are similar and yet different.  Both feature unnamed females, yet one is on the cusp of womanhood while the other is mature and married.  One female is passive, needing a male to initiate healing on her behalf, her father.  The other is actively searching in many places.  One has Jesus come to her publicly, the other goes to Jesus sneakily.  In both these stories, Jesus did not just heal the individual, he healed the community.  Jairus and his family and friends were healed from their grief and fear.  They were healed from the ridicule of the cynical crowd.  The woman was cured from her illness, but she wasn’t healed until Jesus called her sister and made it safe for her to re-enter society free from stigma, judgement and ostracization.

Where do we see ourselves?  What are we needing healing for?  How can we connect with that healing?  How do we find the courage to ask for that healing?  For those of us who relate more with the crowds, how do we make space for the folks that are traumatized, the ones who need this healing?  Who do we need to support in their search for healing?  What cynicism do we need to let go of to help their healing happen?

We might not be at the kind of desperation that throws us at Jesus’ feet.  But you and I know there are many who are.  People who burn churches down or pull out guns during a backyard birthday party for a child.  People who donate tiny shoes on display.  People who have yet to plan memorial services for loved ones.  People who are wondering just how many graves there are at residential schools.  People who are running over Muslims or stabbing women wearing hijabs. Regardless of where we find ourselves in the story, isn’t it comforting to know that Jesus reaches out to the humble, the desperate, the grieving and the proud and wants to heal us all?  Whether we crawl for it, kneel for it, or don’t even know it is available, healing is with us, we are not alone, thanks be to God.

The Children Remembered - trigger warning for residential school survivors

 

White Whale Indians visiting their children at the school

White Whale people visiting their children at Red Deer Institute: "These people travelled over a hundred miles..." Red Deer, Alberta, 1914 UCCA, 1993.049P/861N

It’s interesting the different responses people have to stormy weather.  One person loves to stand on the porch during a thunderstorm, oohing and aahing over every streak of lightening, as long as it’s not too close.  Other people find the loud booms and crashes too much for their ears and nervous systems.  Today’s scripture sounds the same; Jesus sleeps in the boat while the disciples search desperately for bailers and life jackets.

And Jesus seems arrogant when they wake him up.  He knows he can still a storm, but how were they supposed to know this?  He knows that death is not something to be afraid of, but how were they supposed to know that they should face death with faith instead of fear? 

I have been feeling rather stormy myself since the news of the residential school unmarked graves.  Mostly I feel the same kind of rage I felt three summers ago near Grand Prairie, standing by the grave of my uncle, an unnamed baby. That in itself was sad, but the enraging part was that he and another baby were hidden under a bush while at the other end of the field were tall crosses, angels and other monuments to pioneers and homesteaders.  Why were these two little babies treated like pariahs in a graveyard, excluded so starkly from the community?  They died before they were baptised, and that meant they were not allowed to be in consecrated ground; this practise continued until the mid 1950’s.

The news this month from Kamloops reminded me of that, only worse.  Those graves were not just isolated, they were undocumented.  We don’t know who they were, when they died, what their names were, and that level of neglect is stomach churning.  But it’s not a surprise.  There are thousands of children across this land who died while at residential schools, and we’ve known this for years.

Back in the 1980’s when I was studying to become a teacher, we watched a movie about residential schools.  It was from the point of view of a young, idealistic schoolteacher like us, coming to a residential school.  She had great intentions to love and care for the children, rescue them from ignorance and poverty, and assumed that she was doing God’s work.  One scene had her picking at her thanksgiving dinner of roast turkey with all the trimmings while she knew the children would be eating porridge for supper again.  The systemic underfunding, racist attitudes and hopeless anger of the children burned her out.  She left with a broken heart.  I don’t think there was a dry eye in the room when that movie finished.  In the 80’s.  We knew.

In the 90’s I took a course in Indigenous History from the U of A.  The first nations classmates couldn’t use their credit cards in stores without producing proof of identity as the clerks assumed they the cards were stolen.  They didn’t get served in restaurants.  They said we whites were uptight about being punctual, and all we thought about was time and money.  They told how horrendous the legacy of residential schools was, because their parents and grandparents had experienced abuse and cruelty.  My mother-in-law did a video project pairing music from Les Misérables with the story of an indigenous young woman coming to the city to get away from family violence back home.  The girls would arrive at the Greyhound bus station where church volunteers and pimps would wait for them.  They were easy targets for the pimps, and the children ended up often in foster homes.  In the 90’s that video was made.  We knew.

We heard the call for a national inquiry into the schools, and learned from the TRC.  I took our very first batch of prayer shawls down to Edmonton in 2013 where they joined thousands more donated by churches.  I handed out shawls all day, listened to the body language, the anger, the stoicism, the quiet hope.  That day was full of stories and pictures of children who didn’t come home, and the anguish of parents who never heard what happened to their little ones.  In 2013. We knew.

Today we can’t pretend that we don’t know any more.  We can’t deny what happened in the name of Jesus, in the name of civilization, in the name of progress.  On the United Church website, Red Deer Industrial Institute – The Children Remembered they wrote: 

When medical officer Peter Bryce penned his 1907 report on the poor health and high death rates of children who attended Indian residential schools, Red Deer IRS had the dubious distinction of reporting the most deaths during the year of his investigation… These numbers do not reflect the full extent of fatalities… because [sick] children were routinely discharged from school... Bryce estimated that the death rate at the schools was about 25 percent but rose to 40 percent when the children who were sent home were taken into account.

In 1907. We knew.

So what do we do now?  We are being tossed in a tumultuous storm in a boat built on assumptions of British superiority.  We are hearing the thunder of generations of grieving human beings who were crushed in our attempts to assimilate.  We are seeing the lightening flashes of pain and outrage of people who are learning their history for the first time. We listen, remembering Jesus who said “If any of you put a stumbling block before one of these little ones, it would be better if a great millstone were hung around your neck and you were thrown into the sea.”

Generations of Christian missionaries and teachers put more than a stumbling block before children.  Our ancestors in the faith.  Founders of our church. 

The storm they started then is hitting us now.  How do we respond? Maybe it is time to turn inward and reflect on what we have known, should have known and need to know.  It is time to turn outward in humbleness and listen to what others know.  It is time to act in love, speaking what we have known all along, testifying to the truth that the system was made by people like us and it can be dismantled by people like us.  It is time to act.  In 2008, an archaeological survey at the Red Deer Industrial School, located the remains of 18 individuals and a number of wooden headstones.  In 2005, members of Sunnybrook United Church identified 12 of them, including 13-year-old David Laroque, and 14-year-old Irene Stoney, who both died of tuberculosis.  That was a good start.  And right now, we can write our MLAs and insist that the current curriculum for children in K-6, which talks about residential schools in age-appropriate ways, is protected and strengthened, not ignored and diminished.

Jesus calls us to stop having faith in ourselves and start having faith in him.  That when we are humble, we can work with those others who are in the same boat with us to build truthful, trustworthy relationships that calm the storms and heal us all.  May we have the courage to do so.

Red Deer, Alberta, 1914 or 1916

Students at the blackboard practising penmanship, Red Deer Institute.

UCCA, 1993.049P/850N

A Step nearer to Harmony

 

It is an amazing thing to be a part of a group that makes music together.  Making harmony and melody means working as a team with a specific focus.  It takes time and practice and skill development to hone both physical and mental activities in ways that work into a beautiful partnership.  Music can be the greatest gift we can give other people, a gift of joy that is not dissimilar to the joy that Jesus hoped his followers would have.  That has been one of the hardest parts of the pandemic, losing our ability to make music together.  Singing is a high-risk activity, and choirs, even handbell choirs are not safe when our infection rates are so high.  Masks are needed for any activity that requires breath; even trombones and tubas need masks on them.  This has caused pain for many people.  The loss of harmony is hard to endure.

Our gospel lesson today is about joy and harmony.  The harmony between Jesus and God, the harmony between Jesus and the disciples.  The more harmony there was between them, the more joy there was too.  But Jesus was also acutely aware that when the disciples committed to following Jesus, they committed to being out of harmony with the world.  They they would look at the world through their faith and that would leave a separation that would lead to potential ostracization and disharmony.  They would be feared and hated for their loyalty, and it would not be easy for them.

Such is the world at it’s most disharmonious.  It has led to wars and discrimination, racism, sexism and bullying.  Racism that has increasingly targeted Asian people since Trump started calling Covid by its country of origin.  And that nickname for Covid gave some people permission to act violently in numbers that I don’t remember hearing before.  It is disheartening to see racist flags being flown in our county and know that hatred is here.

Store clerks and health care workers are also being targeted for bullying and abuse.  People are loudly proclaiming that they are doing this because they are Christian and anything that limits their ability to preach the Gospel is an attack on their faith.  The world hates them, they claim, and maybe they are reading this same passage today as a justification for their behavior.

I can’t imagine what it must be like to be the target of bullying because of my ethnic background.  To constantly wonder what kind of behavior I will get when I wander into a store.  Will I be snubbed by store employees or by customers?  Will it be because of my gender or my skin tone?  Will people complain that I talk funny or be shocked to hear how Canadian my English sounds when I look like I have come from away?  Such is the daily lived experience of many people.  It’s not something they can turn off or avoid.

I’ll never forget gathering in Edmonton three years ago and hearing the stories of racism that United Church ministers were facing.  Some of them spoke bravely and boldly about the discrimination and bullying they experienced.  Others were more quiet and reluctant to speak out.  One of the participants was MiYeon Kim, the minister who wrote the prayers we are using today.  I first met her when we were student ministers in Alberta North West Conference, and we attended many workshops together with her fiancé Taylor Croissant.  In a sermon she wrote to go along with these prayers, she said that when she moved to Canada, she had to struggle with her own racist assumptions.  Growing up in Korea, she heard many stories about the atrocities her people experienced during the second world war, especially young girls who were forced into becoming ‘comfort women’ for Japanese soldiers.  She tells us:

I recognize that I also have prejudice and hostility toward the Japanese people in my innermost heart. In Korea I had very little exposure to Japanese people, so my prejudices were not challenged. However, my life and ministry in Canada have allowed me to meet and work with Japanese people in the United Church: Dr. Kathy Yamashita and the Rev. Kyoko Miura.

I met Kathy Yamashita at the final meeting of Alberta & Northwest Conference in May 2018. As President of the Conference, she led the meeting with outstanding leadership and wonderful humour. I was so impressed by her.

When Kathy visited our presbytery in her capacity as Conference President, she shared with us her own family’s story during the meeting. I learned that Japanese-Canadians suffered persecution during World War II; they were placed in internment camps and had their property taken from them. It was a story I had never heard before.

I became acquainted with the Rev. Kyoko in a class I took for my continuing education. In the class, she and I were the only Asians among 15 other students. Whether she knew my buried prejudice toward Japanese people or not, she visited with me every breaktime and lunchtime. Ironically, she was the only one who showed me that much kindness. I slowly opened my heart from politeness to friendship…  it became a new challenge for me to overcome my own prejudice... To open my mind and make harmony with Japanese people today, despite the wrong actions of people in the past… and to live out Christ’s commandment to become reconciled with our neighbours. It is not easy. I may need to fight hard against the stereotypes that I grew up with all around me in South Korea.

For someone as sweet and friendly and kind as MiYeon to admit she needs to fight hard against stereotypes is a real surprise.  But that is part of what Jesus wanted when he prayed that God strengthen and protect the disciples.  To help them resist the teachings of the world that says bullying is a part of life and help them instead find much joy as they follow the way that Jesus taught them.  May we too find much joy as we work to build harmony in our lives with our neighbors through remembering and following the teachings of Jesus, teachings of love, compassion, courage and forgiveness.  And may that building of harmony transform even our inmost hearts until we know abundant joy in all our relations!