|
While we laughed and smiled plenty, ate and played, reflected a great deal on our vocation and ministry, we also cried and consoled, we wept and named the enormous challenges in our local, national, and global contexts. We identified and analyzed political, cultural, social, ideological, and theological forces and factors that affect all of us, and we struggled to sense the Holy Spirit’s leading as we minister with Word and Sacrament.
When political activist Charlie Kirk was assassinated on the second day of the retreat, we had a collective and individual shock, dismay, and grief. We spent time in our scheduled daily prayer liturgies praying for Kirk’s family, for the students of the Utah Valley University, and for our nation. We feared and continue to grow concerned, as I’m sure you do as well, that political violence is becoming the response to express disagreement with those who are regarded as “the other.”
I’m a pastor who has done funerals and weddings with those and for those whom I disagree politically and theologically. God’s grace enables me to be in the sacred part of people’s lives and discover the brokenness of our shared humanity. It’s precisely because of our common humanity, created in God’s image and ones who are formed from the dust and who err every single day, that enables me to both share a bit in our humanity and take the risk in expressing my thoughts and perspectives. Disagreement and diversity of thought does not necessitate a collision; we ought not be on a collision course because we disagree or that somehow what looks like opposites must collide to see who is the winner and who is not the winner in the slugfest.
We have all read and heard the famed lines from the holy wisdom of Ecclesiastes, usually read at funerals, or at retirement announcements: “For everything there is a season and a time for every matter under heaven.” Then we are familiar with the litany of “opposites”. . .a time to be born and a time to die, a time for war and a time for peace, etc. Yet, we experience and know that those opposites are continually held in tension intentionally, simultaneously. Things don’t happen as a A and then B. We know from our faith that life and death are a simultaneous promise; funerals testify that “In life and in death, we belong to God.” The end of our life here in our earthly dimension is the continuation of everlasting life in Christ. Likewise, we work and pray for peace, but yet war still happens.
So it is, when we grieve the death of Charlie Kirk and grieve the humanity of the alleged assassin, Tyler Robinson, that caused his humanity to fracture to the point of taking out a human life, we must name in the same breath that Kirk’s speeches across college campuses diminished the humanity and struggles of Black and Brown bodies, of women, of LGBTQIA+ persons, of migrants. As a pastor and as a human being, I will not diminish Kirk’s humanity. He was and is a precious human being. I will not and cannot do what so many in our body politic did when George Floyd was murdered and hate against my community of Asian American Pacific Islanders was on the rise during the COVID-19 pandemic, when so many said, “But All Lives Matter. Thoughts and prayers.” Nope. We cannot go there. And I won’t either. Charle Kirk is and was a precious child of God. As was and is George Floyd. As is Paul Pelosi when he was assaulted. As is our President Donald Trump when two assasins tried to take his life. As was and is those who were gunned down in succession in the 1960s during the Civil Rights era: Medgar Evers, Martin Luther King Jr., John F. Kennedy, Jr., Robert F. Kennedy. And these are just the high-profile ones. There are countless others. So many precious lives – we label them conservative/liberal/progressive, right-wing, left-wing, moderates, Democrat, Republican. Each one precious, 100% broken and 100% redeemed, all at the same time.
To hold in tension intentionally what looks like opposites that enables us to advocate for the safety, security, and food aid for Gazans and Palestinians, critique Israel’s government’s policies, and not be anti-Semitic. It’s the same posture and commitment of faith that says, “I hate what you did, and I love you still” and “I remember and I forgive you” and “I did not vote for you, I disagree with you and you are my President.”
BTW, as I write this pastoral letter, I joined my counterparts around the country in expressing our collective love and prayers for our siblings at Denver Presbytery in the aftermath of the school shooting at Evergreen high school, where on a school bus, the gunperson was and is 16yr old Desmond Holly, precious child of God, and all of the precious children of God.
Notice I keep saying “was and is.” That is the healthy tension of our faith. Our faith holds in tension intentionally the past tense and the present tense. In the Creed, we affirm that we believe in “the communion of saints.” We are in community, in union, in fellowship with the living cloud of witnesses. And notice that that confession is in the third paragraph of the “I believe in the Holy Spirit.” The Holy Spirit connects us to all of God’s precious children in every time and in every place; we are united one to another whether we like it or not. Each of us, all of us, there’s no “was/is” for Charlie Kirk as with Breonna Taylor and George Floyd. They are living in the heart of God, as we are too, with them, and with one another. Precious in God’s sight. Period. Full stop. How the good Lord sorts things out in heaven is God’s business. My and your call and responsibility is to strive to love, to care for neighbors and strangers, even at risk to my own life and livelihood.
The holding of opposites in tension intentionally is premised, yes, you guessed it, on Jesus Christ Himself. Centuries of debate and writing of creeds affirmed that Jesus Christ, the Son of God, is both 100% divine and 100% human. He is one who is fully human, yet without sin. He is the One who died and rose again. He is the One who is fully absent (because he ascended) and who is fully present (whose presence is mediated by the presence and power of the Holy Spirit). Thus, on this side of heaven, we as frail human beings, live, struggle, and navigate the rough terrain and life and faith with the dual tension of certainty-mystery. Unfortunately, our political discourse and social media communications produce too much certainty to the point of erupting in violence when disagreement or diverse views are expressed, rather than living and embracing the mystery of God’s movement. Because there’s so much we don’t know that it’s best we gather together in prayer, in quiet reflection, in study and dialogue, in listening to one another, in asking questions, and seeking to understand, rather than shouting, screaming, and shooting.
So how and where do we go from here? From our clergy retreat, I learned how important it is to:
· Acknowledge and name the pain and struggle
· Breathe and pray
· Be kind to one another
· Listen
· Speak and embody the truth in love
· Know your neighbors and have them get to know you
· Rest
· By and relying upon God’s grace, let’s hold opposites in tension intentionally
· Love and be loved
Those are the ways I’m being a citizen of this country, a Presbyterian minister, a husband and father, friend, executive presbyter, and child of God.
| 
