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A Few Words from Pastor Bryan
...and Valeri Kaur & Braver Angels
I'm feeling strangely hopeful these days. What I mean is that the as messed up as the world is in so many ways--just take in the headlines on any given day--I am also coming across more and more people who are realizing that only Love can set us free from the personal and collective quagmires and impasses that threaten our peace and well-being. And what's giving me hope is that I can actually see and feel Love ("God is Love" 1 John 4:8) in the process of doing just that.
It's almost as though we are hearing the message of Jesus--and of all spiritual masters and teachers and sacred activists throughout history--with a fresh set of ears and maybe even a more awakened and evolved consciousness. Let me try to say that in a different way.
Throughout most of my adult life, I have pretty much expected people to respond to many of Jesus's teachings--such as the mandate to love one's enemies-- by saying things like, "That's a nice idea, but that would never 'work' in the real world. Get real. Don't be naive. It's a dangerous world and you've got to respond to force with force. 'Those people over there' only understand violence."
Does that sound familiar? It sure does to me. I almost expect people to dismiss the teachings of Jesus about love because they are not "realistic."
Well I'm not sure exactly how to account for it, but it feels as though this is beginning to change. I'm coming across more and more people who are realizing, as Martin Luther King, Jr. did decades ago, that;
“Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.”
I am running into more people from different spiritual and cultural traditions who are now insisting that love actually is the only force deep enough and strong enough to break through the cycles of violence and injustice that lead to war, and to build bridges of understanding and empathy that can enable people who disagree deeply to actually work together for the common good.
It is happening. And not just in overtly spiritual circles. One example of what I'm talking about is found in an organization (a movement really) called Braver Angels (www.braverangels.org). Here's what you'll find when you go to their website:
Fed up with today's politics?
Let's do something about it.
Braver Angels is leading the nation’s largest cross-partisan, volunteer-led movement to bridge the partisan divide. Through community gatherings, real debates, and grassroots leaders working together, we’re creating hope — and showing Americans a braver way.
If you go to their website and read about Braver Angels, you'll find that it is people from both sides of our most controversial political issues committing themselves to learning how to respect those with whom they disagree, and having conversations that are more about trying to understand the "other side" than about persuading others they we are right and they are wrong. To me, this is love in action in the public sphere, because it is about respect and listening--the kind of listening that enables people to work together to get things done that serve everyone. This gives me hope, and I'm going to explore the possibility of our church hosting some of these gatherings.
Another person whose focus on "Revolutionary Love" gives me great hope these days is the Sikh author and activist Valerie Kaur. I've shared excerpts from her book, See No Stranger several times in sermons and in these Pulse articles. This past week the following comments by Valerie were made on a podcast that were transcribed and sent out in the Center For Action and Contemplation's (the organization founded by Richard Rohr) daily reflections. Valerie said;
I describe love as sweet labor, a fierce and bloody and imperfect life-giving choice that we make. And if love is labor, then love can be taught. Love can be modeled. Love can be practiced. What I find so invigorating is that more and more of us now are naming the practices—how to be brave with your grief, how to honor your rage, how to let go of things that are dragging you down and the little critic in your mind that’s keeping you from realizing your full self. The more we can share the good news around these practices, the more we can say, “All of us can have access to building beloved community right where we are.
I’m seeing people waking up, being in relationship, grieving together, raging together, marching together, reimagining their own area of public life, their own sphere of influence in ways that I never imagined possible before. In those acts, in those moments and those gatherings around fierce love, I feel like I see glimpses of the nation, the world, that is wanting to be born.…
If we can create and nurture and inspire more and more of those containers, every school, every home, every workplace, every church, every house of worship, every neighborhood can become a pocket of that kind of beloved community, because this love stuff is not saintly. It’s practical. It’s pragmatic….
Oh I really love that. "...this love stuff is not saintly. It's practical. It's pragmatic."
In other words, love IS realistic. In a very real sense, Love "works." It's the only Force strong enough to bring about the changes and healings we need personally, and it's the only Force deep enough to get underneath the world's most entrenched injustices and atrocities.
So like I said, I'm feeling strangely hopeful these days. More and more I'm convinced that God/Love will find a way to get us all where we need to go. 2024 will be full of challenges. But Love can face any and every challenge, and as Anne Lamott puts it, "Grace (another color of Love) always bats last."
Yours in the Peace, Love, and Stubborn Hope of Christ!
Pastor Bryan
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