A Sunday Sermon at Trinity Church, Wauwatosa

Matthew 5:38-48

Earthquakes and Tsumanis and Hurricanes. Mass shootings in Tuscon last month and in Poughkeepsie last Friday. Wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the latter war now in its tenth year. The violence which seems to be a way of life just a few miles east of this corner. Year in and year out, week in and week out, over the past six and a half years of our time together, we have come to this sacred space and prayed. 

Prayed for those who have lost lives or loved ones or livelihood. Prayed for those who have lost homes and hope. Prayed for the unemployed and the underemployed. Prayed for the sick and the suffering. Prayed for the hungry and the homeless. Prayed for those whose have been elected to public office and who have undertaken to fulfill their duties "to the best of their ability", so help them God.

Certainly, this parish has done more than mouth the words of prayers. We've put muscle and money behind our prayers. We have given and given generously toward relief efforts in the aftermath of Katrina, the Southeast Asian Tsunami and the earthquake in Haiti. We've participated in giving away thousands of articles of clothing at Red Door Clothes. We've given through the funds raised at our Awesome Auction to places like Our Next Generation and Sojourner Truth House. We've given money and time and energy to Habitat for Humanity. But in, around and through it all, we have prayed. For many of us, though, all of that praying (even in the face of so much tragedy and pain) has been fairly routine. After all, praying is part of what church folks do, right?

If we're not paying attention, praying can seem like an innocuous expenditure of time. Even in the face of differences of opinion, we can all agree on praying, can't we?  After all, praying seems passive enough so as not to damage our reputation or our social status or our friendships. We can pray quietly. We can pray privately. We can even pray without committing to much of anything. We begin to treat prayer as a no-loss, no-gain proposition.

We can be easily lulled into the misunderstanding that prayer is the activity religious people engage in either, when we don't have any other action in mind or when we have no real intention of actually taking any sort of action. In fact, from time to time, some of us may wonder when (or if) the church will ever do anything BESIDES pray. We may hear our internal voice yelling,"Don't just pray there, DO SOMETHING!"    

Over the past week, the images from our state Capitol building have been stunning.  I can only imagine what it's like to BE there as some of our own parishioners have been. Clearly, there are literally tens of thousands who have been compelled, because of their convictions, to make the journey to Madison and have their voices heard. They HAD to do something! For many, this is a defining moment, with much more at stake than the particulars of a piece of legislation. 

Exactly how this will be a defining moment seems to depend upon which side of the political aisle one is occupying. The rhetoric has been steadily ramping upwards. Opinions have set like concrete. The fortifications of blame and frustration are being erected. Slogans and mantras are lobbed across the airwaves, though cyberspace and onto the Capitol grounds.  

This is the sort of moment tailor-made for the reality programming our culture so craves. One side says, "Come back and do the work you were elected to do." The other side says, "We're working to defend the rights of those who elected us." Pundits pontificate and cast the moment as evidence of the ideological divide in this country which is impossible to bridge.  

Make no mistake; in the end, there will be winners and losers. And whether we want to acknowledge it or not, there are followers of Jesus on both sides of this situation -- at the Capitol in Madison and right here, in this room.

How are we to faithfully engage the words of today's Gospel, when our own emotions are running so high? How do we live the love of neighbor Jesus commands of his followers when our own sense of justice is so offended? How do we pray for our enemies when we want so badly to WIN and we want so fervently to see them LOSE? How do we face into the conflict such situations "out there" stir up for us when we're together "in here"?

The Sermon on the Mount is so simple when it's a hypothetical exercise, isn't it? As long as the enemy is "over there" -- across the ocean or across the country in Washington, DC, or even 75 minutes away in Madison -- we can "love them" in theory. But what about when the "enemy", the one opposed to us, lives next door in our neighborhood? Or across the hall at work? Or on the next pew at church? All of a sudden praying for our enemies takes on an urgency which is undeniable. But when the enemy lectures us on our television screens or shouts at us across a table, to offer a prayer for them becomes almost impossible. We choke on our anger. We can't bless because we want so desperately to curse.

A scant seven years ago, this parish was reeling in the aftermath of months of intense conflict. Longtime friendships had been strained until they had fractured beyond repair. E-mails had flown. Voices were raised. Scripture was quoted. Resolutions were proposed. Meetings, some public and some in secret, were conducted. By the time the dust settled, everyone (those who left and those who remained) had been changed irrevocably by all that had happened.

Then, in the spring of 2004, Trinity Church was given a gift on its way toward healing. That gift came embodied in the person of Skita Cassell, who we are remembering in particular today. As Skita battled the ravages of scleroderma, her family and friends asked to have a prayer service for her here at Trinity. Two of the songs we are singing this morning were sung at that service. Scripture was read. Prayers were prayed. People surrounded Skita, her son, Abayomi, and her mother Marilyn with love and concern. 

I'm told (because I wasn't here at the time) that, in a very real way, this healing service marked a new beginning for Trinity Church. As parishioners here continued to embrace Skita and her family through her illness, they began to risk embracing each other again as well. That simple prayer service planted the seeds of a healing ministry which continues to blossom here today. Skita didn't get cured, but her life was a witness to the healing power of God.

So here we are today. 

Perhaps broken and hurting. Perhaps angry and frightened. Perhaps wondering, "What are we to do in the face of so much confusion and contention?" Jesus' sermon calls to us across the centuries. This call is clearly a call in the prophetic tradition. 

We are called to be holy. Holy in our words. Holy in our habits. Holy in our treatment of others -- even those with whom we adamantly disagree. 

We are called to be patient. Patient enough to bear persecution. Patient enough to give away our money with no hope of repayment. Patient enough to give away our clothes with no guarantee of return. Patient enough to get slapped in the face and respond, not by taking a swing at the person who slapped us, but by giving the offender an open shot at the other cheek.

We are called to love -- not just the ones who love us in return, but the ones who hate us. Love the ones who would see us suffer and not lose a moment's sleep. Love the ones who would take the very food off our plates or the money out of our wallets. Love the ones we have come to hate. 

Jesus' way is not the easy way. Jesus' way takes us along the way of the cross. Jesus' way stretches our sense of justice. Jesus' way squeezes our opinions through the narrow gate of God's righteousness. 

Jesus' way presses us into the company of fellow pilgrims -- a community of people with whom we agree and disagree; some who become friends and some who remain enemies. Within this community we call Church we make our way toward healing and wholeness. Within this community of faith we share our joys and our sorrows; we share our frustrations and our anger; we share our fears and our anxieties. Together, in this community of faith, we practice how to live Gospel lives. Together, in this community of faith, we learn what it means to be holy, to be patient and to be loving. 

What if we're too angry to be holy? And what if we don't want to be patient? And what if we'd rather die than be loving? Well, this is the place to risk giving voice to our struggles. This is the place to risk being real. This is the place to open ourselves to the healing power of the Crucified God.  

And maybe (in the words of those special hymns we're singing), "taking it to the Lord in prayer" would be a good place to start.