Today’s Readings: Psalm 118; Genesis 9:1-17; Matthew 21:1-11; Romans 3:19-31
A few weeks ago, many mainline churches participated in what was called “A Sacred Conversation On Race”. The faith community I served was one of those churches that participated. To help move the conversation along on the Sunday we had the sacred conversation, I used Martin Luther King, Jr.’s words from 44 years ago that pointed out the hour people spend in church is one of the most segregated hours in the life of the United States. It’s difficult for many people to face this reality because we usually think of participating in a sin like racism in only one way; we think of it as something we intentionally do to cause harm to another or to ourselves. Not all sin (or broken relationship with God, others, or self) works this way. Sometimes we participate on a different level. Paul’s words to Romans reminded us of this. In Romans 3:20 Paul wrote: “Our involvement with God’s revelation doesn’t put us right with God. What it does is force us to face our complicity in everyone else’s sin” (The Message). Let’s return to the example of racism for a moment to explore this notion of complicity in sin. Ten years ago when I was participating in a conversation about affirmative action, a colleague of mine explained why it was dangerous to simply trust people’s behavior to naturally correct serious social problems such as racism. My colleague said, “Imagine, for a moment, that an opening occurs suddenly in your office. The position is very important and needs to be filled quickly. How would you fill it? Would you put an ad in the newspaper (this was in the day’s before the Internet was as popular as it is) and wait for responses to come in? No, you would probably pull out your personal address book, start calling friends, and find someone that way. Now stop and think for a moment about the people in your address book. Are those individuals in your address book people from the same social location as you (i.e. same race, same class, same part of town)? If you are like most Americans, the answer would be “Yes”. So if things were left to our natural devices, we would continue to perpetuate the sin of racism by unintentionally (or complicity) boxing those from other racial/ethnic backgrounds out of the process.” Her powerful example of complicit sin has stayed with me for 15 years now. Today, during your time of prayer/meditation, I would invite you to explore your own life. Are there areas where you are complicit in your participation of sin – areas in which you are complicit in the environmental destruction of the planet, the systemic abuse of animals, the denial of people’s basic human rights, etc? If you find an area, spend some time inviting the Spirit’s guidance into your life as you seek new and creative ways of withdrawing your complicit participation in the sin. Til next time…
A few weeks ago, many mainline churches participated in what was called “A Sacred Conversation On Race”. The faith community I served was one of those churches that participated. To help move the conversation along on the Sunday we had the sacred conversation, I used Martin Luther King, Jr.’s words from 44 years ago that pointed out the hour people spend in church is one of the most segregated hours in the life of the United States. It’s difficult for many people to face this reality because we usually think of participating in a sin like racism in only one way; we think of it as something we intentionally do to cause harm to another or to ourselves. Not all sin (or broken relationship with God, others, or self) works this way. Sometimes we participate on a different level. Paul’s words to Romans reminded us of this. In Romans 3:20 Paul wrote: “Our involvement with God’s revelation doesn’t put us right with God. What it does is force us to face our complicity in everyone else’s sin” (The Message). Let’s return to the example of racism for a moment to explore this notion of complicity in sin. Ten years ago when I was participating in a conversation about affirmative action, a colleague of mine explained why it was dangerous to simply trust people’s behavior to naturally correct serious social problems such as racism. My colleague said, “Imagine, for a moment, that an opening occurs suddenly in your office. The position is very important and needs to be filled quickly. How would you fill it? Would you put an ad in the newspaper (this was in the day’s before the Internet was as popular as it is) and wait for responses to come in? No, you would probably pull out your personal address book, start calling friends, and find someone that way. Now stop and think for a moment about the people in your address book. Are those individuals in your address book people from the same social location as you (i.e. same race, same class, same part of town)? If you are like most Americans, the answer would be “Yes”. So if things were left to our natural devices, we would continue to perpetuate the sin of racism by unintentionally (or complicity) boxing those from other racial/ethnic backgrounds out of the process.” Her powerful example of complicit sin has stayed with me for 15 years now. Today, during your time of prayer/meditation, I would invite you to explore your own life. Are there areas where you are complicit in your participation of sin – areas in which you are complicit in the environmental destruction of the planet, the systemic abuse of animals, the denial of people’s basic human rights, etc? If you find an area, spend some time inviting the Spirit’s guidance into your life as you seek new and creative ways of withdrawing your complicit participation in the sin. Til next time…
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