Hoping Kroenke's 12th Night Gift Becomes Our Epiphany

When they saw that the star had stopped, they were overwhelmed with joy. On entering the house, they saw the child with Mary his mother; and they knelt down and paid him homage. Then, opening their treasure chests, they offered him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. - Matthew 2:10-11

It is the Feast of the Epiphany - the day we remember rich and powerful people traveling far to lay their treasure at the feet of a refugee child in an occupied land. 

Not out of obligation. 

Not out of guilt or shame. 

Out of joy.

That's right. It was their joy to lay their gifts at the feet of the Christ child. And it is ours as well. It is our joy to use all that we have in the service of the One who loved us so much he became one us as one of the most marginalized among us. 

Who took the blind man, whom others stepped over, ridiculed and spat on and put him in the middle of the community and said: "What do you want me to do for you?" (Mark 10:51).

Who said of feeding the hungry, giving drink to the thirsty, welcoming the stranger, clothing the naked, caring for the sick and visiting the prisoner: "Truly I tell you, just as you did it to the least of these who are members of my family, you did it to me."

As we enter this season of Epiphany, it is good for us to pause and reflect on two events that happened yesterday, on the 12th day of Christmas ... and to see if they bear any epiphanies for us. 

Last night, about 200 of us gathered in the auditorium of Central Library to discuss the proposed continued housing of The Bridge (a major service provider for people struggling with homelessness) at Centenary United Methodist Church, 3 blocks West of Christ Church Cathedral. 

When it came my turn to speak, I noted several things:

When I first came to Christ Church Cathedral seven years ago, I was told that "we've been having the same conversations about homelessness for 20 or 30 years with very little change." I can now add seven more years to that total. 

We spin our wheels. 

We complain about the ancillary effects of poverty and homelessness on the quality of life for those of us who are housed and the economy for those of us who own businesses downtown. 

We expend incredible resources fighting about New Life Evangelistic Center and complain about the city's short-sightedness and caring more about good press events than real solutions. 

And then we throw up our hands in frustration until the next firestorm comes around.

Except, it is not that we don't know what to do. There are data-proven, successful models of how to move people permanently from homelessness into housing (such as the model Iain De Jong laid out before us more than a year ago at Christ Church Cathedral, thanks to the work of Irene Agustin).  Models that we are using on a small, congregation-based scale with our Cathedral Housing Partnership. 

The problem is not lack of knowledge but lack of political will. 

The truth is, when we -- and by WE I don't just mean the "City of St. Louis" as an institution but ALL of us as the people of St. Louis -- when WE decide we want to do something, we do it. Whether it be renovate the Arch grounds, build a new stadium, give Forest Park a facelift or attract hi-tech businesses to the central core -- when we put our minds, our hearts and our money to something, it happens .. and it usually happens pretty well.

The question isn't "Do we know how to end homelessness?"

The question isn't "Is there enough money to end homelessness?"

The question is "Do we really care enough to end homelessness?"

And here, I suggested, our language is key.

With few notable exceptions (people like Teka Childress and Kathleen Wilder), those among us who are housed refer to those among us who struggle with homelessness as "them" or "those people" or "the homeless." 

When a problem is happening to "them" ... we usually care just enough about it to move it somewhere else or to kick the can down the road and assuage our conscience. But when something is happening to "us" -- that's a different story. When something tragic is happening to "us," -- like our football team leaving, for example -- we will move heaven and earth to make a solution happen.

We who are housed, we who have the resources and the access to political power, we will never care enough to end homelessness as long as those struggling with homelessness are a "them" or a "those people" or "the homeless." 

The first step to developing the political will necessary to end homelessness is to recognize that this is not an "us and them" situation. To recognize that God's dream is the building of the Beloved Community -- a community where there is no "them," only an all-inclusive "us." Where we know one another by name, know each other's stories and care enough about one another to speak the truth in love. 

Where those of us who sleep in warm beds at night cannot sleep because we care so deeply and personally about those of us who are on the streets.

Which leads me to the second event that happened yesterday.

Yesterday, Stan Kroenke sent his argument for the Rams moving back to Los Angeles to the NFL -- and distributed copies to all the major media outlets.  After politicians and power brokers in St. Louis have spent the past two years -- incredibly ill-advisedly, in my opinion -- throwing hundreds of millions of dollars in real and fictional money at him for a proposed new stadium, Kroenke's official response was to kick St. Louis in the teeth and trash us in what he hopes is his way out of town. 

This is the man at whose feet we were willing to lay our city's treasure. 

Which brings us back to the Epiphany -- and what I hope can be an epiphany for us as a city.

We love the Rams -- or at least we used to when they were winning and more lovable. We knew their names -- Kurt Warner, Orlando Pace, Marshall Faulk, Torry Holt, Isaac Bruce and on and on and on. They were OUR team. We took pride in them. And because of that relationship, we were susceptible to arguments that were highly questionable economically and utterly indefensible morally to try to keep them here.

There's nothing wrong with us loving the Rams ... or the Cardinals ... or the Blues  -- in the same way that there's nothing wrong with volunteering at Stray Rescue when there are human beings starving and abused. Love is always good. Love shows us what we are capable of doing when we care enough.

The Epiphany reminds us that the height of wisdom is to recognize that our greatest joy is to meet, love and give all we have to Jesus, who is present not on the thrones of the world (or in the stadiums), but on the streets, in the shelters and in the prisons. 

The Epiphany reminds those of us who, like the Magi, have great power and privilege, that our greatest joy is to open up those gifts and lay them at the feet not of the Stan Kroenkes of the world but at the feet of those of us who sleep on our Cathedral steps. 

The Epiphany reminds us that just as it was the Magi's joy to lay those gifts down in front of the Christ child, it is our joy to recognize that as the Body of Christ we get to to take the Bartimaeuses among us, call them by name, bring them into the center of the community, ask them "what would you have us do for you?" and tear down all the walls that would ever make them a "them" to someone else's "us" ... so we can together all "follow Jesus on the way." 

Stan Kroenke has given us a great 12th night gift -- one that today I hope becomes our Epiphany. That our greatest joy as the Beloved Community is not to build another palace for those of us who are the richest but to cultivate the relationships that will turn into the political will to lay our treasures down in front of those of us who are the poorest. 

Not out of obligation.

Not out of guilt or shame.

Out of joy.

What if Tamir's face looked like this...

Tamir Rice was guilty of a capital crime: He did not look like my child. And because of that, he is no more.

Tamir Rice and my son could have been classmates. They could have been friends. They could have been brothers.

Tamir Rice and my youngest son, were born 76 days apart in the summer of 2002.  On November 22, 2014, both of them were playing -- my son playing indoor soccer at Vetta and Tamir playing by himself in a city park.

Today, my son is alive. Tamir is dead.

In the year and a half after Michael Brown was killed by Darren Wilson, I have learned how much we white people like to talk about "the facts of the case." How we like to pretend each incident stands alone and completely unrelated to any other. How we dispassionately can pick any shooting apart and rationalize any behavior because we know it will never be our child lying in the street. How we can let our own implicit bias and irrational fear of people of color help us create justification even for killing unarmed children -- because we know the face will never be the one we tuck into bed at night.

When the news came today that officers Timothy Loehmann and Frank Garmback were not going to be indicted for shooting and killing Tamir within seconds after their cruiser out of nowhere sped into the park, screeched to a stop mere feet from him (something that would terrify anyone -- 12 years old or not), I wish I could say I was surprised, but I was not.

Nor will I be surprised when the apologists for Officers Loehmann and Garmback use the same tired arguments that have been used time and time and time again. When we are asked to believe that the "facts of the case" did not support even sending this case to trial -- despite incontrovertible video evidence to the contrary.

But there are some other "facts of the case" we need to consider.

If you are a parent of a black child, today's ruling is one more piece of evidence -- as if you needed it -- that it is open season on your child in this country. That police can kill your children with impunity. That our irrational fear as white people is more important than your child's life.

If you are a parent of a black child, today's ruling is one more piece of evidence -- as if you needed it -- that all people are not created equal in this nation. That our Constitutional valuing of someone who was black as 3/5 of a person isn't as much in our history as we tell ourselves.

If you are a parent of a black child, today's ruling is one more piece of evidence -- as if you needed it -- that not only do we not care about your child getting a decent education, having decent recreational facilities or adequate health care, that just being black continues to be considered a capital crime.

If you are a parent of a black child, today's ruling is one more piece of evidence -- as if you needed it -- that her life, his life, and your life do not matter, period.

And the final fact of the case -- if Tamir's face looked like my son's -- then his parents would have had the chance to spend this afternoon the way I did ... watching the new Star Wars movie with my 13-year old son.

Today is the Feast of the Holy Innocents. Based on this passage from Matthew 2, it commemorates the slaughter of innocent and unarmed children by the state:

When Herod saw that he had been tricked by the wise men, he was infuriated, and he sent and killed all the children in and around Bethlehem who were two years old or under, according to the time that he had learned from the wise men. Then was fulfilled what had been spoken through the prophet Jeremiah:

‘A voice was heard in Ramah,

wailing and loud lamentation,

Rachel weeping for her children;

she refused to be consoled, because they are no more.’

The slaughter continues, and Rachel is still inconsolable.

This afternoon, my Facebook and Twitter feeds are full of pain and rage from people who could have been Tamir's mother, father, sister, brother, classmate or cousin. From people who have seen too many of their children, sisters and brothers die at the hands of the state. And one word appears more often than the rest:

Again.

In the nearly 17 months since Michael Brown was gunned down by Darren Wilson, I have been amazed at the strength and resilience of those who have been out in the streets protesting police violence. They have not been peaceful -- nor should they have been -- but with incredibly few exceptions they have been nonviolent. Despite every reason to let their pain and rage boil over -- to say "an eye for an eye" and to give back what they have gotten -- instead they have reached back to the best of the tradition of civil disobedience, blocking streets and shutting down stores, disrupting events and stopping traffic.

As the names continue to roll on the necrology -- Michael Brown, Tamir Rice, Sandra Bland, Jamar Clark, Laquan MacDonald -- they remain steadfast in their commitment, though God knows how. And our response as white St. Louis has been nothing less than shameful. We whine that we are "tired of the protests" ... not recognizing that if our children were subjected to what Tamir, Michael, Sandra, Jamar and Laquan have been, we would be burning down buildings and demanding Congressional investigations. Not recognizing that we are blessed to have some of the most incredible leaders of a generation right here in our midst.

I hear their anger. I hear their pain. I hear their frustration. I hear their exhaustion.

But do we make changes? Do we make an effort to be with them in their pain? Do we at least acknowledge that the pain and the rage and the frustration have merit? Do we say, "My God, I can't believe this has been allowed to happen for so long, we're going to do something about this right now?"

No. We make plans to build a football stadium. That is our answer.

And in this Christmas season, in this season where we celebrate God becoming human in the most vulnerable of children, we have to ask: Where is the church??

Because if we as the church have nothing to say about it. If we as a church continue to let the litany of names roll on, then we are the Church of Herod, the Church of Empire, and we blaspheme the name of Jesus Christ.

If we as the church are not leading the way demanding change and supporting those who are putting their lives on the line in protest for it, then we are merely a chaplaincy for the comfortable and should close our doors.

If we as the church are not standing with the parents in shrouded in mourning and the children shaking in fear. If we as the church care more about respectability and keeping our pledgers happy and giving than following the Christ who bids us take up our cross and head toward Jerusalem, then the church has already died and all that is left is to hold the funeral.

And particularly if we as the white church are not putting our own child's face over Tamir's, and Sandra's, and Laquan's and Michael's -- if we are not even trying to imagine the fear and the agony and the rage -- then we are missing the entire point of the incarnation, where God emptied the divine self into the most vulnerable of children even to the point of suffering the same execution by the state that those holy innocents did just after he was born.

There is wailing and loud lamentation in Ramah this night. Rachel is weeping for her children, she refuses to be consoled, because they are no more.

Tamir Rice is one of Rachel's children. And he was guilty of a capital crime: He did not look like my child. And because of that, he is no more.

Choosing foolishness

For the message about the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, 

but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. - 1 Corinthians 1:18

Six checks of $30,599.25 each going in the mail today --
the final disbursements from the
Rebuild the Churches campaign

Following Jesus is a life of foolishness. A life that causes the world to point and stare at us, as Bill Hicks would say, "like a dog that was just shown a card trick."

There's some crazy, foolish stuff going on at Christ Church Cathedral today.

This morning, we are mailing checks totaling more than $180,000 to six churches that burned in the south in the wake of the massacre at Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston.

This evening, our Chapter will wrestle with a budget more than $200,000 in deficit and what that means for the future of Christ Church Cathedral.

On days like today, I have never been prouder to be part of the Christ Church Cathedral community. Because we are raising foolishness to an art form.

The checks we send out today close out the Rebuild the Churches campaign that saw more than 3,000 individuals and 200 congregations of many faiths give more than $730,000. With the help of wonderful partners like Rabbi Susan Talve and her assistant, Jen Fishering, activist Ashley Yates and the Rev. Karen Anderson, (and our own Annette Carr and office volunteers!) we showed that what hate burns, love rebuilds.

It has not been lost on us (and certainly not to the people in the congregation who have brought it up to me!) that we could certainly use this money ourselves. Some have even questioned us spending the energy and time doing this ... wouldn't it be better spent trying to ensure our own future? Our own survival?

But that is not the way of Christ.

Throughout this fall, Jesus has been speaking to us through the Gospel of Mark ... and over and over again, he has laid a simple choice before us:

Concentrate on your own survival or concentrate on following Jesus.

Deny yourself, pick up your cross and follow me.

If your hand causes you to stumble, cut it off.

Go, sell what you own, give the money to the poor, and come and follow me.

Survival or Faithfulness.

We must choose.

We cannot do both.

Someone once said that the difference between false faith and true faith is that false faith says, "Do not worry; that which you fear will not happen to you," and true faith says, "Do not fear, that which you fear may well happen to you, but it is nothing to fear.”

That following Jesus is called "the way of the cross" tells us surely enough that this is no prosperity Gospel. Shifting our focus from survival to faithfulness is not a test that will lead to survival if we pass. Shifting our focus from survival to faithfulness means we might survive and we might not ... but whether we live or whether we die, we are the Lord's. And we trust that if there is death, resurrection will always follow.

That which we fear may well happen to us, but it is nothing to fear.

Shifting our focus from survival to faithfulness means the only way we fail is if we fall back in fear. Because success is not determined by how much money we raise or how many people are in our chairs -- but by how deeply we "have the same mind in us as Christ Jesus," emptying ourselves out of love for the life of the world.

As long as we love. As long as we give. As long as we step out in faith and not back in fear, we cannot fail.

But we're bound to look pretty foolish in the process. People are bound to point and stare and shake their heads and say:

"What kind of a business raises $730,000 for other businesses when it's running a $210,000 deficit itself?"

"What kind of a business raises money to move two people out of homelessness into housing for a year when it's not even sure how it's going to keep it's own doors open?"

"What kind of a business stands in the street with young people crying for freedom when public opinion is telling them to sit down and shut up?"

"What kind of business would embrace such foolishness with joy?"

The church. The Body of Christ. That's who.

Paul continues in his letter to the church in Corinth:

Consider your own call, brothers and sisters: not many of you were wise by human standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth. But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, things that are not, to reduce to nothing things that are, so that no one might boast in the presence of God. He is the source of your life in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification and redemption, in order that, as it is written, ‘Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord.’

I am proud to be the dean of this church of fools. I am grateful for other bands of fools like Central Reform Congregation and Ward Chapel AME for traveling with us. I am deeply moved by the courage of our Chapter and congregation stepping out in faith and not falling back in fear -- and wrestling honestly when we struggle with which is which.

And I am grateful beyond measure for Jesus Christ, who gives us the way of the cross as the way of life. If we are to boast, let us boast in that.

"I stand in solidarity." ... "Oh really?"

Solidarity.

Solidarity is a word that has a new and deeper meaning for me today than it did 16 months ago.

Sixteen months ago, solidarity was an idea. It was a sense of common purpose. Of agreement. Of "I'm on your side."

Solidarity was something I said. A word used in letters to the editor, Facebook posts and sermons.

I stand in solidarity with _______.

Solidarity was expressing support without risking anything except perhaps the passing ire of those who disagreed with me.

Solidarity was just a word.

Sixteen months ago, Michael Brown was killed and lay in the street for four and a half hours. And a group of young people stood up together and said: "No more."

And I said, "I stand in solidarity with you."

And they said: "Oh really?"

They said: "You can't just say: 'I stand in solidarity.' You have to actually stand in solidarity."

"Stand in the street with us."

"Stand facing the police in their riot gear."

"Stand facing the tear gas and the rubber bullets and the pepper spray."

"Stand and march with us and don't be afraid of our anger, don't be afraid of our pain."

"Stand and care less about your own feelings and more about ours."

"Stand and listen to our stories and believe them."

"Stand and let everyone see you standing with us."

"Stand and don't tell us what to say or how to feel or what to do."

"Stand and respect our leadership. Stand and respect our authority."

"That's solidarity."

"That's family."

"That's love."

And so I did. Or at least I tried to. I didn't always. But I tried to.

And I am learning that solidarity is so much more than just a word.

I am learning that solidarity is being willing to stand in front of someone when they are under attack because you love them so much an injury to them is an injury to you.

I am learning that solidarity is what God did when "the Word became flesh and dwelt among us" -- that it was physical and messy and risky and scary.

I am learning that solidarity not only means standing up but it means sitting down or turning away is nothing less than betrayal.

I am learning that solidarity is more than just a word -- it its about deep relationship. It is about family. It is about love.

This week, in the wake of the massacre in San Bernadino and the evil statements by Donald Trump, I have had many opportunities to sign statements of solidarity.

"I stand in solidarity with my Muslim brothers and sisters."

It would be the easiest thing to do to sign those statements. To make those Facebook posts and tweets. To preach that sermon.

But every time I start to, I hear the voices of Brittany Ferrell and Alexis Templeton and Derrick Robinson and Traci Blackmon and Starsky Wilson and so many others. I hear them say:

"Solidarity? Oh really?"

And I am convicted that I have not earned the right to use that word.

I am convicted that I have not "stood in solidarity with my Muslim sisters and brothers," and to say so would be a betrayal of that word and what it has come to mean to me. A betrayal of all who truly have stood and now stand in solidarity with the Muslim community.

I am convicted that I have lived in St. Louis for nearly 20 years and I though I have acquaintances who are Muslim, I have never taken the time truly to listen to their experience and believe it. I have never given up power and privilege for them. I have never risked one thing out of love for them.

These words: Solidarity. Family. They mean something different to me now. And so while I absolutely stand against the demonization of Muslims and the evil that is spewing from Donald Trump's mouth and the support and silence coming from so many of his supporters, I cannot in good conscience say I stand in solidarity with my sisters and brothers who are Muslim because I have not.

I cannot in good conscience pretend to have a level of relationship I do not, to stand where I have never stood.

Not yet.

But I want to.

So that is my commitment. Not to sign a "statement of solidarity" but to seek out deep relationship ... relationships of "fictive kinship" (as Amy Hunter has taught me), relationships where I hope to find ways I can listen and believe and risk and trust and give away power and privilege. Relationships where I hope people will be as graceful and giving to me as Brittany, Alexis, and so many others have been to me in the past -- trusting me enough to invite me into solidarity that is so much more than a word.

I am tired of statements. Statements do not move me to change oppressive status quos. Statements do not call me into the thin places of risk, the ways of the cross. Statements absolve my conscience and do little else.

So I am not making a statement, I am stating a desire. And I'm asking any who are reading this to hold me accountable to it and, if these words resonate with you, to join me in it.

Not to say: "I stand in solidarity" but to actively seek to do it.

And to expect in the process to be changed forever.

In Jesus' name: WHY?

In Jesus’ name: WHY?

At least 14 people dead in another mass shooting.

I am tired of providing resources for families to talk about this to kids.

I am tired of posting things on Facebook that like-minded people “like.”

I am tired of saying “never again” and “enough” and “this has to stop NOW.”

I am tired of praying for the victims, the families and the shooters.

I am tired of all these things and many, many more. Because they do absolutely no good. Because I have done all these things before and we all know that in a matter of days or, at best, weeks, the next news alert will pop up with a different place, a different name, a different body count and the same words:

“Shooting.” “Gunman.” “Massacre.”

One of the reminders I write on the top of my notepad at the beginning of ever meeting is this:

“Can you ask a question instead of making a statement?”

That’s because questions begin conversations and statements end them.

And I have one question this night:

In Jesus’ name: WHY?

Can someone please explain to me in Jesus’ name, why we defend gun ownership like it is a sacrament? Can someone give me a Gospel argument why weapons that are specifically designed to maim and kill human beings should be allowed to exist.

I’m not looking for a constitutional argument. I’m not looking for a statistical argument. I’m looking for an argument from the Christian faith. Because even though the percentage is declining, more than 70% of Americans still join me in identifying as followers of Jesus Christ . Identify as people who, in some form or another, “promise to follow and obey him as Lord.”

I read my Bible every day. I pray every day. I ask Jesus to grant me sips from the vast reservoirs of wisdom that continue to elude me, to challenge my prejudices, and even to hit me with the holy 2x4 if needed to shape me more into his image. And in my 47 years, I have never read, heard, sensed or had revealed to me my savior asking me to arm myself or to guard the rights of others to arm themselves. I have never heard him praising the virtue of killing or wounding even in self-defense. I have never heard him ask for anything to be pried out of his cold, dead hands save the love of the world for which he died.

But there are clearly sisters and brothers in the faith who have heard differently. And so I genuinely want to know: How do you reconcile gun ownership, gun usage, the nearly unlimited access to guns including those specifically designed not just to kill individuals but mass groups of people with turning your life over to the Prince of Peace? Why do you so vigorously defend the right to bear arms?

In Jesus’ name: WHY?

There are plenty of areas in my life that I freely admit my hypocrisy. I rail against homelessness but have a spare bedroom in my house that lies empty most nights. I rail against the sad state of public education while using my wealth and privilege to send my kids to John Burroughs and Crossroads. But I will not try to defend these things as virtue or claim that Jesus smiles on them – only that Jesus still loves me in spite of my failings.

But I simply don’t see how followers of Jesus can hold a cross in one hand and a handgun in the other and not see the contradiction. And perhaps I am missing something. Perhaps there is some wisdom of Christ that remains beyond me. And so if you are reading this and you are one of those faithful who believes that discipleship of Jesus Christ is compatible with gun ownership and use, please explain to me…

In Jesus’ name: WHY?

If I am wrong and you can hold the cross in one hand and a handgun in another, I really want to know.

But if I’m right and you can’t.

If I’m right and – like me with homelessness and education – we agree that it is sin but because of our weakness we fall short … can we as the 70% of this nation that follows Jesus join with other like-minded people in the other 30% and at least say we will work together to try to be more faithful? To try to reduce the number of guns and our access to them? To try to stop the killing?

If I’m right and Jesus is weeping right now not only in San Bernadino, but over the bullet-ridden body of a child somewhere whose death was deemed so inconsequential we didn’t hear of it, and also over the man stocking his home arsenal in fear of his fellow human beings …

If I’m right and we are truly breaking the heart of Christ with our idolatrous worship of the second amendment…

If I’m right and we are allowing ourselves to have our steps determined not by the Son of God but by a gun lobby making billions selling power to people of color and poverty and fear to people of wealth and privilege…

If I’m right and there is no answer to the question:

In Jesus’ name, WHY?

Then we either need to get to work disarming our society … or stop saying we come in Jesus' name. 

9 pm curfew on our steps: Living in the now ... working for the not yet.

As followers of Jesus, we live in the space between the "now" and the "not yet."

We live believing that the Word has become flesh in Jesus and has shown us a new way of being, begun the inbreaking of the realm of God on earth. When it is complete, it will be the heavenly city where the river of life flows and the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations. It will be the place where we can say "All Lives Matter" because there is no doubt that all are truly treated like they do.

It will be the place where there is no crime because none will feel the need. Where there is no homelessness because none will be without shelter. Where there is no poverty because all will give to each other out of our shared abundance whatever we need.

Our job and our joy as followers of Jesus is, infused with God's grace, to share with God the building of "thy kingdom come, " to take part in what our Jewish sisters and brothers call tikkun olam or "the repair of the world."

But we are not there yet. We live in the in between time between when the vision has been seen and set in motion and before it is realized. And every day we have to negotiate ethics for what living in that in between time means.

Beginning last night, we posted this sign ->->->
on a sandwich board in front of Christ Church Cathedral.

This sign is an icon of the now and the not yet. We dream of Christ Church Cathedral being a place where all can safely gather -- because God's welcoming love is always safe love. However, the reality we live in is that during times where we don't have security present (and at this point we can't afford 24-hour security), things have been happening on our Cathedral steps that aren't safe. We have been getting multiple reports of drug dealing, fighting, passers-by (particularly women) being harassed and even assault.

We also recognize that there are people who seek the shelter of a night's sleep around the Cathedral building. These are people who have told us they don't feel safe in the neighborhood shelters -- and we believe them. So while we long for (and are actively working toward) the day when all will have a safe bed, we do not wish to turn them away or criminalize homelessness by having the police charge them with trespassing while they are just trying to get some sleep.

We have also heard from some people who spend the night outside the Cathedral that they feel frightened and unsafe by some of those who gather on the Cathedral steps later at night.

So, after all these conversations -- with people who sleep around the Cathedral, with neighborhood residents, with people who hang out at the steps in the evening and later at night (a crowd that from night-to-night or week-to-week can change radically), and with our fourth district police officers, we agreed to try these signs for two weeks and to give the police the authority to disperse gatherings on the Cathedral steps between 9 pm and 6 am. We also asked them NOT to bother the people who are sleeping in the alcoves on the sides. The police have expressed concern that the people who have been gathering on the steps will then kick those sleeping in the alcoves out and begin to use those spaces and we have asked the police to let us know if they see that happening.

We believe Christ gives us stewardship of this building for the common good -- for the gathering of the people for the repair of the world and in the love of God that is always, always welcoming and safe. We are taking these steps because we believe the "safe" piece of that has been compromised and without safety, any welcome we offer is false at best and dangerous at worst.

We have also been clear in the conversations with neighbors and the police that enforcing a curfew on the Cathedral steps is not a solution but merely playing "whack-a-mole" with a larger problem. We need to ask the sacred question: Why?

Why are people dealing drugs?

Why are people carrying guns?

Why are people behaving abusively toward one another?

*Why do some people have to sleep outside?

We need to ask why and not be satisfied merely with the response that fits our preconceived notions and prejudices. We need to ask why and commit to the real tikkun olam, the transformation of the structures of the world that a revolutionary Jesus calls us to. The revolution of our broken school systems (and how we fund them) and culture of guns and violence and incarceration and misogyny and overprivilege.

If you are interested in getting more involved with the Cathedral community that lives in and around our building at night, it's pretty easy to do.

*You can just talk to one another as we come to worship on Sundays, particularly engaging people across class lines.

*You can contact Jeff Goldone (jgoldone@yahoo.com) or Muffin Rowlyk (krowlyk@yahoo.com) and get involved with our "Cross-Class Conversation" ministry.

*You can contact Joanne Kelly (joannekellygood@gmail.com) and support the Cathedral Housing Partnership, which is working to end homelessness one person, one relationship at a time with a housing first model.

*You can donate to St. Patrick Center (http://www.stpatrickcenter.org/get-involved/donate/) and The Bridge (http://www.bridgestl.org/) and support their work to help people move from homelessness to housing.

*When you have friends, co-workers and family members who talk about how terrible and dangerous downtown is, you can stand up and say that downtown is wonderful and full of wonderful people and that they should join you coming to Christ Church Cathedral on a Sunday or any day and see for themselves and to not be bound by their fear.

There is much we can do in our own labors of tikkun olam. We are a long way from the "not yet" of the heavenly Jerusalem but we can rejoice that the destination is assured.

Living in the now means we are under the law even as we are leaning in trust into grace. And that's what we're trying to do here.

"You. Can't. Stop. The Revolution." -- a sermon at St. Mark's Episcopal Church, Richmond, VA

A sermon preached at St. Mark's Episcopal Church in Richmond, VA. St. Mark's is using the occasion of its 150th anniversary to examine how they can be active in bringing racial reconciliation and healing in the capital of the Confederacy. 

Repeat after me.

You. Can’t. Stop. The Revolution.

Louder.

You. Can’t. Stop. The Revolution.

Together

You. Can’t. Stop. The Revolution.

You. Can’t. Stop. The Revolution.

You. Can’t. Stop. The Revolution.

You. Can’t. Stop. The Revolution.

Amen.

Please be seated.

Good morning!

I bring you greetings in the name of Jesus Christ from Christ Church Cathedral in St. Louis. I bring you greetings from our Bishop George Wayne Smith and from the Cathedral congregation, from the people of the Diocese of Missouri and from people from all over the St. Louis region, for we mean to be a Cathedral for them all.

It is an honor to be here. And I want to thank your rector, David Niemeyer and Malinda Collier for the invitation. I am grateful to be invited here to preach the Word and to spend the day talking about our original sin of racism. I am grateful because even now 436 days since Michael Brown, Jr. was killed in Ferguson, Missouri, the congregations that are willing to have this conversation are a distinct minority. So I thank you for your courage. Your willingness to take your 150th year and engage this conversation is how movements for Gospel change happen. Just being here and being willing to talk about this is a first step in how the revolution happens. Thank you.

One of the things that has happened to me over those past 436 days is I am beginning, just beginning, to see Jesus with new eyes. I’m beginning to hear Jesus with new ears. I’m beginning to meet a Jesus who is different than any Jesus I have ever met before. And I am meeting this Jesus in different places than I have ever met Jesus before.

I’m meeting this Jesus not in church buildings but out in the streets.

I’m meeting this Jesus not as he gently talks and holds my hand but as she cries out in pain and in rage.

I’m meeting this Jesus not as he sings flowery hymns and prays beautiful prayers but as she faces tear gas and police in riot gear and with the sure and certain hope of resurrection shouts You. Can’t. Stop. The Revolution. Because I am meeting a Jesus who is a revolutionary and who bids us to be revolutionaries too.

And as I am meeting this Jesus, and as I am falling in love with this Jesus, I am convicted that this Jesus has been right in front of me all along but I have chosen not to see. I am convicted that this Jesus has been right here in our scriptures all along and I have chosen not to hear. I am convicted that I have time and again read the Gospel and chosen a Jesus of comfort over a Jesus of challenge. Chosen a Jesus of accommodation over a Jesus of protest. A Jesus of empire over a Jesus of revolution.

I am convicted that time and again, I have chosen a Jesus who affirms my standard of living and ignores those on whose backs it is borne instead of a Jesus who bids me die so that I might live.

Now, this revolutionary Jesus really has been hiding in plain sight. Because we’ve been hearing from this Jesus for the past month or so of Sundays.

We’ve heard him say: "If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.” Then the next week we heard: "The Son of Man is to be betrayed into human hands, and they will kill him, and three days after being killed, he will rise again." Then we heard: “If your hand causes you to stumble, cut it off... and if your foot causes you to stumble, cut it off… And if your eye causes you to stumble, tear it out.”

Finally, last week, Jesus moved from preaching to meddling because he started talking about money and said “Go, sell what you own, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me.”

This is not some depoliticized, domesticated Jesus. This is not Jesus meek and mild. This is a revolutionary Jesus.

Now if we haven’t gotten it. If we haven’t seen this revolutionary Jesus, we’re certainly not alone – because even after all this, the disciples didn’t get it either. And we know that because this morning, we hear James and John say to Jesus, "Teacher, we want you to do for us whatever we ask of you."

After all this, the disciples still want to mold Jesus in their image. And Jesus plays along, "What is it you want me to do for you?" And they say to him, "Grant us to sit, one at your right hand and one at your left, in your glory."

There it is. After all the times Jesus has told them it is about carrying the cross not sitting on the throne, James and John still think Jesus is about them gaining power and status and respectability.

As American Christians, we are the heirs of James and John. Our entire history is us trying to tell Jesus what to do – and we have used the Gospel to do our bidding not the Christ’s. To gild our own seats of power then photoshop Jesus in at our side.

For centuries, we have fashioned Jesus in our image, used his Gospel to justify the genocide of this land’s natives, the kidnapping and torture of black Africans and the building of our national economy on their labor. We have painted pictures of white Jesus to strengthen our own sense of white supremacy, and we have sold crosses as costume jewelry while embracing the same state-sponsored killing that killed him nearly 2,000 years ago.

We are the heirs of James and John because we have sought respectability more than integrity, supremacy more than sacrifice and power more than justice. And like James and John, we have convinced ourselves that it is all our entitled right from calling ourselves followers of Jesus.

And like James and John, if we have ears to hear, Jesus is telling us that we have to stop. That we have a choice. And that choice is not whether we will sit on his left or his right on thrones of glory but whether we will drink the cup that Jesus drinks, be baptized with the baptism with which Jesus is baptized and walk the way of the cross that is the way of life.

A year ago, when the uprising in Ferguson was playing out every night in the streets about 15 minutes from Christ Church Cathedral and on TV screens around the world, I found myself in lots of meetings with clergy across race and class lines trying to deal with this crisis. At that time, many of us were struggling to remember that “this crisis” was not primarily people in the streets and police with automatic weapons, riot gear and tear gas.->

No, the real crisis was decades upon decades, even centuries upon centuries of oppression of black lives in this nation. Of lives of inferior schools and low-wage jobs, of being targeted and profiled and even gunned down. Of being used as walking ATMs to support municipal governments that treated them as if their lives mattered not at all.

So, I was in a lot of meetings with clergy. And every one I went to, I heard the same thing over and over again.

“We need to get them to listen. If we could just get them to listen. We need to show them how this is done.”

The “them” was the young people in the streets. And we, the church, the respectable clergy, it was our job to tell them how to behave. It was our job to teach them about Jesus. And Jesus would be reasonable. Jesus would work the system and get things done. Jesus would keep the peace that kept us comfortable and in control.

And that really was the core issue for us – not issues of justice but our comfort and control. How can we control the narrative? How can we preserve our own power and authority? We were seeking a peace that was not about justice but about preserving the status quo – not looking for Jesus to lead us but telling Jesus what we wanted him to do.

I was at one of these meetings that first week when a new face appeared. His name was Derrick Robinson, and he was an evangelical bishop. And he marched into the church where we were having our meeting and walked right up to us sitting in our chairs and here’s what he said:

“What are you all doing here? You need to get out in the streets with the young people. And don’t be telling them to get into your churches, because they haven’t been there and they’re not going. And don’t be going there in your suits and your collars and preaching to them, because they don’t care and they shouldn’t care because we haven’t been out there with them. You need to go out there and let them lead, and you need to listen.”

“You don’t need to wear your suits. You need to wear your blue jeans.”

When Derrick spoke, it was like the sky broke open and his words pointed me a Jesus who would change me forever. Instead of trying to preserve a peace that was about my own comfort, this Jesus was showing me that the kingdom of God was breaking in all around us and it was intensely uncomfortable. It had to be uncomfortable because the comfort I had been enjoying was on the backs of my sisters and brothers, and my job was not to preserve my comfort but to get out in the middle of everything that was making me most uncomfortable and not tell Jesus what to do for me but to ask Jesus “how can I serve?”

Our job – and in fact not just our job but our greatest joy -- was to seek out those whose lives didn’t matter to the powers of the world and to serve them, to let them lead, to stand in solidarity with them, because that’s where Jesus was.

Our job and our joy is to recognize that the young black women and men who are crying out in the street are the voice crying in the wilderness – pointing the way to the living Christ breaking through into the world in new ways. To recognize that the real Jesus never is a shill for the status quo, the real Jesus never breaks into the world in ways that keep the powerful on the throne and the powerless underfoot. That the real Jesus takes the systems of the world where some are oppressors and some are oppressed and turns them inside out and upside down. Asking those who would be great to be servants, those who would be first to be last.

Our job and our joy is not to keep a false sense of peace of oppression.

Our job and our joy is to join the revolution.

Because just as we had been saying “Teacher, we want you to do for us whatever we ask of you." The real Jesus was out there saying, “Drink the cup that I drink. Be baptized with the baptism I have been baptized with. Stand in my shoes and fear for your children the way I fear for mine. See your child’s face on Michael Brown’s body. Feel the rage and the pain and don’t turn away and don’t intellectualize and don’t just dip your toe in and then pat yourself on the back for being so progressive."

The real Jesus was saying, “Don’t go out there and preach to them but go out there and let them preach to you, because that is where I have always been. That is where I will always be. And you need to listen to me.”

And so as this new civil rights movement that began in the road in front of the Canfield Green Apartments in Ferguson, Missouri where Darren Wilson gunned down Michael Brown, Jr. and continued with Tamir Rice and Sandra Bland and the seemingly endless litany of those whose lives have been taken by state violence sweeps across our land and a nation of young, black women and men find their voices of power, what we really have in front of us is a gift. We have the gift of an uprising. The gift of a nascent movement – a clear, clarion call from the margins for us to get off our thrones of glory and to come meet Jesus on the streets. To care more about integrity than respectability. To care more about sacrifice than supremacy. To care more about justice than power.

It is the gift of a choice. And the choice is which Jesus will we follow.

Will we follow the Jesus we have constructed who sits upon a throne, the Jesus that James and John bid clothe them in glory. Or will we follow Jesus of Nazareth who hangs on the cross and bids us join him in his glory, the glory of giving ourselves for the life of the world. The glory of meeting him in extraordinary images of God that live on society’s margins. The glory of joining him in the revolution that despite our best efforts has not, cannot and will never be stopped.

The choice is right here in front of us. Will we be concerned with power, status, privilege and respectability, or will we be concerned with standing with the oppressed and the marginalized. Will we be concerned with preserving the systems that keep the powerful in power and the powerless in chains or will we dedicate our lives as Christ gave his to tearing down those systems and standing for nothing less than a society that truly has liberty and justice for all.

A few minutes ago, we chanted a chant that I learned from the voices crying in the wilderness in front of the Ferguson Police Department. We chanted “You. Can’t. Stop. The Revolution.”

The Revolution is the gospel of Jesus Christ the revolutionary. The Revolution is not about being polite and nibbling around the edges and it is certainly not about securing our own places of power and privilege.

The Revolution is the last being first and the first being last. The revolution is putting our bodies in the dirt between the crowd holding rocks and the women caught in adultery. The revolution is bringing Bartimaeus, scorned and rejected and told his life doesn’t matter, into the center of the community and letting him set the agenda and guide our steps.

The revolution is seeing our children’s faces on the bodies of Mike Brown and Sandra Bland. The revolution is dismantling the school to prison pipeline. The revolution is giving up our belief in a white Jesus preaching white supremacy and embracing a black Jesus who isn’t afraid to turn over a few tables when he sees justice being denied and God’s children being profaned.

The revolution will not be stopped. The only question is will we get on board. Will we follow Jesus the revolutionary and be part of the repair of this world for which he died or will we be heirs of James and John and continue to preserve our place and our power while millions cry out in chains.

This is the conversation you have chosen for your 150th year. This is the choice that is before you. At stake is not so much the past that you celebrate but the future you will embrace. At stake is whether you will be truly a great church for the 150 years to come.

The kingdom of God is at hand. The revolution is all around us. It cannot be stopped. Will we gild your throne or pick up our cross. Will we build up treasures on earth or die so that we might live.

Will we cozy up to the first or will we stand with the last?

The choice is up to us.