Sermon for Sunday, May 23, 2004WHO BELONGS AT THE TABLE?By Rev. Dr. Harvey C. Martz Scripture: Mark 2:13-17
There is one risk in publishing sermon titles and themes so far ahead and that risk is that some issue will come up that begs to be addressed in a sermon and it does not fit into the series. That has happened for me this week with all of the discussion about who should be able to receive communion in church and what does it mean to translate my Christian faith into my social ethics and my political views. So I am changing direction for this morning from the published theme of integrity - at least from the direction I had first thought and will deal with the foundation stone of integrity later on in this series. I am surprised at times about how pervasive our religious interests can be in national and international affairs. The cover story of Newsweek this week features the two authors of the series of books on Revelation. Their approach to Revelation is a very distorted one I believe, but the fact they have sold 60 million copies is a sign of very strong interest in some Biblical themes. So there is that spiritual interest in the news. The tragic and deadly conflicts that are ongoing between Israel and the Palestinians is deeply based in religious beliefs including the beliefs from ultra Orthodox Jews that all of the land of Israel has been promised by God to them and therefore they should keep the settlements in Gaza and the West Bank and not even allow the Palestinians in the future to ever reside there. Religious beliefs are at the heart of that conflict as well. All of those matters have been in the headlines the past seven days along with another hot issue in America of whether political leaders whose opinion differs with that of their church should be allowed to take communion or denied communion. That issue of course has come to the point ten days ago when one bishop has said that not only should the politician be denied communion but any church member who votes for any candidate who supports abortion rights, stem cell research, euthanasia rights or gay marriage shall be denied communion as well. The emotional debate that has resulted from that Episcopal letter has included one church member from Parker withdrawing his $100,000 pledge to his church's building fund, stating that he does not believe his church should tell him which candidate to vote for. I agree with him and believe that when a church tries to dictate which candidate people should vote for, that church has stepped out of line and is also jeopardizing its tax exempt status. We have had some discussion about that in several groups here this week at St. Andrew and one of the results of that is a decision by our steering committee that we will be sponsoring an ad in local newspapers stating that we believe in an open communion table and that part of the Methodist tradition is to welcome to Christ's table people at all stages in spiritual development and people of all political persuasions. A copy of that ad is in your bulletin today so you will not be surprised when it appears this week. We are doing this to say that this is who we are and not to bash or criticize others, and to let people know that there are different points of view about how to be Christian and how to be faithful followers of Christ. It is a reinforcement of the national ad campaign that is based on OPEN HEARTS, OPEN MINDS AND OPEN DOORS and as you see, the ad will contain that logo. I want to offer this morning a chance to think more deeply about these questions that are at the heart of this heated debate and I want to start with the question of the relationship between church and state or religion and politics. The reaction of some persons to the debate about church leaders speaking out on social issues is that we should just never mix religion and politics, that they are separate spheres and that church leaders should stick to prayer and Bible study and not ever make a relationship to issues of justice or social ethics. That has been a position that some have argued for over the centuries and you might be surprised by the figures in history who have said that. It seems like a convenient, simple way to solve the dilemma but there is one example after another of it not working and not being practiced. Church leaders have consistently for hundreds of years said that religion and social ethics should not be compartmentalized and our faith always has some application to our political judgments beginning with the time in the first and second centuries when Christians had to make political and ethical decisions about worshiping the emperor, bowing to the Caesars who had declared themselves to be divine. Our ancestors were faced with the choice of compromising their faith and lying about their faith, or with refusing to worship the government and perhaps being jailed or tortured or executed. It was an early issue of faith and politics. Moreover, in the fourth century a church leader named Bishop Augustine helped to develop a Christian perspective on war and began to work out some conditions when Christians could support a just war. That just war thinking has been developed over 1600 years and we had a guest speaker here a year ago, Professor Joe Allen, who applied that way of thinking to the Iraq war and helped us apply Christian principles to that current emotional and political debate. We sold 200 copies of Dr. Allen's little book off of our book selves last spring as well. A little over 200 years ago the issue of church and state, religion and politics came to a head in some British colonies in North America when some Christian leaders said that it is the religious duty of citizens to foment a violent revolution and to overthrow the duly established government. Does anybody remember something about that movement? In the intense debate about whether a violent revolution was justified, there were pastors who took a passionate stand from their pulpits saying that it was our Christian duty to revolt and take up arms. And one of the most eloquent leaders in that revolution based his document of independence on religious principles!! This was a very strong application of faith to politics. Do you remember his words? We believe that people are endowed with their Creator with certain unalienable rights including the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness and when the government does not recognize those rights then it is the duty of the people to overthrow that government. This is one of the most telling examples that religion at its best has always been applied to political issues and debates, so it does not work historically to take a simplistic approach and say that we should not mix politics and religion. There are plenty of other examples in our nation and world over the last 150 years of religious principles influencing our political decisions. Some of the leaders in the American abolitionist movement in the 1840's and 50's were church leaders who said it is just wrong for one human being to own another human being. There was of course a split in some American churches over that issue that has only had a fairly recent resolution. Our denomination split from 1844 to 1939. Remember that simple approach that says that church leaders should never speak out on social justice or political issues and should just stick to prayer and Bible study and talking about heaven? That statement was made by Adolf Hitler to pastor Martin Niemoeller during the rise of Nazi Germany when Niemoeller had begun to do what some American pastors did in the 1770's-criticize government policies from his pulpit. Hitler had Niemoeller brought to him and told him to stop criticizing the government or he would be jailed. Niemoeller chose to be faithful to God and not to the Nazi government and spent most of the war in a concentration camp. That same Christian belief led Pastor Dietrich Bonhoeffer to participate in a plot to kill Hitler. It failed and Bonhoeffer was hanged because he applied his Christian faith to the political issues of his time. There are plenty of other instances where religious belief has provided the basis for social ethics. The civil rights movement in the 1960's had a deep spiritual basis and was able to be effective because, slowly, more and more people saw the biblical basis for equal rights for all persons. That same dynamic is at work, I believe in the civil rights issue of our time for equal treatment of gay and lesbian citizens. And the application of our Christian conscience is at work in evaluating the treatment of Iraqi prisoners, and our leaders are saying that we not only need to abide by international law but there is also something basic I believe in the American character that says we are committed to treat each human being, even our enemies, with some measure of dignity and respect, that because of our scruples and ethical principles, there are some things we will not do. This is all to say that we have consistently applied religious principles to political and social issues or questions of right and wrong, and that the relationship of church and state is not so simple as just to say that they should be kept entirely and completely apart from each other. In fact, when that concept of the wall separating church and state was created by - Thomas Jefferson, I do not believe he was trying to keep religion from having a voice in social policy. What was he trying to do? I believe he was working to keep the state from mandating and prescribing religious practice and religious doctrine. He and others were trying to keep the government from dictating how or even whether you should be religious! And that is why the first amendment says that the state shall make no laws establishing a religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof. Religious leaders have always had freedom to speak to ethical issues and social questions of right and wrong, so I believe in the right of bishops who choose to speak questions of abortion, euthanasia, stem cell research, as well as war, tax policy, and public education because I believe those all have implications of how we care for the least and the last in our culture; and why is it that we should be concerned for the least and the last and the most vulnerable? Because that is our Biblical mandate that comes from Jesus and the prophets - to care for the weak and vulnerable and voiceless. Incidentally, the best discussion of all of this is in Dr. Marcus Borg's latest book, "The Heart of Christianity" in his chapter on The Heart of the Matter - Practice. Let's move beyond the question of whether church leaders have a right and obligation to address social ethics and look at what happens when you and may disagree with those statements. Do we still count? Is our differing opinion still valued? Can we still participate in church and take communion? Is there freedom of conscience and the liberty to think for yourself? There is in United Methodism and I am glad because there are parts of our United Methodist Social Principles statement that I disagree with and have for years. One of the hallmarks of our tradition is to have these statements but also to say to each other that we expect you to think for yourself and that we can disagree in love and still be part of the body of Christ. But different churches handle this differently. The question becomes how we can maintain our identity and our cohesiveness as a community of faith if we have differing beliefs. That was one of the key questions at our General Conference meeting last month and the articles in the foyer show some of the diversity. Some said we should just divide again; others said we do not have to think alike in order to be unified in Christ. Different churches deal differently with the question of how we maintain our identity when we have different beliefs on controversial issues. And different churches handle the question of who can come to the Lords table differently. I was baptized in the Greek Orthodox church but today I would not be welcome to take communion in an Orthodox church because I am not currently in good standing. Furthermore, in Orthodox tradition, to prepare myself for communion I would have to fast before coming to church and to engage in a serious examination of my heart. Orthodox Christianity does not practice what we call open communion And I was worried about that three weeks ago on the day our group of Greece pilgrims were sitting in the ruins of Corinth and I told our guide who is Greek Orthodox and who had become a friend, that I wanted her to know that when we served communion in that holy place that we were inviting her to take communion with us even though her own church might not approve of her doing that with a bunch of Methodists! She knew she was welcome and she chose to take communion and it was for me a powerful symbol of our unity in Christ across lines of denomination and doctrine. Different churches handle this in different ways and there are many churches who have a closed communion table, saying that one has to agree with core beliefs of the church to be welcome at the Lord's Table. In our church this is the Lord's table and Christ is our host and those of us who distribute the bread and cup are just the servers and he is the one who invites us and who knows our hearts, and he is the one who welcomes us and embraces us here and sends us forth, forgiven and nourished and renewed and Christ is not particular about who he eats with; he is willing to eat with anyone!! Christ does not turn anyone away. How do we know that? Because the stories about Jesus in the Bible tell us that! The passage from the gospel of Mark today tell us that the religious leaders were shocked by how accepting Jesus was of the wrong kind of people. He was willing to eat with anybody!! He was not discriminating enough. To eat with someone was a big deal and he would eat with tax collectors (they were considered scum because they worked for Rome) and he would eat with others considered impure and indecent. Today, at this table, Jesus does the same thing; he eats with Democrats, Republicans, Libertarians, Independents former Baptists, former Catholics, gays and straights, people who are pro life and people who are pro choice. Christ welcomes everyone. This is our United Methodist belief and even in our most heated debates in our General Conference three weeks ago, no one was ever turned away from Christ's table because of their opinions and beliefs and no one will be. Because we are followers of Jesus and that is how he was at the Passover table - eating with the diversity of people on the last night he was alive. He served the meal to Judas who was about to betray him because Judas thought that would force Jesus to finally call in the legions of angels and overthrow the Roman rulers once and for all. And, seated around that Passover table were two other people who had radically different politics as well and Jesus still served the meal to them and ate with them. Matthew, the tax collector, was there at the last supper - he had been a supporter of the Roman oppressors, and another disciple named Simon who was a zealot. What were the zealots about? They wanted a violent revolution against Rome as well. We cannot get more opposite opinions at the communion table than those, and still Jesus celebrated the last supper with those radically different persons - and so should we!! Open hearts, open minds, open doors - and an open table. That's who we are trying to be at St. Andrew United Methodist Church! There is a song we have been using a lot to describe the kind of church we want to be. We sang it at our groundbreaking.
It says this:
That is the kind of church we are striving to be and with God's help can become. May it be so dear Lord. Amen. |
