ALL SAINTS IN THE LAND OF AFFLUENZA

“ALL SAINTS IN THE LAND OF AFFLUENZA”

            As we pass through All Hallows Eve and All Saints Day, I give thanks for all those saints who have nurtured and challenged me and loved me.  If you have not already done so, I hope that you will take time to name and give thanks for the saints in your life.  Buddy and Anne Hughes became part of Oakhurst Presbyterian when they retired from the PCUSA in the 1990’s, with their most recent position being in Nicaragua.  They quickly became our teachers in the land of “affluenza.”  

            In one of his first sermons at Oakhurst entitled “Affluenza,” Buddy told a story about taking a walk with his young granddaughter in a comfortable, white Decatur neighborhood.  As they were walking, the city garbage collectors were going through the neighborhood doing their work.  As they passed Buddy and his granddaughter, Buddy said “hello” to the man collecting the garbage and thanked him for his work.  After they passed the collectors, his young granddaughter asked him:  “Granddaddy, did you know that man?”  When Buddy said “No,” she admonished him:  “Grandaddy, you should never speak to strangers.”  While he understood her perspective on one level,  he was saddened by her comments, because it meant that the sense of community was broken.  He also noted that it was symptomatic of what he and Anne had discovered had happened in America in their absence:  we had come down with a disease that Buddy called “affluenza.”  Buddy defined it as the power of materialism to overtake us and make us think that we did not need one another.

            We give thanks that Anne is still with us, but Buddy died in 2010.   The Oakhurst sanctuary was filled for his memorial service, and we noted in both joy and sadness the powerful love that Buddy had shared with so many of us.   I recalled a Jewish legend that fit in with my Calvinist sense of total depravity.  Along the lines of Abraham’s argument with God over Sodom and Gomorrah in Genesis 18, the legend indicated that most of us were fitfully captured by the power of sinfulness. Because of this, God’s wrath was great that we had messed up Her creation so much.   Yet, the legend indicates that God lets the world survive because there are forty “saints” whose lives reflect the glory, love, and justice of God.   I noted on that day that someone would have to step up, because with Buddy’s passing, we had just dropped to 39 saints.

            Buddy’s emphasis on “affluenza” reminded me of the idolatrous belief that we have in America in the power of materialism to make us somebody.  It causes us to use people as slaves and to pollute the air and water and land – we are driven by a desire for “stuff.”  It makes us believe that we do not need one another, that indeed we are enemies to one another because we are competing for the same stuff, the stuff that we believe will give our lives meaning.  The drive for less taxes in the new proposal in Congress reflects this belief – the more money we have, the less we will need the community and one another. 

            It is this belief that made us easy targets for a narcissist like Donald Trump.  His belief in his own power and ability has gathered a tribe around him, and we have seen the power of that tribal belief.  He wants to reign over the USA, and our institutions will be sorely tested during his presidency.  He is “affluenza” to the nth degree,” and the question for us is whether we can regroup and build an authentic community based on the values of equity and justice and love.  Right now the tribal view of exclusion, revenge, and wrath seems to be prevailing.  We’ll need more folk to step up like Buddy and Anne and many other saints.  Will we join the saints in marching in?