"THE ORIGINAL CHRISTMAS CAROL"

 “THE ORIGINAL CHRISTMAS CAROL”

Yes, Advent is here, arriving yesterday on the First Sunday in Advent.  It begins a run of 37 days until the 12th day of Christmas ends on the date of the Georgia run-off election for control of the U.S. Senate, January 5.  The next day, January 6, begins the season of Epiphany, when the U.S. Congress gathers to certify that the Biden/Harris ticket won the presidential election.  For those who think that I am being too political here, please note how the Gospel of Luke begins his version of the Christmas story:  “In those days a decree went out from Emperor Augustus that all the world should be registered.  This was the first registration and was taken while Quirinius was governor of Syria” (2:1-2).

The Christmas story is filled with political intrigue as God’s work to restructure our imaginations begins at the margins of life, not in the halls of power.  In Matthew’s version of the Christmas story, King Herod is infuriated that a perceived threat to his power comes not from the elite of Jerusalem but from the hick town of Bethlehem. Herod knows how the world works, so he sends soldiers to Bethlehem to kill all the baby boys two and under.  

     “How odd of God” is a phrase attributed to several poets, including Ogden Nash, but it is definitely appropriate here in the Christmas story.  God begins not in the courts of Jerusalem or in the council of the High Priest, but rather in the Gentile-laden, Gallilean town of Nazareth.  Here She calls on another female, a young woman named Mary, to start the new chapter in God’s work with bringing a new vision of life, justice and love to the world.  Mary is engaged to be married, and when the angel Gabriel asks her to become pregnant with the child of God, it not only scandalizes her but also threatens her life.  Her fiancé Joseph could have her stoned to death for infidelity.  That law was rarely enforced at that time, but it was still on the books, so who knows what a Brett Kavanaugh or an Amy Coney Barrett would do if it came before them?

    There is a reason that God chose a woman as the bearer of this great good news, and a reason that She chose this particular woman.  The unmarried, soon-to-be-pregnant-before-marriage (and in danger of the death penalty) Gallilean named Mary – she says “Yes.”  It will begin a huge and dangerous and heart-breaking and yet exciting adventure for this young woman from Galilee.  Though it was unlikely that she realized all the implications of her decision, she did realize the radicality of this movement by God.  She sang this song in response to her decision to accept God’s request, a song inspired by the song of Hannah in First Samuel 2.  Here is what she sang:

“My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my savior,

For God has taken note of my marginalized status,

From now on all generations will call me blessed,

For God is mighty has done great things for me, Holy is Her name,

God’s mercy will be on those who honor Her from one generation to

      another,

God has stretched out Her mighty arm and has scattered the proud with

      All their plans,

God has brought down the mighty from their seats of power and has

     Exalted those on the margins.

God has filled the hungry with good things

And has sent the rich away with empty pockets and hands.

God has kept the promise made to our ancestors and has come to our help,

God has remembered to show mercy to Abraham and Sarah 

And to their descendants forever.”

    This is the original Christmas carol, so take it in and lift it up! In this crazy time. In this time of Covid and Trumpdemic and the surging power of racism, let us recall these Advent and Christmas stories, and let us make room for them in our hearts.  This is not a sweet, sentimental story.  This is the story of our lives and our times, with all the violence and danger and despair and anxiety. It is always contemporary, and let us set aside some time in this season to allow both the radicality and the Good News of this story sink in.  Because we know the power of Herod so well in these days, we desperately need the courage of Mary, the visions of Joseph, the ecstasy of the shepherds and the dedication of the Magi.  Let us open our hearts to receive these gifts of the season.

"GIVING THANKS"

 “GIVING THANKS”

In this national week of Thanksgiving, I am feeling anxious and fatigued, with four main sources.  A good friend of ours died last month, and that has brough home the question of mortality to me.  Another good friend of ours has been seriously ill over the last month, and she is currently back in the hospital.  Third, the raging of the Covid-19 pandemic has all of us afraid and worn out.  And fourth, the Trumpdemic continues – like a three year old throwing a tantrum, he refuses to go away.

I am hoping that Michigan and Pennsylvania will certify their election results this week, showing that the Biden/Harris ticket won their state elections. I am giving thanks that Brad Raffensberger, the conservative Republican secretary of state of Georgia, held the line on the vote in Georgia and certified that Biden/Harris won Georgia.  I believe that Pennsylvania will hold the line, but I’m not so sure about Michigan, where two Republicans hold the key to an early certification.   I have teased our family in Michigan that their state may turn out to be more Trump-captured than Georgia!  I’d be glad to have to eat my words on that one.  We’ll know after 1 PM on Monday.

As we approach Thanksgiving, however, I want to focus on gratitude.  One more word on politics, and then I’ll stop – congratulations to our daughter-in-law Erin Graham who won election to a first term on the Ingham County Commission in Michigan, which includes the capitol city of Lansing.  She has been chair of the East Lansing school board, and she is a fine politician, in the best sense of that word.  Because of Covid-19, none of our family will be with us for Thanksgiving, but we give thanks for the gifts of life and love.

In this time of national chaos on so many levels, I am grateful for the idea of “equality” that continues to flow throughout the American experiment.  It is a powerful and dangerous idea – the idea that all people are created with equal dignity continues to drive all kinds of movements for justice and equity.  Part of the Trumpdemic backlash is a reaction to this flowing of the idea of equality and an attempt to stem its flow.  History is not progressive, so there is no guarantee that this idea of equality will not be stemmed.  Yet, I am grateful to all the 80,000,000 who turned out to vote for the idea of equality, in the middle of a deadly disease and in the middle of voter suppression.  I’m also grateful to all the people who have worked and who continue to work in this dangerous transition period to sustain this idea.

I give thanks for Caroline, for our health, for our kids David and Susan, for Erin and granddaughters Emma and Zoe, and for a whole host of friends who sustain and who continue to nurture us.  I am working on a memoir on my mother and me and her raising me as a single mom in the 1940’s and 50’s.  As I do this, I am meeting many ghosts and spirits, but I have also been deepened in my gratitude to her for her determined love and dedication to me.  As I remember stories and themes, and as I process them for this memoir, my amazement and admiration for her has grown.  I don’t want to make her into Superwoman, but I do want to recognize what she did and what she accomplished in her life.  She was a woman and a single mom of agency is a time when women, and especially single working moms, were seen as inferior beings.  I celebrate her agency and her tenacity in the face of such patriarchy.

I’m also aware of so many women of color, especially Black women, who have been single working moms for many decades because systemic racism has taken the men from their homes.  Many of them have educated me and deepened me and continue to do so.  So much to be grateful for, so much to be afraid of – may the attitude of gratitude prevail in my heart and in all our hearts in these crazy days.  I recommend that we all take to heart the short prayer from the mystic Meister Eckhardt from the 13th century:  “If the only prayer you ever say in your life is ‘Thank You,’ that would be enough.”

"UNIVERSAL SOLDIER"

 “UNIVERSAL SOLDIER”

We’ve made an oval walking path in our woodsy backyard – twenty times around will give you a mile walk.  In these beautiful fall days, amidst our towering pines and the oaks and maples and poplars, I am thinking of all the people who have walked in these areas, especially the Muscogee Creek people who were driven from the land on the Trail of Tears.  

As I was walking on Saturday and thinking about the Creeks, I thought of Buffy Sainte-Marie, who is a Cree Canadian-American singer and songwriter, pacifist and activist.  Creek and Cree are not the same tribe – the Creek were of the southeast, and the Cree were in Canada – but to my Anglo mind, the sounds are similar and brought her to mind.  She was born on the Piapot Reserve in Canada in 1941, and raised by an adopted Indigenous family in the States.  She taught herself guitar and piano and has written very powerful songs, including a lament for all that Indigenous peoples have lost to Anglo imperialism, called “Now That the Buffalo’s Gone.”  

I first encountered her in the 1960’s when she wrote an amazing song about the impulse for war and death that seems to reside in the human heart, but most especially in the European drive to conquer and dominate.  As Sweet Honey in the Rock later put it: “your hunger for war is nothing new, cowboy.”  The song  is called “The Universal Soldier,” and it is a poem/song that seems to apply to any age and to all people, as she writes.  Here it is:

He's five feet two and he's six feet four

He fights with missiles and with spears

He's all of 31 and he's only 17

He's been a soldier for a thousand years

He's a Catholic, a Hindu, an athiest, a Jain,

a Buddhist and a Baptist and a Jew

and he knows he shouldn't kill

and he knows he always will

kill you for me my friend and me for you

And he's fighting for Canada,

he's fighting for France,

he's fighting for the USA,

and he's fighting for the Russians

and he's fighting for Japan,

and he thinks we'll put an end to war this way

And he's fighting for Democracy

and fighting for the Reds

He says it's for the peace of all

He's the one who must decide

who's to live and who's to die

and he never sees the writing on the walls

But without him how would Hitler have

condemned him at Dachau

Without him Caesar would have stood alone

He's the one who gives his body

as a weapon to a war

and without him all this killing can't go on

He's the universal soldier and he

really is to blame

His orders come from far away no more

They come from him, and you, and me

and brothers can't you see

this is not the way we put an end to war

if you want to hear her singing it, here is the link:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j6imjvgJFvM

    As we think about Native American Heritage Month, let us remember the power and strength of Native Americans who have endured and who have persevered and survived, all the while holding on to a vision of creation that we so desperately need in our time:  the earth and all beings on it and in it are inter-related, including us human beings.  Let us align our lives to reflect this interdependence, or we’ll all perish as fools, as MLK so aptly put it.

"STACEY AND AZZIE"

 “STACEY AND AZZIE”

I give thanks that Sue Thompson, an Oakhurst member,  who now lives in Florida, invited Stacey Abrams to worship at  Oakhurst.  She wanted Oakhurst members to meet Stacey because she was running for state representative.   It was on that Sunday that Stacey engaged one of the all-time great elders of Oakhurst, Azzie Preston.  Azzie began to grill her about her political motivations and ambitions. Later that year, Azzie asked me to invite  Stacey to preach at Oakhurst.  

    We invited Stacey to preach, and she delivered a powerful sermon on the grace and call of God,  a call that emphasized God’s love for humanity and our call to serve humanity in God’s name.  Stacey would speak several more times at Oakhurst, and she said that if her parents weren’t United Methodist ministers, she would join Oakhurst.  I know that she probably said that to all the churches, but it felt good to hear it at the time.  

     The presentation by Stacey that I remember the most was when she spoke at Azzie’s funeral in March, 2009, in the sanctuary of Oakhurst.  She talked about going over to Azzie’s house to discuss the campaign. Stacey indicated that Azzie then began to “school” her on canvassing Azzie’s neighborhood, but not only Azzie’s neighborhood bur many other neighborhoods.  Azzie had great insight into the elections process, but she had even more insight into motivating people to register and to vote.  Stacey told us that it was nothing new for Azzie – as a young adult, Azzie had organized a busload of people to travel to Washington, DC to be part of the historic 1963 March on Washington.  And Stacey paid a great tribute to Azzie:  “She helped bring me home on this process.  She taught me that people can be motivated to register and to vote – they simply want to know that their votes count.”

    We have seen the fruits of that relationship between Stacey and Azzie unfold in this past week.  I did not think that Joe Biden had a chance to beat the Trumpdemic in Georgia, but Stacey had learned her lessons well, and along with many others, she helped to organize the extraordinary turnout in Georgia, a turnout that looks to have won Georgia for Joe Biden.  I was thinking about this relationship and this story as President-Elect Joe Biden spoke on Saturday night and credited Black women with being the foundation of the Democratic party.

    Stacey stayed in touch with Oakhurst, and I was humbled and honored to have her speak at my retirement celebration.  She also wrote the powerful foreword for the book that Catherine Meeks and wrote "Passionate for Justice: Ida B. Wells as Prophet for Our Time."  Caroline was one of the central organizers of a Decatur event for Stacey at Agnes Scott in 2018 during her governor’s race.  We expect to see her soon in the Governor’s house.  In her sermon at Oakhurst, she told an incredible story about her first trip to the Governor’s house.  She was valedictorian of Avondale High school in the Atlanta area, and at that time the Governor of Georgia invited all the valedictorians to attend an event at the Governor’s house to celebrate their singular achievements.  Stacey’s parents were poor seminary students and did not have a car, so they rode the bus to the Governor’s house.  When they arrived, the guard would not let them in because he could not believe that a high school valedictorian would be riding the bus.  Stacey’s parents finally prevailed on the guard to let them in, and from that moment on, Stacey vowed that when she got to be Governor, the Governor’s house would be open to all.

    That is the vision that Stacey and Azzie and so many others fought for, and it is the vision that Stacey continues to lead in us, as we celebrate the great victory for Joe Biden in defeating Donald Trump in the presidential election last week.  We know that the Trumpdemic will not go gracefully, partly because it is not in his nature, but mainly because he is a manifestation of white, male supremacy, a force that never goes gracefully or quietly.  The fact that the Trumpdemic got the second most votes in the history of presidential elections tells us that the forces of racism and sexism and materialism and homophobia remain strong and powerful.  Let us  give thanks for the Stacey Abrams and Azzie Prestons of this world,  and let us step into our places in the parade of witnesses for truth, justice and equity.   Start registering more people to vote in the Georgia senatorial run-offs in January – deadline for registration is December 7.  Vote early too – the runoff is January 5!

"THE BIG WEEK"

 “THE BIG WEEK”

Caroline and I were grateful to be among the hundreds of Zoom participants on Saturday for the memorial service for Murphy Davis, as we celebrated her gifts and her ministry.  We mourned her untimely passing after a courageous fight with cancer over 25 years.  Murphy’s work was to point us the way to justice and equity and mercy for all of us.  She was such a powerful witness – what a life!  She finished her book “Surely Goodness and Mercy” shortly before she went into hospice.  It is the story of her battle with cancer, both individually and institutionally.  If you’d like a copy, let me know, and we’ll be sure to get one to you.  

I’m thinking of Murphy as we come to the end of the voting period for national and local elections on Tuesday.  It is a day and a time that many of us have been anticipating and dreading for a long time.  The current Trumpdemic is antithetical to Murphy’s work and to the values of justice and equity and compassion, for which so many of us have worked.  Whereas Biden is not the ideal candidate, his life story and moderate values stand in stark contrast to the narcissistic and bullying values of Trump’s story and presidency.  Biden’s election means that we will get a chance to deepen some of the values of justice and equity.  Trump’s election means a continued policy of seeking to eradicate the values of justice and equity.

This election of 2020 reminds me of the watershed elections of 1860 and 1932, when the course of American history would be altered by whoever won the election.  Lincoln’s race against John Breckenridge, John Bell and Stephen Douglas was centered on the issue of slavery and preserving the Union.  The 1850’s had seen the second Fugitive Slave Act, requiring all American citizens to assist in capturing people escaping from slavery, and the Dred and Harriet Scott SCOTUS decision in which Black people were declared not to be worthy of American citizenship.  In 1932, Franklin D. Roosevelt challenged incumbent president Herbert Hoover, who had downplayed  the Great Depression.  FDR won in convincing fashion and began a long journey to move us back towards the values of justice and equity.

We face a similar choice now, and I am assuming that all readers of this blog have voted or will vote on Tuesday.  Please make sure that all of your friends, neighbors and colleagues do the same.  This is a watershed election, and we hope that the water will flow in the correct direction after all the votes are counted.  I do believe (and I fervently hope) that Joe Biden will win the election and will be inaugurated in January as the 46th president of the United Sates.  I also believed that Hillary Clinton would defeat Trump in 2016, so my predicting powers are not great.  Yet, I believe that Trump’s leadership has been so egregious, especially in regard to Covid-19, that American voters will turn him out, as we did in 1932 with Herbert Hoover.  If that is not the case, then God help us all. And, indeed, if Trump wins again, we will deserve what we get.  

     I was quoted in an Atlanta Constitution column by Bill Torpy last week concerning whether God had sent Trump to be president.  Torpy and I talked on the phone, and he was puzzled as to why white evangelicals supported Trump so strongly, since his behavior was so abhorrent to them.   We talked about Trump being seen as King Cyrus of Persia, who was praised in the Bible, even though he was a pagan.  Cyrus was praised because he had allowed the Israelites to return to Israel, after their exile in Babylon.  In his column, Torpy quoted his many conversations with white evangelicals, but he closed with part of our conversation:  “So, if God sent Trump to be president and gives him another term, what does that say?”  My reply was: “If that’s the case – and I don’t agree with this – then God is saying ‘The American experiment of equality and equity is over, and I’ll send the man to end it.”

This is a scary and dangerous week(s) ahead of us.  My fervent hope is that Biden will crush Trump as FDR did with Hoover, so that there will be no real debate about whether Trump was cheated or not.  I’m sure that Trump will contest the results if he loses, but if Biden’s margin of victory is strong enough, such challenges will not go anywhere.  Our daughter Susan has cautioned me not to jinx the election with such speculations about a Biden/Harris victory, and I hear her loudly and clearly.  But, I just can’t abide the thought of 4 more years of Trump.  I also recognize that in many ways, this is an exercise in white privilege, that Indigenous and Black people have lived under these issues for hundreds of years, but for us to have any chance of moving towards justice and equality, we must have a new president.  Please lift up your prayers and cast your votes.