Loving Kindness: the Impossible Becomes Possible Preached on February 20th, 2022 For Wollaston Congregational Church Scripture: Luke 6:27-38 This week our gospel reading continues on immediately after the passage we read last Sunday. Jesus has been on an overnight retreat on a mountain, praying alone and in silence. Then he comes down the mountain to preach to the assembled crowd of people. Many of these are already followers of Jesus: they are disciples. In spite of the large group, this seems like an intimate moment. Jesus raises his eyes to meet the eyes of his disciples directly. He speaks to them on the level. This is Luke’s Sermon on the Plain. We can imagine that he speaks gently, not rushing, making a safe space for the hearers. He wants them to pay attention because he is delivering the very core of his message. He does this with mercy and loving kindness. “Love your enemies, do good for those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you” he says. As current day disciples, we might well stop Jesus at this very first verse. We ask: How are we supposed to love our enemies, the ones who wish us harm? This teaching is disarming. To practice it would leave us vulnerable and open to more harm, more abuse. Who would ever do this to themselves? This teaching sounds impossible. We might begin by asking Jesus “who is our enemy, we are supposed to love?” Who is my enemy? Putin? ISIS? Foreign and domestic terrorists? Enemies like terrorists pose a corporate threat. The way they operate means that they instill fear in entire communities, besides the individuals they actually target. Black American communities and churches may fear white supremacists. Jewish communities and congregations may well fear anti-Semitic hate groups and terrorists. And yet there are some luminous examples of these communities finding the courage to love and show forgiveness for these kinds of enemies. On June 17, 2015, the senior Pastor of Mother Emanuel AME church in Charleston, SC welcomed a troubled young white man to their Wednesday evening Bible Study. This turned out to by white supremacist Dylann Roof. The Chicago Tribune reports “The Rev. Clementa Pinckney … even invited the stranger to take the seat beside him … He wanted him to feel at home, comfortable," says Sylvia Johnson, the minister's cousin. "Nothing to be fearful of. This is the house of the Lord, and you are welcome." An hour later eight members of the Mother Emanuel Bible Study group had been shot and killed by Roof. They included: “Tywanza Sanders, Doctor, Coleman-Singleton, Hurd, Jackson, Lance, parishioner Myra Thompson, 59, and Pinckney, who in addition to serving his church was a state legislator for 19 years. Daniel Simmons Sr., 74, a retired minister who'd became a regular attendee at Emanuel, died at the hospital.” The Chicago Tribune reports that Roof’s trial took on the air of a church service. “One (disembodied) voice after another shared with [Roof] the lessons they'd learned at Emanuel, and from their lost loved ones. They had been taught to forgive those who trespass against them; to hate the sin, but love the sinner … Roof lowered his head slightly when Nadine Collier, Lance's daughter, tearfully offered her forgiveness. ‘You took something very precious away from me,’ she said, choking back her tears. ‘I will never talk to her ever again. I will never be able to hold her again. But I forgive you and have mercy on your soul.’” [1] The saints of Mother Emanuel embodied love and forgiveness for a most feared enemy at that trial. Another example shines through in the actions of Rabbi Charlie Cytron-Walker of synagogue Congregation Beth Israel in Fort Worth, Texas. On January 15th, this year, the Rabbi and four members of his congregation were held hostage by armed gunman, Malik Faisal Akram. This has been described as a terrible anti-Semitic act of terrorism. Mary Louise Kelly of NPR reports “Rabbi Charlie Cytron-Walker let the man who had knocked [on the door] into his synagogue ... The man was cold so Rabbi Charlie, as he's known, made him a cup of hot tea.” The man stayed in the synagogue as the Rabbi began prayers with a small congregation. During silent prayer he heard a click and so he left the bimah and went to talk with the guest: "I spoke with him one on one, quietly … I said that he was welcome to stay for the rest of the service or that if he had just come in to get warm, he was welcome to leave. He didn't have to feel that he was being rude. While I was talking with him, he pulled out a gun." [2] Akram held the Rabbi and his congregants hostage for 11 hours. While the perpetrator was drinking juice, the Rabbi threw a chair at him allowing an escape. Akram was subsequently shot dead by security services. When asked if he would do anything different if he had the time over, Rabbi Charlie said he would invite in the stranger and given him tea again. 'We can't live in fear': “hospitality means the world.” Rabbi Charlie was asked if he had a message for the hostage-taker’s family. “Give me a moment — a moment of compassion” he said “while I try to respond. I've not been asked that before. I would say to his family I am so sorry. I am so sorry that you had to endure this tragedy. It's horrible for all of us.” I pray that I may have the grace and the presence of mind to act with the same love and compassion as the members of Mother Emanuel, or the Rabbi of Congregation Beth Israel, if I am ever in a similar situation. But I have never been held hostage at gunpoint, nor have I ever been subject to an active shooter situation. We, you and I, as disciples of Jesus, have been called to love when we have been more inclined to fear. Now, no one should ever hear a sermon, from me or anyone else, that says they should put themselves in harm’s way with an enemy or abuser. In the case of an abuser, distance is may be necessary. Secrecy about the abused person’s location may be needed. Physical threats must be taken seriously. When someone really is a threat, love must be from a distance. Or, perhaps we are not able to love at all. We might pray from a distance. Or, perhaps we are not be able to pray for them either. This is OK. We’ll talk later about extending our circles of love and blessing gradually as we are able. And yet, there are circumstances where our fear of the enemy is “in our own heads.” The perceived enemy may be someone we allow to push our buttons and trigger us to anger or breakdown. It may be someone who we let under our skin, so that we are irritated. It may be someone who seems prickly and rude to us, simply because they need love but are afraid to ask for it. On occasion I have needed to walk into a situation of tragic loss and I’ve feared that I will not know what to say or do. People might be so embittered they become reactive and defensive. They may yell “Call yourself a pastor! How will your pious prayers help us now?” How do I summon the courage to love in that kind of situation? Other times, I’ve been asked to provide spiritual support for someone whose behavior is unpredictable, due to mental illness or addiction. The person appears to be threatening, and yet what they really need is someone to listen with patience and love. In those situations, I’ve been mindful of putting measures for my physical safety in place. Then I need to find the courage to face the challenge to my emotional and spiritual safety. Over the years, I have learned that this requires me to be centered in God. If I walk into a fearful or threatening situation without centering, I can be thrown off balance. I’m inclined to react defensively when fear comes to the fore. A couple of years ago, I was introduced to tool that enables the kind of centering I’m talking about. It is the Buddhist practice of the “Loving Kindness Meditation.” I’ve experienced this meditation in a number of groups and settings. It has always centered the group, with compassion for themselves and indeed compassion for the whole world. The loving kindness blessing begins with the self, and moves outward in circles. The next circle includes someone who is a benefactor: a spouse, parent, or mentor. This is someone it is easy for you to love and respect and care for. In the next circle you focus on someone you feel neutral about, perhaps your mail deliverer, a grocery store clerk. This is someone you see from time to time but don’t know well. In the next circle, the blessing is extended to someone you find difficult to love. Most leaders of this blessing will say that this is not your “worst enemy” or someone you find impossible to love. Instead the participants are invited to simply extend their circles of blessing incrementally. That way they show compassion for themselves and their own limitations. They also have the courage to extend their love just a little more than the last time they prayed. The circle of blessing may be extended to all the people and the creatures of the world. Or it may remain within the participants’ circles of family, friends and acquaintances. It is particularly powerful when the final circle extends to those who are joining together in the blessing. And so, we have circled back to Jesus and his Sermon on the Plain. He looks us in the eye and says, with loving kindness, “love your enemies, bless those who curse you, pray for those who wish you harm.” And then he goes on to lead a life that shows the way to practice this teaching, even in his death on the cross. As we close this time together, let’s show one another the way to become so centered in God, so filled with courage, that we might be able to begin, just begin to extend our circles of blessing and love to our enemies and those who would wish us harm. The congregation was then led in the Loving Kindness Meditation Amen [1] https://www.chicagotribune.com/sfl-you-are-welcome-the-night-emanuel-opened-its-door-to-evil-20150620-story.html [2] https://www.npr.org/2022/01/20/1074191124/hostage-synagogue-texas-rabbi
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