Sermon

INTRODUCTION: Years ago, while serving as the Editor of the Oklahoma Methodist newspaper, I wrote an editorial in support of the “Vietnam Moratorium Day.” It was a day in which people across America protested against the war in Vietnam by participating in peace initiatives of all kinds. College classes were cancelled, demonstrations held, along with widespread public opposition to a hugely unpopular war. To me, there was no question that working to end that war was a righteous cause…which my editorial said.

The paper always came out on a Friday morning. That afternoon, my secretary received a call from our new bishop. He invited me to his office for a 15-minute appointment early Monday morning.

At the meeting, he came right to the point: He wanted me to return to the pastorate, and to take a “growing opportunity” in Catoosa, Oklahoma. Though I had lived in several places in Oklahoma, I didn’t have a clue where Catoosa really was. It was most certainly not a cathedral church by any stretch of the imagination.

My 15-minute appointment with the bishop stretched to more than two hours, filled with some very strong exchanges between his eminence and me. And it was all because I wrote an editorial that he felt should never have been written.

Now, we both defended our position based upon our understanding of what Christian faith “really” was. But as our conversation progressed, I became even more agitated. It was not so much that I had written an editorial against the war. He said he would have felt the same way if I had written one in support of the war. To him, the 600 churches in Oklahoma of the United Methodist Church – with membership twice the size of the Unitarian Universalist denomination today – they had so many people of faith on both sides of the Vietnam War, that a conference publication financially supported by both sides, couldn’t take sides. Period. End of discussion.

Further, not only did politics have no place on the editorial pages of the Oklahoma Methodist newspaper, but neither did it have a place in the pulpits of the United Methodist churches of Oklahoma.

Well, I refused to go to Catoosa, and at the annual meeting of the conference eight months later, the newspaper was eliminated and I had to take a special appointment.

In many ways, it was one of the best things that ever happened to me. In the months that followed, I put together plans for a national symposium protesting the war.

The first issue was where we hold the Symposium? Dr. Finis Crutchfield, the chair of the Board of Trustees at the United Methodist Oklahoma City University was a personal friend. He would soon become a bishop himself. We both believed our new bishop was a disaster. Dr. Crutchfield agreed that come Spring, we could use the university auditorium for three days for the Symposium, free of charge.

United Methodist Bishop James Armstrong, the president of the National Council of Churches in New York agreed to come; Rev. Joseph Lowery, the president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference in Atlanta also consented; Rev. Robert Raines, a prolific author and pastor of a prestigious pulpit in Columbus, Ohio agreed to keynote; Roman Catholic theologian Gregory Baum from Toronto accepted, as did others. But most importantly, the headliner, was the Rev. William Sloane Coffin, chaplain at Yale. Bill was a late, but huge supporter of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., and had become a national leader against the Vietnam War, especially among college students.

In late April, the Symposium started on a Thursday afternoon with clergy from around the region, both Catholic and Protestant. Dr. Coffin was to speak on Friday afternoon. But on Friday morning, I received a call from Yale that due to fog in the Northeast, Bill’s plane was late in taking off, though he was on his way.

Incredibly, I also received a call from the Oklahoma City mayor’s office. She said that her son was enrolled at Yale, and had made her promise to attend. She had heard that Dr. Coffin was going to be late; could she help? When I asked what she might do, she offered the mayor’s limousine and a police escort from the airport.

When Bill arrived, he said had been escorted by the police several times in recent years, but this was the first time in a limousine! Then he opened his big bible and read the story of the exodus of the children of Israel from Egypt to the Promised Land. His first words following were, “It’s been said that ministers should not engage in politics; actually, that statement was first made by Pharaoh to Moses!”

The symposium was an incredibly affirming time for me. We had superb media coverage, published a tape series from the Symposium, and Word Books published the addresses in this book, What’s a nice church like you doing in a place like this?

But, what about the editorial I wrote which started the whole thing? Was the bishop right, that there shouldn’t have been any editorial – either for or against?

When translated to our time, the question becomes, do we constitute religious congregations on political affiliation, so that Democrats go there, and Republicans come here? Or, do those in support of the war come here, and those against it go somewhere else? Or, are politics the new form of pornography in America, and should never be mentioned in religious services? Those it seems to me are the relevant questions on this Sunday before Election Day, Tuesday.

If I could, let me make an aside here: I’ve really never shared with you my sermon writing philosophy. I’m very clear that a lot of it stems from my intensely spiritual upbringing in the first 25 years of life in my Pentecostal ministers’ family. I learned very early on in sermon writing to depend on what we understood as the “Holy Spirit” to guide me.

I’ve moved far away from those theological roots in many senses, but in some ways, not at all. Sermon writing is one: I sit down to write, and I enter the name of the sermon, and put in the footnote on the front page identifying the time and the place. (It’s what writers in the pre-computer days called, sharpening your pencils.)

Then I look at the blank screen. I usually try to have done a lot of reading, reflecting and taking notes and hopefully have some pertinent quotes and illustrations to utilize. But the screen is blank: there’s nothing there…no template: It’s totally intuitive, or as my parents would have said, depending upon the Spirit.

Which is how this one happened. However, as I was writing, I got to this exact point in the sermon, and I thought to myself, “How in the world am I going to get out of this?” Then I realized it was totally up to the Spirit. Whether you agree or disagree, it’s not my fault.

The first question of course is, does faith have anything to say about politics? Or does politics trump faith? Should politics be left at the door? Or, is leaving politics at the door, a very political kind of decision itself – a vote for the status quo? Let’s talk for a moment about some very political events in our nation:

In the last five years, our nation has gone to war in Afghanistan in ’01 and Iraq in ‘03. Almost 3,000 Americans have lost their lives, some 20,000 plus with horrendous injuries, an untold number of Iraqis, that some estimate to be as high as 600,000, have lost their lives, and every month some 100,000 Iraqis are fleeing their homeland because of the violence. And the bill – the monetary costs! – which the American taxpayers will and are being called upon to pay, may eventually reach into the trillions – not millions or billions, but trillions. That number is like the stars in the heavens – impossible for us to wrap our minds around. But be sure that it will be felt ultimately, by us and our children’s children’s children.

Meanwhile we have more than 46 million working poor in America – that’s people with a full-time job who don’t make enough to pay for food, housing, transportation, childcare and healthcare. There is almost an equivalent number without healthcare insurance. That means they either get a free-ride, courtesy of the tax payers or the hospitals, or they don’t get decent treatment at all.

The latest reports show that global warming is threatening both the air that we breathe and the water we drink, as well as the fowl, the fish and the forests. The temperatures are rising, the weather patterns more unpredictable, and the poles are melting. All due to the byproducts of the heavily industrialized nations of the world – with America leading the parade. Incredibly, given this overwhelming evidence, our government has refused to sign the Kyoto protocols that seek to diminish these effects.

Across America, in state after state, politicians are trying to gain votes by supporting gay-bashing initiatives, masquerading as support of families. Some churches have even joined in the fray. In states like Florida, women and men who have served time because of committing a felony face a huge hurdle to restore their right to vote – despite all the evidence that says how important it is for them to reenter society. And thirty-plus-percent of 18-24 year old African American young men will go through some phase of the criminal justice system at some time or other.

This says nothing about the enormous amount of armaments the military-industrial-complex of America sells around the world, nor the nuclear weapons that are still in place, nor the growing lack of confidence Americans have in the political process.

What about the right of a woman to have an abortion, or does she? What about stem cell research? What about homelessness…the problems of the elderly…the malignant use of narcotics…immigration issues? What about separation between religion and the state? What about the fear that so many Muslims have in America to speak out? What about torture of those we’ve captured?

Those are hugely political issues. And if you doubt it, ask any politician. If faith has nothing to say about those issues, then what for crying out loud, does it have to say?

But what if we agree that something has to be said, but some of us might not agree with what’s said? Does that mean then that nothing should be said?

And is it fair to have a one-way conversation, where the minister uses rhetorical skills and the pulpit to foster one view? Instead, should sermons be something of a collective echo rather than a lone prophetic voice?

Put another way, is there no moral right or wrong to politics? Or is faith limited to so-called personal morality…kind of an ambulance service for personal difficulties? What is the answer? What does the Holy Spirit say, might be another way of putting it?

There is a real temptation to think that the more political an issue is, the less spiritual it is…to believe that religion is above politics…that a place of worship is too sacred for the divisiveness of politics…that religious services are not designed to address the grit and grime of politics. Here is what the Holy Spirit inspired me to say to you about that. Here is how this sermon applies to you:

APPLICATION

According to Woody Allen, 95% of life is showing up. And as the Zen saying goes: You have to be present to win.

It’s not only an imperative component of democracy, it is an opportunity for faith to be exercised in the political arena. There are some real losers out there running for office. They don’t deserve to be foisted upon the electorate. It’s your job to vote to keep them out. So go vote Tuesday: no exceptions. If you aren’t registered, it happens. But promise yourself, God and the world, that it won’t happen again.

Voting by itself is a minor virtue. Informed voting is a moral act. From Washington, to Tallahassee, to Ft. Myers, America, those elected Tuesday will be making decisions that will directly – directly! – impact our lives. So know about those who don’t deserve to be elected dogcatcher, much less to high office.

One of the most disastrous dimensions of the last ten to twelve years was former Congressman Tom DeLay’s success as House Majority Leader, coupled later with the strategy of Karl Rove. They envisioned a permanent political majority. With a majority, they concluded they didn’t need to invite the minority party into decision-making meetings. Further, any lobbyist who gave money to the minority party would be penalized. And the majority, because it was the majority, could do almost anything they pleased, when they pleased.

Fortunately, DeLay was forced to resign and is now under criminal indictment. And Tuesday will determine if Rove is a brilliant as his press says. But regardless of who wins, those kinds of majority practices, winners take all, are an abomination. It will be a real test of the new Congress: Will it follow the clear implications of the Constitution, both in theory and practice? Will it be democratic, with a little “d”? Or will it succumb to the siren song of power?

Here at home, I think all of these different Democratic Party groups that we have in Lee County should take on a new assignment: getting to know the Republicans. We might call it, “Invite a Republican to dinner” or “Lunching with Republicans.” Ditto for Republican groups.

Seriously, I think there would be a huge wave of support for reconciliation, restoration of courtesy and kindness, and mutually agreed upon party practices that preclude the kind of poisonous partisanship to which we’ve been exposed of late.

CONCLUSION

In Philadelphia on September 18, 1789, a woman by the name of Mrs. Powel anxiously stood outside the Constitutional Convention. There had been much talk about naming George Washington the King of America. As Benjamin Franklin emerged from one of the sessions, she asked him: "Well Doctor, what have we got: a republic or a monarchy?" Dr. Franklin replied, "A republic – if you can keep it." That’s what democracy is all about.

I’ve never regretted not going to pastor the United Methodist Church at Catoosa. They are probably fortunate as well. I do know how happy I’ve been with the path I’ve chosen, that brought me to where we are this Election Sunday morning. What a wonderful life it’s been. I appreciate the support of each of you. I especially appreciate those who disagree with me but still support All Faiths. That’s a unique blessing I’ve been privy to that kind of support many times.

During the first Gulf War, while I was serving as minister of a Unitarian Universalist Church in Edmond, Oklahoma, one Sunday I spoke out strongly before our entry into that war. Afterwards, during Joys and Concerns, one of the founding members of the congregation, lighted a candle and then said, “I disagreed with everything you said; but as a Jewish refugee from Nazi Germany, I totally agree with your right to say it.” See you at the polls. Amen and blessed be.

[1] Given November 05, 2006, at All Faiths Unitarian Congregation, Ft. Myers, Florida, meeting at the Crestwell School, 1901 Park Meadows, Ft. Myers, FL, by the Rev. Dr. Wayne Robinson, minister: first in a three-part “Patriotic Series.”