e-vo for June 19

Dearest e-votees,

Today is Juneteenth.  It is the celebration/commemoration of the final legal liberation of slaves in the United States.  It is a chance to take a sober look at our history and perhaps a more hopeful look at our future afterwards.

Peace,

Karl

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Slavery imagery has been used to talk about sin.  "We are in bondage to sin and cannot free ourselves" and "Bondage of the will" and "Serving masters in our lives" all readily evoke slave themes.  

When Jesus came into the world to become one of us, to live the life we couldn't, to die a death he didn't deserve and to rise from the dead like no one has before it was to set us free.  It was to declare us slaves no more.  It was to put everyone on notice that the enslavement to our sinful selves and to the devil were no longer binding.  If you will, Easter morning was like a spiritual Juneteenth.

But it doesn't take much looking around this world to realize that the vestiges of sin persist.  Racism keeps people bound up in terms of economics, access to opportunity, housing options, likelihood of incarceration, likelihood of death at the hands of the authorities, etc., etc.  Even though Juneteenth happened as is completed in the past (think aorist you language studiers) the full realization of that freedom is not yet here.

There is a parallel in the spiritual realms.  We are declared free by God through the birth, life, death and resurrection of Jesus.  But we can and do live in the vestiges of original sin, of willful sin and of systemic sin.  There is work to do.

We are called to long to see everybody free and to what we can to help bring that to pass.  We are called to long to see everybody spiritually free and to do what we can to allow God to bring that to pass.

We celebrate Easter and we celebrate Juneteenth.  I long for the day when the celebrations are fully realized in our lives and the lives of all.

God when the son sets us free we are free indeed.  Help us to know and to live that freedom to your glory and to the ends of helping all be free.  Amen.

ometimes we can look at the systemic flaws in other systems (government, other families, other denominations, other nations, other cultures) and be oblivious to, or worse yet turn a blind eye to, our own flaws, our own sins and our own devastating acts that traumatize or end the lives of others.

• The Emanuel Nine were killed by Dylann Roof who was a member of an ELCA church in South Carolina.
  
• Dennis Rader (the BTK serial killer) was a church council president of an ELCA congregation in Kansas.
  
• Dylan Klebold (one of the two perpetrators of the Columbine High School shooting) was an ELCA youth in Colorado.  
  

It is easy to point to 9-11 and make disparaging remarks about Muslims.  It is easy to point out the horrific child abuse perpetrated and systemically hidden in the Roman Catholic church.  It is easy to villify others who do unthinkable acts and to call down judgment upon them.

The truth is that we, too, are a fallen people.  Given the right pressures, encouragements and opportunities we can condone, enable and enact horrific deeds.

Our ELCA church comes from the heritage of Germany.  Our beloved reformer, Martin Luther, wrote some despicable things that were used to support the grievous mistreatment and murder of millions of Jewish people by Adolf Hitler and the Nazis.  We need to know and repent of our history.

All of this to say:  our hands and our traditions are not without blemish and culpability.  Our souls and our unredeemed selves are not without deep flaws and capacity to engage in horrible and dehumanizing behaviors.  We have sinned against those made in God's image in thought, word and deed.  By what we have done and by what we have left undone.  Lord have mercy.

We are at a crucial point in the history of race relations in this country and around the world.  Part of being on the right side of history moving forward is looking honestly at how we have been, circumstantially, unknowingly or with complete complicity, on the wrong side of history.

I don't expect we will have truth and reconciliation boards here in the U.S. as were brought to bear in South Africa during the dismantling of apartheid.   I do know, however, that there is a place for all of us to participate in truth-telling, truth-hearing and the reconciling that can ensue.

God, help us never to forget those who have been silenced by gunshots, nooses, knees to the neck, prevention of access to the voting booths and the broadcast microphones.  Help us give our broken selves and our complicity to you.  Stir us to be just, loving and full of life-giving reparation and repentance.  Amen.