Revenge in our hearts?

     I’ve been thinking about comments I’ve heard recently that basically come down to, “Because I’ve suffered, you should too.” Or even, "Because WE'VE suffered, you should too."

“Because I had to take that test in order to get into that job/profession/group/activity other people should have to as well.  If they don’t, it’s not fair!” 

“Because I received corporal punishment as a child, I think this next generation of kids should also have corporal punishment.  It didn’t kill me so it won’t kill them!” 

“Because I had to go through several rigid screenings in order to be part of this group, everyone else should as well.” 

"Because we have been hurt, we need to make other people hurt too."

Recently there was a huge controversy that involved one of the ordination exams that was offered this past year.  A scripture was chosen for those studying to become Presbyterian pastors that they needed to translate from original Hebrew, do an extensive biblical study on, and then create a congregational bible study from that passage.  This is a part of every exegesis ordination exam that every Presbyterian pastor must take to be ordained in our denomination.  The scripture they picked this last year, though, was one that could have been considered deeply traumatic for many.  It was Judges 19 in which a Levite’s concubine was gang-raped, murdered and dismembered.  Survivors of sexual assault were outraged at the insistence that they be required to study and write about this passage and basically called the committee’s choice that they handle such a passage a form of “hazing”.  Without going too far into the controversy, I found it interesting that one of the arguments for continuing with this passage again came back to the “well we had to look at hard passages to become pastors, so they should too.”  The use of the word “hazing” to describe the exam also backs this idea.  Those who are hazed remember what they had to do in order to “join the club” or the fraternity and they feel it is, therefore, only fair that those who follow should also have to suffer as they did. 

While these examples take many forms and have been said in many differing situations, they all come back to that same thing: I suffered, so others should too.

               This is very problematic.  While I have written about this for my congregation, I wanted to say something more about this using words that are not as "churchy" because, while I think this is especially problematic for people of faith, I also believe it is simply problematic just because as human beings, we should be striving to do better.  Every single day there are so many good things that come to us that we did not earn or deserve.  And there are so many gifts that come our way that we can take no credit for at all. On a small scale, how many times have you gone over the speed limit, or failed to use your turn signal but have not been given a ticket?  How many times have you made a mistake such as talking behind someone’s back, exaggerating a story in a way that you knew would be hurtful to those you spoke about, or were cranky with someone you valued in a way that could have ended the relationship, only to have the experience of finding that those mistakes have not led to the terrible consequences which could have followed?  How often have we experienced being forgiven for the harsh words, or loved beyond the mistakes? 

         In the bigger picture, did you do anything that earned you where you were born?  Did you do anything to have been born into a family that had enough resources to feed you, to house you, to educate you?  Did you do anything to deserve classes and lessons and friends and family who have been kind and loving?  Did you do anything to deserve going on family vacations or trips to the park or zoo or circus as a kid?  How many times have you just barely scraped by on an exam or in some other way and experienced others simply being kind because they could be?  

       But as a people we don’t tend to focus or remember the times we've experienced such beauty or kindness or grace nearly as intensely or as often as we focus on and remember what we consider an injustice to ourselves.  And as a result, we fail then to find the gratitude to extend that grace to those around us, but instead insist that because we suffered, others should too.  And while this may be very human, "an eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind."  We need to do better.  We need to focus less on revenge and on the idea that because I have suffered, you should too, and instead choose more often that because I've been gifted in so very many ways in this lifetime, I will extend those gifts and that grace to you as well.  

     We have the power to create a kinder, gentler world.  And it doesn't take much to move from "it's not fair!" to "How can I help?  What can I do to make your world a tiny bit better?"  My hope is that we could all try to move in that direction, one step at a time.

Anger and Hate

     Years ago I had someone come to me for pastoral care and counseling who was in a great deal of pain.  She told me that she had been the victim of a predator, someone who found her in a time and situation of crisis or trauma and, in the guise of offering care, took advantage of her.  When she finally found the strength to end the predatorial and abusive relationship, the predator sought revenge by turning others she cared about against her.  Because the predator was a charming and likeable person, no one even asked for her side of the story.  It seems people mistakenly believed that the one doing the talking must be the one telling the truth, when instead, he was doing the talking because he was trying to preemptively spread his lies before the truth could come out. She became a pariah as the people around her chose to believe the person they preferred without ever asking her side or seeking her truth in what had occurred.  She was thereby victimized twice by the predator: first by the initial relationship, and second by the damage to her other relationships. She told me that she had come to see the predator as evil, and she hated him with a white hot hate that did not seem to fade with time.  She told me she had never known hate before this event, but now it seemed to consume her and she did not know what to do.  

    She came to me seeking help.  As a pastor, couldn't I tell her how to let go of the anger?  The hate?  Couldn't I help her to figure out how to forgive so that the rage and abhorrence would no longer wrack her body and spirit in a way that seemed to poison everything in her life?  

    I passed along the tools that I had: Pray for the ones with whom you are angry the same good things you would want for yourself.  Talk to God.  Journal.  Distract from your anger by focusing on the beautiful things in this life.  Keep a gratitude journal.  Surround yourself with people who will care enough to talk to you when they have questions or are hearing gossip about you.  Choose friends who will be open with you and will believe what you say to them.  Surround yourself with people who understand about predatory relationships, the deep damage they do, the abuse they infict, and the ways they manifest. Meditate.  Exercise. Eat healthy foods. Practice self-affirmations. Reframe your experiences as growing and learning experiences. 

    I don't know if any of those tools helped her in the long run.  In the short run I believe they were inadequate.  She was truly consumed by her anger and hatred, and those feelings were damaging her to a greater degree even than the original predatorial damage.  What she had experienced as harm was real.  But the daily re-living of that damage did more to hurt her.  And while she knew this intellectually, she could not let go of that anger.  She knew she was allowing the predator to continue to victimize her through her feelings, but she could not let them go.

       As I look back, I realize that I had missed an important step with her.  I've said before that I am a firm believer that we have to go through our grief and pain to come out on the other side.  Stuffing feelings down means they usually manifest in unhelpful ways and they don't resolve.  What I had failed to name was that anger is a secondary emotion.  Hate is often a further step removed and is a tertiary emotion that follows anger.  Both ultimately mask grief and fear.  It feels more powerful to be angry or to hate, so we often move to those feelings when we don't want (or don't have the strength) to feel those more genuine but more vulnerable feelings of sadness and fear.  Until we deal, truly and honestly, with those deeper feelings, we will stay stuck in the anger.

     Personally, I don't want to be an angry or hateful person.  So I write this as a reminder to myself, as I reflect back on my parishioner's experience, that letting these feelings pass through us is essential for our own well-being and wholeness.  Not always easy, especially when you've been deeply harmed, but necessary.  When someone hurts us, it is often our own feelings that do more damage than the other person could ever do.  And while working through those feelings is not easy, it is life-giving to do so.

Too Much Judgement

          Over my life-time we have been steadily learning that punishment is not nearly as effective (if it is effective AT ALL) as a combination of positive reinforcement and natural consequences.  We've learned that beating on children, for example, does not improve behavior, but teaches kids to be bullies themselves.  We've learned that natural consequences (you break a toy and then you no longer have it,  you are mean to a friend and you lose that friendship, you spill and you have to clean it up yourself) have a much bigger impact on all of us.  We learn when there are consequences for our actions that are natural.  What children and all of us learn when we are "punished" for things we've done wrong is more to hate, distrust, fear and seek revenge towards the ones who have punished us.  We've learned this, and in many ways we are beginning to live that out more and more fully.  The best parents I know often use mistakes as teaching opportunities, seeing errors as growing and learning experiences rather than as "sins" that need punishment.  But in other ways, we continue to use the archaic and ineffective methods of punishment in dealing with "mistakes".

    With children, for example, we still use some truly ineffective punishments.  I read an article yesterday that went into detail about something I had long ago come to believe: that suspensions and expulsions just teach kids to act out more: they get out of school, the school has made it clear that they don't want the kids there, often the child gets to be home alone while their parents are working, and what kids have learned from this is that the school authorities don't listen, care, or really values them as human beings.  They are being sent away because they aren't wanted.  No one has taken the time to work with them on what went wrong or how to do things differently, they've just dismissed the child.  What child will work harder for those who just dismiss them?  What child will change their behavior when it is clear that they get rewarded with time off when they act out?  It makes no sense.  And studies are finally catching up and showing this to be true.   

    I've also mentioned before that studies also show (see previous posts) that our entire retributive justice system just creates the criminals we are somehow hoping to change by these punitive responses to crimes.  Restorative justice, in contrast, which focuses on natural consequences, healing for the victims and for the perpetrators, restoration of relationships and reconciliation, in great contrast leads to MUCH lower recidivism rates and actually makes a positive difference for all involved.

    But while I've talked about both of the above in detail in the past, I've been thinking about the other ways in which we continue to live out the mistaken thinking that judging, condemning and punishing others is the way to get others to change in the ways we want.

    For example, employee evaluations have, historically, been opportunities for anonymous people to slam someone else rather than effective and helpful opportunities for constructive feedback.  Often, they have not offered helpful critique that allow for growth and change.  And the anonymity of them means that the person receiving the criticisms can not follow through or ask questions that would allow for further clarity or growth.  Additionally, the anonymity of these critiques also encourages normally sane people to take advantage of their "hidden" status to express opinionated, judgmental and often harsh or unkind ideas without recourse or consequences.  Often these are simply the expression of likes and dislikes rather than genuine helpful feedback that would encourage growth.  My own experience with these kinds of evaluations has also been that I'll receive one evaluation with a comment like "Don't talk so loud!" while another writes, "You need to speak up!" or one saying, "Speak more slowly and calmly!" while another says, "You need to be more animated!" Even less helpful are generalizations that offer no specifics, "I don't like her sermons." or "She doesn't lead well."  All of these leave me without any real way to address opposing or non-specific complaints.  

    But even more basic to our current lives is the "dislike" buttons on all social media platforms.  What does "dislike" communicate after all?  It says absolutely nothing that is helpful.  It does not say WHY a person dislikes something.  It doesn't communicate if there was something specific that was not appreciated or if it was the entire thing.  Often people cannot even see on these platforms who it is that said they "disliked" whatever it was.  And more and more I wonder why we have this option.  I have been listening to some incredible music on YouTube lately.  But I always see in these posts a number of "dislikes".  Why do people listen to those posts if they don't like that kind of music?  Why do people bother to be critical and judging at all of a post that may not have been meaningful to them, but which could be so meaningful to so many others?  How are these snap, unclear, and blanket "dislikes" in any way productive, or helpful, or meaningful?

    We are struggling as a country with increased divisions.  I think part of this is a simple failure to communicate with one another.  But a bigger part is that we make quick and full judgments that we don't explain, don't think through and which do not serve those we judge or ourselves either for that matter.  This is a pattern, this is part of our culture, and it seems to bleed into every part of our society.

    There is a reason Jesus said, "do not judge lest ye be judged."  When a society is more focused on judging than on understanding, on condemnation instead of compassion, on tearing one another down, punishing, hurting, seeking revenge, rather than working to build up, communicate, create bridges of reconciliation and healing, then we are doomed to continue these divides that will tear us all apart.

    Bottom line?  We are far too judgmental.  And we are far too quick to "punish" rather than to heal.  Until we get this, until we change, we are heading down a very dangerous path.  God save us all! 

Revenge

2 Kings 2:1-2, 6-14

Luke 9:51-62

We struggle with the idea of offering a forgiveness that goes all the way that Jesus asks us to take it.  It is hard for us to do, hard for us to imagine, and hard for us to even justify in our own lives.    While we are told that Christians will be known by their love (and that includes and is best manifest, perhaps, in our forgiveness), we don’t do forgiveness very well.  We don’t act loving in this way, we don’t live it and no more is this the case when it comes to forgiveness. 

We want life to be fair.  Of course, we do.  We all want life to be fair.  I am not the exception here.  I want life to be fair too.  And when we are personally impacted, or when people we love are personally impacted, the desire for revenge, rather than the impulse to forgive, can be great.

I think about some of the injustices that I’ve experienced that have really rankled within me.  One example: when I received my doctorate, my congregation at the time wanted to buy me a doctoral robe to honor that.  I went to a place that specializes in clergy robes.  I had picked out from their website when I wanted and went in with the measurements and exact specifications.  They rang it up, charged me the first installment of the robe and I went merrily on my way.  A month later they called and said they no longer made that robe, but they had one that was similar.  They informed me that it didn’t come in my size, it was not the style that I wanted, and I would have to take it to a tailor or seamstress to have it completely altered, taken in, changed.  Of course I said, “no way”.  I had paid for the robe I had ordered.  If I could not have that robe, I wanted a refund.  They refused the refund. 

Okay.  Breathe.

When we were in the process of selling our first house in San Leandro, we were in contract with a family who, at the last minute, 29 days into the 30 day pre-closing period, pulled out.  According to the contract, if they pulled out after a certain date, we were entitled to keep their “good faith” payment of $5000.  But they took us to small claims court and lied through their teeth about what we had failed to do for them concerning the house.  I was so caught off guard by the lies that I did not do a good job and defending myself or what we had done, so we lost the $5000.  The housing market crashed right after that and we were unable to sell our house for another 6 months, which meant carrying two mortgages for that time period.

Breathe again.

As many of you know, when we moved across the country to come to this church, the moving company lost much of our stuff including my daughter’s bed, some large and expensive yard tools, a wagon, a table that had been handbuilt for me by a friend, and to this day I am still finding things that we no longer have because of that move.  The company would not listen to our complaints and never found or paid us for the missing items.

Breathe once more. 

All of these things, from an outside perspective may seem small.  They may seem petty.  We survived carrying two mortgages.  We have been able to replace most of the lost items that the moving company lost.  I did eventually get a robe from a different company, which was a gift anyway and didn’t end up costing us very much.  I have a home and we are fine.  Those things that happened to us were small things in the big scheme of things.  And yet still, it was hard to let go of my desire for all of these people to experience what I experienced in the stress over money, the confusion over lies and unkindnesses, the loss of faith in humanity that I experienced.  Did any of these people EVER think of us again?  I’m certain they did not.  They took what they took and never thought about it again.  On the other hand, I thought of them daily for many months, and was filled with anger and the desire for them to experience what I had experienced each and every time. 

We want life to be fair.  And when people hurt us we want them to suffer as we are.  We want revenge, plain and simple. 

Of course, our faith calls us to something different.  “Vengeance is mine” saith the Lord.  Three times we find this in scripture.  Romans 12:19 Do not take revenge, my dear friends, but leave room for God's wrath, for it is written: "It is mine to avenge; I will repay," says the LORD.

Deuteronomy 32:35 It is mine to avenge; I will repay. In due time their foot will slip; their day of disaster is near and their doom rushes upon them."

Hebrews 10:30 For we know him who said, "It is mine to avenge; I will repay," and again, "The LORD will judge his people."

But we don’t trust that, do we?  We don’t trust it because we see people getting away with all kinds of stuff, all the time. 

But Jesus is clear, too.  Matthew 5: 38-47: You have heard that it was said, ‘Eye for eye, and tooth for tooth.’  But I tell you, do not resist an evil person. If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to them the other cheek also.  And if anyone wants to sue you and take your shirt, hand over your coat as well.  If anyone forces you to go one mile, go with them two miles.  Give to the one who asks you, and do not turn away from the one who wants to borrow from you. “You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’  But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you,  that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.  If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that?  And if you greet only your own people, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that?

This is echoed in 1 Peter 3:9 : Do not repay evil with evil or insult with insult. On the contrary, repay evil with blessing, because to this you were called so that you may inherit a blessing.

And all of this is well and good.  Except we don’t take any of it with any kind of seriousness.  But Jesus lived by what he said and in today’s passage we see that. 

As the time approached for him to be taken up to heaven, Jesus resolutely set out for Jerusalem.  And he sent messengers on ahead, who went into a Samaritan village to get things ready for him;  but the people there did not welcome him, because he was heading for Jerusalem.  When the disciples James and John saw this, they asked, “Lord, do you want us to call fire down from heaven to destroy them?”  But Jesus turned and rebuked them.  Then he and his disciples went to another village.

We see it again when he is being arrested and the soldiers come to take him away.  The disciple cuts off the soldier’s ear and Jesus, in contrast to his disciples, heals the ear.  He even declares forgiveness from the cross for those who have crucified him. 

And maybe, we say, well, that’s Jesus.  That’s not real for us.  I know most Christians feel this way.  It is people of faith who encouraged me to sue in each of the three cases I described earlier.  And I’ll tell you the truth, it wasn’t that I didn’t sue because of my faith, but rather because of a lack of time and resources to do so. 

But as Christians we are to be known by our love.  By our radical, different, outstanding and clear LOVE.  And that means responding to the injustices of this life with compassion.  And that means responding to hatred with love.  This means not seeking revenge, but responding to unkindness with forgiveness. 

There was a news story out about a year ago of a woman who was in a drive-in line at a McDonald’s buying lunch for her kids when the man in line behind her starting yelling racist slurs at her and her children.  He was awful in his language, and this was heard by the woman’s children and was upsetting to all of them.  But instead of responding with anger, she chose better.  She bought the man’s lunch and asked the cashier to give him a note that she wrote that said, “I am not the words that you threw at me or my children.  I forgive you.  Have a good lunch.” 

I’m certain you have all read in the news over the last couple years about congregations that have forgiven shooters.  In particular the African American congregation in Charleston forgave, in a very public way, at the trial of the shooter, the man who killed so many in their congregation.  As the News story wrote it,

“The relatives of people slain inside the historic African American church in Charleston, S.C., were able to speak directly to the accused gunman Friday at his first court appearance.

One by one, those who chose to speak at a bond hearing did not turn to anger. Instead, while he remained impassive, they offered him forgiveness and said they were praying for his soul, even as they described the pain of their losses.

“I forgive you,” Nadine Collier, the daughter of 70-year-old Ethel Lance, said at the hearing, her voice breaking with emotion. “You took something very precious from me. I will never talk to her again. I will never, ever hold her again. But I forgive you. And have mercy on your soul.”

Last week I shared a story of Jesuit Priest Gregory Boyle wrote in the introduction his book, Tattoos on the Heart, about a woman who had lost two sons to gun violence praying for the life of the shooter when he was brought into the hospital, also as a result of gun violence.  Father Boyle said this, “If there is a fundamental challenge within these stories, it is simply to change our lurking suspicion that some lives matter less than other lives.  William Blake wrote, ‘We are put on earth for a little peace that we might learn to bear the beams of love.’.. We’re just trying to learn how to bear the beams of love.” (p xiii).

We believe it is hard not to strike back at those who hit us.  We believe that it is only saints who do this.  Many others believe it is only weak people, or scared people, or foolish people who fail to seek revenge. 

But as Paul tells us, in 1^st Corinthians 4: 10, we are called to be Fools for Christ: living out what others see as impossible, as unlikely, as unpractical.

Father Elias Chacour shared in his book Blood Brothers (p177) about his work with a congregation in Israel/Palestine that was torn with internal strife and hatred.  He had tried to reconcile them again and again but was unable to do so.  Finally, on Palm Sunday, he chose to do something outrageous.  He locked the doors so that those in the church could not leave at the end of the worship service and he said to them. “You are a people divided.  You argue and hate each other – gossip and spread malicious lies.  What do (those who are not Christian) think when they see you?  Surely that your religion is false.  If you can’t love your brother than you see, how can you say you love God who is invisible?  You have allowed the body of Christ to be disgraced.”

He invited them to sit in silence, asking for God to bring healing and forgiveness to his congregation.  After he finished speaking, they all sat in silence for a long time.  Chacour continues, "No one flinched.  My breathing had become shallow and I swallowed hard.  Surely I've finished everything, I chastised myself, undone all these months of hard work with my... then a sudden movement caught my eye. Someone was standing... With his first words, I could scarcely believe that this was the same hard-bitten policeman who had treated me so brusquely.  "I am sorry, "he faltered.  All eyes were on him.  "I am the worst one of all.  I've hated my own brothers.  Hated them so much I wanted to kill them.  More than any of you I need forgiveness."  And then he turned to me, "Can you forgive me, too, Abuna?"  He continued by describing a community that not only forgave one another but went out to the larger community, door to door, asking for forgiveness, and offering it in kind.

These are humans, transformed by their choice to forgive, transformed by their commitment to follow Love all the way, to follow Christ all the way.

 It is easy for us to want and even act in revenge.  It is easy for us to respond with anger.  But, as with everything that God asks us to do, God asks us to forgive not for the other, but for ourselves.  Do you want to be houses of hate and anger?  Or do you want love to rule in your hearts?  When love rules you are more whole, healthier, freer.  The call to forgive is not easy.  But it is part of our call to love and cannot be separated out.  We are called to take seriously that vengeance is God’s and we are invited instead to step into the deep and full living, letting go of anger, and choosing joy and peace instead, that is ours.

Follow up about violent responses, from friend directly affected

The following is from the friend, David Hancock, who found the intruder in his house stealing from him. He wrote this in response to the posts advocating that he should have shot the intruder.  I am sharing it and giving his name with his permission:

Thank you, everyone.

Let me specifically address the responses about shooting the guy.

1- I saw him for three seconds. I thought it was my wife heading to work and I was going to give her a kiss goodbye. So I was kind of surprised that it was a thief. If I were going to shoot him that would mean that I was going out to say goodbye to my wife (who I initially thought was the person in the living room) with my gun loaded, armed, and pointed at her. So that's not a recipe for a healthy marriage. Being in a position to shoot the guy would also have meant being the kind of person who carries a loaded gun around my own house with me all the time. I have no interest in being that kind of person.

2- The Bay Area does not frown upon shooting home invaders. This state's gun laws are incredibly lax compared to where I used to live (Illinois) and to where I am moving in a few weeks (Colorado). In fact, one of the responding officers looked at me and said something to the effect of 'if this guy comes back, California law is VERY lenient with whatever you feel you need to do to protect your home. You can't do anything to him outside, but if he's inside, or ends up back inside, you're free to defend your property however you want.' I bought my first gun in Illinois and I had to go through two full days of safety training before I could buy it and then also complete tri-annual paperwork and updates with the Illinois State Police confirming that I still owned it. Here, I'm required to ever take zero training and didn't even have to register my gun with the state.

3- I've been robbed before, at a job where I worked retail. The kid then had a balaclava on, so I didn't recognize him, and I did have the opportunity to stop him using lethal force had I chosen (that would have meant a lot of risk to me, too, but let's assume that I could have killed him.) The kid who robbed us was the son of one of the police officers who frequented the store and I would have killed the child (who was my age) of someone I knew. So that would have stayed with me my whole life.

I have known people who have killed people and I have seen what that does to them, and the mental difficulties and challenges it brings, repeated nightmares, and, in some, a vacancy behind their eyes that develops over years of worrying about what the act of killing someone does to them and means for them.

It's, frankly, disgusting that Americans are so flippant about ending a person's life. The most common reactions I've had to this event is people saying things like "That would have ended differently for that guy at my house" or "you should have murdered him then had breakfast" or "Why not just shoot him?" All those are exactly word-for-word. Why not kill someone because they have $1K in my camera gear in their arms? Because every human life is worth infinitely more than $1K in easily replaced camera gear. Every person is worthy of redemption, forgiveness, and kindness, no matter the circumstance. Because a camera thief is human, and has in them all the qualities associated with humanity. People don't break into homes and take a paltry little sum of camera gear because it's a hobby. They do it for a need, and whether that need is rent or drugs, that person is in a bad place in their life. I don't need to make it worse. And anyone who writes off a person so easily needs to question their own humanity. I'd much rather be surrounded by camera thieves than people who think it's okay to kill someone because that person is stealing something I can go online and replace tomorrow. All people are worth more than any material item.

Violent Responses

          I was browsing FB the other day and saw a post by a friend of mine who was describing a terrible and scary incident in which he awoke to find an intruder in his home.  The man grabbed a couple things and left. No one was hurt, my friend was able to replace the missing items with fairly little trauma.  It wasn't a pleasant experience but neither was it scarring.  What I found more interesting (here translated "disturbing") was the responses of some of his friends.  Several posted in response that he should have shot and killed the guy.  And that was usually followed by "that would have taught him".
        I have to admit, I find this response shocking and upsetting for so many reasons.  The first is simply the obvious one: once you're dead, there are no more lessons to be learned, folk.  Killing somebody doesn't actually teach them anything.
        But beyond that, why do we feel that we should react to unpleasant things by escalating the violence?  This is a mind-set that seems to have taken over the U.S. at this point in time.  We seem to greet every slight and every affront with an incredibly disproportionate response of revenge and increased harm. This must be a long time human flaw.  In the Hebrew scriptures, we are told "an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth." This was a law put in place to limit the amount of damage that could be returned in response to an injury of any kind.  It was necessary to make those statements at that time because people DID tend to escalate the problems.  "An eye for an eye" meant that you could only return in equal amount what was done to you.  So in this case, you could take something from the other person in response to their taking something of yours (NOT their life, by the way.  That's NOT what you could take in response to their stealing an item.  That is not an equal response.).  The Christian scriptures take it much further.  (Mt. 5:38-42): "You have heard that it was said, ‘Eye for eye, and a tooth for tooth.’ But I tell you, do not resist an evil person. If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to them the other cheek also.  And if anyone wants to sue you and take your shirt, hand over your coat as well. If anyone forces you to go one mile, go with them two miles.  Give to the one who asks you, and do not turn away from the one who wants to borrow from you."  This takes the actions of love and kindness exponentially further.  Not only are we supposed to refrain from killing the people who upset us, not only are we to refrain from retaliating by inflicting the same injury to a person who has injured us, but we are to take loving a giant step further and try to respond to evil with goodness, try to respond to hate with love, try to answer anger with peace, and try to meet injury with caring.  
           Is this hard?  Of course.  Does it bring justice?  Not in the way we have come to understand it, that's for certain.  Is this normal behavior, even for people of faith? Not by any stretch of the imagination.  These tend to be passages that people of faith ignore, "forget," or simply fail to apply to real life.  It is hard to walk with love towards those offering hate.  It is difficult to not want revenge when someone has hurt us.  It is absolutely counter-cultural to not hit back when we are hit.
          But as I say in my sermons almost every week, the things we are asked to do by our faith traditions, while they may appear hard, are always things that invite us into wholeness as well: they aren't just for the "other".  They are meant for our own good, for our own betterment, for our own growth.
          So looking at it from that perspective, what are the consequences for different responses in this case?  Let's say my friend had shot the guy who broke into his home.  Instead of dealing with the, not minor, but not overwhelming either, trauma of an invasive house break in and theft, he would carry the scars for the rest of his life of having taken someone else's life.  Maybe there are people out there who can just dismiss another life as somehow not worthy of continuance.  Maybe there are people who would feel proud of putting out the life of someone who is making a bad choice. But my friend is a thinking person: he knows that just because someone does bad things does not mean they are an evil or worthless human being.  We never know the stories behind other people's actions.  We never know if someone is truly beyond redemption. We never know what has led up to that moment, nor where someone will go next in their life. To quote Gandalf, "Many that live deserve death. And some that die deserve life. Can you give it to them? Then do not be too eager to deal out death in judgement. For even the very wise cannot see all ends."  For those of us who believe in the sanctity of life, taking life away from another human is something you just simply cannot heal from.  Ever.  Even if he could heal from it, he would end up going through the court system as a result of his actions: and that, too, is frankly extremely hard to get over, even if he were exonerated.  He also pointed out to me that since he didn't see the person very well, at first he wasn't even sure it was an intruder.  It could easily have been his wife returning from work.  Would you really want to go out shooting and risk hitting your spouse?
         In contrast, there are many stories of a response of love changing the hearts of anger and evil in the other. How does it affect us to behave with love?  It helps us build resilience, loving builds more love, even in our own hearts; forgiveness helps us to completely let go of the anger and pain we carry. In this case, their ability to forgive has meant that a terrible incident is truly over for them, not something they need to carry forward into any other situations.  In reality, there wasn't time for any response on the part of my friend to the intruder.  But if there had been, we never know how a choice for kindness will affect others, and even our own hearts, down the road.  We never know.  And it isn't our job to determine.  Our job is to be kind, to be compassionate, to "love our enemies" as Jesus would tell us, and to be open to allowing the love we have to grow and change us. The results of that are just not up to us.  
          I find this quick response of "you should have shot the guy" extremely disturbing because it shows an inability to seek empathy for those who are different, for anyone who has done wrong, for someone who has hurt us. It shows a way of thinking that is violent, aggressive, and non-sympathetic.  It reflects a lack of ability to see the humanity in people who harm us. It is an action that also demonstrates a forgetfulness of our own mistakes.  While we may say, "Well, I've never done anything that bad," I don't know that rating our mistakes is very healthy or even fair. Again, we don't know what has led up to that moment for the person choosing that behavior.  This reaction also fails to see beyond this moment into the future consequences of our choice to react with violence and revenge.  
           I would hope for us that we could start the pendulum swinging back towards greater compassion, towards a deeper understanding that the difference between me and you is only time and space: that when we hurt the other, we are injuring ourselves: and when we choose love, we are also choosing love for ourselves.  I think that road may be long, but it's an important journey to walk.

Those charming, charismatic kids - or Lessons from Jane Austen, Part II

       In all but one of Jane Austen's books there is a character who is absolutely charming but who turns out to be a scoundrel and the ultimate villain in her books.  In Pride and Prejudice it is Wickam.  In Sense and Sensibility it is Willoughby.  In Persuasion it is Mr. Elliott.  In Emma it is Frank Churchill.  In Mansfield Park it is Henry Crawford.  In Northanger Abbey it is Captain Tilney.  All of them have similarities.  They are charming. They are charismatic. They are entertaining. They are romantic. They are popular. They have skills and resources in abundance.  Some are good looking, some are rich.  But whatever else they have, their primary quality is that because of their charm, their charisma, they are easily admired by everyone around them. And because of all of that, they are used to getting what they want. People bend over backwards to be with them. Even smart, intelligent characters are fooled by them and would do anything for them.  But they have one other thing in common as well.  They have no morals, no compass, no true empathy for others, and they use and abuse others cruelly to get what they want without remorse or regret. They charm their way through anything and everything and still come out smelling like roses, even after they have devastated the lives of those around them. They smile, they nod their heads, and they move on to charm and then devastate other people. No matter who they have hurt or in what way, they still come off well, still end surrounded by people who admire them and want to be with them, still can get whatever they want through their charm and charisma. The conflict in many of these stories comes at the point at which someone says "no" to them.  Because they never hear "no", they deal with it poorly, usually by seeking revenge on the one who has seen through them.  Their revenge has the potential in each of these stories to ruin the main characters of the books.  My sense is that the only reason it doesn't is that these are stories, stories with the intention of happy endings.
       As I said in my last Jane Austen blog post, Jane Austen's gift is that she is able to capture accurately so much about human nature, and this is no exception.  Unfortunately, these charming, charismatic, delightful scoundrels are real. They charm and then use and abuse. They devastate lives, but do it with a smile and an "explanation" that is nothing but lies, but is also so seductive and inviting that most people are fooled and continue to want to be around them and give them whatever they want no matter what kind of damage they have done to others. They seek revenge when they hear "no" and do so with such charm and finesse that only the wisest see them for what they are, and those who are hurt by them often suffer multiple injuries since their version will never be believed when the charmer puts forward his own story. As Lizzie said in Pride and Prejudice, "And if I endeavour to undeceive people as to ... his conduct, who will believe me?"  Lizzie was respected and well liked, but she did not have the charismatic charm of Wickam.  She knew, then, that people would only really see him for who he was when he injured them directly.  And in the mean time, his previously cruel and vengeful behavior would have to go untold.
       I found myself reflecting on all of this this last week in regards to several different situations.  I have a friend who works with very young children.  She was sharing with me that one of the girls she works with has already begun this behavior.  She is cruel to the other children, but so charming when she chooses to be that everyone wants to be her friend.  She fools her parents and other adults, but when she believes she is not being watched, she says unspeakable things to the other children, and seeks revenge on any child who does not give her what she wants, primarily by socially alienating them. Through her charisma and charm she has the personal power to do that successfully and she uses it to bully, control and devastate children who have dared to exercise their own personal power, have dared to say "no" or have dared to do anything other than what this one girl wants in that moment. My friend has tried to encourage the other children to choose different children to play with. But this little girl has an amazing gravitational force that the other children simply don't know how to step away from to choose something different. Even in her best moments she is insensitive, unaware of the other kids' feelings, and hurtful as a result. As I listened to her story, I thought that since the parents and most other adults don't see it and aren't willing to try to correct it (my friend being the exception), this is a child who will continue to act this way, will have no reason to develop empathy for others and will no doubt become like one of the villains in a Jane Austen novel - charming and devastatingly cruel.
       Similarly, my youngest two children were talking about kids at their schools who behave like this.  By late elementary and junior high these behaviors have been honed in those who learn them. They are better about "sneaking" their cruel behavior while charming the adults or others with power who could challenge it or protect the other children hurt by it.  They form "cliques" of the popular kids who have that same gravitational force that draws others to want to be with them, want to be near them, even when they exclude, are unkind, or sometimes are truly cruel.
        I wish that this behavior were outgrown.  And I think that for some it is.  By college, I think most people do have some kind of empathy and conscience that kicks in.  But unfortunately it just doesn't for everyone.  If you were never forced to develop empathy as a kid, it may not be possible to develop it as an adult. Narcissistic personalities tend to be charming and without empathy. Psychopaths go a step further. They, too, are usually extremely charming and often viewed as very trustworthy, though they are incapable of truly empathizing with others (they are very capable of pretending empathy), and so their behavior is often cruel, especially when it serves their own purposes (see http://psychcentral.com/blog/archives/2015/02/12/differences-between-a-psychopath-vs-sociopath/), but again, often in a "hidden" way so that it does not become apparent to other people and they never have to experience the consequences of their cruelty. We still know adults acting in this way, we still find people using their charm to be cruel.
      As I've listened to the news over the last year, I have been struck by how many of these people have made it, through that charisma and charm, but without any empathy or morality, into very successful public lives: Several politicians in response to the massacres in Oregon and in Orlando saying, "stuff happens" (clearly incapable of empathy), that shop owner who rejoiced over the shooting in San Bernadino because as she said it, "killings always result in more gun sales!" (again, no empathy), other prominent figures, with their complete inability or desire to understand people who are different from themselves, different backgrounds, different classes, different cultures who are seen as disposable and whose deaths are not counted. Why do people listen to them?  Because they are seductive, they have a certain "charm". We hear about charismatic pastors on a regular basis who abuse that power with children or with their congregants. They are so loved by their congregations that even when they do truly unspeakable stuff, the charismatic leaders are usually defended and often fail to be held accountable.  I am certain that there are many who never get caught at all for the same reason.  "Who would believe it?" I hear Lizzie say once more. Rather than be victimized again by telling their story to people who would rather believe the charming, charismatic leader, many victims choose to remain silent.
      The point?  I guess the point is that we have to look deeper, always.  And that being seduced by charming, charismatic folk because it feels good to be around them rather than really looking at their behavior or their words for substance or lack there of leads to pain, if not for ourselves, then undoubtedly for others. That listening to those who aren't as charming or charismatic for their take on a story is more than important: it is vital.  That charm can be dangerous and seductive and one should be careful about trusting it: those who have it are used to getting their way and often have not learned how to handle disappointment with grace, nor to be sympathetic to other people's needs or experiences. And finally, that if you do find yourself the victim of one of these charming charismatic people, know that you aren't alone. That your seduction by their charm was a normal, natural, human reaction. Hopefully we learn from those painful lessons to look deeper the next time. And we can pray and work so that others aren't hurt in the same way. Perhaps the first step is simply to name it for what it is.

Sunday's Sermon on Forgiveness

Matthew 5:21-26, 38-48

I have always loved these scriptures from Matthew.  I have always loved these passages in which Jesus tells us to let go of our anger, to forgive, to love our enemies.  These verses are central to my understanding of God, a God of radical and all inclusive love who calls us to also be about loving everyone, especially those we most fear or even hate.
But it became different for me at the point at which I actually found myself having people who felt like enemies. It was easy to preach about loving your enemies when I didn’t have any enemies. Yes, there were people with whom I became angry, people who had hurt me, especially as a child. There were people whom I struggled to forgive, but these gave me room for growth.  I saw these relationships as opportunities for me to learn to let go of anger, to learn to forgive. I recognized through these situations that forgiveness is for those of us doing the forgiving much more than it is for the one forgiven. But it was different at the point at which my children were experiencing intolerable unkindness in the community.  It was different when people were making judgments against them based on misinformation, half-information, and at the point at which my children were being treated wrongly for something they had no hand in. When people you love, especially innocent people like children, are being persecuted, when their quality of life is significantly altered because of others’ behavior, when you are stuck and cannot get out of a situation with repeated experiences of unkindness and mistreatment, that is much, much harder to forgive.  I also found that just as a loss can bring up other losses (like when someone we care about dies, sometimes we find ourselves grieving other people we’ve lost at other times), that the injustices that surrounded my kids and I brought up all kinds of other times when I had seen or experienced unfair or unkind behavior.  And while on the outside I could act with kindness and compassion, inside it was very, very difficult to let go of the anger I was feeling.
But I will tell you again what I have said before: we are called to forgiveness not for the sake of the other person, but for our own sake.  It was my dis-ease that I was seeking to heal by striving to let go of my anger.  It was the turmoil inside of me that needed to be released so that I could live a full life.  “Anger is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die.”
I have shared with you before about a friend of mine, Erin, who grew up in an abusive household.  Without going through the entire story again, it is enough to say that it took her a long time to forgive her parents, but in doing so, she found herself released from years of anger, rage, and pain. Her forgiveness of the other changed her.  C.S. Lewis says, “I do not pray so that I may change God.  I pray so that God may change me.”  The same applies to forgiveness.
         Corrie Ten Boom wrote extensively about her experience in Nazi Concentration camps and what followed.  She wrote, “Since the end of the war, I had had a home in Holland for victims of Nazi brutality.  Those who were able to forgive their former enemies were able also to return to the outside world and rebuild their lives, no matter what the physical scars.  Those who nursed their bitterness remained invalids.  It was as simple and as horrible as that.”  But that didn’t make it easy.  Years after her concentration camp experiences in Nazi Germany, Corrie ten Boom met face to face one of the most cruel and heartless German guards that she had ever contacted.  He had humiliated and degraded her and her sister and worse.  Now he stood before her with hand outstretched and said, “Will you forgive me?”  She wrote, “I stood there with coldness clutching at my heart, but I know that the will can function regardless of the temperature of the heart.  I prayed, “Jesus, help me!”  Woodenly, mechanically I thrust my hand into the one stretched out to me and I experienced an incredible thing.  The current started in my shoulder, raced down into my arms and sprang into our clutched hands.  Then this warm reconciliation seemed to flood my whole being, bringing tears to my eyes.  “I forgive you, brother,” I cried with my whole heart.  For a long moment we grasped each other’s hands, the former guard, the former prisoner.  I have never known the love of God so intensely as I did in that moment!”
          We know this.  Lack of forgiveness hurts US.  When Jesus say, “If you forgive anyone’s sins, they are forgiven; and if you don’t forgive them, they are retained” the person who retains them is the one who fails to forgive.  We have a choice when we have been injured.  We can get stuck in the pain, the injury and injustice, the anger, or we can forgive and accept the peace that Jesus offers us.  The passing of the peace is supposed to be a time of forgiving one another.  We can offer and accept peace into our hearts, into our beings BECAUSE we have forgiven others and have been forgiven.  Peace is the consequence of that forgiveness, it is the outcome of that forgiveness, both given and received.
No matter what happens, no matter how things are going, the greatest damage we can allow anyone to do to us would be if we allowed them to injure our souls.  Hanging on to anger and hatred, staying in that place of terror and even the “revenge thinking” that wants to take up so much space in our psyches, if we allow this, that is the way we would allow others to permanently injure us and even to destroy our souls.  If we want to take back our power, if we want to refuse to be destroyed, the only way we can do that is by choosing God and choosing to do as God would have us do.  The only way we can survive is by choosing love, choosing forgiveness, choosing to let go of anger, pain, and as much as possible, fear, and to live instead in a spirit of hope, forgiveness and even prayer for our enemies.  Praying for our enemies -praying for their wholeness that they might have the strength to search for truth, praying for their well-being so that they may have the desire to do good, praying for them wisdom and truth and love and even joy because we believe that, too, comes from God and brings about transformation, redemption, and life: that is part of what we are called to do.  It is not all of what we are called to do.  We still are called to stand up for those who are suffering.  But praying for our enemies is a starting place in what we are called to do.
           The result for me is that I, too, find that I am changed by my prayers.  I find that as I pray for “enemies”, that they become more human in my mind and less the incarnation of evil that my most fearful and angry moments push me to believe.  I find that as I pray for them I gain a sense of deepened hope.  As I pray for them, my mind sees more beauty around me, more light in dark corners, more possibility of redemption and reconciliation.  I see God more fully, through praying for those I see as enemies.
           I invite the same for you.  Pray for those you most fear.  Pray for those with whom you are most angry.  Pray for those who feel like enemies.  And allow those prayers to heal you, to change you, to transform you, to make each of us more into the people God calls us to be.  Again, we don’t stop there.  But when we can act in love and hope and the strength that comes from a peaceful heart rather than in anger and hate, we have a much greater chance of making real change.
            One night in the Bronx a man named Julio Diaz was walking down a subway stair case when a teenage boy approached and pulled out a knife.  Diaz gave him his wallet, but as the teen began to walk away, Diaz said to him, “Hey, wait a minute.  You forgot something. If you’re going to be robbing people for the rest of the night, you might as well take my coat to keep you warm.”
             The robber looked at his victim like “why are you doing this?”
             Diaz continued, “If you’re willing to risk your freedom for a few dollars, you must really need the money.  I’m just wanting to get dinner and if you want to join me, you’re more than welcome.”  
             The teen agreed and they went to a local diner.  The manager came by, the dishwasher came by, the waiters came by to say hi, and the teen said, “you know everyone here.  Do you own the place?”
            “No, I just eat here a lot,” Diaz told the teen.  The confused teen said, “But you even talked to the dishwashers!”
            Diaz responded, “Well, haven’t you been taught you should be nice to everyone?”
           “Yes, but I didn’t think people actually behaved that way,” the teen said.
        Diaz asked him what he wanted out of life.  The teen looked very sad but either couldn’t or simply didn’t answer him.  Finally the bill arrived.  Diaz told the teen, “Look, I guess you’re going to have to pay for this because you have my money and I can’t pay for it.  But if you give me back my wallet, however, I’ll gladly treat you.”  But then he also asked the kid if he would give him something in return for his paying for the meal.  The teen agreed and gave him his knife.  Diaz said later, “I figure if you treat people right, you can only hope that they treat you right, too.”
            It is not easy to forgive.  It is not easy to love and wish good for those whom we fear, those who have hurt us, those who have power over us.  But the cost of failing to use those gifts that God gives us, to reach out with grace and the accept and offer forgiveness is high: lack of healing, anger, poison in our very minds and souls.  In contrast, the reward for succeeding is peace – the deep peace that surpasses all understanding.  Amen.

Gossip - the Straight and Narrow

   Humans have a propensity towards gossip.  We do.  We discuss what we hear.  We discuss the news.  And we talk about other people.  I think there are a lot of reasons for this.  We like sensationalism and if nothing exciting is happening in our own lives, talking about others sometimes provides the drama we crave.  We like being important and having an important story to tell about someone else can give us a sense of importance at that moment.  We like being the ones to know something before others do and have the inside scoop.  We like having something to talk about, and talking about other people is easy.   Eleanor Rosevelt is quoted as having said, "Great minds discuss ideas.  Average minds discuss events.  Small minds discuss people." And perhaps that is true.  But it is also true that we aren't bad people because we like to gossip.  We are just human people.  And while others can get truly hurt by our gossip, we don't usually set out with the intent to hurt them.
    Sometimes our gossip is more personal and attacking.  Sometimes people tell stories about their own lives that make someone else look bad.  It took a long time but I did finally realize that those who did this, who told stories about others that raise themselves up as victims and make others look bad, are usually doing that because they are afraid the other person might tell their side first and would make them look bad.  They tell their story so they appear to be innocent, the victim.  They tell their story so the other side won't be sought.  They tell their story so others will not think that they did wrong.  The ones who don't need to gossip about what has happened are usually the ones who are actually less at fault, and often more confident about that: they believe they have nothing to fear, they have accepted and come to terms with their own parts in the situation, so they have no need to gossip or badmouth someone else.  Sometimes people tell a story about someone else as a way of convincing themselves that they are not at fault.  Same thing.  If they tell their story loud enough and long enough, maybe it will be true.  If they can paint a picture in which the other is wrong, maybe in fact the other WILL be wrong.
     I learned this the hard way.  But the truth has truly "set me free" in the sense that when someone badmouths someone else to me, I have learned to listen for the pain and insecurity of the person doing the gossiping, instead of listening to condemn or judge in any way the one being gossiped about.  Sometimes it changes my feelings towards the gossiper. But I do not allow it to change my opinion or feelings about the one being badmouthed because I choose to remember there is another side, one I have not heard.  Again, that has been incredibly freeing.

    But as I reflected on all of this today it occured to me that perhaps there is a more graceful way to see gossip as well.  I was reflecting on my "story" of the last 5 years.  I told very few people about what we were going through.  It was pretty public, so most people heard about it from other sources. But there were a few trusted folk that I was able to talk to directly about what had happened, what was happening at the time.  Each one of those people I begged to not gossip about it.  I told them it was my story to tell and I pleaded with them to allow me to be the one to tell it when and if I was ever ready to do that.  They all promised to hold my confidence.  And in every single case that story was passed along to at least one other person.  Each person I told talked to at least one other, despite my eliciting promises from each of confidence.  For a long time I was really hurt by that.  In a couple cases, where the story was passed not just to one or two others but to many others there is still some hurt. In a couple cases people I trusted and cared about heard the story from other sources and instead of talking to me, passed it along as gossip to others, and that too was very painful.  If they cared about me, why didn't they talk to me instead?  Or at least, why didn't they talk to me first? Why didn't they ask for my story?  Why didn't they reach out to me?
     But there has finally been enough healing that I am beginning to be able to put myself in their better shoes and still see reasons they might have chosen to share the story.  I can imagine the pain that they felt knowing someone they loved was living through hell.  I can imagine the struggle they felt in having no one to talk to about something that was shocking, devastating, a story one hears about, not a reality someone you love lives through.  In some cases, people may not have been sure if they could ask me, or if it would make things worse to ask me my story.  Maybe they were afraid they would have come across as nosy, insensitive or "abulance chasing" if they had tried to talk to me about it.  Maybe they simply didn't know how to offer support, so talking to others, passing on the information, maybe to someone who would be better able to respond, may have felt safer, and more caring.  Maybe it felt like it was all they knew how to do.
     Whatever the reasons, I find I have moved into a place of offering more grace around this.  At the time the gossip was heaping coals on an already burning body.  It was painful.  But as I said I have moved into a place of understanding and forgiveness around this.  I can have compassion, as I grow in comprehension, for those choices that others made.
    Still, what I have learned from this is that we really do need to be careful about what we say about other people.  Gossip hurts.  It may be human.  It may be understandable.  But it hurts.  We need to strive for a better way.  When we fail, we need to find grace for ourselves and one another.  That grace can give us the strength and courage to try again, to learn, to grow, and hopefully to do better.

Power, forgiveness, control

How much power we give up when we allow others to determine our course:
When we react to hatred with venom,
When we respond to assault with revenge,
When we allow another's destruction to move us towards destruction as well.

Even in the small things,
When our thoughts are consumed by what has been done to us,
When our mind is filled with the memories of what could have or should have been,
When our hearts are shattered daily by an onslaught that we cannot control,
We give up our power when we allow this.
We surrender our peace when we yield to the invasion of our being.
We die each day that we choose darkness in response to darkness,
hatred in response to hatred,
fear and anger in response to the bombardment.

What then is the alternative?
There is only one.
In order to not give you my power,
I must forgive you,
Let go of what was and what will be.
I must live in the now that is now,
not the hope of what might have been.
I must choose this day to embody the peace I hope to see in the world.
And to be the love I believe will one day change the world.

Being "fools" for Christ.

For those of us who take seriously the words as ascribed to Jesus in our scriptures, there is a definite belief that love conquers all.  There are the words "do not resist an evildoer but turn the other cheek" and "you have heard it said, love your friends, but I say, love your enemies".  There is definitely something "unrealistic" or "impractical" about all of it, and yet, we are called to believe in it, to fight for it, to created the world of love, to "bring the kingdom to earth as it is in heaven" (whatever it is you believe heaven to be).  We are not called to fight hate with hate, but to fight it with love.  We are not called to seek revenge or even to punish an evildoer.  Instead we are told to not judge and to love the unlovable.  This isn't what our current politics espouse in any form, but these are the words of Jesus.  For those who say they are Christian and yet espouse hatred, fear and self-protection at the cost of harming ANYONE else, I can only say you either haven't actually read the gospels, or you just plain don't take it with any seriousness.  There isn't room to be "practical" or to fight hatred with killing, to self protect with violence, fear, or anger.  There isn't room for revenge or even punishment. Those things we are supposed to leave up to God.  Is this easy?  Of course not.  Are we expected to fail sometimes?  Of course.  But to claim that violence, killing, hatred are ever Christian responses is to utterly fail to understand the gospels.

I will, again, admit that those who say that these practices aren't "practical" are right at some level. Even our scriptures tell us to be "fools" for our faith, believing, hoping, trusting, and choosing love even in the face of hate where there is no sign that these will get us what we want.  The very fact that scripture calls us to be fools for believing in these values shows them to be different than what many who look for practical will find.  Our idealists who espoused these values (whether Christian or not) worked to change the world, and I believe they have - MLK, Carter, Kennedy, Ghandi, etc. They were idealists.  And while their policies may not have been practical they changed the world, and they did it without violence, without hate, without killing. Ultimately, we do create the world we want.  But unfortunately, it is equally true that those who work to keep the world practical, and who therefore fight against the belief that love conquers all also have a hand in creating the world and they fight hard, refusing to believe in the possibility of a world where love genuinely and completely wipes out fear, hatred and darkness.

I find I have no comprehension for those who claim to be Christian and yet who espouse violent reactions to things they don't like. I simply don't understand if they have failed to read the scriptures they claim to believe or if they simply don't take them seriously. They sometimes quote scripture, but it is always Old Testament or occasionally Paul's writings.  It is never Jesus.  EVER.  So if you don't believe in the words of Jesus, stop saying you are Christian.  Just own that you aren't. Stop dragging the name "Christian" through the mud of hatred, fear, violence and killing when that is so very antithetical to the teachings of Jesus.  Just STOP.

Unfortunately, there are too many of those folk out there right now.  There are just too many who live by fear and hate and call it practical (many even dare to call it Christian. Again, have they actually READ the gospels?).  There just don't seem to be enough who are brave enough and faithful enough to choose to live by love at whatever cost.

And I have to admit, it breaks my heart, on a daily basis.