Elections, competition, meanness

            When I was a student at UC Berkeley, I had the great joy and privilege and playing piccolo for the Cal Marching Band.  The Cal Band was (is), almost completely, a student run organization.  It had a complex system that made the orgnization work, and every year we would have elections for the top leadership positions: Student drum major, student music director, secretary, etc.  These were run as almost all elections are: the students would campaign, in a sense, and this would end with each of them giving a speech at an election dinner after which we would all vote by ballot. The reality is that the Cal Band typically has about 170 members, so most of us knew each other pretty well, we witnessed first hand the other members' strengths and weaknesses, and by the time that dinner and vote came along, I assume I was not the only one who pretty much knew who they were going to vote for even before the speeches were made.  Still, there is one election that remains prominent in my mind, 30 years later.
          Two young women were running against each other for one of the positions.  What was unusual about this was that the two young women were known to be best friends.  They were always together, very close, never out of each other's sights.  But they were also very different in terms of temperament.  One, whom I will call Jill, was very confident, strong, an achiever, well-organized, pretty much good at everything she did, and generally very well liked.  The other, whom I will call Sally, was an emotional mess.  I think today we might have more compassion and understanding about the mental illness or life struggles that had led her to where she was.  But at the time, most of us chose to stay out of her way as much as possible.  She threw herself, sexually, at most of the young men, she flitted in and out of very dramatic and emotionally charged friendships with the other young women (perhaps in part because she would not hesitate to fling herself at their boyfriends, too), she was often seen having emotional break-downs or throwing loud temper tantrums.  She was dramatic and emotional and constantly in crisis.  So when we all saw that these two women were running against each other for this position, all of us, I'm certain, planned on voting for Jill.  We did not see how Sally could handle a leadership position in the face of all the other crises that seemed to run her life, frankly.  We had our ballots in front of us as the speeches were made and I know that even before the speeches came, most of us had already marked our vote for Jill.
          Sally stood up and she gave the speech most of us expected her to give.  It was emotional but also passionate about her desire to serve in this way.  I don't remember it much, except that she was clearly very nervous, and she made her earnest desire to hold this position very clear.  Then Jill came to the podium.  And Jill's speech I will never forget.
             Jill stood before all of us, and instead of telling us why she wanted the position or why she would do a good job, she took the opportunity to slam her best friend, Sally.  She called her "unstable" and was sarcastic and mean in her comments.  It was a cruel speech.  And this close community of the Cal Band had no tolerance for this.  At her first comment, her audience collectively gasped with shock and concern.  As her comments went on, groans and "oh!"s resounded.  This shook Jill.  Her stance as she began her speech was extremely confident, as she had every right to be.  But as the rest of us responded negatively to each of her nasty comments, I saw her falter in her speech.  What began with loud assertion, ended with a quiet, unsure, shaky speech.  She read the speech she had written through to the end, and did not alter it, despite our reaction.  But I am certain that as she finished, she could not help but see that none of us were looking anymore at her.  We were all looking at Sally, with concern, and with compassion.
       As Jill sat down, the next thing I saw was everyone's erasers on their ballots.  Sally won that vote by a landslide.  And Jill's popularity from that moment on was never anywhere near what it had been before.  We all voted against meanness, against cruelty, and against that kind of attack.  We expected our leaders to be community builders, community players.  We voted in people who would care about the well being of even their opponents because we knew that that would reflect how they would treat each of us, how they would respond to our wishes for the Band.  Or, to be more accurate in this case, we voted against someone who was so self-focused and self-aggrandizing that they were willing to be cruel even to their best friend to try to get what they wanted.
       Unfortunately, this election does not seem to mirror the choices of our country.  Instead, studies show that the mudslinging campaigns of attack on one another WORK.  Usually, the person who does the most cruel (and often libelous) attacking of his/her competition wins in our bigger elections.  These candidates avoid saying how they really feel about anything, and so people assume these folk are on the same page in terms of values.  We hear from these candidates what is wrong with everyone else and that works to sway votes away those they are slamming, even when the things they say are lies, even when there is not a hint of truth in them.  We vote in those who are best at cruelty, lying, and vicious attacks.  Is that really what we want for the leadership or our country?  
       I recently was in a conversation with someone who is my political opposite.  I heard him say in light of the terrible way our politicians are treating everyone, are speaking about everyone, are attacking those they are running against, even on the same general "side," that he would choose to vote in this upcoming election for anyone who did not behave in this horrible way.  He would vote for the first person who chose, in their campaign, to speak about what they valued, what they wanted, and what they believed, rather than speaking only to attack everyone else.  And for the first time in our history together, I found myself on the same page as him.
      I am deeply dismayed by what has been happening in our country, the policies that are so cruel, the hatred of anyone who is different from us, the constant villainization of the "other".  I think that all of that is both a reflection of the very way in which people talk about and to one another these days, and it is condoning, and affirming this horrible way of treating each other on a day to day basis.       There is a Sweet Honey in the Rock song based on a Chinese proverb that basically says that what you are at heart is reflected in your small actions that reflect into the larger attitudes and actions of the family, then the nation, then the world.  We have forgotten this wisdom, this truth.
    The bottom line:
         If we want our world to be better, it has to begin with the ways we treat one another now, here, today.  If we want our world to be better, we have to be kind to one another.  But more, we must affirm kindness and expect kindness from our leaders.  When we not only tolerate but condone and affirm cruelty from our leaders by our votes in reaction to their campaigns, what kind of naivete is it that expects that their intolerably vicious behavior will not then be aimed towards all of us in their policies, in their practices?  Personally, I've had enough.  I won't support that in any way.  I can't.  I'm voting for compassion this year.  I'm voting for kindness.  I'm voting for Love.

Sermon - for All the Saints/ Pre-election

Psalm 149

Luke 6:20-31

            Today we celebrate All Saints day.  And in that, it is a time of remembering, it is a joint, church-wide celebration of the lives of those who have gone before, a rejoicing that those who have passed are with God, a reminder of the vast gifts their lives have given and passed to us, and, honestly, an invitation to be open once more with our grief at the loss of those we have loved.  But most of all, All Saints Day is a reminder that in God, we have nothing to fear.  Even death has been overcome, our Saints, our loved ones live on.  We celebrate their continued living with God this day.  And we celebrate that as we are called to live bravely, with only love and faith as our shield and fortress, we will follow God’s will most closely when we can let go of our fear. For as Yoda said it, fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate, and hate leads to suffering.  We’ve seen exactly how true that is over the last few months and as we edge towards Tuesday.  This is the most fear driven election I have ever witnessed.  And in that, in that it is a fear driven election, it is also the least Godly that I have ever witnessed. 

            But it is in the midst of this angst that we are experiencing as a country, this fear that we feel as Tuesday approaches, that we are reminded that we have nothing to fear, not only by the declarations of the angels, “Be not afraid!” but by the celebration of All Saints Day itself.  I don’t say this with levity.  I need to be clear about that.  I am not saying it is an easy thing to put aside our fear and choose love.  It isn’t.  It’s the hardest thing in the world to do, especially when it comes to the fear of death.  As part of my job I have had the deep privilege and honor of walking with people in their last weeks and last days.  And it is common for even people of the deepest faith to have fear as they approach the unknown that is death.  We feel that fear from both places: both feeling afraid of our own deaths, but also the place of fearing the loss of those we love.  Last night at the Chromatica concert that took place here, there were two pieces that really “got” to me in the way of moving me to have a hard time not weeping as I listened.  The first was one of the “Children’s Letters to God” in which the child asked what it was like when you die and then said he/she didn’t want to.  In the middle of it was the noise of the question coming from many voices all being raised to God at the same time (or at least that was my interpretation).  And I felt it.  I felt the fear that even our children, perhaps especially our children, have of death.  A fear that is so intense, so real, so DEEP that it influences and guides so many of our decisions.  The second was Eric Clapton’s Tears in Heaven, which I had never before known was written for his child who had died at the age of four.  Just that realization was beyond me.  I know some of you have lost children.  And I tell you, the fact that you continue on each day shows to me an amazing strength.  I’ve been through a lot, but I do not know how a person walks through the loss of a child.  And the terror of that, the terror of my children dying is overwhelming for me. The terror of my kids being hurt and in particular right now, honestly, of my girls being treated as less than fully human, of being molested, attacked, abused because of their gender terrifies me. I will own that many of my decisions, therefore also come from a fear that stems out of very specific love for very specific people, rather than being based on the love for all people that we are told must be the heart of all we are, including our decisions.

            But again, here we are on All Saints Day.  And we are called to remember that those who pass are with God.  We stand on the angels proclamation to “do not be afraid” again and again.  We lean on scriptures that tell us that the only thing we are called to do: the great commandments we are called to live by are loving God and loving all those we encounter.  ALL those we encounter.  The heart of what I am saying is this: Love is supposed to make our decisions for us, not fear. 

            Today’s passage from Luke reminds us that in the face of all of our loss and grief there is comfort.  We are also reminded that what we believe to be true will be turned on its head.  Once more we are told it is the poor who are rich, the hungry who will be made full, the grieving who will be comforted, and the weeping who will laugh.  When we rest in God, even when we are in pain, even when we are struggling, we will find what we need, we will find the hope, the peace, the laughter, the comfort.  Therefore we do not have to fear doing what God asks us to do: loving others, giving to others, sharing with others, welcoming others.  Because it is in our sharing and giving only that we will find we have enough.  It is in our loving that we will find ourselves loved.  It is in our seeing each other human being as a child of God that we will come to know ourselves as children of God.  We know that nothing stays the same, and that God is the God of change.  We also know that our faith boosts us up and keeps us strong no matter what we are going through, what we are feeling.  God stands with us when we are down, and God strengthens us for the times to come when we are joyful.

Death is scary.  Death creates loss and pain for us.  But this year especially as we look at the election about to take place in two days, as we see a country torn with fear, anger, and hatred, we must, as we look at death, the most feared thing there is, especially, rest in the truth that our faith teaches us we do not have to be afraid.  The bottom line in everything is to choose love over hate, choose hope over fear, and choose compassion over judgment.  We are never called to see others as anything besides our brothers and sisters.  We are called to love even those we consider enemies.  Always.

So on this, All Saints Day, and also “two days before election” day, I have two charges for you. First, be of comfort.  Know that God is with the Saints and that God is with you.  Know that as we rest in God, our fears will be eased, our struggles will be made into something good, and our pain will be transformed into life.

But second, do not vote out of fear, or anger or, worst of all, hate. Do not live out of fear, anger or hate.  If All Saints day is about anything, it is about trusting that as the Saints live on, we, too can live as God calls us to live, with love, with trust, with hope and with compassion. 

I want to share with you two writings. 

The first is a poem by W.H. Auden called “Better Fears”

O God

it is so easy

to be afraid

to be made afraid.

Demagogues of every sort

have always counted on our fears

to scare us into submission.

Politicians and preachers

commissars and evangelists

make people afraid—

afraid of what will happen to them

afraid of death

and therefore of life

afraid of differences

strangers

joy.

The fearmongers are so successful

because they find in us

such willing subjects.

But the gospel of perfect love

comes to us

to cast out fear—

from our beginning.

Some of us

have never affirmed

our first birth—

have never said 'Good!' to our emergence

'Very good!' to our creation.

Be midwife to our self-respect

and mother to our growth.

Perfect love

will cast out fear

and when You are through with us

we will be fearless.

  

in the mean time

at least help us

to move from petty fears

to better ones;

from fears of hell

to admissions of joylessness;

from quaking before opinions and modes and fashions

to fearing

loss of our integrity

and untruth in our very souls.

We would say 'Bravo!'

to

our birth

our re-birth

Your will that created us

our choice to be

and to become.

amen.

Let go of fear.  Remember that the thing that is most feared, death, ends with life.  God is with us, making those we have loved, those we love still, into the Saints that remind us of the value of living but also the value of remembering what they have been, what they have given us, who we are called to be.

This second poem I want to share with you is called “life Unbroken”. It was written by Harry Scott-Holland in 1910.

Death is nothing at all.
It does not count.
I have only slipped away into the next room. 

Nothing has happened.

Everything remains exactly as it was.
I am I, and you are you,
and the old life that we lived so fondly together is untouched, unchanged.
Whatever we were to each other, that we are still.

Call me by the old familiar name.
Speak of me in the easy way which you always used.
Put no difference into your tone.
Wear no forced air of solemnity or sorrow.

Laugh as we always laughed at the little jokes that we enjoyed together.
Play, smile, think of me, pray for me.
Let my name be ever the household word that it always was.
Let it be spoken without an effort, without the ghost of a shadow upon it.

Life means all that it ever meant.
It is the same as it ever was.
There is absolute and unbroken continuity.
What is this death but a negligible accident?

Why should I be out of mind because I am out of sight?
I am but waiting for you, for an interval,
somewhere very near,
just round the corner.

All is well.
Nothing is hurt; nothing is lost.
One brief moment and all will be as it was before.
How we shall laugh at the trouble of parting when we meet again!

We can feel safe in the assurance that our loved ones still exist, that they are with God, that our love for them still matters, and their love for us is endless.  We honor the Saints by living in the love God calls us to extend to all creation.  Amen.