Sermon, Sunday, January 23, 2010 - Week of Prayer for Christian Unity

“On Civility and Unity”, A Sermon preached by the Rev. Canon Dr. C. Denise Yarbrough on Sunday, January 23, 2011 at Church of the Ascension, Rochester, NY

Now I appeal to you, brothers and sisters, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you be in agreement and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be united in the same mind and the same purpose. ¹¹For it has been reported to me by Chloe’s people that there are quarrels among you, my brothers and sisters. (1 Cor. 1:10-11)

This coming Tuesday evening President Obama will give his annual State of the Union Address. This is usually a case study in political theater, with member of each political party seated together, and as far from their political opponents as possible, and with each party engaging in loud applause and standing ovations at opposite points in the address, accentuating their differences. This year, two Senators have taken a bold step to address the increasingly ugly and vicious rhetoric that has become the staple of politics in this country. Sen. Charles Schumer, one of our New York senators and a Democrat, and Sen. Tom Coburn, a Republican, have agreed to sit next to each other at the State of the Union address and have invited others in Congress to follow their lead. They want to make a statement about the importance of civility in the midst of difference. They want to emphasize the reality that people of widely divergent and differing opinions can live together peacefully and even work together for the common good, in spite of their differences.

The inability of human beings to find ways to honor the differences among them, whether those differences be political or religious has been evident since the dawn of time. One would hope that people of faith would be a little better at treating one another with dignity, understanding that politics is by definition a rather dirty business, but alas, most religious institutions throughout history have fallen prey to the same angry rhetoric and vilification of those who differ from them as any secular institution. This week, as churches throughout the world observe The Week of Prayer for Christian Unity, we are reminded of the sad reality that our Christian churches are split and divided on doctrinal, liturgical and social issues, thus tearing the Body of the Risen Christ to pieces, particularly when we make those differences the basis for speech and actions that do not respect the dignity of every human being. Apparently, in the history of Christianity, it was ever thus.

This morning we got our second of what will be seven installments of Epistle readings from Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians. When reading Paul it is important to remember that we are eaves-dropping on a conversation, opening someone else’s mail as we encounter texts that often make little sense, referring as they do to incidents and circumstances about which the original recipients of the letter were privy, but that we know little or nothing about. One thing is clear in the Corinthian correspondence, and that is that the church in Corinth, that Paul had founded, was undergoing considerable strife and division. Considering that this letter was written around the year 57 CE, we are talking very early in Christian history, a mere 25 years or so after Jesus’ death and resurrection and ascension. It didn’t take long for the emerging early church to find itself embroiled in arguments and disagreements over issues of authority. And sadly, the arguments over issues of authority never really went away in Christian history, as the 11^th century split between Eastern Orthodoxy and Western Catholicism and the fracturing that happened during the 16^th century Protestant Reformation bear witness.

During the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity, Christians throughout the world are called to pray for one another and to reflect upon how we can serve the world in Christ’s name even with the differences that persist between and amongst us. The World Council of Churches and the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity establish a theme and prepare worship materials every year for the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity. This year’s theme is grounded in the statement from Acts 2 – “They devoted themselves to the apostle’s teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers.” (Acts 2:42) While the many denominations within Christianity live out those four basic elements of Christian life differently, all Christians throughout the world share a commitment to the Apostle’s teaching, as found in our Scripture, to fellowship, i.e. coming together in community to worship, pray, and serve the world in Christ’s name, to some form of Eucharist, whether it be called Mass or Holy Communion, or Holy Eucharist, or the Lord’s Supper, and to prayer, whether formal and proscribed like our Book of Common Prayer, or extemporaneous and boisterous, as in a Pentecostal church, or the silent circle of a Quaker meeting.

The Christian Churches in Jerusalem prepared the materials for this year’s observation of the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity. They call us to look back to the earliest church in Jerusalem as a model for how we live together today as Christians who are diverse in worship style, doctrinal emphases, and sense of mission. They remind us that on the day of Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit descended upon the apostles people of many races, nationalities and languages were there and were able to hear the gospel in their own tongue. Diversity has always been a hallmark of the Christian community. Unity, for which we ardently pray, does not mean uniformity. It is quite possible for us to continue to have different worship styles, different emphases in doctrine, different priorities in the way we live out our Christian life, so long as we treat one another with respect and allow ourselves to see the face of Christ in all our Christian brothers and sisters who do things differently than we do.

In former times, the divisions in the church tended to be doctrinal, giving birth to the multitude of denominations that currently make up the Christian world. Today, the real differences seem to be along the lines that divide so called “liberals” from “conservatives”, “evangelicals” from “mainline.” Whatever the dividing line, it is critical that we learn to respect one another and to understand those Christians who differ from us to be people from whom we might learn something about the God in Christ whom we all love and worship. I teach in a seminary that is ecumenical and I often encounter students who are much more conservative than I am and who stand in completely different places within the Christian tradition with respect to many issues that matter to me. I have learned in teaching in that setting that I can grow in my Christian life more profoundly as I encounter those differences, finding beneath the surface distinctions a fundamental similarity in commitment to God in Christ and faithfulness to the gospel message to love God and love neighbor. My conservative students have taught me just as much as I have taught them and we have all benefited from getting away from labels and stereotypes and learning to build relationships across our differences.

If Christian churches throughout the world are ever to be a beacon of the gospel to a world torn by violence, and meanness and just plain ugly incivility, we will have to learn to bridge the differences in our own house. This week I was reading a book on Hindu Dharma, by Mahatma Gandhi and was humbled to read his statement to the effect that having read the Bible and studied Christian teachings, he believed the Christian religion to be a wonderful religion. He only wished the adherents of the religion would actually live out its teachings and precepts. He said, “I like your Christ. I do not like your Christians. They are so unlike your Christ.” When I was in Australia last year at the Council for the Parliament of the World’s Religions, I met an aborigine named Bob Randall who had been one of the lost generation of Australian aboriginal children who were taken from their families and tribes and shipped off to Christian missionary schools during the early decades of the 20^th century. He reported that as he was learning English from the Christian missionaries, who used the New Testament as their lesson book, he couldn’t understand why they weren’t living out the basic teachings of Jesus as contained in the gospels even as they were shoving their religion down his throat all the while decimating his people and their culture.

The church has long struggled to be a bearer of the gospel to a world that does not always embody the values of the gospel. The church at its best speaks truth to power in cultures where secular values and civil behaviors do not bespeak the love of God and of neighbor that is fundamental to Christian life. The problem for the institutional church is that it has too often absorbed the very un-Christian values of the secular culture of which it is a part, whether those be the values of empire during the era of Constantine, or the feudal culture of the medieval period, or the industrial and corporate culture of the modern era. Today, we live in a world where incivility and disrespect breeds a contempt for life that normalizes the kind of violence that erupted in Tucson two weeks ago, not to mention rampant bullying in our schools and in cyberspace, hate crimes and all manner of mean and dangerous behavior. But at our best, we do better than that, and therein lies the hope. Our Christian values call us to respect the dignity of every human being, to love God and love our neighbor and to do so actively as we live our daily lives. Mark Shields, a reporter on the PBS newshour, commenting on the Tucson tragedy, said,

This is America, where a white Catholic male Republican judge was murdered on his way to greet a Democratic Jewish woman member of Congress, who was his friend. Her life was saved initially by a 20-year old Mexican-American gay college student, and eventually by a Korean-American combat surgeon, all eulogized by our African American President.

This is the diverse and pluralistic world in which we live and in which we must find “unity” in the midst of the diversity. As we observe the week of prayer for Christian unity, let us live out the spirit of Christian unity in the midst of diversity, and embody civility and respect in church, neighborhood, workplace and yes, even politics. Let us all take the pledge that the Progressive Christian Evangelical group Sojourners has called for Christians to affirm as a witness to our larger culture. That pledge is as follows:

"We pledge to God and to each other that we will lead by example in a country where civil discourse and peacemaking are rare. We will work to model a better way in how we treat each other in our many communities, across religious and political lines."

St. Paul called the Christians in Corinth to stop quarreling and to be united in the same mind and the same purpose. That call echoes across the centuries to we Christians in Rochester, New York, and to our brothers and sisters in Jerusalem, in Africa, Latin America, Asia and around the globe. Love God, love your neighbor and grow into the full stature of Christ. Amen.