Commencement
Sermon
Episcopal
Theological Seminary of the Southwest
May 19, 1998
Church of the
Good Shepherd, Austin,
Texas
William
C. Spong, Professor of Pastoral Theology
(copyright 1998)
“To bring the news of the boundless riches of
Christ, and to make everyone see what is the plan of the mystery
hidden for ages in God, who created all things; so that through
the Church, the wisdom of God in its rich variety might now
be made known to the rulers and authorities, which was in accordance
with the eternal purpose carried out in Christ Jesus our Lord.......”
The
South African novelist Alan Paton
told a story of a young man, white of color, who lived in South
Africa in the large
city of Johannesburg.
It was a city where the 10% whites controlled the 90% blacks.
It was fear of the few for the many, fear of the many for the
few. The young man’s father was a leader in the community and
in his church: powerful, wealthy, and influential. He was also
a worshipper in his church on a regular basis. The young man
believed that apartheid was wrong, and it was unchristian, and
it was unscriptural. It was at a time that had no patience for
such a belief. The father resented his son, and implored him
in the name of God himself to set aside such radical beliefs.
He longed for him to return to the more sane ways of controlling
Johannesburg.
One night the son sat alone in his writer’s garret and began
to write the following:
“The truth is that our Christian civilization
is riddled through and through with dilemma. We believe that
men and women are children
of God, regardless of whom they might be, but we do not want
it for South
Africa. We believe
that God endows all people with diverse gifts and that life
depends for its fullness on their employment and enjoyment,
but we are afraid to explore this belief too deeply. We believe
in help for the underdog, but we want the underdog to stay under...and
we are therefore compelled, in order to preserve our belief
that we are Christian, to ascribe to God, creator of heaven
and earth, our own human intentions, and to say that God created
black, white, free, enslaved, marginalized, for a reason. That
one race hews wood in order that another race might drink. We
go so far as to assume that God blesses any action that is designed
to prevent the marginal ones from the full employment of the
gifts that God gave them.”
Alongside of these very arguments we
use others totally inconsistent. We say we withhold education
because blacks can not profit by it; we withhold opportunity
to develop gifts because black people have no gifts;
we justify our actions by saying that it took
thousands of years to achieve our own advancement, and it would
be foolish to suppose that it will take the black person any
lesser time, and therefore there is no need to hurry. We shift
our ground again and again when a black person does achieve
something remarkable, and feel deep pity for one who is condemned
to the loneliness of being remarkable,
and decide that it is Christian kindness not to
let black people become remarkable. Thus even God becomes a
confused and inconsistent creature: giving gifts and denying their employment. Is
it strange then that our civilization is riddled through and
through with dilemma? The truth is that our civilization is
not Christian; it is a tragic compound of great ideals
and fearful practice, or high assurance and desperate anxiety; of loving charity and the fearful clutching
of possessions: This is mine and I will not part with it.
So it was that the Diocese of North
Carolina in 1961 debated long and hard whether to allow little
black boys (girls were not even considered) to go to Camp Vade
Mecum, its diocesan conference center. It was in 1954 when the
Supreme Court, those nine servants dressed in the ecclesiastical
robes of government, and adhering to the constitution as their
sacred text, declared that willful separation of people of color
was wrong. Taking our cue from these Holy Ones in the black
robes of justice, the Church began to write a theology of race.
African American men and women had more confidence in the courts
to act upon what was right than they had in the church, and
that feeling largely remains the same. The Church in those days
was too afraid until the courts said it was okay and the law
of the land. So it was that the North Carolina Council set about
to decide whether black children could go to Camp Vade
Mecum (meaning “come with me”). There was a lot of hatred, pledges
were restricted or eliminated, clergy were set apart, gossip
abounded. The vote passed but the new order filled the church
with anxiety and suspicion. The first ebbing of those previously
held certainties began to fall. They would fall again and again.
The Bishop, Richard Henry Baker, happy
to have made it through the bitterness and terror of that Diocesan
Council, spoke to the delegates. He said:
This is a great day for the Diocese of North Carolina.
I would like to propose that we stand and sing the doxology
and then let us prepare the altar and celebrate the Eucharist
because we were dead and are alive again, lost and are found.
There was a man whose name was Roscoe
Batts, a junior high school principal,
and the senior warden of Holy Hope Church in Rocky
Mount, North
Carolina, a small congregation
of African American Christians, who asked permission to speak,
and the Council became deadly silent. He said:
“Reverend Father in God, my brothers and sisters in Christ
Jesus. This is a great day for our diocese that our children
can now go to Camp Vade Mecum and play with the other children, and it is also
good that we are about to eat the bread and to drink the cup
together and that will be a happy experience, but ladies and
gentlemen of this Council, it is no victory to go to communion
when we can not eat a hamburger and drink a shake together,
or that you cannot do that at your family table with me. There
can be no sacrament on the altar when there is no sacrament
in our homes, on our streets, in our schools and churches, and
that is the only test for a sacrament.” He said:
“there is confusion in the hearts of people when they
hear the Gospel being proclaimed on one hand that does not promote
increased love and charity to every child of God on the other.
We can never become a community of faith until every child can
be held up, with grace and integrity, without passing the test
of those who stand in the role of dominance”. He said: “you
and I can never solve the sacramental mystery of life unless
we can speak intimately for one hour, together, without mentioning
the word ‘race.’ The Gospel of Jesus simply can not tolerate
anything less.” Roscoe
Batts sat down. Something happened. Gospel from the mouth of a junior high school
principal, I think so.
After that seminal council and moment,
my rector at Saint Peter’s Church in Charlotte, North Carolina,
keeping his hand firmly on the pulses of the congregation, and
especially the large givers and those with influence, and fearing
anything that would keep his people from loving him, preached
on the following Sunday. His sermon was an emotional piece designed
to offset the “foolishness” of the Diocesan Council.
He called for gradualism and waiting
and time. He exploited with fear and threats of miscegenation,
mongrelization, and matters of that type. He talked about
blue birds and red birds, and trees as dwelling places of separation
and division. He said things like you can not legislate
morals. He ascribed to God the divisions of race and culture
that were currently in place, and he asked God to preserve the
Church and society, and to save and protect it from these communist
radicals that dared to change things. It was the rhetoric of
the time, and people were often afraid of religious persons
who dressed in robes and preached a message of hate.
Five members of the vestry of that
church asked to meet with Henry Egger, the rector. He looked
forward to the meeting, expecting them to be proud of him since
he had pleased them. It was a peculiar moment. They said:
Henry, I believe it is fair to say that all of us here
are segregationists, we are afraid of integration, we have no
experience in racial equality, we are
terribly uncomfortable. We believe our way of life is the American
way. But Henry, even though we believe that and it accords with
our thoughts, don’t tell us that it is of God, because we know better. It
is a matter of shame for us and the Gospel, and we are convicted
by that, but do not, Henry, do not tell us that our actions
are in Christ Jesus because we know they are not. For your sake
and for the sake of the Gospel, be a good priest, Henry, tell
us about God, do not sacrifice yourself
to social convention and political expediency. God’s love for
his children surely helps us to know that.
Gospel from the conservative voices of five vestry members
of the Church, I think so.
We are at a similar time. Harry Chapin,
the late folk singer, loved to say that our job was to keep
one foot in hope and the other in the dirty ways of the world,
and make no mistake about it, the ways of the world are dirty,
and those of us who are the guardians of this faith tradition
do not always have good insight as to what makes us comfortable
and what makes us courageous. Sometimes we ascribe to God our
own intentions and then rejoice at how similar we and God think.
But listen carefully: knowledge
of the heart of God is not within our capability. The bush is
still burning, and we are compelled to undertake a mission,
but we still have our shoes on.
And our Church is immobilized by the
rumblings. Conservatives are this, liberals are that. This group,
believing that it speaks the truth, sets itself apart from that
group, believing it speaks the truth. This group protects,
that group destroys. I’ve
found it, sorry about you. Argument
is not expected, dispute is not allowed.
People speak in code language to disguise a large measure
of exclusivity, designed to use the Gospel to preserve both
their security and their prejudice. People fail to realize that
much of their piety is at the expense of others. The Church
seems to be preoccupied with everything but a recognition that when it comes to the heart of God, we are
not authorities, and it is blasphemy to behave as though we
are so qualified. We speak of the decline of the Episcopal Church
as though this position will kill that position, but in the
act of making these claims, we continue to separate and divide
the body of Christ, and the body of Christ is wounded. Further,
we speak with such certainty about God, not realizing that certainty
about God is always a gateway to setting one group against another
and perpetuating prejudice. So people are afraid of those holding
power, and power is held more tightly for fear of losing it.
Some feel that the Church is so arbitrary in some of its decisions
and judgments, so secretive and uncompromising in its deliberations,
so cruel in its treatment of people, that if it were judged
by the same standards that judge IBM, Motorola, or the University
of Texas,
then the Church would be sued on a regular basis. And we become
more split, more divided, more splintered because we have lost
the vision that it is the Gospel and the Gospel alone that can
draw these fearful moments together. It was Peter Marshall who
once began a meeting of the United States Senate with prayer
when he said: O Lord,
help us to stand for something less we fall for everything!
The critical question is, what is the Gospel? Is it an old hackneyed word, or does
it still have power to inspire the
hearts of those to look to it with hope. What is the heart and
soul of our convictions about Christ that enables us to be children
of God. May I try?
It teaches us that while we were sinners,
Christ died for us, not when we had it all together. Perfection
is neither asked for nor required. That Jesus in his moment
of passion was abandoned by his best friends, that the same
crowds that sang Hosanna in the Highest, now say Crucify Him, without feeling disjointed or
confused. And Jesus, looking into the faces of everyone (Church
and State alike), says: Forgive
them because they don’t know nothing.
But you can not be forgiven unless you admit that you
are wrong, and if you never admit you are wrong, there is no
basis for forgiveness...that we do not have the perfect picture.
The Church and the nation are often alike:
neither can say “Forgive us, we made a mistake!”
Herbert O’Driskill once said:
we never capture the kingdom of heaven, only glimpses of it
and we can never be totally certain about a glimpse. Then the
two thieves, murderers, perverts, abusers, the woman at the
well, the one taken in adultery, Magdalene, the spit, agony
and the horror of prejudice as the outcast is nailed at Golgotha
to stop the truth he was uttering. And the outcast says:
“Today you will be with me in Paradise”
It is not what you do that makes me love you, it is who you
are...a child within my image...and the image of my father in
heaven. Seeing his mother, his friend, the ambivalence of that
relationship from Annunciation to Pentecost, he says:
Woman, behold your son, behold your mother.
This is no Davidic Messiah, we do not know what he is...we
can never be certain. This not knowing, this agnosticism, if
you will, is inevitable when we try to comprehend what God might
be. I thirst...the torture, the gore, the agony, the spit and
the decay of death.... It
is finished, into your hands I commend
my spirit. That’s the Gospel: God takes our very best shot and
loves us still. And we
are empowered to offer these things, and to offer them honestly:
That’s the Gospel. To quote the Hallmark card: God cared enough
to send the very best. To take Christ seriously is to take yourself
seriously, to live honestly, but also to take your behavior
seriously with every other human being; including those that
you believe, for whatever reason, are morally or culturally
unacceptable, and we know who they are, make no mistake about
it, we know who they are!
Incarnation is not only the Jesus gift.
For every child, from every place, of every persuasion, of every
color, habit or condition is in the image of God, Imago Dei,
flesh surrounding a spirit. You do
not reject anyone who is in God’s image -- no one.
Since, therefore, we do not have to
be perfect, we do not have to be right. And we do not have to
be embarrassed if we are wrong. We are, therefore, set free
to be servants for the good, not the prostitutes of being nice.
Never to interpret the Gospel for the sole
purpose of pleasing others.
The conclusion is simple. If God loves
me, then he must love you, and you, and you. Not just for some
but for everyone. God is not a God of hatred or reprisal. God
surely does not hate the poor, the Jew, the Buddhist, the
Iraqis, those who perpetrate evil and war on us, the prisoner,
or those who reject God, the pervert and those whose sexual
practices are different. The family of God may disappoint, may
hurt, may fight and kill, but that does not change their membership
in the family of God. In my father’s house are many mansions,
if it were not so I would have told you. “We may agree with
you, Henry, and your contentions may be at the point of our
fear, but do not, Henry, do not argue that this hatred is from
the heart of God, because we know better. We may agree with
your sentiments, but do not tell us it is of God, because I
have read my testament carefully and Jesus did not say these
things....” Do you remember that wonderful song sung by
Louis Armstrong when he said: “The colors of the rainbow so
pretty in the sky, are also on the faces of the people passing by... I see
friends shaking hands, saying how do you do, they’re really
saying I love you.” Gospel
from the heart of Satchmo, I think so.
And if our Church, that lovable and
deeply human institution within the heart of us all were to
try to rise to these new possibilities, where might that surge
of energy take us, and how would it feel, if translated into
new visions? May I try:
1.
God will be seen as
available to everyone, and not the special possession of the
religious institution. Worship will be less hierarchical and
more circular, more participatory and less dependent on the
control of clergy.
2.
It will not be denominational
and it will be less territorial. It will rejoice in the convictions
held by other faith traditions, with neither
a need or desire to make them conform to us.
3.
Just as it listens to
the story of God in Christ, and the record of Jesus’ life and
ministry, so also will it listen to the stories of every person,
recognizing the value and uniqueness of every human life.
4.
It will lay down the
kingly image and pretension. It will be moved more by God’s
mercy that it will be to perpetuate itself.
5.
It will find its voice
again to speak to the country, where the issues of drugs, abuse,
hatred, starvation, poverty, and corruption cover the landscape
of the soul of the nation, while the Church remains curiously
silent. If we can not speak, then who can, or who will. How
can they hear without a preacher, and how can they preach, except
they be sent.
6.
It will be moved by
its sacred scriptures as the record of those who lived before
us in faith, but it will not be bound by those portions of the
biblical record that demean, exclude, or limit any of God’s
children.
7.
It will recognize that
God’s revelations did not cease when the canon of scripture
was closed. It will remember that old hymn that states:
New occasions teach new duties, time makes ancient good
uncouth.
8.
It will not exist to
support that specialized activity called religion.
9.
It will honor and respect
all attempts to approach God... It will rid itself of prejudice
to Jews, Buddhists, Islamics, charismatics,
liberals, revivalists, women, renewal movements, intellectual
approaches to the Gospel, soup kitchens,
always looking for ways to bind us in common and never
harass anyone who in sincerity looks for a closer walk with
God.
10.
It will be a community
of faith with a commitment to the baptismal covenant, that wonderfully
hopeful document known for its mandate to tell the truth in
every transaction of life, personally and corporately, so that
it will develop a new relationship of considered and thoughtful
honesty in all of its mission. And
that such words as expediency, equivocation, conciliation, and
political shifting would leave its life, ministry and its vocabulary.
11.
And when at Eucharist
we pray “You made us the rulers of creation. But we turned against
you, and betrayed your trust, and we turned against one another” ..that we could hear that and mean that.
Gospel from the
heart of a Church....I think so.
The young man sitting silently in his
writer’s garret finished his thought in fear. He believes that
you can not survive in painful times by simply being nice, and
you run a horrible risk by being courageous.
That is the tension into which we dare to commit our lives.
He wrote the final benediction of his own life, and the final
refrain of this commencement address. He said:
in these painful moments the direction of my life seems
to become more clear than before. The
Gospel mandate is to tell the truth and not simply be led by
what seems popular. Therefore, I shall no longer ask myself
if this or that is expedient, but only if it is right. I shall
do this not because I am noble or unselfish but because life
slips away and because I need for the rest of my journey a star
that will not play false with me, a compass that will not lie.
I can not aspire to the highest with one part of myself and
to deny it with the other. And even though I shudder to apply
my dream or vision to God himself, fearing the consequence of
such a thought, nonetheless, I believe that it is in the midst
of my deepest human conviction that I am closest to God, and
when I am owned by the convention of local comfort, the furthest
away from the Gospel I am.
So we look to God with humility and
with the lack of certainty.
And we mourn the way things have become; in a world where
the major conversation in the past year is the president’s behavior;
where photographers stalk a royal princess for one more
picture, one more story; where two kids who just met
drown together in the trunk of a car in Austin, Texas, apprehended
by some other kids who were bored, or desperate; where a child
who has hardly learned to read, dresses in camouflage fatigues
and guns down his fellow students; where we put to death person
after person in Huntsville while the issues of violent crime
continue to escalate; where suicide of senior persons has reached
epic proportions (especially in rural America); where congregations
dismiss their clergy as never before in our history, often with
little redress of grievances; or when destructive gossip is
so rampant in Church life that we become authorities on the
lives of each other as surely as we are authorities about God.
Have we not reached the time when the nation and the Church
cry out for another way. Could it be
that we have more to offer than we ever imagined and can the
offering be more modeling and less insistence, more love and
less dogma, more tolerance and less finger pointing, more forgiveness
and greater candor, taking off our shoes because we are still
standing on holy ground. Is that not
the power and splendor of the Gospel! But to announce exactly
what God’s intentions are; to believe that we can speak with
authority for God in all matters, and then condemn those who
disagree with us; to do these things, to fall into these
traps, to advance ourselves to those levels of deity, is to
re-crucify the Son of God by our own contempt.
We can do better and we should. The imperatives of the Gospel are abundantly
clear, and far more clear to the wounded
persons in our society than they are to the Church itself. Many
people have come to believe that there is no home for them in
this house of worship, that Church is still the most segregated
hour in this country. And the Church loses its credibility. It does not need to be that way; it should not
be that way; it can not be that way, and each of us has an obligation
to Christ himself that it will not continue to be that way...
I have a colleague named Bill Adams
-- I believe he is behind me...it is always nice to have him
behind me. He teaches liturgics at our seminary. One should
be so lucky as to have a colleague like Bill Adams.
When he finishes his celebrations in the seminary chapel,
he is want to dismiss us with a benediction which
he wrote. It empowers the cry and desperation of the people
of God, seriously wounded, in our times. With thanks to him,
and love from each of us sitting in the chancel, having been
privileged to teach you, I would like to send you on your way
with his words:
