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Sermon preached by the Most Reverend Katharine Jefferts Schori
Presiding Bishop of The Episcopal Church
All Saints, Year C (RCL)
4 November 2007
St. Paul, Windsor, VT, 10 am
Love your enemies – whew! Who can do that? When this gospel comes up, I am more often reminded of the passage in Romans that says, “if your enemies are hungry, feed them; if they are thirsty, give them something to drink; for by doing this you will heap burning coals on their heads.” There is something immensely challenging about loving our enemies, and doing it with unmixed motives.
I am also often reminded of the Irish prayer that goes in the same direction:
May
those who love us, love us.
And those that don’t love us –
may God turn their hearts,
And if he doesn’t turn their hearts,
may he turn their ankles,
so we know them by their limping.
Most of us find it desperately difficult to let go of a wish that others might get what’s coming to them.
Jesus’ own words are a challenge about people we think are out to get us. Those images about turning the other cheek and giving your shirt as well as your coat are not as naïve as they sound. Jesus is not telling us to be doormats.
In the ancient world, the act of striking another person on the cheek was profoundly insulting, and it usually involved two persons in very unequal relationship – like a slave and his master. The slap was always done with the back of the hand, and the striker didn’t even have to look. If the slave turned his head to offer the other cheek, the master would have to strike with his open palm, and turn toward the one he was about to hit again. It turned the tables. Suddenly the striker had to recognize his victim as a fellow human being.
The image about taking away another person’s coat is an echo of a Jewish law that said a debt could be guaranteed by holding a person’s coat as collateral, but the coat had to be returned at sundown so that the debtor had something warm to sleep in. If the debtor is suddenly walking around with no shirt on either, the holder of the debt is seen to one and all to be an unrighteous person.
There are echoes today. I know a woman who went to Nigeria several years ago to visit the local communities in the Niger Delta, where foreign oil companies continue to extract resources and pollute the local environment. The soot, ash, and smoke are so bad that surrounding villages suffer extremely high rates of respiratory disease, the rivers and creeks are polluted by countless numbers of oil spills, the fish are too poisonous to eat, and no one from the government seems to care very much. Some women from the local villages took action. They marched down to the oil company offices and staged a sit-in. No one would talk to them. Finally they took off their shirts, which in that culture has the same kind of impact as Lady Godiva did in medieval England. Anyone who looks on the nakedness of a woman is profoundly shamed – and it’s not the woman who is shamed, but rather the unrighteous person she encounters. In this instance, it made a difference. The oil companies began to negotiate.
Jesus seems to encourage that kind of non-violent confrontation with our “enemies.” Those who will not do justice need to be confronted, but not in a way that heightens the conflict or exacerbates the violence. Jesus’ call to action in the face of profound injustice comes in a way that surprises and unsettles. Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr. learned their tactics from Jesus. When the wider world has a clear view of the violence being done to human beings and human relationships, outrage often ensues and change begins.
The tension we feel about loving our enemies can have some good and faithful roots. When we feel unjustly vilified or attacked, we yearn for justice. That hungering for righteousness is at the roots of the tradition that says, God IS on the side of the weak, God DOES plant a dream in us that all people should live in peace, with justice. That’s really what the blessings and curses in the first part of the gospel are all about. Blessed are you poor and hungry, for in God’s reign, you will be fed and made whole. Woe to you who are rich and full, for you’ve already got all you ever wanted – and guess what, it won’t last forever. What does have staying power is a community where all can live in peace with each other.
Living in peace means living in right relationship to God and our neighbors. Dealing justly with our enemies – loving them – has something to do with not bearing a grudge, but doing what we can to change unjust behavior. There are lots of us who would rather ignore an insult or injustice than confront the one who offers it. That may occasionally be appropriate, but long term it isn’t going to solve anything.
I remember a day a number of years ago when I was driving to the grocery store – in slushy and pretty awful road conditions. Somehow I ended up with an aggressive driver behind me. I don’t know what ticked him off, but he was riding my bumper and flashing his lights and honking his horn. It soon became clear that he wasn’t going away, so I drove 2 or 3 miles to the police station and into their parking lot. He came right after me. As an officer appeared, I drove over and explained what was happening. The officer told me he would keep the other driver there for a while to cool off, and invited me to go on my way. I was actually amazed that the other driver would follow me into the police station – I don’t know what he thought he was going to do.
The kind of behavior Jesus is talking about – striking others on the cheek or depriving them of their shelter – is bullying. It says that my desires are more important than anybody else or any sense of our fundamental equality. It is a profound dismissal of the image of God that each of us bears. It is a use of violence to dominate another. The question is how we are going to respond. Using violence in answer to that kind of behavior only makes it worse, it only escalates. Respecting the dignity of that other person means responding in a way that says, you may bear the image of God, but you’re not displaying it very effectively. I am not going to disrespect you and the image of God, but I will not participate in your violence.
I watched a similar encounter on an airplane a while ago that taught me something about engaging a violent person. I was sitting in the aisle seat, my husband in the middle, and another man by the window. I was reading something and not paying a lot of attention, but suddenly I realized that the fellow in the window seat had put down his things, folded up his table, and turned around to kneel on the seat. He bent over the top of his seat, and said quietly but forcefully to the man behind him, “I am really concerned about you. What’s wrong? You are pounding on the tray table so hard that my whole seat is shaking. Can I do anything to help?” Most of the encounters I see on airplanes are far more passive-aggressive. This fellow managed to express his concern and his desire for a change in disturbing behavior in a remarkably effective way.
We all have the ability to respond differently when we’re confronted with “enemy” behavior. It’s easier in the moment if we’ve thought about it, and even practiced it. Jesus asks us to love our neighbors, including the ones who treat us shamefully, but he doesn’t ask us to condone their bad behavior. He really asks us to confront it, which is a loving response. It asks the best of another person, it says, “I love you enough to encourage you to confront yourself.” That’s really what the line in Romans is about – our enemies heap coals on their own heads when we love them deeply. And they turn their own ankles if they don’t look out for the people around them. Part of our job is to help heal those burning heads and sore ankles – and maybe the soreheads, too.
