Readings (click here for full text of the readings):
   Exodus 20:1-17; Psalm 19:7-14; Romans 7:13-25; John 2:13-22

I woke up last Thursday morning, and heavy clouds hung in the sky, from one horizon to the other. The days of sunshine and promises of spring were past. The nice little sermon that I’d put together on keeping the Sabbath holy and what that meant – that sermon was out of date, irrelevant.

I woke early that morning, and lay awake in bed for a while. Pam and I had offered Catie yet another chance to sleep in her crib, and she had, once again, loudly refused.  But she was more than happy to sleep soundly in our bed, nestled in between us, the safest place in the world.  As I lay next to her, I thought about that. I wished that I could remember that sensation – of being so small, and sleeping peacefully in the midst of two big, full-size people who loved me more than life itself.  Of not knowing what time it was – or even what the word “time” meant – and of not knowing what “war” meant, let alone that one was going on outside, far away.

And I thought of the joy that Catie has brought to our lives.  The joy that children bring to the lives of their parents, in the days when children are innocent in all senses of that word. Innocent of any apparent wrongdoing, as the no-no-no of the terrible two’s is still a ways off, let alone the rebellion of adolescence.  And innocent of the real world that goes on its merciless way outside, where people kill other people, and we forget that we were meant to wake up in the morning next to the people we love, and live long enough to fall asleep next to them that night.

We awoke in Vergennes, with all of its quaint, small-town New England charm, far away from the potential target cities in our country where a change in alert status from yellow to orange really means something.  Speaking as someone who woke up in downtown Manhattan on September 12^th, 2001, I can tell you that it feels different here. There may well be fear, but it is fear for other people, or for the world in general, the world whose tendrils of hate and destruction may one day reach idyllic Vergennes. I know a little bit about fear for myself and the people I love most in the world who sleep on, reluctant to wake and see what curses this day holds for them, for all of us.

And I imagined how a father of a three-month-old daughter might feel if he woke in Baghdad that same morning, to the sounds of exploding bombs and whirring missiles and crackling anti-aircraft guns.  He would probably look at the beautiful new person who lay next to him, peaceful, oblivious to the horrors that lay outside, not even alive on September 11^th, when life in this country changed, and which set the wheels in motion for the war that we know today.  And he would feel utterly helpless, unable to protect the child he loved beyond measure from the forces that were so big and strong and indiscriminate and uncaring.  He would gladly give his life to save his daughter – in a heartbeat – but he just doesn’t know how.

I prayed for him that morning, and every morning since.  I don’t know his name – he probably has many.  Add to him the fathers of children older and younger, and the fathers-to-be, and those who were never to be fathers either by choice or circumstance or gender – and there are thousands upon thousands to pray for.  I am innocent, and safe, and a citizen of the country that bombards their nation with tools of destruction. They are innocent, and on the edge of life, and citizens of a country whose leader cares for them less than the heartless bombs that litter the sky do.

Our task this morning is to understand the events of this week in theological terms. Let the politicians do their political analysis, and the economists look at the financial implications.  We are in God’s house, so what does God say about this?

First and foremost, God weeps. His children are dying, at the hands of their brothers and sisters. The divine response to violence is always sorrow.

Second, we could fall back on the Old Testament pattern of challenge in times of prosperity, and comfort in times of deprivation. Over and over in the Hebrew Bible, when the people of Israel were free, and powerful, and wealthy, the prophets warned them not to be complacent, not to fall into bad habits, not to abandon right worship of the Lord our God. For if they did not repent of their evil ways, judgment would befall them. But when that judgment did come upon them, and they were cast into poverty and slavery and homelessness, the message of the prophets immediately changed.  God was no longer judge; He was redeemer. Threats of divine abandonment were replaced by promises of eternal welcome.

The message of God went from “if you don’t, then …” to “now that you have, I’ll …” Jesus did the same thing, for He preached deprivation to the well-off, and riches to the poor. In the prophetic words of the Song of Mary: “He has cast down the mighty from their thrones, and has lifted up the lowly.”  So do we have the right, now, to make the same leap?  If a week ago God was saying to us, as some proclaimed He was, that we shouldn’t resort to violence because that was contrary to His will, is God now saying to us, as we are in the midst of war and the horrors that come with it, that He will always stand by us?  Can we presume to make the leap the prophets of old did, from judgment to promise, from caution to exhortation?

We cannot. For we remain the enthroned, the safe, the sheltered, the wealthy. The war indeed touches all of us, often to the core of our being. Our hearts go out to the parents of infants who lie in bed, waiting for a bomb to destroy their home and their children. We walk beside loved ones who are in the armed forces, or who live in parts of the world that might directly be touched by the war or retaliations for it. But we are not in Iraq.  Thousands of missiles, designed to “shock and awe” the people into submission by their sheer number and might, are not aimed at our nation, our state, our city, our homes. We dare not trust in the hopeful promises of the later prophets.  They are not meant for us – they are meant for the poor in spirit, the innocent victims of violence, the children of God who lie in the path of the most frightful war machine humanity has ever had the pride to create.

Third, we must recognize that we are Christians. That means we follow Christ. We are children of God, created in God’s image, given stewardship over this world that God has made.  That is who we are – that is our essence.  We may happen to be male, or female.  Old or young. Vermonter or flatlander. These are incidental qualities that have nothing to do with our basic identity.  We are Christians first and last. The fact that we live in Vergennes and not in Baghdad is a matter of fate, fortune, chance – call it what you will. 

And so it is that I’m more troubled than ever before that we display an American flag in this sanctuary. I’m an American citizen – I neither deny it, nor regret it.  I don’t overlook the freedoms that this country offers to its citizens, and the noble part America has played in the world in the last hundred years. I am usually proud to be an American – not today, but usually.

I suppose it all depends on what we mean by that flag. If it’s a sign that our thoughts and prayers go out to the quarter of a million brave American souls who are following orders and putting their lives on the line for something they believe in – then I embrace the flag. But if it means that our thoughts and prayers only go out to them, then we are wrong, and full of sin.  For our thoughts and prayers must go out to all the souls whose lives are imperiled by this war, regardless of nationality, regardless of role, regardless of innocence.  For we are all sinners. We are all children of God, even Saddam Hussein, the murderous dictator who is loved by God, if by no one else. 

In the end, it’s a question of what we mean by us and them, by ours and theirs.  Each week at the Eucharist we hear the words of Jesus: “This is my Blood of the new Covenant, which is shed for you and for many for the forgiveness of sins.”  We are the “you” that Jesus was talking about – we are His people, and He is our shepherd, and we recognize His voice when He calls us by name. But who are “the many” Jesus speaks of?  They are other people who may not know His name. Or if they do know it, they might not pay much attention to it.  Or they might curse it, because they associate it with persecution and colonialism. Jesus offered Himself as “a perfect sacrifice for the whole world,” which extends beyond our national boundaries, to the whole world, to all persons, in all times.

And what of “ours” and “theirs”? I drove by the Baptist church on Route 7 rather late on Wednesday night, around the time the bombs started to fall on Baghdad, and their sign read: “Pray for our troops, and our nation.” I can’t say exactly what they meant by that, but I do know what we must take it to mean. In Christ there is no East or West, no North or South. No American or Iraqi.  No Christian or Muslim. No ours or theirs. Everyone is His, Christ’s, and therefore also ours. “Our troops” are the children of God who are ordered to fight. The people of “our nation” are those created in God’s image, regardless of ethnicity or religion or citizenship. We must walk very carefully when we talk of “us” and “them,” of “ours” and “theirs,” because in Christ there is only “us” and “ours.” There is no “them” and “theirs.”

And, finally, we return to the Ten Commandments. Preaching a polite sermon on the Sabbath wasn’t possible on a day such as this. But the Ten Commandments apply to all times and all places, and today the commandment we must remember is not so much the one about keeping the Sabbath holy, but rather the one before it that says: “You shall not make wrongful use of the name of the Lord your God, for the Lord will not acquit anyone who misuses his name.”  Other translations state it more clearly, saying that the Lord “will punish” anyone who misuses his name.

If we take this commandment seriously, we convict ourselves. For in this country we use a lot of God language. Each president seems to end every speech with “God bless America.” And our current president proclaims his faith more boldly than any who preceded him. But we must wonder: If faith plays such a role in the decisions our president makes, why has he refused to meet with ecumenical Christian leaders who have requested, politely and otherwise, just a few moments of his time? And why does every Christian denomination save one formally oppose war with Iraq at the present time, if it’s really God’s will?

Some argue that religion has little place in politics. If so, then Christianity has no business in the halls of political power, and decisions can be made based on political science or foreign policies or notions of a superpower’s responsibilities. If so, then call declarations of war what they really are – political decisions – but don’t go looking for a divine stamp approval, because there just isn’t one.

For if Christianity is more than what we do on Sundays, if God asks more of us than lip service and passive obedience, then we must proclaim in our words and in our actions that God is not in favor of this war.  That is beyond dispute; it is not a matter of opinion.  God’s response to this war is not one of approval, or apathy, or resignation, but profound sorrow. The tears of God flow freely this day, as His children kill each other in His name. To say that God favors this war is to “make wrongful use of the name of the Lord your God,” and all who dare do so would do well to remember that the Lord has promised to punish anyone who misuses His name.

As Christians, we are resurrection people. Even in the dark days of Lent and war, we are people of hope, looking forward to the coming of the risen Christ, the Prince of Peace.  And even as dark clouds obscure the warmth of the sun, and the future is vague and threatening, we can know two things for certain. First, Christ is risen.  And, second, He isn’t here. He’s over there. For Christ tends to His children in need, wherever they are. He was with Pam and me and the rest of New York City on September 11^th.  But this morning He’s in Baghdad, standing watch over a father and a mother and a child, who huddle together in a bed, listening to the bombs fall from the sky, waiting for the one that will tear them limb from limb, one from another, in the name of God.

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