Signs and Wonderings

The following is adapted from two entries in my personal blog.


The sign in the photo above doesn't look like anything special, does it? Covered up as it is right now, with a plastic banner advertising the day school, it appears to be nothing but a commercial sign. But if you were to pull off that banner, and peel back layers of paint, you would find something very different. Pastor John R. Smith of St. Michael's calls it the "prophetic sign." The school banner will be down soon, and the prophetic sign will again broadcast its message to passersby.

If you've been reading my personal blog for a while, you may have noticed that I don't write about politics very much. Doing so properly would require a level of research I really don't have time for. And if I did write about it, someone would inevitably disagree with me. Then there would be arguments and harangues and debates, and I'd have to marshall even more facts for a follow-up entry, and...no. Sorry. It's not worth it to me. Now we can move on, to another subject I'm always nervous about covering - religion. And fair warning: politics are going to sneak in here a little bit, too.

About nine years ago, I decided that I was never going to figure out what I believed about God if I mostly ignored the subject outside of my nightly prayers. At the time I was reading non-fiction by Madeleine L'Engle, who for many years was writer-in-residence at an Episcopal cathedral in New York. The Episcopal / Anglican tradition came across in her work as pretty much everything I liked about the Roman Catholic Church, minus everything that had driven me away from Catholicism many years before. Besides, there was an Episcopal church just a couple of miles away from me. So I went there one Sunday. I've been going to St. Michael's ever since.

The reason I had noticed St. Michael and All Angels Church in the first place was that it had a sign out front that I liked. It was a line drawing in black paint of a man, a woman, a baby and a donkey, presumably the Holy Family fleeing to Egypt. Next to the picture were the words, "Jesus was a refugee." That sign made me like St. Michael's even before I drove into its parking lot for the first time.

But that's not the only message "The Church with the Sign," as it's sometimes called, has had on its famous sign. Back in the 1980s, before "Jesus was a refugee," the sign said, "It's a sin to build a nuclear bomb." For the Jubilee Year in 2000, it exhorted us to ask governments and other institutions to "Forgive the debts of the poorest countries." And since 2003 or 2004, possibly a little earlier, the sign has depicted a long line of children of many ethnicities. It says, "Either we are all God's children - or no one is."

The sign in 2004.

Illegal immigration is a big issue in Tucson, which is about 100 kilometers from the Mexico border at Nogales. Every year, roughly a thousand people die in the Arizona desert, trying to get to a better life in the Land of Opportunity. If the heat and dehydration don't kill them, they are often victimized by "coyotes," people who smuggle immigrants in for money. At the first sign of trouble, coyotes tend to abandon their clients in the wilderness, or in the back of an overcrowded, unventilated truck. What do they care if some of the people don't arrive alive? The coyotes already have their money.

This is why a number of churches around Southern Arizona support organizations that try to save the lives of these people, most of whom are here to take jobs that few Norte Americanos would want, especially at day labor wages. Groups like No More Deaths don't encourage people to sneak into the country; but they don't want the border crossers to die, either. So volunteers set up and maintain water stations, clean up trash along migrant routes, and administer first aid. This is all done in uneasy cooperation with the U.S. Border Patrol. The volunteers do not help the border crossers establish illegal residency, but they do render humanitarian aid.

Once in a while, though, humanitarian efforts clash with governmental ones. From the No More Deaths website:

Shanti and Daniel Fight Humanitarian Aid Charges

No More Deaths volunteers, Shanti Sellz and Daniel Strauss, both 23, were arrested by the U.S. Border Patrol for medically evacuating 3 people in critical condition from the 105-degree Arizona desert in July 2005.

Shanti and Daniel were following the protocol of NMD training (acknowledged by NMD and US Border Patrol) by consulting medical professionals who advised them to evacuate the critically ill men to a medical facility, and then consulting a NMD attorney who approved the evacuation.

A pro bono attorney for Shanti and Daniel spoke at St. Michael's several months ago about their case. After church, she handed out lawn signs that said, "Humanitarian Aid Is Never A Crime." I certainly agree with those words, so at her urging, I took a sign home, although I explained that I would want to consult with my husband before putting it up. She told me to take one anyway, so I did - and put it in my closet.


As of last night, the sign was still in my closet, although John had raised no objection to having it in our front yard. Unlike the woman who is currently in trouble with her homeowner's association for displaying a Support Our Troops sign, I was worried about ticking off the neighborhood association or individual neighbors. Go ahead. Call me a moral coward. I'll probably agree with you. But we get neighbors anonymously reporting us to the city if the grass gets long, the pool gets dirty, or water leaks from a burst pipe. And people just don't have a lot of signs or banners up around here, unless you count the occasional flag --U.S., P.O.W./M.I.A., or Dale Earnhardt.

But in the past week or two, I've noticed that a few neighbors do have signs on their lawns - not just any signs, but this sign:




So I asked John if he would mind if I put up mine. He said he'd never had any objection in the first place, and to put it up if I want to. "Not that it will accomplish anything," he added, "except to alleviate your guilt."


I don't really believe that, so this afternoon I went home at lunch, and put up the sign. Here it is. And here it stays, for a while at least. The trial of the NMD volunteers, previously set for January and then April, has now been postponed indefinitely.

*****

This is my entry for this week's Round Robin Photo Challenge: "Obstruction," as suggested by Nancy of Nancy Luvs Pix. As it happens, it's also a follow-up to the previous RR Photo Challenge, "Signs."

Despite the obstruction, a few of God's
children manage to wave hi.

Remember the St. Michael's "prophetic sign" I showed you last time? It's the one that says, "EITHER WE ARE ALL GOD'S CHILDREN...OR NO ONE IS." As you may recall, that sign has been covered up recently - in other words, obstructed - by a printed plastic sign advertising St. Michael's Parish Day School. You can just see a few children waving at the edges of the wooden one if you peek at the sides.

This past Sunday, I happened to notice that the plastic sign no longer covered the wooden one. I also noticed and remembered the other side of the sign, which is visible from the parking lot, a message to parishioners as we leave church. I set out to take a photo of both sides. The message "Go in peace to love and serve the Lord" is partially obstructed by the pale, thorny sticks of a dead ocotillo. This is appropriate, I think, because the prickliness of our own tempers often gets in the way of our being peaceful and loving.

A message of peace, obstructed by thorns of ocotillo

As I set out to photograph the back side of the sign, three of my friends waited for me in my car, including 100-year-old Eva. I had put the air conditioning on, but I didn't want to keep them waiting for long. So I took a few shots of the "Go in peace" sign of the sign, and left re-photographing the "God's children" side for another day. This was a mistake, it turns out. On Monday, the sign for the school was back.

Nails in the wood hold down the second sign,
and obstruct the children's view.

On Tuesday after work, I walked around and took more pictures of the sign from different sides, all the ones you see here and more. I thought about slipping a few of the grommets of the plastic sign off the nails that are holding it on, and getting a quick shot of the sign underneath before putting it back the way I found it. But it sounded tricky to do, and a lot of traffic was going by, and I was afraid people would think I was vandalizing the church. So I didn't do it.

While taking these shots, I discovered another sign. It's a Notice of Hearing before the City of Tucson's Sign Code Advisory and Appeals Board. It seems that St. Michael's is "requesting a variance to exceed the allowable sign area of twenty square feet frontage on Wilmot Road." The hearing took place on March 15th, but this is the first I've heard of it. Then again, I don't attend Vestry meetings.

A notice of hearing about the famous sign,
and noncomforming crosses.

According to the notice, the St. Michael's prophetic sign is 20.5 square feet, just over the limit for a "Single Family Residential District, Public Uses and Churches" zone. (St. Michael's is next door to the hospital and the public library on one side, houses on the other. The other side of the street is all businesses and offices.) In addition, the notice lists St. Michael's as having "six noncomforming 'crosses,'" which it says have a total area of "31.3 square foot." The requested variance is to increase the allowed signage area enough to include the sign, the crosses, and more. The leftover square footage is probably for the temporary signs the church puts up from time to time to promote such events as the English Faire and the Advent Bazaar.

Two of the noncomforming crosses, as seen from the parking lot.

Now there are two more points about this I find instructive - or rather, obstructive. For one thing, I can only find three "nonconforming crosses" at St. Michael's, at least without an exhaustive search. The ones I did find aren't right up against the "frontage" of Wilmot, anyway. One is over the end of the left wing of classrooms, one is over the arch that leads to the tree-lined walkway in front the the church proper, and one is directly over the church itself. They're not signs, either, in the sense of having words or pictures. They're crosses, and they're part of the architecture. Gee. Imagine a church having crosses on display! And from Wilmot Road, the view of the crosses I saw was partly obstructed anyway. So is the church itself, for that matter. What's visible from the street is mostly the school.

One of the crosses is near the white truck,
above and to the left

And the sign. That's very visible from the street. I have to wonder why this hearing took place just this month, when the wooden sign and the crosses have been there for many years. Did someone try to use zoning laws to achieve a political or religious purpose, namely the censorship of a sign the person found objectionable? Or was it simply a matter of the church trying to ensure it doesn't run afoul of city sign regulations in the future? I don't know, and I don't think I'm going to ask.

But I sure hope the Sign Code Advisory and Appeals Board agrees to the variance, and doesn't obstruct the church's ability to "sign" its messages to travelers on Wilmot Road.

Karen

Mary's Eggs!

I've seriously neglected this blog recently. Let me start to make it up to you, "you" meaning anyone who actually bothers to visit this blog. Tonight: Mary Urich's eggs. Tomorrow: a photo essay on the St. Michael's "prophetic sign."



Mary has been making egg ornaments for a number of years now, designing and experimenting all along the way. One of her more recent innovations has been to use goose eggs to accomodate larger, more ambitious patterns.




Most of the eggs shown here are goose eggs, photographed shortly after Christmas at the St. Michael's coffee hour after the 10 AM Mass.



This last batch is chicken eggs:


I'll have a second entry with more eggs sometime between now and Easter.

A Day of Dilemmas (excerpt)

The following is adapted from a much longer posting on one of my personal blogs, Outpost Mâvarin:

I had an interesting day on Sunday. It was full of friendship, crises, mild stress, and more ethical choices than I normally run into in a week. Let me tell you about it.

Act One: Church

Before church this morning I rushed into my office and, while checking my email, quickly scanned a sermon by Father Douglas. I've had the thing for four weeks, but hadn't yet turned the hard copy into an electronic one. So I put it on my scanner it this morning, in the hope that later I would be able to save the file both as a jpg or something and as a Word file. I needed to do both, because when I do OCR (Optical Character Recognition - cheap software trying to "read" the words), the poor thing gets confused by handwritten edits. I have to type what it's supposed to be, and clean it all up in Word when the OCR is done.

So anyway, I had this old sermon I was rushing to get into the computer, because I was afraid Father Douglas would be there and want his sermon back. I should have done the scanning and clean-up before, but I'd put it off, first because of a dead phone line in my office, which resulted in my computer and my scanner being in different rooms; and later because, well, it's a lot of work, and I was busy! By Sunday morning, I didn't have time to do the OCR and corrections. But I did what I could, stuffed the sermon in my purse, and went to church.

It turned out that Father Douglas will be back next week. So I have more time to do this right. Whew!

See, I was already feeling guilty, because I've been a slacker on the church web site lately. I think I didn't get the first half of last week's announcements typed and uploaded until Wednesday, and the second half until Thursday. I still hadn't gotten the Advent Bazaar flyer posted. Bad Karen. No biscuit!

But when I got to church, did anyone complain? They did not. Two different people told me that because of my notice about making egg sandwiches for the Casa Maria soup kitchen, three people who Googled Casa Maria saw that announcement, and drove all the way from nearby Vail, AZ to help make sandwiches on Friday. Good thing that notice was in the Wednesday batch. Had it been in the Thursday announcements, it might not have hit Google in time.

So I got away with those two things for now, but I need to do better.

Then came the real moral dilemmas of the morning.

1. At the end of Mass, the Sunday School kids came up and sang two verses of O Come O Come Emmanuel. They were so cute! They sang very well, too.

Father John wanted me to take pictures of them, so I obliged. But I was also mindful of Internet security guidelines that I read a few months ago, that one shouldn't post pictures of other people's kids without parental permission, especially if you identify a place where predators can find them, such as at a particular school. Or St. Michael's, I suppose.

So, since I was serving as Mass anyway, and was therefore sitting behind the kids, I took pictures of them from behind. The photo has no identifying features for anyone to use to get to these children. Did I do the right thing? Should I post this picture? I'm not sure, but here it is.

2. About a month ago, two 23-year-old volunteers for a humanitarian group called No More Deaths were arrested by the Border Patrol for driving sick, dehydrated illegal border crossers to a Tucson hospital, on a doctor's advice. No More Deaths provides water and first aid to try to reduce the horrendous, ever-growing number of deaths in the Arizona desert each year, often in cooperation with the Border Patrol. But this time, two people were brought up on federal charges, and could go to prison for 15 years.

The pro bono lawyer for this group was at our church on Sunday, at all three masses. I heard her speak at two of them. The stand the group is making is that it should never be illegal to give humanitarian aid, to provide succor to suffering people in an attempt to prevent needless death. Now understand, these border crossers would have been deported after their hospital stay anyway. Nobody from No More Deaths was trying to smuggle anyone. They were just trying to save lives.

So anyway, the lawyer handed out lawn signs after church. I ageed to take one, but I didn't promise to put it on my lawn, saying only that I would talk to my husband about it. (John's stance is that he wants to know more about the specific situation from an unbiased source, before putting up the sign). But to be honest, I'm a little afraid to display the sign on our lawn. I agree with it, absolutely, but the border problem is a very divisive issue around here, with a lot of kneejerk sentiment and thinly-veiled prejudice. If I display this thing, will a neighbor take it away? Will I be harrassed? Or will nothing happen at all?

I'm such a coward sometimes. I hate confrontations and ill-will. I have no problem at all writing about this online, because I can explain the situation. I've even written about this problem before. But a lawn sign has to be its own explanation. Do I trust it to be up to the task, in a neighborhood where I don't know my neighbors?

There's got to be some irony in there, somewhere.

Karen

*Whimper*

No pictures tonight. I'm not in the mood.

Call me thin-skinned. Call me oversensitive. I'll even agree with you. This is a fault I've worked to overcome over the years, but I've never entirely succeeded. For example, I always get upset when a conservative Christian pops up out of nowhere to attack something I wrote online. Usually the comment is anonymous, so I can't even respond directly. Instead I look the comment over, and consider again whether the criticism has merit. I second-guess myself. I feel guilty for any deficiencies I think I see in my own writing, beliefs, or character. I get upset and frustrated for not having communicated effectively enough to be understood, to win the person over.

But really, it usually comes down to one thing. What parts of the concepts of compassion and tolerance don't these people understand? I'm not talking about all Christian conservatives, mind you, but occasionally I get a comment like this one, that basically takes me to task for loving my neighbor.

This St. Michael's Arts blog is ancillary to the main church (news) blog, started so that parishioners can contribute photos, essays, prayers, poetry, art--well, pretty much anything, as long as it is compatible with the fact that it's a church's blog. But nobody sends me (or the church) anything for it, so rather than leave it completely neglected, I occasionally post something on it, usually adapted from something in my personal blog, Musings from Mâvarin.

Tonight, someone left a comment to this blog. (Actually, it's the second one this week. The first was commercial comment spam.) It was posted to an entry of pictures and a tiny bit of text provided by Ila Abernathy, about her annual trip to Guatemala to help displaced Maya in remote villages with medical supplies and training. That happened to be the oldest entry on the face of the blog at when the comment was posted. The newest entry at the time, the one this anonymous person was talking about in the misdirected comment, was my rant from June about how poorly a Wiccan friend of mine is treated by doctors, social workers,etc. because of her affiliation with a fringe religion. The commenter felt that I --and St. Michael's generally--was betraying God by advocating compassion and tolerance toward this friend.

But for me, the story of the Good Samaritan, the edict to love one's enemies, and any number of other passages from the New Testament, demand no less. The idea that you can and should be mean to someone, discriminate, condemn, maybe even beat up or kill that person, all because he or she is not one of Us, not a Christian/ Muslim/ Jew/ Democrat/ Republican/ American/ Whatever, is exactly the sort of thing that leads to suicide bombings, the Holocaust, and really, most of the evil in the world. Not that the commenter was advocating anything of the sort, but clearly, my plea for tolerance was being condemned. So what is the person advocating, if not intolerance? The difference between that and those other horrors is one of degree, not one of concept. A person can be wrong about something, terribly wrong, but that doesn't give us the right or the responsibility to treat that person with hostility.

So as I said, it's appropriate for me to disagree with my friend's religion, but it's not appropriate for her pain doctor to refuse to see her, or someone to label her a troublemaker and deny her services, solely on the basis of religion. And really, how does preaching at her, shunning and mistreating her, and implying that anyone who defends her is betraying God...how does any of that follow Jesus's teachings and examples, or convince D/S to become a Christian again? How does the song go? They'll know we are Christians by our hate? Of course I want her to find her way back to Christianity eventually, but this is no way to accomplish that.

Maybe I'm being harsh here. Maybe it's a mutual misunderstanding between me and Mr. or Ms. Anonymous. Maybe I made this person feel attacked, and this was the response.

But either way, I'm feeling all hurt and insecure here. I want to go in a corner and whimper. You don't like me! You think I'm bad! And in this case, I was already feeling a little guilty. I wanted to post something early in the week about the losses St. Michael's has recently suffered, the deaths of Janet Womble and Sherwood "Woody" Bowker. I wanted to say that in the midst of death we are in life. Ila is back from Guatemala, school is starting at St. Michael's, and the choir will soon be singing for us again. Life goes on, and no doubt in the coming months we will have new arrivals, baptisms, renewal. But I got busy with work and other parts of my life, and didn't post in time to give you a heads-up for Janet Womble's funeral on Wednesday. Woody's Mass and reception is on Saturday, August 28th at 8AM. So even before I saw this comment, I was feeling guilty about my recent performance as Webmaster. I could have, should have done more, posting at least an announcement to the news blog if nothing else.

But the comment was not about that kind of shortcoming. It struck at the heart of what I believe as a Christian. And have you ever noticed that saying you will pray for someone can sometimes be a passive-aggressive attack on a person with whom you disagree? The implication is that I'm on the fast track to Hell, and only your prayers can turn me around, so that I will agree with you and go to Heaven after all. Yes, sure, go ahead and pray for me, and for my friend. I pray each night for everyone everywhere, no exceptions. I pray that we will all come to know that God is real, that God cares, that we will all understand better what God wants fromeach of us, and for help to get through the difficult times in each of our lives. I pray that we will learn to live up to our potential, using our talents well. I pray that we will learn to truly love and help one another, not just our particular insular groups but everyone. But don't tell me you're praying that I will see the error of my wicked ways. I'm far from perfect, but I'm not all that wicked. Your prayers will neither keep me from Hell nor send me there.

One of the commenter's criticisms was the claim that I had posted an "evil symbol" on a church blog. This confused me at first. I looked at the entry where the comment was posted, and saw pictures of Guatemalans, and a picture tha a child in Guatemala drew. Was this person seeing something in the drawing that wasn't there? But no, I later noticed that I had a right-side-up pentagram in the entry about my friend, mostly because I didn't have any other illustrations for it. This symbol is not Satanic, but perhaps I should not have put it on the church blog, even as an illustration of the beliefs of others.

Understand: I am not a minister, priest or deacon. My only formal course in religion was nearly thirty years ago at Syracuse University. I've read much of the Bible but not all of it, and I've read some modern translations of rejected (non-canonical) scriptures and other modern scholarship. I am the church webmaster, and I help out at Mass in minor ways, mostly as crucifer and lector. But I don't speak for the church, except to post announcements, mostly written by others. The opinions I post on the Arts blog are my own unless otherwise marked. They're intended to be one person's opinions and spiritual journeys, to be interspersed with the contributions of others. Unfortunately, others don't contribute.

So what should I do? Should I let this comment spook me, again? Should I stop posting to the Arts blog until I find others to contribute, so it's not all me, assuming an authority I don't have or want?

Or should I still express my opinion from time to time, and hope that most people will see Christian values in my words, instead of anti-Christian ones?

Karen

P.S. Obviously I took the advice of readers, and posted a version of this entry, originally written for Musings, to the SMAAARTS blog. This probably pushes the entry with the comment off the front page, but it's still there to be seen in the Archives. I also emailed Father Smith, who was also attacked in the original comment, asking for his input. And I received a lovely, loving email today from a self-identified conservative Christian and fundamentalist, saying that I was right to love others, to keep my chin up. Thank you, and God bless you all--whether you agree with me or not.

Ubi Caritas Et Amor - Or Lack Thereof

Run for the hills, because Karen is going to talk about religion again.

I always get nervous about entries like this one. Some so-called Christians will probably be angry, if they ever read this; and non-Christians who come across the similar entry on my personal blog will probably skip it. I may even get a hateful comment or two--it wouldn't be the first time. Still, I'd prefer that you stick around. It may not be quite the sermon you expect.

I had lunch yesterday with a friend I've known for fifteen years. This friend has numerous problems--multiple physical and mental illnesses, family and money problems. She also happens to be Wiccan.

Now, I'm not a big fan of Wicca, especially as practiced by 21st century Americans. In my extremely limited experience, it seemed silly and fake, more like a self-conscious fantasy role playing game and snubbing of the prevailing culture than a deeply held set of beliefs. I could be totally wrong here, and probably am, but the only Wiccan ceremony I ever witnessed left me with that impression.

Still, D/S believes in it, probably more deeply than I would be inclined to credit from my one brief encounter with the religion. She does absolutely no harm thereby: does not curse or sacrifice or worship the devil, or partake in any other evil practices of which witches have been falsely accused over the centuries. Wiccan, as I understand it, is predicated on a respect for life, human and otherwise. She commits no crimes or atrocities, and is therefore entitled to her consitutional right to freedom of religion. It is appropriate, perhaps, to briefly express gentle disagreement with her, but she should not be subjected to discriminatory treatment, harrassment, hatred, or neglect because of her beliefs.

Nevertheless, as she moves through the patchwork system of government social services and government-sponsored health and rehab programs, my friend frequently encounters all of the above. She is labeled a troublemaker and treated with hostility by people in authority, or expected to change her ways if she wants to be helped. "They wanted me to move to a facility that has three hours of Bible study every night," she told me. A former Christian, my friend is already familiar with the Bible, but that's not the point. The implication is that she would receive nightly pressure to recant and change her mind about religion, as a condition for receiving government-sponsored treatment. Sorry, but that's just plain wrong, on several counts. It's unconstitutional, it's unfair, and it's unChristian.

Equally wrong is the treatment she gets from her pain doctor--or rather, lack of treatment. Having seen a "Goddess Bless" sticker on my friend's mobility scooter, the doctor immediately expressed his disapproval. My friend has since been told by the doctor's staff that she never will be allowed to see him again, and will only deal with the nurse practitioner instead. Aside from the insult, and possible violation of the Hippocratic oath, the treatment itself is inadequate. My friend's pain medication was changed to a famously addictive drug that's "as cheap as dirt," as a result of which she recently spent time in the hospital with withdrawal symptoms.

Not right. Not fair. Not Christian.

I just posted Father Smith's sermon from earlier today on the St. Michael's sermons page. Two brief quotes are appropriate here:

In this age it is not enough to throw biblical statements to the outsider. For God’s words remain empty until they are lived. But when the word is demonstrated in our lives, relationships, lifestyles and loves, it becomes "alive and active," manifesting the living Christ in the world so that the unbelievers or the enemy themselves are forced to ask: where do those Christians get this love and this peace?

But it's never an easy peace. Jesus goes on to say to His disciples, "I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter in law against her mother-in-law; and one’s foes will be members of one’s own household." In Jesus’ time, Semitic peoples had a striking way of expressing the love they felt for different people. Instead of saying, "I love you more than I love him," they would say, "I love you and hate him." This was their way of expressing preference in relationships, and did not mean the second person was hated. So when Jesus said these words it was not meant that we should hate our families but, that our love for Him should come as a priority. Some of you live this reality: a family member doesn't believe in Jesus, but you love them and would do anything for them, but your belief in Jesus Christ and knowing Him as Lord and Savior is a priority. You still love them and help them, but you won't follow their beliefs.

This sermon follows on a recent Gospel reading at St. Michael's, in which Jesus eats with tax collectors, 1st century pariahs who were considered sinners and collaborators. In a choice between the self-righteous or the sinners, the rich and powerful or the humble laborers, Jesus always chose to hang out with the lowly ones: the pariahs, the fishermen, the tax collectors and the lepers.

My friend is as close to being a metaphorical leper as you'll find in the modern world. She has no husband, no money, and lots of illnesses. Her own son seldom consents to see her, although he lives nearby. She is terribly lonely. My friend is fat because of her disabilities, and a vegetarian in a McDonald's world. She wants to work, but even self-employment seems to be beyond her at this point. She furnishes her small apartment mostly out of dumpsters. To top it off, she's an adherent to a minority religion that is little tolerated and less understood. And yet she is intelligent and generous and kind, with a keen sense of justice.

So how would Jesus treat a woman like that? Certainly not with disdain and hostility and neglect! He would bring her love and peace and healing. This is what we should also try to do.

But contrast this with the text of a banner I saw last night on a website that a Jewish friend of mine considered absurd enough to be funny. The web page was primarily about Noah's sons riding dinosaurs. Frankly, I was too angered by the page's header to be amused by the pseudoscience:

WHERE THE WORTHWHILE WORSHIP. *UNSAVED ARE NOT WELCOME (AS JESUS COMMANDED)*

I totally missed the fact that the page was satirical, no more in earnest than The Onion. The words on this banner are more blatant than most of what one sees from the religious right, but I found it all too plausible. Churches all over the country struggle with issues of tolerance, and all too many come down on the side of exclusion. I'm thinking particularly of the gay issue here, but it also extends to the denial of communion to politicians who don't want to pass secular laws to enforce church doctrine. Admittedly, there's a serious issue of morality involved here, but it seems short-sighted to place that single issue above all others, especially since reasonable people disagree on the subject. Jesus never mentioned homosexuality, birth control or abortion, but that's all some people seem to care about, not the "love your enemies" stuff that Jesus did talk about.

Some groups of Christians routinely declare that other Christians aren't really Christian at all, because they don't pass some sectarian litmus test. Come to think of it, I suppose I'm doing that myself here. It's not that I think that the most homophobic, intolerant Christian conservatives don't believe in Christ. It's just that they have a twisted way of showing it, informed more by Us and Them mentality than by the Beatitudes.

It galls and astonishes me that after all these centuries and all we've learned, after crusades and pograms, burnings and persecutions and an Inquisition, people still use Jesus to promote hatred and discrimination instead of love and peace. My friend will never be inspired to return to a religion that's supposedly about love and peace, when its practitioners primarily exhibit the opposite qualities in dealing with her.

Father Smith's sermon today pointed to a much better approach, and St. Michael's sets a much better example. This church and its parishioners feed the homeless, help the sick, and welcome refugees and the marginalized. Despite the current strife over the gay clergy issue, the graphics provided by the Episcopal Church USA send a better message than those who hate others in the name of Jesus. They tell us we are welcome. We are here for each other. We are one.

When religion and hatred and intolerance go hand in hand, neither God nor humankind benefits thereby. Instead there is evil and malice. This is true whether the religion in question is Islam, some form of Christianity, or anything else.

If, on the other hand, a person practices peace and love and tolerance, helps others and does not judge them harshly, that person is following Jesus's example. This is true whether the person believes in Jesus or not. These principles are universal ones, taught by many religions as well as secular ethicists. The Ten Commandments are not a Christian invention, although certain presentations of them may be. Even the numbering of them varies by denomination. But the basic principles of honesty, kindness, and fairness are acknowledged the world over in one form or another.

Myself, I'd rather eat lunch with a kindhearted Wiccan, or Jew, or atheist, than someone who claims to love Christ and yet treats non-Christians (or gays, or any other category of "Them") with hostility and disdain.

And so, I think, would Jesus.

Karen

Ubi caritas et amor, ibi Deus est. - "Where charity and love are, there is God."