The Pain of Anyone's Body

Exodus 1:15-22; I Corinthians 26; Mathew 2:16-18

Holy Redeemer Lutheran Church, Jerusalem

July 20^th, 2014

 

The problem, unstated till now, is how

to live in a damaged body

in a world where pain is meant to be gagged

uncured   un-grieved over   The problem is

to connect, without the hysteria, the pain

of any one’s body with the pain of the body’s world

For it is the body’s world

they are trying to destroy forever

The best world is the body’s world

filled with creatures   filled with dread

misshappen so   yet the best we have

our raft among the abstract worlds

and how I longed to live on this earth

walking her boundaries    never counting the cost

Adrienne Rich

 

Every day I check in with my friends on facebook to see how they are, to make sure they are safe. One friend always answers, “Still alive.” Another answers, “God is with us. We must have patience. It is written.” But I know that we are also wondering, like the psalmist, “How long, O Lord?” How long must we bear the pain of so many deaths and have sorrow in our hearts all day long.

Yesterday in Beit Jala I had the honor of blessing a new women’s center called Beit Shams, House of the Sun. It will be a center for the healing arts for women and their children. I created a Celtic Christian ceremony that included blessing each room. We ended in the Horizons room where a white keyfiah was spread on the floor in the center. On our altar was a rainbow candle surrounded by stuffed animals and dolls, reminders or remainders of the lost lives of the children. One bear wore a jersey with a football, a visual cue to remind us of the four boys on the beach.

The second part of our time together was to engage in the holy act of reading the names of those who have died in the past few weeks in Palestine. It is a sacred act and duty to commemorate the dead. We each read about 10 names except when a whole family was listed. We said their name and how old they were. The list often said, “The child” and then the child’s name.” After each name, we said Presente. This is a cultural tradition from Latin America used during the civil wars to honor the spirit of the martyrs as still alive with us, in us. We brought into our sacred space over three hundred spirits. The room was ablaze with tealights and their presence.

July 14^th was the 8^th day of the attack on Gaza. It was also my birthday. I, who just celebrated being alive, read the names of 15 people who died on my birthday including three children. Sarah Omar Sheik Eid was four years old when she died on the day I was born. She died with Omar and Jihad, members of her family.

 O Lord, how much longer? And I don’t just mean when will there be a cease fire but when will we stop killing our children, slaughtering the innocent ones. Is there anything in our sacred texts that tell us why we kill the weak and vulnerable, especially children? or how to stop? How to stop a genocide taking place?

There are three essential tasks a prophetic preacher must do in a sermon says Walter Brueggermann in his latest book on the subject. The preacher must speak the truth, explore grief, and find hope.

The truth, dear ones, is that we are witnessing a genocide taking place in Gaza,whole families are being targeted and wiped out.  We read the names from the most recent to the beginning. There were so many killed in one day now. For many in the women’s circle the reading of the four boys who were killed while playing football on the beach was over the top. Our wails joined those of their parents. It was a loud lamentation. Rachel was again weeping for her children and could not be consoled, because they were no more. We are all members of one broken body. We are all members of one family.

In Egypt, in another time, the King asked some Hebrew midwives, Shiphrah and Puah to kill all male babies in case one of them might grow up and become a threat to his imperial authority. Life itself was a threat. But the clever women did not obey him. They obeyed their God who believes all life is sacred. They spared the babies and the Hebrew people grew strong. God rewarded these smart women with healthy families.

In Palestine, in another time, near Bethlehem, King Herod feared that a child would be born who would challenge his imperial authority. He learned about this possibility from the three Wise Ones from the East. After seeing the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes and after giving him gifts for a king, they decided it was best to go home another way and avoid King Herod. In a fury, Herod decided to kill all the children in and around Bethlehem who were two years old or under. Life itself was a threat.

It appears that our holy texts, both old and new, have stories about jealous kings who command children to be killed to secure their imperial authority. It seems that innocent children have always been victims of power struggles.  But it also seems that there have also always been people who have disobeyed, who have resisted, found a way not to participate, not to follow, to assert life. There were always clever women and wise men who knew that there was something above imperial law.

The texts illuminate the present. Once again children are targets in a bloody slaughter. Once again their small charred bodies are being sacrificed and once again every Rachel, every mother, and every father is weeping out in horror and disbelief. And we, the church, are witnesses to this savage disregard for human life. We are the body of Christ suffering on the Via Dolorosa. Their pain is ours. As witnesses to these acts of terror we have a choice on whether or not to respond. As witnesses to our faith that believes all life is sacred, we have no choice but to act.

Our first task is not to runaway or hide from the truth of the extent of this genocide taking place, the way extreme violence has become normal. The first task is to face and accept the reality that we are once again watching the slaughter of innocent lives, especially children. They are not human shields. They are human beings. They are not collateral damage. They are targets. Telling the truth means facing this ugly truth straight on. It also means naming the complicity of others in these acts of terror. This includes looking at one’s own country’s political and financial support, looking at what is being done in our name or with our tax dollars. It means facing the fact that the facts we are getting, the story we are hearing is full of holes, misinformation, even lies. Facing reality takes courage for it also breaks the heart.

Our second task then is to keen, wail, scream, rage against the pain and sorrow, to not be afraid that it will consume us. To do this we must be willing to name the names. One of the women yesterday said it helped her to hear these names read aloud in a group. The dead became real to her. By starting a facebook page called Every Body Has a Name and keeping track of the growing death toll, I am actively engaged in mourning and helping an online community grieve together. It is hard to look at all these charred and disfigured bodies, to light so many candles, over 300 deaths listed yesterday. It is hard but necessary otherwise we grow numb, used to it, and unable to feel. Our Bible includes psalms of lamentation for a reason. We need a place to yell “”How Long, O Lord.” We need a time and place to hold each other and the pain we share as members of one bleeding body.

Our third and last task is to have hope, to not give up or into despair. Our texts this morning give us some ideas. In each story people refuse to follow death orders. They value life over death. For example, because of the actions of the Hebrew midwives baby Moses was born. Later he was saved by his sister who puts him in a basket to be picked up by Pharoah’s daughter. He was then raised in Pharoah’s household. Without each of these law defying women Moses would never have been born. There never would have been a liberator who led his people to freedom. Their small acts of resistance formed a chain of events that made a difference. I find hope in knowing that my small acts of defiance, non compliance, might make a difference somewhere down the line.

And the Wise Ones, they choose simply not to play with Herod. They choose another path, the path of nonviolence. Their inaction gave the holy family lead time to escape and take flight into Egypt. They model noncompliance as a form of resistance and this gives me ideas and hope for our time.

Theologian Karl Barth says we should preach with the Bible in one hand and the newspaper in the other. I say we should preach with three hands---the people in one hand, the Bible, and whatever ways we learn about the world and what is happening. My newspaper is my facebook feed and on it, in between these horrible pictures of disfigured and blown to bits bodies from banned weapons and chemicals, I find pictures of huge protests across the globe in support for Palestine. I have hope when I see the King and Queen of Sweden attending such a protest march.

And like the Midwives who act through defiance, I see the people in Paris protesting even though they have been banned. I have hope when I see these pictures especially when they are also asking for their governments to take action like support arms embargos. I have hope when I hear Chile has decided to completely cut off trade relations until international laws are followed. I have hope that these acts of resistance will lead to a change. It did for Moses and it did in South Africa.

I have hope when I hear a story about a Norwegian journalist who left his work to go and save a wounded child struck by an air strike. I have a little bit of restored hope when I hear the NBC journalist who reported on the death of the four boys on the beach has been brought back to work in Gaza. His truth-telling had led to his being pulled out. Our collective calling NBC out on trying to silence the truth by removing him has paid off and he is back. This gives me a spark of hope that sometimes when we act together we can make a difference. These acts spark small tea lights of hope.

I have hope when I read about the great work Augusta Victoria is doing to help families from Gaza get the medical attention they need or when I hear about the international volunteers from the UK, Sweden, and the US who have decided to accompany the Red Crescent ambulances into firing zones to retrieve much needed medical supplies. I am inspired to know that these ISM volunteers not only took personal risk but that they also informed their embassies to do everything in their power to ensure that Israel respects international law and does not target them retrieving these valuable medical supplies. Their bravery inspires hope.

All of these acts of kindness, truth telling, and protesting give me hope that the world is waking up, that humanity has not lost its voice. But I also find hope or solace in knowing that as horrible as things are, and most likely will become more so, that in the end justice will prevail. Like the Hebrew midwives and the Wise Ones and my faithful Muslim sisters and brothers I too believe God stands on the side of the oppressed and seeks their liberation. I too believe my liberation is connected to theirs and that one day we will all be free on earth as it is in heaven.