Upon the Death of an Enemy

Powerful blog post by Rabbi Menachem Creditor: "Upon the Death of an Enemy."

Wonderfully expresses the many emotions people are feeling on the killing of Osama Bin Laden. Perhaps my favorite moment:

According to a Midrash, when the angels rejoiced at the victory of God and the deliverance of the Children of Israel at the Red Sea, they invited God to join their celebration. God declined, saying, "How can I rejoice when my children are drowning?" God's response, as intuited by our tradition, teaches us that the very people who enslaved and tortured us were still human beings when viewed through sacred eyes.

Here are a few Biblical verses and sayings I've seen on Facebook as well:

"Do not gloat when your enemy falls; when they stumble, do not let your heart rejoice"

(Proverbs 24:17)

"I take no pleasure in the death of anyone, says the Lord"

(Ezekiel 18:32)

I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked"

(Ezekiel 33:11)

"You have heard that it was said, 'You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.' But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be children of your Father in heaven."

(Matthew 5:43-44)

The group "The Christian Left" sums it up:

"We rejoice when evil acts end; we do not rejoice when anyone falls."

Unvirtuous Abbey

Unvirtuous Abbey is a twitter/Facebook page which regularly posts...well...I'll call it "different" religious sayings. Their description is this:

After watching Facebook statuses and tweets of motivational quotes, pious prayers, and religious platitudes, the Abbey was born.

Here's an example from an interview they did on The Virtual Abbey:

Some believe religion is sacrosanct. We obviously don’t and wondered: What if everyone actually prayed what was on their minds? Our prayer for those whose closest thing to prayer is texting “OMG!” was retweeted a lot. We believe that’s because readers realized we were pointing out how texting “OMG!” has less to do with God and more to do with something else.

People also enjoy irony, such as praying for those who spend countless hours on Farmville and then heat up something for lunch in the microwave. There’s a disconnect.

Sometimes we tweet a song lyric with the words “Jesus said.” A recently popular tweet was, “As soon as Jesus was baptized, a voice from heaven said: “Whoa, oh, oh, sweet child o’ mine. Whoa, oh, oh, oh, sweet love of mine.” Yet, a few followers still wrote and said, “Um, I think that was Guns and Roses?” to which we respond, “Oh, they said it too?”

This morning one of their "monks" posted this intriguing post on the blog "Two Friars and a fool" called "Unicorn Theology and Unplugging Your Head". Here's an excerpt:

Christianity is definitely having a public relations problem now. So many churches are trying to market themselves in a different way. Sometimes they market themselves well, like the church in Halifax, Nova Scotia, where someone spray painted the words, “God is dead” on the side of the building, and the minister (rather than get angry) wrote above it, “Not so fast. Happy Easter!” And sometimes churches have marketing fails, like the church having their Worship, Teaching, and Friendship conference. (WTF?)

Some of our most popular prayers at Unvirtuous Abbey have to do with the disconnect between perception and reality. What is poignant for us is when we hear feedback to a prayer that has drawn someone closer to the holy in their lives.

Some of the more recent prayers that generated lots of comments are:“

“For those who deny global warming yet think that human morality affects plate tectonics, we pray to the Lord.”

“Lord, you who told Lazarus to “Come out!”, we pray for religious leaders who tell people it’s wrong to do that. Amen.”

“For those who claim to be holy but burn others’ holy books, Lord have mercy.”

“For those who say ‘Everything happens for a reason’ because, honest to God, that’s a really dumb thing to say. Amen.”

“For those who insist on the literal inerrancy of something they’ve never really read, Lord hear our prayer.”

...In some cases, churches are going so far to the theological right that people have to unplug their heads before they enter the building; and in other cases, churches are going so far to the left theologically in order to attract the masses, that they describe themselves as “post theistic”. In a way, they are offering what one person has called, “unicorn theology.” (And even though unicorn theology sounds kind of awesome, it may not have many practical applications, other than being awesome.)

We, the monks of Unvirtuous Abbey, believe that as Christians we are called to be keepers of the story, and tellers of it. We are encouragers of its sharing, and we are enablers of its hearing.

I am curious about peoples' respond to this!

Chocolat's Easter Moment

(Easter Sunday sermon, preached at All Saints' Littleton NH on 4/24/2011)

I’ve had a vision of Easter in my head for a few weeks now...

It happened during our film discussion program.

The movie, was Chocolat.

For those of you who have not seen it, it concerns a little town in France, under the strict leadership of a Count.

This town is really good at the practice of what they understood to be Lent:

self-denial

keeping appearances

holding fast to traditions

tranquility

It appears that they have come to live this way all of the time.

However, just as they are entering Lent, a woman named Vianne blows into town and opens a chocolate shop. She has the ability to open the senses of people through her craft. She starts to transform the people of the town, one by one.

It quickly becomes the impression of the Count that all hell is breaking loose. He is determined to conqueror the threat to his town.

While the characters are all delightful in their own way, there is one that I am particularly drawn to this morning: Pere Henri, the very young village priest.

Pere Henri has been with the town five weeks.

He is reminded, by the Count, that his predecessor had been with them for five decades.

Pere Henri goes from being intimidated by the Count...sharing his sermons ahead of time for suggestions...to delivering the Count’s words verbatim from the pulpit: suggesting that Satan’s work is being accomplished through chocolate. It puts the fear of an angry, punishing God into the people: driving them away from Vianne.

The night before Easter, as the Count yet again reworks Pere Henri’s sermon, he is driven to frantic, drastic action. The Count rushes to the chocolate shop at night, breaks in, and starts destroying the chocolates one by one. As he does so, a sliver of chocolate falls on his lips.

He tastes it.

And the man who had denied himself of all temptations finds himself out of control: laughing hysterically, eating every morsel of chocolate in sight.

But gradually, the laughing turns to sobs...as the heavy burdens of pain, loss, and shame...all the feelings he had buried deep in himself and hid from all others...comes to the surface and are finally released.

Easter morning arrives: and Vianne and Pere Henri find the Count curled up...sleeping in the delicious mess of chocolate.

The Count wakes up...looks at them, and whispers “I’m so sorry.”

They treat him with kindness and dignity.

The Count turns to the priest: “The sermon. I didn't finish it.”

The priest replies: “I'll think of something.”

So...now is our shared moment. Pere Henri slowly makes his way into the pulpit. He shares these words:

I'm not sure what the theme of my homily today ought to be.

Do I want to speak of the miracle of our Lord's divine transformation?

Not really, no.

I don't want to talk about His divinity.

I'd rather talk about His humanity.

I mean, you know, how he lived his life here on Earth.

His kindness. His tolerance.

Listen, here's what I think:

I think we can't go around...measuring our goodness

by what we don't do...

by what we deny ourselves...

what we resist...

and who we exclude.

I think we've got to measure goodness...

by what we embrace...

what we create...

and who we include.

This little sermon in the movie reveals a powerful truth: that Jesus’ divinity means little without embracing his humanity.

Easter is not just a call to believe in Jesus' resurrection: it is primarily an invitation to live our lives in his Spirit...valuing life and each other in the way that Jesus lived his life before us.

Thanks be to God

Alleluia, Alleluia!