[1] In March of 2020 the United States government responded to the existence of the coronavirus in our midst with a call to shut everything down for two weeks.\u00a0 The worst of it would then pass over us, and we could resume our normal lives once more.<\/p>\n
[2] It didn\u2019t work out that way.<\/p>\n
[3] Some of us decided that this meant there wasn\u2019t really any serious threat after all \u2013 that the pandemic was a horrible hoax.\u00a0 Some of us decided that the danger was much worse than we\u2019d thought \u2013 that we\u2019d better protect ourselves and hide from the virus until a cure (or at least a vaccine) came to our rescue.\u00a0 Some of us struggled to discern how to lead a community of believers through this valley of the shadow of death \u2013 to discover and follow the path toward which God was calling the church.<\/p>\n
[4] In the midst of so many things I did not understand, I searched for wiser souls to guide me.\u00a0 I was greatly supported by the Festival of Homiletics last year.\u00a0 It was so good to hear from others engaged in the same quest for signs of what God would have us do.\u00a0 We hadn\u2019t been trained to preach through a pandemic; we hadn\u2019t anticipated that we\u2019d ever need to do such a thing; we were having to rewrite the book on how to address the congregations caught up in this global crisis \u2013 but God had called us to this work, and God would show us the way through it.<\/p>\n
[5] In the aftermath of the homiletics conference I resolved to devote my personal and professional reading list to books and articles that would reorient my mind, my heart, and my spirit to this new challenge the world was handing to the churches.<\/p>\n
[6] Two of the most insightful, most helpful, and most hopeful guides that I came across were Rabbi Arthur Ocean Waskow\u2019s Dancing in God\u2019s Earthquake<\/em> and Steven Charleston\u2019s Ladder to the Light<\/em>.\u00a0 Both authors, in different ways and in keeping with their different backgrounds, assured me that \u2013 no matter how unfamiliar this territory seems to us \u2013 God\u2019s people have been here before.\u00a0 From the perspective of ancient tribes deeply connected to the earth upon which they dwell, Jewish and Native American people have experienced world-ending catastrophes before.\u00a0 Even after holocausts and genocides, exiles and trails of tears, they are here to give witness to the faith within them, to remind us that their history is also a part of our history, and that God has not forsaken us.<\/p>\n [7] In Dancing in God\u2019s Earthquake<\/em>, Rabbi Waskow responds to this situation from a biblically, theologically, and ecologically oriented perspective.\u00a0 He calls upon us to listen in new ways to the old, old story we know so well and to reevaluate the lessons we\u2019ve learned from its pages.\u00a0 He invites us to listen with open ears to the messages the earth and its creatures are sounding \u2013 so many of whom cry out in pain as they respond to hostile forces acting upon them and breathe a death rattle as they perish.\u00a0 The end seems to be approaching ever so rapidly \u2013 but, he reminds us, we have experienced this before.\u00a0 Just look at the book of Exodus:<\/p>\n [8] We have been taught to fear all that we might sacrifice if we pause in our rush toward the extinction of life on this planet, but the planet, the news headlines, and our God are calling out that we humans need to stop and reevaluate our life on this earth.\u00a0 We need to confess the ways we are contributing to the destruction all around us, and we need to repent of our participation in that process.\u00a0 We need to rediscover our proper place in God\u2019s scheme of things.<\/p>\n \u201cIf we fail to wrestle God, we will murder a brother; just as it is only when Jacob learns to wrestle God that it becomes possible for him to make friends with his brother.\u201d\u00a0 (page 134)<\/p>\n [9] But reconcile we can; work together we can; face the danger with hopeful hearts we can; trust in God\u2019s sovereignty and commitment to this creation \u2013 and to its people \u2013 we can.\u00a0 Dancing in God\u2019s Earthquake<\/em> begins to teach us how to do this alone and together.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n [10] Steven Charleston, an Episcopal priest and a member of the Choctaw nation, speaks to the \u201cworld earthquake\u201d from a different perspective.\u00a0 His focus is on restoring our courage in the face of the dangers all around us and rebuilding our human community as a primary means of addressing the issues that threaten us.<\/p>\n [11] He begins with the image of the kiva,<\/p>\n [12] The kiva becomes a metaphor for our current spiritual situation.\u00a0 We feel overwhelmed by forces hostile to life as we have known it.\u00a0 We have no clear and trusted authority to rally us against them.\u00a0 We are afraid to step outside our comfortable, protective womb.\u00a0 And yet we must eventually leave it if we are to become the people God has created us to be and to experience the abundant life that God intends for this world and its inhabitants.<\/p>\n [13] Charleston invites us to view this kiva as a place not of endings only, but of beginnings.\u00a0 He uses not only the image of a womb preparing its fetus for birth into a new reality, but also the earth nurturing a seed in order to turn it into a plant that nourishes others.\u00a0 It is a place of growth, of learning, of practicing the skills we will need when we reach the light at the top of the ladder we must climb in order to exit our kiva.<\/p>\n [14] The chapters in this book are named for eight rungs on the ladder that describe eight stages we pass through before we are ready for the new life that awaits us: faith, blessing, hope, community, action, truth, renewal, transformation.<\/p>\n [15] The kiva is also a symbol of the spiritual resilience of North American indigenous peoples.\u00a0 \u201cOur traditional religious practices were banned.\u00a0 Our sacred objects were taken away from us and either destroyed or put in museums as a curiosity for our conquerors.\u00a0 Our families were scattered into diaspora.\u00a0 Even our languages were forbidden….But we are still here.\u00a0 Our voice is still strong.\u00a0 Our vision is unimpaired.\u00a0 Native America knows something about resisting darkness.\u201d\u00a0 (Charleston, page 2)<\/p>\n [16] Ladder to the Light<\/em> generously shares that knowledge with the rest of us.\u00a0 It is a call to recognize our common humanity and our common adversities.\u00a0 It is also a call to recognize the other creatures of this earth as our kin, without whom we cannot survive.\u00a0 It resonates powerfully with the Christian obligations to love our neighbors as ourselves, care for the earth, believe in the coming resurrection to new life, and be not afraid of what is to come, for God is in the birthing of it.\u00a0 Houses divided against themselves cannot stand, and so, \u201cin these days of darkness, we need to be about healing ourselves from past conflicts and empowering one another for the shared struggle we all face together: the struggle to bring peace, justice, and healing into our world.\u201d (page 155)<\/p>\n [17] Both of these books provide excellent devotional material for individuals and small groups settings.\u00a0 Their pages abound with sermon inspiration and illustrations.\u00a0 They are trustworthy spiritual guides to rethinking our theologies, traditions, and practices to better enable us to live in a post-pandemic world.<\/p>\n [18]I would like to conclude with a quote from Dancing in God\u2019s Earthquake<\/em>:<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" [1] In March of 2020 the United States government responded to the existence of the coronavirus in our midst with a call to shut everything down for two weeks.\u00a0 The worst of it would then pass over us, and we could resume our normal lives once more. [2] It didn\u2019t work out that way. [3] […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[15,143,51,144,37],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5483","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-book-review","category-covid-19","category-decolonization","category-judaism","category-native-american-american-indian"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n\n
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