Another Outrage

But when you see the desolating sacrilege set up where it ought not to be 

(let the reader understand), then those in Judea must flee to the mountains;

-Mark 13: 14

There are lots of scriptures I could apply to the photo of El Presidente in front of St. Johns Episcopal Church up the road in DC.  But the one that came to mind was the rather cryptic verse from Mark chapter 13, about the desolating sacrilege.  Partly because people aren't exactly sure what Jesus was talking about.  Perhaps it was the pagan destruction and desecration of the temple that took place during the exile, maybe it was more of a prophecy about the coming destruction of the temple at the hands of the Romans (less likely).  But on a gut level it feels like it absolutely applies to anything that attempts to usurp the holy spaces with something profane.  We know that Jesus was outraged by the greed and falsity that had taken root in the Temple in Jerusalem, it was the thing that led him to his only real eruption of violent protest.  I'm not going to draw any connections between a specific church building and the Temple in Jerusalem.  Church building are ultimately just buildings, it doesn't make me angry when an old church is turned into a restaurant after the worshiping life of the people who made it sacred has ended.

No, it's not the building, it's not the Bible that Trump held up like some sort of bowling trophy, it's not any of the physical details of the moment that make it a desolating sacrilege.  It is rather the very notion of the moment and the details of its execution.  He had peaceful protesters, including one of the attending clergy at St. Johns tear gassed to clear the way for his little stroll across Lafayette square.  He did not pray, he did not read from that book he held up.  He had just made a very Caesar-like proclamation that all the state governors needed to get much tougher on the protesters, in case any of them really wanted to be more like Pontius Pilate.  As a Christian, I felt very violated by that picture, and I'm not a super sensitive sort when it comes to ritual sacredness.  I don't mind when the youth want to play hide and seek in the sanctuary of the church or when someone wants to hold a secular meeting in our building. My list of rules is pretty short when it comes to who can use the church facilities and for what.

A man who has done pretty much nothing in the past several months except foment division among the nation about a very serious health crisis and now about our old mortal sin of racism standing in front of a church waving a Bible is just a little too much to take.  I felt desolate, and I knew that this was really the meaning of sacrilege: a public display of absolutely empty pretense that is meant to seem like a statement of faith.  Did he do it to assure people that God was in control?  No, he did it to prove that he was in control, and didn't even manage to land that punch.  He doesn't look in control, he looks scared and small, which is what he is.  He is holding a book that he reportedly loves while everything that he says and does shows that he has absolutely no idea what is in it.  He is standing in front of a church that he thinks shows his point about how lawless and profane the protesters are because they vandalized it, when he has just tear gassed one of it's priests who was out working with the Black Lives Matter medical attendants.

Whatever Jesus was talking about when he told the people of 2000 years ago about the desolating sacrilege, I'm pretty sure he was also talking about what happened yesterday as well.

And Here We Are Again

The rich and the fortunate can well keep quiet,

nobody wants to know what they are.

But the destitute have to show themselves, 

have to say: I am blind

or: I am about to become so

or: nothing on earth works out for me

or: I have a sick child

or: right here I am being pieced together...

and perhaps even that won't suffice.

...

But God himself comes and stays a long time

whenever these maimed ones bother him.

-Rainer Maria Rilke, The Voices

I want to talk about George Floyd, but I can't bring myself to do it, so I will just say his name and let the injustice of his death speak for itself.  If you can watch that video and still equivocate, deny or somehow justify it, if you think, after all examples that have hit us in the face over the past decade are still just outliers and aberrations, there isn't anything I can say to you anyway.  I've been over this too many times in the course of writing this blog, the fountain is dry.

I would like to talk about the protests though, because there are things we need to mark very carefully in the midst of the chaos.  And there are judgments that are probably best left until we find out all the facts.  At a glance though there are honest protests taking place, there are moments of beauty where the police take off their helmets and shields and march with the people.  There are crowds that insist upon and enforce among themselves an ethic of peacefulness that seems practically superhuman in the face of such injustice.  There are instances of looting and vandalism, there are sinister implications that extremist groups may be infiltrating the protests and turning them into riots.  The left says it's the white supremacists, the right says it's Antifa, the scary thing is they very well could both be correct.  There is never a shortage of opportunists who would like nothing more than to increase the violence to serve their own ends.

We need to resist the bait we that is being dangled by those with an agenda other than the needed cry for justice.  But these protests need to happen, even if they get messy, because we cannot even pretend we have listened to the people whose blood has been running in the streets.  We are showing them, from Ferguson to Minneapolis that we will only pay attention when they shout and march in the streets. We will only take them seriously when it's time for tear gas and rubber bullets.  If they kneel in protest, we say it's inappropriate and our rich white man gangs (like the NFL owners) ban them or blackball them.

White America, we have left them no choice, but to do this.  To put more black bodies at risk, from riot police, from a COVID outbreak, maybe even from people in the crowd who are there to work evil instead of justice.  I believe that Christ is present in these protests, and I believe Christ will remain present much longer than the attention span of white Americans. I certainly acknowledge that Jesus himself was darker skinned than we generally imagine, but I know, right now, if Jesus were walking the streets of America, he would have a black face.

How followers of Jesus can remain ambivalent or even take the side of the oppressor is beyond me.  I'm out of things to say.  My outrage has been running in the red for too long, and I'm white. To try and feel what it must be like for black folk is to truly understand why you might just want to burn it all down.  Especially if it turns out that there are people, white people, in your very midst who are actually pushing you towards violence to discredit you or simply push the envelope of chaos.  I see your protest, I feel your anger, and I know it's justified.  In as much as you can keep it peaceful and be beautiful, I admire you more than I can say, but even if it goes sideways I absolutely know why you have to keep going.

When I can do something from my end, with my voice, with my vote, with my money, with my time, I will do it.  Even tasting your outrage through the filter of my empathy, I know it tastes like fire.  I pray that it is holy fire.  Christ be with you all.