The Word Was Made Flesh and Dwelt Among Us

4 December 2005

First UU Church of Austin

4700 Grover Ave., Austin, TX 78756

www.austinuu.org<

Listen to the sermon by clicking the play button.

PRAYER

Mystery without name and mystery beyond all naming we give thanks this morning in this season of Thanksgiving. We give thanks for roofs over our heads, hot showers and steaming baths, food in our pantries and on our tables, for the air that we breathe and each heart beat as it drums out our life.

In this giving of thanks we trust that we have given enough – of ourselves, our talents, our riches, our dreams. Now help us Great Spirit that is the principal of movement to move ahead into our lives – fully up to the front of our being – exposed and weathered but never weary of what Emerson called the direct, personal and unmediated experiences of our lives. Help us great Mother of necessity to keep inventing our way to see the world, our way to be the world.

Now may that authentic, up front, direct connection to life pull us toward itself and in so pulling carry us close to the source of all being – step by step, hour by hour. In the name of everything that is holy and that is, precisely, everything.

Amen.

SERMON

“The Word became flesh and blood, and moved into the neighborhood. We saw the glory with our own eyes, the one of a kind glory, like father, like son, like mother, like daughter, generous inside and out, true from start to finish.” (John 1:14 [Patterson translation] Italics and bold mine)

Introduction: For those of you who are offended (Gesturing to the clerical collar) by my manner of dress, I take note of your offence, but do not apologize. I ask rather that you honor your feelings of being offended and as intelligent and thoughtful beings that you hold your judgment. On the weekend of November 19th-20th I was involved in a Vigil with 20,000 other people of faith. This Vigil honored all those tortured, killed or disappeared by graduates of the School of the Americas at Fort Benning, Georgia. When sides are so designated it is important that everyone know that when it comes down to shirts or skins it is immediately apparent which side you’re on!

Turning away now is like seeing the first squiggle in the corner of a painting and deciding that, that painting will never hang in your home. Do me a favor – do yourselves a favor let me paint for you the rest of the painting? A painting of protest and people, a painting of faith and faithfulness, a painting of community and communion, a painting of life and loyalty and finally a painting worth more than these mere words.

And when it’s done, when the final strokes have been placed and I sign it in the corner (gesture the signing of the painting) then we’ll look at what we have done, see clearly what we have outlined.

Now let’s make some broad strokes that will give us an idea of what we may be looking at. The Main Gate at Fort Benning, Georgia is located down a street about 6 blocks long. On one side there are apartments that have been abandoned. These apartments are used by organizers for their different activities.

The Puppetistas use an area between the abandoned apartments for their rehearsal space. The Puppetistas are groups of people who man 30-foot puppets.

In order to maintain a sense of having control over the Vigil the fort in conjunction with the city of Columbus, Georgia have put chain link fencing up the entire length of this street on both sides. There are rules about the size of the sticks you can have on your protest signs and the size of the crosses you can carry. And there’s a rule that no one may wear a mask. Some protestors get around the mask rule by painting their faces, some come dressed as white-faced mimes.

On the right side of the street as you walk toward the Main Gate there are tables of the different organizations that show up for the protest. Everyone is there from the peaceniks that are for total non-violent civil disobedience to the American Communist Party who seem to be in favor of the overthrow of the present form of government. As one communist gentleman explained to me, revolution is the only way that those in power will relinquish their grip on power. I don’t know if that’s true or not, but Martin Luther King, Jr. did say, “Freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed.”

One thing’s for sure capitalism is alive and well at these tables because every form of memorabilia is on sale there that deals with protests of any kind. Some of the most thoughtful and funny bumper stickers along with some of the most obscene and tacky ones I’ve ever seen are on sale there.

Now we look toward the Main Gate of the Fort. A few years ago the Main Gate was left open with, of course, Military Police on duty just like any other day at the Fort. This changed when Martin Sheen and 4000 protestors walked across the line and entered the Fort.

They were packed onto buses and driven off the Fort. But the city of Columbus and the United States Army figured out that processing 4000 protestors and jailing them was beyond the city’s resources.

Since that time the Main Gate at the Fort has been closed. The gates are locked. The Army put up another temporary fence in front of the Main Gate and the City of Columbus followed suit and put yet another fence in front of that fence. That means to get over into the Fort at this point one would have to cross three fences. Paint these fences like gray hash marks, but do not judge them because by the end of the Vigil they will be transformed.

In 2004 seventeen people still managed to get over all three fences and one of these was a 76-year-old blind man. Where there is a will there’s a way. This year over 40 crossed under or over the fences and became prisoners of conscience.

The word that was made flesh and dwelt among us in Columbus, Georgia was the word, “no.” Paint this “NO!” in giant red capital letters punctuated with a bloody exclamation mark! The word made flesh in any protest is nearly always the word, “no.” It’s one thing to disagree with governmental policies; it’s another thing to embody that disagreement with your flesh and blood.

At the School of the America’s Vigil this year over 20,000 people gave up their individual bodies to embody as a community of protestors the power of the word, “no.” We are saying “no” to oppression, we are saying “no” to the School of the Americas, we are saying “no” to torture, we are saying “no” to death squads, we are saying “no” to tyranny. By the way, this oppression, this torture, these death squads, and various tyrannies have been sponsored since 1984 by Democratic and Republican Presidents and Congresses alike. It’s nice to know that on some level bi-partisanship is alive and well.

Let us make this particular painting a triptych – a three-paneled piece hinged together. Each painting is separate, but each is connected and therefore related to the others. This will be the panel on the right side of the triptych. The center panel will, of course, be the Vigil at the Main Gate. By the way – when a triptych is finished – do you sign all three panels (gesture the signing again) or simply the one in the middle?

The right panel of this triptych is a scene from the Americas south of our border – a time before the horse and the European.

The ancient Incas, Mayans and Aztecs celebrated to their gods by sacrificing human beings! Imagine a religion that must sacrifice a human being to their god!? It’s unbelievable, isn’t it? Simply unbelievable!

Every year in the ancient villages they would gather into the center of the main village all the young men. From all these young men, they would choose one young man. They would choose the most beautiful, the most charming, the most athletic, and the most gifted young man of them all.

They would take him from his family and place him into the royal court. And there he would be stripped and his body would be bathed and perfumed. Then, he would be dressed in a robe of the finest raiment, and offered a meal of the most sumptuous fruits and vegetables of the region, and after supper, the high priest would take him aside and teach him to play tiny clay flutes that would make music that would remind anyone of heaven and the angels. And that’s not all he got. The young ladies of the court, the young girls of the village, none of these young ladies or girls could deny this young man any desire he had, an desire whatsoever. Now, this went on for an entire year. He had everything he wanted, whenever he wanted it, as much as he wanted it.

At the end of a year, at an appointed hour, he would meet a high priest at the base of a pyramid and they would begin ascending the pyramid together. On the first few steps he would take the tiny clay flutes and throw then down and break them because, you see, he no longer had any need of music that would remind him of heaven and the angels. Further up, he would take off his robe and rend it in two, because, you see, he no longer had need of fine raiment. And finally, totally naked he would ascend to the top of the pyramid where a priest would take a knife made of obsidian, thrust it into his chest and pluck from it his still beating heart! Imagine having everything your heart desires taken from you! Imagine a society that calls upon their youth to sacrifice themselves so that order can be maintained, or better yet, so that a form of reality worshipped by the old has no ripples made in it, so that crops could flourish and those with money and power could continue with money and power! It’s unbelievable isn’t it!? Simply unbelievable!

So where does one find the courage to stop things that seem to have been going on forever? I turn now to the left panel of the triptych where I wish to paint a different scene.

When I lived in Japan I was undergoing orthodontic treatment in Tokyo. Every other week I would travel by train into the largest city in the world. I generally did this alone. I was 12 years old and never afraid. This says more about the Japanese than it does about me. Across the river from the Ochanamiso Station was the Orthodontic Teaching Hospital. Across the street from the train station there was the Christian Student Center. The Christian Student Center was operated by Catherine Smith, a Scots/Irish missionary.

When Catherine first came to Japan as a missionary she wasn’t sure what kind of work she would be doing, but when she saw the way the Japanese culture in the 1930’s treated their unmarried pregnant women she knew exactly what she must do. The Japanese as a culture frowned upon these women and generally banished them first from their families, and then from the society.

Sensei started the Sunshine School for Girls as a place where these women could live with dignity while they were pregnant.

So painted here is the Sunshine School for Girls. There’s lots of golden sunlight falling upon the school and a missionary woman stands outside the front door with her arms extended to embrace the world. Her look is so inviting that we, too, wish to go inside and visit with her.

The courage displayed by Sensei Catherine Smith and others is, in fact, the courage to do what is right! It has been said recently that it isn’t a matter of whether we’re right or wrong; it’s how persuasive we are. That to couch arguments in the terms of being right is an incorrect manner of going about things, but I am here today to tell you that it may not matter in the end whether we are right of wrong, but it does matter if it is right or wrong!

And now I want to put the finishing touches on this painting of ours. I want to paint for you the day of the Vigil in which the names of all those disappeared, tortured, or killed by the graduates of the School of the Americas are read over loud speakers. I want to paint the 20,000 of us who processed in a slow circle around this staging area as the names were solemnly read. And as each name was read 20,000 voices responded in Spanish, “Presente!” Como se dice presente en Anglise? How do you say, “presente” in English? Present. I am here. I am present. These people are present there in this ceremony. These people who have been killed, tortured and disappeared have not been forgotten, they have not been lost to us, and as long as we gather and read their names they never will be. Nearly everyone in the crowd of 20,000 is carrying a cross with the name of someone killed, tortured, or disappeared by an SOA graduate. These crosses were raised heavenward as each name was read.

Can you see there in the middle panel of the triptych the long line of mourners their white crosses held skyward? Listen carefully can you hear the sound of 20,000 voices raised in protest? Can you hear the screams of those who were tortured and raped? Can you see the babies ripped from their mother’s breast and impaled upon bayonets affixed to weapons made in this country? Can you feel the desolation of powerlessness, the futility of poverty, the inconsequence of a life so led?

Listen as I read in the manner of the Vigil these few names;

Archbishop Oscar Romero gunned down while celebrating the Mass.

Agustina Vigil, 25 years old and pregnant at the time of her death.

Domingo Claros, 29 year old wood cutter.

Cristino Amaya Claros, 9 year old of son of Domingo Claros.

Maria Dolores Amaya Claros, 5 year old of daughter of Domingo Claros.

Ignacio Ellacuria, Rector of the University of Central America in San Salvador and outspoken critic of the Army.

Ignacio Martin Baro, who studied the effects of the war on the human psyche.

Segundo Montes, a strong advocate for refugees and human rights.

Amano Lopez, a gifted counselor and pastoral worker.

Juan Ramon Moreno, gifted preacher and retreat leader.

Elba Ramos, the Jesuits’ housekeeper and remembered as sensitive and intuitive.

Celina Ramos, Elba’s 14-year-old daughter who worked as a catechist.

As each protestor passed the Main Gate they rid themselves of their crosses. Now that fence has been transformed – it has blossomed with thousands of crosses, flowers and signs. In the middle of all this repression there is a ray of hope – a living memorial.

For most of us, the phrase “and the word was made flesh” is a bizarre metaphysical statement from some other world. We can’t actually PICTURE a mere word becoming skin with blood vessels beneath.

But in our real world, in real time, the word becomes flesh in a more mundane way. Last week, 20,000 people whose word was “No!” got in busses, planes, cars, and trains and traveled to a remote part of Georgia, right near the Alabama border. They assembled in a mass of flesh — over three million pounds of flesh, all together.

And what they were saying — what WE were saying — was “You hear the people say No and you don’t listen because they are only words. But LOOK. WE are people in whom that “No!” became so strong it brought us here, to show you our faces — and our names, if you demand — and to say “NO!” this is not the way civilized humans can treat one another. We are like you. We bleed when we’re cut, we cry when we’re hurt, and when we’re tortured and murdered, we die, and we come to awaken that human part of YOU, that part that also knows this is wrong, this is vile, this is evil, this degrades everything we hold to be holy and high. “No!” we may not kidnap innocent people who stand in the way of our greedy and bloody power. “No!” we may not take them to shameful places, do inhumane and shameful things to them, make them hurt, make them bleed, make they cry out, make them die, “NO!”

We are that “No!” standing before you, as your brothers and sisters, as fellow citizens of a country we love even more than you do. We love it even more than you do because we love it enough to stand against its most shameful actions, to stand against them in person, in the flesh, in your gun sights, and say “Here we are, in the flesh.” We are the word “No!” standing before you in the flesh, asking ‘Can you hear us now? Can you hear us now? No. No! NO!”

(Make the motion of signing the painting.)

It is finished.