Category: Politics (Page 21 of 23)

God At My Right Hand – From the Daily Office – October 19, 2012

October 19, 2012 / eric / 0 Comments

From the Psalms:

I have set the Lord always before me; because he is at my right hand I shall not fall.
My heart, therefore, is glad, and my spirit rejoices; my body also shall rest in hope.

(From the Daily Office Lectionary – Psalm 16:8-9 (BCP Version) – October 19, 2012)

Vitruvian Man by Leonardo da Vinci Heart, spirit, body. These two verses speak to me of the necessary investment of one’s whole self, the whole person, into the spiritual and religious life. One of the most influential lay theologians of the middle 20th Century, William Stringfellow wrote: “Spiritual maturity or spiritual fulfillment necessarily involves the whole person – body, mind and soul, place, relationships – in connection with the whole of creation throughout the era of time . . . . Spirituality encompasses the whole person in the totality of existence in the world, not some fragment or scrap or incident of a person.” (The Politics of Spirituality, Westminster John Knox: 1984, p. 22) If Stringfellow is right, and I think he is, then a plan for spiritual growth should follow the Psalmist example and “set the Lord always before” the person seeking to grow. Always . . . not just an hour or so on Sunday morning.

Consider all the areas of life in which a modern person lives, all the activities that fill our days, all the commitments to self and others that we juggle: marriage (or other significant relationship), family (nuclear and extended), friends and coworkers, employment, finances, health, entertainment, volunteer service . . . everyone who makes such a list creates different or additional categories, but the point is that life is (always has been) a bundle of stuff. However one subsections one’s life, there are going to be one or two areas that are just wonderful, and one or two areas that aren’t so good; there are parts of our lives that fill us spiritually and other parts that drain us. Good spiritual practice attends to both sorts of life activities.

Some questions I ask myself on a regular basis are: What has been going well? What hasn’t? What can I do to pour-over the strengthening aspects of the fulfilling areas of life into those that are draining? What are some achieveable goals for filling up those less-than-rewarding aspects? Who is speaking in these areas of my life? Is God? Who else needs to join the conversation?

That last one for me is a big one. The Psalmist said, “Because God is at my right hand I shall not fall.” I often wonder how he knew that. The only way I know that God is present with me is through the presence of other people. For me the presence of God is mediated through the community of faith. In his first catholic epistle, St. John wrote: “No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God lives in us, and his love is perfected in us. By this we know that we abide in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit.” (1 Jn 4:12-13) I only know that God is at my side when God is there in the presence of a brother or sister in Christ. So the question of who else should be engaged in my spiritual conversation is very important.

The gospel lesson for today is St. Luke’s story of the Transfiguration. Having seen Jesus transformed, Peter, James, and John are overshadowed by a cloud from which they hear a voice say, “This is my Son, my Chosen; listen to him.” (Lk 9:35) That doesn’t happen to most of us very often, if at all. But Christ does come to each of us through those around us; we should engage him in conversation and listen to him. Only in that way will we be assured, like the Psalmist, that God is at our right hand.

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Father Funston is the rector of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Medina, Ohio.

In God We Trust – From the Daily Office – October 15, 2012

October 15, 2012 / eric / 0 Comments

From the Prophet Micah:

Put no trust in a friend,
have no confidence in a loved one;
guard the doors of your mouth
from her who lies in your embrace;
for the son treats the father with contempt,
the daughter rises up against her mother,
the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law;
your enemies are members of your own household.
But as for me, I will look to the Lord,
I will wait for the God of my salvation;
my God will hear me.

(From the Daily Office Lectionary – Micah 7:5-7 – October 15, 2012)

In God We Trust on Dollar Bill Sound familiar? Jesus sounded a lot like Micah at times:

Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth; I have not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law; and one’s foes will be members of one’s own household. (Matt. 10:34-36; cf. Luke 12:51-53)

Micah is the same prophet who authored what may be my favorite verse in all of the Old Testament: “He has told you, O mortal, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?” (6:8) And Jesus is the same preacher who said “Love your neighbor as yourself” was one of the greatest commandments. (Mark 12:31) How does one reconcile these admonitions with advice to put no trust in friend or loved one and promises to bring enmity between family members?

The answer lies in the last part of the above quotation from Micah: Trust in God. In the 1950s the U.S. Congress decided to emblazon “In God We Trust” across American currency as a response to the rise of “Godless communism” in the Soviet Union and its sphere of influence. One may debate whether it was appropriate under the U.S. Constitution, or whether it has since had any salutary effect, but it is what Micah models here, and it is the message of Scripture and of Jesus. “Don’t trust human beings! Trust God!”

In the last weeks of the U.S. presidential campaign, as political debates lead to family arguments and people begin to see the members of their own households as political enemies, it is well to remember this. Human beings, even the best of us, are fallible and untrustworthy, especially the ones we put on pedestals and look to to solve the problems of our nation or our world. As the Psalmist (echoing Micah’s sentiment) reminded us, “Put not your trust in rulers, nor in any child of earth, for there is no help in them.” (Ps. 146:2, BCP version)

It may sound trite. It may be misplaced on our currency. But it is the only solution: “In God We Trust.” If we remember that, maybe we can all just get along . . . .

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Father Funston is the rector of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Medina, Ohio.

Political Speech: Prophetic or Nasty? – From the Daily Office – October 11, 2012

October 11, 2012 / eric / 0 Comments

From the Prophet Micah:

And I said:
Listen, you heads of Jacob
and rulers of the house of Israel!
Should you not know justice?—
you who hate the good and love the evil,
who tear the skin off my people,
and the flesh off their bones;
who eat the flesh of my people,
flay their skin off them,
break their bones in pieces,
and chop them up like meat in a kettle,
like flesh in a cauldron.

(From the Daily Office Lectionary – Micah 3:1-3 – October 11, 2012)

Cannibalism, Copper Engraving by Theodore de Bry Micah gets just a wee bit graphic here with his metaphors, with his condemnation of political leaders, don’t you think? He has accused them of being cannibals! He describes them as treating the people like meat for a meal; they have butchered them, flayed them, broken their bones, and chopped them up for stew meat! It’s awful!

In the midst of our political campaign, I am intrigued by the awfulness of Micah’s prose as it compares to the things we are seeing about the candidates, about President Obama, about Governor Romney, and on the local level about those running for the Senate, for the House, and for state and local offices, though those are not quite as bad as the presidential advertisements, commercials, and so forth. Worse than the television advertisements and radio spots are the things that others (the superPACs and the partisan websites) are throwing up on the internet, on Facebook, on Twitter. Some of it truly awful. Like Micah’s prose.

Where does one draw the line? Each week in our Prayers of the People, my parish includes a petition that political discourse during the election campaign will be civil, courteous, and productive. So far, I’m sad to say, it seems to be none of those things. I think many people would agree that it is excessively negative, but has it crossed the line? I believe that it has; it always does – this election is no different from any other of my adult life, to be honest. Every election year seems to bring out the worst in people.

Why do we feel justified in uttering such terrible things about others, especially about those who are our leaders or those who would like to be our leaders? And is there any difference between our election year condemnations of incumbents and challengers, Micah’s prophetic condemnations of the leaders of Jacob, the rulers of Israel? Are we following in a prophetic tradition when we call them out in such “purple prose” for what we believe are their failings?

Are we being prophetic like Micah and his colleagues in Scripture? Or was Micah just being nasty like us and our neighbors? Is there a difference? I wish I knew.

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Father Funston is the rector of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Medina, Ohio.

Radical Preaching – From the Daily Office – October 10, 2012

October 10, 2012 / eric / 0 Comments

From the Prophet Micah:

Alas for those who devise wickedness
and evil deeds on their beds!
When the morning dawns, they perform it,
because it is in their power.
They covet fields, and seize them;
houses, and take them away;
they oppress householder and house,
people and their inheritance.
* * *
“Do not preach” – thus they preach –
“one should not preach of such things;
disgrace will not overtake us.”
* * *
If someone were to go about uttering empty falsehoods,
saying, “I will preach to you of wine and strong drink”,
such a one would be the preacher for this people!
* * *
The one who breaks out will go up before them;
they will break through and pass the gate, going out by it.
Their king will pass on before them,
the Lord at their head.

(From the Daily Office Lectionary – Micah 2:1-2,6,11,13 – October 10, 2012)

Bible Lighted by Votive Candle Micah condemns those who plot to do wrong “on their beds” and then carry out their plans when they rise; he prophesies God’s retribution against them. But then he is told not to do so; those to whom he preaches not only reject his prophecy, they tell him not to preach such things at all. He concludes that they only want to hear their preachers tell them of pleasant things, the things they enjoy; they want preachers who will utter “empty falsehoods” and preach of “wine and strong drink.”

I’m sure that every preacher has at one time or another felt like Micah. I remember early in my ordained career being told by a congregant that all she wanted from church was to spend Sunday morning with her friends singing songs she knew and hearing “an uplifting message.” But not every bible text lends itself to an “uplifting message” and from time to time there are social ills that need to be addressed! The early 20th Century Swiss theologian Karl Barth insisted that theology and preaching had to be done with the Bible in one hand and the newspaper in the other. Another theologian, Reinhold Niebuhr is often credited with saying that the role of the preacher is to “comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable.” (Interestingly enough, the originator of that idea was newspaper humorist Finley Peter Dunne who said it was the role of newspapers to do so.)

Micah, Barth, and Niebuhr thus call the preacher to view contemporary culture, especially the news of the day, though scriptural lenses and view the Word of God through cultural lenses, to call out and condemn that in the culture which does not accord with the word of God, even if the preacher is, in turn, condemned for doing so. The witness of Micah reminds us that doing so will result in criticism from at least some of those to whom one preaches. The thin-skinned preacher would do well to be safe and conservative and always preach that pleasant, uplifting message. In my opinion, he or she would not be faithful, but he or she would be likely never hear “Do not preach of such things” from his or her congregation.

Preachers, as Micah makes clear, and as Barth and Niebuhr intimated, are not called to play it conservatively safe. Preachers are called to be (as Micah puts it) “the one who breaks out”, the one who leads his or her people out of their comfortable culturally-bound lives through the gate of Scripture so that they may follow “the Lord at their head.” It isn’t always, or even often, an easy-to-hear, uplifting message that breaks down those cultural walls. It is been said that the word of God is radical and so it is; Scripture gets to the root, the radix, of human existence and good preaching should do the same. Although Barth was speaking in a political context, something else he is reported to have said is also true of preaching: “The radical is probably wrong but has a chance of being right; the conservative is always wrong.”

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Father Funston is the rector of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Medina, Ohio.

Why Do You Call Me “Lord, Lord”? – From the Daily Office – October 8, 2012

October 8, 2012 / eric / 0 Comments

From the Gospel of Luke:

Jesus said: “Why do you call me “Lord, Lord,” and do not do what I tell you? I will show you what someone is like who comes to me, hears my words, and acts on them. That one is like a man building a house, who dug deeply and laid the foundation on rock; when a flood arose, the river burst against that house but could not shake it, because it had been well built. But the one who hears and does not act is like a man who built a house on the ground without a foundation. When the river burst against it, immediately it fell, and great was the ruin of that house.”

(From the Daily Office Lectionary – Luke 6:46-49 – October 8, 2012)

Jesus Teaching the Crowds It’s a darn good question, “Why do you call me “Lord, Lord,” and do not do what I tell you?” As we come to the last month of the 2012 political campaign, it is one which needs to be carefully considered by many Christians on all sides of the political divide. Are the values on which Christian voters are making their decisions those taught by Jesus, or are they cultural values dressed up in Christian clothing? One-issue voters in particular should take a broader look at their choices; just because a candidate supports your position on a question of particular importance to you does not mean his or her overall platform conforms well to the values of the Gospel, or does what Jesus told us to do.

Yesterday, evangelical preachers and churches around the country broke the law by engaging in something called “Pulpit Freedom Sunday”. They claimed to be the victims of “religious discrimination” because of a provision in American tax law which prohibits churches which claim religious tax exemption from endorsing political candidates and preachers from making campaign speeches from their pulpits. In this blog, I will not debate the law or the legality of what these churches and preachers did, but I do want to suggest that they have lost their way. Christ’s church was never intended to be a political party; Jesus is not a Republican, nor is he a Democrat; he is not a Green, or a Libertarian. Preaching politics from the pulpit undermines the Gospel message which is for all regardless of their political affiliation or their voting decisions. Preaching partisan politics from the pulpit is not doing what Jesus told us to do!

When the Gospel of Christ is equated with a particular party’s platform or a particular candidate’s position, the person or institution preaching that equivalence is not doing what Jesus told us to do. In fact, I believe they have even stopped calling Jesus “Lord, Lord” – they have given their allegiance to something or someone else!

The Gospel should impact our political decisions; I’m not suggesting otherwise. But churches and preachers should not be endorsing political nominees nor telling their congregations how to vote. Instead, they should be encouraging their members to give food to the hungry and something to drink to the thirsty, to welcome the stranger, to give clothing to the naked, to care for the sick and those in prison (see Matthew 25), and ask themselves how their political decisions best accomplish those goals. Because that is what Jesus told us to do!

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Father Funston is the rector of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Medina, Ohio.

Doers of the Word – From the Daily Office – September 23, 2102

September 24, 2012 / eric / 0 Comments

From the Letter of James:

Be doers of the word, and not merely hearers who deceive themselves. For if any are hearers of the word and not doers, they are like those who look at themselves in a mirror; for they look at themselves and, on going away, immediately forget what they were like. But those who look into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and persevere, being not hearers who forget but doers who act – they will be blessed in their doing.

(From the Daily Office Lectionary – James 1:22-25 – September 23, 2012)

Bla Bla Bla - Act Now It is said that Martin Luther hated the Letter of James; he called it an “epistle of straw” and didn’t believe it should be in the Bible. Why? Some folks will tell you it is because this epistle doesn’t support Luther’s theology of justification by grace through faith; James insists that works are necessary and the reformer just didn’t like that. However, that’s not really the case. Luther had doubts about the epistle’s apostolicity; he didn’t think it was really written by James the Apostle. He was probably right.

Nonetheless, in his preface to the New Testament, Luther praised the Letter of James and said he considered it a good book “because it sets up no doctrine of men but vigorously promulgates the law of God.” According to Luther’s biographer, Roland Bainton, “Once Luther remarked that he would give his doctor’s beret to anyone who could reconcile James and Paul. Yet he did not venture to reject James from the canon of Scripture, and on occasion earned his own beret by effecting reconciliation. ‘Faith,’ he wrote, ‘is a living, restless thing. It cannot be inoperative. We are not saved by works; but if there be no works, there must be something amiss with faith.’ ” (Here I Stand: A Life of Martin Luther)

Earlier this year, President Barack Obama addressed a prayer breakfast and took this passage as his text. Among other things, this is what he said:

The Bible teaches us to “be doers of the word and not merely hearers.” We’re required to have a living, breathing, active faith in our own lives. And each of us is called on to give something of ourselves for the betterment of others – and to live the truth of our faith not just with words, but with deeds.

So even as we join the great debates of our age – how we best put people back to work, how we ensure opportunity for every child, the role of government in protecting this extraordinary planet that God has made for us, how we lessen the occasions of war – even as we debate these great issues, we must be reminded of the difference that we can make each day in our small interactions, in our personal lives.

As a loving husband, or a supportive parent, or a good neighbor, or a helpful colleague – in each of these roles, we help bring His kingdom to Earth. And as important as government policy may be in shaping our world, we are reminded that it’s the cumulative acts of kindness and courage and charity and love, it’s the respect we show each other and the generosity that we share with each other that in our everyday lives will somehow sustain us during these challenging times.

That’s pretty good Christian theology, Mr. President!

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Father Funston is the rector of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Medina, Ohio.

It’s A Puzzlement! – From the Daily Office – September 19, 2012

September 19, 2012 / eric / 0 Comments

From Psalms:

Give the king your justice, O God,
and your righteousness to a king’s son.
May he judge your people with righteousness,
and your poor with justice.
May the mountains yield prosperity for the people,
and the hills, in righteousness.
May he defend the cause of the poor of the people,
give deliverance to the needy,
and crush the oppressor.

(From the Daily Office Lectionary – Psalm 72:1-4 (NRSV) – September 19, 2012)

Yul Brynner as the King of Siam in The King and I It’s a puzzlement!

In a recent online discussion of economic issues, a participant commented: “Government should not be charged with solving societal issues such as poverty, and this should be a society’s efforts to solve these problems through programs, charities, etc. sought by a willing group of individuals.” (I quote the comment as written; no editing.)

I don’t understand this compartmentalization of reality, this distinction of “government” as somehow separate from and different from “society”. I especially don’t understand it in a country whose founding document begins,

We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

What is “society” if it is not “We the People”? And in our system of governance, the government, the sovereign, is also “We the People”. So how is it that “government” is distinct and different from “society” in the context of the United States of America? We the People decide by our votes who serves in “the government”. If we like the job they do, we vote them in again; if not, we vote them out. (There are a lot of people employed by “the government” who are not elected to it; but they are not “the government” — they are “government employees”. We can get rid of them, too, by voting out their elected bosses who are answerable to us.)

OK . . . so there’s that political framework puzzlement, but there’s also a religious puzzlement. Christian folk, especially conservative evangelical American Christian folk, love to pray the Psalms. Some of our most conservative brothers and sisters will allow no music in their worship other than the Psalms. So here we have a Psalm praying to God to give “the king” the power to “judge [God’s] poor with justice,” to “defend the cause of the poor,” to “give deliverance to the needy.” Later in the Psalm, “the king” is praised because he “delivers the needy when they call” (v. 12), he “has pity on the weak and the needy” and saves their lives (v. 13), he redeems their lives from oppression and violence (v. 14). In other words, he does all the things the participant in that conversation said the government shouldn’t do.

But the king was the government at the time the Psalms were written! We might be tempted to change king to president in an attempt to contextualize and modernize this Psalm to fit our American circumstance, but president would be the wrong word to substitute. The right word would be government. And an even more correct substitution would be We the People . . . for the king named in this Psalm was the sovereign and in our country We the People are the sovereign.

If we wish to pray this Psalm in our context, that would be the way to do it:

Give We the People your justice, O God,
and your righteousness to our children.
May We the People judge your people with righteousness,
and your poor with justice.
May the mountains yield prosperity for the people,
and the hills, in righteousness.
May We the People defend the cause of the poor of the people,
give deliverance to the needy,
and crush the oppressor.

Why the compartmentalization of life? Why the separation of government from society? Why the failure to see that what we revere in Holy Scripture, the righteousness prayed for the government in ancient Israel, ought to be our prayer for the government in modern America? Why the failure to see that it should be a prayer for ourselves? Why the refusal, as a society, as a nation, as the sovereigns of our nation’s government, to deliver the needy when they call, to have pity on the weak and the needy and save their lives, to redeem the lives of the poor from oppression and violence?

We the People are the society. We the People are the sovereign. We the People are the government. We the People are the ones called by this Psalm and charged by Holy Scripture with “solving societal issues such as poverty.” Why is this so difficult to comprehend?

As another king (a fictional one) was wont to say, “It’s a puzzlement!”

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Father Funston is the rector of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Medina, Ohio.

God’s in Control – From the Daily Office – September 18, 2012

September 18, 2012 / eric / 0 Comments

From John’s Gospel:

The next day the great crowd that had come to the festival heard that Jesus was coming to Jerusalem. So they took branches of palm trees and went out to meet him, shouting,
“Hosanna! Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord – the King of Israel!.”

(From the Daily Office Lectionary – John 9:12-13 – September 18, 2012)

2008 Electoral Map We are living through a presidential election campaign in the United States. It seems to have been going on for ever, and the political ads and the news coverage of the candidates are increasing in intensity and in frequency. Pollsters take the public’s political pulse; commentators analyze the polls; the public reacts to the analysis; the pollsters re-poll the public. It’s a system of pendulum swings that feeds upon itself and oscillates back and forth. Flip-flopping candidates are matched by a flip-flopping electorate, and the candidates, their surrogates, and the commentators all decry the fickleness of the crowd.

But there is nothing new in a vacillating crowd, just look at today’s story of Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem. In just a few days, without the help of 24/7 television news and the internet, the same crowd will be whipped into a frenzy demanding Jesus’ execution. In their eyes, Jesus will go from king to criminal in less than a week! They will move from “Hosanna!” to “Hang him!” in four days’ time! Talk about a rapidly swinging electoral pendulum!

Of course, at this point in the American electoral process opinions are pretty much hardened; our electoral choices are probably rock-solid by now. The candidates are courting a small portion of voters, the so-called “undecided”. This group makes up under 10% of the voting public: a recent Wall Street Journal poll says only 3% of voters haven’t decided who they will vote for, while Gallup places the number at 8% at the highest. In physics terms, I suspect, the “amplitude” of the political pendulum’s oscillations is very small.

It was larger in Jesus’ time. As told in the Gospels, the swing involved nearly the whole crowd of visitors (and residents) in Jerusalem, not just a small (under 10%) group of “undecided” Jews.

Here’s what I take away from a comparison of the Jerusalem crowd and the American electorate, and the outcome of their and our decisions . . . in the long run, they were not in control and, frankly, neither are we. That’s not to say that we shouldn’t care, shouldn’t decide as carefully and prayerfully as we can, shouldn’t take part in the electoral process, shouldn’t vote. We should do all those things! But we should do so in the faithful assurance that, in the long run, God is and will be in control. The “Jerusalem electorate” chose badly; God redeemed that decision and used its result for the salvation of the world. However we choose, whatever the short term result, in the long term God will use it.

Archbishop William Temple, archbishop of Canterbury during the Second World War, once said:

“While we deliberate, God reigns.
When we decide wisely, God reigns.
When we decide foolishly, God reigns.
When we serve God in humble loyalty, God reigns.
When we serve God self-assertively, God reigns.
When we rebel and seek to withhold our service God reigns –
The Alpha and the Omega, which is and which was,
And which is to come, the Almighty.”

So we should do our homework. We should study the issues, review the candidates, take part in the process, vote in the election. We should do so hopefully and, regardless of the outcome, we should not despair. In the end, whatever decision we make, God’s in control!

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Father Funston is the rector of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Medina, Ohio.

Wonderfully and Marvelously Made – From the Daily Office – September 15, 2012

September 15, 2012 / eric / 0 Comments

From the Psalms:

For you yourself created my inmost parts;
you knit me together in my mother’s womb.
I will thank you because I am marvelously made;
your works are wonderful, and I know it well.
My body was not hidden from you,
while I was being made in secret
and woven in the depths of the earth.

(From the Daily Office Lectionary – Psalm 139:12-14 (BCP Versification) – September 15, 2012)

I wasn’t sure whether I wanted to tackle what this portion of the evening Psalm for today brings to mind. After all, I love the Old Testament reading for today which is (as many have recently been) from the Book of Job; it is that wonderful chapter where God, having had enough of Job’s whining, finally answers him saying:

Who is this that darkens counsel by words without knowledge?
Gird up your loins like a man,
I will question you, and you shall declare to me.
Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth?
Tell me, if you have understanding.

I just love God’s reply which basically says, “Who the Hell are you?” But as I was reading this lesson, I came upon this question that God asks, “Who shut the sea with doors when it burst out from the womb?” and that mention of a womb took me back to the evening Psalm and that took me back to a conversation I was part of earlier in the week. The conversation had to do with abortion, opposition to abortion, and what it means to be pro-life.

The conversation was sparked by this picture:

“Jesus,” said one party to the conversation, “commands us to care about both?”

“Where,” asked another party, “does Jesus command us to care about fetuses.”

Of course, Jesus does not; Jesus never made much mention of pregnancy or childbirth or care for the unborn. However, today’s Psalm might be read to lay the foundation for an understanding of God’s care for the unborn. The other party to the conversation didn’t go there, however. Instead, that person referred to Jesus’ citation of the second great commandmant: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” (Matt. 22:39) He continued with this assertion: “Since a baby in utero is a person and a child of God, the baby is your neighbor.” This statement is a logical as well as a theological stretch, I’m afraid, and here is where I started giving the issue some thought.

The reference to “a baby in utero” is fraught with issues. There is considerable debate today as to when a fertilized egg achieves the status of “baby”. It is not, however, at the moment of conception. Technically, from a medical point of view, a baby isn’t a baby until it’s born; “baby”, medically, refers to an infant, a newborn. From two months after conception until birth the child in utero is considered a fetus. During the first two months after conception, it is an embryo. (And then there are the theological issue of “ensoulment”, which is said to happen at “quickening”, and the legal issue of “viability”, which is the ability of the fetus to live outside the womb. Neither time nor space allow exploration of those issues.)

The second issue with the statement is in referring to whatever it is that is in utero as a “person”. Personhood is a legal concept and, in law, personhood is achieved at birth. (I’m not going to get into the currently hot political issue of whether corporations are people; that’s a whole other legal question.) Legally, a person is an autonomous being, a natural born man, woman, or child. The fertilized egg, embryo, or fetus in utero may be a person-in-potential, but is not yet a person-in-actuality. There are, of course, a number of proposed bills or constitutional amendments in several states that would change this legal definition, but as of now this is where American law stands.

Now, having said that, there are good reasons for being opposed to abortion, but basing that opposition on the supposed personhood of the in utero embryo or fetus, and stretching that personhood to neighbor status, and attaching Jesus’ “second great commandment” to that supposed neighbor just is not one of them. I’m opposed to abortion because I truly do believe, as this Psalm says, that God is involved in the procreative and developmental processes, that the development of the embryo into a fetus and the growth of the fetus are not simply mindless biological operations, that there is a mystical, spiritual “knitting” taking place, that we human beings are wonderfully and marvelously made by God. Abortion interferes with God’s work whereby we are “made in secret and woven in the depths of the earth.”

But I am also opposed to the outlawing of abortion because I hold what I believe is a fully consistent “pro-life” philosophy. I believe that one who is opposed to abortion must also be in favor of safeguarding the health and welfare of mothers before, during, and after giving birth. I believe that one must be in favor of improving the lives of children after they are born. A truly pro-life position would promote child and maternal welfare and health programs, feeding programs, education programs, and (I believe) access to safe and legal abortion in those circumstances where the life, health and safety of the mother are at risk, where the pregnancy results from rape or incest, or where there is medical reason to believe that the person-in-potential will be born with severe physical or mental developmental handicaps which would make life an intolerable burden. To be truly pro-life is to be pro-choice, because the choice is not between abortion or a baby; the choice is between a safe, legal abortion and an unsafe, deadly one. No woman should ever have to choose the latter!

To oppose abortion without supporting infant and maternal health programs, child welfare programs, good education, and access to safe and legal abortion when needed, is not a pro-life stance. It is simply to be pro-birth, but there is so much more to life after birth!

We are wonderfully and marvelously made, knit and woven together by God in our mother’s wombs, not just to be born but to have a life, a good life. That’s why, as opposed to abortion as I may be, I hold to a pro-life pro-choice position in favor of the availability of legally regulated, medically safe, accessible abortion for women who need to choose that path.

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Father Funston is the rector of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Medina, Ohio.

Playing My Harp in the Voting Booth – From the Daily Office – August 25, 2012

August 25, 2012 / eric / 0 Comments

From the Book of Psalms:

By the rivers of Babylon —
there we sat down and there we wept
when we remembered Zion.
On the willows there
we hung up our harps.
For there our captors
asked us for songs,
and our tormentors asked for mirth, saying,
“Sing us one of the songs of Zion!”
How could we sing the Lord’s song
in a foreign land?

(From the Daily Office Lectionary – Psalm 137:1-4 – August 24, 2012)

This is one of my favorite psalms, not so much for its own import, but because of the reggae song Rivers of Babylon which is based on it. Here’s a YouTube recording of the Melodians singing the song. (My favorite version is a live performance by Jimmy Cliff, but I couldn’t find a good video of it.)

It is the plaint of the refugee: how can we sing the Lord’s song in a foreign land? How can we do anything that is normal to us? How can we be the people we are meant to be in a context not our own?

This is the life of the Christian according to St. Paul! We who are members of the Body of Christ are not in our “native land”; we are not at home in this world. To the Philippians he wrote, “Our citizenship is in heaven.” (Philip. 3:20) And to the Ephesians, “You are citizens with the saints and also members of the household of God.” (Eph. 2:19)

This is difficult for us to accept. We like to think that the context in which we find ourselves, our worldly situation, is where we are supposed to be! I was born and reared in the United States of America; I was educated in its schools, worked in its industry, worship in its churches, vote in its elections. I am an American! And yet Paul and Psalm 137 insist that I am a “stranger in a strange land”, that I am a citizen of somewhere else, that my values are not necessarily those of the world and the society in which I find myself, leaving me with the question asked in the Psalm: How can I sing the Lord’s song in this foreign land? How can I apply the values of the gospel in my daily life in this place-other-than-heaven? How do those values influence the way I vote, the choices I make, the activities i do, the way I spend money?

And let’s be honest and take a step back to an earlier question . . . . Do gospel values influence my daily life, my vote, my choices, my activities? Or have I hung up my harp on the willows and given up trying to sing God’s song in this strange place? I hope that I have not, and I hope over the next several weeks to tune my harp and take it with me into the voting booth in November.

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Father Funston is the rector of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Medina, Ohio.

Category: Politics (Page 21 of 23)

God At My Right Hand – From the Daily Office – October 19, 2012

In God We Trust – From the Daily Office – October 15, 2012

Political Speech: Prophetic or Nasty? – From the Daily Office – October 11, 2012

Radical Preaching – From the Daily Office – October 10, 2012

Why Do You Call Me “Lord, Lord”? – From the Daily Office – October 8, 2012

Doers of the Word – From the Daily Office – September 23, 2102

It’s A Puzzlement! – From the Daily Office – September 19, 2012

God’s in Control – From the Daily Office – September 18, 2012

Wonderfully and Marvelously Made – From the Daily Office – September 15, 2012

Playing My Harp in the Voting Booth – From the Daily Office – August 25, 2012

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