Sermon 9/7/14
Proper 18, Year A
RCL |
Track 1
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I have been reflecting
recently on the ritual of the courtroom.
Have you ever thought about how scripted and prescribed the actions
are? Think of how often you have seen
the courtroom scenes play out in media—TV shows like Matlock, Law and Order, Boston Legal, and movies like 12 Angry Men, To Kill a Mockingbird, A Time
to Kill, A Few Good Men, Legally Blonde.
The ritual of the court
comes from centuries’ worth of tradition, legal interpretation, standards of
order, policy, hierarchy, and practice.
The system may look different depending on what culture you may be in. For instance, our court system practices according
to an adversarial model in which parties square off to plead the case in front
of a (hopefully) impartial judge and/or jury.
Other systems operate under an inquisitorial model in which judges act
as investigators and examiners. In any
case, we are familiar with a lot of the rituals that have developed. The practice of standing when the judge
enters the court room in something of a procession. The swearing in of witnesses. The requirement that the defendant must stand
for the reading of the verdict. The
emphasis on maintaining order, decorum, and dignity, or else risk showing
contempt of court. These are common
fixtures of the popular image of the court system, the parts we see in media.
And there is a reason for
treating this system with gravitas. The court system is the institution we have
invested with the authority to judge us, to imprison us, to possibly even kill
us in the name of each other. Such power
should carry a solemnity. And regardless of whether or not the pageantry—the
liturgy—of the courtroom is intentional, it serves the purpose of marking
liminal spaces in the lives of those whose future is decided in the courtroom.
I would suggest we would
lose some confidence in the system if the power with which the court acts were
to be treated in a trivial manner by the people who wield that power. In essence, the court has a reputation to
maintain, and ritual mystifies and legitimates its practice.
I have also been thinking
about the power of the ritual, and its effect on the people who go through the
system. If one is found guilty within
the court system, they are found guilty within this highly ritualized system
that then pronounces judgment; a judgment which may often include separation
from society—prison. In extreme
cases—separation from society by death.
The court in our name
pronounces sentence according to a proscribed form that has as its goal to
pronounce with finality the reality we will recognize. The individual is guilty, as punishment, and
possibly for our safety, the person is to be separated and grouped with others
who had transgressed our laws.
Highly ritualized and
choreographed acts. The person is given
a new status. Criminal. Guilty.
Convict.
We see these images on the
news, even if the trial is not in our own sphere of friends, cases are often
reported as at least local news. We are
frequently treated to national stories of court cases. The person led away in handcuffs, perhaps
even shackles on the ankles, in jumpsuits marking their new status in our
society.
But the ritual of the
trial and conviction is only half the story.
What I’m interested in is the ritual that does not happen.
Have you ever noticed that
the person convicted does not return to court to be ritually restored to the
community? The release of a prisoner has
a script, absolutely. But it does not have
anywhere near the same level of ceremony.
As I think about the
stigma that ex-convicts live with, I wonder if our practice of putting them in
prison with ceremony and finality and publicity without the same level of
ceremony and publicity in welcoming them back into society means that the
status the court confers upon prisoners is never actually lifted.
I wonder if things would
be different if we as a society gathered to acknowledge the debt as paid and to
welcome the formerly imprisoned back among us with as much decorum as when we
imprison them.
These are musings I have
had for years; thoughts that recur somewhat frequently especially as I follow
the uneven justice that our institutions administer. No system is perfect, right? All human institutions carry the capacity for
sin, right?
The reflections came back
as I was thinking about our gospel reading for the day. The reading is given as Christ’s own
institution of church discipline.
One way that may look is
this: When we read this passage through
the lens of our notions of discipline conditioned by our society’s conception
of justice, it’s possible to see this passage as answering the question of when
we are permitted to break contact with someone who wrongs us. In that lens the passage reads like three
strikes and the person is out.
In the Christian context,
the passage is saying something different.
The passage is telling us the lengths to which Christians must go to
stay in community.
It is our judicial context
that leads many to think that the separation of one who does wrong from the
rest of society is for our own protection and that person’s penalty.
By contrast, what this
passages intends is for us to recognize that once a wrong is committed, the
person who did the act is spiritually in danger, and at risk of alienation by
her or his own choosing, and so the community has responsibility to act to keep
them in relationship.
These differences between
our judicial system and the church point to a set of assumptions about who we
are when we gather that are at odds with each other. Our culture has us as bound together by
social contract, which we are free to accept or deny. But as long as we live within the political
bounds, we are governed by the rules of the realm. The church is different, even as the church
is treated in culture and in practice as a voluntary association of like-minded
individuals. The Church at its best and
most reflective of Christ is the acknowledgment that we are the Body of Christ
despite the differences we see or learn in our society. As the body of Christ, we cannot say that we
have no need of each other (1Corinthians 12).
No, Paul says in our readings from Romans today: Owe no one
anything, except to love one another; for the one who loves another has
fulfilled the law. The commandments are summed up in this word, "Love your
neighbor as yourself." Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore, love
is the fulfilling of the law. This is
not the teaching of our culture, which as a whole seems to emphasize our right
to be free of each other. Our faith,
instead, calls us to tangible relationship and care for those around us.
These differences point to
another way in which Christians can exist within our culture. But it is also harder; so much harder. Especially if you are as judgmental a person
as I am.
I’d like to highlight 4
practical implications from this passage
1) It’s not uncommon to hear that we may have conflict in
every other area of our lives but somehow the church and its members are
supposed to be immune to this. After
all, we’re Christians! “In this passage,
Jesus seems to assume that there will be conflict among his followers. What makes us Christian is not whether or not
we fight, disagree, or wound one another, but how we go about addressing and
resolving these conflicts.”[1] These guidelines may be directed to those
within the church, but they offer an example of the way Christians can show
Christ to others who know little more about us than that nationally Christians
have a reputation for judgmentalism and hypocrisy.
2) It is not in keeping with this passage to refuse to
exercise forgiveness when it is genuinely sought. After all, the passage seeks
to keep all in community. In the verses
just after this passage, Peter asks the question: How many times must we forgive? Jesus’ answer? Essentially:
Always forgive.
3) It is not in keeping with the passage to ignore the
harm done to another person for the sake of maintaining niceties. After all, this passage assumes that sin
exists, and that the harming of another is never to be overlooked. For the church to preach the demands of
forgiveness without thorough attention to the demanding need and careful
attention to repentance would risk passive, if not outright, violence to the
injured.[2]
4) It is so normal in a situation in which we have been
wronged to absorb that hurt and take it to others to talk about. It’s actually comforting, isn’t it? Without the input of the person who hurt us,
we can tell the story our way (The way it *really* happened, according to us)
and receive our support, and have people affirm that, yes, the person who
harmed us is a scoundrel. This passage
counsels that the first thing we do
is fight that natural tendency, and address the harm with the person. Directly.
The potential benefit is enormous:
regain a member of the community without having to deal with the
distortion that comes through hearsay and rumor—or the festering that comes
through inaction and stasis. In the passages just before this one in the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus tells the story of leaving the 99 sheep for the one. It is hard not to then see a connection to this discourse on discipline. To retrieve the one who by sin alienates herself or himself from others is more important than sitting in smug satisfaction with those who have never strayed.
Beloved of God, there is a
difference between justice as it is practiced in our world, and that which
Christians are called to enact in communities in which we find ourselves. It is a harder task, to owe all nothing but
love. It is a harder task to seek a
reconciling justice with which to replace punitive retribution. But it is our task to be the leaven wherever
we go, to make true the statement that justice is love when love enters the
public realm, and to seek justice that builds community instead of writes off others’ lives. Practice a love that rebuilds and reconciles
in the wake of sin both great and small, both in private and in public. And may doing so inside and outside of the
Church show that a different way is possible in an unforgiving world.
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