Sunday, September 13, 2015

"Speech of substance, weighted with love"

Sermon, St. Andrew’s, Sedona,
Proper 19, Year B

Not many of you should become teachers, my brothers and sisters, for you know that we who teach will be judged with greater strictness. For all of us make many mistakes. Anyone who makes no mistakes in speaking is perfect, able to keep the whole body in check with a bridle. If we put bits into the mouths of horses to make them obey us, we guide their whole bodies. Or look at ships: though they are so large that it takes strong winds to drive them, yet they are guided by a very small rudder wherever the will of the pilot directs. So also the tongue is a small member, yet it boasts of great exploits.How great a forest is set ablaze by a small fire! And the tongue is a fire. The tongue is placed among our members as a world of iniquity; it stains the whole body, sets on fire the cycle of nature, and is itself set on fire by hell. For every species of beast and bird, of reptile and sea creature, can be tamed and has been tamed by the human species, but no one can tame the tongue-- a restless evil, full of deadly poison. With it we bless the Lord and Father, and with it we curse those who are made in the likeness of God. From the same mouth come blessing and cursing. My brothers and sisters, this ought not to be so. Does a spring pour forth from the same opening both fresh and brackish water? Can a fig tree, my brothers and sisters, yield olives, or a grapevine figs? No more can salt water yield fresh.  --James 3:1-12

Have you ever dealt with a bully before?  Not just from being bullied yourself, but suppose you were in a position of power, and had to deal with a bully.  Have you ever watched a bully try to get out of trouble?[1] One of the first things you might notice is that the bully will try to minimize the harassment.  You’ll recognize it immediately because of the language and tactics they use:

“It was just a joke.”  The use of the word just minimizes the impact and tries to paint the harassment as a small matter.  Calling the harassment a joke tries to frame the entire matter as if the person who was being bullied simply mistook the bully’s intention.  Or the bully wants you to focus on the intention, not the reaction, as a way of avoiding blame.

“You are being too sensitive.”  This is often a silencing mechanism that a bully uses.  It is a tactic that attempts to make the mistreatment normal.  “It makes it sound like there is some line [at] which it is alright to be sensitive, but that the current incident does not cross that line,” as interpreted by the bully, or others who share the bully’s worldview.[2]  It attempts to rest the problem on the person being bullied, who the bully tries to define as too weak to handle the real world or the supposedly objective truth that a bully claims special access to.

Relatedly:  “I’m sorry you were offended.” This is the great non-apology, right?  “The aim is not to atone for a wrong, but to reduce damage to the person’s image. Repentance is feigned or ignored, contrition held at arm’s length. Non-apologizers…are more likely to implicitly blame the [person receiving the non-apology] for getting upset, manufacturing offense, or interpreting the incident in a way that reflects badly on the wrongdoer.”  The person delivering it can move on, professing the matter dealt with—a routine step in self-mythologizing narratives [that will make them feel better about themselves—meanwhile] recipients of the unapology feel continued frustration, even disgust, at the failure to accept responsibility.”[3]

These are incredibly common sayings.  Even if you might not fall into the category of ‘bully,’ you might use this kind of minimizing language because it’s the cultural mess we exist within that conditions our reactions to things. 

And there is a difference between a bully and a person making a mistake— a difference between a genuine expression of remorse and an insincere fauxpology designed to get someone’s conscience off the hook.  The difference comes down to such things as acknowledging the offense clearly, explaining it effectively, restoring the offended parties’ dignity, assuring them they’re safe from a repeat offense, expressing humility (which shows understanding of their suffering, and making appropriate reparation).

But a bully will hold to the tactics above, and that is if they do not simply persist in abusing others with no attempt to minimize their acts.  There are also the people who proudly proclaim they are simply and always offensive, as though that is enough to excuse all manner of abuse they mete out to others.[4]

The minimizing tactic is interesting to me, as is the use of language and words as a weapon.  The use of minimizing language is an attempt by the person who uses language as a weapon—think of people who rightfully get called out on their use of racist, sexist, or homophobic language—they use it to distance themselves from any responsibility for the power and consequences associated with what they say or the words they use.

In other words, bullies know full well how powerful their choices of words are, but they try to deny that their words have any power beyond their mere existence.  Bullies choose words explicitly for the pain they know the words can cause, and then blame their victims when the words do their expected damage by claiming the victim gave the words too much power.  The bully counts on a simultaneous reliance upon and denial of the power of language, and gambles that bystanders will agree with the bully’s denial of the power of words.

This is part of the cultural context we live in.  We live with the knowledge of very public cases detailing how sustained campaigns of bullying have led to teens committing suicide—and leads many others to depression.  We live in a world in which we’ve seen how carefully orchestrated propaganda campaigns against groups help create the conditions through which their mass murder becomes possible (think about how Germans referred to Jews as rats and Rwandan Hutus referred to the Tutsis as roaches for years before the slaughters began—a pattern of dehumanization).  

The very reason that the classical rhyme we learned as children—that sticks and stones may break our bones, but words will never hurt us—the very reason that has to be a constantly repeated mantra is because it flies in the face of this truth:  our realities (even our obscured realities), the worldview we inhabit, our notions of our very self, are constituted and expressed by words and language.  “Every choice of phrasing and spelling and tone and timing carries countless signals and contexts and subtexts and more!”[5] That nursery rhyme may be helpful for a time in someone’s life—to help not take the hateful words of another as the truth.  But the nursery rhyme is dead wrong in trying to say that words have no power.   And this notion that our speech is so easily rendered useless is one that James, who wrote the epistle lesson we heard this morning, would have found disastrously untrue.

Our reading from James comes halfway through his letter—and his attention to right speech is one of the three marks of true religion that he lays out at the beginning when he writes that:
“If any think they are religious, and do not bridle their tongues but deceive their hearts, their religion is worthless. Religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: to care for orphans and widows in their distress, and to keep oneself unstained by the world.”[6]
For James, an unbridled tongue is much more than a local problem characterized by a little gossip—though it can include that.  He considers an unbridled tongue to be an almost cosmic force set on evil. We see that in his conviction that the tongue is a fire capable of setting the whole cycle of nature ablaze.[7]  Given how speech can be used for significant evil—such as setting up the conditions for genocide, or quite literally bullying someone to death, or contributing of the marginalization of other groups (James is particularly concerned with the wellbeing and the mistreatment of the poor)—it is not so hard to see James’s point.[8]  Nor does it help that we may use words and language in such harmful ways, and try to deny that our words have any power.

We live as witnesses to a society that rewards significant attention to the most extreme voices. I don’t think I have to point to the election cycle as an example, but there it is.  We witness bullies use the most hurtful language they can muster against others while claiming that the fault for the reaction belongs to the person who was just insulted.  We witness promises being broken.  It is unfortunately not hard to find Christians who participate in this kind of behavior.  In cases in which there is an argument about removing a display of religion from the public square, you would not have to look very hard in any online comment section or letters to an editor to find a Christian issuing a death threat, or condemning an opponent to hell.

We witness the power of language, and we may lament that in so much of our discourse there is power to destroy, to divide, to berate.  We might actually prefer that words could be emptied of their power.  Sometimes it may even feel like we do that when we stop listening, seeking a break from the non-stop negativity, It may be tempting to fall silent, unplug, and retreat into shells we create for our own mental health.  There is some necessity in that, given how it helps to detox from the worst discourse the world can throw at us so that we have room to see the truth that God reveals to us more clearly.   It’s like recovering from drinking too much brackish water. 

But, there is something else we can do, something other than retreat.  While James has been interpreted to advocate silence, it is more accurate to say that the act of speech is a Christian practice and that careful attention to speech is important.  For James, The life of faith is one that integrates all parts of oneself toward perfection in God’s image.  That is what he means when he writes that it should not be the case that blessing and cursing comes from the same mouth, as fresh water and brackish water cannot come from the same spring.

James means that our progression into the life of God will be characterized by our ability to offer the world wellsprings of that which refreshes instead of that which sickens.  It means offering speech of substance, weighted full of healing and love.

Here are some ways that might look:
·        It might mean remembering the power of our own words, and not attempting to minimize their impact.  If we think we’ll have to walk back something we are about to say, consider whether those words need to be spoken. 
·        It might look like holding onto our own criticism of others until we can find a way to do so in ways that build others up instead of tear them down.
·        It will look like apologizing—actually apologizing—for when we hurt others.
·        It might look like holding a bully accountable for the power of their words and the harm they cause.  It means not buying into the lies they use to try to minimize the impact of their words.
·        Simultaneously, we must offer comfort and support for those who are bullied, so they might experience the reality of love, healing, and worth that bullies would deny to them.

Sisters and brothers, there is a thirst in this world for something better than our society can give.  So many people can tell stories of showing up with cups in hand, seeking a spring of fresh water, only to end up with mouthfuls of salt water.[9]  How might we be springs of refreshment in this world, offering refreshment borne of the love of God?  How might we, knowing the power of our words, offer speech of substance that heals the wounds and oppressions the world inscribes onto us and others?



[1] Well, election season is upon us, so you’ll get some practice! 
[2]  "You're Too Sensitive." Geek Feminism Wiki. Accessed September 11, 2015. http://geekfeminism.wikia.com/wiki/You're_too_sensitive.
[3] Carey, Stan. "Sorry Not Sorry: The Many Names for Non-Apologies." Accessed September 11, 2015. http://www.slate.com/blogs/lexicon_valley/2014/11/20/sorry_not_sorry_non_apology_fauxpology_unpology_and_other_names_for_hollow.html.

[4] They might introduce themselves by telling you they are an asshole.  You will most likely quickly find this is true.
[5] Munroe, Randall. "I Could Care Less." Xkcd. Accessed September 12, 2015. http://xkcd.com/1576/.
[6] Jas 1:26-27.
[7] My appreciation to Barbara Brown Taylor for much of this phrasing, and her quoting of Luke Timothy Johnson’s commentary on the “letter of James,” (in The New Interpreters Bible (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1998, 12:204)).  Bartlett, David Lyon, and Barbara Brown Taylor, eds. Feasting on the Word: Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary.  Year B Vol 2. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2008.
[8] See Jas 2.
[9] I owe this image to Barbara Brown Taylor, ibid.