THOUGHTS ABOUT “INTERNATIONAL BURN THE Q’URAN DAY” AND RELATED AFFAIRS

Though I’m Christian, not Muslim, I am just as distressed at the idea of the proposed “International Burn the Quran Day” as I would be if it were “International Burn the Bible Day.” But that’s precisely what Pastor Terry Jones and his church, the Dove World Outreach Center, of Gainesville, Florida, have proposed as a way of observing the next September 11, 2010, the ninth anniversary of the terrorist attacks (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IS5AuRgeoAE): burning copies of the Quran.

I’ve studied the Quran (or at least an English translation of it) and my supreme loyalty is still to the Bible. Yet I offer the Q’uran respect similar to what I offer my Muslim friends, just as most of them respect me and my Bible. This seems a fair and reasonable exchange. If Pastor Jones and the Dove Outreach Center wish to help people come to know Christ, as is his stated goal (mine too), will they gain a fair hearing by such a threatening and provocative act of flagrant disrespect? Or is his a magical world in which he expects respect, but he doesn’t have to give it?

In his interview on CNN, Pastor Jones recites a litany of charges against Islam, such as forced conversions, terrorism and lack of freedom. I’ve also heard Muslims recite litanies of historic grievances against Christians, going back to the Crusades and to old and contemporary forms of Western colonialism. Their reasoning is so similar, they must either both be right, or equally mistaken. To me, Al Qaeda is to Islam as the Ku Klux Klan is to Christianity. Both appeal to one religion or the other, and both are perversions of it. So, just as I would not want myself and my sacred scriptures discredited by association with the Ku Klux Klan, we must make the same distinctions when relating to all who call themselves Muslim. I know, love and respect all the many Muslims in my life. And I haven’t met an Al Qaeda jihadi yet.

I’d like to take Pastor Jones to meet some of my Muslim friends, including the Muslim family in West Africa that effectively “adopted” Becky, our daughters and myself, without requiring us to become Muslim. They even said we could host prayer meetings or a church on their property. That may not be as unusual as Jones thinks.

So, count me as a conscientious objector to International Burn the Quran Day on September 11, 2010. We have, as a nation, more and better grieving to do about the events of that tragic day, nine years ago, if we are to break out of the cycle of victimhood, vengeance and violence. The wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, and the burning of the Quran are part and parcel of our entrapment in aborted and misdirected grieving. Doing something as vindictive and disrespectful as burning the Quran, in order to poke Muslims in the eye, the vast majority of whom had nothing to do with the events of that day, will lead to no one’s healing, including our own. Quite the opposite. Respect and reconciliation will go much farther toward healing the wounds of September 11, which were felt just as strongly in the Muslim community of America, as among non-Muslims.

Similar errors and attitudes are at work over plans for a newer, larger Islamic center in Lower Manhattan, near the site of the World Trade Towers attack. My thoughts: outside of the people of Manhattan and their elected and appointed city officials, its no one else’s business. There may be reasons related to zoning laws and civil safety codes that would argue for or against it, same as if a church were proposed for that site. Religion (or which one), however, should not be a deciding matter in the case, unless we want to start a precedent of legalized religious preference and persecution. We Mennonites should be familiar with where that leads. Our experience has taught us instead that the Holy Spirit has more powerful means of convicting and convincing people than what human laws and regulations can ever provide.

More importantly, what does it say about us that a proposed mosque has become a major national election year issue? Besides fear of Muslims and Islam, it also indicates ignorance. There are already thousands of Muslims living, working and worshiping in Lower Manhattan, with plenty of mosques there even now. Furthermore, the imam and potential builder of the proposed Islamic Center is a Sufi Muslim. Sufism is the most peaceful and universalistic sect of Islam, the one least likely to inspire, recruit and send forth armed jihadists and suicide bombers. In fact, Sufis are more regularly targeted for persecution, violence and murder by Al Qaeda types than are Christians and Westerners, at least by number of successful attacks and body counts.

It all comes down to this: Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist, Wiccan freedom of religion (and atheist freedom from religion) is our freedom of religion as well. Respect for Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, Pagans and atheists is tied up with our respect as well. Respect does not mean agreement, nor is it to be confused with postmodern relativism, the belief that all beliefs are equally true, that they all lead to the same destination. They aren’t, and they don’t. To say otherwise is not even respectful to any religion and its adherents. But respect is indispensable to a Christ-like way and witness in the world. In this fearful post-9-11 age, it could even distinguish us.

Pastor Mathew Swora

This latest round of clergy sex and cover-up scandal could help usher in the next big thing: a Reformation Point Three. I think Reformation Point Two has been underway already in the globalization of the church and the emergence of the Church of Asia and Africa. We think of Reformations as basically theological movements. But I wonder if they aren’t just as much about power, and the breaking down of mental, institutional and social fortresses, so that the power within can be dispersed, shared,  and multiplied, as it was meant to be. Even the great theological councils and creeds, perhaps even the formation of the Canon, may have happened in part as reactions against the abuse of power, and to establish or affirm external standards of faith and conduct by which to hold leaders and authorities accountable to the people whom they are to serve and empower. Popular imagination holds heretics like Marcion in the 5^th Century A.D, who tried to eviscerate the Canon of everything Jewish, as renegade heroes fighting for our freedom to think for ourselves (the prequel to The Da Vinci Code). But their brands of faith required at least as much faith in themselves as orthodoxy requires in its sacred scripts. And that without the stringent moral standards of the scriptures. Or the accountability of other believers, living or dead.

As I talk with unbelievers, one common reason they cite for not believing is not so much the beliefs themselves (they often believe things that require at least as much faith), but the church’s abuse of power, politically and economically, as well as sexually. A Reformation Point Three would recycle some of the original Protestant and Anabaptist criticism of entrenched, hierarchical, institutionalized religious power. It would also take us back to an apostolic understanding of church leadership, as a tool for the maturation and empowerment of all believers, even to the cultivation and multiplication of power and leadership. In the kingdom of God, those are not zero-sum schemes; Holy Spirit-given power and leadership grow with the sharing. And that takes us back to the model of leadership and power exercised by Jesus, who gave himself away to the ultimate degree, so as to share his life, power, mission and authority with his disciples.

In a Reformation Point Three, we will relearn how to minister and witness without the kinds of power and prestige that the church hierarchy was trying to protect with its cover-ups. That kind of power and prestige are going, going…..gone even as I type this. That will lead to new/ancient and more grass-roots forms and shapes of church, operating against social headwinds of mistrust and contempt. Again, nothing new in our history. The setting, in fact, for some of our finest moments.

April 7, 2010

Pastor Mathew Swora

Rightly or wrongly, fairly or not, our comrades in the Roman Catholic church are taking quite a beating in the global press over the latest round in the clergy sex abuse scandal. Vatican officials close to Pope Benedict are comparing this latest eruption of outrage and accusations to the ancient persecution of the church in the Roman era, even to the Nazi Holocaust (a very regrettable comparison). But if there is any truth to the claim that some in the secular, liberal and modern press are too eager to seize any stick with which to beat the church, that pales in comparison to the culture of cover-ups and secrecy in the church that each new round of the scandal seems to uncover. And that pales in relation to what too many people have suffered by way of abuse, and continue to suffer as abuse delivers on its long-lasting legacy of damage to body, soul, spirit and relationships.

I can hear my comrades howling over the fact that the same press that lambastes their hierarchy for sexual misconduct turns around and nearly celebrates the sexual misconduct of certain politicians and celebrities. Point taken. But the church is being taken to the woodshed not just for engaging in the very conduct that it condemns (the politicians and celebrities don’t build careers on making moral prescriptions); the problem is also with the cover-up, which celebrities, by their very job description, don’t engage in, either. Most importantly, there is the matter of predation, the vulnerability of the victims, and broken trust. Whatever one might say about philandering  or swinging actors and politicians, these are not as regularly the features of their misconduct.

This is not just a Roman Catholic thing. Other Christian denominations and communions have their stories and histories of abuse, perhaps even of some cover-ups. It is a power thing. And religious power can be an especially fertile field for the abuse of many kinds of power. In systems of church leadership you have a heady, powerful brew that can either lead to the eternal maturity, glory and empowerment of eternal human beings, or you have a web of expertise, domination, attention, intimacy, dependency and symbolism that can ensnare, exploit and infantilize people. The difference depends in part upon how the clergy see themselves. Are we seeking honors and satisfaction from God, or from people? Has our spiritual and theological development served to enlighten us to the fact that we are each “the chief of sinners,” or have we come to feel entitled and superior? Are we using the power that comes with our calling to glorify God or to aggrandize ourselves and our institutions? Do we even see this power as something to share and to cultivate in others, or is it a zero-sum game by which we gather power at other people’s expense?

The clergy sex abuse scandal occurs at the point where sexuality, spirituality and ecclesiastical power meet. Clergy, how are we doing at growing up and being sexually mature people? Or are we taking out our immaturity upon our congregations either by denigrating sexuality, or idolizing it? Within our internal “wiring,” sexuality and spirituality are only a hair’s breadth apart. How are we doing at the balancing act of affirming the goodness of our created sexuality, while submitting it to our spirituality? The latter should direct and define the former, not vice versa.

How are we doing with issues of intimacy and self-disclosure? Do we appreciate just how much intimacy is already involved when we share our faith lives, our questions and our beliefs with other people, especially when we pray with them? As for our temptations and struggles, do we have a “confessor” to whom we can take them? If not, why should anyone bring their temptations and struggles to us? After all, we of all people should know that we are “the chief of sinners.” The totality of our lives and souls cannot be an open book to everyone. But between all the persons in our lives, is all of our life then an open book to someone? Besides God, of course? God made the church for a reason.

Mathew Swora, April 6, 2010

As a pastor, my calling is not to use the pulpit, nor the church website, to tell people how to vote, nor what the politics of God’s kingdom would look like in legislation in Washington, D.C. or the state capitol. The kingdom of God is political, but in a way that transcends and surpasses the power contests of political parties and office-seekers. God’s kingdom also unites people of different parties and political persuasion in the commonality of sin and redemption. We are all “the chief of sinners (I Timothy 1: 15),” and “to grace how great a debtor,” regardless of how right we may believe our positions to be. To believe that our positions are morally right does not permit us to believe that we are morally superior. We all live in a world that bedevils our best efforts to do good with dilemmas, mixed motives, character flaws, and unintended consequences.

That is why I neither preached nor blogged on the recent federal insurance reform legislation while it was the hottest topic in the land. My faith makes me care very much about the un-insured and the under-insured, and it moved me in one direction on the legislation more than the other. But I could see how reasonable people might disagree with me, based on the faith and values we share in common.

But some things happened in the course of recent protests in Washington, D.C. against health insurance reform in Washington, D.C., that revealed an ungodly and anti-Christ tendency, or temptation, that cuts across all political lines and unites us all, conservative or liberal, Republican or Democrat. To that, I as a pastor must speak.

It is visible in several Youtube videos, such as http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ik4f1dRbP8&feature=channel. It is the response of some protesters to a man who showed up with a sign saying he has Parkinson’s Disease. At the very least, he was engaging the Tea Party activists with an important question, namely, What is someone like him to do if a private insurance company drops him, or denies him coverage, and he can’t get it anywhere else?

Maybe some of the protesters had some good ideas for him. Maybe some of them engaged him in a respectful and reasonable discussion on that. Maybe they would even have been right, even more right than the legislation being passed. But the cameras caught several protesters who treated him to hostile, threatening contempt, with people stereotyping him as a lazy bum just looking for a handout. That you get on the other [presumably black and poor] side of town, one person shouted. Its evident on the video that the hecklers were much more healthy than the Parkinson’s sufferer, at least physically. Compassion at that part of the protest rally was replaced by a culture of contempt for the weak and the needy, at least on the part of those caught heckling and ridiculing the man with Parkinson’s disease.

How do they respond to someone with cystic fibrosis, or Downs’ syndrome, or an elderly person bent over with advanced arthritis and osteoporosis? I wondered. If they feel a twinge of judgment, fear and a desire that such persons disappear from their sight, I would have to confess that they are not alone. Sometimes the same ugly thoughts and desires run through my head at the sight of human suffering. Fear and contempt can run a mile down the road while compassion is still tying its shoes. But hopefully that gut-level reaction of hostility and contempt is recognized for what it is: fear of our own vulnerability and mortality. Hopefully it is restrained and overcome by an awareness that “there, but by the grace of God go I.” That’s what being spiritual is about, at least for Christians. And if my prayers for a long life and a chance to see my children’s grandchildren are answered, the odds go up astronomically that “there will go I.” In which case I don’t want someone yelling in my face telling me to disappear, contemptuously throwing me a dollar bill to expedite my exit.

This culture of contempt for human weakness is not the exclusive property of either donkeys or elephants. Its not a conservative or liberal thing. I’ve seen and heard much judgmentalism and contempt on both sides of America’s culture wars. The earliest, oldest wisdom from ancient prophets and psalmists tell us that we are indeed “our brother’s keeper” and that the true measure of spirituality is not whether we can project our spirits out of our bodies or do other feats of martyrdom and meditation, but if we “do justice, love mercy and walk humbly with our God (Micah 6:8).” We can’t get any more “conservative” than that. At their best, liberals and conservatives, Republicans and Democrats are simply arguing over how best to flesh out a culture of compassion for the weak and needy (all of us, eventually). Hopefully they’re listening to each other compassionately and respectfully (What planet am I on? you ask). To live out a culture of compassion in a world of changing technology, we always need new ideas for implementing ancient values. No party and no politician have the last word or the complete picture on that.

But to display contempt, especially for the weak, needy and vulnerable, is to short-circuit the search for truth and effective policy. Because they are no longer the issue. Power is. We’ve been down this road before, like when Nazi Germany was disposing of its “useless eaters,” including the disabled, the infirm and the elderly. Contempt of the weak and the sufferers becomes contempt of oneself, because weakness and need are inescapable to the human condition. I can only hope that when those particular protesters are in wheel chairs, hospital beds or nursing homes, which I can guarantee that they will be, if they live long and rewarding lives, they will have a change of heart toward human suffering and the weak. I also hope they will be surrounded by people who will not mock or turn away from their weakness and need, but who will embrace and support them.

And that their health care needs will be met, one way or another.

Pastor Mathew Swora

I Cor. 1: 26 Brothers, think of what you were when you were called. Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were influential; not many were of noble birth. 27But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. 28He chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things—and the things that are not—to nullify the things that are, 29so that no one may boast before him. 30 It is because of him that you are in Christ Jesus, who has become for us wisdom from God—that is, our righteousness, holiness and redemption. 31Therefore, as it is written: “Let him who boasts boast in the Lord.”

Where I Corinthians begins, with the cross of Jesus Christ, it ends. The last controversy in Corinth that Paul addresses, in chapter 15, has to do with the resurrection, and whether or not God brings the dead back to life in real bodies. They should already know the answer to that question, because he starts out by saying, “I remind you of what I preached to you before….that Christ died for our sins.”

So as I explore some more of Paul’s deep thoughts about the cross and what it says for Christian community, I don’t want to come to Easter and the end of Lent with anyone not hearing the same thing: that Jesus Christ died for our sins, on the cross. I don’t want anyone coming through Lent to Easter wondering, “How can my sins ever be forgiven?” or “What can I do to atone for my own sins? Or “How can I know that God would ever forgive me or accept me?” The cross stands as God’s answer with an exclamation mark, to all such questions, declaring that the mercy and compassion and acceptance of God know no bounds or limits, and can overcome any sin, shame, guilt or gulf between people.

There’s no evil so big that the goodness displayed on the cross cannot overcome it. There’s no guilt deeper or taller than the mercy displayed there when Jesus prayed for his executioners and said, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.” There’s nothing we can do to detract from, or add to, his work there, who died for his enemies, and those who abandoned or betrayed him, rather than avenging himself on them. We can only accept it, or not. The last thing that I, as your pastor, want is to stand before the Great White throne of God and hear him ask me, “You preached every Sunday, but did anyone ever hear from you the same good news that gave you such relief when I laid hold of you?”

And that implies something else: A Jewish rabbi was once asked, “Why is it that so few people find God?” His answer: “Because so few people are looking low enough.” That could have been the rabbi Saul, when he wrote in today’s passage, “God has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God has chosen the weak things of the world to shame the strong. He chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things—and the things that are not—to nullify the things that are… …so that no one may boast before him.”

Here we come to another implication of the cross, something else it says about the church, about Christian life and relationships, once we understand its leveling word of forgiveness: before the cross of Christ, no one is in a position to boast. At least not about themselves. Before Christ and the cross, all human clamor, claims and comparisons must go silent. In chapter I, Paul has two related kinds of boasting in mind: one has to do with social class and status; the other he mentioned earlier in this passage, when people divided themselves up and said, “I am of Paul,” or “I am of Apollos,” or “I am of Cephas,” or “I am of Christ.” Which implies that Paul and me are better than Apollos and them. Or vice versa. Such boasting about social class and “Who’s my preacher?” are probably connected and related.

First, about dividing and boasting about preachers and teachers: Oratory, teaching, preaching and public speaking skills were to First Century Greeks what basketball or football skills are to our society today, especially for the educated and upper classes who could attend schools of oratory. “How about them Vikings?” you might hear around the water cooler on a Monday morning. On a Monday morning in ancient Corinth, the talk might have been more like, “How about that Apollos and his sermon yesterday?” Funny how people could get all worked up about how well someone spoke, all the while forgetting what it was that they said.

The first time we meet Apollos is in Acts Chapter 18, after Paul had left Corinth, after he had then lived and worked three years in Ephesus. Then there came to the church in Ephesus a Jewish Christian from Alexandria, an Egyptian university town, one Apollos, who we read was very well educated, and very polished, persuasive and skilled in the art of public speaking. After helping the Christians of Ephesus a while, Apollos went on to help the Christians across the sea, in Corinth. Thank God for Apollos.

Because there’s no evidence that Apollos and Paul were personally at odds. Paul refers to him respectfully in chapter 3 of this letter and says, “We both are God’s servants by whom you were led to believe. Each one of us does the work which the Lord gave him to do; I planted the seed; Apollos watered it, but God gave the growth.”

So if neither Paul nor Apollos were stirring up trouble against each other, then there are two likely reasons why their fans were at loggerheads: again, class and status; the other is because of that stubborn tendency in human nature to clamor, claim and compare, in effect, to find something to compare ourselves over, and to start boasting about it. It may be helpful when comparing cars; it may be fun when talking smack about our favorite sports teams. But in the kingdom of God, its like introducing wolves into a sheep pen.

Interesting: Paul does not say, “Stop boasting,” or “Don’t boast.” Rather, he says, “Let anyone who boasts boast in the Lord.” With that Paul displays an amazing understanding of human psychology. He seems to understand that as humans we’re going to look for some sort of hook on which to hang our sense of worth and value. And we’re going to want to express it and extol it. Its incurable. We might do it over a clique in school, or a social class, or a celebrity, a sports star, a sports team, or a politician and his or her party, or our nation and its military might, maybe even our denominations, churches and preachers. When we do, we’re giving these things and people the power to make us happy or sad, to feel like winners or losers, by how well they do in competition with other cliques, classes, countries or celebrities. As though we were succeeding or failing through them. As though our worth and identity were based on their’s. As though we were even living vicariously through them. That’s why we see a lot of grumpy faces in this town on Monday mornings…………… during the NFL play-off season.

So instead of saying, “Don’t boast!” Paul says, in effect, “Hitch your hopes, your value, your honor on the Lord, even, on the Lord who went downward, into dishonor, on the cross, against all the normal human striving for honors and upward mobility. Let him be for you what you tried to make of Apollos and me” (or of the Vikings, the Twins, Jennifer Aniston or your country); let him do for you what Apollos and I (and the Timber Wolves and your social class) can never do for you, namely, give you an unfailing and unshakable sense of worth, value and meaning. There’s nothing more powerful and striking anyone can do to affirm our worth and give us honor than what Christ did by dying for us, in dishonor, on the cross. That’s what we express and extol in worship.

The other reason why the Corinthian Christians were at loggerheads, had to do with social class and status. When Paul first worked among the Corinthians, he says he didn’t approach them with fancy flights of eloquence and open and shut cases of elegant logic. Those who responded to his simple, startling and straightforward message about “Christ and him crucified” were, for the most part, poor, slaves, and the semi-educated. “Not many among you were considered wise, powerful or of high social standing,” he said. Like the kinds of people who ended up on crosses whenever they forgot their place.

When Apollos showed up in Corinth, with his gifts of education and eloquence, could it be that he appealed to a different class, the upper, wealthier, more highly educated, more socially-respected and influential crowd? Even those of noble birth? If so, great. Nothing wrong with them coming into the church: the ground is level at the foot of the cross. But later in this letter we find evidence of tension between social classes in the church. We’ll read that some come to love feasts with lots of food and pork out, while others come empty-handed and leave with empty stomachs. Some get invited to feasts in the temples of idols, and some do not. Some could engage the legal system to start a lawsuit against their brother or sister, who were only at their mercy.

Not that they were always being rude and predatory. Maybe they were just clueless. Its harder for people with power and wealth to know how that power and wealth are affecting others; they are often barely aware of it. Those without such power and wealth are often aware quite aware. And it’s one reason why the life and work of the poor and powerless can be so complicated and nerve-wracking. The Evil One may have used those class distinctions to create tension between those different groups, who then said, “I am of Paul” or “I am of Apollos.” Those could be divisions of class, as well as divisions around who’s the better speaker and teacher.

What they need, and so do we from time to time, are reminders of how God works in the world. Just as God used a tool that looks like great weakness and foolishness to the world—the cross—so too does God most often use people who look to the world like agents of foolishness and weakness: the poor, the un-influential, those without the credentials, the lowest in class, status and power. “The foolish things of the world” which God has chosen “to shame the wise,” and “the weak things of the world” whom God has chosen “to shame the strong,” are often people.

That’s what the tool on the altar is about: a visual, physical symbol about the seemingly weak and foolish things and people that God uses in the world, so that the honor and power are his, not ours. Whether its a homeless and crucified Christ, or Gideon in the Old Testament, leading 300 men against the entire Midianite army, armed with nothing more than torches and clay pots. Not that God loves the poor and lowly more than the middle class or the rich and famous. Not that the poor and lowly are better people than the middle or upper class—remember, the effect is supposed to be that no one can boast. Rather, as that rabbi said, they are looking low enough to find God, because they’re already low enough.

Which leads to a startling idea–the vision of something never before seen or done in human society: a class-free, status-equal human community. It’s God’s dream, its called “the kingdom of God,” and his demonstration plot for this class-free, status-equal community is called, “the church.”

We may say, “But even the church has never accomplished that!” And that would be true, sad to say. Go to some big, beautiful European cathedrals and they’re inspiring, all right. Until you see the special, tall, doors through which the nobility entered and worshiped on horseback, to keep watch over their serfs, and to remind them of who’s in charge. What Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., said about race is even truer for class: that the Sunday morning worship service is the most segregated hour in America’s week.

Now, about Emmanuel Mennonite Church, we have as great a diversity of class and wealth as you’ll find in most American churches, especially for our size. And those with wealth to share have been as generous as any you’ll find anywhere else. Visitors have remarked on how friendly and welcoming this church is. But I know what the struggle is like inside when a visitor appears to have great needs, or shows signs of the physical or mental health problems that can keep poor people poor. I know it can be scary. Until, that is, we remember that we’re all just hanging on and keeping it together, one day at a time, by the grace of God and the skin of our teeth. Whenever we’re tempted to draw back in fear from the poorest, weakest and neediest, maybe its because they remind us of who and how we really are.

But then again, we haven’t gotten too many of such visitors. In part, I think its because the poor and those of high needs and lower social status are much more alert to cues and signs of wealth, power and status, than are those who have wealth, power and status. As often as not, the poor may protect themselves from shame and discomfort by shying away from middle and upper class people. It takes a while to earn trust, for people to learn and word to get out just who are the people who won’t look down on you even though you haven’t got the formal education that they have, or the grammar, or the clothing, housing or income. Or even, that these people are willing to listen to you and learn from you, because they value the education we got on the streets, and in the school of hard knocks. They understand what Paul says about God choosing the weak to confound the mighty, and the foolish (in the eyes of the world) to confound the wise, because they know, deep down, that they are them. Maybe they’ve even experienced the warm welcome and the sacrificial hospitality of the poor. It may be their last meal of the week or their one meal of the day that they’re offering you; they’ll miss it worse than you; but it would hurt them worse if you refuse it.

Do such relationships sound impossible? They can and do happen. And here at Emmanuel Mennonite Church in the Phillips Neighborhood of Minneapolis is as good a place as any. For God has not given up his kingdom dream of a class- free and status-equal counter-cultural community, and the cross reminds us of it. All people stand before God with no more than what Jesus took to the cross, after the soldiers gambled for his clothes, which is even less than what the typical homeless person carries from the streets to the shelter where he sleeps at night. We might as well get used to that before that day of reckoning arrives. But on the other side of the cross, in the New Jerusalem, God’s people will be equally honored, rich and esteemed. We might get as well get used to that too.

Now that is something worth boasting about.