Friday, June 6, 2025
PREACHING 2025: "When the Gospel Divides"
Bethlehem, West Bank, June 2025
Almost two months ago, during a busy and crowded Easter celebration at home, two couples left in protest (or maybe disinterest) during my sermon on resurrection and resistance. I had recognized (with immense gratitude) the $6,000 contribution I was soon to deliver to friends and partners at Wi'am in the West Bank--funds raised to extend mental health programs for children and empowerment initiatives for women under occupation. And I had noted that this gift represented love, even solidarity, for Palestinian Christians brokenhearted and grieving for a genocide in Gaza funded, in large part, by our American Congress. Our friends in Bethlehem would be immensely grateful.
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| Wi'am receives CCD's gift! |
In order for the four to leave--during my sermon--those sitting near them were asked to stand and offer safe passage, which of course they did. But the quiet flurry of activity created a moment for curiosity and reflection, for a fairly polite congregation and its fairly ordinary pastor. And understandably, said flurry saddened a few kind greeters at the back door. Does any mention of unrest, genocide, dissent have a place in Christian worship? On Easter Sunday? Do friends who've made an effort to attend a special holiday service have a right to something less troublesome, less political, more satisfying and affirming?
Looking back at it now, I think these kinds of experiences are crucial, formative even, in the 21st century church. Where the rubber hits the road, so to speak. Not that I should aim to offend decent people, much less drive them from church (we seem to do enough of that already!)--but that the gospel should, from time to time, be so wildly committed to human well-being, so truthfully committed to divine mercy, so clearly on the side of human liberation, that it causes a stir. That it moves a few among us to say, "What?"
Here's the part of that April 20 sermon that seemed to provoke a mini-rebellion:
My friend Ched Myers suggests that the collaboration of Roman and religious leaders in crucifying Jesus on Golgotha marks the culmination, the realization of a so-called “crucifixion economy.” It’s an appalling notion, and still prescient in a contemporary kind of way. This idea of a “crucifixion economy.” That is, in nailing Jesus to the cross—as it had done to so many other rabble rousers of that era—the empire sought once and for all to erase his vision of abundance and mutual aid, to silence his cry for forgiveness of debt and jubilee in the land. There’s something terribly familiar in all this. Right? For this “crucifixion economy” claims that scarcity is creation’s one and only natural law. Claims that poverty is a tragic necessity, a price to be paid for progress among the deserving. Claims that state violence itself protects the just from the unjust, and the wise from the foolish, and the keepers of the peace from the rabble rousers themselves.
So Jesus is executed then. His friends—though not the women in our story this morning—scattered. His practice of plenty for the poor and forgiveness for the indebted, snuffed out. For the common good. To Make America Great Again.
It's impossible, of course, to watch what Elon Musk and Donald Trump and J.D. Vance are doing this spring and not make a connection. When they brazenly defund foreign aid, and HIV prevention programs in Africa, and peace initiatives here and abroad—while cloaking all of it in messianic language—isn’t this something very much like a “crucifixion economy”? And when they continue funneling billions of dollars to CEOs at Lockheed Martin and Elbit Systems for Israel’s renewed and genocidal assault on Gaza—isn’t this something akin to a “crucifixion economy”? And when they float the possibility of paying El Salvador to incarcerate American citizens, American dissidents, American academics in dank and desolate dungeons—isn’t this their version of a “crucifixion economy”?
But discipleship takes another road. Discipleship is about joining hands and hearts and marching forward; it’s about building relationships and coalitions to fight hatred with love, to resist racism with steadfast courage and consequential action. Counting the cost. Doing it anyway. Because Jesus isn’t to be found in that tomb, my friends; Jesus is risen and walks again among the brokenhearted and hungry. And in the church that serves them.
I've had almost two months to think on all this. And much of my thinking takes place here now, in Bethlehem, just a stone's throw from the apartheid wall separating Bethlehem from Jerusalem, and about an hour's drive from Gaza itself and the matrix of ethnic cleansing and starvation there. Among dear and creative disciples, Palestinian Christians, drawing on their own faith (and ancient texts) for imagination and hope. And given this location, I think I'll stand by the Easter sermon.
I wish I'd had some kind of opportunity that Sunday: to hear from the disgruntled visitors, maybe even to understand what kinds of need, what kinds of pain, they carried to worship that day. I wish they'd taken a bit more time to hear me out, to probe my motivations, maybe even my faith in raising genocide and American complicity at such a high moment in the liturgical calendar. But that wasn't to be. So I'm left to do some reflection on my own.
Civic religion may work for some in the States: a kind of reassurance that one can find solace in old stories and hymns (occasionally), or even an affirming blessing that sets apart the American experience from all others. But the church betrays Christianity if it settles for such, and allows its sacred traditions to be used as prooftext for American goodness, American ambition and capitalism itself. To invest our spiritual lives in Jesus, and in the movement he inspired, is to invite daily renewal, radical trust and a whole set of practices that defy 'civic' religion and its accommodation to violence, accumulation and earth's despair.
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| In the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, Old City, Jerusalem |
So there's just no way to worship on Easter--or receive the promises of resurrection--without looking at the warmaking world, the suffering of the poor and the starvation of children. Especially when all of that madness is justified so very often in the name of religion, even Christianity itself. If the Risen Christ means something to us, if he offers something beyond platitudes and pie-in-the-sky escapism, he must also be the Wounded Christ, the Crucified Christ, the bombed and starved Christ...who returns with hands outstretched inviting our compassion, our courage and our love.
What I know today is this: that this same Christ (Wounded, Crucified and Risen) has given me these friends; that these friends insist on my companionship and solidarity "on the way"; and that sometimes that kind solidarity is going to offend...even folks I may love and cherish. Call that the way of the cross. It's my way now.
Wednesday, June 4, 2025
SABBATICAL 19: "How Are the Children?"
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| Beit Sahour in the West Bank |
Today I visited with Dalia Qumsieh (Founder & Director) and Amir Almufreh (Project Coordinator) of the Balasan Initiative for Human Rights in Palestine. Started in 2020, Balasan manifests its human rights commitment in addressing issues of injustice and oppression in the West Bank: advocacy in the international community; concrete legal assistance in matters of illegal settlement, annexation and occupier intrusions; empowerment for young adults seeking support for justice inititives; and a new women's collective linking Palestinians in the diaspora with Palestinian women here in the West Bank.
I'm eager to report out on what I learned today. There was so much by way of motivation and reflection...so I think I'll simply jump in with several critically important take-aways:
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| Dalia Qumsieh |
Does the church believe in the sacred rights and capacities of the human being (and every human being) or not? Are we willing to rationalize these rights away--in service to whatever ideology, xenophobic political party or racist trend is current? Isn't a church dedicated to the teachings of one who gave every last breath for human dignity obligated to do the same?
(And this brings to mind my colleagues in the UCC network and, in particular, Loren McGrail, John Thomas and Allie Perry. They read the urgent Cry for Hope of Palestinian Christians and insisted that we in the UCC also turn to human rights as a "plumbline" that determines resistance and action and the shape of our partnerships. I'm so grateful for that network, and the prophetic spirit of a church that has raised me up and fired me up.)
2. Dalia notes that Israel carries out genocide in Gaza with absolute "impunity" and is not only unaffected by moral outrage (and statements to such)...but almost emboldened by it all. This is something we've all seen...but to hear a committed, engaged Palestinian say it, and with such anguish, affects me deeply now. She insists that the time for statements is past: the occupying power is all too happy to wave another statement on by. Each one proves, in a way, Israel's exceptionalism and its moral "high ground"--the only nation unaccountable to the laws of others. And righteously so.
2. Dalia is quick to remind me that, though Israel maps out the Gazan genocide and executes it daily, the United States (my United States) bears an even "greater responsibility." This is, of course, hard to hear; but she is compelling, earnest, kind and truthful. Without American support, so many UN resolutions blocked, international law rendered toothless and ineffective--Israel could do very little of what it's done over the last 60 (and especially, the last 25) years in Gaza and the West Bank. Without billions and billions and billions of lethal aid (funded by Democrats and Republicans)--Israel's daily bombardment and sophisticated gutting of Gazan society could not inflict the destruction and death we've seen.
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| Amir Almufreh |
3. The urgency of the moment, then, requires (in their words) sanctions, sanctions, sanctions. The global community (and the US, in particular) have to say NO MORE. An arms embargo. An end to funding of any kind for a rogue state. A principled commitment to human rights as the basis of any future, any arrangement, any way forward. But it all begins with sanctions, sanctions, sanctions. And urgently. Because children, mothers, communities, cultures are dying. It's about erasure now.
And this fits the work we've been trying to engage in the UCC Movement for Palestinian Solidarity (formerly UCCPIN). If our calling is solidarity, that's about more than moral outrage. If our faith implicates us in relationships, in partnerships--one body with many members--that faith requires consequential discipleship and action. Like it or not, our government (representing us) is at the very heart of all of this (genocide, occupation, illegal settlements, annexation plans). None of it happens apart from you and me. So what? What does that mean? What do we do with that? (Jesus doesn't say, by the way: "Think it over and follow me." He simply says: "Follow me," or, "Let's go.")
4. We had a good conversation, a thoughtful exchange, around Palestinian agency. The God-given right of Palestinian people to do their own work, build their own institutions, name their own intentions and priorities, and draw from their own traditions in relationship to the healing that must be done. This is, to be clear, the substance of the human rights approach. While 80 years of displacement and run-away colonialism clouds the Western mind, and often renders Palestinians either invisible or two-dimensional, Dalia's people, Amir's people are anything but. They are bright and gifted. They are passionate and eager to learn. They are defiant and ready to build something new.
The rest of the world has to stand up for those human rights, has to defy governments that would deny them (or reason them away), has to put an end to genocidal violence: so that Palestinians themselves can do what they alone can do for themselves. Build. Dream. Create. Heal.
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| Boycott, Divestment & Sanctions |
One of Balasan's exciting new inititaives is the Al-Thuraya Women's Collective--bringing women in the Palestininian diaspora together with women here in the West Bank and Gaza for collaboration, mutual aid and strategic assessments and action. I'm going to quote this right off their website, because it's so, so, so brilliant:
Named after the ancient Pleiades star cluster revered by the Canaanites as a source of guidance, the Al-Thuraya Women’s Collective symbolizes feminine constellation and connection, guidance, and visibility. This collective seeks to unite expert Palestinian women in Palestine and in the diaspora in bringing about their expertise and working collectively towards the protection of Palestinian rights and for the Palestinian cause. This collective creates a dynamic forum exclusively for Palestinian women with strong expertise and experience advocating for Palestinian rights, and serves as a vibrant platform for connection, where women can exchange ideas, strategize legal and advocacy efforts, and collaboratively advance the Palestinian cause.
I hope my US friends and siblings will take good note of this project, and Dalia's and Amir's enthusiasm for it, as we all move forward. If there's a future for the Palestinian people, Dalia insists, that future must look to "Al-Thuraya"--to the wisdom, expertise and communal sensibilities of women (in the diaspora and nearby) who will become the navigational stars for communities of the future. Agency, agency, agency.
And again, our US calling has to involve paying attention, taking their passion seriously, centering their voices--and responding in every way we can to their creativity.
So join the Apartheid-Free Movement, friends. Do it now. And tell everyone you know why you did it. Boycott Chevron: make a point of showing up at a station, joining other communities in making plain why you're doing so. Share news on a coming Sabeel delegation. Invite friends and church members to come, see, act. There are no "little" moments, and there are no insignificant choices. We simply must step forward and choose life.
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| Bethlehem, Nightfall |
Years ago, my UCC colleague, the Rev. Traci Blackmon asked us to consider this question as the beating heart of our witness, our discernment and our prophetic action: "How are the children?" It was simple: "How are the children?" But the more Traci asked the question, the more it shook the foundations of the church. If our children are hungry, if our children are cowering in school classrooms shaken by violence, if our children are orphaned by genocide, fleeing city to city in Gaza...doesn't that reveal something of God's own suffering and God's cry for justice? Can we say anymore that we didn't know?
Amir Almufreh and Dalia Qumsieh have reminded me that the children of Palestine are bright and brilliant and wise--but that they are also frightened and traumatized and starving and orphaned by American-funded violence. They've reminded me that they (and many others) are committed to fighting the good fight, championing the human rights of their people, bringing them together for creative strategizing and mutual encouragement and community. They will continue to do their work, make good on their promises.
The next step then is mine, maybe even ours. Will we do the same?
"How are the children?"
TO BE COUNTED: "A Time for Solidarity & Action"
Again, our United Church of Christ network (soon to be renamed the UCC Movement for Palestinian Solidarity) has spoken to the church, bearing witness to Palestinian partners and their cries for justice. I strongly urgently recommend this letter to all friends, regardless of faith tradition. It includes excellent resources appropriate for educational efforts, congregational motivation and action:
Tuesday, June 3, 2025
SABBATICAL 18: "Walls, Tables and Beloved Communities"
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| Tuesday Morning, My View |
Above me, not twenty yards from this picnic table, is an IDF tower, set into the apartheid wall, where it separates Palestinians from Jerusalem, and from Rachel's tomb. And even now, I hear the radio chatter up there, Israeli soldiers monitoring whatever dangers, threats and movements they wish in the streets and neighborhoods below. Or maybe they're just playing video games.
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| Greta, #gazafreedomflotilla |
I'm told that, from time to time, soldiers will fire rubber bullets into Wi'am's olive trees, or at children playing on swingsets. Once in while, they spray skunk water at women and men here, leaders gathering for mutual support in a time of genocide. Just 45, 50 miles from where I sit, US-funded jets and drones are bombing Gazan neighborhoods, forcing mass migration, killing civilians. A friend here insists he can hear the bombing from his front door. In the Mediterranean, Huwaida Arraf, Greta Thurnberg and others are sailing this way, a Gaza Freedom Flotilla, determined to break the cruel and calculated naval blockade on Gaza's Palestinian communities.
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| Breakfast, Tuesday |
My companions are staff members here at Wi'am and local friends and supporters; and their conversation dances across many dishes and their own faces in an Arabic that's far too quick for me to catch. In a moment, they''ll be laughing at something wildly funny; then they'll pivot quickly (and without a tipoff) into something much more serious and sad (Gaza, perhaps, or the cost of living, or a Houthi rocket shot down over Jerusalem last night). But breakfast stretches deep into the morning, and conversation leaps this way and that, bringing broad smiles and then bewilderment out of friends who rely on one another. For everything.
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| "Make tea, not walls..." |
And I'm moved by a kind of awareness: that this, at this table, is freedom. Whatever else this grotesque occupation does to these friends, however menacing and restrictive its walls and checkpoints--at this table they are free to needle one another, to celebrate one another, to question everything, to enjoy the fruits of a land they love. And perhaps this is why they linger around it--this liturgy isn't forced or rushed, this kind of freedom is precious and grace-given. So they sit and talk: mediators, women's advocates, healers, attorneys, shop keepers and a refugee from Gaza. And the table before them is a promise made by a higher power, and a reason to clear the plates, clean up, and do the hard work love requires. When so much sadness and death crowds their city, their land, their people.
This has to be a kind of holy communion, right? A eucharist, a beloved community...
I like to tell my friends at church that we miss the point when communion becomes 'transactional'--as in, I do this, I perform in this way, I get something in return. Instead, a community like this one in Bethlehem comes to tables like this one to be 'transfigured' and 'transformed.' Over and over, a discipline, a practice, a kind of surrender. Ordinary conversation becomes sacred prayer. Sadness shared becomes motivation. Pita and hummus become the body and blood of a resurrection that is not distant or merely theoretical--but here, now, embodied, and inviting in us all new life and Christ-like resistance. Let it be. Dear One, let it be.
Monday, June 2, 2025
Sunday, June 1, 2025
POEM: "Following Zoughbi"
A poem in gratitiude for my friend's faith,
vulnerability, and example in a harrowing time.
As you step gladly, bravely, gladly,
Looking for familiar faces, cherished friends or
Inevitably, the weary, hidden eyes of the frightened.
And there are more of the latter this spring,
More all the time now, by design:
Others, many others, are gone.
Your beloved community.
You have a thousand reasons to fear
For a future armies would impose,
For sacred harvests, forbidden:
Tiring of evening explosions, echoes of genocide,
And the grim checkpoints everywhere,
Altars to suspicion, where children not
Half your age question your humanity.
Your beloved community.
Instead you scan city markets for stories to tell,
For teachers, heroes and smiling eyes
You quickly commit to memory.
You stop midsentence to grab an old friend,
Hugging, clutching at one another.
The two of you remembering some delight
That joins you forever, a bond that will not break.
Your beloved community.
I follow you, understanding very little,
Reading only your laughter and their gratitude,
And aching to know what you know:
That the Kin-dom of Heaven is here,
in a city locked down;
That the communion of saints is
Nevertheless undeterred
By hideous walls and weaponized creeds;
And, yes, that every sacrament that matters,
Every one, is right here before you,
In your dear city, and in your hands, and in
Your neighbor's beleaguered but brightening eyes.
DGJ
For Zoughbi Zoughbi,
Founder and Director of
Wi'am: The Palestinian Conflict Transformation Centre
1 June 2025
Bethlehem, Palestine
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