If you looked at your newsletter this week you would’ve seen in the “This Sunday” section a blurb about the theme of today’s service Many Paths, One Road being about the many ways to praise from an array of faith traditions.
Two days ago, as is typical for a Friday morning, I was sitting on the sofa preparing to get started on further preparations for that reflection, when Lisa said,
“Hey, you should hear Rachel Maddow’s piece from yesterday about the first 30 days of the administration. She led with a clip from our governor’s State of the State Address.”
I don’t spend a lot of time watching Rachel’s show, or any news shows, because I choose not to take in a lot of political stuff these days. It’s too much of a downer, with the seemingly daily supply of new deeply troubling things.
But I have been heartened on several occasions in the last number of weeks by things our governor has said, and him being put at the top of a nationwide show was intriguing. So, I tuned in.
In those next 45 minutes three lights came on for me. One was about altering the direction of today’s service. One was about tuning in [more about that later]. And one was about the story of a girl named Paige.
It is there that we shall begin.
As fate, or providential grace, would have it, minutes after I sat down to begin transitioning today’s message from Many Paths to lights coming on, I received a text from my nephew Moe, who is a transgender young man.
The text said: “Hey, I’d like to ask a favor. A couple years ago, I bought cookies from this trans girl scout named Paige. Her family had recently escaped to Connecticut from Texas because her aunt had reported her mother to child protective services in response to Paige coming out as trans.”
Then Moe directed me to an online piece of Paige’s story, entitled Our Flee to Safety.
The subtitle is The Light Came On, dated December 3, 2022.
The story begins: “Max, are you a boy or a girl?”…The Question That Would Change Our Lives Forever.
Paige, then Max, had always been so unhappy and angry. Constantly breaking down and crying, “I just don’t know what’s wrong with me.” But last Christmas all that changed when the request for gifts not only was all girl toys, lip gloss and such for Christmas, but also a request from Santa for a dress and high heels.
Christmas morning Paige, still Max, was ecstatic to see everything she had asked for. Especially the dress and high heels. Paige grabbed the dress to go put it on with a smile from ear to ear. It was quickly labeled the best Christmas present ever.
Almost a week passed of that dress being the only thing Paige wanted to wear, and asking to be called this girl name and that girl name instead of Max. A light went on and everything clicked. I turned to my child and asked, “Max, are you a boy or a girl?” “I’m a girl!” she replied.
At that point I realized what had been wrong, why my child had been so unhappy, so angry with life. She was being forced to live as a boy when she was a girl. We had a discussion about it to make sure we were understanding each other, and I finally understood what had been going on with my child. She picked a new name, Paige. We went to the store to buy girls’ clothes, and Paige was so happy. I began to notice that she was no longer sad and angry, but was happy and carefree.
She stood looking in the mirror at the new dress we had just bought, and I said, “Not everyone will be happy with who you are. But you need to always be true to yourself and who you are. And I will always love you for you.”
As she continued to look in the mirror, she pushed a piece of hair behind her ear and said, “I don’t care what people think, I like myself.”
I smile at my beautiful daughter who has become her true self. But, I had no idea how hateful the world would be, and everything I would have to protect her from.
There were two parts of my nephew’s text. Here’s the second part: “Recently, Paige’s mother reached out to me again. They’re once again moving, to Scotland, because of the current administration. They’ve got a Gofundme, I was wondering if you’d be willing to throw them a few bucks.”
And to think that my first thought upon getting Moe’s text that I was being asked to buy girl scout cookies.
In these last weeks I had wondered when the current toxic waters would, like waves on a beach, start to roll in higher, closer to my perceived semi-safe house on the shores of life. Life in America.
Of course, this story is three layers out from me. But is it really?
We all know that we are called to… in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets.
This sums up our How-To manual for living a life of faith.
What it felt like in those 45 minutes was an internal tidal wave of spiritual and political waves crashing together.
As we’ve discussed, it’s virtually impossible these days to separate the two, if we are living into the core of our purpose to continue what Jesus began – working for healing as an inclusive, compassionate, joyful community.
I want to pause for a moment to appreciate these individual concepts that comprise what we say our purpose is: inclusive – compassionate – joyful.
In these brief 30 days of the new administration, it feels like we’re resoundingly on the other end of that spectrum. Eradicating – unfeeling – spiteful.
Now, if ever, is the time to be focused on the one most important word in our covenant.
The action word…working. Active engagement.
We’ve talked about one way to do this is by listening. Sounds passive, but it’s any but that, especially when we’re talking about listening to those on the other side of the aisle, to diminish the divide and deepen our understanding.
Listening to that end is as important as ever.
It is not, however, the listening of which we speak today.
There’s listening to something else that we are also called to, which also takes work and meaningful engagement in these difficult times.
Listen to the reports of what’s happening.
Expose yourself to what is, for many of us, difficult fodder to choke down.
This was the second light that went on for me as I watched that news piece two days ago. I, we, my friends, must keep ourselves informed.
It makes me think of the song “For What Its Worth”…I think it’s time we stop, yeah, what’s that sound? Everybody look what’s going down.
It is imperative that we have an understanding of what is occurring in our very midst.
How can we set about our purpose to work and heal if we’ve retreated to the safety of our homes and have drawn the curtains, because what’s happening outside is uncomfortable to witness?
This brings to mind a piece poet Denise Levertov entitled Witness.
Sometimes the mountain
is hidden from me in veils
of cloud, sometimes
I am hidden from the mountain
in veils of inattention, apathy, fatigue,
when I forget or refuse to go
down to the shore or a few yards
up the road on a clear day,
to reconfirm that witnessing presence.
That poem makes me think of the German citizens living in proximity to the operating concentration camps…coming outside their homes long enough to sweep off their sidewalks the ashes off blown from the stacks of the camp ovens.
And then quietly returning back in, knowing all the while from whence those ashes came.
Some might think that that’s a overly-dramatic analogy.
Our governor doesn’t think so, and (for what it’s worth), I don’t either.
The segment played by Rachel Maddow was about 10 minutes. I will share with you about two of those minutes now…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hS66O1C7Gp4
“If we don’t want to repeat history, then for God’s sake, in this moment, we’d better be strong enough to learn from it.”
Learn from it. Become knowledgeable.
We heard that word knowledge earlier in the service. Do you remember?
It was in our first reading when the scripture passage took us on a train ride with several station stops. The train – we’ll call it the Love Train – started at the faith station, and then took us to virtue.
What’s it take to be virtuous? The train’s next stop is the knowledge station. To buoy yourself for knowledge, especially when it’s not easy to digest, we move forward on the train for the next two stops of self-control and steadfastness.
Exercising our faith by becoming knowledgeable about what’s happening through steadfast engagement (which starts with listening)…
brings us further down the line to godliness. And from godliness, my friends, we arrive at affection, and ultimately, end of the line… love.
This formula doesn’t work without the key ingredients of being steadfast in gaining knowledge in order to love.
I, like many of you, have exercised more of a head-in-the-sand approach.
It doesn’t feel good to see what seems like the methodical, categorical dismantling of our country… of inclusion – sea to shining sea, of compassion – Give me your tired, your poor, huddled masses yearning to breathe free of joy – my country tis of thee, sweet land of liberty
While all this sounds political, it is very much about who we are as a community of faith.
After last week’s invitation to consider who you’d have a hard time inviting to your table, someone mused about how comfortable a ‘red’ person would be at ours.
My friends, we can’t be healers – working for the healing of our world – if we don’t know the details of the disease.
Details that includes a single mom of three children (one who made the courageous step into the fullness of her personhood), fleeing this land of liberty, in order to keep that child safe.
When you’re choosing a doctor, do you base your decision on credentials/level of knowledge, or if they’re red or blue.
I look forward to hearing from you now. Let’s speak to the question of listening. How much do you? If a lot, how is that for you? If not a lot (as has been the case for me, up until now), how is it to receive the invitation to do so?
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