September 20, 2026 Reflection

I really struggled with the reading this week. It seems like Paul is telling us that when we’re in disagreement with another person or among a group, we should essentially agree to disagree and move on. And absolutely not judge each other over our differences.

Now I admit that I enjoy a good argument, and I really get hooked when I feel like something isn’t fair. I know that this is part of my personality – if any of you are familiar with the Enneagram personality typing, I lean towards an 8, commonly known as the Gentle Tank. As someone whose undergrad studies focused on political sociology, and who is of course very committed to being part of a justice and peace seeking faith, and we know without justice there is no peace, I find it hard to just let things go if I think they’re not fair, not just, but simply wrong.

The reading also really hits home because I have been in a hard personal struggle with the conversations, arguments, even entrenchments regarding the Israel/Palestine war and the passion on each side. Some would even be angry with me implying that there are two sides to the blood bath there – you are either pro-Israel or an anti-Semite, pro-Gaza or a racist supporter of genocide. I am repelled by the domicide that is happening in Gaza, the wiping out of all homes and infrastructure, and the massive killing of civilians, of children, and, I am soon going to have a Jewish granddaughter and I’m very aware of the rapid rise in anti-Semitism and the danger Jews are in even where we live. A danger they have faced for millennia, particularly when there is political instability.
I quite simply don’t know, to the point of tears, how to be in a conversation about what is happening there. It is so complex, such an ancient battle. Each time one raises a point about atrocities by ‘one side’ someone often then mentions something the ‘other side’ did, as if there is a scale where the atrocities are heaped on one side then the other, not have things balanced, but to see who wins in this grotesque comparison. Who has suffered the most atrocities. I don’t know how to make a pathway of peace into the conversations, let alone the horrific situation.

Another tension for me: I am staunchly opposed to the Christian nationalism and rise of political oppression in the United States, and a friend challenged me regarding being anti-American, calling on me and all of us to show compassion and to avoid the temptation of self-righteousness. Yes, and, to me compassion usually indicates there is something troubling the person to whom you are offering compassion, there is something ‘wrong’ or troubling and we bring compassion to the situation or relationship. To be compassionate to supporters of a strong swing to the right, to those in favour of establishing a white Christian male dominated culture feels to me like it is implying there is something wrong with them, creeping into a type of patronizing attitude that they just need to be fixed, healed, whatever. And that doesn’t feel right either, maybe even subtly self-righteous.

And my concern is not just what’s happening south of the border. Yesterday I was listening to Chantal Hebert, a much loved and respected Canadian political commentator and she said what Europeans are thinking about right now isn’t the relationship between Canada and the E.U. It is the rising possibility of war. Real war. With the recent events in France, Germany and Poland a real worry, and real possibility of war. We need to figure out how to live and love towards peace – soon.
I know we like to model ourselves on the deep compassion of Jesus, but perhaps because I’m lacking a bit in the compassion category, I also call to mind the passages in the Bible when Jesus has just had enough. In fury he threw over tables in the Temple. In a bit of self-righteousness, he initially turned away the Syro-Phoenician woman when she asked for some of that famous compassion and healing. He called out the powerful and rich when they judged a widow for not putting much money in the offering plate and he harshly scolded those who judged the woman who poured expensive oil all over him. He called his own best friend Satan, and he told his followers that if they didn’t get any traction in spreading the word to shake the dust of that town off their feet and just move on. He called some religious leaders a ‘brood of vipers’. “How can you, being evil, speak good things?” he asked them. (Mtt 12:34) I have to tell you that even typing those things made my vindictive little heart happy – Jesus got mad too!

I remember that other saint, Michelle Obama, saying in one of the campaigns for President, “When they go low, we go high.” Sometimes Jesus didn’t go high, and I and some political commentators I follow aren’t sure that’s going to work anymore – when going low can come with silencing the press, arresting, if not killing, protesters, and manipulating the vote, I’m not sure going high is going to address the problem. And to be clear, this happens all over the world, and throughout time – I’m not being specific to any one place that may come to mind.

When I am really struggling with a sermon, I go back to the text, back to the Bible to listen again. This is the NRSV translation of the letter Paul wrote to the church in Rome: “Welcome those who are weak in faith, but not for the purpose of quarreling over opinions.” (I have to say here by ‘weak’ Paul is referring to those new to the faith, not that there is something lacking in them). “Welcome those who are weak in faith, but not for the purpose of quarreling over opinions. Some believe in eating anything, while [others] eat only vegetables. Those who eat must not despise those who abstain, and those who abstain must not pass judgment on those who eat; for God has welcomed them. Who are you to pass judgment on servants of another? It is before their own God that they stand or fall. And they will be upheld, for God is able to make them stand. Some judge one day to be better than another, while others judge all days to be alike. Let all be fully convinced in their own minds. Those who observe the day, observe it in honour of God.” (Romans 14:1-6)

Even though Paul has not yet met the congregation in Rome he has obviously heard that there are tensions. The members of the young church are arguing about dietary laws and festival days. Some of the members were Jews who believed Jesus was the Messiah AND still believed they should abide by Torah, rules of the Old Testament. So, for them some foods, particularly meats, were considered impure and forbidden. And some members of the congregation came to faith through Jesus, were not Jews, and they believed that the ‘old’ rules no longer applied. They could eat whatever they wanted. But, they still thought it was OK to attend festivals honouring the multiple gods of their Roman culture. For those who were Jewish, to acknowledge any god other than the one true God would have seemed a heresy. Paul writes to say, “Let it go. Eat or don’t eat, go to the festival or don’t go, as long as whatever you do is in honour of the one God, upper case G, it doesn’t matter.” For, he goes on to write, “If we live, we live to God, and if we die, we die in God; so then, whether we live or whether we die, we are God’s. …Why do you pass judgement on your brother or sister? Or you, why do you despise your brother or sister? For we will all stand before the judgment seat of God.” (Romans 14:1-10)

Although these could sound like small things, what to eat and what days to celebrate, a few years earlier these very issues were threatening the stability of the church in Galatia and give witness to the undergirding tensions within the followers of the Way of Jesus. Some were formed as Jews, others as people from a multi-god culture. When you think about it, we’re not that different. Christians are formed by a variety of traditions – evangelical to atheists. We can see the differences in the response to the words we use for God – God, Father, Creator, Son, Mother, Mystery, Creator. I’ve served congregations that were bitterly divided about which hymn book to use, whether there should be carpet or no carpet in the sanctuary, who could use the good dishes.

ationally we have been torn up over a new curriculum, the ordination of women, gays and lesbians, to apologize or not apologize for our role in the colonization of indigenous peoples and residential schools.

We are all formed by what our culture tells us is important, which often stands in stark contrast to what Jesus says is life giving. We are always swimming upstream, following the One who tells us to give up our lives in order to have life in abundance, when the prevailing current tells us to get what we need, and more, and hang on to it for dear life.
Often when people disagree the temptation is to say let’s agree to disagree, it’s a matter of opinion and perspective. But I think, I believe, that that is a betrayal of our faith, and of God’s faith in us. God created the universe and called it good. God created us and called us good. All of creation, and all of us are God’s sacred creation, not only good but precious in God’s eyes. So, when a person or a group or a government declares someone less than, I believe that’s wrong. When a culture considers women less than men, it’s wrong. When a culture values one colour of skin over another, it’s wrong. When a government declares one sexual orientation right, and any other abhorrent, it’s wrong. When, and I’m on thin ice here, a government declares we don’t have time to be concerned about the environment, about this planet that we consider sacred, because we need to commodify it all and become financially independent as a country, it’s wrong. Or perhaps I should use that wonderful weasel word, problematic.

I believe the Christian baseline for right and wrong, as opposed to a matter of opinion, is that we live in God. Our creator called all creation good – every part of it. And policies and prejudices that call any of it less than created and blessed in God’s eyes, need to be called out. Need to be challenged. With compassion, yes, but not support. Not sanctioned.

I saw this poster the other day, of Martin Luther King Jr and his words: “There comes a time when silence is betrayal.” When I saw that I felt a wave of full-on vindication. “Yes, bring it!” my little warrior heart shouted. But then I read the words that were printed below his words: Speak. Act. Love. Speak -Yes!

Act – Yes! Love – Damn it!

And so it is – as hard and challenging as we may find it. Jesus shows us the way. Seek peace, but don’t compromise on love. Seek justice – but not without love. Uncomfortable and hard as that may be.

I finish with a poem from Tennessee Williams:

The world is violent and mercurial – it will have its way with you.
We are saved only by love – love for each other
and the loves that we pour into the art we feel compelled to share:
being a parent; being a writer; being a painter; being a friend.
We live in a perpetually burning building,
and what we must save from it, all the time, is love.
Amen