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The Cathedral of St. Philip
Atlanta, Georgia
May 2, 2010
The Fifth Sunday of Easter - Year C
Youth Sunday
I love my family and friends.
I love getting Facebook notifications.
I love the woody gasoline infused scent of my grandfather's garage.
I love underground rap.
I
love eating sushi with my parents, reading until I fall asleep,
travelling, watching "˜Scrubs', exploring the city with my friends.
I love God.
We
can at least agree on the last one; we love God. Since I love God, and
I know that God is love, then I know God. It's just common math. After
all, I've worked to know God. I've been attending Bible studies since
seventh grade, I lead a Bible study, I've studied the New and
Old Testament at the Westminster Schools. I've even studied other
faiths and concluded that God is Love, and that's all. I placed an equal sign between God and love. I considered myself enlightened and called it a day.
I
was born in Japan. I spent my first six years surrounded by Shintos,
Buddhists, Christians, and atheists. I was taught that the religious
traditions of peaceful people were all acceptable. After having moved
to Atlanta (nestled snugly in the "Bible Belt"), my ideal world of
religious tolerance was interrupted on September 11, 2001. For the
first time I heard about a religion called Islam. Some said it was a
religion that advocated violence. Others said it was not a religion at
all. It became clear to my family that we did not know enough about
Islam. In an effort to change this, five years later we hosted a hijab wearing, Arabic speaking, Egyptian girl named Esraa.
I
could not stop returning to my equation (God=Love) knowing there was
more to it; I'm not crazy about math in the first place. Seeing the
acts of hate, violence, and fear alongside beautiful acts of love only
made me question this unequivocal conclusion that: God=love.
After
all, what even is love? How do we come to know it? How do we come to
know God, and how are the two so intrinsically connected?
Today's lesson from the book of Revelation gives us some insight:
"And I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband."
This
allegory depicting the final state of the church doesn't only apply to
"end times." We can see this as an image of paradise, God's kingdom
coming to earth to be present among us.
When God became human
in the form of Jesus, incarnate through the Holy Spirit and Mary, we
were given the gift of equality. We have divinity instilled in us
alongside our humanity. C.S. Lewis reflects on this concept, "You don't
have a soul. You are a soul. You have a body." This body that our soul
inhabits parallels the Earth being a vessel for the kingdom of God, as
we see in Revelation
When Esraa, my Egyptian homestay sister, first
came to stay with us, I saw her as someone I would learn from at a
distance. Perhaps I could gain a few funny stories of cultural
misunderstandings, which I certainly did. I did not expect to grow
close to her nor understand her. I secretly thought that I would be
able to convert her to a faith, in hindsight, that I did not
understand, Christianity.
Esraa's arrival in our home
dramatically altered the path of my own faith journey. Her faithfully
fastened hijab, completely covered body, and strange eating habits
(especially during Ramadan) set her apart from the other students at
our school. It was difficult for everyone (including me) not to judge
her. I did not yet know how alike we were. I began to grow accustomed,
even fond, of her oddities: burning hemp scented incense in her
bedroom, her fear of Bach, our chow-golden retriever mix. I could even
forgive her for eating all my favorite cereal, Honey Bunches of Oats.
We spent a lot of time together, and gradually our heated religious
debates became intimate conversations about our faiths; we became
sisters.
We became sisters in the light of understanding through
the process of incarnation, that is recognizing God in other human
beings. My year with Esraa helped me to grow exponentially in my faith
in showing me what the much preached about compassion really meant. We
were able to see God in one another despite our many differences.
Knowing
God takes more than just studying scripture, going to church, and
reading about theology. None of that holds real value without the
element of incarnation. The only means we have to know God and our
fellow beings is through the same compassion that God showed us by
becoming flesh.
John's message conveys that the best way to
understand God and love is to see this quote from Revelation as God
joining humanity. In turn we are given the chance to join God. We can
understand God by becoming incarnate, the same way God did through
empathy and compassion, essentially putting ourselves in others' shoes.
God
inhabited flesh, and now "the home of God is among mortals." This great
equalizer, incarnation, permits God to live among us, in husbands and
wives, relatives, children, teachers, convicts, friends. Karen
Armstrong, theologian and founder of the Charter for Compassion,
demands that "we dethrone ourselves, habitually and reflexively, from
the center of our worlds and practice putting others there." The
humility and selflessness she necessitates are at the core of the
teachings of Jesus, the incarnate Son of God and Son of Man. We cannot
know God without coming to know the rest of creation in which God is
present.
This concept of incarnation is crucial both in personal
relationships and in our general interations. In the words of the late
writer David Foster Wallace, "everything in my own immediate experience
supports my deep belief that I am the absolute center of the universe,
the realest, most vivid and important person in existence. We rarely
talk about this sort of natural, basic self-centeredness, because it's
so socially repulsive, but it's pretty much the same for all of us,
deep down." However, as humans, and as Christians, we have been shown
by God's human son, that through love and discipline, we can truly care
for other people.
Through God's incarnate son, God knows my
human fears, my human imperfections, and shares my very human joys. In
humility, God became one of us, so that we could be like God, and
embrace the divinity that is within and recognize our kindred divinity
in others.
Our greatness as a church, a community, a nation,
can be measured by our ability to recognize the humanity and divinity
in each person, and in our treatment of the "least and last." An
American Buddist monk once said, "True compassion does not distinguish
between healer and wounded, but regards them as equals." God is no
longer distant; God is among us as a friend, a teacher, a stranger,
anyone.
We have been given this gift of heaven on earth if we
choose to live in it through the example of God's compassion. We are
challenged to know God by knowing others. We must know love to know God.
