Faith is a Verb… Musings by Pastor Tony May 25, 2018

Faith is a Verb…     Musings by Pastor Tony     May 25, 2018

I read an interesting statement recently, and I wondered what all of you thought of it.

“Most worship events benefit the preacher. She uses her theological education to help her understand the weekly biblical text. She takes a few days to read the commentaries and other resources on the text; then she sifts through these findings to create a fifteen to forty-five minute verbal monologue that gets poured over the captive congregation. They hear it once, but the preacher has heard it and worked it over many times. 

“If worship is about giving people the opportunity to respond to God in ways that nurture them spiritually and enable them to better engage with the world in which they live, that benefit needs to be spread more widely.  The only way I know how to do this is to build a culture of participation at all levels of church and mission, and especially in worship

Participation doesn’t just mean having the congregation sing or pray together. It means making the entire worship event the product of guided of curated involvement—an art installation where the elements of worship are the artifacts. It is worship where a variety of people from all backgrounds, ages, levels of commitment, learning styles, education, and stages of spiritual formation contribute creatively to the content, leadership, and shaping of the worship event. That’s participation. ”[1]

I have talked about worship as participation vs performance/presentation. The intent for the Worship Team is to move us more from performance by the staff and choir to participation of many. However, the Worship Team is struggling. I am struggling to find committed individuals to help curate worship, to contribute creatively to the content, leadership, and shaping of worship. I told the Council last week that I want stop thinking of the Worship Team as a group who creates worship for us and to start thinking of all of us as a Team that Worships together, as a congregation we are a Worship Team.

Creativity grows exponentially with more people in a room bouncing ideas off each other. Remember the boat and all the items we added to it in January and February a year ago? That happened because there were people helping with boat-like metaphors to align with the scripture, people looking for the props, people writing the liturgy, people helping choose music, and people willing to step in and read. It took a team, a Worship Team, to create that. And that kind of thing is possible if we as a congregation are committed to participating in worship to our fullest.

I will be hosting a Spectrum on June 3 to discuss worship, the future of the Worship Team, and how we might have more participation in worship from creating content, to leading, to shaping the worship event. I hope you will join me.                                                    

 Peace,

Pastor Tony.

[1] Mark Pierson, The Art of Curating Worship: Reshaping the Role of Worship Leader, (Minneapolis: sparkhouse press, 2010), p. 63-4.

Pastor Tony's Sermon May 20, 2018

Can these Bones live?     5-20-18      Pentecost and Dedication of Landscaping            

·        Council—what would a movie look like of this script?

o   Alvin Ailey dance

o   Zombies

o   Dem Bones, Dem Bones, Dem dry bones

o   And the most profound was setting it during the Holocaust.

 

Mortal, can these bones live?

Only you know, O God.

 

o   This valley of dry bones may have been a battlefield.

o   It may have been a mass grave, with the bodies left to dry out

o   Ezekiel may have been a warrior with PTSD

o   He lived through the destruction of his home—Jerusalem, and his church—The Temple

o   He endured the forced march of the Exiles some 500 miles to Babylon

o   He has flashbacks and hallucinations

o   He envisions a lifeless mass grave, and the life that can come from it, as a metaphor for his beloved homeland

o   It is a story of the Spirit bringing life where the was death, healing where there was brokenness, peace where there was genocide and war. And it is a story of a peaceful quiet cemetery suddenly coming to life with the cacophony of life, those who died from violence and war becoming an army fighting for justice and peace.

 

Mortal, can these bones live?

Only you know, O God.

·        Today is Pentecost, the day we celebrate as the birth of the church.

o   We tell the story of the early church--a diverse group of multi-lingual persons—who gathered to worship;

o   when the Holy Spirit blew through, they began to hear each other, understand, in their native tongues.

o    It’s a story of a group of people deep in grief from the death of their leader, Jesus,

o   a story of a church in chaos,

o   a story of chaos of wind blowing through the space, maybe slamming doors shut, blowing leaves and paper and clothes around

o   a story of that out of chaos can come understanding, calm, and a new church.

Mortal, can these bones live?

Only you know, O God.

·        The church today might have a similar question: can these bones live?

(Only you know, O God.)

Can this structure, these Boards and Committees, these buildings and grounds live?

Yes, dry bones, listen to the Spirit,

who breathes breath where there once was only death

Listen to the Spirit, who plants gardens where weeds and invasive species once grew

Listen to the Spirit, who blows fresh winds into stale rooms, who brings refugees home, releases captives, and brings justice and peace where there was once only war.

O Mortal, Can this church live?

o   Look around you. what do you see?

o   What has changed in the last few weeks?

o   What once was A skeletal garden, overgrown with ivy, is now alive with native plants.

·        We celebrate this. We dedicate this. We pronounce it good.

·        And also look at the cracked cement,  the worn deck, the retaining wall struggling to retain it all.

Mortal, can these bones live?

Only you know, O God.

·        In this garden of life, made possible by the death of a beloved friend, Jill Bryans, Life returns, Bringing breath, bringing its own kind of chaos, and its own kind of peace.

·        It is new, a new spirit, a cold wind, blowing through this place. Do you feel it?

·        It brings understanding in our native languages.

·        It brings peace where there has been chaos, and yes, it may bring some chaos where there was once the silent dry bones of a cemetery.

Mortal, can these bones live?

Only you know, O God.

Dry bones: listen; God will put breath into you. God will put ligaments and tendons on these dry bones. God will add some muscles, some nerves, and blood vessels, and a few internal organs. New life, which brings its own peace and its own chaos. Grandchildren who have minds and bodies of their own, who desire things that you don’t even know about, who sing a different tune, and whose points of view are so radically different than yours. They speak a different language filled with words like Tweet, and Instagram, Facebook, and on-line bullying; and yet the Holy Spirit will blow through and we will hear in our own native language, bringing us fresh life. Come Holy Spirit Come.

Mortal, can these bones live?

Only you know, O God.

Amen.

Faith is a Verb... Musings by Pastor Tony May 4, 2018

I’ve been thinking and reading a lot about love lately. God is Love. Paul wrote, “Faith, hope, and love abide; the greatest of these is Love.” Jesus tells us the two great commandments are to love the Lord your God, and to love your neighbor as yourself, which make up the two stained glass windows at the front of our sanctuary. Based on that, the UCC has named a new Vision Statement: “United in Christ’s love, a just world for all,” and has also taken on a new campaign called the 3 Great Loves: Love of Creation, Love of Children, Love of Neighbor. This story-telling campaign is asking churches to send in stories about ways they are already living into this vision.

in  Christianity in a Nutshell, Brazilian Liberation theologian and mystic Leonardo Boff writes that the Trinity--that mathematical conundrum at the heart of Christianity—is so intertwined as to be a single source—Mystery, a single energy-being he calls God-communion-love. Starting with time-before-time, in that instant just before the Big Bang, the Mystery fluctuated rapidly between particles and energy, particles bursting forth in bright sparkles and then resorbed back into an ocean of energy that is source to all, a “Loving Abyss, Nurturer of All, Originating Source of all Being,” which expanded in the Big Bang to create the entire universe. In other words, the entire universe is created out of an infinite supply of Love.[1] We are part of this Creation, carrying that originating energy of the Big Bang in our bodies, formed from the Loving Abyss. Our formational energy is love.

 In All About Love: New Visions, bell hooks states that love is not an innate feeling that we instinctively know what to do with; instead love is an action, or series of actions, that we must learn and practice. Love is an outward action, an expansion of self, for the spiritual growth of yourself or someone else, and hooks enumerates and then expands on the skills needed to practice love: care, affection, recognition, respect, commitment, trust, and open and honest communication.[2]  Love is not a mushy feeling that makes us moon over a romantic interest. Not unlike our “Faith is a verb,” love is an action, it calls us to action, and can only occur when respect, trust, honesty are present.

In our garden-themed spring worship, we are celebrating our respect, commitment, and love of Creation. We will continue that at least through May 20, Pentecost Sunday, when we will dedicate our new landscaping in an outdoor worship service followed by a potluck meal. Please bring a side or dessert to share. And wear Pentecostal picnic clothes!

 May you love God so much, you love nothing else too much.        Peace, Pastor Tony

[1] Leonardo Boff, Christianity in a Nutshell, Phillip Berryman, transl. (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2013). Quote is from pg. 10.

[2] bell hooks, All About Love: New Visions, (NY: William Morrow, 2001).

Jubilee USA Update

Link for sharing: http://www.jubileeusa.org/ffd2018

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
April 24, 2018

UN Forum Wrestles with Economic Policies 10 Years After Financial Crisis

Islands Call for Debt Relief Ahead of Next Hurricane Season

New York City - Officials from governments, the IMF, World Bank, the private sector and NGOs meet this week at the United Nations for the Financing for Development (FFD) Forum. The annual gathering seeks to implement the Addis Ababa Action Agenda that governments endorsed in 2015 in Ethiopia. 

"These meetings are critical to address the root causes of poverty and raise revenue in the developing world," said Jubilee USA Executive Director Eric LeCompte. LeCompte has participated in FFD negotiations since 2012. "Better policies on tax, debt, trade and transparency issues are critical for lifting people out of poverty."

During the forum, public statements and private negotiations focus on new debt relief processes for Caribbean and small islands ahead of the next hurricane season. Islands from Dominica to Barbuda are still recovering from the 2017 hurricane season.

"There is growing consensus among a number of decision making bodies to put in place permanent debt relief processes to protect small islands when that are hit by natural disasters," noted Eric LeCompte who supported similar processes at the IMF. "We must all act quickly as the next hurricane season begins in just a few weeks."

Jubilee USA Network is an alliance of more than 75 US organizations and 650 faith communities working with 50 Jubilee global partners. Jubilee USA builds an economy that serves, protects and promotes the participation of the most vulnerable. Jubilee USA wins critical global financial reforms and won more than $130 billion in debt relief to benefit the world's poorest people. www.jubileeusa.org

###

Available for interview: Eric LeCompte, Executive Director

Contact: Lydia Andrews, Deputy Director

lydia@jubileeusa.org / (o) (202) 783-3566 x109 / (m) (847)772-2305

 

Faith is a Verb… Musings by Pastor Tony April 13, 2018

Faith is a Verb…       Musings by Pastor Tony                            April 13, 2018

We, the members and friends of Arlington Community Church, are called to be stewards of creation and build a just society based upon the inspiration of our faith.

This coming Sunday after worship we will discuss and vote on a new Vision and Mission Statement. The statement itself (see below), is the outcome of the New Beginnings process that we started two years ago. After those initial discussions, two small groups met to determine whether the mission and social justice things we were already doing were things we wanted to continue to do, and to discern if there was something else we wanted to do. Any new ideas would be taken to the congregation for a discussion and vote on our direction in mission and social justice.

What emerged was the desire to maintain our relationships with GRIP, Neighborhood House of North Richmond, the Emergency Food Pantry in Richmond, and the Contra Costa-Solana Food Bank, as well as a desire to be better stewards of the environment. Following our unanimous vote to become a solar church, and sparked by the passion of our Music Director, Shanti Moorjani, we realized that our congregation’s concern for our Earth could be a new beginning for us.  

From there we took core pieces of each of those group’s work and put them together in a Vision and Mission Statement. The Vision Statement (see the top of this article)  captures the three main things we see in ourselves today: We care for the environment, we work toward justice, and we are a community of faith. A lovely three-leaf clover of Environment, Justice, Faith, uniting in one statement why we do what we do, where our passions lie, and what our priorities are.  

This Vision and Mission statement is to remind us who we are and to encourage others to join us. It will also be used as part of the application process toward becoming designated a “Creation Justice” church by our denomination.  Please join us on Sunday after worship to discuss and vote on this proposed Vision and Mission Statement

Vision and Mission Statement to be voted on April 15, 2018

Arlington Community Church United Church of Christ

Vision We, the members and friends of Arlington Community Church, are called to be stewards of creation and to build a just society based upon the inspiration of our faith.

Mission

We believe that all life is dependent upon our planet; therefore, we seek justice for the planet and all of its inhabitants by speaking up for its well-being.

We encourage asking the question at every decision point, “Is this good for the Planet?”

We support the Person of the Planet program, which builds awareness about environmental issues, and calls us individually and corporately to make changes in our lives.

We seek the designation in the United Church of Christ as a “Creation Justice Congregation.”

We believe that each and every one of us is equally loved and affirmed in God’s sight as a valuable human being. We pray and work to remove barriers and foster reconciliation among ourselves and people everywhere. Led by the Holy Spirit, we listen to and learn from one another.

We are Open and Affirming of all persons moved to join in our spiritual journey regardless of their race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, abilities, or other God-given differences, visible or invisible. We thank God for our diversity.

We address the structural causes of poverty and inequality in our communities and in countries around the world; for example, by joining Jubilee USA Network, we work with people of many faiths to build an economy that protects and promotes the participation of the most vulnerable.

We serve others by partnering with agencies that feed the hungry and work with the poor.

We work toward accessibility for each person by removing physical barriers to participation including lighting, enlarged print, hearing assistance, ramps and handrails.

We are called to be the Church: to protect the environment, care for the poor, forgive often, reject racism, fight for the powerless, share earthly and spiritual resources, embrace diversity, love God, and enjoy this life.

Pastor Tony's Sermon March 18, 2018

John 19: 1-16     3-18-18     ACCUCC     Rev. Tony Clark

Listen to this week's complete sermon by clicking here

Then Pilate took Jesus and had him flogged. And the soldiers wove a crown of thorns and put it on his head, and they dressed him in a purple robe. They kept coming up to him, saying, “Hail, King of the Jews!” and striking him on the face. Pilate went out again and said to them, “Look, I am bringing him out to you to let you know that I find no case against him.” So Jesus came out, wearing the crown of thorns and the purple robe. Pilate said to them, “Here is the man!” When the chief priests and the police saw him, they shouted, “Crucify him! Crucify him!” Pilate said to them, “Take him yourselves and crucify him; I find no case against him.” The Jews answered him, “We have a law, and according to that law he ought to die because he has claimed to be the Son of God.” 

Now when Pilate heard this, he was more afraid than ever. He entered his headquarters again and asked Jesus, “Where are you from?” But Jesus gave him no answer. Pilate therefore said to him, “Do you refuse to speak to me? Do you not know that I have power to release you, and power to crucify you?” Jesus answered him, “You would have no power over me unless it had been given you from above; therefore the one who handed me over to you is guilty of a greater sin.” 

From then on Pilate tried to release him, but the Jews cried out, “If you release this man, you are no friend of the emperor. Everyone who claims to be a king sets himself against the emperor.” When Pilate heard these words, he brought Jesus outside and sat on the judge’s bench at a place called The Stone Pavement, or in Hebrew Gabbatha. Now it was the day of Preparation for the Passover; and it was about noon. He said to the Jews, “Here is your King!” They cried out, “Away with him! Away with him! Crucify him!” Pilate asked them, “Shall I crucify your King?” The chief priests answered, “We have no king but the emperor.”

Then he handed him over to them to be crucified. 

I try to imagine who I might be in the gospel story. In this season, as we hear the stories of Jesus being betrayed, arrested, tried, and then sent to the cross to die, I often wonder who I would be in this story. Would I be there with Judas, or Caiaphas and the other high priests, or with Pontius Pilate, or in the crowds that first hailed Jesus with Hosannas and then turned and cried “Crucify him”?

This is a very human story of people facing the truth of God’s love and running away from it, or deciding it is fake news, or believing it is not for them because they are not deserving or in need of it. This is the story we tell every year of a person who could show this truth and reflect back to each of us, not who we believe we are, but what God believes that we are beloved. As I place myself into this story,  I ask whether I can see that truth, hear the voice of the shepherd, and respond in kindness, humility, and doing justice, or not.

I confess that often I do not see myself in the way Jesus sees me, as beloved, as part of the kingdom of God with an important role to play. In many ways I am Pilate, rejecting the truth of the one who stands before me.

My mother took me to see the musical The Man of La Mancha when I was in Jr High School, and more than 35 years later, I still remember the scene when the Man of La Mancha, Don Quixote, faces the Knight of the Mirrors.

Don Quixote is a character who spends the majority of the play believing he is a vivacious young knight who kills dragons and saves beautiful maidens. In reality, he is very old; there are no dragons, only windmills that he attacks and kills; his beautiful maiden, Dulcinea, is actually a prostitute. He has a servant, Sancho Panza, who takes care of him in his madness, allowing his fantasies to be a reality for him. However, In the real world of pre-modern Spain, it is dangerous to live in a world of fantasy, and Don Quixote is forced to face his madness by the Knight of the Mirrors. The Knight of the Mirrors points out to Don Quixote the truth. While several other knights surround Don Quixote, holding their shields, which are mirrors, the Knight of the Mirrors tells him to look within to see the truth.

What I remember most about the scene that these knights had very large shields, almost full-length mirror size, and that they were very bright. With Don Quixote’s back to the audience, the mirrors not only faced him, but they also faced us, showing us who we were, catching the stage lights and reflecting bright light into the darkened house and into our widened pupils. This bright light hurt, reminding us that the truth might hurt, and also reminding us that we cannot live in fantasy forever.

Somehow this scene comes to mind when I think of Pilate judging Jesus. When Jesus met Pilate, Pilate asked him if he was the king of the Jews, and Jesus said, “You say that I am.”  The guards then dressed him in a costume, a purple robe and a thorn of crowns, putting him in the role of king in the drama to unfold. Pilate then asked Jesus, “Where do you come from?” and Jesus did not answer because he had already answered, “My kingdom does not come from this world.”  Pilate told Jesus he had the authority to set Jesus free or to have him crucified, and Jesus told Pilate that Pilate’s power was granted by God. Pilate believed that truism in his own way, that his authority had been granted by his own god and king, the Emperor Tiberius.

Then Pilate took Jesus to be judged in a public plaza called Gabbatha, which was attached to the Antonia Palace, the Jerusalem home-away-from-home for the prefect of Judea. Pilate sat in the raised judge’s seat, and Jesus was forced to stand or kneel below him. The crowd of chief priests cried out, “Kill him, crucify him.”

The scene feels like the Knight of the Mirrors facing an accused man who is kneeling below, with the knight towering above him, as the chief priest hold their mirrors for Jesus to see the truth. Yet, we know that in the gospel, it is not Pilate and the priests who hold the mirror; it is Jesus who holds it up to them, and to us, to see the truth of ourselves.

In John’s gospel, every person who meets Jesus must face themselves, and, finding themselves reflected in the mirror that is Jesus, they see the truth of themselves.

At the Samaritan well, Jesus met a woman, and he revealed that she had been married several times-- not out of love or failed love but out of duty to the law. In those words she heard a truth, that in spite of her situation as an outcast, she had a role as evangelist and teller of the good news of Jesus. Jesus was living water; she was the one who led people to the well to drink.  Jesus held a metaphorical mirror up to her and she saw that she was a beloved child of God with a role to play in the new kingdom.

Later, Jesus met a man born blind, whom everyone believed had been born in sin, and when Jesus spoke to him and rubbed mud on his eyes, he heard the voice of Jesus and responded. The formerly blind man, an outcast, had heard the Shepherd’s voice, and now he could speak about that to others. Jesus held a metaphorical mirror up to him and he saw that he was a beloved child of God with a role to play in the new kingdom.

When Jesus met Pilate, Jesus held a metaphorical mirror up for Pilate to face himself and the truth. Yet, I wonder if Pilate could see himself as a beloved child of God, or if he saw someone else there. Did he look through the mirror and project himself onto Jesus, seeing only a heretic, a traitor, an impersonator of the king, and one who disrespected power?

Pontius Pilate, whose title really was the King of the Jews, nicknamed Jesus the King of the Jews. Pilate’s kingdom was of this world; Jesus’ kingdom was not of this world.  Pilate’s role was to judge guilt and pronounce death sentences; Jesus came not to judge sin, but to pronounce sight. What he saw in Jesus saw Pilate believed he had the mirror; yet, it was Jesus who really had the mirror.

Jesus did not judge the Samaritan Woman at the Well who had several husbands. Her society had already done that, and they found her morally lacking. Yet when Jesus held up the mirror to her, she saw not what her neighbors saw, but what Jesus saw--that she was Beloved. 

Jesus did not judge the Man born blind; his neighbors had already done that and found him sinful. Yet when Jesus spoke to him, he did not hear the voices of his neighbors calling him a sinner, but the voice of the Good Shepherd calling him Beloved.

Nor did Jesus judge Pilate; He spoke to him, telling him the truth. He held a mirror up to Pilate and to the chief priests, but they could not see themselves. They believed the images they saw were of Jesus, the heretic, traitor, impersonator of the king, and one who disrespected power. They could not judge themselves guilty because they could not see themselves in the mirror being held up by Jesus. Nor could they see the deeper truth, that God so loved the world--even them, that Jesus came into the world  not to judge but to heal its brokenness it. They could not see that they were part of the world that God so loved and they were part of the broken world that needed healing.

What they saw in Jesus was really a reflection of their true selves. However, they could not see the truth that even they were beloved by God.

In this way, I confess that sometimes I, too, am like Pilate or Caiaphas, unable to see the truth that God believes me to be beloved with a role to play in the kingdom. I act  The task for me, for all of us, in this season is not to get trapped in the sadness of betrayal and judgement and death, but to look in the mirror that Jesus holds up and see trust, truth, love, and the desire for life. To see myself not as a betrayer of the truth, not as the judge of the world, not as the one who cries, “Crucify him”, but as a beloved by God with a role to play in the kingdom.

 I think I will go home this afternoon and put a note on the bathroom mirror that says, “You are beloved by God.” Perhaps this is what we all need to hear as we step into the passion story.

Amen.

 

A Participatory Faith Community by Barry Cammer

A Participatory Faith Community

From Barry Cammer

It’s been absolutely wonderful to see so many of our newest members step up and become a participant in the life of our faith community called Arlington Community Church. For decades, most protestant and catholic churches have been “performance” venues where the pastor and a few extremely dedicated members put on a show, a worship service for the audience to witness and absorb. Over the last few years, we have been taking very small steps to be a little less performance and a little more participatory. We’ve stopped using the big pulpit and lectern and brought worship leadership level with worshippers. We’re using more lay-readers. Our liturgy has become more responsive, with lots of places for the worshippers to speak. We’ve even been engaging the congregation in dialogue sermons and conversations about issues of faith and life.

I love our pastor Tony. He’s a good pastor, a wonderful preacher, an excellent organizer. But our worship and church life should never become “The Tony Clark Show”. I don’t want this, and I know that Tony doesn’t want this. I want to belong to a community of faith where worship and church life is something we all do, in which we all participate according to our abilities and gifts. What abilities and gifts do you bring to our community of faith? I want to belong to a community of faith where everybody does something that nurtures our lives together. Truly, in a church our size (or any size) there isn’t much wiggle room for many to say, “If I don’t do it, someone else will.”.

RECRUITING. Just last week, I wrote a very short email to Tony. I said, “I hate recruiting!”. After working for almost 45 years in human services and ministry, I’m tapped out. I no longer have the energy to make calls asking(or pleading with) people to participate. But I am tasked with recruiting for folk to participate in Sunday worship, special services, and other events. So here’s what I’m going to do. Even though I’ll still send a few email messages out, I’m going to send everyone a “Volunteer Request”. Please complete this form and return it to the church office, or put it in the offering plate, or somehow get it to me so that I may call upon you to assist in worship.

To those of you who already participate a great deal in the life of our faith community and especially to those of you who do a lot more than I do, I send you gratitude and I hope to send you assistance in the near future.

Pastor Tony's Sermon March 11, 2018

John 18: 28-40     3-11-18     ACCUCC     Rev. Tony Clark

“What is the truth?”

Listen to this weeks complete sermon by clicking here.

This is a sermon about politics. It is a sermon about power and propaganda and their use in the political realm. This sermon may be impolite.

I know that some of you do not like politics to invade my preaching, so let me tell you what this sermon is not. It is not about the separation of church and state, because that wasn’t a thing back then. It is not a sermon about the balance of powers between an executive, legislative and judicial branch of government, because that wasn’t a thing. This is not a sermon about the lack of unity in a representative government, because that wasn’t a thing. In short, this is not a sermon about today.

Unless you hear it that way.

Pontius Pilate was neither good, nor empathetic, nor particularly wise. He was a powerful man. Pontius Pilate was a political appointee by the Emperor Tiberius to the office of Prefect of the region of Judea; he was appointed about 4 years before Jesus began his ministry; he served about 11 years, until some 4 years after Jesus died.

Pilate lived in and ruled from Caesarea Maritima, the coastal capital of Judea, about 70 miles away from Jerusalem. Caesarea was an engineering marvel, developed from an old fishing port by Herod the Great around the time of Jesus’ birth. It boasted a harbor rivaling Alexandria and Athens in an area with no natural harbor, constructed of cement made of quarried lava and lime.  Soaring over the harbor was an enormous stadium, and an even more enormous palace, in which the Prefect, Pontius Pilate lived and ruled the region. Someone had to quarry the stone and the lime, build the forms for the cement under water, carry the stone, and someone had to pay for it. Actually many someones did the labor and paid the exorbitant taxes-- the people, the peasants, who lost limb, life, and livelihood to build the infrastructure that maintained a tariff free zone and a peace called Pax Romana.

Pilate was incredibly insensitive to the people he ruled.  He bumbled his way through Jewish festivities and rituals, offended the Jews by bringing engraved images of the Emperor into the city of Jerusalem at night, and, ordered symbols of Roman power to be erected at the Jerusalem Temple. He said that anyone who did not worship the Emperor would be killed. When the Jews protested, saying they would rather die than desecrate the laws of Moses, Pilate barely averted a crisis by backing down on the death penalty.

Pilate was known as a harsh ruler, At the end of his reign, Pilate was recalled to Rome by the Emperor for violence against faithful Samarians. The story goes that Pilate and his people claimed that an archeological relic of Moses had been found at the holy site of Mt. Gerazim, and when the faithful flocked to the site for worship, he ordered his military to surround them and slaughter them. For this Emperor Tiberius recalled him to Rome, and he was exiled and ordered to kill himself after his own trial.

 As Prefect, Pilate represented the Emperor with all power in the region. He oversaw the collection of taxes, was in charge of a military unit of about 3000 men, and had judiciary power in concerns of the Emperor. He oversaw the trials of traitors—those accused of treason against the Empire.  He was the Internal Revenue Service, Governor, and Supreme Court of the land. Although the local Jerusalem court, called the Sanhedrin, was relatively independent of Pontius Pilate; the High Priest who oversaw the Sanhedrin was appointed by the prefect. The High Priest Caiaphus, who interrogated Jesus just after his arrest and turned him over to Pilate, was appointed by the Prefect who proceeded Pilate.

Pilate was prone to be persuaded by propaganda, and Caiaphus played on Pilate’s personality and hunger for power. Pilate was in Jerusalem for the Passover festival, the holy day in which Jews celebrated their ancestors overthrowing an oppressive ruler. Pilate recognized that Jews could compare the harsh treatment by  the ancient Egyptian Pharaoh and the current Roman Emperor.

Pilate was primed for a fight--predictions of this Passover included violence. He left his tower in  Caesarea Maritima, the financial and civic capital, and arrived in Jerusalem, the center of the faith of the people he ruled. He came with his own National Guard to “keep the peace” and squelch any violence aimed at the state, marching into the city in the glory of a military parade, with banners a horses and rows of high stepping saluting men carrying arms.

The next morning, when Pilate awoke, he received the news from his favorite source, a perpetrator of propaganda partial to Rome, a babbling morning news source that reported there were protestors outside his hotel. The riotous rabble was awaiting a decision about a heretical rabbi who had been arrested overnight. The propaganda continued that the rabbi, named Jesus, had been arrested for calling himself the King of the Jews; he had been questioned for his religious teachings, and he was brought to Pilate not only as a heretic but as a traitor.

Caiaphus, or one of his representatives, whispered the propaganda to the most powerful person in the land. He might just have reminded Pilate that tax evasion was treason, that Jesus had called tax collectors to leave their posts and follow Jesus.

Pilate questioned this rabbi, named Jesus, himself, “Are you the King of the Jews?” Jesus, the smarter of the two, answered in true rabbinical form with another question, “Are you asking this on your own or did someone tell you this about me?” Pilate’s answer, that he was not a Jew, implied he did not know that much about Jewish customs and titles. Pilate told Jesus that Jesus was being accused by the High Priest, and then he asked him what he had done that was so bad that his trial was rushed and the case against him had to be heard before Passover festivities could even begin. Jesus said the most political thing he could, “My kingdom doesn’t belong to this world.”

In a world of Kings and Prefects, “My kingdom doesn’t belong to this world,” is a political statement. It is a statement of power of governance, of tax collection, of judicial activity. It is a statement delegitimizing the person in power and looking elsewhere for that leadership.

Pilate, at first, did not see anything wrong with this statement; it was a local problem not a national one. It was an internal problem within this bizarre faith that didn’t worship the emperor, had a silly spiritual law against graven images, and prayed to a God who blessed the poor, the weak, the elderly, the enslaved. Pilate knew that the only god of the realm, the Emperor Tiberius, blessed the wealthy, the powerful, the strong, and those who were loyal to him.  Pilate wanted to be blessed by that god. There was one king, Tiberius, and Pilate was his local representative. This “King of the Jews” did not threaten him. The crime did not rise to the level of him.

It was when Jesus said, “I was born into this world to tell about the truth,” that Pilate began to wonder about the propaganda he had been fed. He wondered What was true? What was news? What was fake news? so he asked, “What is the truth?” Pilate began to wonder if trusted Caiaphus had an agenda. Perhaps Pilate pondered whether he had been played as a puppet to the propaganda machine. Who had the truth, this humble rabbi or Caiaphus?

Caiaphus and the other chief priests  called for Jesus to be killed on the cross for claiming to be the King of the Jews. The crowd, stirred up by the propaganda of Caiaphus also joined in the cry to put Jesus to death and release Barabbas. Now Barabbas, barely a blip in this story, was a bauble, a pretty shiny thing dangled before the crowd to distract them; John wrote that he was a bandit, reminding us that bandits steel the attention of the sheep away from the calming voice of the Shepherd.

Pilate asked the people how he should decide. He sent out short statements, and small questions, and if he had had a Twitter account, these short bursts would have fit in the 140 characters. The crowd, in their mob mentality, took responsibility for Jesus’ death, and Pilate symbolically washed his hands of the affair. Pilate asked if they wanted him to nail their king to the cross, and the crowd cried, “There is only one king; the Emperor is our king.”

Jesus had said, “My kingdom is not of this world.” His kingdom, his political realm, is a place where life, not death, is truth. His kingdom was not focused on wealth and power and violence, but, rather, his political realm blessed the poor, the powerless, and the peacemakers. His kingdom did not rely on propaganda or fake news; it relied on relationships that built on the truth love.  Jesus’ political statement was that this Kingdom from another realm built on love, not the kingdom of politics and propaganda and power, is the truth.

Claiming to be a citizen of that kingdom, rather than a party to the power and propaganda of this world, is a political action. May God protect all peoples who take the political stance of their faith, and may God protect peoples everywhere from propaganda, unexamined political power, and people like Pontius Pilate. Amen.