Sermons

The Theology of U2
Rev. Douglas Taylor
March 23, 2014

Part I

I can’t believe the news today
Oh, I can’t close my eyes
And make it go away
How long…
How long must we sing this song

                                    -Sunday Bloody Sunday

As I entered my teenage years, the Irish rock band U2 crossed the ocean with their third album entitled War. In many ways they are what you expect from a rock band – four guys: a drum kit, bass, guitar, and vocals.  They’re loud, they swear, they thrive in the center of attention, they go by iconic names – Bono and The Edge rather than by their birth names: Paul and Dave.  They totally work that ‘too cool for you’ look in photo shoots.  They are rock stars. 

But in many ways they are atypical for a rock band.  Their music is not all love songs.  They sing about faith and hope, they sing about injustice and social turmoil, they sing about brokenness and the power of love. 

In 1983 they performed at Red Rock amphitheater in Denver, filming the concert for release titled Under a Blood Red Sky. Rolling Stone named them the band of the year in 1983. The opening lyrics of their song Sunday Bloody Sunday captured me.  “I can’t believe the news today.  I can’t close my eyes and make it go away.”  U2 captured my emotional and political stance with those words. 

I remember hearing about a prominent religious figure saying several decades back that he had to stop watching the news because it interrupted his prayers; it made it too hard for him to pray.  What I heard from this rock band was the opposite.  I watch the news and am drawn to lament with the Psalms: ‘How long must we sing this song?’ 

When I was a teenager I didn’t know what this song was about.  I thought it was a reference to the America’s Civil Rights movement and our 1965 Bloody Sunday when Dr. King and protestors tried to march across the Edmond Pettus Bridge.  But it was instead about two events 50 years apart both called ‘Bloody Sunday’ in Ireland’s history; one from the 1920’s and another from the 1970’s 

Broken bottles under children’s feet
Bodies strewn across the dead end street
But I won’t heed the battle call

Bono insists it is not a rebel song or a partisan song.  It is an appeal to end the violence.

And the battle’s just begun
There’s many lost, but tell me who has won
The trench is dug within our hearts
And mothers, children, brothers, sisters
Torn apart

For years after writing it, violence would still flair up in Ireland, bombs would still go off.

And it’s true we are immune
When fact is fiction and TV reality
And today the millions cry
We eat and drink while tomorrow they die

How long, how long must we sing this song?  The urgency of the emotion gives the song its drive, but the clarity of its conscience gives the song its heart.  As I think about my own ministry and passion I can see the influence U2 in general and this song in particular had on me in my teenage years.

Over the years, U2 has written songs about the social problems of drug addiction (Bad, Running to Stand Still), inhumane treatment of the mentally ill (The Electric Co.), suicide (Stuck in Moment), female body image insecurities (Original of the Species), and grieving Argentine mothers of political victims ( Mothers of the Disappeared).  But it is the appeal against violence that appears most regularly in their music throughout the years.

Bono and the band are regulars at the various global music charity and consciousness-raising events such as Live-Aid, Band-Aid, “We Are the World”, and the Conspiracy of Hope tour.  Plus Bono has gained renown for meeting with political figures around the global to talk about helping Africa rise up out of debt and crushing poverty. They are an activist rock n roll band.  And for more than a generation, they have made it cool to be an activist!

Van Diemen’s Land is a song off their “Rattle and Hum” album.  It is a song written by lead guitarist Edge as an appeal for justice without violence.  John Boyle O’Reilly was a poet sentenced to the Van Diemen penal colony in Australia back in 1848 for his role in an Irish rebellion associated with the Great Potato Famine – which wasn’t really a famine but a plundering of Irish potato farms for export while the Irish people starved.  The song calls not for a rebellion but a reflection on suffering and justice.

Part II

I am far from the first person to recognize and comment on the ethics and theology of this rock band and their music.  For over a decade, nearly a dozen books have been published with titles such as:

Walk On: The Spiritual Journey of U2 (2005)
One Step Closer: Why U2 Matters for those Seeking God (2006)
Get Up Off Your Knees: Preaching the U2 Catalogue (2003)
We Get to Carry Each Other: The Gospel According to U2 (2009)

The depth of this band is not captured only in a political and social outcry.  U2 has always had an element of religious and spiritual search in their lyrics.  Early on, three of the four band members were part of a Charismatic Christian community.  After their first album they felt pressure to pick a side – to be a Christian Rock band playing the message of that particular community or to let go of Christianity and faith to embrace the rock star world.  They choose to find a third way.  Their music has strong themes of redemption and salvation, with lots of biblical imagery, but they explore doubt and loss of faith as well. 

All over the websites people of faith are condemning U2 for not being Christina enough or not ‘really’ Christian.  And then other websites have people of faith lifting up U2 (usually with a perplexed expression because U2 doesn’t quite fit what they expect from a rock band with a message of faith.)

In their 1991 song Mysterious Ways, they have the line:  “To touch is to heal, to hurt is to steal. If you want to kiss the sky, better learn how to kneel” but that is coupled with words from an earlier song: “We thought we had the answers, It was the questions we had wrong” (11 O’clock Tick Tock – 1983).  In their 2009 song Magnificent Bono sings: “I was born to sing for you, I didn’t have a choice to lift you up and sing whatever song you wanted me to. I give you back my voice … I will magnify.” But they also sing “I have spoke[n] with the tongue of angels, I have held the hand of the devil … but I still haven’t found what I’m looking for.”

In a 2004 interview Bono said:

There [are] cathedrals and the alleyways in our music. I think the alleyway is usually on the way to the cathedral, where you can hear your own footsteps and you’re slightly nervous and looking over your shoulder, and wondering if there’s somebody following you. And then you get there and realize there was somebody following you: it’s God.

                        -from Jon Pareles, New York Times, section 2, p29 (Nov 14 2004)

Their song I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For was covered by a gospel Choir; there is a clip of Edge saying it really is a gospel song if you listen to the lyrics … it’s not in they way they play it, he says, but it is gospel.  But then Bono will say it is more an anthem of doubt than an anthem of faith.  My sense is that it’s a mix – it is a searching through doubt and faith.

A significant element of U2 is the message of grace and hope and the Gospel.  While they don’t come on heavy handed with their beliefs, they do lean heavy on their faith.  There is no denying they are a rock n roll band with deep spiritual overtones.

I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For comes from the 1987 “Joshua Tree” album.  It was a number 1 song on a number 1 album.  The album’s title is about old growth trees in the Nevada desert.  The Joshua tree grows in dry dirt, sand and stone and somehow survives to show there must be water somewhere around there, hope lives hidden there somewhere.  The song “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For” is about spiritual doubt and the drive to keep searching, knowing that the source of life is there somewhere.

Part III

As was mentioned in the announcements, Jason Smith won the sermon topic at last year’s church auction and asked me to preach about the Gospel of U2.  In our conversations we learned that he and I were both at the 1987 concert at Silver Stadium in Rochester for the Joshua Tree tour.

Jason wrote me saying:

I remember seeing MTV videos for Gloria and I Will Follow, [but] it was the performance of Sunday, Bloody Sunday at Red Rocks that caused me to buy my first U2 [album] …riding my bike down to T&C World of Video on Market Street in Corning to pick up the Under a Blood Red Sky EP when I was 14 years old, seeing them perform at Live Aid, playing the song Bad when Bono jumped into the crowd, going to see them twice on the Joshua Tree tour in Syracuse and Rochester, during my Freshman year at Corning Community College with my best friend Scott, continuing the tradition of seeing them live with Scott right up until 2009 when I took my boys to see them for the first time at Giants Stadium.

When I asked him why U2 was important to him he said:

It’s a combination of the depth of U2’s convictions, their willingness to discuss social action in their music and the history of camaraderie that the music has provided to me that keeps me coming back for more.

What keeps me coming back to U2’s music is the way they cast hope while being firmly grounded in reality.  They sing about resilience and the power of love. 

Their 2000 album has a song about Aung San Suu Kyi, the political figure from Burma/ Myanmar who chose to leave the comforts of Oxford University and return to Burma facing imprisonment but to fight for the cause of democracy.  She became a symbol for people.

            Walk on, walk on
            What you’ve got, they can’t deny it … Walk on, walk on.

A favorite of mine is their song One from their Achtung Baby album.  Bono sings:

Have you come here for forgiveness
Have you come to raise the dead
Have you come here to play Jesus
To the lepers in your head

It has the line:

One love, one blood
One life but we’re not the same
We get to carry each other, carry each other 

I love that it doesn’t say, ‘we have to carry each other,’ but that we ‘get to.’  What makes us “one” is not that we are all the same; but that we belong together as humanity and that we are responsible for each other in a way that blesses us. 

U2 performed their latest song at the Oscars last month; Ordinary Love is a tribute to Nelson Mandela.  One interpretation is that it offer the perspective of Mandela when he gets out of prison.

I can’t fight you any more, it’s you I’m fighting for

The song has won the Golden Globe award for Best New Song this year and was nominated at the Oscars from the soundtrack to the new Mandela movie “Long Walk to Freedom.”  The song appeals just to ‘ordinary’ love – not the extraordinary, monumental love like that of Gandhi, King, or Mandela.  Just the ordinary love will be enough, more than enough to see us through.

U2 sings about more than injustice and a bit about faith.  They have blended the activist spirit with the postmodern yearning for deeper meaning.  The Christian ethic and faith they present are not neat and clear.  Bono sings about brokenness and despair, lost faith and found hope.  He sings about our responsibility to build a better world with the flawed material of our own aching hearts.  U2’s theology is about the transforming power of love that can and does change the world.

So what music or art has influenced your outlook on life, your faith and understanding of the world? 

Pride (In the Name of Love) is from the “Unforgettable Fire” album of 1984.  The first two verses are stylistically written to be like “grainy photos sent back along the wire from the front lines of resistance;” snapshots of the work and its cost.  The last verse is about the death and legacy of Martin Luther King Jr. The song is about the power mix of love and pride that propel people to stand up and speak out and change the world. 

Prayer

Gracious and Loving God, from whom all things come and to whom all things return

Let us turn our attention this hour to the clamoring needs of our world, of our people, of our own souls. We gather today as a liberal people of faith, people of a wide path, a welcoming path, a path of compassion and acceptance.

We gather as a people in honor of our differences and the differences all the world round.

Let us gather as people of courage and hope, let us gather as people of love and justice

In this silent moment we recognize and honor those places in our own lives and in our own hearts where burdens reside. We seek the comfort of community, the peace of faith, and the yearning for wholeness in our lives.  May this hour bring life-giving truth and peace to us and all the world. 

We recognize and honor that people in many places the world over seek this same balm. 

We recognize that this very hour and over the past days and weeks and ages and eons, people have come together in faithful community seeking this same balm of comfort and justice and life. 

Let us recognize that humanity is one family; that though we are not the same, we are still one human family in one common web of existence with all that is holy.

Let our prayer be not only for ourselves and for our near neighbor.  Let our prayer be for clean water for all people, for schooling for every child, for medicine for all the afflicted, and for an end to extreme and senseless poverty

Let us together build a better and safer world for all creation.  Let us not ask for the blessing of the holy upon our lives and upon this world. Let us instead step up and be the blessing to the world. 

Let us speak up for the disempowered, and be the voices of compassion and reason for a world gone mad with cruelty, poverty, and injustice. Let us set aside hate, and devote our lives to the ways of peace and justice. 

Let us be tender with the broken places in our own souls and in the souls of our neighbors near and far. Let us be tender yet persistent with the broken places in our global systems that allow racism and poverty to flourish, that allow homophobia and misogyny to run rampant.

For such injustice let us be tender but not complicit, demanding but not unkind. Let us acknowledge these broken places in our world and in ourselves and stand up, speak out, and reach out to make a difference

Be thou an ever present strength upon our journey, O Spirit

In the name of all that is holy
may it be so

Love Builds a Bridge
Rev. Douglas Taylor
February 16, 2014

Yesterday my 21 year-old son sent me a message on facebook in anticipation of my sermon today.  It warms my heart to think he is paying attention.  The message was a picture of a church roadside sign that read “God says homosexuality is in” and there were two guys grinning in the foreground holding a letter “s” from the sign board.  In other words, the sign originally said “God says homosexuality is sin,” but these young men had stolen the “s” so the new message is that God says it is “in”

As a parent, I hope my values are transmitted to the next generation.  When I am at my best I hope these values are not merely a parroting of my values but a deep reflection and acceptance of what I hold dear.  I hope what I have projected into the next generation is not merely the conclusions I have reached, but the terms by which I reach those conclusions.  I don’t want my kids to be comfortable with homosexuality because their parents are; I want them to see the deeper value of acceptance and non-judgment at the heart of any particular political or social issues in the news today.  I want them to recognize the best qualities of love in the conversation.

It is a particular sort of love that I want to focus our attention on this morning. I know Valentine’s Day just happened and everyone was talking about romance and relationships. But the love I want to raise up is suitable for all of us, whether we have a date or a partner or a spouse or any of that. 

Carter Heyward, a lesbian feminist theologian, teacher, and priest in the Episcopalian church offers this on the topic of love:

Love, like truth and beauty, is concrete. Love is not fundamentally a sweet feeling; not, at heart, a matter of sentiment … Love is active, effective, a matter of making reciprocal and mutually beneficial relation with one’s friends and enemies. Love creates righteousness, or justice, here on earth. To make love is to make justice. (Our Passion for Justice)

Or as philosopher and activist Cornell West succinctly said, “Justice is what love looks like in public.” 

The song we just offered, “Same Love” by Macklemore, Ryan Lewis, and featuring Mary Lambert, has become a popular radio song.  Ben Haggerty (that is Macklemore’s real name) wrote the song as a statement in favor of same-sex marriage.  The cover of the album shows his uncle John with his partner Sean. 

Marriage equality is a current news story.  Same-sex Marriage has become the legislative flash point for GLBTQ issues in our country and in Unitarian Universalism these past few years.  Back in 2005 in a sermon on marriage I stated that it was only a matter of time before marriage equality was the law of the land.  These things take time but it certainly seems like the tide of cultural acceptance is rolling in.

Two weeks back Tabernacle United Methodist church hosted Rev. Frank Schaefer into their pulpit.  Rev. Schaefer was defrocked last year for officiating at the marriage of his son several years back.  There was a trial and everything; his ministerial credentials were revoked by the council.  The United Methodists have been wrestling with GLBTQ issues but at the last General Conference they upheld the language that disallows the officiating at same-sex marriages.  Schaefer was in town to preach at Tabernacle, a Reconciling Congregation – that is akin to our ‘Welcoming Congregation’ as a formal designation welcoming people of all sexual orientations and gender identities. 

Rev. Steve Heiss is minister serving that congregation.  Rev. Heiss has issued a public letter to his congregation and to his bishop stating that he has officiated at several same-sex marriages and has no intention to cease the practice.  Rev. Heiss will probably be brought to trial and be defrocked as well.

As a Unitarian Universalist clergy I have no such concerns for the same-sex marriages I have officiated.  Unitarian Universalism went on record in 1970 with a resolution against the discrimination of homosexuals and bisexuals.  There was an official resolution in 1984 affirming the practice of conducting services of union for gay and lesbian couples, and another one in 1996 supporting full marriage equality. 

But in many ways, marriage equality is not the pinnacle of LGBTQ concerns in our society.  I recall conversations with people who were frustrated with the marriage equality focus, not because they didn’t agree with same-sex marriage or because they did not wish to marry their partners, but because there were many other issues of importance that were getting no attention.  Marriage Equality became a wedge issue during recent election seasons, and by some interpretations even a distraction tactic.

But marriage equality, I believe, has come to represent more than just the freedom for same-sex couples to marry.  In many ways Marriage Equality seems to be akin to the voting rights act of the 1960’s.  The point of the civil rights movement was not to win the vote for people of color.  The point was to stop the legal violence and dehumanization.  The point was to get society to see that no matter the color of your skin, all people deserve equal treatment.  But a galvanizing focus of that was the push for the voting rights act.  The voting was literally valuable, but it was also symbolically valuable – voting is about agency and having a voice and power.  The 1960’s voting rights act was about more than voting.  Similarly, the point of marriage equality may not merely be about the freedom to marry.  It is the legislative focus for the effort to change the culture at large; to get people to pay attention to the violence and the dehumanization of gay and lesbian people, of bisexual, transgender, queer people.  Most of society is still coming to terms with just the G and the L parts of the GLBTQ acronym. 

Charlotte and I participated in a fascinating interfaith lunch conversation with local Christian clergy last week.  The conversation ranged from war and peace, through politics and popes, and finally into sexual orientation.  Homosexuality was the topic which then dominated the bulk of our interchange that afternoon.  We talked about how different denominations handle the topic, we talked about Rev. Hiess and Frank Schafer; we spoke of weddings and family members and colleagues. It was wonderful to hear our liberal Christian colleagues speak so affirmatively for the full inclusion of gay and lesbian people in the worship life of their congregations.  

There were different guesses as to how long it would take for society and the different religions to come to terms with marriage equality and the full participation of gay and lesbian people in the church.  But these colleagues seemed to echo the general sentiment of Macklemore’s song. “I might not be the same, but that’s not important.”  “Strip away the fear and underneath it’s all the same love.” People are getting much more comfortable with the conversation.  Marriage equality is approaching ‘normal.’

In a slightly different though related topic, a week ago (Feb 9, 2014) football player Michael Sam announced publicly that he is gay.  This is news as he is the first professional football player to make such an announcement prior to retirement.  Dale Hansen, a local Dallas Texas Sportscaster, offered a remarkable commentary on the news. He said,

It wasn’t that long ago that we were being told that black players couldn’t play in our games because it would be uncomfortable. And even when they finally could it took several more years before a black man played quarterback, because we weren’t comfortable with that either. So many of the same people who used to make that argument and the many who still do are the same people who say government should stay out of our lives but then want government in our bedrooms. I’ve never understood how they feel comfortable laying claim to both sides of that argument.

Hansen then quoted Audre Lourde in that commentary: “It is not our differences that divide us. It is our inability to recognize, accept, and celebrate those differences.” 

What Loure was lifting up is not that our differences ‘don’t matter;’ she wanted our differences acknowledged but not judged. She calls for our differences to be acknowledged and celebrated.  Audre Lorde was a black lesbian feminist at a time when it was hard enough just being black, or lesbian, or a feminist.  She understood about differences and the loss and silencing that occurs when we say our differences don’t matter. 

One way to look at our differences is to say they matter a lot; they matter so much that they are insurmountable barriers. Another way is to say our differences do not matter at all; indeed we are all the same deep down. A third way to look at it all is to say our differences matter a lot and we can celebrate our differences together. 

In considering all this news from the past few weeks and the conversations I’ve had, I’ve been thinking about this point made by Audre Lourde.  Thinking about my conversations at lunch with other clergy, thinking about the words of Macklemore’s song and how popular the song has become, thinking about the courageous stance of Rev. Steve Hiess, thinking about the same-sex weddings at which I have officiated, and thinking about this young football player having to explain what it will be like in the locker room – thinking about all this I am reminded of the of love. And justice is what love looks like in public.  

And this is what I think is so elegant about the push for marriage equality:  It puts love into the conversation.  Too often people get bogged down thinking about what homosexuality means in the locker room or the bedroom.  But the bigger point is relationship, it always has been.  The point is the love.  Seeing the conversation as one about love helps people to make that first step.

Macklemore says “It’s the same fight that led to walk-outs and sit-ins, human rights for everybody there is no difference.” Justice is what love looks like in public.  Like the voting rights act, the legislative push for marriage equality is worth it both literally and symbolically.  In the literal sense, it matters for couples to receive equal protections and rights whether they are a same-sex couple or an opposite-sex couple.  In a symbolic sense, it matters because we’re talking about love and reminding everyone that we’re talking about the basic human relationship between people.  Love is patient, love is kind.  Love is bigger than our differences; and love can help build the bridge between those differences such that we see that our differences do not matter and beyond that to see that they do matter in a way that can be celebrated.

Love finds a way when laws are blind and freedom banned.  Put your trust in that concrete form of love that looks like justice, listens with patience and reaches out across our differences with kindness.  Love is patient, love is kind.

In a world with out end
May it be so.

Micro-aggressions in the Mosaic
Rev. Douglas Taylor
January 19, 2014

It was roughly mid-way through my seminary years that my soul caught fire with the life and writings of the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. I had learned about him and had heard his words before, in school and in church, but this was my first encounter of reading more than a quote or hearing about what he had said and done. His use of language stirred my heart and the content of his writings struck my conscience.

I was working on an assignment to build a modern lectionary – what are the contemporary writings that would fit as Unitarian Universalist scripture. I am not the first to suggest that the writings of Dr. King could serve as scripture for modern liberal religion. I don’t mean scripture as ‘divine word of God, inerrant and perfect, the root of all sound creed and belief.’ Instead I mean scripture as ‘life-giving writings that wrestle with the deep questions of truth and meaning.’ I imagine the writings of King could fit alongside the letters of Paul, the prose of Lao Tzu, or the words of the Hebrew prophets

Obviously I am thinking about many of his speeches, the “I have a Dream” speech in particular as we just heard. But the work I really dug into for that assignment in seminary was his “Letter from the Birmingham Jail.” It was written in 1963 while King was imprisoned for civil disobedience. He outlines the method and reasoning for non-violent direct action. It is a response to a public letter of concern and caution from eight white southern clergy. They cautioned King to wait, to give more time for the political system to respond. King replied:

We know through painful experience that freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed. Frankly, I have never yet engaged in a direct-action movement that was “well timed” according to the timetable of those who have not suffered unduly from the disease of segregation. For years now I have heard the word “wait.” It rings in the ear of every Negro with a piercing familiarity. This “wait” has almost always meant “never.” … We must come to see with the distinguished jurist of yesterday that “justice too long delayed is justice denied.”

I MUST … confess that over the last few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro’s great stumbling block in the stride toward freedom is not the White Citizens Councillor or the Ku Klux Klanner but the white moderate who is more devoted to order than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says, “I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I can’t agree with your methods of direct action”; who paternalistically feels that he can set the timetable for another man’s freedom; who lives by the myth of time; and who constantly advises the Negro to wait until a “more convenient season.” Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.

This then is my focus for today. Each year it is my commitment to bring a resonant message on the Sunday closest to the national celebration of Dr. King. I have preached about The Dream, about racism or Beloved Community; I have preached about democracy or the kindred values between King’s message and Unitarian Universalism. Today I focus on racism, but something far more insidious than blatant racism and outright bigotry. Today I ask you to focus with me on the impact of lukewarm acceptance, the difficulties of shallow understanding from people of good will.

We in this congregation, I know this to be true, are people of good will. I am a person of good will. So what I am poking at today is for my ears and the ears of all of us: a sermon for people of good will. And what King offered in that letter over 50 years ago is that being a person of good will is important but not sufficient.

It also is good and worth noting that we are a people of tolerance and plurality. As a faith tradition Unitarian Universalism recognizes the mosaic of multiculturalism. We honor our differences, for that is where the richness of interaction and engagement resides. We know that welcoming differences can often be messy. Misunderstandings can occur, often do occur. We bump up against each other with our differing opinions, expressions, experiences. The Beloved Community is not a perfect paradise. There are cracks and chips in the mosaic most of the time.

This word in the title of my sermon “Microaggressions in the Mosaic” refers to the cracks and chips in the mosaic. It was a new term to me a few summers ago and it kept popping up in my awareness as a way to talk about this: microaggressions. I avoided it for a while because it has the feel of a pop-psychology buzzword. But today I want to throw it under a microscope for a few minutes to see if there really is anything to this word.

The term “microaggression” was coined back in the 70’s by psychiatrist Dr. Chester Pierce. The term has come back into use through the work of a Columbia professor named Derald Sue. Sue defines microaggressions as small indignities. Of course as a collage professor what he really defines it as is, “brief and commonplace verbal, behavioral, or environmental indignities, whether intentional or unintentional, that communicate hostile, derogatory, or negative racial slights and insults toward people of color.”

This seems almost like a new dressing on the same old experience of racial slurs and insults. The unique piece is that microaggressions are often unintentional and seemingly insignificant. We’re talking about throw-away phrases rather than ‘hate-speech.’

In an article from Psychology Today, Derald Sue writes,

The most detrimental forms of microaggressions are usually delivered by well-intentioned individuals who are unaware that they have engaged in harmful conduct toward a socially devalued group. These everyday occurrences may on the surface appear quite harmless, trivial, or be described as “small slights,” but research indicates they have a powerful impact upon the psychological well-being of marginalized groups and affect their standard of living by creating inequities in health care, education, and employment.

Professor Sue was looking at a pattern of experience in his research and naming it. Here are some examples of the experiences Sue was seeing. When a white woman clutches her purse as a Black man approaches, it sends the message: You and your group are criminals. When an Asian American, born and raised in the United States, is complimented for speaking “good English,” (or perhaps for speaking English well,) the message is intended as a compliment but it also says: You are not a true American. You are a perpetual foreigner in your own country.

Of course the targets of microaggressions are not just people of color. Sue’s research began with the experiences of people of color, but he soon saw that this was a universal experience for anyone of a minority identity: women, LGBTQ persons, religious minorities, people with disabilities and so on. When a female physician wearing a stethoscope is mistaken as a nurse, the message may not have been intentional but it is there: Women are less capable than men. Or consider the example of a gay couple asked “Which of you is the husband and which is the wife?” Certainly there are gay couples who consider their relationship in that way, but the message is: a same-sex relationship is abnormal and you can pretend to fit if you try. Or the way people raise their voice when speaking to a blind person. The subtle message is that a person with a disability is somehow inferior in all aspects of physical and mental functioning.

One website  I stumbled upon shows examples of Racial Microaggressions by having people write down common statements they hear. A young woman of Asian descent holds a sign saying “No, where are really from?” A Black teen holds a sign that reads “You don’t act like a normal black person, ya know.”

Some of these examples may be about thoughtlessness more than good intentions. And they are small and easy to brush off, but they add up. Part of what we can notice is what I spoke about this fall in my Forgiveness sermon: Our intention behind our words and the impact of our words do not always line up, but both are true. Even when we are thoughtful and have the intention of complimenting or connecting with someone, our impact may be otherwise.

Many years back, before I moved to Binghamton, I was officiating a memorial service for a Japanese American WW II veteran. The deceased had not been a member of the congregation and I did not know him before being asked to do the service. During the service an older man spoke at the open remembrances time, he was a neighbor and friend of the deceased if I remember right. It was clear this neighbor and friend thought very highly of the deceased and the man was choked up at times while sharing. He concluded his remarks with, what I am sure he believed was, a sincere complement. He said his friend was a ‘credit to his race.’

“Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will.” (MLK) The problem with calling someone a ‘credit to his race’ is in the way people of a minority identity group are often called upon to represent all people of that minority identity group. Perhaps you are thinking, ‘That’s not so bad.’ And if that is what you’re thinking, you’re right – it’s not so bad …which is my point. These microaggressions are small and trivial. Each alone is hardly worth mentioning. It is the daily accumulation that weighs people down. Sue’s research shows how the daily accumulation of these ‘small slights’ weigh on a person.

During that memorial service I responded to this comment about race with what I hope was both compassion and truth. I waited until the open remembrance time was complete and I closed it saying something like this, “One of the people sharing offered the compliment that this man was a credit to his race. I am sometimes not exactly sure what that means, but I will take it a step more to suggest he was a credit to humanity.”

I hemmed and hawed about saying anything during the service. My goal was not to chastise the speaker because what he offered was offered as a sign of respect and with the intent to honor. But neither could I just let it go. I wanted a balance and I am not sure that I got it or that it was even possible; which brings me to another point well worth mentioning.

We don’t need to speak perfectly. I know – this whole sermon so far has been all about how we must be careful with our words. I will shift that slightly and say: we can be more aware of our words. But part of being in a diverse and dynamic community is that we will experience it as messy, we will bump into each other, we will say things that have an impact that does not match our intention.

So here is the next big piece to add to the conversation: how to move forward when a person of good will, a friend, says something that sounds like a microaggression.  There is a fabulous video from 5 or 6 years ago by Jay Smooth  called “How to tell someone they sound racist.” The basic premise is to avoid the ‘what they are’ conversation and focus on the ‘what they said or did’ conversation. If you say to someone “You are a racist,” then the conversation gets warped into an argument about the motives and intention of that person. But if you say instead, “What you just said sounds racist,” then the conversation says in the realm of the event in question and the impact of the action.

I have had this kind of conversation with people. I’ve been on both sides of this conversation at different times – recently. If someone says to me, “Douglas, you are a racist,” I am not open to that conversation because I know I am not a racist. Yes, I participate in this racist society and I benefit from white privilege, but I will contend that that is not the same thing as being a racist. I am aware that some people hold the definition that any white person in American is ipso facto racist. There are religious definitions that say any human being is ipso facto a sinner. I disagree with this ‘depravity-based dogma’ whether it is religious dogma or social dogma. I agree with Jay Smooth on this – avoid the ‘what you are’ conversation in favor of the ‘what you said or did’ conversation.

When someone says to me, “Douglas, that thing you just said sounded racist,” I am open to listening to that because I care about how I sound – it matters to me that my words be inclusive of the differences in our community and in the Beloved Community we are striving to build.

I’m not looking at the skinheads and neo-Nazis as the great hindrance in our work to build the Beloved Community, to face racism in our society, to deal with differences with dignity. The hindrance is all too often the simple, thoughtless things you and I say to each other across our differences.

And consider: if these small microaggressions can wear people down, the opposite of that is likely true as well: micro-blessings that can build us up. Let us commit to building up the world we long to have, let us offer little actions, small kindnesses borne of simple awareness for each other. But mostly let us not remain silent in the face of even these small microaggressions, these little slights that are not in line with how we long to be with each other. Dr. King said, “In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.” Let us learn to speak up with compassion.

In a world without end
May it be so.

Fear Not!
Rev. Douglas Taylor
December 15, 2013

“And a light shines out in the darkness, and the darkness shall not overcome it.” (John 1:5) No amount of darkness have ever yet extinguished a single light (a paraphrase of St. Francis of Assisi.) Every year on Christmas Eve I read the passage from the gospel of Luke that describes the birth of Jesus with the angels and the shepherds and song of peace on earth, good will to all. My favorite line, a line that always stands out in my mind causing me to reflect, is when the angels tell the shepherds to not be afraid.

In that region there were shepherds living in the fields, keeping watch over their flock by night. Then an angel of the Lord stood before them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid.” -Luke 2:8-10 (NRSV)

In the King James Version the angel says “Fear Not!” So blunt, so succinct. Fear Not! Fear is one of those strong basic emotions we all feel, it catches us at times and throws us off center. I am not at my best when I am caught up by fear. It is almost a meditative balm to hear those words each winter: Fear not! At this cold and dark time of the year when the world and my spirit turn introspective, the worm of fear is more present – at least it is for me. What are you afraid of?

I remember a ‘getting to know you exercise around this point from years back. It was my first September in this congregation, back in 2003. The Board of Trustees held a retreat, a ‘deep chair meeting’ it was called. As the opening activity we broke into triads to talk together about the question: “Do you live your life based more out of faith or out of fear?” It is possible I am misremembering the question because it seems like an obviously loaded question with only one correct answer: faith, not fear, is how I live.

But notice the irony of my situation. I was new to the community and here I was meeting with the leaders of the congregation for the first time as the minister. What fears might have an effect on my life? How about: the fear of the Board leadership seeing me as fearful. I don’t remember what I said during that exercise over ten years ago. I suspect I claimed faith over fear. But I also suspect I took the risk to wade into an exploration of where fear lived in me as well. What are you afraid of?

In that nativity scene, the fearful response of the shepherds is understandable and reasonable. The story says angels appeared suddenly, God’s full glory was shining all around. The shepherds were afraid. Who wouldn’t be? Fear and being afraid comes up often enough in the Bible, it is not just this regular nativity passage. Much of the time the Bible refers to fear as one of our strong emotions as human beings along with love or jealousy, grief or anger. Sometimes people are afraid.

Another major use of the word in scripture is linked to the fear of God, an odd use in my experience of life and faith. But it is there, many times! The faithful are exhorted to fear God. The more complex interpretations of those passages talk about the fear as being linked to awe. And this is a fascinating experience to explore but I’ll save it for another day.

More often, in scripture, the word fear comes up in a third way, not as the simple observation fear as part of the normal range of human emotion, and not as a complex response to the raw experience of God. The passages most people focus on are this third type of scripture passages that say ‘do not be afraid, God is with you.’ “Fear not” is considered by some to be the number one command spoken in the Bible in part because it comes up so often.

In Genesis God says to Abraham, “Fear not, Abram, I am your shield.” (Gen 15:1) To Isaac he says “I am the God of Abraham your father. Fear not, for I am with you.” (Gen 26:24) And he says much the same to Jacob a few chapters later (Gen 28:15), and again to Moses (Ex 33:14). All the major prophets hear this exhortation in one form or another (Isaiah 41:14, Jeremiah 1:8, and for Elijah in 2 Kings 1:15.) And many of us are familiar with David’s statement along these lines in the 23rd Psalm, “Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me.” And there is the iconic Christian image of Jesus calming the storm. (Mat 8:26) Jesus is asleep in the boat with the disciples when a storm rises; the disciples wake him and he says, “Why are you afraid, you of little faith?”

That last one is a bit of a spin on the usual formula. “Fear not, I am with you,” turns into “Fear not, have faith.” Fear is often contrasted with faith. People say the opposite of faith is not disbelief but fear. Do not be afraid, only have faith. The piece in all this scripture that leaves me unsettled is the way fear can be seen exclusively as a religious response to life, or more pointedly – as an unreligious response.

Yet fear is a natural and common experience in our lives. Anyone with a basic range of emotions will experience fear. The concept found in these various scripture passages that fear is something that can be faced with the strength and aid of God is a great concept. The layer of interpretation implying that fear is a faithless response, that fear is proof of a lack of faith, that if only you had more faith you would not be afraid – that is going too far and does not fit my experience of life.

We all experience fear. What are you afraid of? My critique of the dominant scriptural perspective is that is seems to say ‘don’t have fear.’ To exhort: “Fear not!” is to say, ‘get rid of that fear, have none of it.’ My experience is that we all have fear and the better message would be ‘overcome fear.’

One of these most well known quotes on the topic of fear is from Franklin Delano Roosevelt, “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself!” And many remember and take strength in the equally famous quote from his spouse Eleanor Roosevelt. It is less pithy but more helpful:

You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, “I have lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along.” You must do the thing you think you cannot do.

Our own Ralph Waldo Emerson has written something similar: “He has not learned the lesson of life who does not every day surmount a fear.”

In the epic fantasy saga, “Song of Ice and Fire” by George R.R. Martin, the one that has been turned into the TV show “Game of Thrones,” there is a character named Arya Stark who learns the mantra “Fear cuts deeper than swords” from her ‘dance’ instructor.

In the epic science fiction saga Dune by Frank Herbert, the Bene Gesserit use the Litany Against Fear. There is a prominent scene early in the first book when Paul Atreides uses the litany.

I must not fear.
Fear is the mind-killer.
Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration.
I will face my fear.
I will permit it to pass over me and through me.
And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path.
Where the fear has gone there will be nothing.
Only I will remain.

All of these examples from contemporary literature say that fear is a reality we all face. These perspectives help deepen what scripture offers about fear. The true goal is not to achieve a state of fearlessness, to have no fear. The goal is to overcome the fear, to be in control of the fear rather than allow the fear to be in control of you.

Being afraid is not a choice, what we do with it is. There is a biochemical experience that our bodies have for fear. The main component in this is the amygdale, a highly connected neuron bundle in our brains.

The amygdale also connects to parts of the brain responsible for physical activity (the autonomic system). Thus when we experience what we think is a threat, several things occur. The first thing that happens is our attention is drawn to the object; we become hyper-focused on what we believe to be a threat. In tat moment of focusing, we briefly freeze as our blood flow increases, our heart pounds, and our body tenses. We become pale as a ghost in these moments as the blood drains from our faces and into our muscles, readying them for a defensive movement.
We might feel our mouths turn dry as our digestive system shuts down to conserve energy. Furthermore, a rush of hormones enters our bloodstream, heightening our sensitivity to the world around us. All of this happens in milliseconds as the brain searches our memories in order to recognize the object or experience before us. (Redeeming Fear by Jason Whitehead, p46)

But while there are automatic reactions that happen, we can still choose to respond differently. For example, I am afraid of bugs. I do not like them but have developed a measured response over the years. I can walk around outside just fine with all manner of bugs around me. The second I sense one on me I sort of freak out. I can see a bug crawling around uninvited in my house and most of the time I do not immediately squash them. I am training myself to help them out of the house. I have grown quite deft at the cup-and-paper-scoop.

There was one morning maybe two or three years back, I came downstairs to see a huge spider near the front door. We occasionally have wolf spiders in the basement that can be quite large. This one was about 3 or 4 inches across. This spider lived through those next few moments mostly because I had not yet had any coffee. I can attest to the hyper-focus amygdale response. I stared at that huge spider as I inched past it, never letting it out of my sight.

I know spiders are technically not bugs, they eat bugs. I am grateful for spiders, I really am. But that thing was big. I did not kill it. But neither did I have the wherewithal to get close enough to help it back outside. So I called my son Keenan to take care of it. He’s a good boy.

What are you afraid of? Public speaking, car accidents, enclosed spaces, dogs? Fear is natural and common. The iconic adventure movie from the 80’s Indiana Jones was made that much better when we knew the title character was afraid of snakes. It made the character more human.

But it seems to me there must be another level of fear in this conversation. The bible passages that speak of knowing God is our strength and aid are surely referring to something deeper than a fear of snakes. The immediate, emotional reaction to circumstances is one form of fear. But when we are asked “Do you live your life based more out of faith or out of fear?” we are not considering my reaction to bugs. There is a big-picture, long-term attitude of fear we are capable of as well.

Wendell Berry says,

When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,

Do you do that? Do you wake at night worrying, fearful of the trouble in the world? I do. I wake at night concerned for ‘what my life and my children’s lives may be.’ I worry some nights about the world my children are growing up in. It is not exactly a fear for my children’s safety or personal welfare. It is more a fear about the world and what’s gone wrong. Dealing with greed and injustice, heartbreak and cruelty is hard enough for me personally. Helping my children learn to deal with it too is that much harder.

And as an outgrowth of that, my concern grows beyond myself and my children to include all people around me that I care about. I want to make the world a better place for everyone I care about, and I also want to strengthen everyone I care about to be better able to get through the hard times.

What am I afraid of? Yes I’m afraid of bugs, but that’s not something that rules my life or constricts my capacity to live freely and fully. I’ll tell you the fear that occasionally creeps into my heart. I am afraid that all my efforts to preach inspiring sermons and create helpful programs and foster a warm and healing community of faith will be irrelevant and meaninglessness in the face of ongoing environmental degradation, societal bigotry, global terrorism, and just the basic apathy of our times. In naming this fear I see its companion of faith that what we are doing does make a difference. These fears live in me but they do not control me. I have a counter-faith that holds these fears.

What are you afraid of? And does it drive your life? Or can you face it and overcome it? Can you see the companion of faith that resides alongside it? Naming your fears and owning them is a big piece of overcoming them. How can you face it if you can’t name it? Then as Eleanor Roosevelt suggest, “Stop and look fear in the face.” As the Bene Gesserit litany offers: you can permit it to pass over you and through you but not hold you. In other words, simply facing it is most of the work of overcoming it. The rest is done by faith. Trust that you can get through it, that the fear will not determine your living.

And perhaps most helpful of all, at least what has proven most helpful for me, is to recognize fear as natural and normal and in its own way even helpful. Like the ebb and flow Meg Barnhouse wrote about in the reading we used this morning (A Time for Darkness.) “Maybe the ebb and flow of Spirit is a rhythm that is good to feel. Maybe in our growing into wholeness there is a time to feel dusty and dry, “Hard as iron” like the winter ground, and stony as winter water.”

Maybe fear is one part of the ebb and flow of life, and part of faith is trusting that the fear is not the whole picture. As poet Sarah Williams says in the last lines of her poem “The Old Astronomer,”

Though my soul may set in darkness, it will rise in perfect light.
I have loved the stars too fondly to be fearful of the night.

If you have been in the darkness so long – acknowledge your fears, shine your light upon them, don’t let them linger unnamed and free. Face them and let them pass through you. They won’t disappear or vanish, but they will fade and they will lose their power. Even the fear can be transformed into a messenger in the service of hope and Spirit, in the ebb and flow of life.  And a light shines out in the darkness, and the darkness shall not overcome it. No amount of darkness has ever yet extinguished a single light.

In a world without end
May it be so.

Miserable Theology or Théologie Misérable
Rev. Douglas Taylor
December 10, 2013

I Synopsis of our story

The book, Les Misérables is a French historical novel by Victor Hugo. Published in 1862, it is considered one of the greatest novels of the 19th century. It is also considered one of the longest ever written; the novel is lovingly known by fans as “the brick.”

The book and the subsequent musical and film adaptations are known by the original French title. The title is not exactly a misnomer; it’s more that the phrase “les misérables” is not easily rendered into English. It could be The Miserable, The Wretched, The Poor, The Dispossessed, even The Outsiders: these are all suitable translation candidates, but in a way we need to include all of these concepts to get at the French concept contained in the title Les Misérables. All of the major characters, in one way or another, are outsiders, poor, miserable.

The story was turned into an award-winning musical. It premiered in 1985 in London and on Broadway in 1987. It is in the top five all time longest running Broadway shows, coming in fourth after Chicago and Cats and the other famous Victor Hugo story, Phantom of the Opera. SRO, a local community theater company will be performing this show during the last three weekends in January. I strongly encourage you to go.

Here is a quick synopsis of the major plotlines of the story. The story tracks the life of Jean Valjean, starting the completion of his 19 years of hard labor in prison. Valjean experiences hardship as an ex-convict, but by an act of compassion on the part of a bishop Valjean has an opportunity to start a new life.

Fast forward 8 years and Valjean is living under an assumed name in a small town where he has become a wealthy factory owner and the mayor of the town. We meet Fantine. She is a worker in one of Valjean’s factories. Fantine has an illegitimate child, Cosette, who lives in another town with an innkeeper. Fantine send all the money she can to the innkeeper to care for the child. Fantine’s circumstances go from difficult to worse when she losses her job at the factory and falls ill. The mayor, Jean Valjean, gets involved and does what he can to care for Fantine as she dies. Valjean promises her he will take care of her daughter Cosette as his own child. The iconic picture of the young waif that is all over Les Miz material is a drawing of young Cosette.

When Valjean reaches the child Cossette, we meet the innkeeper and his wife, the Thénardiers. They are a duplicitous couple who are treating Cosette as a servant while extorting money from Fantine. Valjean pays off the Thénardiers and he flees to Paris with Cosette to start a new life again.

Fast forward 9 years and Paris is in upheaval as young people ferment a rebellion against the French government. Cosette, now a young woman, falls in love with one of the young men involved in the uprising. She and Marius have only a few days together before rioting starts and the young people build barricades in the streets.

Meanwhile Valjean is ready to pull up roots and flee with Cosette again. You see all this while the police officer Javert, who had known Valjean from his time in prison, has been chasing Valjean to bring him in for breaking parole. The Thénardiers are after him too because they are greedy and angry after losing Cosette. And because this is not complicated enough, we add a love triangle for Cosette and Marius in the figure of Eponine, who is the daughter of the Thénardiers!

It all comes to a head at the June Rebellion. Valjean, rather than fleeing as he had planned, joins the uprising after he learns the Cosette is in love with one of the young men involved. Valjean has another confrontation with the policeman Javert, and he also manages to rescue Marius.

The story lifts up themes of redemption and forgiveness, with some strong subthemes of justice and grace. We could do a year of Sundays exploring the lessons of social justice and moral theology in Les Misérables. But we shall endeavor to confine ourselves to one hour today.

The story opens with Javert, the police officer, releasing Valjean on parole after serving nearly 20 years in prison with hard labor.

Prologue, parole song

This scenario is an oft-used literary example of the moral dilemma about the ends justifying the means, commonly called the Heinz Dilemma. Is it morally right for a man to steal an expensive drug that he can’t afford but that will save the life of his dying wife? Are there circumstances under which stealing or other crimes are morally justifiable? Are there absolutes worth defending? Where is the line when considering relative morality? Does society share in the culpability of the crime? This line of questioning is a standard use of Les Misérables for an ethics class.

In Les Misérables, Valjean experiences great difficulty after leaving prison. The 19 years of hard labor was perhaps not the worst part. Valjean is plagued by the ex-con label. He can’t get decent work, he is kicked out of inns, nobody trusts him, and he has to report in to every police station regularly. His whole life is defined by being a convict. We who watch this story know it is unfair, unjust. Valjean is understandably bitter and resentful.

The turning point for him – and this all happens still in the prologue of the show – is when a bishop shows him kindness, takes him in and feeds him. Valjean accepts the hospitality but later at night steals as much of the church silver as he can find and runs. He is picked up by police and taken back to the bishop. And here is the twist. The bishop lies to the police and tells them that the silver was a gift he had given to the ex-con. This is what the bishop then says to Valjean after the policemen have left.

Prologue, Valjean forgiven
Prologue, What have I done

II Reflection on Redemption and Transformation

Is there another way to go? This moment in the story is not the climax, it is the starting point. Les Misérables is not a story leading up to that epiphany moment for the character. It starts there for Valjean and then shows the progress forward from that moment. Towards the end of the novel, Hugo explains the work’s overarching structure:

The book … from one end to the other, in its entirety and details … is a progress from evil to good, from injustice to justice, from falsehood to truth, from night to day, …from hell to heaven, from nothingness to God.

For Valjean it begins when he sees there is another way to go. We all have the capacity to change. The theological argument of this story is that human beings are capable of rising up out of whatever wretchedness in which they may find themselves. And for Victor Hugo the theology was deeply entwined with the critique of dehumanizing aspects of society. It was the law of society that stripped Valjean of his dignity and sense of worth. It was an individual who saw through the labels and the pain to the human soul still struggling within. The bishop did not say to Valjean: ‘yes this is all their fault, look what they have done to you.’ He said, ‘you can change – you can become an honest man.’ We Unitarian Universalists can be too quick to look for the light, seeing guilty feelings as a problem rather than sinful or hurtful behaviors as the problem. The bishop acknowledges Valjean’s sins and crimes, and then opens up a way for Valjean to change.

But, the bishop did not simply offer Valjean mercy and forgiveness. He also offered him the means by which he could make a new life for himself, to redeem himself, to remake himself into the noble and honorable person he had been. In the New Testament there are two versions of the Beatitudes. Matthew (5:3) says “Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. But Luke (6:20) says more simply “Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God.” There is a spiritual component for Valjean, he was poor in spirit. But the bishop knew it was not enough to forgive him and say ‘go sin no more.’ He also gave Valjean resources so that he could change.

Hugo’s theology of human nature mirrors mine: we all have an inherently good nature that can be soil, broken, shattered, damaged, and ignored. But it can never be utterly destroyed. Every human has the capacity to rise up and be transformed. Hugo’s sense of ethics also parallels my own: people are more important than rules; corruption and greed are realities we must navigate with compassionate action on our part.

Valjean had nearly lost his soul, his sense of worthiness as a person. Later in the story – when he has moved on to the small town and become the mayor and a successful factory owner – he faces a test. He learns that the courts believe they have captured Jean Valjean. The real Valjean has a choice to make now that he has an active conscience again; it is a difficult and bitter choice.

Who Am I

III Reflection on Justice and Grace

Valjean is a man of high principles, a deeply moral and thoughtful man who is committed to living his life with integrity. The same could be said, word for word, for Valjean’s nemesis Javert: high principles, deeply moral, thoughtful, committed to living with integrity.

Many people say the major theme of Les Misérables is the question of grace vs. justice. This is not entirely accurate. I think the nuance I am poking at is about grace. I think the greater theme is closer to the question of redemptive or restorative justice vs. retributive justice. Valjean’s experiences at the hands of the law are about retribution for his actions, not restoration. He does, as I said earlier, receive redemption, but not through the law. Valjean’s counter point in the story for this theme is the policeman Javert. Near the end of the story Valjean says to Javert “You have done your duty, nothing more.” There is likely a double meaning intended. Valjean is not holding a grudge; he understands it was Javert’s duty to pursue him. The other meaning is an accusation: you did nothing beyond the letter of the law.

It is mistake to assume Javert is the villain in this story. Javert is just as much one of Les Misérables as all the others. And at heart, he is a man committed to the principle of justice. Javert has many commendable qualities. He is tenacious, principled, loyal, and courageous. Unfortunately he is also stuck in an absolutist sense of right and wrong. He believes the law of France is aligned with the law of God. He believes a tiger can not change its stripes, that change is not possible, that the only solution to disorder is swift reordering. He believes this not because he is cruel or spiteful. He believes this because he wants to create a better world where good and honest people can thrive.

Stars
On My Own

IV Reflection on Love

Many people love this song and love the character Eponine. It seems everyone loves Eponine except Marius! In the grand themes of this story, Eponine’s misery of unrequited love seems small by comparison to Fantine’s life and death, Valjean’s efforts to live with integrity and compassion, and Javert’s inability to come to terms with the moral world of Valjean. But when Eponine’s song is seen not as the pining puppy love of a teenager, but as the deep lonely cry of her whole life, it makes greater sense in the broad themes of the story. Eponine is one of the truly noble characters in Hugo’s story.

The arc of the story is from injustice to justice, from wretchedness to wholeness, from hell to heaven, from abandonment to love. The questions the characters ask over and over are “What shall I do with my life?” “Who am I?” “Is there another way to go?” Victor Hugo’s story circles around again and again to a theology and an ethic of love. Even if you are among the wretched, Les Misérables, and our society does not value you or even see you, still you can rise above that, still God’s love can give you strength. And when you are caught in a dilemma, love can lead you through. Both theologically and sociologically, the solution for much of what is wrong in the world can be transformed by love.

In the preface of the book, Hugo wrote this about the purpose of his story Les Misérables:

So long as there shall exist, by reason of law and custom, a social condemnation, which, in the face of civilization, artificially creates hells on earth, and complicates a destiny that is divine with human fatality; … in other words, …so long as ignorance and misery remain on earth, books like this cannot be useless.

Society and civilization are not going to lift humanity up, indeed too often they do the opposite. But one individual who cares can make a difference. The closing theological statement of the story is sung on the deathbed of Jean Valjean: “To love another person is to see the face of God.”

Our final song is Jean Valjean’s famous aria “Bring Him Home” is sung after Valjean learns his daughter’s beloved has gone to fight on the barricades. Valjean goes to protect him and hopefully to see him through alive.

Bring Him Home

— end —