Twenty-fifth Sunday after Pentecost - November 10, 2024
Father Vincent Pizzuto, Ph.D.
St. Columba's Episcopal Church
Isaiah 44:24-45:1-5 + Ps. 146 + Revelation 13:1-10 + John 8:2-11
Alternative Readings chosen by the Vicar
Grace to you, and peace, from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. + I speak to you in the Name of the Three-in-One and One-in-Three. Amen!
In place of a sermon this morning, I was tempted to just read the Apocalypse from beginning to end. But I am instead going to speak to you from my heart, at a time when I know that many of your hearts are tender as you consider the social, political, and environmental implications of this week’s election. I understand your concerns, and I share them. And so, it is my hope to speak with you not as a representative of any particular party, but as a Christian, who believes that the Church has moral and spiritual responsibility to speak to this critical moment in our national and ecclesial history.
The Gospel can never be collapsed into, or equated with, the platform of any one political party, but must stand as a light, and at times, a corrective to both parties when they fail to live up to the highest demands of a conscience informed by that same Gospel.
I made the rare decision, for only the second time in my life, to deviate from the Lectionary readings prescribed for today because I believe each of these passages expose something important that we need to examine if we are to appreciate the critical shift we are undergoing as a nation and to consider ways of responding that are better informed, less adversarial, and ultimately more hopeful.
This past Tuesday, while our nation overwhelming elected officers who represent the Far Right on the political spectrum, we still remain a country who is divided almost evenly across both parties. To that end, it is incumbent upon us to recognize that Trump’s sweeping victory is, in large part, the result of votes that were not cast for him as much as they were cast against a leftist movement that is increasingly intolerant and out of touch with the vast majority of American citizens.
One thing our country can agree on is that over the past decade we have become bitterly divided; a division that is fueled by growing extremes on both sides of the political spectrum. What is called for in such times is the courageous act of moving toward a more balanced center in which we give our political opponents or ideological enemies a hearing beyond the vitriol and fervor we have whipped up against them. This means calling out the extremes we face on both sides of the aisle, in an attempt to move toward a humanizing center in which we can reclaim some degree of civility, truth and unity. To that end I will risk being unambiguous about my criticisms of extremism in this country regardless of which side of the political aisle it is emerging from.
This past July 21st, I gave a sermon I entitled, Radical Centrism in which I spoke of my deep concern of the dehumanizing effects born of these extremes. In that sermon I cited a book entitled, Jung and the Christian Way, by Christopher Bryant who provides an overview of Carl Jung’s own exploration of the inevitable balancing act that can be seen in the course of history and no less in the human psyche. If it did not make an impression upon you before the election, I suspect it will speak more powerfully now:
“The human soul is moved by opposite needs and instinct, the tensions between which makes for vitality and creativity. But if one of these opposed tendencies is allowed free rein so as to exclude the other, then sooner or later a revulsion sets in to restore the balance and the situation is reversed. For example, people in society want both order and freedom. In a healthy society these two opposed needs are held in creative tension. But if either is pressed too far, by a kind of pendulum swing, it will bring about its opposite. To go all out in removing every restraint on individual freedom will in the end lead to the suppression of freedom under some form of dictatorship. For people will find the anarchy of unlimited freedom, in which everyone does what is right in [their] own eyes, so intolerable that they will be ready to welcome authoritarian government with enthusiasm.” (Christopher Bryant, Jung and the Christian Way, 13).
And here we are. The election of Donald Trump is the inevitable result of a society that is completely out of balance. And which has chosen a president whose sympathies lie with dictatorships over what they perceive as the anarchy of unlimited freedom.
Allow me then to turn to the Gospel story of the woman accused of adultery. And I will pose the issue this way: If we were to canvas Christians across the country with the question, “What makes for an ethical society?” How might progressives and conservatives respond differently? I believe the gospel today provides us with a pertinent insight that Exposes the philosophical underpinning of both sides of the political spectrum. First, I will summarize the passage. (Here I present a summary of the story off script).
Essentially, throughout this narrative Jesus’ actions represents two complimentary philosophical approaches to social ethics that make sense when held in balance, but which have become instead a chasm of bitter divide among the Left and the Right in our country today – most especially among the “Christian” Left and “Christian” Right. It is incumbent upon us to understand this divide if we are to appreciate the political shift that unfolded in this week’s elections and find a way to reconcile the divisions they have come to represent.
So, for example, when asked, “What makes for an ethical society?” the progressive Christian might say, “An ethical society is one that cares for the poor, the outcast, the vulnerable, and the marginalized. It is one in which we, like Jesus in the gospel today, ally with the would-be outsider. It is one in which we work to ensure that community structures and social services are in place to house the homeless, care for the downtrodden, ally with racially marginalized groups, or with women, and the LGBT community, and so on. Why? Because these are the people in our own time and culture Jesus would have and sided with as we see him do repeatedly in the course of his own life and ministry.” Thus, “sin” [for those of us on the left] is understood more in social terms: structures of oppression, injustice, or exploitation in which we are all implicated, environmental destruction which for which we all bear collective responsibility, the sin of racism which extends far beyond personal prejudice to wholesale systems of exclusion of some over others.
Now by contrast, when asked, “What makes for an ethical society?” the conservative Christian might be more prone to say, “An ethical society is one in which individual people act ethically and strive to live virtuous lives. How “virtues and ethics” is defined, however is not as much along collective or social lines but emphasizes instead personal responsibility. Thus, says the conservative, “One cannot have an ethical society, a ‘godly nation’ that encourages, enshrines, or legalizes sinful or unethical behavior.” If such a Christian regards homosexuality as sinful, for example, same gender marriage becomes, for them, the celebration and legalization of a life lived in sin. It is easy to see how this would extend to issues like abortion, gender reassignment, and so on.
As these examples demonstrate, while these two philosophical positions are rarely, if ever, openly acknowledged, they lay at the heart of some of the most divisive national debates that bitterly divide us today. If a well-meaning, god-loving, kind-hearted progressive Christian is convinced that the LGBT community is among the outcast, oppressed, and marginalized of society; that like the adulteress in today’s story would not have been judged by Jesus but rather sought out as among the lost sheep, then standing up for LGBT rights is constitutive to what it means for us to live out our Christian discipleship in the world. Conservative Christians don’t have to like it, they don’t have to agree with it, but they do have to understand it.
By contrast, if a well-meaning, god-fearing, generous-hearted conservative Christian is convinced in her heart that homosexuality is a sin, then a nation whose highest court enshrines same-gender marriage is a nation that has placed itself in diametrical opposition to the radical call of the Gospel. In her conservative world view Jesus’ poignant admonishment to the adulteress, “Sin no more!” rings loud and clear. I don’t have to like it, I don’t have to agree with it, but I do have to understand it.
And if I disparage her simply as a monstrous unenlightened homophobe, I not only dehumanize her, but worse thwart the possibility that over the course not of weeks or months, but possibly over years of providing her with a contrast experience that alone will ever stand the hope of her seeing my own humanity. Of her understanding that I am married to Fernando not merely because I am a flaming liberal who wants to mock God, but because I actually believe in the conservative value of marriage as a stabilizing institution in society.
I believe Jesus in the narrative holds a position that at once allies and supports a person in society who is otherwise disadvantaged by her social context of living in a patriarchal society. But at the same time her victimization does not exonerate her from moral or ethical responsibility. I want us to hold out this balance he maintains as I try identify the political extremes we are dealing with precisely because we have lost sight in our modern society of this balance.
Having taught in higher education for almost a quarter century, I have never before seen such a degree of leftist totalitarianism take such a strangle-hold on our educational system as it does now. So much so that it has become nearly impossible to engage in genuine academic debate, to the detriment of all our students.
For all of USF’s self-congratulatory patting itself on the back for its celebration and embodiment of diversity we have remained shockingly blind and intolerant to one kind of diversity to which we have remained unrelentingly opposed: Ideological diversity.
There is an egregious double standard that demand our attention here if we are to be faithful to a progressive view of Christianity that we claim to a spouse. The fact is, the Trump voter cannot be reduced to a straw man or a liberal punching bag that we can pretend in our unchecked liberal bubble is motivated by the same convictions and agendas. Is there no room in our academic halls for the expression of ideological diversity? Have we become so divorced from one another in this country as we cannot even have civil debates that would help all of us discover new ways forward that are more comprehensive and less divisive?
The point of the academy has always been that we learn to sharpen our intellectual swords through respectful, if at times vigorous debate, with those who hold differing opinions. In the last decade any capacity for this kind of honest discussion, debate, and intellectual critique in which various and opposing positions are respectfully vetted and argued has been utterly eviscerated by an extreme leftist agenda which has curated a culture of victimhood, in which any possible questions that might offend or God forbid “traumatize” someone is simply out of the question.
In a culture of wokeism, identity politics, cancel culture, any kind of legitimate discussion or debate about any of the thorny issues we now face in society is immediately squashed as hostile and ‘intolerant,’ when in fact those questions were motivated by nothing more than intellectual curiosity. And I can provide anecdote after anecdote of how this has played out in ways that are themselves hostile and cruel. At USF there is hardly a colleague I have spoken to – always in low whispers or off-campus lunches where we know we will not be heard – who has not expressed genuine fear of raising legitimate academic questions that at any past time been would have been considered prime material for intellectual debate – but from which we are now all but required to refrain for fear being accused of form of intolerance.
It must likewise be stated unambiguously that over the past decade the Republican party has been by and large completely evacuated of any moral integrity, much less moral authority, and any semblance of reflecting the gospel of Jesus Christ. I am speaking here about the party not the people who belong to it. I am speaking here of republican leadership too cowardly to denounce Donald Trump in public for his despicable lies while at the same time privately admitting to hating him. This, for fear of losing political power from the people they claim to represent. But no less has the Democratic party been fearful of alienating their own extremists voices. And doing so has cost them the election.
Thus, for as long as progressives continue to set up the “Trumper” as a monolithic straw man we do so to our own detriment. The Republican party can walk away from this election now claiming to be the party of the people, having won the popular vote, having made inroads across all kinds of racial, ethnic, and gender divides. And the reasons why people voted for him are as complex as the people themselves. But we should not make the mistake of assuming a vote for Trump is against the values and human rights issues progressive’s hold dear. To the contrary, no farmer, coal miner, or middle-class blue-collar worker trying to feed their kids, has the time or luxury to think about gay rights, transgender rights, or the invention of the “Latinx” community fomenting from our faculty lounges while inflation is forcing them are paying nine dollars for a loaf of bread.
Let me be clear, when you are drowning at sea and someone throws you a life-buoy you don’t give a damned who is holding the other end of that rope. How many of you, if drowning at sea only to realize it was the SS Republican pulling up along-side you and Donald Trump throwing the buoy, wouldn’t grab hold of that buoy with all your might? The question of the last election was would I save Donald Trump if he were drowning. The question after this election is: would I let Donald Trump save me if I were drowning?
The growing economic divide between the rich and poor Is becoming so extreme that those being left to drown in financial debt are taking a buoy from whomever will throw it to them. Other than the fact that I fully expect Trump will continue to try to run our country no different than he would corporation, I have little confidence that his offer of help will ultimately amount to anything significant. But he has certainly given them the impression it will. And the track record of a democratic party who have become so out of touch with the middle class has given them little alternative. Liberal elites indeed.
The counter extreme we are seeing to our systems of higher education that have become little more than liberal soap boxes can be seen in the rise of Christian nationalism. Any Christian leader, priest, pastor, or minister who claims to support Donald Trump, in order to advance the agenda of Christian nationalism all the while knowing full well he has an undeniable history of duplicity, lies, immorality, misogyny, and an unfettered idolization of power, have themselves become so detached from the Gospel of Jesus Christ as to become the very abomination Revelation speaks of today.
Indeed, in a less critical age, one might hear in that passage something that would all too easily be seen as reflective of Trump himself. No doubt many of you identified with that intuitively as we heard that text proclaimed. I included that reading, not because I believe it directly speaks to our current political crisis, much less to Donald Trump, but because it exposes within us as associations that feel all too real.
It Is essential that we do the hard work of discerning between the people who voted for Trump and the leadership of the far right which has created an unholy alliance closer to home than any of us should be comfortable with: Christian nationalists. And I am convinced above all that as Christians it is our bounden duty to call out this alliance as a modern heresy. And evidence of their willful deception is exposed in the recent development of a king Cyrus theology, derived from the very passages we heard from the book of Isaiah this morning. (Here I present a summary of the story off script).
I call you by your name,
I have given you a title, though you do not know me.
I am the LORD, and there is no other;
There is no other god beside me.
I arm you, though you do not know me,
so that it may be known from east to west that there is no one except me.
In this way, the Christian nationalist have twisted themselves into exegetical knots as the only way they can theologically finagle themselves out of the moral conundrum of passing themselves off as Christians while voting for someone whose life and political platform could not be more antithetical to the life and teachings of the gospel. Or frankly, what some in past ages, less informed by reason would have simply called “antichrist.”
This deceptive ploy of the “King Cyrus theology,” admits by its very existence, that Christian nationalist know full well that Trump’s moral stature is radically inconsistent with what should be the moral stature of the leader of any nation much less one that they would want call a “Christian nation.”
How many people have you heard interviewed in the weeks before this election --- citizens of this country saying, “I’m voting for Trump….I’m going to hold my nose while I do it, but I’m voting for Trump!” And now the rest of us will have to smell the stench of it for years to come!
Meanwhile, in their unqualified support of Donald Trump, the leadership of the Republican Party has completely abandoned what had been their own philosophical insistence that an ethical society requires individuals to act ethically. This, with the support of Christian Nationalists (a term that is itself an oxymoron) who have conveniently exonerated Trump of his despicable history of personal immorality while in the same moment exonerating themselves of any personal moral accountability for supporting him.
This is exactly how the King Cyrus theology of the Christian Nationalists works! It allows them to unabashedly betray what had been a main stay in their philosophical principle of individual moral accountability, now brazenly dismissed out of hand. President Trump is just like King Cyrus: Neither knew God, neither is morally upright, but conveniently both are nevertheless unknowingly being used by God for the good of God’s people. For the good of a “Christian nation.” Unadulterated Heresy.
If you want to measure just how far the Republican Party has fallen into disgrace ask yourself this: How is it that the same Party that at one time impeached Bill Clinton for the Monica Lewinsky scandal, has now elevated a political candidate to the highest office in the land whose moral character is as obviously, unquestionably, and egregiously bankrupt as that of Donald Trump.
This is a thinly veiled attempt for the leadership of the far Christian right in an unholy alliance with the upper echelons of the Republican Party to have their Trumpian cake and eat it too.
If this election has taught us anything, it is the value of moving to the humanizing center in which we can both ally with and support those whom society has cast aside while still holding one another moral account accountability.
And if there is a time that we must hold onto what is good and true, in our progressive values, we must simultaneously remember that diversity and inclusion cannot exclude ideological diversity. If this has been our blindspot over the past decade, it is time now for us to remove the log from our own eye that we might see the spec in someone else’s so that our church may become a via media, not only between warring factions in Christianity, but between warring factions in society itself.
Let it be our firm resolve find our way forward by casting stones at our would-be political enemies but by daring to step into the circle of judgment from our own political allies in order to our nation to accountability -- not to one political party or another but to the gospel of Jesus Christ.
+ Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen!