Pride, wk 1
Different contexts mean God will guide us in different ways to celebrate or stand up for queer pride.
SPEAKER NOTES
Pride, wk 1
Intro
Today’s goal: working the question: “how do we celebrate or stand for pride in different contexts that feel really different?“
For example, the context here at BLC, a church with a rainbow flag on our sign out front is going to be different than, perhaps, the context of a holiday dinner with family members… or maybe not, but I know that’s the story for many of us. Either way, I’m sure we can all imagine other contexts we’re in that feel more uncertain on Pride weekend (maybe workplace? maybe neighbors?)
Not all contexts are the same, and so wisdom is required to know how to navigate those different contexts. Wisdom is not just about remembering wise sayings, it’s about recognizing which wise saying applies to which situation.
We know this intuitively. We know that we sometimes have to show up a different way, speak a different way, celebrate a different way, explain things a different way — NOT to moderate our convictions — I’m not talking about hiding or being wishy-washy — but just to communicate effectively and with integrity.
However, our internet and social media-saturated culture can squeeze this sort of intuitive wisdom out of us. The algorithms that dictate so much of our lives favor one liners, that are stated universally, without nuance or exception — this thing that I’m saying in all caps applies all the time to every situation. And then that can become a purity test measuring others, encouraging performance of virtues rather than genuine engagement.
The danger to this, I want to underscore, is that when we let technology dictate that we forsake wisdom in favor of purity tests, we have enough data now to see that the societal results of that is excessive outrage, and the people who are most likely to be negatively impacted by excessive societal outrage are the marginalized — because, by definition, marginalized populations don’t have as many protections as centered populations do.
Big tech companies use pseudo-religious language to express goals of “connection” and “lifting people up”, but until a big tech company proves they will choose protection of a marginalized group over their bottom line, I’m skeptical.
When it comes to pride month, the people most likely to be negatively impacted by letting technology dictate how we engage is people who identify queer.
So, pushing beyond big tech’s squeeze to universalize, our question today is, again, how do we celebrate or stand for pride in different contexts that genuinely feel really different?
This is a question of discernment. And discernment is the realm of spirituality, not technology.
Prayer is what helps discernment — because the need to figure out “what is the wise thing to do?” goes from an overwhelming personal question to a question we are facing alongside a God of love and grace, eager to communicate with us and guide us, through our thoughts, feelings, perceptions, or experiences.
Spectrum of support
To help us discern with God, I thought we’d borrow the idea of the Spectrum of Support — this is from movement building and union work — to help us talk about different contexts we might end up in, and how God might guide us accordingly in each context to celebrate or stand up for queer pride in different ways.
Active Allies
- Scripture: 1 Corinthians 12’s the Body of Christ
- What Hayley brought us to last week — that experience of: “When one member suffers, all suffer together with it; when one member is honored, all members are honored together with it.”
- This is being in the context of active allies. People can speak and operate with a level of ease and trust that won’t be the case in every context.
- That ease and trust are there because there is a feeling of “skin in the game” — not only the good will of charity, but solidarity — when one suffers, all suffer with it.
- And not even as a morality-motivated choice, but more like as a recognition of our already-connectedness.
- I feel the pain of my queer friends and family not merely becasue I’m morally opposed to people being excluded because of their sexual orientation or gender identity, but because, like any relationship, people I live alongside are a part of me and I am a part of them — their pain is my pain.
- This is the kind of experience that is behind Paul’s image of the body of Christ.
- When we feel this, the company of active allies, we hardly need to train ourselves to look for God’s guidance in these contexts because it feels so natural. We should still call this prayer! When we naturally feel drawn to treat with honor and respect the other members of the body we are also a part of — those thoughts, feelings, perceptions, intuitions are infused with the voice of the God of Love!
Passive Allies
- Scripture: Zacchaeus
- The memorable character from chapter 19 of the Gospel according to Luke: who watched Jesus from a tree because he’s seen as a traitor among his fellow 1st Century Jews for being a tax collector for the Roman Empire — but then Jesus notices him, invites himself over for dinner, and Zacchaeus is changed by the whole experience.
- Zacchaeus is caught in the middle between
- his people, fellow oppressed 1st century Jews
- and his employer: the Roman Empire, a cruel taskmaster, but it comes with some benefits of money and status.
- He can be seen as a traitor, yes.
- Or he can be seen as the one Jesus might magnetically pull from “passive” to “active”
- Zacchaeus would totally be purity tested on social media today. And then Jesus would too, because he went to his house for dinner.
- But, thankfully, that’s not the story.
- Because of the wise way Jesus listens to God and discerns his context, Zacchaeus does make the move from passive to active. ("I will give half my possessions to the poor and pay back those I've cheated four times the amount”)
- I think of…
- Honestly, this church earlier in its life, before we left our affiliation with Vineyard Churches so that we could be more explicit and vocal about full queer-inclusion in our community. Thankfully our story was like Zacchaeus; we got down from the tree, and Jesus invited himself over, and we have been changed for the better.
- On the other hand, I also think of all the big Global or American brands that once seemed so courageous elevating a message of queer pride because it was trendy for a bit, but now have retreated behind their worry about the bottom line if they are too loud about it. This is predictable. It will take courage for them to come down from their tree, and accept Jesus inviting himself over, because active support is more risky than passive support.
- In the company of passive allies, we want to look for God to be guiding us in modeling: the risks of getting active are worth it!
- God, how can I model that?
- Not so much: God, how can I convict this person to be more morally in line with me?
- More: God, how can I help you draw this person into solidarity with their queer friends, family, and neighbors? — with whom they are ALREADY a part of the same body, they just don’t see it yet.
Neutral + Passive Opposition
- These two slices of the spectrum, I would guess, capture most of those family members we might have uncomfortable moments with at holidays.
- Scripture: Parable of the Persistent Widow
- We’ve mentioned this one a lot over the last 5 years — because it is SUCH a scripture for our times.
- Also from the Gospel according to Luke — in chapter 18, shortly before the story of Zacchaeus.
- Jesus tells a parable of a widow, someone with little power, who is persistent for years asking for justice for her situation from a town judge, who in this case is explicitly called unjust.
- The widow is not a model of outrage. She is a model of persistence.
- And the end of Jesus’ story is that she gets justice for her situation from the unjust judge, even though the judge never becomes an ally to her situation — he only grants her justice because he’s tired of being bothered.
- At best, this judge can be described as neutral, and, frankly, that’s the best we can do sometimes.
- Passive opponents will likely never become allies, and that’s okay; with persistence, God can often squeeze some justice out of these situations and relationships anyway!
- So we slow down and listen for God to guide us toward persistence
- God, how do I celebrate and stand for queer pride at this dinner I’ll be at with these people who are passive opponents or who are neutral?
- This is often very in the moment, under your breath prayers… and then trusting God to speak in the thoughts, feelings, perceptions, intuitions that then come to you.
- God, what do I say here?
- What about now?
- God, I’m struggling to handle what I just heard; help me cool off.
- Alright I’m cooled off; what do I say now?
Active Opposition
Unavoidably, this is some people we know, or have to interact with if only because they have a platform.
It is rarely a good idea to put any stock in moving someone who is an active opponent.
(Notice there are no arrows on that part of the spectrum.)
Rather, this is where we turn to the Biblical prophets: the non-violent protesters and demonstrators of their day.
Scripture: Amos 5:21-24
21 “I hate, I despise your religious festivals;
your assemblies are a stench to me.
22 Even though you bring me burnt offerings and grain offerings,
I will not accept them.
Though you bring choice fellowship offerings,
I will have no regard for them.
23 Away with the noise of your songs!
I will not listen to the music of your harps.
24 But let justice roll on like a river,
righteousness like a never-failing stream!
- Now we’re getting into outrage territory, right? In the right context, that’s appropriate!
- It’s not that outrage is never called-for; it’s just that technology has a way of making all contexts feel like active opposition. They’re not.
- But when our context really is active opposition, we hear God like Amos did.
- Historically, it is the people of Amos, the Hebrews several hundred years after these words, under brutal Greco-Roman rule, that begin the first-ever large-scale experiments with non-violent resistance.
- Not just pacifism, a refusal to be violent, but a disciplined and compelling resistance based in non-violence to build enough power elsewhere on this spectrum that eventually the cultural tide turns on active opponents, and their injustice becomes untenable.
- The Biblical historian John Dominic Crossan points to John the Baptist and Jesus as two of the earliest and most prominent practitioners of this new philosophy of nonviolent resistance — Jesus’ term for it was “love your enemies”.
- The combination of Amos’ protest and Jesus’ philosophy is how we celebrate and stand up for queer pride in the context of active opposition.
- God, give me courage.
- God, help me remain disciplined and on message and not reactive.
- And this is where I would differentiate between online outrage and prophetic outrage — online outrage is reactive and undisciplined. Prophetic outrage is extremely disciplined and intentional — think of the training civil rights groups in the 1960s would bring their activists through, to be unflinching in their message but to not retaliate when harassed or beaten — that’s a prophetic outrage.
- And that’s what is called for in the context of active opposition.
Prayer
So what contexts were you in this week? Or will you be in this next week? I wonder if the spectrum of support helps you identify different contexts, so you can know a little more clearly how to ask God for discernment and wisdom as to how to celebrate and stand for pride with integrity.
We are not left to our own devices to try to figure this out, and we need not meet any purity tests. We have a loving, communicating God of grace, who wants to guide us, should we attempt to listen. And the connection we can feel when we do is what life runs on.
I’d love to lead us all in some listening right now.