Packing pails of justice and mercy.

"What are you doing, son?" "I'm packing some justice & mercy into a Canadian Tire pail. What does it look like I'm doing?"

 

 

Once upon a time, people would part with the words, “God be with ye.” But just like we now shorten our greeting when we meet from, “I wish you a good morning” to “Mornin!’,” “God be with ye” became “God by ye,” and finally, “Good bye.”

The progression from “God” to “Good” is significant, and for many it may appear to be a backward step theologically. But let’s not get caught in the trap of having the definition of a word overrule our understanding of what GOODNESS (or GODNESS) is, or is meant to be. Words are servants to thought and imagination, not the other way ‘round.

All scriptures, all religions since the beginning of human consciousness (I suspect) have had but two end goals, first, that GOOD shall prevail. That the harmony, the justice, the mercy and the generosity that constitute the everything of human well-being shall rule. And secondarily, that when GOOD falters and life sours, relief and even great reward will follow the end-time of our suffering. Otherwise, where will our hope come from?

Out of our disappointment that GOOD is so hard to achieve and maintain, cultures have invented and personified imaginary forces that undermine the reaching toward GOODNESS: demons and devils whom we can blame when willfulness and greed undermine our GOOD judgment.

We all—religious or not—know what GOOD is made of, I suspect: “He has shown you, O man, what is good; and what does the LORD require of you but to do justly, love mercy and walk humbly with your God?” (Micah 6:8) It’s often in our nit-picking search for the “but” in our scriptures and traditions that we falter on the simple path to GOODNESS, to fulfilling our roles as crusaders for harmony, justice, mercy and generosity.

It’s at troublesome times that the institutions of GOODNESS—the Christian Church being one—ought to rise as models of the peaceable kingdom. Instead, we seem more and more to illustrate its opposite while cloaking our divisiveness, injustice, ruthlessness and greed in a transparent robe of piety. 

An example: “I am justified in withholding expressions and acts of love for those created homosexual, transgendered or however queer, and I have found the Bible verses to support my stance.” Such apostasy has somehow been given license in the Christian Church, replacing unity with division, justice with false witness, gentleness with arbitrary judgment and generosity with self-justification. We have allowed to thrive among us movements that place boundaries around LOVE, love that is the choice—the only choice—able to light the path toward GOOD, toward GOD.

It’s Lenten season, and the theme in many churches will be gratitude for the sacrificial death of Christ that is able to absolve us of temptations to choose the UNGOOD: our rebelliousness, our selfishness, our carelessness about insisting on that which is GOOD. I have to wonder if the formulaic “born to eternal life through the blood of Christ” is an emphasis that needs some tempering. For instance if, as Christians, shady acts committed, righteous acts neglected are stamped by Christ's blood with “OK,” does it follow that continuing to be half-hearted and a bit self-centered in our communal walk is excused—over and over? And if that were true, where would our motivation to be crusaders for GOOD finally come from?

A bit pessimistic, you say? I agree. We have plenty of examples of persons, congregations, denominations that have caught the vision of GOOD and the LOVE that can deliver it. For many of us, much of the time, though, we’re like the man whose car won’t start. Unfortunately, he knows no mechanics and so all he can think to do is to stare at it, say a prayer, maybe, or hope some help will happen by. What we most need is the determination and skills to build upon and around the GOOD crusades we’re already doing, to teach and learn the “mechanics” that make us able to engage confidently in the grand commission.

So, how would we get there from here? Let’s talk.

And here’s a talking starter: justice lives at the core of both Testaments of Christian scripture and all of Jewish and Muslim scripture. A vision of a just GOODNESS might well include this: on a planet of abundant food, no one should come to depend on the crumbs that fall from overfed tables to survive. Why do we as overfed Christians and Jews and Muslims put so little concrete effort into insisting on practices and policies that could restore the hungry to a place of dignity, of fairness, of the wholeness we are lucky to enjoy?