The
Editor’s SpotTwo images for thinking about GA
by Doug King, Communications Coordinator for Presbyterian
Voices for Justice
Sometimes a picture, an image of some kind, helps us think and talk about
difficult subjects. Just recall how many images are used in the Bible to
talk about God and about human life. As we approach our 219th
General Assembly, with all its difficult subjects and matters of contention,
I’d like to suggest two images that might help us in our thinking and our
talking with one another.
First, a pretty simple one: A circle.
“How Large Is Your Circle?” That was the title of a sermon
preached by the Rev. John Shuck on Sunday, May 2, 2010, in First
Presbyterian Church of Elizabethton, Tennessee. I found his use of the image
of a circle a very helpful way of thinking about our coming General
Assembly. [You can read it
on his blog page ]
“How big is your circle?” That, he says, is the crucial
question raised by Jesus’ call to us to love one another: How big a circle
is included within that “love one another”? Is it our family and friends? Or
people who believe or look or act like we do? Or is it “everyone?” That,
obviously, is a step toward the right answer. It’s a tall order, though,
loving everybody.
But here’s another step toward the answer: “How do you
love six billion people, let alone non-human relations? We do this through
politics. We put it in terms of human rights and a just distribution and
access to Earth's gifts.”
So the question that confronts all of us – in the battles
over immigration, and the rights of people who are different from us in one
way or another, and what it means to be people of faith in this wildly
diverse world – is simply “how large is your circle?”
This metaphor of the circle – and the question of how big
we draw it – might be very helpful as we deal with various issues at the
Assembly, but like all metaphors it has its limits. A circle is, after all,
a geometric figure. It is finite, and no matter how big it may be, it is
still closed. And it doesn’t really change. It may grow larger or smaller,
but if we bend it or squash it or open it up, it’s no longer a circle. So we
might look for a different kind of image to help us consider our life as a
people of faith, a church.
And for that I would turn to a very familiar bible image
for the church: the body. The body of Christ, yes – but still the
image is of a body. This image comes not from the neat world of geometry,
but from the organic, messy world of living being.
After all, when Jesus talked about his little community of
friends and followers, he didn’t call them a circle, but his friends, a
family, or even (to borrow a phrase Paul seemed to like) his body. It would
be hard to find an image more organic than “body.” What can this tell us
about being open and inclusive?
First, a body is obviously does have boundaries, and it
cannot be stretched too far. We are bounded by our own skin, for starters,
and the psychic boundaries that keep us wary of getting to close to others,
or letting them get too close to us. But those boundaries are not absolute.
If our boundaries were as closed as a perfect circle, we could not live. Our
bodies must have all kinds of permeability – letting air in and out, food
and water and ... well, you know the details, some of them more interesting
than others. With those permeable boundaries there is risk – germs and
injuries and imperfections of all sorts can ruin our bodies and end our
lives.
A body, then, always has its risks and joys. It is really
an intricate finely tuned network (when it’s healthy) with nerve impulses
and blood and air and food and fluids being “communicated” throughout the
system.
And we’re hearing from people like our Moderator, the Rev.
Bruce Reyes-Chow, that we need to get that network, the body of Christ that
we call the church, functioning in the new ways that are possible today –
with on-line social networking and all the rest. But that will take more
than technology – it will take the will and the wisdom, the courage and the
self-restraint and willingness to listen, that make true communication
possible.
That new kind of networking will also take a willingness
to be who we are, where we are, doing what we can do to embody God’s
love for the world through the stuff we do, day in and day out. Presbyterian
Voices for Justice, in presenting of the Whole Gospel Church award to
Kwanzaa Church, is intentionally lifting up that kind of embodying of the
Gospel, for just such daily acting out of God’s love is clearly what they
are about. But we also do it, as John Shuck reminds us, through politics –
through large-scale actions, policies and programs that reach far beyond our
own embodiment of divine love and justice and peace.
We live in a new culture, as our Vice Moderator the Rev.
Byron Wade has been helping us to see. In a talk in April at the Clearwater
2010 conference, not far north of Minneapolis, he contrasted the now-fading
“modern era,” which is characterized by single truth, central authority and
standardized worship, with the “post-modern era” with its shifting world
views, changing power bases and more expressive forms of worship. “We’re
going from control of chaos to people living with ambiguity,” he said. We
are becoming a community that is “contextually responsive.”
So we invite you all, especially as you may be
participating in our coming Great Presbyterian Family Gathering, to consider
the circle and the body. Let’s ask ourselves and our sister and brother
Presbyterians how widely we can draw the circle of love. Let’s ask how our
body, the body of Christ, can become a network with better circulation, a
stronger heartbeat, more effective activity to build and change the world in
which God has placed us. What can we receive from one another (in the church
and beyond it), and what can we give?
Let’s seek new ways to be present in our world and in our
new cultural environment – acting for justice and peace right where we are
(not just in thoughts and words, but in deeds, done through our bodies).
And let’s seek ways to extend our love beyond the
reach of our own actions, shaping politics and policies that will bring
justice and peace and well-being throughout the whole wide circle of nations
and races and species that are within the beloved circle of God’s creation.
219th
General Assembly