Scripture: Matthew 22:15-22
I hope what I have to say this morning will not seem inappropriate. For better or worse, it is what I have to say, and I decided not to censor myself and try to talk about something else that my head or my heart wasn’t really in. So for better or worse…
You will need to ignore the scripture and sermon title printed in your bulletin. I was mulling over what teaching of Jesus I wanted to deal with next and I was beginning to settle on what he said about family, about hating father and mother, wife and children, sister and brother, but at the time I wasn’t completely sure I wanted to do that, maybe wondering whether I was going to be up to that particular challenge this week, having a little bit of a hard time concentrating frankly, finally realizing that the main reason I was having trouble concentrating was that it was Monday, which not only meant it wasn’t time to be concentrating yet, but also this week it being Monday meant, of course, that it was the eve of election day. No wonder I was having trouble concentrating on preaching topics. As the saying goes…Duh…At which point I also realized that I probably wouldn’t be able to give a sermon this week without reference to what was about to happen, or by the time I was preaching what would have just happened this past Tuesday.
The election came and went and the end of the week arrived, and I still felt that way, that I could not say nothing about the election. Normally, of course, I would not; I would not not say nothing about the election. OK, the triple negative is a bit much. Normally, I would not talk about elections during sermon time. The church is not the place for political commentary about elections, about politics in the broadest sense, yes, but not about elections. Besides we’ve all heard plenty of that already. For lots of reasons, post-election commentary doesn’t seem appropriate in church, and normally I would not be tempted in that direction. But now is not normally, and this election is not a normal election. So although I will try to avoid excessive partisanship in my comments, it will probably be obvious in the course of what I do want to say, who I voted for. At this point, it can’t be interpreted as political campaigning, and most of you pretty much know who I would have voted for anyway. In any case, I do have some comments today in the aftermath of the election from what I hope will be and what I intend to be a faith perspective.
As a Christian, and particularly as the kind of Christian we are trying to be here at Sojourners, racial justice matters. In terms of racial justice, in terms of moving this country a significant step closer to where we want to be in terms of racial justice, this election mattered. It was not all about race. The candidate himself, I think, tried to make that clear. Barack Obama did not ask anyone to vote for him because he was black. Those who voted for him did not do so because he was black. Overwhelmingly, I believe, they voted for him because they thought he would be a good president. As far as being a good president goes, only time will tell. But now that the election is over, and before we know very much of anything at all about what kind of a president Barack Obama will in fact be, it is also clear that the fact that this man who was elected because people believed he would make a good president, the fact that this man also happens to be African American is not a matter of small interest or little importance. I know I am only stating the obvious here, but I have to state it anyway.
I can appreciate and feel in my heart something of what it must mean to millions of African Americans, personally, psychologically, symbolically, culturally, at so many different levels, some of which can’t be easily put into words, what it must mean that an African American person has been elected by the people of the United States to be their president and that an African American family will soon be calling the White House home. I can appreciate that enough that I also realize that I can only begin to appreciate it, only begin to fathom the importance of what has already happened for so many black Americans from 106 year-olds to new-borns and their parents.
I should have more first-hand knowledge, I suppose, of what the election of an African American president means for white Americans, since I am one of those. And I can testify that for me personally the election of Barack Obama touches me in ways deeper than what I am ready to put into words. Again it is not a matter of party politics I’m referring to, and as far as policies and governing goes, we shall see. But the fact that an African American has been elected president because a substantial majority of us believed he would do the better job means more than I can easily say to me as an individual and as a white American.
As to what it may mean to other white Americans, at this point I think I can only begin to fathom that as well. Race affects us in so many ways at so many levels of our lives, conscious and unconscious, acknowledged and unacknowledged, it’s impossible to say very much at this point as to how it will all play out and what it will come to mean to white Americans. But there are some things we can say. Again to state the obvious, the presidents of the United States have been up until now relentlessly white and relentlessly male. At least in one way, that relentlessness has been broken, and I think it is a signal that that relentlessness will not prevail in either way in the future. That is a good thing for all of us, not just African Americans.
Also, in an “out there” sort of way, the way we tell our history changed almost immediately. Barack Obama’s projected election on election night was the occasion for some commentators I heard to mention that a century ago, when Theodore Roosevelt invited Booker T. Washington to the White House as a guest, Booker T. Washington being a very respectable and safe black leader, but when he was invited to the White House, Roosevelt endured a torrent of criticism. And just a few years later, the commentator reminded us, Woodrow Wilson, thought of by many then and now as a progressive president, ordered that African Americans not be hired to any positions of responsibility in the government and that federal government facilities, such as bathrooms and cafeterias were to be strictly segregated. And his successor Warren G. Harding invited leaders of the Ku Klux Klan to the White House where a Klan ceremony was then held. Once upon a time such information had the status more of dirty little secrets. Few people knew about such things; fewer still mentioned it in public. We, we white Americans I mean, just pretended it hadn’t happened or that it somehow doesn’t matter that it happened. Whether one voted for him or not, agreed with his ideas or not, the election of Barack Obama has already made us more honest and more open regarding our history, and it is a good thing for all of us.
From a faith perspective and in a faith community where racial justice matters, I cannot help but lift up today the election of Barack Obama with thanksgiving, knowing I may be misunderstood as celebrating a victory of Democrat over Republican, but not meaning to speak in that spirit but rather simply in the spirit of recognizing that this election is of significance, in some ways of deep significance, in the long journey we are on toward a more racially just society.
I know that the question asked of Jesus in the scripture we heard earlier was actually about paying taxes, whether Jesus’ followers were obliged to pay taxes, and maybe because of that Jesus’ answer that we are to render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s and to God the things that are God’s, often is made to sound, in the way it’s interpreted, to sound as though there are some things we just have to do, that there is a kind of grudging or necessary obedience we owe to the state, symbolized by paying taxes, but the more important matter is the kind of offering we make to God, monetary or otherwise.
I have a bit of a different spin on this today. I’m thinking that all the time and effort and money that has gone into this election, all the hoping and dreaming and praying that has gone into this election is a way of rendering unto Caesar. Rendering to Caesar is not necessarily a sort of necessary but unpleasant duty. And all that people have put in to this election, not only the presidential election, but that’s what I’m focusing on this morning, all that people have put into the election is a way of rendering to Caesar in an upbeat and positive way. And all that I have said this morning in the way of being gratified and grateful regarding the election is also a way of rendering to Caesar. And it is not that it has nothing to do with God. It is not God-less, this rendering to Caesar. It is to recognize that the political process deserves its due from us, not in a grudging way but in a hopeful way, and we invest some significant portion of ourselves in that process. What happens there does matter.
But it is not the whole picture, and from a faith perspective our hopes, our prayers, our allegiances cannot be all wrapped up in any political process. That, of course, is where rendering to God comes in. We may legitimately invest some significant portion of ourselves in the political process, but there is an even greater portion of ourselves that ought not to be tied in to the electoral process, whoever ends up being elected.
I was reminded of this in a certain way on Wednesday of this week, less than 24 hours after Barack Obama had been declared the president elect and when many people were basking in an afterglow from the previous evening. An email came into the computer here at church from Mike Schuenemeyer, who works for the UCC national offices in the area of ONA concerns and issues affecting the gay and lesbian community. He was not celebrating. The passing of the various propositions and state constitutional amendments further restricting the rights of the lgbt community, especially proposition 8 in California denying same sex couples the right to marry and the initiative in Arkansas that prohibited same sex couples from adopting children, these things had clearly left him in anything but a celebratory mood. The pain in his written words was palpable. And it was in sharp contrast, to be honest, to what I had been feeling before I clicked on his email. It brought me up short, perhaps I should say brought me to my senses. The work that needs to be done, just about all of it, the work that needs to be done, the prayers that need to be said, the dreams that need to be fleshed out, the hopes that still need to be fulfilled and are still a long way from being fulfilled—all of that is still there. Very much still there. The electoral process is worth investing ourselves in and can bring dramatic steps forward. At the same time, perhaps paradoxically, it moves us only a little along the road toward justice, from a certain perspective a very little. The electoral process cannot bear the weight of too much of our dreams. We have to bear that weight and we need the help of God to do so.
After we have done all our rendering unto Caesar, there is still an enormous amount of rendering unto God that still awaits, both in the way of stubborn racial realities that do not change just because Barack Obama has been elected president and in the way of other matters of justice that command our attention and our allegiance. It is, of course, all right to celebrate the election of Barack Obama, as many of us have and will continue to do. But from a Christian perspective, our hope cannot be vested in him. We will need to hold him accountable, especially those who have supported his candidacy and rejoice in his election. More than that, we will need to hold ourselves accountable. From a Christian perspective, the election of Barack Obama is just one more step along the journey, and there is an awful lot of rendering unto God that still awaits us, all of us. The journey continues. Amen.
Jim Bundy
November 9, 2008