Listen To The Graves of the Saints
"You need to stand and listen to the graves of the saints."
In a Zoom meeting the other day, one of the members present observed that it seems our current world culture really has not learned much from our shared past. Referencing the overt bigotry against the LGBTQIA+ community, the ongoing racial unrest in so many forms, the painful grievous nature of the ongoing warfare in Ukraine, and our shared unwillingness to extend mercy and grace to others that they not be brought low by our stiff-necked system of beliefs within the Church itself, another of the participants, a Veteran of the military and of the cross as a minister, quietly, simply said, "You need to stand and listen to the graves of the saints."
That so struck me, I wrote it down immediately and have been mulling on that wisdom ever since. What does it mean to, ". . . listen to the graves of the saints"?
Then came the most recent of school shootings, this one in a Nashville, Tennessee, Christian elementary school, which claimed the lives of three 9-year old students and and three adults, each around 60 years of age. A Facebook friend of mine simply posted this question, "When will it end?"
". . . listen to the graves of the saints."
Mary, the mother of Jesus, knows something of this kind of pain and heart-wrenching grief, as she watched her Child be beaten, forced to carry His cross to Golgotha, be nailed to it, then jarringly lifted up for everyone to observe as He died. So does God.
Come to think of it, the entire faith community had a lot of experience with such atrocities, long before the arrival of Jesus - so much so, that they thought He would be the One whose birth, life and ministry would save them and stop the pain and heart-wrenching grief. Yet, when He did not become the ruler they wanted, they stripped Him of the mercies He taught and, quite literally, hung Him out to dry, another expression of their disgust with God for not answering their prayers the way they wanted. "When will it end?" ". . . listen to the graves of the saints." It will end when humanity chooses Mercy over power, Grace over authority, Redemptive Love over manipulation, Healing over wounding, and Hope over despair.
Until then, despite every law which might be designed, written and passed to manage access to weapons, children will die, even as the Child died. You think that is not so? ". . . listen to the graves of the saints."
In a culture which deeply values having an advantage over others, spending trillions on weapons of mass destruction to hold those at bay whom we regard as enemy, whether historically accurate or imagined possibility, how is it those same people can wonder why it is children grow up believing that pain, however inflicted, produces gain? That some find relief in holding people hostage or shooting them in their innocence as an acceptable cost of getting your way? That others are surprised when the distinctive boundaries of warfare, once considered to be battlefields, becomes blurred by the willingness of national leaders to pursue civilian population centers as a method of forcing capitulation and resignation?
"When will it end?" ". . . listen to the graves of the saints."
God so loves the world that God does not condemn the world, but chooses to empty the graves of the saints by the Spirit. Choosing Mercy over power, Grace over authority, Redemptive Love over manipulation, Healing over wounding, and Hope over despair requires of us a committed, tenacious, persistent and consistent willingness to walk the Way in faith, expecting of others no less and no more than we are committed to living in our own lives.
Pass all the laws you want, but if the collective narrative of the culture continues to honor the national accumulation of weapons of mass destruction, no local law will be able to compete with the example which is galvanized at the highest levels.
Pass all the laws you want, but if the leadership of this and every nation continues to rattle their sabers and test their missiles in a not so subtle attempt to force an acceptance of superiority, no law will overcome the enculturation of oppressive tactics.
Pass all the laws you want, but if the ordinary, everyday citizen on the street or in the fields does not rise up in solidarity with others like them around the world, striving for Peace, Justice and Equity as the norm for daily life, above submission to the dominant culture . . . then Jesus will be crucified, children will die and our earthly home will become little more than decay and coffins, with parents and communities weeping, asking for better - even as they reap what they sow.
"When will it end?" ". . . . listen to the graves of the saints."
There are no easy answers, no magic bean to be planted, no magician's surprise to save us. There is only our willingness to commit to the Cause of Life, however it is we come to that.
For me, it is to listen to the empty tomb of Jesus, to hear the hollowness of this world's warfare even as I bow down to the Victory of God over this world's sense of inevitability and self-centeredness. God sent Jesus that we might learn to navigate through the blood on the ground and the sounds of grief in the air. God sent Jesus that we would come to choose and witness to the Holy in the midst of the profane, inviting us to take His hand as He leads us to walk over the stormy waters and to the shoreline of Resurrection. God sent Jesus - that we not be afraid of stepping out in faith, rather than only trusting legislation and legislators, that we embrace the goodness in others as a means of coming to understand and embrace the Divinity in us all, and that we find the inner courage to allow our actions of Compassion and Inclusion to speak louder than our demands for government intervention.
In the end, it will be to whom we choose to listen - and with Whom we choose to walk.
Thoughts and prayers, however well intentioned, are not enough. Neither are laws and rules. ". . . listen to the graves of the saints." 'Life' for all people requires our commitment to life for the least among us, for until that moment is achieved, life will only be a contest, a battle, a war to be won . . . and the least among us will be seen by all, but God, as acceptable losses of the cause to which we bow our knees.
Something to ponder on the journey . . .
