Shame on the Shepherds: Political, Religious and Otherwise!

Woe to the shepherds who destroy and scatter the sheep of my pasture! says the LORD. Therefore thus says the LORD, the God of Israel, concerning the shepherds who shepherd my people: It is you who have scattered my flock, and have driven them away, and you have not attended to them. So I will attend to you for your evil doings, says the LORD. Then I myself will gather the remnant of my flock out of all the lands where I have driven them, and I will bring them back to their fold, and they shall be fruitful and multiply. I will raise up shepherds over them who will shepherd them, and they shall not fear any longer, or be dismayed, nor shall any be missing, says the LORD.
The days are surely coming, says the LORD, when I will raise up for David a righteous Branch, and he shall reign as king and deal wisely, and shall execute justice and righteousness in the land. In his days Judah will be saved and Israel will live in safety. And this is the name by which he will be called: "The LORD is our righteousness." --Jeremiah 23: 1-6

There are days when the Sunday lectionary speaks too much truth to our modern day world. And perhaps it is fitting that on "Christ the King Sunday" the truth, as spoken through the Scriptures, shines a bright spotlight on matters both inside, and outside, the church. A report in The Pink Paper that the United Nations has voted to revoke protections from persecution for LGBT people worldwide sent a chill down my spine. This at a time when there is increasing threats and violence against LGBT Africans and their allies. Of course, there is the pending vote in the Church of England's General Synod Wednesday on the Anglican (in name only) Covenant. Supporters of the document want us to believe it is some benign formality meant to bring cohesion to the Anglican Communion. But there has never been anything particularly cohesive about Anglicanism, and we of the loyal opposition know this is about power... and punishing particular members of the Communion who have empowered women and gay people to be fully baptized members of the Church. Mark the words of the prophet:

"It is you who have scattered my flock and driven them away and not attended to them."

The persecution and the punitive actions taken against the "others" is not the stuff of God. It is the machinations of men; frightened people who persist in the erroneous belief that if somebody else gets to have a seat at the table, there will not be enough bread and fish to go around. Do they not remember that in the loaves and fishes story, which appears across the gospels, all were fed?

"Then I myself will gather the remnant of my flock out of all the lands where I have driven them, and I will bring them back to their fold, and they shall be fruitful and multiply. I will raise up shepherds over them who will shepherd them, and they shall not fear any longer, or be dismayed, nor shall any be missing, says the LORD."

A word to all you who have failed to be the shepherds you were supposed to be: you will be sacked, and God will, again, be the one with the final say because it is God who redeems and calls the lost and the cast aways to come home. Because the covenant made with us who you would expel and send to the gallows is the promise that God is with us always and will not give up on us. Ever. That is the covenant those of us who have known the pain of exclusion can always look to during times when the supposed shepherds have decided to abandon us to the wolves. And that is the covenant I can accept and believe in.

As we round out Year C in the lectionary, we hear the story of Christ's crucifixion between the two other condemned men. On the one side is the robber taunting Jesus; on the other side, the one who asks for mercy. And even as Christ is hanging there on the cross, he tells the one seeking mercy, "Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise." The question I have for our modern world men and women: will you join in the punishing and persecution, or will you recognize the injustices being committed by politicians and religious leaders and speak out for justice and peace in the world?

"Father forgive them for they do not know what they are doing."

Indeed.