PRESENT, EVEN IN THE DARK Ecclesiastes 3:1-8; Psalm 23; Romans 8: 35, 37-39 July 16, 2006 By Rev. Dr. Jeanne Knepper
We’ve received some hard news this week, hard news, and also news of life renewed. It has been a week to tie opposites, sorrow and joy, hope and despair, life and death, together, together is ways that we mostly avoid.
It was not always so. When I was doing research in the Methodist Magazine, looking at the stories of the lives of Methodist women in the early years of the church, I learned that young women, upon learning that they were with child for the first time, often began to sew their grace clothes. In a time before knowledge of sanitation, ultra sound, nutrition, forceps and monitors, the beginnings of life too often walked hand in hand with the ends of life, for mother or baby or both. In fact, for most of human history, life and death have been threads woven all through the human fabric. And religion has been a force to hold them together, reminding us always that the movement from life to death to life beyond death is part of the natural flow of being.
Now, we’ve mostly moved death off stage, to the edges of the fabric, away from us, to nursing homes, hospices, hospitals—or highways and battlefields. We’ve created a different script, a flashier movie to distract ourselves from the realities of death, pain, loss and grief—and we’ve also woven religion into a brighter cloth, bringing the threads of life and wholeness to the front side, and leaving people kind of alone when they find themselves on the dark side of the cloth, feeling alone and unprepared and inadequate when the cloth flips over and wraps them in threads of loss and pain.
Today, we are turning the fabric over, looking directly at the darker side of life: Hard things happen. Relationships break down. People make foolish and irreparable choices. Tired people say cruel words that can never be recalled. Cancers grow silently until they threaten life. Minds shrink under the attack of strokes and tangle in the knots of dementia. Every life ends. Every relationship ends. Nothing is permanent. We will all experience loss, pain, grief, and death. And our faith will not keep us from this hard reality.
So what difference does it make then, to be people of faith?
All the difference in the world.
All my experience tells me that God—that deepest love that centers and calls all being, that wondrous mystery that calms all fear, the source of all life and peace and joy and hope—God will not end when I die, nor will God be crushed by my times of despair. When I don’t know what comes next, I can trust that God is still there, holding me, preparing me for a future I don’t—can’t—understand, holding me close in the dark. This is a great comfort. Held in the arms of God, we are not afraid.
OP-ED CONTRIBUTOR Too Good for Marriage By KENJI YOSHINO New Haven
LAST week, New York's highest court voted 4-to-2 that a legislative ban on same-sex marriage did not violate the state Constitution. In doing so, it added to the patchwork of state rulings on the issue, including those of Indiana and Arizona (which similarly upheld legislative bans) and Massachusetts (which struck down a legislative ban).
What's noteworthy about the New York decision, however, is that it became the second ruling by a state high court to assert a startling rationale for prohibiting same-sex marriage - that straight couples may be less stable parents than their gay counterparts and consequently require the benefits of marriage to assist them.
The critical question, expressed in a plurality opinion by three members of the New York court, is whether a "rational legislature" could decide that the benefits of marriage should be granted to opposite-sex couples but not to same-sex couples. The opinion then answered in the affirmative with two different arguments. While both related to the interests of children, they differed significantly in vintage and tone.
The more traditional argument stated that the Legislature could reasonably suppose that children would fare better under the care of a mother and father. Like most arguments against gay marriage, this "role model" argument assumes straight couples are better guides to life than gay couples.
And like other blatantly anti-gay arguments, it falls apart under examination. In a decision last month in a case concerning gay foster parents, the Arkansas Supreme Court found no evidence that children raised by gay couples were disadvantaged compared with children raised by straight couples.
But the New York court also put forth another argument, sometimes called the "reckless procreation" rationale. "He terosexual intercourse," the plurality opinion stated, "has a natural tendency to lead to the birth of children; homosexual intercourse does not." Gays become parents, the opinion said, in a variety of ways, including adoption and artificial insemination, "but they do not become parents as a result of accident or impulse."
Consequently, "the Legislature could find that unstable relationships between people of the opposite sex present a greater danger that children will be born into or grow up in unstable homes than is the case with same-sex couples."
To shore up those rickety heterosexual arrangements, "the Legislature could rationally offer the benefits of marriage to opposite-sex couples only." Lest we miss the inversion of stereotypes about gay relationships here, the opinion lamented that straight relationships are "all too often casual or temporary."
When an Indiana court introduced this seemingly heterophobic logic last year in upholding a state ban on same-sex marriage, I thought it was a cockeyed aberration. But after both New York City and New York State presented similar logic in oral arguments, and the court followed suit, I began to understand the argument's appeal: it sounds nicer to gays.
It also sounds more desperate. New York's ban on same-sex marriage is based on provisions enacted in 1909. It is preposterous to suggest the Legislature promulgated and retained the law because it believed gays to be better parents. Moreover, as New York's chief judge, Judith Kaye, pointed out in her dissent, even if marriage were a response to the dangers of "reckless procreation," excluding gay couples from marriage in no way advances the goal of responsible heterosexual child-rearing. "There are enough marriage licenses to go around for everyone," Judge Kaye noted.
This is not the first time courts have restricted rights with a flourish of fon d regards. In 1873, the United States Supreme Court upheld an Illinois statute prohibiting women from practicing law. Concurring in that judgment, Justice Joseph Bradley observed that the "natural and proper timidity and delicacy" of women better suited them to "the noble and benign offices of wife and mother."
Hostile rulings delivered in friendly tones can take longer to overturn, as evidenced by the century that passed before members of the Supreme Court reversed their thinking about women and, in a 1973 opinion in a sex discrimination case, recognized that confining women in the name of cherishing them put them "not on a pedestal, but in a cage."
We should not need a century to unmask the "reckless procreation" argument as a new guise for an old prejudice. The "reckless procreation" argument sounds nicer - and may even be nicer - than the plainly derogatory "role model" argument. But equality would be nicer still.
Kenji Yo shino,a professor at Yale Law School,is the author of "Covering: The Hidden Assault on Our Civil Rights.''
Troy Plummer
Ph: (773) 736-5526 Fx: (773) 736-5475 We are United Methodists of all sexual orientations and gender identities making disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world.
CONNECTIONS UPUMC • No choir practice July 18. • UMW bake sale, Sunday, July 16, after church. • Lunch Bunch meets at Thai Ginger, Tuesday, July 18, 12:30pm. Bev Read is taking reservations. • Trustees meet, Thursday, July 20, 6:30pm, Errol Stephenson Hall.
THE LARGER CHURCH • Alton L Collins fundraising BBQ and Old Time Fiddlers, Sunday, July 16, 4pm. Reservations, 503-637-6411. • United Methodist Women School of Missions, “Harvesting Peace.†July 27-30 in Nampa ID.
THE COMMUNITY • Readiness Fair, Saturday, August 26, Roosevelt High School.
FUTURE EVENTS, FOR YOUR CALENDAR • Second Annual North Portland Pride Festival, Sunday, August 13, Noon-4pm, UPUMC. • Children’s Sunday School goes to Camp, Wednesday-Saturday, August 16-19, Suttle Lake Camp. • UPUMC Yard Sale and BBQ, Saturday, September 2, 10am-4pm. • Linnea Good Concert, Saturday, September 9, Tigard UMC, 7:30pm. • Third Annual All-Church Retreat at Camp Magruder on the Oregon Coast, Friday-Sunday, September 15-17, 2006. • Interfaith Transgender Conference, October 21-22, 2006 at Corvallis First United Methodist Church.
WEEKLY AT UPUMC • Choir practices Sundays at 9:30am, Tuesdays at 6:30pm, Sanctuary. • Men’s Group, Tuesdays, 10am, Narthex. • Alcoholics Anonymous, Narthex, Sundays, Tuesdays and Fridays at 8pm, weekly. • Overeaters Anonymous, Wednesdays at 7pm, Saturdays at 3pm. • Morrison Center Program, Wednesdays at 4:30pm, Thursdays at 3:30pm. THE NURSERY IS STAFFED DURING WORSHIP FOR CHILDREN YOUNGER THAN SCHOOL AGE. SCHOOL AGE CHILDREN ARE INVITED INTO THE SANCTUARY UNTIL THE ‘PASSING OF THE PEACE’; THEN THEY GO TO SUNDAY SCHOOL.
CONNECTIONS UPUMC • No choir practice July 4, 11, 18. • Backyard picnic and grill, 14945 SE Center St, let Jeanne know if you are coming. • Staff-Parish Relations Committee meets Monday, July 10, 6:30pm, Errol Stephenson Hall. • Administrative Council meets Monday, July 10, 7:30pm, Errol Stephenson Hall. • Outreach Committee meets Tuesday, July 11, 7:30pm, Errol Stephenson Hall. • UMW bake sale, Sunday, July 16, after church. • Lunch Bunch meets at Thai Ginger, Tuesday, July 18, 12:30pm. Bev Read is taking reservations.
THE LARGER CHURCH • Alton L Collins fundraising BBQ and Old Time Fiddlers, Sunday, July 16, 4pm. Reservations, 503-637-6411. • United Methodist Women School of Missions, “Harvesting Peace.†July 13-16 at George Fox University in Newberg OR; July 27-30 in Nampa ID.
THE COMMUNITY • Morrison Child and Family Center program begins for summer, Thursday, June 29, 3:30pm-6:30pm, Errol Stephenson Hall.
FUTURE EVENTS, FOR YOUR CALENDAR • Second Annual North Portland Pride Festival, Sunday, August 13, Noon-4pm, UPUMC. • Children’s Sunday School goes to Camp, Wednesday-Saturday, August 16-19, Suttle Lake Camp. • Readiness Fair, Saturday, August 26, Roosevelt High School. • Linnea Good Concert, Saturday, September 9, Tigard UMC, 7:30pm. • Third Annual All-Church Retreat at Camp Magruder on the Oregon Coast, Friday-Sunday, September 15-17, 2006. • Interfaith Transgender Conference, October 21-22, 2006 at Corvallis First United Methodist Church.
WEEKLY AT UPUMC • Choir practices Sundays at 9:30am, Tuesdays at 6:30pm, Sanctuary. • Men’s Group, Tuesdays, 10am, Narthex. • Alcoholics Anonymous, Narthex, Sundays, Tuesdays and Fridays at 8pm, weekly. • Overeaters Anonymous, Wednesdays at 7pm, Saturdays at 3pm. • Morrison Center Program, Thursdays at 3:30pm. THE NURSERY IS STAFFED DURING WORSHIP FOR CHILDREN YOUNGER THAN SCHOOL AGE. SCHOOL AGE CHILDREN ARE INVITED INTO THE SANCTUARY UNTIL THE ‘PASSING OF THE PEACE’; THEN THEY GO TO SUNDAY SCHOOL.
A reflection on immigrants rights protest in Salem
Written by scott
Thursday, 13 July 2006
Palm Sunday Protest author: Amy L. Dalton e-mail: ald-at-riseup.net
A reflection on Sunday's immigrants' rights protest in Salem, with pictures from Salem & Portland.
On Sunday, I was one of at least 15 thousand people gathered at the steps of Oregon's state capital, waving flags and calling for legislation that respects the role of immigrant workers in US society. After a two-hour rally, the largely Latino group marched in a circle around the capital mall, while passing cars honked their approval. The protest, called by Oregon's Farmworker Union, PCUN and endorsed by a number of unions and labor organizations including Jobs with Justice and VOZ - the Worker's Rights Education Project, was a prelude to Monday's National Day of Action for Immigrants Rights, which all told drew hundreds of thousands to the streets to express opposition to pending anti-immigration legislation in Congress. These events build on several weeks of mass protest on this issue in what is turning out to be one of the largest expressions of decentralized, coordinated protest that US society has ever seen.
Though most of the protests took place on Monday, PCUN chose to hold its protest on Sunday -- Palm Sunday. This was not intentional, but a few folks, like me, brought their palm branches from church to the protest. Palm Sunday falls a week before Easter, and is the day Christians remember Jesus' arrival in Jerusalem amidst a parade of supporters.
Several hours before yesterday's convergence, Rev. Gail McDougle of Salem's First Congregational United Church of Christ reflected on this parade. She reminded her congregation that it was actually one of two parades that converged on Jerusalem that day, the other being "a flood of overlords and soldiers" gathered to enforce Pax Romana during a "testy" time in the Jewish year. "This imperial parade was intended to produce both shock and awe," said Rev. McDougle.
It is indeed such a testy time right now in the life of Pax Americana, and we are seeing the parade of shock and awe enter into our cities. The flood of anti-immigrant legislation that has filled our lawmaking halls and captivated our attention with talk of building walls across deserts and criminalizing those who would aid the desperate. At several points, this talk has revealed its true nature as the rhetoric of control has slipped into the rhetoric of aggression.
But another parade is also entering into our cities. Like the followers of Jesus it is an eclectic bunch, cobbling an identity together from a variety of sources. And like those who danced into Jerusalem, it is a group intentionally claiming the rights to a heritage despite the protests of some guardians of that heritage. Then, the heritage was the promise provided to the people of Israel that a messiah -- a true king -- would rise up who would lead the people to freedom. Words like "king" and "kingdom" were wrested from the grasp of imperial Rome and claimed in the service of this vision. By this act, every time Christians use the word "King" the entire question of the nature of authority is called.
Today, the contested heritage is differently voiced, but similarly aligned. The words being wrested now are "union," "democracy," "united we stand," and "liberty and justice for all." Protesters in this parade literally draped themselves with the American flag, often alongside the flag of their country of origin, to make this point. By this act, the very nature of these words is called into question, and thus can never again be answered simply: what is our union? what is the core of our unity? what is it that brings us together?
Amidst this, I am like the little children who waved the palm branches as Jesus approached -- today replaced by drivers who honked their car horns in eager anticipation of the unfolding consciousness. Together we cry, "Hosanna! Blessed are the ones who come in the name of Union!"
University Park United Methodist Church (UPUMC) is located at 4775 N Lombard, Portland Oregon 97203. UPUMC is small, diverse, growing, laughing, committed, caring, serious, warm and REAL! We are a community that encourages each other as we grow in faith, in knowledge, in service, and in love of self, God and neighbor. At University Park we not only respect but welcome diversity in race, gender, national origin, age, sexual orientation, gender identity, physical and mental ability, economic status and profession. We believe all people are equal before God and entitled to Gods grace and abundance. Pastors: Rev. Dr. Jeanne Knepper & Rev. Marcia Hauer http://www.upumc.net
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