Sermon preached by The Reverend Dr. Harold T. Lewis

SERMON PREACHED BY THE REVEREND DR. HAROLD T. LEWIS, RECTOR CALVARY EPISCOPAL CHURCH, PITTSBURGH, PENNSYLVANIA AT THE SEVENTH TRIENNIAL BLACK CLERGY CONFERENCE EMORY UNIVERSITY CONFERENCE CENTER, ATLANTA, GEORGIA ON THE FEAST OF ST JAMES OF JERUSALEM, BROTHER OF OUR LORD 24 OCTOBER 2005


"Peter rose and said, . . .'God made no distinction between them and us; for he purified their hearts by faith.'" (Acts 15:9)


I cannot tell you what a great privilege it is to be here with you this morning, to worship with you, and to be your preacher. I am indebted to my sister, Angela Ifill, who now occupies the office at 815 which used to be called, as I reminded myself on those not so rare occasions when I needed a dose of humility, "Deputy for Colored Work." (But you know, if you call a horse a noble steed, it's still a horse!) She is kind and magnanimous to invite the Staff Officer Emeritus to take part in this seventh triennial black clergy conference, and as someone once said, "Emeritus" comes from two Latin words -- ex meaning "out," and meritus, which means "deserves to be."

My text comes from the Book of Acts, which I like to describe as the minutes of the early church. I have chosen a verse which appears a few lines before the beginning of today's lesson, because it is needed, it can be argued, to make sense out of the pericope before us. This utterance from Peter's lips is every bit as important, I think, as the declaration he blurted out at Caesarea Philippi. You will remember that while other disciples thought Jesus was Elias or one of the prophets, Peter declares, "Thou art the Christ, the Son of the Living God." Now we are well on the other side of the Crucifixion and the Resurrection, and Peter and his buddies --- that ragtag, motley crew --- have been dispatched to various outposts all over the then known world, and are about the business of spreading the Good News of Jesus Christ. But, as was the case when they were following the itinerant preacher from Galilee, they didn't always get it right. Even Peter, who had been given the keys to the Kingdom, even Petros, the Rock upon which Jesus built his church, still had to sort a few things out.

The major controversy confronting the fledgling church had to do with Gentiles, and their status in the new religion. The meeting into which we barge in today's lesson has been called the Jerusalem Council, and it had been convened to settle a theological question: the Gentles' relationship to the law of Moses. Certain Jewish Christians, you see, were displeased with Paul's practice of accepting Gentiles into the church without the rite of circumcision. In other words, they believed that since Jesus a) was a Jew, b) was circumcised according to the Law (the idea of circumcision became too delicate for Episcopalians, so the old feast of that name is now the feast of the Holy Name of Jesus) and c) entered into and grew up in a Jewish community, it seemed altogether fitting and proper that those not fortunate enough to be born Jewish should become Jewish before becoming Christians. Circumcision, then, was seen as a prerequisite for baptism. This was not, mind you, a theological debate akin to the question of how many angels can dance on the head of a pin. This was serious business. Failure to resolve it would have torn the church asunder. Schism was looming large. Hence the meeting at Columbus, Ohio --- I mean Jerusalem.

As the so called Judaizers were standing their ground, and perhaps gaining ground among the delegates, Peter makes his speech. He explains that he had been chosen to preach the Gospel to the Gentiles, and that God had been pleased to imbue them with the Holy Spirit, just as he had done to Jewish Christians. The Gentile converts, he tells them, had become exemplary Christians. (There's nothing like a convert!) And then, the punch line: "God made no distinction between them and us, because he purified their hearts by faith" (a statement, by the way, of his own conversion experience). In other words, because of God's equal treatment of both groups, Jewish Christians could claim no superiority. At Caesarea Philippi, Peter showed that he understood who the Messiah was; he had a full grasp of the identity of the founder of this new religion. Now at Jerusalem, he shows that he has a full understanding of the church's mission.

Now, have you ever been to a meeting where you make a perfectly valid, cogent, even brilliant point, but it is not until your point is made by some other person present, maybe because he or she has more clout, that your point is accepted? Well that's what happened at the Jerusalem Council. James, who was presiding, iterates Peter's point, and, for added measure, supports it by quoting a passage from the Prophet Amos: "All other peoples may seek the Lord, even all the Gentiles over whom my name has been called." And then everyone nodded in assent. Now the sad thing is that the Jerusalem Council had to meet at all. Had no one read Amos before, and if so, (and I don't often use the expression "the plain meaning of Scripture") what did they think the prophet meant? Did they not know that our Lord's first missionary act was in fact his Epiphany, which is called his Manifestation to the Gentiles? Now I don't remember much from introductory Greek 37 years ago, but I do remember that the word translated "Gentiles" is ethnoi, which, as my professor would say, comes from our word "ethnic." And that is why, even long before the days of political correctness, the Wise Men in the manger scene came in a variety of colors.

Today's collect gives James due credit for his work at the Jerusalem Council. In it we pray that following his example, the church may give itself continually to the reconciliation of all those who are at variance and enmity. "At variance and enmity." My sisters and brothers in Christ, if one thing has always characterized the life of the church, it has been the fact that there have always been groups who have been "at variance and enmity" in relation to the dominant group, or simply put, there have always been those who are in and those who are out. When I was in the Office of Black Ministries, I spent an inordinate amount of my time, it would seem, explaining why there was such a thing. I found myself giving history lessons to inquirers about the historic marginalization of people of color, and how those groups found it necessary to band together. I would tell them about the conditional ordination of Absalom Jones --- the condition being that neither he nor his people could participate in the convention of the Diocese of Pennsylvania. I would tell them about the attempt to pass the so-called "Sewanee canon" at the General Convention of 1883, which would have placed all blacks in the South in a non-geographical Negro jurisdiction under white rule. I would tell them about the two bishops suffragan for colored work consecrated in 1918 with the understanding that they would not lay hands, suddenly or otherwise, on any white heads. My stock answer, by the way, to those who wanted to know why there was no such thing as the Union of White Episcopalians was, "Oh, but there is; it's called the Episcopal Church!"

And if I wanted to get personal, I could tell them about my interview at Berkeley Divinity School, in which a professor asked me, with a straight face, "Mr. Lewis, did it ever occur to you that the Episcopal Church doesn't particularly like you?" I didn't understand the question. I had been baptized and confirmed in St. Philip's, Brooklyn, with three black priests, two thousand black souls, six candles and two thuribles, and the only white Episcopalian I remember from my childhood was the Bishop of Long Island! Or I could tell them that my bishop released me in the spring of my senior year because there were no curacies opened for Negro ordinands. You can add your own stories, I am sure.

But lest we begin to feel smug and victimized, let me remind you that the who's-in-who's-out game is one that can be played intra-racially as well as interracially. We know all too well that by the rules of what Kortright Davis has dubbed "skinocracy," there have been some congregations where those of a fairer hue and "good" hair were welcomed while those of darker hue in whose hair a pencil could securely ensconce itself were told they would be happier at a sister parish. I know of at least one inner-city parish whose members tired of paying a guard to look after the Beemers and Benzez during mass, and, in an act of "black flight," moved its congregation to the suburbs where their people lived anyhow. And there are those parishes, lest we forget, where those whose ancestors harvested sugar cane are not as welcome as those whose forebears picked cotton --- or vice versa. Yes, and there are those churches all of whose members have roots in the Caribbean where the pecking order is determined by which island you hail from --- as Jamaicans and Bajans and Trinidadians jockey for positions of power.

Women can write another chapter in the book about being in or out in this church. At a time in the life of our church when most people accept as a given, and indeed embrace as a blessing, the ordination of women, we are reminded that this is by no means a universal point of view. In my diocese, for example, a resolution at convention last year which would have upheld the ministries of women failed, because many present did not wish to offend those in the Anglican Network who have not yet accepted, and who may never accept the idea that a woman can be a priest. We forget, too, the road that women in our church have had to hoe. It was in 1970, the year that women's ordination to the diaconate was approved, that women could be seated for the first time as deputies at General Convention!

Needless to say, the Episcopal Church, and indeed the Anglican Communion, is facing its greatest crisis with respect to who is in and who is out in its current debate on human sexuality. African Americans and women have found that the stained glass ceiling can be raised. How well I remember Barbara Harris predicting that the Diocese of Proctor and Gamble would never elect Herb Thompson. The Lord must have a sense of humor, because on the very day Herb was consecrated, Barbara was elected in Massachusetts! Rectors of predominantly white congregations (like women bishops) are now too numerous to hold their meeting in a phone booth! The Church seems to have adjusted to women and blacks in positions of authority. Most would opine, however, that persons of homosexual orientation will not soon enjoy such ease of assimilation. Indeed, many pundits believe that some form of separation or even schism is inevitable, and that we already live in a de facto state of schism. There is talk of the formation of secession, of new provinces, of diocesan realignments. Property disputes abound (as I know only too well). The question of who will be invited to the Lambeth Conference has become a hot topic. One South African bishop said to me, "In 1988, bishops could bring their wives; in 1998, bishops could bring their husbands. Will bishops be able to bring their partners in 2008?" The theological and political ramifications of the consecration of Gene Robinson is grist for the mill for many more sermons. What I want to say, briefly, is what this all means to black Episcopalians.

First, make no mistake. This is not just about sexuality. It is about power. A rector in the Diocese of Los Angeles who now purports to be under the ecclesiastical protection of the Archbishop of Uganda said that the recent developments are indicative of the fact that the church has been in decline since the civil rights movement. Exegesis: The hegemony of the (presumably straight) WASP male has been threatened by civil rights, women rights, now gay rights, and this most recent incursion into his domain of privilege is the last straw. I think this is a plausible view because those espousing a conservative, anti-gay agenda, who normally have little interaction with African Americans, have all of a sudden discovered Africans as their bosom buddies, because they find themselves (perhaps for different reasons) on the same theological page. The corollary of this is that the movement, on these shores, is virtually bereft of people of color.

Second, this current debate is not just about another difference of opinion, like the traditional split among Episcopalians into the three camps of low and lazy, broad and hazy, high and crazy. In the old days, we all accepted each other, even if Anglo-Catholics thought that low churchmen were theologically deficient and sacramentally deprived, and evangelicals dismissed catholics as eccentric and maybe even a little superstitious. Today, the human sexuality issue has drawn a line in the sand, and one's views on the topic have become a litmus test not just for one's theological position, but for one's fitness as a Christian. This is why Canon Ifill could be refused the privilege of exercising the homiletic office in the cathedral church of her native Trinidad. This is why the bishop of Long Island could attend the consecration of a bishop in Jamaica, but was not allowed to lay hands on the ordinand. Given our intimate and historic ties with the Province of the West Indies, and the fact that so many of our clergy are sons and daughters of that province, who for a century and a half have filled our pulpits when we were unable or unwilling to foster vocations ourselves, this is a serious tragedy.

Thirdly, the Afro-Anglican Movement has been compromised. While there was much camaraderie and evidence of "bonds of affection" at Toronto last summer, many players were conspicuously absent from the table. People of color from the U.S., scant in number in the Episcopal Church, could take pride in the fact that most of the world's Anglicans look like us, and while this is still true, this issue has separated us from each other, threatening to sever those bonds of affection which we have worked so hard, since the Barbados conference in 1985, to create.

Finally, we must beware of the back burner syndrome. This church has long been like a fickle lover, flitting from one love interest to another. The ink was hardly dry on the House of Bishops' pastoral on racism before we moved on to some other 'ism. And Lord knows, we can only deal with one crisis at a time. As other issues demand the church's attention, ethnic agendas get put on the back burner, or worse, get removed from the stove altogether. As we move around the church, the question is asked: "Where will the next gay bishop be consecrated?" No one is asking about where the next black bishop will be consecrated. It doesn't take long for the church to adopt a been-there-done-that-bought-the-tshirt attitude.

But the good news is this. Like St. Paul, we know how to be exalted and we know how to be abased. We know what it is to have been "'buked and scorned." We know what it means to be the ethnoi, the out group. In the book Having Our Say, written by Bessie and Sarah Delaney, whose father, Henry, was suffragan bishop for colored work in North Carolina, (paving the way for our brother Michael, who is now bishop of all the people in North Carolina) the sisters share their reaction to the 1929 stock market crash. They said that downtown, people were busy jumping out of windows, because they just couldn't face a world without wealth and privilege and all the trappings of success, but that in Harlem, it was "just another crisis." We, a people who sing lustily, "Stony the road we trod," are a people who have never taken prosperity or good fortune or smooth sailing, as our due. Not that far removed from suffering, we see such things as boon and blessing. Similarly, we are not jumping through stained glass windows because of a gay bishop, and we certainly will not declare that there's no room for him in the church --- the same church that in myriad ways has excluded us over the years, often with Scriptural and theological justification. We have been, historically, the group that has held the church's feet to the fire, demanding that it live up to its claims of catholicity and inclusivity. We have been among the most loyal members of this church, staying with it through thick and thin, and there seems little reason to abandon it now when the church needs us most.

In the 16th century, Anglicanism faced a situation not much unlike the one in which we find ourselves today. There were those who challenged the vision of an emerging Anglican ethos which held that the Gospel of Jesus Christ was greater than the differences that threatened to divide them. In speaking to this crisis, Richard Hooker, the great Anglican divine to whom we are indebted for the three-legged stool of Scripture, tradition and reason, wrote this: "I pray that none will be offended if I seek to make the Christian Religion an inn where all are received joyously, rather than a cottage where some few friends of the family are to be received." It seems to me that the very same sentiment is expressed in a Negro spiritual: "Plenty good room, plenty good room, plenty good room in my Master's Kingdom." I think this was the theology that Peter was trying to espouse at the Jerusalem Council --- that instead of worrying about who's in and who's out, we should be about the business of building up the Kingdom of Christ, the Kingdom of Jesus whose will it was that all men and women be drawn unto him.

Let us pray: Though with a scornful wonder men see her sore oppressed, By schisms rent asunder, by heresies distressed; Yet saints their watch are keeping, their cry goes up, 'How long?' And soon the night of weeping shall be the morn of song. AMEN.