Many of you believe whole-heartedly in prayer, as I do. There are also some here this morning who have given up on it after praying for months and years for the sake of a loved one, to no apparent effect. Either way, I want you to know that you're in the right place.
Some of you believe in physical resurrection, as I do, others of you believe in only a spiritual resurrection, but there may be some here this morning who do not believe in an after-life at all. Whatever you believe, I want you to know that you're in the right place.
The truth is, we are uncomfortable with doubt, but when we pretend it doesn’t exist, and when we hide it from each other, we lose out – we lose our ability to be real and we lose our ability to be a healing presence in the world. We don't gain anything by pretending total confidence. As Voltaire said in the 18th century, “doubt is not a pleasant state of mind, but certainty is absurd."
Truthfully, total confidence is not what faith is about. Faith is not so much about believing a certain set of propositions – a list that we can check off – virgin birth, yes. Star in the sky, yes. Walk on water, yes. I happen to believe these things mostly because I find them beautiful – but I know lots of very faithful Christians who don’t believe them at all. A checklist of beliefs is not what make us who we are.
Honest relationship is what makes us a people alive in God’s Spirit.
When we say the Nicene Creed together - to outsiders and maybe to you - it may sound like a set of propositions. You may, in fact, believe every one of these things but that is not the important thing about the Creed. The essential reason this is in our liturgy, week after week, is that it puts us in relationship - in communion - with people around the world now and across time – and we value this relationship above all else. Credere – what we translate as "I believe" - is much more about our heart – it’s about where we put our trust and the weight of our being. Our religion is not so much about believing certain things as it is about what St. Peter calls "a living hope" – a living relationship with the Lord of Life and with each other. Like all relationships, it takes being present and available when we feel close to God and when we do not, when we are in love with God and when we are not, when we totally believe – and when we do not.
One of the books I keep on my shelf for the title as much as for the content – is called “May I Hate God?” and the Catholic author’s answer is "yes – hating is as much a part of relationship as is loving." When we are deeply disappointed or hurt or feeling abandoned, our love can temporarily turn to hate – but if we continue in relationship, it does not harden there, or remain in that state. It’s only when we refuse to engage, when we don't care, when we refuse to reveal the true state of our heart that we can get stuck and gradually find our love grown cold and our inner life increasingly dead.
The author of this slim little book points to the Psalms as one place among many in the Bible where people reveal the true state of their doubts about God’s loving intentions, their experiences of his abandonment, their laments and their sorrows and yes, even their angers, at their experiences of God’s absence and neglect. And lo and behold, those psalms almost always turn somewhere in the middle or towards the end into praise – because the very act of honesty, the very act of authentic revelation of what is really happening with your heart gives the Holy Spirit room to act and sufficient space to provide refreshment.
In Jesus’ resurrected body, his essential qualities remained. His kindness and compassion were entirely intact. He breathed peace and forgiveness and completely allowed for the very human need to touch and to see for themselves – in other words, through betrayal and abandonment and death and loss, Jesus continued in relationship. And his friends did as well - through their own fears and disappointments and disillusionments, they continued to meet with each other, and to be available for Jesus to come and find them. And out of the gift of that relationship, the gift of that commitment, new life was born, the Holy Spirit was breathed into them, and they were sent out to preach peace and to practice forgiveness.
Do you need to forgive God for not keeping you or your loved ones entirely safe and protected, or for not saving us from ourselves in this oh so broken world? Do you need to forgive your children for not being who you wanted them to be? Do you need to forgive yourself for not being honest with yourself, for not siding with yourself, for anything at all? We are a people whose gift to the world is relationship, peace and forgiveness. And that starts in here, at home, with those around us, and spreads out from there.
I invite you to place your hands on your heart, breathe in the Holy Spirit, and breathe out, saying “Peace be with you.”
Then turn to your neighbor, breathe the Spirit and say “Peace be with you.”
And when you receive the Host, you may want to offer your peace to God and breathe in his holy breath of peace to you.
Resources: The Rev. Buzz Stevens, Ministry Matters, 2010, for the beginning thoughts.
Garrison Keillor, Thinking Weaselish Thoughts at Eastertide, Salon.com, 2008
Voltaire, 1694 - 1778
Pierre Wolfe, May I Hate God, Paulist Press, 1978
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