The man thanked the officer and he drove away.

Transcription

1 1 I d like to start off with a joke that was shared at General Council 43: A guy is driving around in his car with 20 penguins, sitting in the back seat. Unfortunately, he got pulled over, and the police officer was more than a little startled to find a flock of penguins out for a joy ride. The police officer said to the man, This time, I m going to let you off with a warning, but you need to take those penguins to the zoo. The man thanked the officer and he drove away. The next day, once again the man went out for a drive and once again, there were 20 penguins sitting on the back seat. Wouldn t you know it? but the same police officer pulled him over. Upon seeing all those penguins again in the back seat, the cop said to the man: I thought I told you to take those penguins to the zoo! And the man replied, I totally listened to you, officer. Yesterday, I took the penguins to the zoo and today, we re going to the theatre! I m sure that if I opened our time up for discussion right now, and I asked you why you come to church, that each of you might share a different reason. Maybe it s for the community, maybe it s for the music, maybe it s for the assortment of goodies offered at coffeetime.i believe that a big reason why people come to church is to be reminded no matter how flawed we think we are, no matter how many mistakes we ve made this week, no matter how challenging our lives are right now we come for the reassurance that can only be found in God s presence: we come to be reminded that we are God s children, that we are cared for, that we are loved, and that we are connected to something so much greater than ourselves. When we come to church, we are reminded of our place within all of creation, within our relationships, and within the Divine s plan. A good service and a good sermon should ground us in the truth that Jesus came to share: we are all God s beloved and God has always got our back. So I promise that when we come to the end of this sermon, we ll once again be reminded of this truth, but what I hoped to share with you today are some of the challenging conversations that occurred at General Council 43. I d like to unpack some of the learnings and some of the calls to action that happened at that recent gathering. And in case you re interested, the United Church created many YouTube videos which you can watch online that contain actual footage of the daily General Council proceedings and many interviews of participants. One video was a press conference with our new Moderator, the Rt. Rev. Dr. Richard Bott, just a few hours after he was elected to become the moderator. In it, he

2 2 mentioned that the General Council executive had declared that the United Church s theme over the next 3 years is to be discipleship. And so one of the reporters asked Rev. Bott, well, how should we go about exploring discipleship? And Rev. Bott described what he called, the spiritual practices of discipleship, which are found, using the acronym, UNITED. So here are the Rt. Rev. Bott s suggested practices we can use in order to deepen our discipleship to Christ: U = uplifted by God s love. (Start by recognizing that we are loved and that everyone is loveable) N = Nurtured by worship. ( Our rituals of gathering, singing and praying together and practicing the sacraments deepens our spiritual life) I = Inspired by scripture (How we are challenged and inspired by the stories found in the Bible) T = Transformed through prayer (Remember from last week when we pray to God and we invite spirit into our lives, that it s supposed to change us and crack open our hearts so that we are more compassionate, more inclusive and more aware of our interrelatedness with all beings) E = Empowered through spiritual friendships (Outside of our hour together on Sundays, how often do we get together with other members of the congregation to talk about our faith and learn from one another? We can learn a lot from one another as we share our struggles and joys about how we re transformed by the divine) D = Developed through Service (When we serve our community or serve the world, we are engaged with the practice of living our faith out loud). So there you have it these are the different components with which we all need to engage in order to deepen our spirituality and to deepen our discipleship: Uplifted by God s Love Nurtured through Worship Inspired through Scripture Transformed through Prayer Empowered through Spiritual Friendships Developed through Service

3 3 I ve made a reminder sheet that I ll put up on your bulletin board so that you can continue to think some more about how to apply these guidelines as a congregation... So, as a church, as a denomination, we have been asked to spend the next 3 years, reflecting on how to be better disciples and also putting our ideas into action. What was really interesting at GC43, is that the questions of how we shall be faithful disciples and what we value as the United Church were brought up during the last day of the gathering. Rev. Paul Walfall, from the Alberta Northwest Conference was an intercultural observer at General Council. There are only 2 intercultural observers and their role is to participate in small group discussions and help to ensure the full participation of all those people who identify as a minority whether that be due to their race or gender or sexual orientation, etc. During that last day, Rev. Walfall was asked to share his observations and reflections with the full assembly, and his words were very powerful. He spoke about being invited to the table of the United Church of Canada; how the United Church does try to include representatives of different experiences, backgrounds and cultures when they have big events such as the General Council assembly. Rev. Walfall said this issue for me is no longer who is missing from the table? but what is my place at the table? He said that it s not enough that we have a variety of faces around our discussion tables, but that we need to honour the different experiences and points of views of our brothers and sisters who identify as minorities. Rev. Walfall said that the answer to the question of what are you doing at the table? is found in dialogue: It s found when we take seriously each person s experience, and treat each person with dignity, respect and love. What he s meaning is that not only do we listen with open ears and open hearts to those who appear to be different from ourselves, but that we also follow through and create United Church policies and culture which include and represent everyone. Rev. Walfall encouraged us to use the acronym, ACT, whenever we encounter racism: A = Acknowledge (We need to acknowledge that racism exists within the church. Even when we do our best to try to eliminate racism, from time to time, it still rears its ugly head. So A stands for acknowledge.)

4 4 C = Confront. We have to call out racism when we see it. We have to be willing to stand up and lovingly confront our friends, our family members and even our ministers when they perpetuate racism, in any of its many guises. T = Transform. Look for ways to change unhealthy patterns and policies, and eliminate stereotypes so that we re not enabling the cycles of racism. A-C-T. Acknowledge. Confront. Transform. These are the steps we need to take every time we encounter racism. In fact, there s an article in today s Toronto Star newspaper that echoes this idea, with a reminder that we also have to continuously confront the racism hidden within ourselves as part of the solution for bringing about positive societal change. We need to acknowledge that we are part of the problem, as well as part of the solution. Back to Rev. Walfall s presentation at GC43 he ended his presentation by asking the audience, How do you cook your chicken? And he shared with us his recipe for preparing barbeque jerk chicken. Mmm mmm..mmm. But he went on to say that everyone probably has their own signature way of cooking chicken. There are lots of recipes out there. But what if you make your chicken and you make your chicken and I make my chicken and we all bring it to the tabl?. And let us all offer our chicken to one another. I will offer my chicken right alongside yours. And we will all feast. And it will all be good. My friends, this is how we need to approach being the church together. Everybody s got a killer chicken recipe and we need to embrace all the amazing chicken dishes which are offered at our table. Everyone s voice and experiences are important. Well after Rev. Walfall finished speaking, he sat down and the meeting continued. But then, 20 minutes later, a few brave souls went up to the microphone to speak. And they said, in essence, that the United Church has just been challenged to shake up how they do things. And it had been observed that very few minority voices had been heard throughout the week. And so what were we going to do about about that? So our past Moderator, Rev. Jordan Cantwell, who was facilitating the discussion, put aside the order of business and she invited the delegates who were people of colour to speak. And what happened next was, for many people who were there, was the most powerful and most important part of General Council 43.

5 5 People of East Asian, African and Indigenous descent came to the microphones and they shared their stories of experiencing racism within the church. Some even shared experiences of racism that had happened during GC43. Each story was unique. Each sharing was an incredible act of bravery and vulnerability. Those who attended this discussion realized that they had witnessed something special. One could sense the energy of the Holy Spirit enlivening this discussion. Here was the work of the church. Here is our call to create a more loving, open and inclusive community of faith. Remember our UNITED acronym? Well, here we were being reminded of letters U and E: We were being uplifted by God s love, and becoming empowered through our spiritual friendships. By listening to the marginalized voices of people of colour, we began the work of redefining ourselves as the United Church of Canada. This conversation we began at GC43 has now been taken home to churches all across Canada. And it s only the beginning. If we re really serious about doing the work of being the church, then the discussion doesn t begin and end at General Council. We pick it up. We do the challenging work of checking in about how we do things. Can we be more welcoming? Can we find new ways to become more intercultural? Shall we explore more expansive ways of promoting fellowship and hospitality? Can we draw the circle wider? I promised you that I would finish this sermon with the message that we are all God s beloved and it s true, we are. God loves us far more than we can ever comprehend. Our work, is to help everyone feel that and know that it s true deep, down into their very bones. May everyone who comes here and worships with us experience a radical welcome. May everyone who encounters us get a taste of Oneness and blessed community. And may everyone, after our service has ended and as they leave this place, do so, knowing that they are wholly loved. Blessed be and Amen.