Opening Focus:
Last Monday the funeral of Queen Elizabeth II renewed our awareness of both the universal transience and the incredible treasure of life in this world. Also, our reading today is a story Jesus tells about two people living in very different circumstances who die and go to their eternal home in the life beyond.
No matter who and how different we are, life here is only a short stay on the way towards life shared together in the great beyond. And I wonder: how does that shape how we live our life with others here?
Somehow,
it seems to connect with something Muhammad Ali once said, that was shared with
me this week by Bruce Murray. “Service
to others” – as a way of life, Ali says, “is the rent you pay for your room
here on earth."
Reading: Luke 16:19-31
In the Gospels, Jesus has a clear bias towards the poor and the disadvantaged. In today’s reading from Luke 16:19-31, it’s clear that the religious leaders and the teachers of the Law are upset by thus, probably because their understanding is that riches, success, and blessings on Earth are a sign of God’s favour, and a sign of being on the right track to a seat at the eternal heavenly feast. Plus, they’re among the rich, the respected and the powerful.
So, instead of arguing with them, and accomplishing nothing other than hardening their dislike of him, Jesus tells them a story about two people who die and go to heaven – using their own ideas about what heaven looks like, and how it’s balanced with an opposite eternity called hell.
“There was a rich man who was dressed in purple and fine linen and lived in luxury every day. At his gate was laid a beggar named Lazarus, covered with sores and longing to eat what fell from the rich man’s table. Even the dogs came and licked his sores.
“The time came when the beggar died and the angels carried him to Abraham’s side. The rich man also died and was buried. In Hades, where he was in torment, he looked up and saw Abraham far away, with Lazarus by his side. So he called to him, ‘Father Abraham, have pity on me and send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue, because I am in agony in this fire.’
“But
Abraham replied, ‘Son, remember that in your lifetime you received your good
things, while Lazarus received bad things, but now he is comforted here and you
are in agony. And besides all this,
between us and you a great chasm has been set in place, so that those who want
to go from here to you cannot, nor can anyone cross over from there to us.’ [Note: In the way Jesus tells the story, Father Abraham does not specify who it is who has set the chasm, and made it uncrossable.]
“He answered, ‘Then I beg you, father, send Lazarus to my family, for I have five brothers. Let him warn them, so that they will not also come to this place of torment.’
“Abraham replied, ‘They have Moses and the Prophets; let them listen to them.’
“‘No, father Abraham,’ he said, ‘but if someone from the dead goes to them, they will repent.’
“He said to him, ‘If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, they will not be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.’”
Reflection
Just over two weeks ago, on Thu, Sept 8, the world heard with sadness of the passing of Elizabeth Alexandra Mary Windsor, Queen Elizabeth II. This past Monday, we watched the global broadcast of her funeral in Westminster Abbey and the service of committal in St. George’s Chapel in Windsor Castle.
The service was deeply moving and meaningful in all its pageantry and symbolism, its deep silence and heart-felt tribute. The services – both the funeral and the committal, were conducted under the rubrics of the Church of England’s Book of Common Prayer. The liturgy was traditional – shaped and perfected over the centuries. The music was specially chosen and perfectly offered. The readings and prayers were full and deep.
And I was struck by what was said of the Queen, and why she was so beloved in life and honoured in death. Mention was made of her calm and courageous embrace of the world and its issues. Of her consistently dignified and respectful posture towards others. And, more than anything else, her life of unstinting service of others, her dedication to serving the common good and well-being of the world that she inhabited and influenced as queen.
Four days before the Queen passed, on the other side of the world and on the other end of the spectrum of 400 years of British and Canadian history, another woman died – Bonnie Lee Goodvoice-Burns, a Dakota woman, member of the Wahpaitan-Dakota First Nation, and a member of the James Smith Cree First Nation. She was one of 11 people murdered and 18 people injured in a violent massacre by another member of the community severely addicted and troubled and out of control.
Bonnie’s funeral took place a week before the Queen’s, and it too was done under the rubric of her community’s and her people’s traditions. Because of the depth of trauma inflicted on the whole community – 29 people killed or injured in a community of 1500, made up such deeply interwoven families that no family was left intact or unaffected – efforts were made to create traditional time and space for healing ritual.
Silence and privacy were requested. Media conferences were limited. A community fish fry in was held in a large tent on the grounds of Bernard Constant Community School. The event spanned a few days, with food and people coming for all over to share in the grief and in the goodness of community, of creation, and of life. Ribbon skirts and shirts traditionally worn at funerals were made by hand for all the community members to wear. There was a sacred fire. At one point, four eagles circled overhead.
And the things that were said of Bonnie? Stories were told of how she always put others before herself. How she worked at the school, and made a difference for good in people’s lives. How for her the children – her own as well as others, came first. She was a “true matriarch” living out the best of her people’s spiritual tradition. And she was “not a victim; she was a hero” because she died protecting her children from the attacker.
I mention the similarity of those
two passings and the celebration of those two lives lived and now ended,
neither to diminish Elizabeth II and what her life and her reign meant to so
many, nor to elevate Bonnie to something she was not, and did not inhabit
during her life on Earth. The point is, though,
at the end of it all, and seen through the eyes of eternity, is there a
difference between the two? In the eyes
of God, and in the good judgement of heaven, at the end of their life stories is
there a line of separation between them?
Neither one really chose their place in the world. Elizabeth, in fact, in the beginning was not meant to be queen. It was a royal scandal and her uncles’ abdication of the throne, followed later by her father’s early death, that suddenly placed her, feeling woefully unprepared at the age of 26, on a throne that more than ever required a strong, courageous and creative presence in order to survive and remain meaningful in a rapidly changing world.
And as for Bonnie, she did not choose the broken and dysfunctional setting into which she was born. The deep damage that was done to her community long preceded her, and she like so many was born into the near-impossible challenge of finding a way of healing, of recovery, and of new life.
Both women, though, embraced where they were. Accepted the challenges of their own formation and reformation. And lived out their place – lived out the role made available to them, for the good of others and the well-being – the welfare and the ongoing, unfolding common good of the community they were part of.
So that at the end, passing from and passing beyond their particular place and role in the world, is there any difference between them? Are they of different races and classes? Or do the lines of separation dissolve, and in the eyes of God they are of one people and one extended, connected family?
In this world and in this life, we live with so many lines of separation. We focus on so many apparent differences. And we let these appearances – these apparent differences and lines of separation, shape our lives, our practices, our politics, our prayers, our definitions of who and what our community, our family, our tribe are against others. We let these things limit what we see as our concern and our responsibility.
Like the rich man who, even when he entered the afterlife, and found that his way of drawing lines as he did, and as firmly as he did only landed him in the dark and in torment – even when he learned the effect of his way of living, he still only cared really for those he saw as his kin. Instead of giving thanks to God for raising up Lazarus at least to a share in the goodness of God and of life, he asked God to please send Lazarus as a servant to comfort him and to warn his brothers. Even in hell, he lives within the lines he drew so firmly, and held to so harshly in his life on Earth. And is that why he is there – and stuck there so firmly?
It makes me think that God would much rather we not draw lines through the world the way we do. Because if lines are to be drawn at all between us, they are not to be drawn between the rich and the poor, or between the have’s and the have-nots, between the powerful and the disempowered, between us and them – however the “us” and the “them” are defined.
Rather, the line of separation, if there is to be one at all, is more rightly drawn between those who no matter their circumstance in life and their place in the world, give of themselves, and share what they have and who they are for the good of others around them, and those who do not. Between those who, no matter how ill-prepared and overwhelmed, or broken and limited they may be themsleves, give of themselves and do what they can for the well-being of all, and for the common good of the wider community they are part of, and those who do not.
And actually, as I think about even that, it doesn’t seem quite right. Not yet completely honest and accurate. Because we are still trying to draw lines between people – between person and person, based on our human judgement.
I wonder if the more helpful thing is to see that the line of separation is most truly drawn right through the middle of each of our lives, between the times and the moments and the ways we are of service to others – especially others who seem to be on the other side of a line, and the times and moments and ways we are not. Between the times we are able to serve the well-being of others and the common good, and choose to, and the times we are able, and choose not to.
I think I may make a little poster for my wall, to help me remember the way Muhammad Ali put it – that “service to others is the rent you pay for your room here on Earth.”
