Tough Love

I’ve been taking my time putting away Christmas decorations. I told several people I kept having the feeling that Christmas was stolen from me this year. We had lights on the house, a tree, lots of decorations, all the usual food, lots of presents—you’d think I’d have been satisfied. But what we didn’t have was a four week run up of church through Advent—not just the liturgical realities but also the preparations and rehearsals for Christmas itself. We didn’t have friends in or drop in on anybody. We didn’t sing. After Christmas I love the sweetness of the season of Christmas too—the twelve days ending in the feast of the Epiphany, the arrival of the magi, the fruition of the remembrance of Emmanuel “God-with-us” and the launch into the refreshed new year. I was really looking forward to Epiphany this year.

Well, that sort of got taken from us too, didn’t it? We knew it was going to coincide this year with the certification of the Electoral College votes by the US Congress. But we didn’t know what else was coming down the pike. No sweet multi-course meal, no music by the fireplace this year. Rather, it was a tense day reminiscent of other days of tragedy in the world. I spent most of it working on academic research on one computer with CNN open on the other computer and NPR on the radio behind me. The only exception was the hour I spent driving to a healthcare appointment and back—all of that time spent listening to NPR on the radio as well. The capital was “breached,” a mob attempted a “coup,” a vile set of circumstances came home to roost (forgive my nicely mucked up metaphors). Democracy, in the form of the Congress reconvened if shaken returning to the constitutionally-mandated work of certifying a free and fair election, triumphed. But the social fabric remains shaky at best. Everyone is angry or frightened or both.

It seems there is a lot of anger floating about in the world today and much of it landed on us, much of it is still present within us. Preaching a gospel of love often feels futile. People want to believe in love, but it is really quite difficult to understand the concept properly. We love chocolate, we love strawberries, we love the sunshine, we love beauty, we love music, we love each other. Yes, these are all inward ways of comprehending love. But this is not what we mean when we say that we are called to walk in love. To walk in love is to give oneself to the act of always loving—it is an outward action, not an inward sense.

When difficult things present themselves, it is very hard to think about how to work around them by walking in love. Part of it is that we think we are supposed to love some one or some thing that obviously has caused us harm. Maybe, if you can do that it might help. But really, what it means to walk in love through difficulty is to refuse to give into hate, refuse to be embroiled in fear. Instead, we must fill our hearts and minds with the love of God and keep going forward. A psalm comes to mind (23:4) “yea though I walk the valley of the shadow of death I will fear no evil.” In a week like the one we just experienced in the United States, with mounting death from a pandemic that could have been mitigated year ago, with a seditious coup propagated by a sitting president, it is indeed tough to love.

Thus, it is time for tough love. It is time to refuse to be consumed by fear or hate or trembling, but instead to walk in love. How? Not by disregarding the circumstances. Rather, by responding bravely and firmly but always with a loving heart.

Here is where the season of Epiphany can show us the way. In Genesis 1:3-4 God’s creation is defined by the manifestation of light, which was good, because light is love. God’s love shines like the sunlight. The presence of light is the sign of the presence of love. The presence of love separates the dimension of love from the chaos of the absence of love. When we walk in love we walk in the dimension of light, the dimension of creation, eternally.

In the book of the Acts of the Apostles (19:1-7) Paul, arriving in Ephesus, baptizes a group of believers. Now, baptism is new birth by the Holy Spirit given through the action of water. The flowing water is a symbol both of the birth process and of the motion of the spirit, always forward, always cleansing, always refreshing. In Mark’s Gospel (1:4-11) Jesus is baptized by John in the Jordan river. As Jesus comes up out of the water he receives a dramatic vision of heaven accompanied by the arrival of the Holy Spirit descending “like a dove” together with the voice of God. Interestingly, it is an internal experience for Jesus, it is not just a response to baptism but also a catalyst to action. It is the acknowledgment of and the catalyst for the creative power of the presence of love.

We baptize children, we baptize new Christians. We forget, easily, that the people we baptize are people who embrace love. What happens after baptism? Many of us forget to walk in love. We pretty much learn to walk defensively, walls up, in fear. We learn to reside with the absence of love. And we forget that when we do that we create the kind of world we have now.

If we want a world that is not ruled by chaos or hate, then we must learn to fill our own world with love, even when it is tough. We must learn to look for, to prize, to nourish the light of love in our lives. Is there an LGBTQ perspective? Only that it is in this that we are truly and fully integrated. Indeed, it is we who are identified by the love we are created to share who can show the way.

1 Epiphany Year B 2015 RCL “The Baptism of Our Lord” (Genesis 1:1-5; Psalm 29; Acts 19:1-7; Mark 1:4-11)

©2021 The Rev. Dr. Richard P. Smiraglia. All rights reserved.