You Will Not Replace Us
St.
Paul’s Episcopal Church
17-18
November 2018
Mark
13:1-8
Have you ever seen the “Planet of
the Apes?” I’m not talking about any of the recent reboots, with Andy Serkis
jumping around in a suit that would let CGI magic convert him into a super
smart chimpanzee. I’m talking about the original, with Charlton Heston playing
an astronaut that crashes on a world where apes are the predominate species,
and humans are mute beasts which are hunted as vermin.
I first saw it in the summer of
1968, when I was in the last stages of flight school in Savannah, Georgia,
before going to Vietnam, after the assassinations of Martin Luther King and
Robert Kennedy. Yes, I’m that old.
At the end of the movie, Charlton
and his mute girlfriend rode up on the remnants of the Statue of Liberty.
Charlton realizes that he is actually on Earth, an Earth wherein everything he
has known has been reduced to rubble by the actions of the previous predominant
species. And he goes ape. Pardon the pun.
Jesus’ disciples, in today’s
gospel reading find themselves in a similar situation. As they emerged from
Herod’s Temple, one of them said, “Look, Teacher, what large stones and what
large buildings!" But Jesus responded, “Do you see these great buildings?
Not one stone will be left here upon another; all will be thrown down."
Later, the disciples asked him,
“When will this be, and what will be the sign that all these things are about
to be accomplished?” Then Jesus began to wax eschatological, talking about the
end of all things, wars and rumors of wars, earthquakes, and famines, and false
prophets rising up in the name of Jesus. Our Evangelical brothers and sisters
call this period the “end times.” They love talking about the end times. They
think that moving the U.S. Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem will force the
God of Creation to initiate the “Rapture.” They ignore that the “end times”
have lasted about 2,000 years.
For the writer or writers of
Mark, everything Jesus had predicted was seeming to come true. In 64 AD, Rome
had suffered a horrific fire, and the emperor Nero made sure Christians were
blamed for it. The apostles Peter and Paul were martyred. Then, Jewish zealots, chafing under Roman
oppression rose up to throw off the yoke.
The result was the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple in 70 AD.
Somewhere during this time, the stories of the miracles and ministry of Jesus
of Nazareth were written down.
It surely seemed to Jesus’
followers that the end of all things was at hand. Everything they were used to was being
destroyed. The temple was the dwelling
place of God, the physical presence of God in the midst of God’s people. After
that, Judaism itself would be transformed into a synagogue-based faith.
The followers of Jesus must
surely have felt like Charlton Heston in the “Planet of the Apes.” Their entire
world was coming to an end.
But it doesn’t take a zombie apocalypse
or simian apocalypse to turn your world upside down. It can be a gradual process.
Around the turn of the 20th
Century the Progressive Movement emerged throughout the country. The
Progressives rose up and instituted a wave of political reforms designed to
keep American Civilization the way it was. The existing elite was being
displaced by “new money” industrialists. Immigrants were coming in not from
Northern Europe, but from Southern Europe, Jews from Eastern Europe, and even
Asians. They didn’t look like us, or talk like us, and a lot of them weren’t
Christian, but the ones that were Christian were Roman Catholic. The
Progressives instituted a quota system to stem the tide. Historian Richard
Hofstadter credited the movement to “status anxiety.” Their world was in danger
of being turned upside down, and they felt they were being dispossessed. Sound
familiar?
The reason I subjected you to the
history lesson, besides the fact that I was an academically trained historian,
is because of a curious fact. In the
weeks leading up to the midterm elections, the biggest threat to the American
way of life was not North Korean missiles, ISIS terrorism, not even domestic
white extremism, even though 25 Americans were killed in mass shootings the
last couple of weeks. The biggest threat to the American way of life was a
migrant caravan fleeing drought, famine, and gang violence in Central
America. The Pentagon has deployed almost
6,000 troops to the Mexican border to help turn back the brown horde, even
though Federal law prohibits using the military to enforce civilian law.[1]
Additionally, the White House issued an executive order requiring asylum
seekers to enter the United States at established points of entry, which was an
illegal order, and where they are usually turned around and sent away.[2]
What is this all about? A friend
of mine on Facebook posted the following meme, “Real Christians would be
waiting at the border with food, water, clothing, and shelter for the caravan .
. . just saying.” The scriptures back her up.
Joseph, Mary, and Jesus fled the wrath of Herod to Egypt.[3]
They were refugees, seeking asylum. What did Jesus say about what we should do?
“For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave
me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes
and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you
came to visit me.”[4]
What this is all about is fear.
Fear with a bit of heresy thrown in. Fox News had 310 mentions of the migrant
caravan on October 23, 204 mentions on October 31, and 16 mentions the day
after the election.[5]
Our own fears are being used to
manipulate us. In a new survey released on November 7, the Public Religion
Research Institute found that 76% of all voters who identify with one political
party believe that “the American way of life needs to be protected from foreign
influence.” Only 39% of those who identified with the other main party believed
the same way. Sixty-one percent of the first group believe that “the impact of
the U.S. becoming majority nonwhite by 2045 will be mostly negative,” as
opposed to 19% of the other group.[6]
What most disturbs me, however, is that 54% of all white evangelical
Protestants say that becoming a majority-nonwhite nation in the future will be
mostly negative.[7]
Finally, 51% of white evangelical Protestants favor a law to prevent refugees
from entering the U.S.[8]
Tell Joseph, Mary, and Jesus to turn around and go back to Herod.
White Americans are being urged
to be afraid that they are being dispossessed. That they are in danger of
losing their elite status in American society. It is informative that when
neo-nazis, white supremacists, and alt-righters marched in Charlottesville,
Virginia, to protest statue of Robert E. Lee, they chanted, “You will not
replace us!”[9]
What is going on with America,
and with white evangelical churches in specific? Jesus gave us an idea in
today’s gospel when he said, “Beware that no one leads you astray. Many will
come in my name and say, ‘I am he!’ and they will lead many astray.” Many white
evangelical churches, fearing that they are becoming dispossessed, that
American is no longer a Christian nation, are substituting right-wing
conservatism for the gospel of Jesus Christ. Many are claiming that God put
Donald Trump in the White House, instead of an obsolete Electoral College meant
to protect slave states. It’s become so bad that a group calling itself, “Make
the Gospel Great Again,” put up electronic billboards around St. Louis that
featured a picture of Donald Trump with a quote from John 1:14, “The Word
Became Flesh.”
What is permanent in our lives? What
are the stones that make up the Temple of the things we hold fast? Do we clutch
onto our status, our wealth, or place in the community or in the Church?
The truth is that all things are
in transition, becoming what it was not. They are all slipping away. The Temple
of Herod built up and then was thrown down. The Roman Empire fell to
barbarians. The British Empire rose and then faded to become a Commonwealth.
Even our shorelines are not fixed forever. Rick Scott has spent his term as
governor of Florida denying global warming, but he may have to rethink his
stand when the water reaches his upper lip.
There is only one thing to which
we can cling. One thing that will remain constant in our lives. One group of stones that will never be thrown
down. That thing is the love of God manifested in the face of our Lord Jesus
Christ. As Jesus said, “Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will
never pass away.”[10]
[2] https://www.dallasnews.com/opinion/commentary/2018/11/12/trumps-executive-order-asylum-violates-law
[3]
Matthew 2:13.
[5] https://thinkprogress.org/donald-trump-migrant-caravan-midterm-elections-media-coverage-a379a950e7ad/
[6]
PRRI, “Findings from the 2018 American Values Survey, p. 27.
[7]
Ibid., p. 28.
[8]
Ibid., p. 33.
[9] https://www.splcenter.org/hatewatch/2017/10/10/when-white-nationalists-chant-their-weird-slogans-what-do-they-mean
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