Settled in 1736

Smoke From a Distant Fire

Date: April 24, 2005

Scripture: Acts 7.55-60, John 14.1-14

There are two fires that I want to talk about in relation to today's gospel reading – specifically, the second half of John 14.6, which says “Nobody comes to the Father except through me.”

The first was a carefully controlled, well orchestrated little blaze in a fireplace in the Sistine Chapel. It was made from paper votes sewn together, a tradition that goes back hundreds of years, some kindling material, and a chemical to ensure that the smoke from this little fire would turn white.

When the first puff of smoke went through the chimney, and bells started to ring in St. Peter's Square, news services from around the world went into overdrive. Habemus Papam! We have a pope!

And in a moment of ironic juxtaposition that one could not make up, as CNN announced this news, as the new pope stepped out onto the balcony, the little crawl on the screen, the little line that runs below read:

“Best-selling singer Clay Aiken will talk about his own experiences with bullying on the Dr. Phil Show today.” (I am thankful to John Stewart for pointing this out.)

Clay Aiken. New pope.
World Leader. Dr. Phil.
Decisions, decisions.

The second fire I want to talk about wasn't nearly as well orchestrated, nor was it contained. It didn't result in white smoke. In fact, the smoke was black and acrid, filled with the sickening smell of burning human flesh.

This was a car fire, caused by an I.E.D. – an improvised explosive devise. The car was traveling on the road from the airport to Baghdad in Iraq . Inside the car was Faiz Ali Salim and Marla Ruzicka. Marla Ruzicka was a 28-year old humanitarian aid worker, a California girl, and founder of CIVIC – Citizens for Innocent Victims in Iraq. Salim was her driver. She had been working in Iraq and Afghanistan since the spring of 2003, going door-to-door to identify the innocent victims killed in Iraq . That is, the innocent civilians whose only misdeed was being in the wrong place at the wrong time. The orphaned children. The maimed teenagers. The parents who are now childless.

Nobody knows how many innocent victims there are. The United States Government refuses to take a census of this number. Marla Ruzicka, however, documented cases of the death and maiming of innocents and had actually made some headway in getting Congress to compensate these victims.

How ironic that she herself became a victim. Marla and her driver were trapped in their car and burned to death. She never made CNN. Certainly never made Fox News. She never had an appearance on the Dr. Phil Show. In fact, you had to turn to page 18 of the New York Times to find this story. I don't think it even appeared in the Globe.

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For me, this has been one of those weeks where – and I can't use any other word for it – the foolishness of the human condition combined with the arrogance of the human condition has gone beyond the powers of my sense of humor. Way beyond.

Example one:

I was listening to a caller on the Mike Barnicle show this week, someone who had identified himself as a Christian, defending capital punishment for retarded people. As you might know, this was recently overturned by the Supreme Court – in a Virginia case – much to the displeasure of Justice Antonin Scalia. Daryl Renard Atkins, who was scheduled to be executed in Virginia , has an IQ of 59, roughly that of a nine-year old. The caller's logic – and remember now, he identified himself as a Christian – was “an eye for an eye … it's right there in the Gospel,” he said.

Now this is very disconcerting. And there are so many inconsistencies here I almost don't know where to begin. However, let me start with an eye for an eye. It is not in the Gospels, at least not in the way the caller thought. It is from Exodus – the second book of the Hebrew Bible – and commonly referred to as the Law of the Talon.

Exodus 20-22 says:

20 When a slaveowner strikes a male or female slave with a rod and the slave dies immediately, the owner shall be punished. 21But if the slave survives a day or two, there is no punishment; for the slave is the owner's property.

22 When people who are fighting injure a pregnant woman so that … harm follows, then you shall give life for life, 24eye for eye, tooth for tooth …”

Let me add a little more context:

Jesus says in Matthew 5.38-39:

38 ‘You have heard that it was said, “An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.” 39 But I say to you, Do not resist an evildoer. But if anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn the other also.”

That, my friend is the Gospel.

As for Antonin Scalia, he is a staunch Roman Catholic, defender of faith, decryer of relativism in all things, cannot stand the mentality of what he calls “cafeteria Catholics,” who “pick and choose” what church teaching they will believe.

Memo to Justice Scalia:

Dear Tony,

May I bring to your attention the Roman Catholic Church teaching on capital punishment. It comes under the “No” category. I refer you to the case of Jesus v. the Hebrew Bible, and the precedent outlined in Matthew 5.38.

If there is any part of “No” that you, with considerable IQ, do not understand, please feel free to call.

Relatively yours,

John Hamilton

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Now I know that some people do not like it when I bring the sermon into the public square. When I address it to issues that go beyond the news and into politics.

I know that some people come here to be refreshed and uplifted on Sunday morning. And I will try to get there today.

But it is important to realize this:

Like it or not, we have been pulled into the public square. The freedom of conscience which we value so highly has been pulled into the public square. We need to know who we are and what we stand for. We've got to know the Bible. We've got to know where we believe when we say “No one comes to the Father except through me.”

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Tonight, Bill Frist, Senate majority leader, is going to a Kentucky megachurch for a broadcast called “Justice Sunday.” There, he will argue that Democrats are using the filibuster in judicial nominations as (quote) “an assault against people of faith.”

Now if Frist was a small-town mayor in rural Mississippi , this remark would still be offensive. But he is the fourth most powerful person in the country. Whose faith is he talking about? What form of – I suppose – Christianity is he talking about? He does not speak for me, and I am offended that he uses the term people of faith.

Where do you think Bill Frist stands on “No one comes to the Father except through me”?

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One thing we do know is where Joseph Ratzinger, now Benedict XVI, stands on John 14.6.

Let me quote from “Dominus Iesus,” which Ratzinger authored back in 2000. He says:

As a remedy for this relativistic mentality, which is becoming ever more common, it is necessary above all to reassert the definitive and complete character of the revelation of Jesus Christ. In fact, it must be firmly believed that, in the mystery of Jesus Christ, the Incarnate Son of God, who is “the way, the truth, and the life” ( Jn 14:6), the full revelation of divine truth is given.

Fair enough. But does it strike anyone as odd, however, that it is always people in authority – the ones who lay claim to absolute truth – who do the most complaining about relativism? You know, like Jerry Falwell, Tom Delay. And isn't it, using the razor of logic, a form of relativism, to assert that you alone have the absolute truth?

Just something to think about …

But back to Ratzinger. Are we with him so far on John 14.6? Don't get too excited just yet. Later in Dominus Iesus, he goes on to say:

One cannot attribute to [other sects of Christianity] … a divine origin … Furthermore, it cannot be overlooked that [their] rituals, insofar as they depend on superstitions or other errorsconstitute an obstacle to salvation.

… they are in a gravely deficient situation in comparison with those who, in the Church, have the fullness of the means of salvation.

In other words, we are back to “extra ecclesiam nulla salus” – outside the church – the Roman Catholic Church – there is no salvation.

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I think that Marla Ruzicka found salvation. Greater love than this has no person – than to give one's life for another. To the best of my knowledge, she wasn't a religious person. But she certainly modeled a Christian life. We hear a lot of jabber about moral values. How about “lived values.” To take the words of the Gospel and live them.

There's easy Christianity – cheap grace, Bonhoeffer called it.

And then there is the cost of discipleship – which comes, sometimes, as it did for Bonhoeffer and Marla Ruzicka, at the cost of one's life.

That may not seem particularly uplifting. But remember, ours is a resurrection faith. That new life can rise out of the death.

What if we were to make Marla Ruzicka's organization CIVIC – Citizens for Innocent Victims in Iraq – part of our outreach, our Christian Service? Something that we supported. It is something I plan to suggest to Christian Service folks. [I have put the news report out for you to read.]

Let me close today with a quote from G. K. Chesterton, the British author. He said, the problem with Christianity is not that it's been tried and found wanting. It's that it has been found difficult and left not tried at all.