The Body of Christ

Burundi’s president wants to run for an unconstitutional third term and the country might be on the brink of war.

The death toll in Nepal is over 3,000 and rising and thousands more are injured and homeless.

Violence and peaceful protests in Baltimore have the U.S. all the more divided on the issue of race.

ISIS is running amok and beheading people.

Nigeria and surrounding countries are still afflicted by violence between Muslims and Christians.

Mexico’s government has effectively suffocated the voices of the families of 43 missing students 7 months after the fact proving police violence and a corrupt government reigns supreme.

Latin American countries rally together in protests against the United States’ sanctions on Venezuela.

When I’m overwhelmed with big, monstrous problems and I can’t find words or thoughts to calm my mind and heart, my prayer inevitably becomes a meek “Jesus, come soon.”

When I spoke these three words to a friend, he reminded me, “we are his body.”

THAT’S NOT THE RESPONSE I WANTED, MARK!

But he’s right.

Central to the Anabaptist faith is pacifism. Anabaptists will be quick to remind you that pacifism is not passive – it is an active peace seeking and active peace building.

So, I am to claim to be a part of the body of Christ and claim the label pacifist, I have to quit praying “Jesus come soon” as an excuse to sit back and be hopeless. Instead I need to recognize I am the hands and feet of Christ and I must run into the action with all its weight and despair and bring Jesus with me (remembering Jesus is already there).

So I pose a question to myself and to the Body of Christ: we are all hoping and praying for peace, but what are we doing to bring that peace? I’m not talking about engaging in heated arguments online, posting news that confirms your view, or clicking “like” on posts and comments to virtually vote for whom you agree with. Facebook doesn’t prevent war, heal the wounded, end police brutality, tranquilize extremism, reconcile opposing religions, redeem corrupt governments, or smooth over political relations.

And neither does this blog post. But you know what does?

Advocacy. Education. Protests. Service. Aid. Improved policy. Relationships.

I’ll ask myself and my fellow Christians again: what are you doing to bring peace? Are you acknowledging your race and or/economic privileges and reconciling that?   Are you giving money to NGOs that create real change? Are you serving in a community to educate and or serve people that need it? Are you participating in protests? Are you boycotting companies that take advantage of their workers? Are you preaching peace, justice, and reconciliation in the pulpit? Are you having meaningful, honest, respectful, face-to-face conversations with others about these issues?

Do I dare say what I really want to say? It’s my blog, I can say what I want:

If you aren’t actively bringing peace, you aren’t the body of Christ.

If I’m not actively bringing peace, I’m not the body of Christ.

A phrase often used in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America

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Some resources for people that want to do peace:

Boycott Driscoll berries

Donate to the reliefs efforts in Nepal:   http://www.pri.org/stories/2015-04-25/how-help-nepal-7-vetted-charities-doing-relief-work-following-earthquake or https://donate.mcc.org/cause/nepal-earthquake

Talk with your church leaders/congregation about how to work towards racial reconciliation within your church community

Talk with your church leaders/congregation about how you can serve your community:  Union Church in Seattle is  great example of this. The fourth Sunday of each month, congregants serve Seattle by sharing meals with cancer patients, preparing meals for the homeless, making cards for the women’s shelter they host in the church each month, picking up trash in Lake Union via kayaks, etc.

Think about how you can serve; within your community, country, or internationally: MCC accepts families, single adults, and young adults for service terms all over the world: http://mcc.org/get-involved/serve     Peace Corps, AmeriCorps, Jesuit Volunteer Corps, Lutheran Volunteer Corps are also great service organizations.

Find a cause and a peaceful protest to attend in your area. You are bound to find other ways of getting involved by attending protests.

Write letters and make calls to your local representatives and/or companies to let them know about events/policies/products you approve and don’t approve of.  Each call/letter represents about 1,000 other people, so your voice counts, and these people really do listen!

Sign online petitions. There are tons of success stories from simple on-line petitions.  This is one of the easiest things on this list (after boycotting, which involves not doing something) as it just requires your name and location.  And if it asks for an email address, just do it and unsubscribe when you get an unwanted email. It takes no more than two mouse clicks.  https://petitions.whitehouse.gov  and https://www.change.org are great sites for convenient peace and justice work.

Pacifism and my journey to Quakerism

My journey to becoming a pacifist lies inside my process of becoming Quaker. It’s a bit unique.  Three years ago, I heard the news that Osama bin Laden had been killed.  My first reaction was that of excitement and victory but a look at my Facebook newsfeed showed a dichotomy of responses that forced me to take a closer look at my beliefs surrounding war and murder.

On one side, some friends spouted victorious proclamations of the death of bin Laden. “USA! USA!” “BOOO! You suck, Osama!” “God bless America! Osama bin Laden is dead! I hope he rots in Hell!”  On the other side, people expressed mourning over the loss of life.  “Another one of God’s children is in hell tonight because he didn’t know the love of Christ.”  “Forgive your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.” “The only time death was a victory was on the cross.”

While scrolling through the endless posts, something became very clear to me: some of these people sound like Jesus – and it’s those who are mourning the death of a fellow human. If I call myself a Christian, shouldn’t I act and sound like Christ?   If Jesus meant everything He said, shouldn’t I forgive and pray for my enemies?  This made much more sense to me than reading the Gospels and picking what to take seriously. If Jesus was a pacifist, I should be, too.

I have a good friend who is Quaker (Jessy Hampton! She’s on a SALT trip in Israel/Palestine right now! Shout out!) and we began to talk a lot about active peacemaking and Quakerism.  I really resonated with the theology so I decided to look into it more. Over the next several months, I had conversations with other respected Quakers and theology professors and did my own research. Eventually I began to consider myself a Quaker.  Belonging to this denomination of Christianity means that I live out the main values of Quakerism: simplicity, peace, integrity, community, equality, and stewardship.  While I don’t currently attend Quaker meetings (it’s slim pickings in Seattle), I remember my commitment to the Anabaptist community when I politely abstain from communion.

Sure, peace is a nice thought, but it is realistic? In order to be an informed pacifist I felt that I should understand how pacifism and reconciliation play out in the real world – not just ideologically. Two summers ago I traveled to Rwanda (through a SPRINT at SPU) to learn more about the 1994 genocide and the ongoing reconciliation process.  On this eye-opening trip I met Rwandans who survived unimaginable horrors yet found hope and forgiveness through Jesus.  They are now spreading the good news of forgiveness and healing by running reconciliation workshops all over the country. From the experience, I learned that the best way to end war is to prevent it through education.  Teaching tolerance and respect for all humans is key to working against hate and violence.  I try to do this on a small scale in my own life through my work with kids and my interactions with peers.

Peace may be an impossible dream, but I’m willing to bet that Jesus believes in that crazy dream, too.