Ezekiel 17:22-24; Psalm 92:1-4, 11-14; II Corinthians 5: 6-17; Mark 4:26-34
The Rev. Candice B. Frazer
Several years ago, I lead a youth pilgrimage to Rome. We modeled it as best we could off of the ancient medieval pilgrimage to Rome—visiting various churches, the catacombs, and (of course) the Vatican. We hired a tour guide to lead us through the Vatican Museum, Sistine Chapel, and St. Peter’s Basilica to ensure we did not miss anything especially important. Our tour guide was German, though she spoke impeccable English. She was living in Italy and working on the equivalent of a Ph.D. in art history. She was honest with us as soon as we met her, informing us that she was not a Christian and throughout our tour it became increasingly evident as to why she was not a Christian.
Our tour guide had a passion for art—she offered details not only of what the art was about but how it would have been made. She drew our attention to the details of individual pieces and what set them apart from other pieces and other artists. From ancient marble busts to exquisitely woven tapestries and everything in between, it soon became evident as to the opulence and extraordinary collection on display at the Vatican.
Not only did our tour guide offer artistic and historical detail to the many works of art we viewed, she also offered her own commentary on the social justice issues relevant in the curation of the pieces in the museum. Time and again she would point to a symbol of the cross and talk about how the church had used its power and authority to acquire a piece of art without proper compensation and, in many cases, without proper consent. As we toured the grounds and the basilica, she berated the church for the blatant robbery of believers through the sale of indulgences as the primary funding source for the current basilica. She even alluded to the use of slave labor in the building of Vatican City and the old St. Peter’s. The more she spoke to specific stories or lore concerning the church’s behavior all in the sign of the cross—the less I wanted to associate with the cross. At the time I wore a James Avery ring with the cross cutout in the middle of it. When I returned home from our pilgrimage, I took that ring off and didn’t wear it again for several years.
Prior to my pilgrimage to Rome, I simply appreciated Rome for being Rome. Of course, the Caesars would live in opulent style and grandeur, but I never truly appreciated how much the Popes simply became Caesars in their own way as the church gained power and authority after the death of Constantine. I have heard we are doomed to repeat the past, but maybe it is more that we just don’t know how to live into a transformative future.
We hold up transformative change as a positive quality we aspire toward, but most of us are more comfortable with congruent change. We might say we want things to change, but we work like the dickens to keep things the same or only marginally different. You’ve heard the saying, “The more things change, the more they stay the same.”
The celebration of Juneteenth marks a transformative change in our country. It is a day in which we remember when every American truly became free. Though the United States of America was established as the land of the free, that was not truly the case until June 19, 1865, when Union soldiers brought news of the emancipation to Texas—a full two months after Robert E. Lee surrendered. Texas was the last state in which to set its slaves free. In a 1940s interview Laura Smalley, born a slave and a small child when Maj. Gen. Gordon Granger arrived in Texas to declare the slaves free, talked about how Ole Master came back from the war and carried on as usual, never telling anyone that the Confederate army had lost or that his slaves were now legally free. It was not until June 19 that they knew anything about it and when the announcement was made, Ole Master simply turned his slaves off his property. Laura Smalley described it as being turned out like cattle.
The ex-slaves may not have had a place to go, but the human spirit is tenacious. They found places to settle as well as meaningful employment. In the years following the Civil War, they voted, ran for office and won, and contributed to the life of their communities. In those years following the Civil War, ex-slaves became important to the economy and political life of our country. So much so that the more independent and powerful they became, the greater their perceived threat to those who were already in power. New rules were written segregation became established, voting ceased to be a right for every American, lynching became a popular means of control. By the Civil Rights era, red-lining and imprisonment became the new form of slavery in our country—and, sadly, those things still exist today.
As a nation, we have experienced one of the most significantly transformative experiences in our history. And yet, just as the Popes did in order to gain the power of the Caesars before them; the years that followed were marked by congruent change efforts to restore a new status quo that looked more like the culture of slavery than the transformation of freedom. In 1980, Texas declared Juneteenth a state holiday. It would not become a federal holiday until 2021 and is officially known as Juneteenth National Independence Day. In large part its proclamation was in response to the George Floyd incident.
Paul tells us that if we are in Christ we are “a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new!” Juneteenth marks a time of “new creation.” But it cannot simply be a date on the calendar or an extra day off work. Juneteenth is a time to live the transformative Christian life. We must not become Caesars, allowing our greed, lust for power, or even our laziness to keep us from taking advantage of the opportunity of becoming new. Instead, if we are in Christ, we are called to bear the Good News of liberation for the captives and a life of perfect freedom for all people. We can no longer look at one another from a human point of view, but we must see one another as Paul sees us, as members of the body—part of God and God as part of us.
Juneteenth serves as a reminder of what it means to be truly free. When slavery existed, no one was truly free. Slaves served Ole Master and lived by the whip and cruelty of the white man, and the white man’s soul was enslaved to his greed and to his desire for the status quo. I believe we find ourselves in that same situation 150+ years later. We have allowed greed and status quo to drive congruent change that does not build up the kingdom, but slowly spirals us down into nothingness. As Christians, if we are in Christ, we must choose differently—we must walk by faith not knowing where the path ahead may lead us and yet trusting that God will never lead us astray. The only thing that truly matters in this life is not how much stuff we own or power we possess, it is the willingness to lead a life that is pleasing to God. We can choose to hold on to power and possession as the Caesars did of old. Or we can choose to be made new in Christ—witnessing to truth and to justice.