Sanctuary

Sanctuary

(“Seek good and not evil, that you may live; and so the Lord, the God of heavenly forces, will be with you just as you have said.” Amos 5:14)

You keep moving the target, you keep changing the rules,
you declare some things illegal and others gifts of gold.
When you based your opinion on third-hand
professional gossip you got lost in the crystalline darkness.
While you laugh I cry that you
have held the truth at arm’s length. And you mock
the prophets who speak showers of rain,
not your disdain for what you cannot understand.

These moments are over like the fading rainbow,
and we do well to remember the colors once the
spectrum has gone from our perception. (Does it
get brighter
the longer we stare?)

So they hijacked 700 without due process,
they commandeered them across the skies
without a clue how many were wrong or right.
And then I hear your voice pronouncing judgment
on them all,
making them guilty, making them criminals,
making them subject to your cartoon caricatures
and two-dimensional portraits. You paint them
all the same.

Sanctuary. We hear the mission bells.
Sanctuary. We hear the widow’s tears.
Sanctuary. We wait the summer sun.
Sanctuary. We wait the promised sage.

Sanctuary, we hear their calls to hear their case,
a place safe enough for their stories to be
safely shared over soup and a bed protected from
the managers of messages who lengthen the shadows.
And we hear the babies gently cooing themselves to sleep.

Open Their Hearths

Open Their Hearths

(“I will seek the lost, bring back the strays, bandage the injured, and strengthen the weak, but I will destroy the fat and the strong. I will shepherd them with justice.” Ezekiel 34:16)

Did you deeply believe you pulled the strings?
Did you think you could pull the rug out from under them?
Did you think they were blindfolded and could not see
the machinations and motives in your published screeds?

Where did you come up with such ill-advised plans?
Where did you find the words to push them down the
throats of those who waited for directions home?
Somewhere you decided to cut bait and run,
and leave the consequences to courts you thought
you controlled.

Once you closed your eyes, once you were out of view,
once you were alone, no one but you, only you; once
there was no one to perform for,
once the cameras shut down for the night, did you
allow the cries to reach your ears of all
those you stole from? Did you account for all you stole?

You called them strays, but they were herded away by
your incongruous religion. You called them animals while
you foamed at the mouth and lacerated compassion like
a butcher’s cleaver.

There is a day, indeed it is here,
there is a way that the weak will travel
that takes them inside the heart of all creation.
Your time is up,
your rule is over,
your words are zed,
you’re not so clever.
There is a moment decreed when
all the injured will find alternate phrases
to the ones fed from pompous and penal
pulpits.

You lit the fire, but they will open their
hearths to the sojourners of solace.

Love Songs for Everyone

Love Songs for Everyone

(“But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.” Matthew 6:33)

Demonizing immigrants is not doing anything
for the kingdom of God.
Vilifying gays does not accomplish God’s dream
for the world.
Letting the poor in,
but insisting they sit where they cannot be seen,
is from a kingdom of this world, a kingdom headed by
a Satan who only wants to discredit God’s grace.
Letting the mentally challenged have a place,
but insisting they better never become ushers,
misses everything that God has ever dreamed.

Seek the dream, the one where every tribe, nation,
language, and ethnic group, every sexuality, every
bisected economy of the poor, rich or medial are one;
seek the kingdom, where God is happy that
uncommon odors cannot deny a teenager a place
in the celebration of grace. Open wide the gates,
and do not lock them again. Throw open the windows
and let the unbridled joy seep into the neighborhood.
Let it waft into kitchen windows of those who
wondered why they were never invited. Let it whisk
around the room like Thanksgiving pie baked hours
before its partaking. Let the words learn holy silence.
Let the words learn that tongues do not need to wag.
Let the words learn the happy sound when someone finds
their way to our group who knows nothing of our niceties.

Open your arms wide, learn their faces, repeat their names,
invite them for lunch, sit with their children, play their games,
roll the tonka trucks for the littles to roll back. Tell the adults
there is no qualification for our little group. Some of us
are not sure what we think about God these days. Some of us
are undeterred and couldn’t be moved from faith by the worst
calamity possible. Some are CEOs, some are dishwashers,
some are behind on their rent, some own their homes outright.
But together we are a dream come true, a dream formulated
in eternity past, in the heart of God. A dream that sees the kingdom
full of every possible extraction and opinion.

I’ve been poor, I’ve been broke, I’ve been okay, I’ve been saved.
I’ve been well-off, not really rich. I’ve been waiting to be a part
of something like this.
There are no greater riches than the grace we find hidden
in the lives we once had bidden adieu to. Isn’t it time to
hear their stories, affirm their humanity, celebrate the divine
that dwells in them as certainly as we think it does in us?
Isn’t it time that our worship is simply full of
love songs for everyone.