Davie Napier - "Back from the Cave" (November 24, 1974)
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Transcript
Transcripts may contain inaccuracies.
(worship music) | 0:05 | |
(choral singing) | 0:52 | |
- | Grace to you and peace from God, | 6:46 |
our father, and our Lord Jesus Christ. | 6:49 | |
My brothers and sisters in Christ, | 6:55 | |
let each one of us now confess his or her sin | 7:01 | |
surely in the presence of almighty God, | 7:10 | |
but also in the presence of a caring fellowship | 7:14 | |
of friends and neighbors. | 7:18 | |
Let us pray. | 7:22 | |
Oh Lord God, | 7:25 | |
you have made our land rich | 7:27 | |
in the abundance of your creation. | 7:29 | |
Yet freedom, justice, | 7:32 | |
food for life, and love universal | 7:34 | |
ar for us and for countless others all over the world | 7:38 | |
still only a dream. | 7:42 | |
We come before you acknowledging that our gratitude | 7:45 | |
may not be gratefulness, but greediness. | 7:49 | |
We know that our stewardship should be manifest | 7:53 | |
in service to others. | 7:56 | |
We know it is not enough for us simply to say, we are sorry. | 7:59 | |
As we say this, others are now hungering, starving, and die. | 8:04 | |
We need to feel personally the urge to aid | 8:11 | |
our distressed and broken sisters and brothers of the world. | 8:14 | |
May we learn to share our abundance so that our dreams | 8:20 | |
of wholeness and health for all may become a reality. | 8:24 | |
And then with the help of your amazing grace, | 8:30 | |
we who are still lost in the maze of selfishness | 8:34 | |
may become truly thankful. | 8:38 | |
So we pray, | 8:40 | |
so may it be. | 8:42 | |
Let us continue | 8:48 | |
each in a personal way with our prayers to God. | 8:51 | |
The Lord will keep your going out and your coming in | 9:16 | |
from this time forth and forevermore. | 9:22 | |
May the almighty and merciful God grant us pardon | 9:28 | |
and forgiveness for all our sins | 9:34 | |
through Jesus Christ, our Lord. | 9:39 | |
Amen. | 9:43 | |
(worship music) | 9:46 | |
(choral singing) | 10:21 | |
- | Let us stand for the affirmation of our faith. | 14:40 |
We are not alone. | 14:51 | |
We live in God's world. | 14:53 | |
We believe in God who has created and is creating, | 14:56 | |
who has come in the true man, Jesus, | 15:01 | |
to reconcile and make new, | 15:04 | |
who works in us and others by his spirit. | 15:07 | |
We trust him. | 15:11 | |
He calls us to be his church, to celebrate his presence, | 15:13 | |
to love and serve others, | 15:18 | |
to proclaim Jesus crucified and risen, | 15:21 | |
our judge and our hope | 15:25 | |
in life, in death, in life beyond death. | 15:27 | |
God is with us. | 15:32 | |
We are not alone. | 15:34 | |
Thanks be to God. | 15:36 | |
The Lord be with you. | 15:40 | |
(congregation answers) | 15:43 | |
Let us pray. | 15:44 | |
Oh God, we thank you | 15:54 | |
for this day and this moment, | 15:58 | |
for this university and this chapel, | 16:02 | |
for this service and this experience, | 16:07 | |
for this family of yours throughout all the earth, | 16:13 | |
and this people, each person gathered here | 16:16 | |
to worship this day. | 16:20 | |
We thank you, Lord, | 16:24 | |
that you lead us by your spirit | 16:25 | |
and you protect us from others, | 16:29 | |
and from ourselves, | 16:31 | |
that you spare us the full consequence | 16:34 | |
of our stupidity, our fear, and our hate. | 16:37 | |
We thank you for peace, when it exists, | 16:43 | |
for love, where it is felt, | 16:48 | |
and for hope, when it is sure. | 16:51 | |
We, oh God, who are blessed with riches of body and spirit, | 16:56 | |
thank you for life | 17:02 | |
and all that life means to us. | 17:04 | |
Oh God, ever caring, ever sustaining, | 17:09 | |
ever seeking spirit, we reach out now | 17:14 | |
in thought and concern for brothers and sisters, | 17:19 | |
men, women, boys, and girls who are in special need. | 17:23 | |
Some are right here in this place, oh God, | 17:28 | |
and we know it. | 17:30 | |
Well-dressed, well-nourished, well-educated, | 17:32 | |
lonely, hurting, struggling, confused, longing, | 17:38 | |
some are naked, hungry and sick, | 17:46 | |
bodies twisted and broken | 17:50 | |
from disease, and starvation, and neglect. | 17:51 | |
Oh God, through the spirit of Christ, | 17:57 | |
teach us how to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, | 18:01 | |
visit the sick, go to those who are in prison, | 18:05 | |
bind up the broken hearted, and set free the oppressed. | 18:09 | |
Oh God, may we become so sensitized to the needs | 18:16 | |
of your children here and everywhere. | 18:18 | |
We will offer them bread for life surely | 18:22 | |
and share with them the bread of life, | 18:27 | |
who is even Jesus Christ, our Lord. | 18:30 | |
And now, oh God, teach us to serve you | 18:37 | |
with loyal and steadfast hearts, | 18:43 | |
to give and not to count the cost, | 18:46 | |
defied and not to care for the wounds we receive, | 18:52 | |
to work and not to ask for rest, | 18:56 | |
to serve and not to ask for any rewards, | 19:01 | |
save that of knowing, oh God, that we are in some small way | 19:04 | |
doing your will through Jesus Christ, | 19:10 | |
our Lord, our brother, who taught us how to live | 19:16 | |
and teaches us how to pray as we pray together. | 19:21 | |
Our father, who art in heaven, | 19:26 | |
hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, | 19:30 | |
thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. | 19:34 | |
Give us this day our daily bread | 19:39 | |
and forgive us our trespasses | 19:42 | |
as we forgive those who trespass against us. | 19:44 | |
And lead us not into temptation, | 19:48 | |
but deliver us from evil | 19:51 | |
for thine is the kingdom, the power, and the glory, | 19:54 | |
forever and ever, amen. | 19:58 | |
May I welcome you to this service of worship this day, | 20:05 | |
a day in some ways, | 20:13 | |
which is a down day for those of us | 20:16 | |
who struggled hard and wanted yesterday's game to come out | 20:23 | |
just one or two points different from what it did. | 20:27 | |
But may I, in this context, say a word of congratulations | 20:34 | |
to those who represented this university yesterday, | 20:39 | |
some young man, coaches, and athletes whom I have gotten | 20:44 | |
to know quite well this fall, | 20:47 | |
and congratulate them on the way they really gave | 20:51 | |
of themselves, for themselves surely, | 20:54 | |
but also for you, and me, and for this place. | 20:57 | |
So it is a down day, but not really. | 21:02 | |
And I say congratulations to those who represented us. | 21:06 | |
May I invite you to one of two special services | 21:12 | |
this afternoon and tonight at three o'clock | 21:17 | |
and at eight o'clock, | 21:19 | |
something rather unique in the way of worship in this place. | 21:21 | |
There will be a puppet show depicting the creation. | 21:25 | |
There will be music, | 21:28 | |
and there is an art exhibit which will be | 21:30 | |
on display in the crypt. | 21:32 | |
So there'll be something for us to see up here | 21:34 | |
and as well as downstairs. | 21:37 | |
Services will begin at three and at eight. | 21:42 | |
You are invited to come and share | 21:45 | |
in these worship experiences of religion and the arts. | 21:47 | |
The offering today in its entirety, | 21:56 | |
as decided by the administrative committee of the chapel, | 22:02 | |
will go to Oxfam America. | 22:06 | |
And that means that it will go to relieve some | 22:13 | |
who are starving. | 22:17 | |
I was impressed in a way that I have never been | 22:20 | |
impressed before by the Duke students this week, | 22:23 | |
who some 15 or 1,800 or so of them fasted on Thursday | 22:25 | |
and contributed something over $4,000 to Oxfam Relief | 22:31 | |
and with your generosity and your concern this morning, | 22:37 | |
our total contribution to Oxfam may well exceed $5,000. | 22:40 | |
So I encourage you to give, | 22:46 | |
to join with those students and others who have already | 22:47 | |
expressed their concern this week. | 22:50 | |
The time of the offering, will you remember this | 22:53 | |
and give so that someone may feed just a little bit better. | 22:57 | |
We welcome to Duke University and to Duke Chapel today | 23:06 | |
the Reverend Dr. B. Davie Napier, | 23:11 | |
currently president of Pacific School of Religion. | 23:15 | |
He is a poet, priest, pastor, teacher, | 23:19 | |
administrator, Old Testament scholar, | 23:26 | |
but contemporary prophet. | 23:31 | |
You are invited to join us today at lunch in room 101 | 23:35 | |
of the Union Building to have conversation with Dr. Napier. | 23:39 | |
But at this moment, may I say to you, Dr. Napier, | 23:44 | |
that in the name of God, and on behalf of those of us | 23:48 | |
who gather here to worship this day, | 23:52 | |
I welcome you to Duke Chapel. | 23:54 | |
And now we hear the word which you bring to share with us. | 23:56 | |
- | The reading of 1 Kings 19 | 24:17 |
will become a part of the sermon. | 24:24 | |
What Ms. Phyllis Christian Harris reads | 24:27 | |
represents my own translation and editing | 24:33 | |
of that remarkable story. | 24:37 | |
In the preceding chapter, 1 Kings 18, | 24:41 | |
you remember that Elijah, the prophet of Yahweh, | 24:47 | |
has defeated and decimated the prophets of Baal, | 24:52 | |
whose sponsor and champion is Jezebel, | 24:57 | |
daughter of the king of Tyre | 25:02 | |
and wife of Ahab, king of Israel. | 25:05 | |
in the narrative before us, the narrative of the cave, | 25:10 | |
Jezebel sends a word of dire threat to Elijah, | 25:13 | |
who in terror runs south to Mount Horeb, | 25:21 | |
where he hides in a cave, | 25:28 | |
emerges, is rebuked, goes back the way he has come, | 25:31 | |
and on the way anoints Elisha. | 25:37 | |
But as I hope you will see, | 25:43 | |
Elijah's story is also our story. | 25:45 | |
The threat, real or simply paranoid, | 25:51 | |
the flight in terror through the wilderness of despair, | 25:57 | |
the wonder of sustenance in that desert, | 26:02 | |
the darkness, the stillness, | 26:07 | |
the strangely comforting loneliness of the cave | 26:10 | |
in which we spend a night, or a week, | 26:13 | |
or however long it takes for the noise and fury | 26:19 | |
of our hell to subside, | 26:22 | |
the perception of the gift now of gentle silence, | 26:26 | |
the miracle then of the discovery, | 26:31 | |
a new of the is-ness of the word, | 26:33 | |
but the immediate bitter protest against it, | 26:38 | |
because it will not let us stay in this place of haven | 26:41 | |
from storm, and the silence of gentleness, | 26:45 | |
because it sends us back again. | 26:50 | |
And because it rebukes the pride of our paranoia, | 26:53 | |
our sometimes monumental sense | 26:58 | |
of absolute unique commitments and persecution. | 27:01 | |
And finally, our return to call an Elisha | 27:07 | |
on the way and to resume the work of ministry, | 27:11 | |
ordained and lay, to word of God and word of earth, | 27:17 | |
renewed by the whole kaleidoscopic experience | 27:23 | |
of the trip to the cave. | 27:28 | |
- | Now, Jezebel sent this word to Elijah. | 27:31 |
If you are Elijah, I am Jezebel. | 27:34 | |
(Davie speaks in foreign language) | 27:38 | |
- | You may be a prophet, but I am royalty. | 27:44 |
If your name means God is Yahweh, | 27:50 | |
mine means without cohabitation. | 27:52 | |
And as long as I'm here, neither you nor Yahweh | 27:56 | |
will stand in the kingdom of this royal house. | 28:02 | |
You make your own appropriations. | 28:05 | |
Here are some of mine. | 28:08 | |
Or perhaps one of yours this morning would be | 28:11 | |
if you are Duke, I am Carolina. | 28:15 | |
Here's one of mine, a beautiful morning | 28:21 | |
in Nanking, China, a Saturday morning, | 28:22 | |
I am attending Hillcrest American School and I am boarding | 28:27 | |
with a missionary couple near retirement, | 28:32 | |
their kids long since grown and now thoroughly idealized. | 28:37 | |
It's a matter of dispute between them and me | 28:45 | |
whether I'm supposed to practice the piano on Saturday. | 28:49 | |
I haven't done so this morning. | 28:54 | |
I've gone out to play. | 28:57 | |
I'm 10 years old. | 28:59 | |
Mrs. Wilson, furious that I have gone out | 29:03 | |
before practicing, calls me into the house and says, | 29:07 | |
in effect, if you are Davie, I am Mrs. Wilson. | 29:11 | |
My parents are summoned from Xinjiang, | 29:17 | |
two hours by rail down the Yangtze, | 29:20 | |
and I'm put to bed on bread and water for the weekend. | 29:22 | |
I am devastated for the loss of Saturday, | 29:27 | |
but secretly I don't mind missing the long Sunday in church. | 29:30 | |
The trip to the cave was real, but short. | 29:34 | |
Years later, 1939, I'm in seminary, | 29:39 | |
third year, Christmas vacation near at hand. | 29:46 | |
Failing vision in my left eye, | 29:52 | |
detachment of the retina, | 29:56 | |
an immediate operation at Johns Hopkins | 29:59 | |
and possible abandonment of projected PhD program | 30:02 | |
in Old Testament. | 30:06 | |
If you are Davie, I am adversity. | 30:08 | |
That trip to the cave was longer. | 30:13 | |
It is the late 1940s, | 30:18 | |
I'm the teaching chaplain at the University of Georgia. | 30:19 | |
It is, of course, before the Supreme Court decision | 30:26 | |
of 1954 and the Martin Luther King era of the 1960s. | 30:28 | |
Joy, my wife, and I host a seminar of mine for dinner | 30:34 | |
and as it turned out a very long evening's discussion | 30:39 | |
with three black Morehouse faculty, | 30:41 | |
George Kelsey in Christian ethics, | 30:46 | |
A.E. Jones French, | 30:49 | |
and Ed Williams in economics. | 30:51 | |
An influential university colleague learned of it | 30:55 | |
and confronted me in fury. | 30:58 | |
What he could not tolerate was the fact that we had had | 31:03 | |
these three colleagues with us at dinner. | 31:07 | |
He said, I'll have you fired if it's the last thing I do. | 31:11 | |
If you are Davie, I am John. | 31:15 | |
Now it is the 1950s. | 31:22 | |
I'm on the faculty of the Yale Divinity School, | 31:24 | |
collaborating with a colleague at another seminary | 31:28 | |
on what is to be a joint introduction to the Old Testament. | 31:31 | |
Suddenly in the midst of the venture | 31:39 | |
he writes in effect, your stuff is too inferior to mine | 31:41 | |
to be published with it. | 31:45 | |
If you are Davie, I am, shall we say, Egbert. | 31:47 | |
I don't know any Old Testament scholar named Egbert, do you? | 31:54 | |
On that one too, I went to the cave where the word, | 32:00 | |
and joy, and Richard Niebuhr sent me back | 32:04 | |
to publish the same stuff in what became my first book, | 32:10 | |
"From Faith to Faith." | 32:14 | |
It is 1967. | 32:18 | |
I'm dean of the chapel at Stanford. | 32:21 | |
And in my first year there, the very simple message, | 32:24 | |
if you are the chaplain, I am the president. | 32:29 | |
The issue then centered in Vietnam, | 32:36 | |
the bitter opposition to it, and its effects | 32:40 | |
by the vast majority of students | 32:45 | |
and the role of the Stanford chapel | 32:48 | |
as the center of the resistance. | 32:51 | |
A funny thing, later when he was no longer president | 32:54 | |
and I was on my way elsewhere, | 32:57 | |
but US personnel were still waging the war in Vietnam, | 33:00 | |
he dropped by my office and fell glumly into a chair | 33:05 | |
and said, Davie, what are we going to do | 33:07 | |
about this damn war? | 33:09 | |
I said, where were you a few years ago? | 33:12 | |
This is simply to illustrate autobiographically | 33:18 | |
something of the variety of the form of the trauma, | 33:20 | |
Elijah Jezebel, that may send any of us | 33:24 | |
running for life, as it were, | 33:29 | |
through the desert to the cave. | 33:31 | |
- | Frightened for his life, Elijah ran away. | 33:35 |
When he got to Beersheba in Judah, | 33:38 | |
he left his servant there and went on | 33:40 | |
into the wilderness until at least he sat down | 33:42 | |
under a broom tree and prayed that he might die. | 33:46 | |
I've had it Yahweh, he said, | 33:49 | |
I'm no better than those who've gone before me. | 33:52 | |
- | You can have the whole thing, Yahweh. | 33:58 |
Carry on, but count me out. | 34:01 | |
Go ahead with your fights, but (foreign term). | 34:06 | |
And dear God, don't we all know this feeling. | 34:11 | |
So let's get it out with a proper prayer, | 34:16 | |
not a conventionally pious prayer, like, you know, oh Lord, | 34:19 | |
I'm courageous only help thou mine un-courage. | 34:23 | |
We, in circumstances like this, ought to be able to say, | 34:29 | |
who do we think we're kidding? | 34:34 | |
We hide it. | 34:35 | |
We ought to be able to say, Yahweh, | 34:37 | |
eternal God, Lord of my Lord, Jesus Christ, | 34:40 | |
I've had all of Jezebel I can stand, | 34:44 | |
get her off my back. | 34:48 | |
And if you can't do that, then I say the whole deal stinks. | 34:51 | |
I want out. | 34:56 | |
I've had it, Yahweh. | 34:58 | |
I'm no better than my mothers, my fathers, my ancestors, | 35:00 | |
those who've gone before me. | 35:05 | |
It's enough. | 35:08 | |
Take my life since God knows I'm not better | 35:10 | |
than those who've gone before me. | 35:13 | |
- | He laid down there and went to sleep | 35:16 |
until suddenly someone touched him and said, | 35:19 | |
wake up and eat. | 35:21 | |
He looked about and there at his head | 35:22 | |
was a stone-basked biscuit and a jar of water. | 35:24 | |
So he ate and drank, and then on the strength | 35:27 | |
of that nourishment, he went to Horeb, | 35:29 | |
coming there to a cave, he spent the night. | 35:32 | |
- | Now we have before us a description that is | 35:38 |
incomparably eloquent by virtue | 35:40 | |
precisely of economy, simplicity, | 35:44 | |
and in all of biblical literature a stark singularity. | 35:49 | |
Time stands quite still. | 35:56 | |
It is a moment of crisis majestically detached | 35:59 | |
from all known and common ways. | 36:02 | |
And it is recounted in Hebrew | 36:05 | |
without the use of a single verb to sap | 36:08 | |
the naked power of static, substantive words. | 36:12 | |
We can get by in English using only the imperfect | 36:17 | |
of the verb to be, | 36:20 | |
but the Hebrew remains starker, | 36:22 | |
barer, more powerful, more arresting. | 36:25 | |
- | There was a mighty wind. | 36:31 |
(Davie speaks in foreign language) | 36:32 | |
Not in the wind was Yahweh. | 36:34 | |
(Davie speaks in foreign language) | 36:36 | |
And after the wind, earthquake. | 36:38 | |
(Davie speaks in foreign language) | 36:40 | |
Not in the earthquake was Yahweh. | 36:44 | |
(Davie speaks in foreign language) | 36:46 | |
And after the earthquake, fire. | 36:48 | |
(Davie speaks in foreign language) | 36:51 | |
Not in the fire was Yahweh. | 36:54 | |
(Davie speaks in foreign language) | 36:56 | |
And after the fire, | 36:57 | |
(Davie speaks in foreign language) | 36:59 | |
a sound of gentle silence. | 37:01 | |
(Davie speaks in foreign language) | 37:04 | |
- | It is dearly beloved, not even the beloved phrase, | 37:15 |
a still small voice. | 37:22 | |
When the deafening sound of the awful violence | 37:26 | |
of nature has passed, | 37:28 | |
and there is that sudden contrasting gentleness of quiet, | 37:30 | |
that audible voice of silence, | 37:34 | |
it is the word of Yahweh | 37:38 | |
that is, that comes, that occurs, that happens, | 37:40 | |
that is articulate and apprehendable. | 37:46 | |
Yahweh was not in wind, earthquake, or fire. | 37:49 | |
And after all of these, there was a sound of gentle silence. | 37:54 | |
- | Upon hearing it, Elijah covered his face with his robe | 38:00 |
and went out to take his position at the mouth of the cave. | 38:03 | |
It was only now that the word of Yahweh was. | 38:07 | |
- | That is that it came, | 38:09 |
that it occurred, that it happened, | 38:11 | |
that it was articulated and apprehendable. | 38:13 | |
- | What are you doing here, Elijah? | 38:16 |
(Davie speaks in foreign language) | 38:18 | |
Elijah replied. | 38:21 | |
- | Now watch the defense mechanism come into play, | 38:23 |
all of us are familiar with it. | 38:28 | |
Elijah is, of course, taken sharply aback, he's affronted. | 38:32 | |
What kind of Yahweh word is this, this implicit rebuff? | 38:36 | |
Doesn't he, Yahweh, understand that it's this prophetic role | 38:41 | |
of his that he's imposed on me, | 38:46 | |
that brings me here to the cave, shattered, exhausted, | 38:48 | |
running and hiding from my very life? | 38:53 | |
I don't need this critical interrogating word. | 38:56 | |
I need the healing word, the affirming word, the stroking, | 39:00 | |
the stroking word. | 39:06 | |
- | Elijah replied. | 39:08 |
- | To that seemingly uninformed, unsympathetic word, | 39:09 |
Elijah replied testily. | 39:12 | |
- | I have been passionately devoted to Yahweh, | 39:15 |
God of (foreign term), even while the people of Israel | 39:17 | |
have abandoned you, your altars they have destroyed, | 39:21 | |
your prophets they have put to death with the sword. | 39:24 | |
I am left now myself alone, | 39:26 | |
and they are after me to take my life. | 39:29 | |
- | I want you to hear this essential word. | 39:33 |
From any of us in widely varied situations | 39:38 | |
of self-righteous paranoia, | 39:42 | |
where we see ourselves, as it were, | 39:47 | |
as Yahweh's lone ranger, | 39:50 | |
Horatio at the bridge, | 39:53 | |
Hans Brinker with his silver skates | 39:57 | |
and his finger in the dike, | 39:59 | |
it was only one of those, I'm not sure which it was, | 40:00 | |
the last single remaining bastion of theological | 40:05 | |
and prophetic integrity. | 40:09 | |
And of course, for background music, | 40:12 | |
the Tannhauser Overture, in counterpoint | 40:14 | |
with hearts and flowers, you know, like humoresque | 40:18 | |
and way down upon the Swanee River. | 40:20 | |
Don't you understand they are after me? | 40:23 | |
- | But Yahweh answered Elijah, | 40:28 |
go back the way you have come. | 40:30 | |
- | Retrace your steps, return to where and what you were. | 40:32 |
- | Because there are still 7,000 left in Israel. | 40:36 |
- | The number is no census count, | 40:39 |
but a round number, thousands upon thousands. | 40:42 | |
- | Whose knees have never been to bow, | 40:45 |
nor whose lips have kissed him. | 40:47 | |
- | The way to the cave, or to broaden the matter, | 40:52 |
for the ways to the caves are as crowded | 40:55 | |
these US years as roads to the beaches | 41:00 | |
on Labor Day weekend. | 41:03 | |
Why have we become a generation of cave seekers? | 41:05 | |
Well, if Elijah is Legion, | 41:10 | |
then so is Jezebel. | 41:16 | |
And if Jezebel is Legion, so is the cave. | 41:18 | |
As the flight to the cave is undertaken | 41:23 | |
by vast numbers for a vast range of reasons, | 41:25 | |
so too the nature of the cave | 41:29 | |
varies vastly and appropriately. | 41:31 | |
Nevertheless, every search for the cave represents | 41:34 | |
the more or less desperate craving of the searcher | 41:38 | |
for relief from coping with the seemingly uncopeable, | 41:42 | |
the cave is the womb. | 41:49 | |
A few of the obvious drives that pack us off daily, | 41:53 | |
or weekly, or episodically, or for some in hope permanently, | 41:55 | |
our fear, or even terror in the particular given set | 42:01 | |
of circumstances, the sheer discouragement | 42:06 | |
and exhaustion of facing questions | 42:09 | |
without answer, profound disillusionment that takes | 42:13 | |
many forms with the pertinent prevailing system or systems, | 42:17 | |
deep and bitter contempt of one's own society | 42:26 | |
bred of the abysmal failure to attain | 42:30 | |
in consistent practice even a semblance | 42:33 | |
of the justice professed and acclaimed, despair. | 42:37 | |
So it was with the college generation of the late '60s, | 42:42 | |
over the formidable obduracy of a political establishment | 42:46 | |
in going its merciless way, quite apparently | 42:51 | |
deaf to the cries of anguish of its empathetic | 42:55 | |
and real victims, victims by the tens of millions here | 42:58 | |
and around the world. | 43:03 | |
Archbishop Dom Helder Camara of Brazil, | 43:06 | |
tells us to be aware of escape mechanisms, conscious or not. | 43:13 | |
And he calls attention to what is surely potentially | 43:20 | |
one of our most disastrous forms of caveism. | 43:23 | |
He says, be aware especially of a very serious sign. | 43:29 | |
He said these words last June at Harvard. | 43:35 | |
And here, I think, he goes on above all | 43:38 | |
of the admirable youth of today's world. | 43:41 | |
The danger that after the enthusiasm, | 43:46 | |
the dedication without limits, | 43:48 | |
the commitment during university days, | 43:51 | |
they will reach the phase of installation in life | 43:54 | |
of conformism, of bourgeoisieism, | 43:59 | |
of the death of ideals. | 44:04 | |
The traffic to the cave may embrace us all, rich and poor, | 44:08 | |
royalty and commoners, black and white, free and slave, | 44:12 | |
female and male, peasant and landowner, | 44:17 | |
exploiter and oppressed, and all of us bent | 44:21 | |
on exchanging what we deemed | 44:26 | |
to be an unremediable, intolerable, | 44:28 | |
essentially uninhabitable situation for peace, | 44:32 | |
or even the illusion of peace. | 44:37 | |
And the range of caves runs from the old standbys of sex | 44:41 | |
and alcohol and other drugs to TA, | 44:48 | |
transcendental analysis, | 44:55 | |
TM, transcendental meditation, | 44:58 | |
TV, | 45:02 | |
before whom we stand, sit, lie, eat, and drink | 45:06 | |
for an unconscionable number of adult hours every week, | 45:10 | |
TF, touchy, feely | 45:15 | |
in dual or group encounter, | 45:21 | |
TZ, try zen, | 45:24 | |
TS, take Sominex. | 45:29 | |
(congregation laughs) | 45:32 | |
It is not my intention to say that the cave | 45:36 | |
has no legitimate function. | 45:39 | |
Elijah came back from the cave revived, renewed. | 45:42 | |
Although the word of Yahweh was quite absent and silent | 45:47 | |
in the cave, the experience of the cave, | 45:50 | |
the recapitulation of the womb, | 45:53 | |
the distance and perspective afforded by the cave | 45:56 | |
from and upon Baalism, and Jezebel, and Israel. | 46:00 | |
All this was and is a legitimate gift | 46:06 | |
of a legitimate and essential cave trip. | 46:09 | |
It may be given to us, all of the Elijahs, to return | 46:13 | |
from the cave with fear and terror, if not allayed | 46:18 | |
at least in control, | 46:22 | |
with new resources given to face unanswerable questions | 46:25 | |
with courage and endurance, | 46:28 | |
with disillusionment transformed to fresh determination, | 46:32 | |
with societal contempt converted again to sorrow, | 46:37 | |
compassion, and resolution, | 46:42 | |
and with despair, turning back, | 46:44 | |
once more, to prophetic passion. | 46:46 | |
I hope it's unnecessary to say that both the church | 46:52 | |
and the seminary suffer erosion of authenticity | 46:56 | |
in proportion to the measure of their acquiescence | 47:04 | |
in institutional cave playing. | 47:07 | |
Many lay and clergy would make the church the cave, | 47:12 | |
the escape, the refuge, the womb. | 47:15 | |
The resources of faith, which by the grace of God | 47:21 | |
are imparted to the church as gifts | 47:23 | |
to be given and proclaimed | 47:25 | |
are themselves such properly dispensed | 47:29 | |
as to render infrequent or unnecessary the trip to the cave, | 47:32 | |
but the church itself may not be the cave, | 47:36 | |
except at the cost of losing both the word of God | 47:40 | |
and the word of earth. | 47:44 | |
For all of the legitimacy of the cave trip, | 47:47 | |
the word that comes when we emerge from the cave, | 47:49 | |
where alone the word is accessible to us, | 47:52 | |
the word that comes is always the same, | 47:56 | |
what are you doing here? | 47:59 | |
Do you know what you are doing here? | 48:02 | |
And if you know why you have come, | 48:04 | |
then go back to what, and where, and who you were. | 48:07 | |
Paulo Freire says that we are not built in silence | 48:11 | |
but in word and work, in action reflection. | 48:17 | |
And in a note on that statement, he comments, | 48:21 | |
I obviously do not refer to the silence | 48:23 | |
of profound meditation, | 48:26 | |
could we say the cave, in which one only apparently leaves | 48:28 | |
the world, withdrawing from it in order to consider it | 48:32 | |
in its totality and thus remaining with it. | 48:35 | |
But this type of retreat is only authentic, | 48:38 | |
he says, when the meditator is bathed in reality, | 48:40 | |
not when the retreat signifies flights from the world | 48:45 | |
in a type of historical schizophrenia. | 48:50 | |
At a meeting of the Central Committee | 48:54 | |
of the World Council of Churches in West Berlin last August, | 48:55 | |
the chairman, Dr. M.M. Thomas, said almost wistfully | 48:59 | |
at the conclusion of an address, | 49:03 | |
insisting these were not his terms | 49:07 | |
on the inseparability of the word of God | 49:10 | |
and the word of earth. | 49:12 | |
I sometimes wish he said that we could interpret the theme | 49:15 | |
Christ only as withdrawal from these many worlds | 49:17 | |
and many responsibilities, | 49:22 | |
but we cannot because in and through Christ, | 49:24 | |
God renews all people and all things. | 49:26 | |
In the same address, he had said earlier, | 49:30 | |
as both a temporal and spiritual being, one cannot be | 49:33 | |
involved in a purely horizontal or purely vertical activity. | 49:36 | |
The horizontal vertical, the social spiritual dimensions | 49:41 | |
meet in human nature. | 49:45 | |
And in all human aspirations and activities, | 49:47 | |
living theology, he said, is a dialogue | 49:50 | |
between the gospel of Christ and the self understanding | 49:53 | |
of men and women in concrete situations. | 49:57 | |
Evangelistic witness, he said, must be related | 50:01 | |
to the deepest concerns of men and women. | 50:04 | |
What are you doing here, Elijah? | 50:08 | |
You may stay overnight as it were in the cave, | 50:10 | |
but you may not stay in the cave | 50:13 | |
shut off from the word of earth. | 50:16 | |
And so from the word of God. | 50:19 | |
This is the very word of God, | 50:21 | |
go back now to hear and heed the word of earth. | 50:23 | |
Do we understand in the church | 50:29 | |
what Freire is talking about when he says that people | 50:31 | |
cannot save themselves no matter, he says, | 50:34 | |
how one understands salvation? | 50:37 | |
Either as individuals or as oppressor class, | 50:40 | |
salvation can be achieved, he says, only with others. | 50:43 | |
It is Rosemary Ruether who suggests there are two ways | 50:49 | |
falsely to appropriate the transcendent. | 50:53 | |
One is to domesticate it. | 50:56 | |
We do very well with that. | 51:00 | |
The other is to separate, isolate the word, | 51:02 | |
cut it away from the whole of human life. | 51:06 | |
She says both the establishment, | 51:09 | |
domestication, of Christianity and the segregation | 51:12 | |
of the sacred to a sphere removed from the midst of life | 51:17 | |
are equally ways of abolishing the presence | 51:22 | |
of the holy spirit so that the world of the powers | 51:25 | |
and principalities can go on as before. | 51:28 | |
Domestication, we know all about. | 51:33 | |
It is Baalism, it is the attempt at sustained | 51:39 | |
worship at two altars, Yahweh and Baal. | 51:47 | |
The attempt at prolonged separation is caveism, | 51:53 | |
tolerable, acceptable, even therapeutic | 51:58 | |
as temporary expedient, but quickly self-defeating | 52:02 | |
since word of earth, and in consequence, | 52:06 | |
word of God are shut away. | 52:07 | |
What are you doing here, Elijah? | 52:10 | |
Go back the way you've come, | 52:12 | |
because there are 7,000, thousands upon thousands, | 52:13 | |
a multitude, vast throngs, whose knees have never bent | 52:18 | |
to Baal, nor whose lips have kissed him. | 52:23 | |
Go ahead with the next line. | 52:32 | |
- | Leaving that place. | 52:35 |
- | Is leaving the cave. | 52:36 |
- | Elijah came upon Elisha, son of Shaphat | 52:38 |
plowing with 12 yoke of oxen in front of him | 52:41 | |
and he with the 12. | 52:44 | |
And Elijah passed by, he tossed his robe over him, | 52:46 | |
leaving the oxen. | 52:49 | |
- | And I'm doing some adjustment on the text, | 52:51 |
and this is not Chris's fault. | 52:53 | |
Go ahead, if you will, Chris, with the next lines. | 52:54 | |
- | Leaving the oxen, he ran after Elijah and said, | 52:56 |
let me give my father and mother a farewell kiss, | 53:00 | |
then I will follow you. | 53:04 | |
Elijah said, go on back. | 53:05 | |
What claim have I got over you? | 53:08 | |
Leaving him, Elisha went back, took the pair of oxen, | 53:10 | |
slaughtered them, used the implements of plowing | 53:14 | |
to cook their flesh and gave to the people to eat. | 53:17 | |
Then he left to follow Elijah and he became his disciple. | 53:22 | |
- | Don't misunderstand me, which is a way of saying | 53:27 |
to myself, don't let me misunderstand me. | 53:29 | |
The cave may be good, | 53:33 | |
recreative, restorative, | 53:36 | |
and therefore, essential, but not caveism, | 53:39 | |
which would institutionalize the cave. | 53:43 | |
Cave, si, caveism, no. | 53:46 | |
The cave gives shelter when the furies without | 53:49 | |
and within are raging beyond all control | 53:52 | |
and the word comes more easily | 53:56 | |
and distinctly after the grateful sound of gentle silence | 53:57 | |
and our emergence from this place of isolation and security. | 54:03 | |
It is now that we know in the word of God | 54:08 | |
and the word of earth that we are not alone. | 54:11 | |
We are surrounded, in fact, by clouds of living witnesses, | 54:16 | |
that there is the work of the kingdom to be done | 54:20 | |
and disciples and colleagues, | 54:22 | |
intimate Elijahs with whom to be doing the work. | 54:25 | |
Go back, always go back | 54:30 | |
and on the way, always on the way, | 54:33 | |
find commission, enlist and inspire, | 54:36 | |
Elisha, and Elisha, and Elisha. | 54:39 | |
Go with the word of God and the word of earth, | 54:42 | |
go with Elijah and Elisha. | 54:45 | |
Go with Gustavo Gutierrez, who reminds us that Christ | 54:49 | |
God has irreversibly committed himself | 54:55 | |
to the present moment of humankind. | 54:58 | |
He means, of course, every present moment, | 55:02 | |
to carry it to its fulfillment. | 55:04 | |
Go with Elijah and Elisha, | 55:08 | |
go with Dom Helder Camara, who on rarely intimate terms | 55:10 | |
with the bitter word of Brazilian earth, | 55:14 | |
as well as the word of God. | 55:17 | |
He's nevertheless able to declare, | 55:19 | |
I believe in a creator and father | 55:22 | |
who desired man and woman as co-creators and who gave | 55:25 | |
them intelligence and a creative imagination to dominate | 55:29 | |
the universe and to complete the creation. | 55:33 | |
And he constantly sends his spirit | 55:37 | |
to make the human mind fruitful, | 55:39 | |
even as he made the waters fertile | 55:41 | |
at the beginning of creation. | 55:42 | |
Go with Elijah and Elisha and with Paulo Freire, | 55:45 | |
who against odds much greater than we see or know | 55:50 | |
affirms his trust, as he says simply, | 55:53 | |
in people and his faith in the creation of a world | 55:56 | |
in which it will be easier to love. | 56:00 | |
Go with Elijah and Elisha. | 56:07 | |
Go with all these. | 56:10 | |
Go even with Gary MacEoin, | 56:12 | |
radicalized Latin American priests, | 56:17 | |
who choose to stay within the church and who do not, | 56:20 | |
he writes, see themselves as conduits of grace | 56:24 | |
to tens of thousands of people. | 56:29 | |
They are, he says, satisfied if they can create | 56:32 | |
a few small islands of Christian life, | 56:35 | |
leaving the future radiation to the holy spirit. | 56:39 | |
Beloved, we will go to the cave as we may and must | 56:46 | |
when the time and place | 56:50 | |
of our present moment become unendurable, | 56:51 | |
when in whatever way we hear the terrifying word | 56:54 | |
of threatened, unqualified disaster, | 56:57 | |
if you are Elijah, I am Jezebel. | 57:00 | |
But we will take only temporary lodging there. | 57:06 | |
We will resist the drift or the drive | 57:10 | |
toward caveism in ourselves, in church, | 57:12 | |
and in the life of faith. | 57:17 | |
On our way, always on our way in the earth, | 57:20 | |
we will bring Elijah with us to the work | 57:25 | |
of the word of God and the word of earth. | 57:28 | |
If we cannot do more, it is enough. | 57:33 | |
We will create islands of authentic Christian life, | 57:37 | |
and we will be content in faith to leave | 57:43 | |
the future radiation to the holy spirit. | 57:46 | |
Let us pray. | 57:52 | |
Source of light, ultimate author of truth, | 57:56 | |
creator and sustainer of our life, | 57:59 | |
eternal advocate of justice and integrity, | 58:03 | |
in the midst of human conditions around this globe, | 58:07 | |
which deny you, in a time when commonly power claims | 58:09 | |
to be truth, | 58:14 | |
and in an epoch when we know how unjust | 58:16 | |
are the ways of our nation and world, | 58:19 | |
we make bow to remember in your presence this university. | 58:23 | |
With regret and penitence for the good | 58:29 | |
we might have been and were not, | 58:31 | |
but with thanksgiving for what it has been given us, | 58:34 | |
is given us, to create of light, to clarify of truth, | 58:39 | |
to enhance of life, and to support of justice and integrity. | 58:45 | |
To these ends, be pleased to bless this university, | 58:52 | |
her multiple boards and constituencies. | 58:57 | |
To these ends of light and truth of life, | 59:02 | |
of justice and integrity, all who are a part | 59:04 | |
of this institution. | 59:10 | |
In the name of that one who gave himself | 59:13 | |
for the peace of the world, | 59:15 | |
even our savior, Jesus Christ, amen. | 59:17 | |
(worship music) | 59:28 | |
(choral singing) | 59:53 | |
(worship music) | 1:01:51 | |
(choral singing) | 1:03:08 | |
(worship music) | 1:07:50 | |
(choral singing) | 1:08:03 | |
- | Oh God, | 1:09:02 |
as we have given of ourselves this week past, | 1:09:04 | |
and now give of these, our possessions, | 1:09:09 | |
may we commit ourselves body, mind, and spirit | 1:09:13 | |
to you and to your way, | 1:09:19 | |
and to our neighbors and their needs. | 1:09:22 | |
We dedicate ourselves now to love as Christ loves even us. | 1:09:26 | |
In our Lord's name, we pray. | 1:09:35 | |
Amen. | 1:09:39 | |
(worship music) | 1:09:43 | |
(choral singing) | 1:10:16 | |
The grace of our Lord and savior, Jesus Christ, | 1:13:57 | |
the love of God, the father, | 1:14:02 | |
the fellowship of the holy spirit be with you | 1:14:06 | |
and those whom you love, this day and forever. | 1:14:12 | |
(choral singing) | 1:14:20 | |
(bells ring) | 1:14:44 | |
(worship music) | 1:15:02 |