Talitha Cumi: Rise Up, Little Girl: September 23

 Then Jesus took a little child and put it among them; and taking it in his arms, he said to them, “Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me, welcomes not me, but the one who sent me.”

Let’s picture this in our minds, this embrace by Jesus of a child. And let us remember that a child, in this Mediterranean society of Jesus, was one without status, power, or value.  This is the one Jesus brings into the center of the gathering; this is the one Jesus embraces, welcomes, and by doing so, welcomes the Divine.

Friends: the only way I know how to be a priest and pastor is to be myself. With vulnerability and authenticity.  So with vulnerability I come before you today and share that I have discovered a ball of anger burning within me. An anger that I had not recognized was within me all these 52 years I have been trodding this fragile earth, our island home.  But I cannot hold it in any longer. I cannot ignore it. It burns. And right now, it is being fed daily. I have found myself needing to find more and more ways to seek the light, to go to the silence and enter that holy space where God waits for me so that the anger can at least be siphoned off a bit and weakened, so that I can be reminded of our bigger Truth, this stronger love that wins…..

 Then Jesus took a little child and put it among them; and taking it in his arms, he said to them, “Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me, welcomes not me, but the one who sent me.”

Beloved, as the Body of Christ, we are called to follow Jesus’ action, and we need the little child we bring into our embrace to be female…..all females.  Because Beloved we have not valued the female among us. Probably since time began; I don’t know. But, I do know, certainly for my whole life. And this assault of the female is so embedded in who we are, how we live, what we find to be normal, that we don’t even recognize it when it is happening. We all participate in it---male and female. We just allow it. If we are female, we swallow it. We normalize it: Boys will be boys…….telling our girls to watch how they dress but not asking our boys to respect girls enough to learn control.

Oh, Beloved, there are just so many ways and so many things that lead to this diminishment of women…..that is why this ball of anger within me is burning……I knew when this began, this metoo movement, with women standing up and refusing to be silenced and demanding a change, demanding justice for the violence that is so often just accepted as this is how it is…..I knew this would be a reckoning. I knew once the thread was pulled, it would be unraveling and unraveling and unraveling for a long time …….

Because you see, sexual assault isn’t just physical…….if you are a male, you probably cannot even imagine……it begins when we who are female are put in precious clothes that are supposed to stay clean; dresses that limit our movements; clothes that define our expectations. It begins when people assume that our highest goals are found in the home with only a limited pool of influence. When we are told that there are positions and roles that we cannot do….and then when we refuse to relent and we achieve those roles, we are told we are not as valuable because we are paid less for the same work….When we are told to not raise our hands so often or to speak more quietly, to be more feminine…..when we show leadership skills and are seen as bossy or aggressive instead of promising and effective….

But, Beloved, even for all of these truths to be true, so many other things had to be accepted as truth first.  Humanity has built a structure that inherently lessens the influence, the voice, and the value of women. This goes beyond patriarchial society. It is found even at the heart of our faith story and how we, as the Church, have chosen to tell it. We have focused the great miracle of the Mother of Jesus, the love and life of Mary whose greatest gift is that she gave birth to the Divine into the world, and we have wrapped it in the word “virgin” as if that is the most important aspect because that aspect then defines her…..and it defines her as men would have her be: pure, chaste, submissive.

And then we hold that version of the Mother Mary up and ask every female to fall in line. Be like this Mary---not focusing on her trust in God, not focusing on her ability to give birth to Jesus who is Love into the world, but focusing on her purity, with every image we see of Mary showing her to be beautiful, calm, quiet, and submissive. And also, that somehow, she is incomplete without the child.  And as this cherished picture is held up for all females to hold as our highest possible achievement, with this expectation for women, came the right to shame anyone and everyone who falls short of it (which is almost every female at some point in her life), even when the falling short of it is caused by someone else’s actions and aggression against her, even though men are held to no such standard. In fact, the standard for men has actually been the opposite. Virility is the highest virtue, not purity.

The damage began so long ago. And has been built and nourished and fed and expanded…….touching everyone who identifies as female………in some way……often (if not always) in many ways: Words that shame or judge; expectations that limit and diminish; glass ceilings that hold us down.

And this week as I prepare for today’s reflection, Christine Blasey Ford has been doubted and questioned and belittled by men over and over and over again (I mean, really, is it any wonder that victims do not tell when this is what they can expect? When so often there is no proof but only their word). And as she has come forward, like so many women before her, including the women who first arrived at Jesus’ empty tomb that first Easter morning, it has been assumed that Professor Ford is telling an idle tale, assumed by legislators who are elected to protect the civil rights of all citizens, legislators who are supposed to see beyond party to the common good of our nation that so desperately wants to be the greatest, the first----this week I hear the Good News:

“Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all.” Then Jesus took a little child and put her among them; and taking her in his arms, he said to them, “Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me, welcomes not me but the one who sent me.”

Oh Beloved, let us be this servant, let us as the people of God, and then I hope and pray us as the United States, let us learn how to be the greatest by becoming the servant. And let us finally and fully recognize that we must serve all children, yes, but let us pay special heed to the female among us---the One who has been granted the lower status. And let us tend her wounds. Let us make changes and choices that help her to believe that this reckoning will lead to a new day.  A new day when half of God’s beloved people, those who identify with the pronouns she, her and hers, will no longer be limited by words, expectations, and lower salaries. When the She among us will have no ceiling to push her down. When the Female portion of the image of God within this tapestry of humanity will be loved, valued, and cherished for who she is and what she brings to the table.

There is much healing that needs to happen; anger that needs to dissipate; redemption and reconciliation in which we must all participate. No one is exempt because this is systemic and woven into all of our DNA. Beloved, this isn’t a political statement. This is a Biblical Statement. And beloved, Jesus is here. Waiting to embrace. To receive, to heal, and to rebuild. If we truly tend to Mary, then Christ will be born anew….within us, around us, and through us. Richard Rohr reminds us: “Christianity is a lifestyle – a way of being in the world that is simple, non-violent, shared, and loving. However, we made it into an established “religion” (and all that goes with that) and avoided the lifestyle change itself. One could be warlike, greedy, racist, [sexist], selfish, and vain in most of Christian history, and still believe that Jesus is one’s ‘personal Lord and Savior’….The world has no time for such silliness anymore. The suffering on Earth is too great.”

​Beloved, let us be the Jesus who, in the fifth chapter of the Gospel of Mark, takes the hand of the little girl who is lying dead and says: Talitha Cumi! Rise Up, little girl, rise up!