Crossing chasms

Luke 16: 19-31
New Ark United Church of Christ, Newark, DE
Sept. 29, 2019

James Janknegt: The Rich Man and Lazarus

Have you ever participated in a privilege walk? It’s an exercise in which participants are asked to step forward or backward in response to questions about societal privilege.



It would be too cumbersome to conduct a privilege walk in this space with all these chairs. Also, it can make us feel exposed and reveal things about our lives that we might want to keep private. But I think we can still benefit from reflecting on some of the questions and imagine where we might end up in the room by the end of the exercise. The original has 44 questions. I’m going to ask you a little over half that.



So imagine that we are all lined up across the middle point of the worship space. As you reflect on each question, move your imaginary self forward or backward as per what your response would be.

• If your ancestors were forced to come to the USA not by choice, take one step back.
• If your primary ethnic identity is "American," take one step forward.
• If you were ever called names because of your race, class, ethnicity, gender, or sexual orientation, take one step back.
• If you are the gender you were assigned at birth, take one step forward.
• If you are not the gender you were assigned at birth, take one step back.
• If one or both of your parents were "white collar" professionals: doctors, lawyers, etc. take one step forward.
• If you studied the culture of your ancestors in elementary school, take one step forward.
• If you went to school speaking a language other than English, take one step back.
• If there were more than 50 books in your house when you grew up, take one step forward.
• If you ever had to skip a meal or were hungry because there was not enough money to buy food when you were growing up, take one step back.
• If you were taken to art galleries or plays by your parents, take one step forward.
• If one of your parents was unemployed or laid off, not by choice, take one step back.
• If you have health insurance take one step forward.
• If you were ever discouraged from academics or jobs because of race, class, ethnicity, gender or sexual orientation, take one step back.
• If you were encouraged to attend college by your parents, take one step forward.
• If you have a disability, take one step backward.
• If you were raised in a single parent household, take one step back.
• If your family owned the house where you grew up, take one step forward.
• If you saw members of your race, ethnic group, gender or sexual orientation portrayed on television in degrading roles, take one step back.
• If you were ever offered a good job because of your association with a friend or family member, take one step forward.
• If you were denied employment, paid less, treated less fairly because of race, ethnicity, gender or sexual orientation, take one step back.
• If you ever inherited money or property, take one step forward.
• If you were ever stopped or questioned by the police because of your race, ethnicity, gender or sexual orientation, take one step back.
• If you were ever uncomfortable about a joke related to your race, ethnicity, gender or sexual orientation but felt unsafe to confront the situation, take one step back.
• If you were ever the victim of violence related to your race, ethnicity, gender or sexual orientation, take one step back.
• If your parents attended college take one step forward.
• If your parents told you that you could be anything you wanted to be, take one step forward.
• If you are able to take a step forward or backward take two steps forward.

Where did you end up? Are you forward of where you started? Are you back of where you started? About the same? Wherever we ended up it is certainly not together. There is now distance between us.



 

Much of what moved us forward or backward was beyond our control and yet there are systems in place to ensure who moves forward and who does not, to not only create chasms between us but to safeguard them as well. Those of us who are where we started or forward of where we began have privilege that gives us choices.

The rich man in Jesus’ parable had choices in his lifetime while the poor man Lazarus did not. The rich man could choose his fine clothing, could choose to dine sumptuously every day, the kind of feasting one would do on a festival or holy day. He chose to have a gate to his house which means there was a barrier of some kind around it to safeguard his way of life. Even the choice of translating the phrase “and at his gate lay a poor man” – the word “lay” sounds like Lazarus put himself there when a better translation would be “was laid”, as in someone or a group of someones left Lazarus at the rich man’s gate, probably expecting that the rich man would help Lazarus because that’s what Moses and the prophets taught those with wealth should do.

For quite some time there has been an ever-widening chasm between the richest and poorest households in the U.S. According to data from the U.S. Census Bureau, it’s the widest it’s ever been in the past 50 years. You may hear folks tell you that the GDP has been growing steadily for the last 10 years; that the median income hit a new record high last year; that unemployment is low—all of which is true. But that doesn’t mean that everyone is doing better because of this booming economy. If anything, it has only increased inequality because our economy was designed by those with wealth to safeguard the chasms between us.

It’s not as simple as what a person is paid to work; it’s how they are valued by society as a whole. We’ve monetized what it means to be white, straight, cisgender male. In God’s economy the values are reversed. The rich man is nameless; the poor man has a name which means “God helps”. In God’s economy God fills the hungry with good things and sends the rich away empty. The first becomes last and the last, first. God lifts up transgender folx, gender queer and non-binary gentle beings and brings down cisgender folks. God lifts up indigenous and brown and black lives and brings down white lives. God lifts up people with disabilities and brings down the abled. God lifts up the earth and brings down human greed. God lifts up what capitalism does not value. God lifts up what we have brought low.



We’ve known since we’ve had the ability to observe and reflect that when the most vulnerable among us are thriving, we all thrive. When all of our children, and not just some or even most, are doing well, humanity is thriving. When everyone has access to health care and education and housing and a living wage we all will do well. When every body can exist safely in the same space, we all will live well. When the earth and all life live in balance—well, that one’s pretty obvious.

There is nothing supernatural that can save us, no power from above to spare the so-called righteous from upheaval, punish the wicked, and give justice to the oppressed. It has always been in our hands, our will whether there will be heaven or hell on this only earth we have. We know how the powerful are willfully, arrogantly neglecting their part, how they keep God or what God values at a distance, and we must work hard to call them out. But do we experience the distance between human beings, do we experience inequality, the disrespect, the dehumanization of others, as painful to us, as painful as it is to them?



Do we take seriously that when one rejoices, all rejoice together;

when one suffers, all suffer together?

That when we misgender someone, it hurts us as much as it hurts them?

That when we walk past a plea for help, it hurts us as much as it hurts them?

That when we disbelieve someone else’s truth about themselves, it hurts us as much as it hurts them?

We value our own experience and do all that we can to keep what we have, to preserve how we live. Are we willing to do the same for those who are not able to do this for themselves? Are we willing to step backward so that they may move forward? Not yet apparently. So what will move us in that direction, if not Jesus and his love and all the other teachers and prophets throughout the ages? As the leading banner read at the first-ever National Trans Visibility March in D.C. yesterday, “How many of us have to die for you to get involved?” 

Benediction



The line it is drawn
The curse it is cast
The slow one now
Will later be fast
As the present now
Will later be past
The order is rapidly fadin'
And the first one now
Will later be last
For the times they are a-changin'


May we, as Church and as people, have the strength and the courage to keep changing with them.