A Call To Exploration- Romans
12:9-21
This past Spring,
universities across the United States were bombarded with a reality check
around their issues of tolerance and diversity.
It wasn’t the university that was specifically called out but rather the
students. In a time in history when
American politics is the microcosm of a culture which is continually at odds
over very serious issues, controversial topics and speakers have been met with
hostility by student activists in a way that was almost unheard of a decade or
two ago. On the campus of the University
of Minnesota, Condaleeza Rice, a polarizing Republican who at one time was
considering a female front runner for the Republican national ticket was
heavily protested by hundreds of students.
These students, expressing their beliefs and values, on that day destroyed a little fabric of what
the university is meant to be about.
Later that month, Rice actually withdrew from a graduation speech at
Rutgers University, citing the extreme protesting and hostility she was
potentially bringing to the campus.
Now
I’m not a huge Condaleeza Rice fan myself, but the problem is in the deeper
understanding of what is happening here.
Michael Bloomberg, in his graduation speech at Harvard this past may,
sums it up quite well.
“Tolerance
for other people’s ideas and the freedom to express your own are
. . . perpetually vulnerable to the tyrannical tendencies of
monarchs, mobs, and majorities, and lately we’ve seen those tendencies manifest
themselves too often, both on college campuses and in our society,
On
every issue you must follow the evidence where it leads and listen to people
where they are,
The college campus
at one time used to be a place for diverse thoughts. Sure, the thoughts and ideas were divisive,
and people became impassioned about their beliefs and ideas, but they did not
flatly reject the expression of those ideas.
But what seems to be happening is that people are now no longer to hear
different opinions. There are few debates
in our culture any longer, instead you come over here and I’ll give my
perspective and you go over the and get yourself your own education.
This
has left us to be isolated, and as much as we want to believe we are in the
most advanced higher education universities that we can be offered, the reality
is that we are in many ways losing the sacred struggle of difficult
conversations. We are instead pushing
certain groups away while letting other control the airwaves. This is the
challenge of higher education. It used
to be that on the campus, the academy was a place for diverse thinking, for
challenging ideas and difficult conversations.
But now it feels like we are wanting to push out ideas which differ from
our own instead of engaging in the hard work of talking together.
There
is much to be said about our Christian identity within this discussion. Many religious organizations these days wish
for you to believe all the same thing.
It’s the indoctrination of their beliefs, making sure that everyone in
each tribe believe the exact same thing, yet by doing so we have formed over
39,000 Christian denominations across the world. Our unwillingness to have differing ideas in
the same denomination (not congregation, denomination) has led us to shatter into
thousands of pieces. How many disputes
do you have to have to form 39,000 denominations? How much unwillingness to hear each other
does it take to form that many differing groups.
Paul’s
message in Romans tonight speaks directly to the needs of the community to be
willing to see differences as not only alright but as assets to the
community. And we need see this as
well. As a community that prides itself
on welcoming everyone to the community, we need be inclusive without becoming
exclusive. Think about our values. When we say that we are GLBTA inclusive, are
we willing to let someone in the door who is not yet settled on their beliefs
on this topic. As Christians who are
sometimes less serious about scripture as we are about service are we ready to
let in someone whose focus is only on studying the Bible. Are we ready to welcome someone in who is
theologically more conservative than us, more progressive than us? Are we ready to welcome differing races,
ages, etc? I think so, but sometimes I
wonder just a little bit about our own readiness when certain demographics
might enter the community. This is
challenge to myself as much as it is a challenge to each of us gathered here.
Paul’s words echo loud and clear for
me. Do not attempt to be wiser than you
are? Do you be haughty to think you have
it all figured out. Your love much be
genuine or you yourself will find that you are a fool who is faking their real
concern for others who are different from you. And what’s better, if you truly
believe these people are evil, overcome it by doing the right thing, by doing
good. I’m pretty sure Jesus wasn’t a big fan of the prostitution and the tax
collecting that was being done, but he did what others didn’t and welcomed them
to the table. And let me be clear: the
majority of different opinions and beliefs we will see hear are far less
divisive than many in Jesus’ day. The call that Paul gives us offers us the
chance to remember that we are called to exploration, rather than to static
uniform belief in this community.
Last week, I told you then that
campus ministry was the place you learned how to be you, how to figure out who
you are and how you are to figure out how to live. Tonight I invite you from that lens to
consider this idea of divergent beliefs and ideas combining to find a deeper
sense of community than what most people imagine. IF you are going to figure out how to be you,
you have to be willing to allow yourself to hear and appreciate each other’s
different opinions. You may not always
agree, and you shouldn’t, but you have to find ways to appreciate each others
ideas. Yes, in the process it is your
job so stand up for what you believe.
The problem is that most people get set in their ways and refuse to be
changed by others. Sure you grew up as a
fiscal conservative who thinks that tax increases are the worst idea ever
conceived by American politicians. Sure
you think the Bible is the literal word of God and that has been and will be
always the same. But be challenged. You never know. Maybe you will learn something about yourself
in this exploration of the world.
Jesus,
and our current culture, offers us something to realize about the nature of
ourselves: we like to be with people who believe what we believe. And certainly, you are going to get a chance
to spend a lot of your life like this, and probably our community will continue
to reflect similar beliefs. But we should not stop ourselves from welcoming
others, from being challenged ourselves, and certainly from allowing the
university to be a space of free flowing thought and challenging conversations.
If
we are here to learn how we figure out who who we are, we must learn where we
sit in comparison to others. The how is in the challenge of knowing who you are
and being willing to be challenged and changed.
And we must appreciate the value of the other around us. John Wesley once said, though we may not
think alike, at least let us love alike.
So
let us begin our call to exploration from this point of unity: we are called to
love each other, to let go of differences that divide us, even though we may be
challenged by each other, and to simply become a community who is practicing a
call to exploration. If you want to know
how to figure out who you are, you must enter into the fray of other opinions,
beliefs, and thoughts. You must find
participate in a community which challenges you and stretches you. By remaining stagnant and only associating
with those with whom you have similar values, you will never fully embody who
you are. So let us hear each other, let
us explore together. That is the
beginning of how. The is a call to
exploration.
May it be So
Amen.
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