Jesus says he came to make us one. Looking around, we can all see that we aren’t. Of course, we could be wrong…
Looking for unity in all the wrong places
Easter 7C | John 17:20-26
“I ask not only on behalf of these, but also on behalf of those who will believe in me through their word, [so] that they may all be one.”
John 17:20-21a
This public prayer that Jesus is praying offers a beautiful message. Not just for those eavesdropping at the Last Supper, but for all of those who come after them. That we may be numbered among the many. That we shall be the beloved community. Together. All of us.
The word that sticks out is one. That we may all be one.
And so, for two thousand years, the church has sought to find this vision of oneness.
So, let me ask: how are we doing with that?
Yeah, not so well, eh?
And what’s funny is that we find ourselves jumping to extreme conclusions when we’re confronted with all of this around us.
- Nihilistic complacency: We say nothing can be done. We’re broken sinners doomed to always fall short (so why even try?).
- Individualistic salvation: We must do something. This minute. Ourselves. With fully-formed processes of personal development and firm answers to every question.
Either we can suddenly fix two thousand years of dysfunction or we are utterly powerless to do anything at all.
Of course, there are other ideas.
The early church had no trouble seeing unity in their diversity. Different churches had different priorities. They shared sacred texts and informed one another of developments. For many generations, they passed on a way of life that represented the diversity of people and their faith.
In the fourth century, this began to change (for several reasons). Emperor Constantine sought to use Christianity to more unify the Roman Empire. He also saw the empire as relying on order and an unsettled understanding in Christian thought was threatening that order. So let’s “fix” Christianity to save the empire some headaches.
At the same time, certain theologians in northern Africa offered a new vision of unity. Not in diversity sharing, but in order and sameness. They argued that oneness may best be embodied by one catholic church. So we must all agree, abide by the same principles, and support the same order.
This came to serve as an impressive solution to the emperor’s “problems” and the church’s own concern as it wrestled with different views of the divinity of Jesus.
But it also brought hierarchy and new forms of division. It created a sense of who “counts” as a Christian and, ultimately, excommunicated millions of faithful people. Only to wage crusades against them centuries later.
It is hard to see this vision of unity as ideal.
Another example.
A new tradition in many parts of the church is to celebrate the combining of lives in holy matrimony with a unity candle. The candle, as a visual cue of two persons becoming one, offers a thoughtful engagement with the beauty and the challenge of marriage.
Because, before we’ve even finished lighting the unity candle, we’re faced with what to do with those two other candles.
If we blow them out, we’re saying marriage means we stop being our own people? There is something psychologically dangerous to identifying our whole selves within another.
And if we leave them lit, are we not showing enough devotion to our oneness? Are we trying to have our individualistic priorities ahead of combined life together?
Of course, the obvious response to this is don’t read so much into it! But this symbol so beautifully displays our fundamental struggle with unity today. It embodies our desire to be individuals and our desire to be community. For us to be people of faith and to be the church.
And the irony is that the church has always struggled with this.
We seem to think unity is a problem to solve; a conclusion to engineer.
Jesus says it is by the grace of God.
We have tended to do this backward. We have engineered conformity, might, power, control, dominating a people and then said that God gave it to us. Our manifest destiny.
Our ancestors argued that power comes by the grace of God as the vehicle for unity. This is a belief we certainly can trace back to Constantine. And find is alive and well in the Christian Identity Movement and among its evangelical proponents.
But this is precisely backward. We don’t murder people and say that God made us do it.
The grace of God guides us to build unity with one another. So that we might reflect the love for one another that Jesus has for us as Jesus reflects the love the Father has for him.
It is a beautiful sentiment. And it is our work, not our answer. It is the material substance of our lives, not the shortcut to individual redemption.
Because that is the rot at the root of the tree which afflicts Catholics and Protestants alike: individualism. Either granting one individual power over the community or granting all individuals power instead of the community.
We aren’t striving for unity! We’re after unfettered power!
Even if it’s the personal power to say that’s not what I believe! as a means of preventing the community from sharing its voice.
The power of guns
A racist sought to exert his individualistic power in Buffalo, New York last week. He joined communities online, wrote a manifesto which is a hallmark of the white power community, and then went and murdered people as the white power community encourages.
This was not a “lone wolf” or some crazy person who didn’t belong anywhere. He was part of a community seeking unity around whiteness.
He based his manifesto on the manifesto of another murderer in the white power movement. Who based his manifesto on that of another. Who based his on that of another. This is the apostolic succession of white power murderers.
And their goal is a deranged mutation of unity. These aren’t loners seeking belonging. These are people who belong to a community of terrorism.
While the young murderer in Uvalde, Texas doesn’t belongs to the White Power Movement, he does belong to the wider movement of individualistic power. Because we ourselves struggle to see our oneness. Its potential and its presence.
The Purpose of Oneness
Jesus doesn’t end with our being one. The whole passage is a collection of ____-in-order-that-_____ phrases.
He says that his followers and all who come after may believe in order that we might be one.
And then…
Jesus and God are one,
All might believe,
Glory is given to Jesus to give to all,
The glory is in us
That we may be completely one
The world might know
Jesus is sent by God
And God loves the world
That all of the people may be with Jesus in glory.
And then he says that he did this all for love.
{Gen Xers, cue the Bryan Adams song – All for one, all for love}
At the foundation of unity, of oneness is love. The one thing we’re commanded to do.
This is the way out.
All the political assumptions we make about fixing our problems are not futile. Nor are they wrong. But our conversation is so fixated on individuals, power, and control. We would seek cultural change without acknowledging that individual actions are not culture.
Unity isn’t found in an individual.
It is found in the tension. In our relationships. How we make community with one another.
For us, here, that even means how much we define St. Stephen’s by the voice of its rector! A lot of Protestant and Catholic influence would have us see my role as often speaking on behalf of the community. This is certainly easier!
But our theological conviction is also “wherever two or three are gathered.” We are embodied whenever some of us get together. Which means some people might get together and paint a room and guess what? We did that. Which is as annoying as anything! Because a lot of us might not like the color.
So guess what? We might get together and change it.
And we might get a whole bunch of us in a room to settle on what “counts”. And we might draw up rules and call them “by-laws” and try to enforce them by empowering the vestry. Which is totally what we do. And that’s us too.
We confess
Then when we get together on Sunday to pray and learn and share, we also confess. And we all confess that each of us has screwed up. All of us has screwed up. And we have let others screw up for us.
We let other people sin so we don’t have to and therefore pretend we’re not responsible. But we are.
So we confess. It isn’t just me. And it isn’t just you. And it isn’t just us. It is all. We. We are in this thing together.
A heating globe that will see tens of millions of climate refugees in the coming decades. We should probably start preparing for that.
A culture of violence and individualism that protects the sins of many at the expense of the many more. We have a faith tradition that has some things to say about that.
A need to build community with friends and neighbors for our sake. And we have everything we need to make that happen.
Because we have love.
We have the love of God in Jesus. We have the love he shares with us. All of us. To share with each of us.
We have the peace Jesus left with his disciples. To share with one another. A refilling pot of grace that we can ladle up all night long if we need to.
Any of us. All of us. It never has to be one of us. Jesus sends his disciples out in pairs. That is the principle unit of faith. Not the individual over everything and all things. We is the essential unit.
So We are never alone. And we have each other. May it always be so.