The Gospel reading today was form the Narrative Lectionary John 19:1-16a and Dez preached about Pilate, a puzzling character in the passion narrative who does not see the guilt of Jesus but does not distance himself from what he perceives as his duty.
Dez also preached about the Roman Empire's role in the crucifixion and the tension between Roman policy towards conquered nations regarding worship. Rome wanted their gods, together with the emperor, to be worshiped with the local gods. Obviously this created a tension with the Jews who recognized only one God.
A memorable part of the sermon was Dez's observation that "violence is the language of empire". They moved their sermon to what is asked of us as individuals and as a community. Dietrich Bonhoeffer was cited who considered himself a guilty martyr. An individual identifying as a Christian does present a series of challenges today.
I had my personal reaction to the question of what is asked of us. Recently I have been exploring the removal by the ELCA of Pastor Nelson Rabell-Gonzalez as leader of the Synodically Authorized Worship Community (SAWC) Misión Latina Luterana. Since the Sierra Pacific synod has not revealed, despite Rabell-Gonzalez's wishes for those accusations to be made public, the specifics of complaints made against him So some parallels with John 29-30 jumped out for me:
Pilate then went out to them and said, “What accusation do you bring against this Man?”. They answered and said to him, “If He were not "an evildoer, we would not have delivered Him up to you
Dez did not bring up these comparisons in her sermon but the parallels, to me, were striking regarding what we are being asked to believe about Pastor Nelson.
The other part of the reading that struck me in regards to what is happening in the Sierra Pacific synod was Pilate and Jesus talking about the followers of Jesus. Jesus said:
The reason I was born and came into the world is to testify to the truth. Everyone on the side of truth listens to me.”
“What is truth? retorted Pilate. With this he went out again to the Jews gathered there and said, “I find no basis for a charge against him.
The synod wanted Pastor Nelson to sign an NDA which they call a Non-Disparagement Agreement rather than a Non-Disclosure Agreement. Regardless of what it is called it is not exactly a strong embrace of accepting the truth coming out whether or not it is embarrassing or uncomfortable to reveal.
What we are called upon to do as individuals, as a church, or a community is neither easy or straight-forward.
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