By Whose Authority?

Yesterday U.S. District Judge Kathryn Kimball Mizelle of the Middle District of Florida struck down the mask mandate for those traveling on airplanes, buses, trains, and other modes of public transportation.  The judge ruled that the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) did not possess the legal  authority to impose the mandate from February 2021 to the present.  That mandate had been extended several times, most recently, to May 3, 2022.  It had clearly been point of contention for those on the political right as well as the political left.  Now the mandate is history.  Many airlines were quick to make masks optional for their flight crews and passengers.  Personal freedom has finally prevailed!

In the 1960's, we were taught to be suspicious of any authority.  "Question authority" was the cry on the lips of the generations opposed to our government's engagement in the Vietnam war.  That fear of authority has been evident throughout the waves of the global pandemic created by COVID-19.  The conflict was fueled in the highest levels of the U.S. government as elected leaders discounted and disputed the counsel of scientists.  In every setting, including churches, many have longed for the return of personal freedom.  We demanded the freedom to choose how we would live our individual lives.  We resisted any and all external authority to inform us and shape our behaviors.  

Yes, yesterday was a decisive victory for all who have been longing to be free of restrictive public health mandates.  But now, the decisions for how we will live rest squarely on our individual hearts and minds.   Here's the question:  Who is your authority as you seek to be faithful?  

Jesus was also confronted by the question of authority (Mt. 21:23; Mk. 11:28; Lk. 20:2).  As a follower of Jesus, I find in him my greatest authority.  He models what it means to be responsibly free--not just for our individual lives but for that of the community and society and world where we live.   When I hear him say, "Love your neighbor as yourself," I realize that I must act responsibly with my liberty.  Love means yielding for the common good, caring for the vulnerable, and using freedom to strengthen community.   In practice that means I must be mindful and respectful of those who are working in public places (e.g., clerks in stores, flight crews, physicians and nurses, pastors, teachers) and for those who are not able to make such decisions for themselves.  There are many individuals around us who look to us for guidance and care.  Perhaps that was what the CDC was trying to do.  Now it is up to us.

Love your neighbor . . . 

The View from the Amistad Chapel

 On Sunday afternoon, I hope to be in the virtual congregation, attending the final worship service from the Amistad Chapel in Cleveland.  Many folks will be doing other things.  Most have had little connection with the chapel or with our church house, which has been home to the national headquarters of our denomination for three decades.  The chapel was dedicated to the memory of La Amistad, a slave ship that traveled from Sierra Leone in West Africa to Cuba with a precious cargo of fifty-three captive people in 1839.  There was a uprising on the ship as it neared its destination in July 1839.  The captain, the cook, and three Africans were killed.  Rather than return to Africa, the ship's owners sailed up the East Coast of the United States, hoping that the U.S. would restore order and return the ship to Cuba.  The Amistad was intercepted.  Some of the slaves escaped, but were soon caught,  All were eventually jailed in New Haven, CT.  A long, legal process with international aspects ensued.  The case finally reached the U.S. Supreme Court in 1841.  The court's decision set the captives free.  Our ancestors before we became the United Church of Christ joined that legal struggle to set these people free.  The Amistad Chapel was dedicated to that memory and to the hope that all will finally be free.

When we worshiped in the Amistad Chapel, we would pass the baptismal font to encircle the Communion table and listen for a word from the pulpit.  We would sit before the cross and sing the hymns of our faith.  We were the church in that space.  When I worshiped in the Amistad Chapel, I would always sit in a place where I could see outside through the huge plate glass windows.  The gospel stories of Jesus' love for all peoples and for the city came alive in the faces of those passing by.  The chapel was at ground level, and there I saw most clearly those for whom Jesus called us to care and to serve.  In many ways that view from the Amistad Chapel grounded our life as church.  It reminded us of our mission.

Soon the Church House and its chapel will be part of our denominational history.  We are on the move to a new space just a few blocks away, where the headquarters of the United Church of Christ will be housed on the eleventh floor of a downtown office complex.  This change is difficult for me.  I know we do not worship a building or a particular space.  We are called to adapt as we follow in faith.  But I will pray as we gather on Sunday afternoon that we will always remember that view from the Amistad Chapel--even when our sacred space is eleven stories above the streets of Cleveland.  I will pray that every setting of the United Church of Christ, including each one of its local churches, has a view that reminds us of those with whom Jesus Christ, the Head of the Church, calls us engage with love and justice to work for healing, for peace, for freedom for all.

May it be so!  May it be so!