Sermon for Williamstown
29th of January 2017
Micah 6:1-8
Matthew 5:1-12
This morning, with great joy, we’re baptising Arlo Conate. Baptism is many things: a cleansing bath; a symbolic death; an anointing; an initiation. Today I want to focus on that last. We’re making Arlo a member of Christ’s body the church. In today’s service Arlo is becoming brother to every Christian in the world. This week I’ve been thinking about what that will mean for Arlo as he grows; what that means for all of us who are identified by the sign of the cross on our foreheads as belonging to Jesus. Is being brother or sister to everyone who bears Jesus’ name a good thing?
I’ve been thinking about this because this past week was the first week of Donald Trump’s presidency, a week in which the American President did many frightening things. I won’t bother listing them now – Waleed Ali did an excellent job of that on The Project and you can easily find that video for yourself. But I will quote from an essay that Australian historian and speechwriter Don Watson wrote before Trump was elected. In it, Watson describes a visit Trump made to a lobby group called ‘The Faith and Freedom Coalition’. Trump tells his audience of Christians that he himself is Presbyterian, to applause. He attacks Hillary Clinton, calling her ‘Crooked Hillary,’ and says that she wants a 500 per cent increase in Syrian refugees. The audience boos. At this point, Watson writes:
A young woman stands and shouts “Refugees are welcome here,” and goes on shouting while three bull-necked bouncers haul her out of the room, and the faithful chant, “USA! USA! USA!” Then two more women stand and shout over the chant, “Build bridges not walls!” They too are dragged out as Trump says, “What’s happened in our country is so sad. We are so divided … By the way, these are professional agitators, folks. They’re sent here by the other party.”[1] Continue reading →
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