Short Homily - Holy Week 2021 - Monday Taize service for Ukraine

Preached at St. Augustine Of Canterbury Episcopal Church

When I was in high school, one of my favorite classes was 9th-grade English Literature. It wasn’t so much because of the books that we read, although I was then, and still am a voracious reader. It was my favorite class because of the teacher. Now, when I was a young girl and all through my teenage years, I guess other people found me a bit odd…I was never the Popular girl…hard to believe I know! 

I had a few close friends who had my back…my father and my stepmother who were also relentlessly on my side, and then I had Sally Hubler. In addition to being the English teacher at my high school, she also was the drama teacher and coach and was all around a lovely and caring human being. I found out yesterday after church that she had passed away earlier in the day, from complications of lung cancer, and this brought back a wave of memories, of her sticking up for me, and just being such a great human being.

 So, all through school, I was the subject of bullying, the first incident I remember was when I was in 2nd grade, and the boys in the class decided to call me “Encyclopedia” and it was not meant in a good way. In the 70s, girls were still subject to a lot of unwritten and unspoken rules regarding what was OK for them to do or be because of their gender, and apparently “smart” and “outspoken” were not OK. 

This bullying carried over into high school, where there was a group of boys, led by one particularly unpleasant bully who made sure to pick on me or degrade me in some way on a regular basis. This is where Sally Hubler enters the story - she was the only teacher in that school who, when witnessing the harassment and bullying that I was being subject to, paid attention, listened to me, believed me and took action. 

On a number of occasions, she called out the bullies when they would try to push their noxious campaign in her class. Thanks to her I felt so much less alone and was able to make it through the 9th grade with my mental health relatively intact. In the years since then, a number of the people who had bullied me have apologized to me, thanks to the magic of Facebook, including the leader of the pack.

 He told me that he was sorry that he had been such an immature jerk and that he knows that it was wrong, and this has helped my heart to soften a bit in regards to him…so, how does this tie into today’s Gospel, and with the situation in Ukraine?

Well…one of the things that I learned to do when I was in my 20s and 30s, was to pray for my enemies. And one of the things that I hope we all will do today, and continue to do into the future is to pray for not only those people who are being persecuted, bullied, and murdered in Ukraine but also we should continue to pray for the people and leadership of Russia as well.

Now, I had taken up a practice of praying for those whom I felt had done harm to me, that they would feel the Love of Christ, that they would know peace, and that the behavior that they had inflicted upon me, they would not do to another, and so I was really quite surprised when I got a Facebook message from my high school bully with an apology. 

I don’t know if this happened because I prayed, but I know that because I prayed about it, when he did confront me and apologize, I was able to respond to him with PEACE. In my heart, I had already felt at peace about the situation because I had offered the burden up to God. This is in general a good practice when there are situations over which you have little to no control.

We here may feel an overwhelming need to help the people of Ukraine, and we may feel some very uncomfortable anger, and maybe even hatred for the people of Russia, and in particular their leadership. These feelings are important for us to have, because they will spur us to do what we are able to do to help, whether that be offering monetary assistance to helping organizations, or to pray for a peaceful resolution and end to the violence. 

As a person of Ukrainian heritage - my great-grandmother was born in Skalat, a village in Ternopil Oblast in the Carpathian mountains - I have really struggled with feelings of anger and desperation at the horrible violence being inflicted on the people of Ukraine. I have relatives there, though I do not know them, and while I would still feel outraged and anger about the situation were I not of Ukrainian descent, it just makes it feel that much more personal.

 And so, I feel that I have to pray for Vladimir Putin, and his military forces who are responsible for so much death and destruction in my ancestral homeland now, because the burden of these feelings is so heavy, and because I have such limited power to do anything to rectify the situation.

In our Gospel today, Jesus knew that one of his numbers was going to betray him, he knew that he was going to be subject to torment and death, and still, he ate dinner with Judas, and in the end, he also prayed for those who put him on the cross.  

His prayers did not “fix” the situation or soften the hearts of those who put him to death, but it did do something…because here we all are, over 2000 years later, still recalling this story, and trying to learn from him and his example, and indeed from the examples of some of the other players as well, from Mary we can learn faith and trust in God, and the value of sacrifice for the good of someone else who is in danger, from Judas, we can learn how to forgive things that seem unforgivable, and from Jesus, we can learn that the way to peace is by trusting that God is in this all with us…so, while I do not think we should expect an apology from Putin or those who have orchestrated this war any time soon, there are innocent people in Russia who are resisting and suffering as well. And so today I ask that we consider the following things:

What are we willing to sacrifice for the peoples of Ukraine who are in danger, how can we help tangibly and spiritually?

How Can we speak up and step up for those who are being harmed? 

Can we sacrifice financially for their good? 

Can we bear some  discomfort because the people of Ukraine are on the cross right now? 

Can we pray for our enemies in earnest, knowing that God is in this with us?

How can we pray for the situation in order to create more peace instead of less? 

I truly believe that even small acts of resistance matter, and making ourselves islands of peace, mercy and forgiveness makes a difference…for we are all one in Christ Jesus, so let us all do what we can to shift the balance towards Love and understanding. May it be so, through the love of our Savior Jesus Christ.

Amen.