Rage Against Asphyxiation

I sat on a small plastic green chair yesterday as school chapel was about to begin. It is a weekly moment. It used to be (how often do we use those words now) that the entirety of the school would gather together in the sanctuary to sing, dance, talk, listen, pray, but now that the worship world has paused, we are separated to classrooms to watch worship take place on screens.

The call to worship was spoken: the leader's hand was raised in the air for blessing - 'We begin in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, Amen.' - and she made the sign of the cross towards the screen. We had invited God to be involved in the process.

I looked around as the invocation was being spoken. The room was chock full of four and five-year-olds, their eager expressions redolent with joy. Worship was an exciting departure from what could sometimes be mundane. Their little heads, faced forward, expectantly awaiting what would come next, seemed to bob in anticipation.

And then, without warning, a youtube advertisement came up. As always, it is without warning, without choosing and generally without tact. A video game character, a menacing man garbed in black with an equally menacing automatic machine gun, popped up and began shooting. Because the children were only meters away from the screen, the reality shocked, started and scared them. I felt so badly for the teacher - there was nothing he could have done - but he stretched out in front of the screen, protecting the children and their eyes that were now scarred from a world that constantly confronts them with violence. The teacher turned the TV off, and a minute later, after the violent video game ad had passed, we resumed worship with a gentle song about God's love in the world.

This hyper-reality truly shocked me. It was an electric jolt, an awakening, to the present reality of this world which has experienced the same jolt in Minneapolis.

Most people, or white people (myself included), have been meandering through life oblivious to the present reality that faces the non-white world (which is most of the planet). If I am honest with myself, I invite God into my life not to transform my thoughts and beliefs, but to confirm them and my place in the world. I want to live a life blessed by comfort and then move seamlessly on to worshiping the God who has dispensed this comfort upon me (or so I make-believe).

And yet the truth and true reality of this situation is that God seems to be particularly worried about and for, all people who are persecuted, and God's judgement against those who are asleep, or worse yet, have closed their eyes to injustice and persecution, is written in large black ink many times throughout the Bible.

Take care of the widow, the orphan and the stranger. Do it.

Some people look from the outside at what happened to George Floyd and have made immediate judgements about it. I'm not talking about the situation in general, but the reality at large. Because I currently live in a different country than the United States, there are whispers both spoken and written online - 'Thank God we don't live in America' or 'I'm glad we don't have those kind of problems here.' Instead of feeling empathy, we have a warped sense of nationalism, that somehow our country is better than that one. Insert whichever nation you want, not just America. Instead of speaking out about the problem that all people of privilege, we instead turn a spiteful eye and pray 'Thank God we can get back to the normalcy of our lives.' I hope this is not a time where middle to upper class white people hole up in their middle to upper class homes to binge on Netflix until they can feel safe to come out of their middle to upper class caves to get back to their middle to upper class lives.

In a month, the media will have turned the page and their attention on to the next tragedy, the next horror story, the next shallow pool of fear in which we dive. We will get on with our lives, or that's what we want, and we will forget what happened to George Floyd.

That is exactly what we should not be doing. We should be experiencing George's last words, 'I can't breathe.' We should be fighting against the suffocating knee of injustice pressed against the throats of the world, instead of worrying about national interests. We should be inciting our governments to riot against this vicious, poisonous evil of racism - not to 'look into it,' but to do something - our leaders need to humble themselves, get down on that knee of choking privilege and beg forgiveness and respond with compassion, justice and grace.

The country in which I live, Australia, has had racial issues in the past. In the last decades, they have made public admissions and public apologies to the very people they had attempted to suffocate in the past. For this, I am amazed and grateful. I truly continue to pray that our words are not just puffs of air issuing from our throats and lips, but true calls to action.

Let those apologies be not just words, let it be a new reality and a new truth, that all people are created as equals. We are no longer valued by the countries in which we live or the countries from which we come, but valued because the air we breathe is precious to our identically shaped lungs, and the blood which collects the oxygen is exactly the same colour. We are valued because we are human brothers and sisters - borders and biases are irrelevant and unnecessary.

So today, I can't breathe. I'm suffocating on the sorrow of the people in Minneapolis - the community and its collective conscience. I want to be with people in this fight against injustice, but I have to get past the desire to shut my eyes, turn off the computer and look forward to the next week of my life when all this will be in the rearview mirror.

We must all stay present and focussed in this fight against asphyxiation.

Family Feud

The Bible is replete with tragic heroes.

Some of them appear as rugged individualists bent on conquest and pushing into the land that God promised, while others show up unfiltered in their thoughts and reflections, men and women who struggle with the thought of a God who they believe is omnipotent yet strangely absent in times of greatest need. These heroes desire a different life and different view of this all-powerful God: they want to feel and experience the presence of the omni-loving God.

God does not always appear when most wanted, but when most needed.

For we who are neither biblical figures or particularly heroic (although it feels somewhat daunting to stay in lockdown), the need to connect and be loved by both God and family is still present. Especially in uncertain times, to feel valued is an important way to deal with isolation and separation.

I think this is seen most poignantly in the life of arguably the most tragic heroine in the Bible: Leah, the first wife of Jacob.

As the story goes, Jacob meets Rachel, the love of his life at a 'wishing well,' where, after falling in love at first sight, he gallops off to her father (his uncle Laban) to ask for her hand in marriage. After consistent trickeries and deceptions, not only does Jacob work seven years for the love of his life (cue Freddie Mercury).

Instead, on the wedding night, Laban substitutes the older daughter (Leah) for the younger (Rachel). While most of this story does not seem correct (certainly politically, but also from a choice perspective) in the 21st century, this was Laban's wish. It is not the custom in this place to give the younger daughter in marriage before the firstborn. (Gen. 29:26) Thus, without knowing (due to darkness, clothing and whatever else the tradition stipulated on wedding nights) Jacob married 'Leah (who) had tender eyes.' (Gen. 29:17)

While we who read with 21st century spectacles might think this is an insensitive and shallow way of describing two daughters (Rachel being shapely and attractive) Hebrew scholars have said that Leah's tender eyes were a compliment to her. John J. Parson's writes,

Leah's eyes were weak or tender from crying her eyes out becasue of the prospect of marrying Esau. The adage of the town was: Two sons to Rebecca and two daughters to Laban - the older to the older and the younger to the younger... She wept to be the mother of the righteous. And it is through Leah that the lineage of David comes (Judah).

Jacob ended up with both sisters, but '...he loved Rachel more than Leah.' (Gen. 29:30b)

It's a very cold world to be in competition for love. Siblings sometimes feel it, whether it is a true competition or not. To be a success, to receive accolades from parents, to be loved - these are the things that give life meaning. When praise is lavished on one child over another, often the one who feels snubbed will rebel to at least receive some kind of attention from parents. But imagine living in a culture of bigamy? What happens when you feel underappreciated?

From this heroic story of Leah, we don't get a sense that she complained to God. There is no dialogue between the omnipotent Creator and the older wife, but the tears may have continued because she felt unloved.

When the LORD saw that Leah was unloved, he opened her womb; but Rachel was unable to conceive. Leah conceived, gave birth to a son, and named him Reuben, for she said, 'The LORD has seen my affliction (being unloved); surely my husband will love me now. (Gen. 29:31,32)

Twice more she conceives and gives birth, At last, my husband will become attached to me because I have borne (eventually six) sons for him.

To be in a home which is constantly defined by competition for attention and love is one of the most difficult places to be. Now, in 2020, in some places, that competition is catastrophically magnified because of the lockdown. Families who had found a tenuous balance of existence because of freedom for distance and space are now thrust into a situation where that fight for the (seemingly) limited resource of attention is omnipresent.

How do we work through this struggle of lockdown? What are the practicalities of the life of the heroine, Leah?

1. Paying attention is one of the only free things in life. You can give it away and never run out. In giving attention to our kids and our families, we strengthen bonds so that when we are apart, life is not about competing against, but striving together for something.

2. Honour the value of our relationships. This it not about what they do, but the mere fact that they are a gift.

3. Realise that God's perspective of timing is different and wondrous. While this is difficult and too often clichéd, tears and patience are often a powerful elixir to sensing God's presence in life.

4. Lastly, and hopefully most significantly (I hope), diversify relationships. Even in times of lockdown, reach out to others whether through social media or phoning. Don't place all of your social happiness in one basket. This is good for you and for your family.

Social Dis-connection

I like to walk - to feel the breeze on my face before the chill of winter hits, and to see the glittering blue sky, gem-like over the eucalypts - I am aware that I am not alone: dozens of people are feeling the necessity to do exactly the same thing that I am. Escape from the isolation, and yet strangely, the isolation lingers because we have been told that we cannot interact with other people.

We must keep our social distance.

If there is any one phrase that I want to deliberately scratch from my reality, it is this one. Social Distance. Social disconnection.

Let's be honest, we've been socially distancing for years, we just called it something else. We called it take away food, or conference calling, or even connecting via social media. Each of these carries with it a sense that being in physical presence of others is a dangerous thing - we could catch something.

We could catch something, all right. We could catch on to the fact that relationships, although fraught with possibilities for difficulty, are the only things that truly make life worthwhile. Have we sublimated personal, physical touch, or verbal communication for efficiency and expediency so that we can maximise the time that we have managing information and resources? Have we lost a grip on meaning?

I'll give you an example:

Before this 'New Normal' (another phrase which causes me to gag) of social distancing (retching sound), I drove to the airport to pick Christine up from her flight. As I was turning onto the airport drive, an elderly man was crossing the road in front of my car. Because he wasn't really watching for traffic (and seemed not really to care about the inconvenience for me), I had to step on the brakes quickly so that I didn't hit him. My first response was one of impatience and I almost honked the horn at him. How dare this old man get in my way? I'm in a hurry! I've got things to do! He's lucky I'm such an observant driver.

It is the monologue of our pre-COVID 19 (Ugh, gag reflex) culture that anyone who is in the way of our efficiency and expediency is an obstacle to be removed. As I drove by myself, isolated in my own car, listening to the kind of music that I wanted, I wanted that old man out of the way so I could park and walk quickly and briskly to the terminal. I knew that once I arrived there, I would be surrounded by similarly impatient people, ninety-nine percent of them impatiently awaiting the arrival of impatient fliers. We would stand next to each other, but we would be separated by an immeasurable distance caused by our phones. I knew that I wouldn't be talking to anyone. I would find a comfortable social distance.

And yet, God decided my eyes (and ears, and heart) needed to be opened.

After parking my car, I walked briskly to the airport along the path. Lo and behold, in front of me was the elderly gentleman I'd almost run down at the roundabout.  Truly, I wanted to pass on the right with efficiency and expediency. I wanted to, not run him over, but run by him - I was a man on a mission.

Then, I got a message from Christine saying that her plane was delayed forty minutes. Rolling my eyes in frustration, efficiency and expediency were now bound up in the fickle ETA of Qantas, I slowed my pace. Suddenly, I found myself almost parallel with the old man. Looking to the skies, I waggled a metaphorical finger: I see what you're doing, God. Very funny.

So, I strolled up beside him and inquired about his day.

He looked at me as if I had spoken in some kind of Martian language. As if unaccustomed to conversation, he cocked his head and stopped. He asked me to repeat the question, and it became immediately apparent that I was speaking a different language. He was Greek. Through the next ten minutes of walking, of asking questions, I found out a lot about Tom - or, Anastasi as he was called in Greek.

Tom and his wife, who suffers greatly with dimension, had lived in Australia for fifty years. Recently, they had celebrated their 55th wedding anniversary, but because of his wife's illness, and the fact that they had been 'jailed' in a retirement/nursing home village, the celebration was difficult. As Tom pushed these words from his mouth, his accent, thick and beautiful, caused me to listen intently.

Because Tom was translating his words from Greek into English, and this process was very difficult for him while walking, he would stop every ten steps or so, put a hand on my arm and bring us to stasis.

We had to stop moving so that we could communicate in the same language.

"No one ever talks to me in English," Tom said. "I live with Greeks, I am surrounded by Greeks, my children live a long ways away, but when they come home, they want to practice their Greek... You are the first person who will talk English with me." This sentence took almost a minute to come out and be translated by me. He smiled and said, "You have an accent. You must be from England."

Well, there's a first time for everything. I've never been accused of being English before.

Tom's journey around the airport was a nightly occurrence. Escaping his 'jail' and the struggles with his wife's disease, Tom would circle the airport perhaps subconsciously wishing that just one of these days, one of the planes would fly him back home - back to a place of comfort and safety, where he knew everyone and things made sense. He wanted to go back.

We reached the front footpath of the airport and I made a snap decision to invite Tom to wait with me and another friend for the arrival. Unsurprisingly, Tom agreed. "But," he said putting a hand on my arm, "You buy the beer."

I wasn't prepared for my encounter with Tom. In fact, I would have been more comfortable in pushing past that encounter to get on with my speedy life, but as we sat in the airport bar, sipping large schooners of pale ale, Tom listened intently, smiling and nodding (whether he understood the English conversation around him is beside the point). Occasionally, he would put his hand on my arm and ask me to repeat (because of my thick English accent!), and we would pause the conversation.

We were socially connected, not distanced.

At the end, I placed my own hand on his forearm - he looked shocked, as if he hadn't been touched in a long time - and I gave him my business card. He read it, smiled and flicked it against his fingers.

"Okay," he said, "I call you. I call you and say, 'This is Greek Tom. You come back to the airport.'"

We've been extrapolating at length how God is teaching us new things in this New Nor... (I won't write it) new period of human existence. Yes, some of it is slowing down, but I think the greater priority for us is to stop and ask questions, be blessed by, and value the stories of others - stories of people who may normally be overlooked.

I feel like going back to the airport.