THE NEW SEEDS OF TRANSFORMATION
Fifth Week in the Time of Assembly
According to the prophet Isaiah, God promised that “he would paint his law on the hearts of his people, from one generation to the next.” No matter whether they were in a church or a temple; no matter if they could recite the dogmas of religion; the Law of the Kingdom of God, the law that we should love each other, be righteous and do justice would be painted on the hearts of each new generation.
Today, we also reflect on the scripture in Revelations about the slaughter and injustice to the innocents who have been washed in the blood of Jesus and whose voice we can hear calling from heaven. These injustices are easy for us to see.
Leadership from Familia Latina Unida were in Washington this week with many other groups because the Supreme Court heard testimony about DACA. The Trump administration, out of pure wickedness, has been trying to roll back the protections that dreamers won during the Obama Administration. It is likely that the Supreme Court, stacked by Trump and the Republican Senate, will rule with the President and make 900,000 young people illegal with the stroke of a pen.
How could a nation do that to nearly a million of its next generation?
Look around: More children are killed in school shootings here than in any other nation.
Look around: we have an epidemic of teen suicides and who does it fall on heaviest? Teen age Latinas!
Look around at the young people who have had a father or mother deported – and with them their dreams of college or whatever shattered. We are talking about six million U.S. citizen children who live each day that their family and their home could be destroyed at any moment on any day.
Look at the children locked in cages, many separated forever from their mothers.
How many die because they were not covered by health insurance? How any die on streets at each other’s hands – or the guns of police.
Look around: Look at the green card veterans who fought for this country and now find themselves denied the right to live in the country they fought for!
Like the innocents in Revelations, the martyrs of the next generation cry out to us for justice!
We hear their cries as we complete this spiritual year in the time of Assembly. It is the time to assemble what we have learned, what gifts we have received, so that we may plant them like seeds in the soil of next year. What we are here to say, to reflect on and to focus on, is that yes, our next generation have suffered much, but there is good news in them!
Even while so many suffer from injustice, tens of thousands of this generation have made it out of inadequate schools and broken families in dangerous neighborhoods to get an education – and to educate themselves. They are self-reliant. They are conscious. They are smart – and they see the injustice that surrounds them and their people.
Even while the Supreme Court heard arguments to eliminate DACA, outside a new generation of fighters gathered in determination to fight – not only for themselves but for their families.
We have seen them in the elementary schools and the high schools this year in the youth health service corps – learning quickly about the diseases that go untreated in our community and lead to the 20 year death gap – and doing something about it!
We are seeing it downstairs in the Healthy Hood as dozens of smart qualified “healers” have signed up to counsel those for whom mental health assistance is denied. They will not only stand with them at the edge of depression and suicide but they will help them see the social conditions, the injustice, that have brought them grief.
We are seeing it in the college students we have been meeting with and in the law students and medical students that are ready to take on the challenges that racism and white nationalism pose to this nation and to the world.
We are seeing it as some of the older guys, out of the plague of mass incarceration, are reaching back to gather in younger guys still on the street as they wake up to what is being done to them, to the way they are being played. The light is going back on in their eyes!
And of course, we are seeing it in the new Spirit among deported veterans as they received on Veterans day in Tijuana a visit from Miguel Perez, now able to claim his place in this country – with a U.S. Senator at his side!
How will it happen? How will a new generation take on the struggle of the one before it – and do better! Look at the scripture:
Elias was a disciple of the great prophet Elijah. When the old prophet was about to finish his time, he asked his disciple: what can I do or you before I go? Elias said, “Give me double your Spirit, of your power!” The prophet told him that “this is difficult but if you can watch me as I enter heaven then you shall have the double power!” Elijah was taken up on a chariot and Elias watch closely as he entered heaven. Sure enough, he inherited double the power of Elijah!
You see, when Elias watched Elijah all the way into heaven, he saw the Kingdom of God, he came to know the Kingdom of God. Our power comes from the realization of that Kingdom amongst us, as we bring the gifts of God’s justice, God’s love and God’s Spirit to our communities of faith and resistance.
So today too we need to assemble those young people who are rediscovering themselves in the faith that has sustained their people since the time of the appearance of the Virgin of Guadalupe. Many others have sought the spiritual strength outside of the faith: no matter. Jesus as well sought his spiritual strength and the unity of his people outside the hypocrisy of the temple! What is important is that they know where they come from and who they are; If they both gather all that the last generations held for them and yet are true to the new spirit that God places in their hearts, the new wisdom that their experience provides, they will receive a double portion of the Spirit and the Power of the Kingdom..
Those in churches of resistance like this one have among us a new generation of faith leaders. What our young faith leaders must show their generation is that when we pray, we pray in the midst of millions of their people who have prayed through the ages, still pray and will pray tomorrow. They must come to feel that when we stand together and listen and join in singing Sumergeme each Sunday, we close our eyes and we are lifted up to find our place in the Kingdom, lifted by the millions of voices singing that song today, yesterday and tomorrow.
The way that Jesus gave us, to form communities of faith in diaspora, communities of faith and resistance, provides the spiritual strength the next generation will need to sustain themselves and persevere in the struggle of their people. We worship a God that lives and acts in the history of his people and our faith offers us a powerful connection to that God, a connection that gives us “the double power!”
Our strategy for next year calls for seven million young people to demand their human right to family and bring that demand throughout the nation. We face an evil wave of hate and white supremacy in this nation that we must confront and defeat.
Those who want to claim this land as a white nation say they want freedom: freedom from the majority of people of color that is growing in this land, freedom from the responsibility for equal justice for all people. In the face of this selfishness and wickedness and racism, the next generation will carve out its own “Freedom Charter.”
The Freedom Charter: Freedom From Gun Violence, Freedom From Deportation Violence, Freedom From Police Violence, Freedom From Mass Incarceration Violence, Freedom From The Violence Of The Denial Of Health Care, Freedom From The Violence Of Miseducation, Freedom From The Economic Violence Of Income Inequality, Freedom From The Violence Of Climate Change – And Freedom From The Violence Of Hate And White Supremacy
The lives of all your ancestors are with you, for in you, their lives have meaning. And the teachings reveal to us that true freedom is found in obedience to the law of God – that we put no other Gods before the One God and that we love each other as ourselves!
Look up! There’s old Elijah! There’s Zapata and the young Zapatistas! There’s Rudy Lozano! There’s Malcolm X. There’s Lolita Lebron! Here’s a whole cloud of witnesses, those who gave their lives for justice, for their people. They are calling for you. They are crying out to you. They are saying you can do more than we did. You can have the double power! It’s within your reach - if it’s in your hearts. You are not alone.
We are with you – but look to each other. There is a Kingdom more powerful than any nation, more powerful than any bunch of politicians, more powerful than any army – it is the Kingdom of God. It is a righteous Kingdom. It is a Kingdom of NO Compromise. It is a Kingdom where there is no injustice and where there is no fear or doubt. God has placed that Kingdom in your hearts – but it will only live if you join your hearts together; Love each other; Sacrifice for each other; Stand by each other. Never give up on each other. Lean on each other. Love your people! Make each other stand straight. You are the next generation! You are not only the future you are the present! You are the Oaks of Righteousness God has planted to transform this nation.
Once the prophet proclaimed that “a shoot would come up from Jesse; from his roots a Branch will bear fruit.” The people waited and indeed he came. So will the hearts and minds of the next generation become next years seeds of liberation. “The Spirit of the Lord will rest on them and with righteousness they will judge the needy, with justice they will give decisions for the poor of the earth. Righteousness will be their belt and faithfulness the sash around their waist.” Let it be so!
THE HOLY SCRIPTURES FOR THE 5TH WEEK IN THE TIME OF ASSEMBLY
L. At that time Jesus said, “I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth,
P. because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned,
L. and revealed them to little children.
P. Yes, Father, for this is what you were pleased to do.
Revelation 7:13-17 These in White Robes—Who Are They?
Then one of the elders asked me, “These in white robes—who are they, and where did they come from?” I answered, “Sir, you know.” And he said, “These are they who have come out of the great tribulation; they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. Therefore, “they are before the throne of God and serve him day and night in his temple; and he who sits on the throne will shelter them with his presence. ‘Never again will they hunger; never again will they thirst. The sun will not beat down on them,’ nor any scorching heat. For the Lamb at the center of the throne will be their shepherd; ‘he will lead them to springs of living water.’ ‘And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.’]”
2Kings2: 7-12 Elijah Taken Up to Heaven
Fifty men from the company of the prophets went and stood at a distance, facing the place where Elijah and Elisha had stopped at the Jordan. Elijah took his cloak, rolled it up and struck the water with it. The water divided to the right and to the left, and the two of them crossed over on dry ground. When they had crossed, Elijah said to Elisha, “Tell me, what can I do for you before I am taken from you?” “Let me inherit a double portion of your spirit,” Elisha replied. “You have asked a difficult thing,” Elijah said, “yet if you see me when I am taken from you, it will be yours—otherwise, it will not.” As they were walking along and talking together, suddenly a chariot of fire and horses of fire appeared and separated the two of them, and Elijah went up to heaven in a whirlwind. Elisha saw this and cried out, “My father! My father! The chariots and horsemen of Israel!” And Elisha saw him no more. Then he took hold of his garment and tore it in two.
Isaiah 11: 1-5 The Branch from Jesse
A shoot will come up from the stump of Jesse; from his roots a Branch will bear fruit. The Spirit of the Lord will rest on him— the Spirit of wisdom and of understanding, The Spirit of counsel and of might, the Spirit of the knowledge and fear of the Lord— and he will delight in the fear of the Lord. He will not judge by what he sees with his eyes, or decide by what he hears with his ears; but with righteousness he will judge the needy, with justice he will give decisions for the poor of the earth. He will strike the earth with the rod of his mouth; with the breath of his lips he will slay the wicked. Righteousness will be his belt and faithfulness the sash around his waist.