Pastor’s Corner: Impassioned

June 20, 2018

I’ve heard – both first- and second-hand – some of the responses to last Sunday’s (June 17th) sermon, “Let Me Take a Closer Look.” A number of people have commented, favorably I hope, on the “passion” with which I spoke. For this I thank you.

It’s true. I’m stirred up.

That’s not my cultural heritage or my training. New Englanders are supposed to cope with internal passions the same way they’re supposed to cope with cold temperatures: with a studied disregard. As a preacher in the Congregationalist tradition, I was taught to value reasoned argument over enthusiasm, lest another Great Awakening, um, re-awake.

More urgently, I know my struggles with my own anger. It took hard work (and far too much error) for me to learn to step back, come to terms with my feelings, and then step back into a situation which rouses my ire. When I’ve lost my temper in years past, it has always been to my cost, and whatever points I might have made were lost.

Once long ago, however, a friend told me, “I like it when you get angry. You get clear.”

This is a time for clarity.

I promise you that I do step back and come to terms with the feelings. When children are stripped from parents by national policy, however, I step forward again and I bring the passion with me. The passion belongs in such an urgent cause. The passion belongs in opposition to a monstrous evil. The passion belongs when children are at stake.

It’s true. I’m stirred up. I will be stirred up – until this indefensible practice is consigned to the dustbin of history.

With aloha,

Pastor Eric

Since the writing, the President has signed an order which will continue the “no tolerance” policy, but requires children to be incarcerated with their parents. I note that these people are being held without bail for a misdemeanor, and incarceration of children with parents is also evil.