How We Deal With Conflict

             Ferguson, Missouri has been a place in the news this week because of the protests following the killing of an unarmed African American teenager in that town this week by a policeman.  At first, the police refused to release the name of the officer who did the killing and finally when they did release the name, they also produced a video of the young man allegedly stealing cigars from a convenience store and assaulting a clerk.  The people, who had calmed down were angry again and spent another night rioting.  The police confronted these crowds with militarized equipment, stun grenades, tear gas and large vehicles, most frequently seen in places like Afghanistan and Iraq.  There has been a lot of comment subsequently about the militarization of the police in this country and how that is contributing to a difficult climate. 

            The world is currently in an angry mess.  Politicians in this country seem to be unable to do much of anything to solve problems, and increasing turbulence abroad is demanding our attention and the attention of the world.  How are we going to solve the problem that Hamas and Israel pose to us?  What can we do about the Islamic State’s attempt to recreate the Caliphate in Syria and Iraq?  These awful arguments are causing many deaths, some of them horrible; and every attempt to bring the opposing sides to a bargaining table has resulted in failure.  War seems to be the only solution that is desired by those involved in the problem and the rest of the world is without any means to curb this desire.  Not even the United Nations can make any difference at all.  We are politically paralyzed.  There are even fears that this turmoil will eventually spread to the United States and that we will suffer along with the people who are now being brutalized by war. 

            There is nothing really new here.  We have had these dreadful arguments before when the Christian Crusaders took on the Muslim people in the Holy Land, or when countless other disputes put us on one side or another in a political argument.  But it hasn’t always been a global dispute that has gotten our attention.  The Civil War was fought over the question of slavery.  Slavery ought to have been decided when the Constitution was written, but it was deferred because of a North/South division in this country.  Even the Civil War didn’t solve the problem.  Innate racism continues to plague us.  That is one of the causes of the problems in Ferguson, Missouri. 

            I love the story that we find in the Gospel of Matthew where Jesus teaches his disciples a lesson about religious law:  It isn’t what goes into a person’s mouth that defiles them, but what comes out of it, the Lord says.  He goes on to explain himself by saying that what goes into the mouth goes into the stomach and eventually into the sewer; but what comes out of the mouth proceeds from the heart and includes evil intentions including murder, theft, adultery, fornication and slander.  He concluded by saying:  these are what defile a person, but to eat with unwashed hands does not defile. Jesus then goes into the land of Canaan where he is met by a woman who asks him to heal her daughter who she claims is being tormented by a demon.  At first, he refuses, saying that he was only sent to the lost sheep of Israel.  But the woman doesn’t relent.  She pleads with him.  He tells her that it isn’t fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs, which seems to be a rather harsh dismissal; but she answers him eloquently: Even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from the master’s table!  Jesus is convinced:  Great is your faith, he says, let it be done for you as you wish, and her daughter was healed instantly.

      This seems to me to be a great statement of God’s love for all of us despite our divisions.  Jesus came for everyone and we are the ones who continue to make distinctions.  We may hold in our heart reservations about what kind of love God holds for those who are not Christian; but those are our problems.  God has no issue with that whatsoever.  Muslim, Buddhist, Hindu, whatever faith that is held or not held but the people in this world, all of them are loved infinitely by the God of Wonder who has been known in many different ways and moments in this world, and who knows how many others.  We are foolish when we confine our faith to only ourselves, when God loves so lavishly and completely and invites us to join in that Love by loving one another.