Day 124c: Another Peace-less Pastor … (August 31, 2019)
I continued on along the still-dicey ultra-thin shoulders of Highway 15, thankful that it was a Saturday morning and that the traffic wasn’t as oppressive as it well could have been. It didn’t take too long for me to amble alongside The Church of our Savior – a Reformed Episcopal place of worship* on the far outskirts of Leesburg. The church seemed quite peaceful & lovely and I was feeling more than a bit parched, so I walked up its long and beautiful drive to the neighboring parsonage, which was equally lovely and obviously well-tended. It seemed a perfect place & a most auspicious opportunity to share my message of Peace & Goodwill (essentially, a raw & unadulterated version of Way of Christ), and yet Reverend Jim was less than thrilled to see me when he answered the door, and quite obviously fully failed to appreciate either the magnitude of our meeting or the magnificence of my message – indeed the very same message as the one professed by his own supposed Lord & Savior (!!!) …
*The church’s website homepage describes its mission as follows: “We hold to the doctrine of the Anglican Church which is grounded in the Holy Scriptures, supremely expressed in the King James Version, and in the teaching of the ancient Fathers and Councils of the Church agreeable to those Scriptures. In particular, we subscribe to the Thirty-nine Articles of Religion, the Book of Common Prayer (1662 – 1928), and the Ordinal.” Ironically, it also states “We seek to serve, and to teach our children to serve, the Lord Jesus Christ as the Way, the Truth, and the Life (John 14:6), to be not conformed to this world but transformed by the renewing of our minds (Romans 12:2)”, two tenets of faith neither of which were personally experienced by me there on that particular day.
“I do understand what love is, and that is one of the reasons I can never again be a Christian. Love is not self denial. Love is not blood and suffering. Love is not murdering your son to appease your own vanity. Love is not hatred or wrath, consigning billions of people to eternal torture simply because they have offended your ego or disobeyed your rules. Love is not obedience, conformity, or submission. No, these are counterfeit forms of love – a faux-goodness that is contingent upon authority, punishment, or reward. In the greatest contrast, true Love is respect and admiration and compassion and kindness, freely & unconditionally given by a fully unafraid human being … In truth I have seem even those who have long since abjured God die in equal grace. And this must make sense to most, seeing as how atheists don’t use their doings to bargain for a better seat at the table. Indeed many do not even believe supper is ever going to be served. As such they are not storing up merit in a life hereafter. They just smile and care and give because their heart is ripe and full of the same. They are kind for no particular reason; they simply love for Love’s sake alone.” ~ inspired by Dan Barker & Stephen Levine
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