So today I have come across yet another story of the Westboro Baptist Church:
Westboro Baptist Church to picket funerals in Tucson
And I am keenly aware of the hate being propagated here. But the thing I am most aware of today, is the hate that we automatically aim right back at them. It often seems like if we don't respond with disgust and bitterness in the face of something like this, that we are in fact encouraging it. That unless we voice our absolute and utter disagreement and our thoughts on how this enrages us, that we may be seen as condoning it....
But is this really true?
When Jesus said to bless those who curse you, he didn't mean to first make sure everyone knows how wrong the one doing the cursing is, and then, in your infinite wisdom and goodness, to "pray" for them. He simply said to bless them, to love them, to pray for them, and to forgive them.
So what does it mean to bless? The first definition I came across online was this, from thefreedictionary.com:
bless
Wow. To invoke divine favor upon? To confer well-being or prosperity on? To honor as holy?!!
This doesn't mean that you have to agree with what is being done. But this is what we are asked to do and to feel towards the people who are doing the cursing. Because they ARE holy. They are made in the image of God just as you and I are. They are beautiful.
I know that for me, this isn't my first reaction. And I'm sure for many of you, it is the same.
But what if we could recognize that our reaction to them is even more crucial to Peace then their cursing? Think about it. What you focus on increases. Where attention goes, energy flows. These are not just fun little cliches. There is a very small group cursing. But the entire nation sees this on our televisions and internet and even though it does not ignite us to hate the ones they hate, we are still focusing our attention on this hate. We still look at it in disgust and anger and hurt. And so then the number of us experiencing this reality becomes far greater than the small number doing the cursing in the first place. As we curse them, for cursing another, and the cycle continues.
True Justice can never be found from within this cycle.
True Justice can ONLY be found through compassion, through love, through seeing past the hate to the Truth of who these people are, through the eyes of understanding, and through Seeing as God Sees.
It's like what happens on a day when I am truly exasperated with my 3 year old. She yells at me, and I yell back. And in this cycle of frustration and anger, only more frustration and anger are created. There is no Peace to be found, and it does not in any way teach her Peace.
"Whatsoever you do unto the least of these, you do unto me." Right?
So when we see a story like the one above, will you join me in transforming what you find within yourself? That is really the only place that you can transform hatred and anger, isn't it? So when we look at them, let's bless them. Let's "confer well-being and prosperity on them." Let's "invoke divine favor on them." Let's "honor them as holy."
Does this seem completely backwards and counter-cultural? Good. Then we may be beginning to just barely touch the surface of the Rhythms of Peace that we were created for.
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It is my prayer that the members of the Westboro Baptist Church would come to know that they ARE Love and that they are loved. That each individual would experience utter and complete compassion and forgiveness in their own soul so that this and this alone would pour forth from there lives. Where there is the most capacity for hate, there is also the most capacity for compassion. May they come to Know Peace.
It is my prayer that every individual, including myself, who witnesses acts of hatred and anger and bitterness, would awaken to their own capacity for transforming these things within themselves with compassion, forgiveness and understanding. That Peace would reign in our hearts and minds drowning out and completely dissolving every hint of that which is embodied in the cycle of bitterness. May we each know that only place we are responsible for healing is within ourselves. And may we have the courage and clarity to open to that healing.
Blessings to you!
Serafina