‘We just loved one another’

Will Campbell, prophet, preacher, writer, civil rights activist, who always maintained a love/hate relationship with the church, recently passed away.  Although he called himself a “steeple drop-out”, he never tired of challenging pastors, “to minister to the hurt wherever you find it and live in hope even in the midst of tragedy.”  And after all his years of confrontation with injustice and racism, he still spoke of loving our enemies as our sisters and brothers because, “God loves them, and us, anyway.”  
One of his novels, “The Glad River” tells the story of a small band of radical believers who call themselves “The Neighborhood.” Their friendship sustains and renews them in the face of the many challenges of life and faith. At the conclusion of the novel, two members of The Neighborhood bury the third member. One gives this eulogy: “We had good times together…and bad. We laughed together and we cried together…We sat on rushing riverbanks in the hills, and whiled away many a summer afternoon on sleeping bayous. We read books and learned to talk like each other, argued about trivial things and took hard counsel together about the things that mattered. But mostly…we just loved one another.”  
Loving our enemies … loving those who disagree with us … arguing and agreeing, but loving still. Sounds good, indeed sounds a lot like what Jesus taught and how he lived. But is it really possible in today’s divided and angry world? And I confess that even as I despair over such a world, I am also very much a part of it.
For example, I just wish Texas would go away. Since the Supreme Court decision striking down key provisions of the Voting Rights Act, the Texas legislature, dominated by the radical right, is moving as fast as it can, through redistricting and strict Voter ID laws, to limit the right to vote. We don’t need to expand our base, we just need to keep people from voting … especially the poor and people of color.
This same legislature, shedding crocodile tears for unborn babies, passed restrictive abortion legislation that essentially prevents poor women from having access to legal and safe abortions. If I sound cynical, I am. For even as they weep for the unborn, they make darned sure that poor children will not have access to Food Stamps. As I have said before, these people are not pro-life, they are pro-birth. What happens to children after they are born is not really something the far right cares much about.
And so, the House of Representatives, filled with right to life warriors, completely eliminates Food Stamps from the Farm Bill. Corporate welfare — yes! Food for poor children and families – no!  Once they are born, let them fend for themselves. In the words of economist, Paul Krugman, “We are talking about a state of mind that takes positive glee in inflicting further suffering on the already miserable…an almost pathological mean-spiritedness.”  
I can rant and rave about them, but can I love them? I’m back to Campbell who insisted that God loves even the meanest SOB, and so must we. Love a neighbor…be a neighbor. I can continue to speak out against the mean-spirited injustice seemingly rampant in our time, but nothing will ever change if I become as mean-spirited as the ones against whom I struggle. It just might be that the only way the world really is ever going to change is if we get out there and do some love and discover that when we do, we really do live and live abundantly…just like the man said.
Rev. Gene Nelson is the pastor of the Community Church of Sebastopol.