These Uncertain times

This sermon was preached at Ledyard Congregational Church in Ledyard, CT on November 10, 2024

My Lord God,
I have no idea where I am going.
I do not see the road ahead of me.
I cannot know for certain where it will end.
nor do I really know myself,
and the fact that I think I am following your will
does not mean that I am actually doing so.
But I believe that the desire to please you
does in fact please you.
And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing.
I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire.

And I know that if I do this you will lead me by the right road,

though I may know nothing about it.
Therefore will I trust you always though
I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death.

I will not fear, for you are ever with me,
and you will never leave me to face my perils alone.

“The Merton Prayer” from Thoughts in Solitude Copyright © 1956, 1958 by The Abbey of Our Lady of Gethsemani. Used by permission of Farrar Straus Giroux.

Thomas Merton O.C.S.O. (January 31, 1915 – December 10, 1968) is arguably the most influential American Catholic author of the twentieth century. He wrote over 60 books and hundreds of poems and articles on topics ranging from monastic spirituality to civil rights, nonviolence, and the nuclear arms race. He kept private journals and maintained a voluminous personal correspondence; he also recorded his classroom lectures.

After a rambunctious youth and adolescence, Merton converted to Roman Catholicism while attending Columbia University. On December 10th, 1941, he entered the Abbey of Gethsemani, a community of monks belonging to the Order of Cistercians of the Strict Observance (Trappists), the most ascetic Roman Catholic monastic order.

The 27 years he spent at Gethsemani brought about profound changes in his self-understanding. This ongoing conversion impelled him into the political arena, where he became, according to Fr. Daniel Berrigan, the conscience of the peace movement of the 1960s. Referring to race and peace as the two most urgent issues of our time, Merton was a strong supporter of the nonviolent civil rights movement, which he called “certainly the greatest example of Christian faith in action in the social history of the United States.”

This prayer was written during a time of deep uncertainty in his life as his ongoing conversion was leading him through new and uncharted territory in his life. I find his words quite comforting as we move into these uncertain times.

Uncertainty is one of those things we’re not very good at. We like things mapped out…A leads to B leads to C. We see the end, if not from the beginning, at least from the middle. And while that may be our preferred way of experiencing the world, in my experience that’s not the way it usually works out.

We live with uncertainty about our jobs…will they still be there in six months? There is uncertainty about our health, what it means to live with chronic disease or waiting for a new diagnosis. Our family relationships are, at times tenuous, as we navigate the changes that are inevitable among people who continue to evolve throughout their lives. There is no end to the avenues of uncertainty that haunt our lives. And we don’t like it one bit.

We knew that no matter who won the election we would be moving into uncertain times. Ours is a nation deeply divided and the way forward is anything but certain.

There is a feeling of being unmoored, like a boat that is bobbing around not attached to the ground tackle that holds it in place. After Super Storm Sandy, which Jean and I rode out on our boat, much to our families’ chagrin, we got phone calls from all over the country yelling at us. When we emerged from the companionway, the first thing I saw was a beautiful 38 foot sailboat lying on its side on the rocks two docks behind our boat. It’s hard to describe the sick feeling that came over me as I thought about the owner. A salvage crew was already approaching to lift the boat off the rocks, but it would be weeks before the damages were fully assessed.

I’ve had that same sick feeling in the last few weeks, the uncertainty of what lies ahead and what it will take to bring our nation back together as a safe place for all people.

Uncertainty looks like me, a gay married woman whose marriage may well be made illegal in the next few years.

Uncertainty looks like sky high grocery prices and most of our produce rotting in the fields when we deport half the migrant workers on whom our economy depends.

Uncertainty looks like the roll back of rights for the trans community and the end of gender affirming care. Now you may not understand what it means to be transgender, but that doesn’t mean that you know better than the person who lives in their skin what is right for them.

As an open and affirming church, are we ready to welcome a scared population of LGBTQIA people who are wondering what is ahead for them. Or, as I suspect, are we hiding our light under a bushel because the truth is we are welcoming of that community as long as we look and act straight.

Uncertainty looks like Project 2025, and if you don’t know what that is, you need to. It is impossible to be a responsible American citizen in this day and age without a working knowledge of Project 2025. It is available for free online. It is the blueprint for unprecedented uncertainty for every vulnerable population in this country. Don’t be upset with me for what I am saying unless you have done your due diligence and become familiar with Project 2025.

Uncertainty looks like extreme weather patterns that will continue to increase if we do not pay attention to the degradation of our planet. Sure, it’s amazing to have temperatures in the 70’s during November, but not when you realize why this is true.

Uncertainty lives at the razor’s edge of two things, despair and possibility. When we get to the very edge of all we have ever known and entered unchartered waters we have a choice. We can wring our hands and get immobilized in fear and despair, or we can do as the Psalm 46 suggests…be still and know that God is still God.

This is not a get out of jail free card. This knowledge will save us from nothing. Rather, it will ground us in a certainty that roots our action on the side of what is good and holy and just. God is faithful and calls us to be the same.

 Our tasks are the same now as they have ever been, to clothe the naked, feed the hungry, welcome the stranger, visit the imprisoned, care for the planet and care for one another.

Our identity as God’s people, people on whom God has laid a claim in our baptism surpasses our identity as citizens, political affiliates, liberals, conservatives, tree huggers or granola groupies.  

What we share is that we are citizens of this country, and this world and God calls us to covenant relationship that puts all other identities second to the one we share in Christ. If we fail in this, we fail in all else.

Whatever the uncertainty in your life, whatever despair creeps around the edges of your peace, whatever fear invades the certainty that, while partly an illusion, you have lived with…be still and know that God is God. Keep digging, deep, down deep, until you get to that bedrock that is the root of all things.

When we stand secure in that place…what is unclear will become clearer, what is uncertain will become more certain, what is fearful will diminish because we will discover that love is stronger than hate, faith is stronger than fear, the call of life surpasses the threat of death. God is still God. We are still God’s beloved. These times will require all the faith, all the love, all the grace and all the courage we can muster. It’s time we put the protest back in protestant.