A Reflection on Orlando

A sermon by the Rev. Jacqueline Cherry

The Episcopal Church of St. John the Evangelist, San Francisco

June 19, 2016 – Proper 7, YC

Last Sunday morning, my 10-year-old daughter, Firefly, and I went to brunch in the neighborhood. She sensed something was wrong, so in a very understated way, I told her about Orlando. We’d been seated only a few minutes when a gay couple sat down at the table next to ours. Both men were glued to their phones, broadcasting the news as it flashed across the internet. I tried to distract Fly; but I couldn’t keep myself from listening either.

One man proclaimed, “We’re under attack!, a guy armed with assault weapons was arrested on his way to LA Pride! They are coming to get us.”

I could see the wheels turning in Firefly’s head, she said —When you were a kid you worried about a nuclear bomb; when I was born we worried about climate change; but now I have to worry about guns.

“But now I have to worry about guns” was both a question and a statement. My job as a parent is to protect my daughter. Or, if nothing else, provide the illusion that she is being protected. So when she asked if we were safe I said Yes.

And the men next to us echoed Yes. We lied. Last Sunday morning none of us felt safe.

For some, the Pulse massacre brought back terror of the Stonewall Riots. For others, the massacre brought back profound grief of the AIDS epidemic when we watched our gay brothers and lovers die; young and old, in every corner of our lives —the waiter at the Patio - dead; men who stood with us here, in the communion circle - dead; co-workers, classmates, fathers, men we loved, men we didn’t like at all - dead. And friends we didn’t know were dead until we read their names on the quilt. Somehow we managed to choke back the grief and carry on. But it came flooding back with the news of Orlando; the Pulse massacre shocked and brutalized our collective gay spirit.

Over the last week, we have heard nonstop chatter and speculation — the gunman was a terrorist; had pledged his allegiance to Isis; was bullied as a child; was a closeted gay man who had internalized his father’s homophobia; and so on.

With very few facts revealed, this is what we know to be true:
The Pulse massacre was a direct assault on the gay community by an American born shooter. More specifically, a surgical strike on gay Latinos, a brown-skinned subset of Orlando’s larger gay community.

So yes, Firefly, yes Harper Dandridge and Rhys Monroe, yes David, and all you children with two mamas and two daddies; yes you unflinching gay teens celebrating your high school graduation; yes, in this country you need to worry about guns. And you need to worry about homophobia — deep, systemic, insidious homophobia.

We gray-haired lesbians and gay men, we who have lived here in this city-over-the-rainbow for decades, we have done you a disservice. We have worked for gay rights and equality for some 30, 40, some 50 years. We are weary. And I am afraid our post Stonewall, post Silence = Death complacency has nurtured in you a false sense of security, when we wanted nothing more than to believe our protests and parades had made the world safer for you. We failed.

In the wake of the Pulse massacre, I hear the gospel story of the possessed man, living amidst the tombs, in a different light. In the wake of the massacre, the Gerasene demoniac is an outcast gay man, reviled for who he is, shackled and bound by self-loathing and homophobia. Jesus, of course is the same, he goes to the place nobody will go, and heals a man nobody else would dare touch.

Oh, it’s a good story, Jesus exorcising legions of demons that immediately embody a heard of swine, cascade over a cliff and drown in a lake. But I’m convinced that this story would play out differently today. St. Paul reminds us that before Christ, the law was our disciplinarian. And he goes on to assure us that in Christ we are all children of God.

Today there is no need for exorcism. Today Jesus would sweep the ostracized gay man up in his arms, and gather under his wing all of the queer outcasts - the fags and dykes, trans and transitioning, and the bullied gay teen standing on the edge of a chair waiting for the courage to step off. Jesus shepherds them all out of the catacombs, and onto hallowed ground.

My sons and daughters, Jesus says, I give you this holy place. When you are afraid, when enemies mock you and break your bones, when you cry to God, “Why have you forgotten me?” Gather with one another in this sanctuary, sweet with the smell of perfume and sweat, hear the gospel of Whitman, sing your gay anthems and dance.

Here you may kiss your lover. Here you are free to flip your hair like Cher. This is your holy place; this is Pulse, the I Beam, Amelia’s, The Eagle. Come here and know that you, and you, and you, are forever loved, just as you are.

There are rites and liturgies in the gay community, though they might not be recognized as such —

• The Liturgy of Coming Out; 
• The Covenant of Sacred Sex Between Two Women or Two Men;
• A Celebration at the Occasion of the First Gay Parade;

and the one I wrote last night,

Prayers of Thanksgiving for a Gay Bar
Let us thank God for the beauty of this sacred space.
Eternal Creator, lover of all life, the heavens cannot contain you;
inside the walls of this gay bar,
O God, we feel your presence.
For our Community universal of which this building is a symbol,
We thank you, God.
For your presence whenever 2 or 3 have gathered,
We thank you, God.
For this place where we may be still and know that we are loved,
We thank you, God.
For this sanctuary where we are free to two-step and waltz,
We thank you, God.
For dark corners where bodies are worshipped,
We thank you, God.
For the fellowship of daddies and dykes, fairies and femmes,
We thank you, God.
For the balm of refuge from our homo and transphobic world,
We thank you, God.
For blessing our vows and sanctifying our colorful families,
We thank you, God.
Eternal peace be to this gay bar and to all who cross its threshold.
Amen.

For two days after the Pulse massacre I was numb and didn’t cry. On Tuesday I drove through the intersection at 16th and Potrero and passed the same McDonald’s I’ve passed 1000 times. I’ve always hated that place, I curse the cars backed up on 16th Street waiting for the drive through. When I’m stopped at the red light I inevitably recall Michael Moore’s documentary. To my eye, that McDonald’s was nothing more than a health hazard to avoid.

But Tuesday as I drove by, I noticed a new message on the golden sign glowing above the front door. In all capitol letters it read — LOVE HEALS.  ALL OUR HEARTS ARE WITH ORLANDO.

That’s when I lost it. That’s when I pulled over by the post office and cried. That’s when everything felt different, and at the same time I realized the horror that nothing had changed at all. I wept for the young men and women gunned down in their holy place. I cried for our country’s love of guns. I cried for the shooter, and I wondered what demons possessed him.

Then I realized the Gerasene demoniac wasn’t just an outcast gay man; he was also the shooter. Jesus would cross the Galilean Sea, step off of his boat, and ask the armed man his name. And just like the demoniac, Jesus would transform Omar Mateen with his love. Remember this morning’s Epistle, In Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith. There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus. God’s love knows no bounds; there is no religion more radical than Christianity.

In the wake of the Pulse massacre where 50 people were killed by assault weapons that are legal and easily acquired, there are two things I ask you to do: commit to working for stricter gun control laws, and love like you’ve never loved before. Brothers and sisters, our lives depend on it.

Amen.