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| Sunday morning Beverly |
It's a beautiful spring day walking from the subway station to Beverly Church.
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| along the way.... |
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| along the way |
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| Ready to preach |
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Let's start with Paul and Silas in prison. Incarcerated is what we say. When I say that, what do you think of? How many of us have family members or friends behind bars? I was never chosen to be a juror because I always had members of my church incarcerated.
So common that we speak of the "school to prison" pipeline. A friend of mine who works with homeless people tells me that in Oklahoma they use 3rd grade failure rates to predict future prison building needs. Michelle Alexander has shown us how mass incarceration is "the new Jim Crow." In a direct line from slavery.
According to the NAACP:
Incarceration Trends in America
Between 1980 and 2015, the number of people incarcerated in America increased from roughly 500,000 to over 2.2 million.
Today, the United States makes up about 5% of the world’s population and has 21% of the world’s prisoners.
1 in every 37 adults in the United States, or 2.7% of the adult population, is under some form of correctional supervision.
StopFriskRacial Disparities in Incarceration
In 2014, African Americans constituted 2.3 million, or 34%, of the total 6.8 million correctional population.
African Americans are incarcerated at more than 5 times the rate of whites.
The imprisonment rate for African American women is twice that of white women.
Nationwide, African American children represent 32% of children who are arrested,
Though African Americans and Hispanics make up approximately 32% of the US
population, they comprised 56% of all incarcerated people in 2015.
Drug Sentencing Disparities
African Americans represent 12.5% of illicit drug users, but 29% of those arrested for drug offenses and 33% of those incarcerated in state facilities for drug offenses.
In 2012 alone, the United States spent nearly $81 billion on corrections.
Spending on prisons and jails has increased at triple the rate of spending on Pre‐K‐12 public education in the last thirty years.
I'm gonna stop. It's just not right.
There sit Paul and Silas in prison....why? Well as always it's got something to do with money. Seems this slave girl kept following them around. Calling out that these men were "slaves of the most high God" who were ".....proclaiming a way of salvation. Well, come to think of it, that was true! And she is annoying Paul to no end. So he discerns that there's a spirit involved and he draws the spirit out.
SO the owners who were making money from her "psychic readings" or "fortune telling" or "tarot card reading" are angry at having lost their meal ticket and seek to find a way to get Paul and Silas taken in. And it of course involves some "Jew" baiting language and sure enough there's an angry mob and beatings. And they wind up in double bondage, not only in jail, but in stocks as well !
So far, as to be expected. I like the scene where they are singing hymns and the prisoners are listening...I remember when I was arrested in the protests following the Mohamed Diallo killing. As I was led in to the cells, my African-American brother clergy were singing spirituals and gospel songs, making the prison walls vibrate with sound. I thought of this verse.
SO here's where the story takes a turn...seems God doesn't like prison walls either . and there's an earthquake and the walls fall down. And everyone runs away, right? No way. They stay. And presumably the other prisoners do too.
The jailer is sure he will be blamed and made to pay. But when he looks, they're all still there. Still praying, singing , testifying.
And before it's all over, the jailer will have become their captor, in essence. By this propaganda of the deed, as my Central American call it, the jailer is converted...and his whole household.
And Paul and Silas, who took the risk to stay in jail, are washed, bandaged and fed. .
What we see is caring about someone enough to take a very serious risk on their behalf. Showing by doing. We're called to that kind of love.
Loose ends. I don't expect any earthquake to take down our walls anytime soon. Rikers Island isn't going anywhere anytime soon. We'll have to do our own actions, like Paul and Silas, and see what can happen.
At our last General Assembly last year in St.Louis, as a sign of protest against the bail bond system, we took up an offering of some 65000 and a whole bunch Presbyterians marched downtown and bailed out over 100 prisoners...not a bad way to begin....
Amen
In our prayers, there are many intercessions as always. But this tine, prayers of thanksgiving as well as Geraldine's granddaughter has 6 college acceptances to choose from. Geraldine always knew something special was in store. As always we will go downstairs to break bread together.
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| Beverly is hospitality |
First Reading Acts 16:16-34
16One day, as we were going to the place of prayer, we met a slave girl who had a spirit of divination and brought her owners a great deal of money by fortune-telling. 17While she followed Paul and us, she would cry out, "These men are slaves of the Most High God, who proclaim to you a way of salvation." 18She kept doing this for many days. But Paul, very much annoyed, turned and said to the spirit, "I order you in the name of Jesus Christ to come out of her." And it came out that very hour.
19But when her owners saw that their hope of making money was gone, they seized Paul and Silas and dragged them into the marketplace before the authorities. 20When they had brought them before the magistrates, they said, "These men are disturbing our city; they are Jews 21and are advocating customs that are not lawful for us as Romans to adopt or observe." 22The crowd joined in attacking them, and the magistrates had them stripped of their clothing and ordered them to be beaten with rods. 23After they had given them a severe flogging, they threw them into prison and ordered the jailer to keep them securely. 24Following these instructions, he put them in the innermost cell and fastened their feet in the stocks.
25About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the prisoners were listening to them. 26Suddenly there was an earthquake, so violent that the foundations of the prison were shaken; and immediately all the doors were opened and everyone's chains were unfastened. 27When the jailer woke up and saw the prison doors wide open, he drew his sword and was about to kill himself, since he supposed that the prisoners had escaped. 28But Paul shouted in a loud voice, "Do not harm yourself, for we are all here." 29The jailer called for lights, and rushing in, he fell down trembling before Paul and Silas. 30Then he brought them outside and said, "Sirs, what must I do to be saved?" 31They answered, "Believe on the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you and your household." 32They spoke the word of the Lord to him and to all who were in his house. 33At the same hour of the night he took them and washed their wounds; then he and his entire family were baptized without delay. 34He brought them up into the house and set food before them; and he and his entire household rejoiced that he had become a believer in God.
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