The Emperor of All Social Maladies

"This is my Son the beloved, of whom I am well pleased"

What are some of your favorite comic strips?  The Far Side was one of my favorite comics during my college years, and still is.  The humor was often based on animals, complete with many human attributes and portrayed in awkward human situations.  

Yes, The Far Side was great at pointing out the absurdities of life!

So recently I saw a Far Side cartoon on a guys t-shirt.  The caption, I think was “Dog Church”.   The preacher was a dog and the congregants sitting in the pews were also dogs, (mostly little old lady dogs) sitting in the half empty pews, clutching their purses, wearing pearl necklaces, hats and their cat-eye glasses as they listened to the dog preacher, who was in the pulpit.  And the dog preacher, standing there in the pulpit, with arm and paw pointing to them as he preached, “You’re all BAD dogs!”

No, I never wanted to be a preacher like that!  And I am sure you don’t want to hear a sermon like that either!  

Now, in the gospel for today, Matthew describes Jesus' baptism.  He is baptized in the river Jordan by John the Baptist.  Afterward, the Spirit of God descends upon him and Jesus hears a voice from heaven that says, “This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased…” 

Do you feel beloved by God?    We have been taught since we were children that God is love, and loves us.  But how many of us really feel that love?  

And how about taking a "God's eye view" of ourselves.   Let’s dare to look at ourselves from how God might see us for a moment…...  Is God well pleased…?

   

Well, um, we are human.  We make mistakes.  At times we forget that, “love is patient, love is kind…that love is not envious or boastful…or that love is not arrogant or rude…and does not insist on its own way…love is not irritable or resentful”.       It is a pretty tall order to live and walk in love!  

I am currently reading a very interesting book called The Emperor of All Maladies.  It is excellent.  And just what is the emperor of all diseases?  Cancer.

So, if I asked you what is the emperor of all social maladies, what would you say?      

Rudeness.

If many of you have also noticed this, you are not alone.  It is what many are calling “The Rudeness Epidemic”.   TV show talk show hosts on certain cable news channels and radio talk show hosts kick up the dust and fan the flames of various issues with their snarky, sarcastic, and mean spirited comments.  Facebook at times can be pretty vicious too. 

What are we to do?

Are we being overly sensitive, or is that society is just getting more and more rude?  

Judith Martin, better known as “Miss Manners”, has written columns and many books over the years on proper behavior and etiquette.    Her books are full of humor, wit and wisdom.  One of her best selling books was, Miss Manner’s Guide to Excruciatingly Correct Behavior, which has become a classic.   

Now, her books are not simply about which fork to use at a formal dinner party.   You see, because how we treat others is actually very deep, spiritually and ethically.   For etiquette is really about respect and how we treat each other.  

How shall we live?   What kind of person do I want to be?   What kind of people do I, we, want to be around?   Without ever saying it overtly, Miss Manners states that the rules of etiquette, hypocritical though some may be, are a requirement for modern civilized society.

Well as try as we might, sometimes we make mistakes.  We lose our cool, we get angry.  We get impatient, anxious, perhaps even rude.  We are not perfect.    To err is human, as the saying goes.   In fact, that is really what the word “sin” means, “to miss the mark”, to not hit the bulls eye of a target.  In other words, to sin is to error, to make a mistake.

On the other hand, if we are the one who just became irritated, annoyed or offended at someone’s insensitive or rude remark or behavior, may we pause and take a breath.  Perhaps they are having a bad day.  Perhaps they just received some very bad news.  Or perhaps they are carrying some sort of emotional pain that we cannot even begin to understand. 

One time I was flying back from the Bay Area, and the man sitting next to me on the airplane was acting very strange.  He was cold, aloof, and in his own world.  When I said ‘hello’ to him, he did not respond.  He stared out the window.  His uneasiness made me a bit uneasy.  It would have been all too easy to just dismiss him as being rude, weird or a jerk.  So I read my book for most of flight.    

Then about the last ten minutes of our 90 minute flight, as the plane was vectoring over Phoenix and getting ready to land at Sky Harbor airport, I noticed he was silently crying.   

Uh oh.  I wanted to say something to the man, but did not know exactly what to say.  Finally, I asked him if Phoenix was his home.  And that is all it took, the door was opened and he began to talk to me.   

The man told me he was from the Bay Area, but was flying to Phoenix to meet his son, who was in Phoenix visiting his grandparents.  He was meeting him in person to tell his son that his mother, (the man’s wife) was just killed in a car accident yesterday. 

Ugh….  

I watched him exit the plane, he was met by his 13 year old son.  The boy running up to greet his father, not knowing the bad news he was about to hear...and how his life would be turned upside down in just a minute or so.

Rev. Jeanne has a little saying full of wisdom at the bottom of her email salutation that says, “Be kinder than necessary…for everyone you meet is fighting some sort of battle”. 

And here we all are St. Peters, our little church, all of us on the journey together… trying to grow our spirits, live and walk in love, and help each other along the way.  We may not be perfect, but here we all are…in spite of ourselves and our imperfections,  trying … anyway.

Amen.

[Sermon given at St. Peter's Episcopal Church, Casa Grande, AZ JAN 12, 2014]