Love is love

Marriage Homily for Lynn Johnson and Joel Costello, Dec. 13, 2014, St. James

I begin with a little ditty from the last time Joel and Lynn and I met for pre-marital counseling.  Lynn was telling me that the wording on the marriage application has not yet changed to match the law; so the clerk asked the two men which of them would like to be “the wife.”  Lynn said he’d do it because, after all, he has the girlie name. Joel pushed back a little and said, Yeah, but I’m the one who carries a purse.

This is such a good day and a blessed event and I am honored beyond measure to have been asked to preside over this celebration of marriage.  This nation and its protestant churches have come such a long way in such a short time – its really breathtaking.  When I attended seminary from 2000 to 2003 the topic of gay marriage was front and center.  The national Episcopal Church was struggling with discernment on the issue and a national vote was set for the summer of 2003; anxiety was high church-wide. One day during a systematic theology class in 2001 one of my female heterosexual colleagues complained to the professor that she was tired of talking about this issue – it was all we ever talked about and she just wanted a break.  I though Professor Joe Monti was going to come completely unglued – he got right in her face and said:  You’re tired of it?  We’ll you better think again – ‘cause this is YOUR issue. You’re going to be on the front lines. This is your fight. Your church is positioned and ready to vote Yes at General Convention in 2003.  And you better figure out right now how you are going to live that out. And don’t ever tell me you’re tired of fighting for human dignity. This is what you signed up for.  

The irony of this is, of course, that she, and I, are only ordained to the priesthood because of the years of struggle that came from the women who we followed. We stand on the shoulders of thousands of men and women did not tire in their pursuit of the end of oppression, many of whom have lived to see the changes they fought for put into place and thriving. I am a beneficiary of social struggle. I try not to take that for granted.

I confess that even still, sitting in that classroom in 2001 I never thought I’d actually ever preside over a same sex marriage. Things at that time were so hostile, people were so staunchly set in their positions.  I never thought this massive church would actually be able to come to a resolution, much less put it into action. And yet, here were are, just over a decade later and today I am presiding over my second same gender marriage in three years – legal in both New York and PA as well as in the dioceses in which they were/are being performed.  As required by canon law I spoke with my bishop recently to seek approval for this union and I am required to do prior to all weddings and he gave his heartfelt and enthusiastic blessing.  And in preparing the liturgy for this service, in the space of five minutes I changed the language of the traditional Episcopal marriage rite from wife and husband to the wording we are using today. Imagine that, five minutes and a few strokes of the keyboard to change centuries of hatred, oppression, and exclusion.

What is important for our purposes today however is to understand what lies at the heart of this transformation.  The Episcopal Church has only seven doctrines. Just to compare, our Roman brothers and sisters have over one hundred and fifty. The over-riding doctrine for us, the one on which everything else rest is this: God is Love.  That’s it; three words. God is Love.  This doctrine, taken to its natural conclusion forces us to conclude without question that exclusion cannot be a part of our common life because it is not a holy expression of love, therefore it cannot be of God.  God is love – exclusion falls outside of that parameter. Likewise, oppression cannot be part of our common life because it is not a healthy or holy expression of love therefore is not of God. Christians must reject both exclusion and oppression and anything else that divides us from one another and from God based on a doctrine of three words. God is Love.

Of course this very simplistic understanding of the doctrine of Love turns on our personal perception of God.  If we think of God as judgmental and punishing then we are given license to mediate this to every person who does not meet our expectation of the way things are supposed to be. For some of us, love and its expression is a complicated issue; often tied to fear.  Human love invariable involves some level of pain out of which fear finds a sure home. 

I find the writing of Sri Chinmoy helpful on this score. Chinmoy is an internationally renowned spiritual leader and tireless emissary for peace.  He describes God as “the Love.” He writes: Where there is love, real love, there can be no fear.  Why do we fear? We fear because we have separated ourselves from God’s Love and we are apt to think of God the Omnipotent, not God the All-Love.  But even the Omnipotent God is not a God that threatens or strikes us with an iron rod every time we make a mistake. There is no such being as God the tyrant. There is only one God, and that God is God the Love. This God does not punish us. This God is constantly shaping us in His own way. ….. [We sometimes] feel that if we do something wrong God will punish us mercilessly. This is not so.  It is God’s Dream that each individual embodies. It is God’s Reality that each individual has to manifest here on earth.  It is in each human being that God’s Reality lives.”

Christians understand this concept of the God who is Love in the writings of the apostle Paul. The love of which Paul speaks in his first letter to the Corinthians is not love the verb. Paul is actually describing the very person of God.  God is patient; God is kind, God is not envious or boastful or rude. God does not insist on God’s own way, God is not irritable or resentful; God does not rejoice in wrongdoing, God rejoices in the truth. God bears all things, believes all things, God hopes all things, God endures all things. God never ends. Love never ends.

You might think theological discussion is boring and irrelevant but I assure you that were it not for such discussions you and I would not be here today celebrating the love that exists between these two lovely men; making legal and binding that love.  That love, the love that exists between two people, that love is why we are all here.

Have you ever wondered where love comes from?  You know, ...the kind of love that knocks you off your feet.  ….the kind of love that shows up when you least expect it or even want it.  …the kind of love that keeps that other person on your mind hour after hour.  …the kind of love that acknowledges that even the air you breath is made thinner by their absence.  

In his song, Sideways, Citizen Cope sings:

You know it ain't easy for these thoughts here to leave me
There are no words to describe it in French or in English

Well, diamonds they fade and flowers they bloom,

and I'm telling you these feelings won't go away
They've been knockin' me sideways
They've been knockin' me out lately whenever you come around me
I keep thinking in a moment that time will take them away
But these feelings won't go away, they won’t go away.

So are we born with it? Or do we learn it, like we learn to walk or ride a bike? From the Christian perspective, Love is God that resides in you. But we do not generally connect romantic love with God, as if there is something profoundly wrong with associating the two.  But Christianity has a long history of doing just that. The mystics have for centuries understood their feelings and yearnings to find union with God in terms of human love and longing. The two are very much one in the same. It does not benefit us to try to separate them, thereby rendering one lesser than the other.

At the end of the day, there are some things that are indisputable in regards to love: You do not possess it, nor can you harness or control it. It is life-giving and ever-growing and expanding. Ultimately it is a force for good; seeking to bring about peace and wholeness both internally and externally.  No matter how hard you try to beat it down or dismiss it, it will prevail.  To deny love is to do violence to yourself.  It will not be denied.  Given half a chance, love will consume you, motivate you and compel you like no other force on earth.  Unbridled it has the power to bring you back to your truest self.  If you wonder, Who am I? Ask instead, Who do I love? 

So let this marriage be for you a model of what love looks like when it is righteous and true and holy; two men who are winding their way back to God through their authentic expression of love. It is undeniably God’s own doing.