A Plea To the Fractured

There is a fracture – a deep, widening chasm. 

And there are wedges being driven into its most fragile places.

This is not a chasm between the Church and the world, not a sorting of the sheep and the goats. This is a fracture straight through the center of the Church.

There are some near the fault line who are trying to straddle the gap – trying to keep one foot in both camps. And they are about to fall into the chasm between the cliffs, if they haven't already.

We are playing tug-of-war across this fracture – over relief, over labels, over Scripture, over politics, over souls – and these are about to fall into the chasm.

If they haven't already.

Last week, 10,000 children fell into the chasm, victims of our divisive tug-of-war.

It's time to draw the chasm closed, time to heal and mend this fracture.

First, we must recover those we've lost in the battle. We must reach down into the darkness where we let them fall – into the pit of our judgment and our neglect – and draw them out. We must wrap our arms around them and promise them we will not let them go again.

And then we must come together. We must each, in our own land, dig in our heels, reach across the fracture, lock fingers with those we have alienated, and pull: as if our lives depended on it, with all our might, until our Church is whole again, even if that's not until we reach heaven.

We must work with all our might, fighting not against one another, but against our own foolish divisiveness in our own foolish pasts.

To those in the chasm: we are sorry. We are coming. Please forgive us and help us recover. Love us, and show us how we should have loved you.

To those standing in the gap, trying to keep peace and unity for all of us: thank you. It is only because of your painstaking efforts that this chasm is not far wider. Hold on. And pray it won't be for much longer.

To those across the way: we can see you. Some of us are trying to hear you, trying to listen. Please take my hand. Please pull with all your might – for reconciliation, for peace.

And to those on my side: stand with me, I beg you. Dig in your heels. Refuse to drift further away. Reach out, dig in, and pull.

I am not asking anyone to switch places, to cross over this fault line. You may keep your position and have harmony, too. Neither am I insisting we must do away with the fault line altogether in order to be truly united. It will always remain. We will always be on one side or the other.

But it does not have to divide or define us. There are faults enough within each one of us – there is no sense in deepening the one running between us.

To those widening the chasm, driving wedges deeper and deeper until the plates shift further and further apart: I understand. I know what it is you fight for, and I love you for your zeal. I will endeavor to listen to you, for it is your dedication to the truth that has inspired much of mine. I beg you to continue speaking this truth, continue holding it before my eyes. I am not asking you to set it aside even for a moment as we endeavor to close this gap. I am asking that you carry it with you to the fracture, burdensome as it may feel at times, and use its power, its hope, its true story of blessed reconciliation to draw together these two lands that seem forever divided.

You see, that is the greatest truth you uphold: this impossible truth that two beings which seem to be too distant for reconciliation could be joined – flawlessly, inseparably, eternally.

This truth that the Holy God could be joined with this filthy mess of humanity, this Church-Bride riddled with faults – this is the truth you bring to the reconciliation efforts.

So do not think I am asking you to lay aside the truth. Indeed, it is the truth that must draw us together. Let us stop using it to widen the chasm between us: let us allow it, instead, to work its sanctifying power on us, in us, between us, and through us. 

May we all, holding firmly to truth, forgetting what is behind, and straining toward what is ahead, find the strength to reach out, dig in, and pull.