Monday Morning Musing: Mother of Exiles

I am delighted to have begun serving as a "bridge pastor" for a local ELCA congregation. This simply means that in the time between the leave taking of their pastor and the appointment of an interim, I will lead worship on Sundays and do the ubiquitous other things as desired. We are early in what will very likely be a rather brief relationship, but I can say that they are a lovely group of people, eager to live out the call of the Gospel.

It's been a minute since I last preached a sermon, so I felt that yesterday's offering was well, disorganized. The lectionary readings for this season aren't the most inspiring and I wanted to give them my A+ effort, but I fear they got more like a B-. Or maybe that was just me. They were generous in their reception and response.

The Gospel text was about hospitality and I think it's good for us on this Independence Day Eve to recall that hospitality, the wide welcome of those from other countries, is the very basis of the foundation of this country. Except for our indigenous siblings, the rest of us descend from immigrants. One would imagine that we would continue to hold wide welcome as a value, or at least an aspirational value. But here we are today, building walls and literally shipping busloads of people out of red cities and into blue ones. God help us.

In my sermon yesterday I noted that at the base of the Statue of Liberty is the poem The New Colossus, written by Emma Lazarus. We so often hear the famous few lines that begin with "give me your tired, your poor" but the beauty and the power of this poem really live in its wholeness.

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,

with conquering limbs astride from land to land;

Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand

a mighty woman with a torch, whose flame

is the imprisoned lightning, and her name

Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand

glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command

the air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.

"Keep ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she

with silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor,

your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,

the wretched refuse of your teeming shore.

Send these, the homeless, tempest-most to me,

I lift my lamp beside the golden door."