The Practice of Sanctuary

In 1986, during the height of the Central American crisis, a pastor I consider a hero and mentor, was arrested and convicted of violating federal immigration law. He had opened his church as a sanctuary for migrants fleeing the civil wars of El Salvador and Guatemala. He and a network of churches had created a kind of underground railroad, where they provided shelter and services to people fleeing intense violence and oppression. And they broke the law to do it.

I met John Fife many years later, during a seminary trip, where he sat in the churchyard where he created this sanctuary in Tucson, AZ. There was a memorial in that yard to those who had lost their lives cross the border and John sat back in cowboy boots as he remembered the days when he faced trial and possible jail time for following what he believed to be the call of the gospel. What I remember most is how he closed his talk. He got a big smile on his face, looked at all of us seminarians, and drawled; “Just remember one thing: the bastards never win in the end.”

The practice that John Fife was using, the practice of sanctuary is an old one. The term itself originates in England and medieval Europe, during a time when the church could harbor any person accused of a crime and advocate for them with the authorities. In the United States, it is a practice that has been used many times, and usually in defiance of the law itself. It was used during the time of slavery, when runaway slaves would take refuge in houses and churches as they made their way north in the Underground Railroad. This was illegal, according to the Supreme Court at the time, but it was deeply rooted in faith and a commitment to a gospel that proclaimed freedom for all. It was used in the civil rights movement, especially when things got dangerous and violent for protesters in the south. It was used during the immigration waves of the 70s and 80s.

And now, many churches are talking about it again. And so are cities and universities, as it has become a point of contention with the incoming administration. I want to talk a little bit about this idea, this idea of sanctuary, and why I think it is important.

First, the practice of sanctuary is deeply rooted in Jesus’ gospel

In the gospel this morning, Matthew introduces Jesus with the words of the prophet Isaiah. Matthew says that Jesus’ movement was like a light coming on in darkness. It was reminding people of life in the middle of so much death. As a whole people suffered under the heel of an occupying empire, the Jesus movement brought hope.

And it brought hope by banding together a bunch of poor people—revolutionaries, fishermen, carpenters, homeless people, people on the run from the empire and eventually on the run from the law. Jesus’ central message was a message of offering freedom and liberation and healing to poor and suffering people. A different kingdom, a different government, a different world. Turn around, he says, for the kingdom of heaven is coming. And this great movement of people follow him, from all these little towns in the middle of nowhere.

And, throughout the gospels, this band of people, and especially Jesus and his core group of followers, find places of sanctuary. Someone is always wanted to kill Jesus and Jesus has no permanent home in the gospels. But Simon Peter’s family in Capernaum open their home as sanctuary to Jesus and his movement. So do other families throughout Galilee. So do Mary and Martha, much later, when Jesus goes to the capital. So does the owner of the upper room before Jesus is arrested—and that person opens their home or space to Jesus when there is already a warrant out for his arrest.

So this idea, this practice, is one that is deeply rooted in the gospels. It is part of what Jesus did and what Jesus is offered as the head of a new poor people’s movement.

 Second, this practice goes further back and is rooted in the Hebrew Scriptures

Our Psalm today reads:

For in the day of trouble he shall keep me safe in his shelter;
he shall hide me in the secrecy of his dwelling
and set me high upon a rock.

It’s a psalm about being hidden in the temple, about being hidden in a place of refuge, in the dwelling of God, away from the psalmist’s enemies.

And that practice comes from the Priestly codes in Deuteronomy, where six cities were set aside as cities of refuge. These were particularly designated for people who had unintentionally killed someone and had people trying to kill them. So, if you had intentionally murdered someone, you were dealt with by the community, but if you had been exonerated and the victims family still wanted to kill you, you had a place to run to and stay safe.

While that is the stated reason for cities of refuge, this was a common practice in the ancient world. And the people who came to these cities, or who came to sites of worship for sanctuary, were often escaped slaves, people accused of pettier crimes, people in debt, and political rivals and refugees. When Solomon becomes king, for example, his brother who had organized a coup, fled to the temple and clung to “the horns of the altar”, claiming sanctuary.

This Psalm of David, Ps 27, is a song about hiding out in the temple, “living (it says) in the house of the Lord” so that the singer will be delivered from his enemies.

This practice of sanctuary is an ancient one, a practice that sometimes brought to light the intense inequality of the times, and provided some kind of safe place for those hunted by those in power.

Last, this practice of sanctuary is deeply motivated by a longing for liberation

That text from Isaiah that Matthew quotes and that we read as our first reading? Did you hear that last part?

Isaiah talks about light in darkness and life in death, not as metaphors, not as fancy language. He goes on:

For the yoke of their burden,
and the bar across their shoulders,
the rod of their oppressor,
you have broken as on the day of Midian.

In other words, the goal is the ending of oppression. The goal of Isaiah, the goal of Jesus, is to end oppression. To end slavery, to end suffering, to end poverty, to end oppression.

Right now, in Westport, our church has offered sanctuary to about 15-20 people every night. We started, we opened the church, in response to very public threats made against us and against our people. And we have managed to keep the church open for 89 days.

We have offered sanctuary to people who are homeless, people who are cast out and made refugees by our economic system.

We have offered sanctuary to people who are sometimes using drugs as part of their survival strategy, people who are considered in our society as less than human. I have heard business owners on the harbor openly say in city council meetings that they want drug addicts to die. By offering sanctuary, we publicly proclaim that people who use drugs are human and deserve to be treated with dignity and respect and are loved by God.

We have offered sanctuary to people who are in trouble with the law, in a system that criminalizes poor people and catches them in a lifetime of criminal charges, jail time, probation, and fines. We openly ask, just like sanctuary churches in Europe, for officers of the law to stay off the property without invitation. We do so because we need to create a safe place for people, where we take their side against an unjust system, and try to find ways to navigate services and court systems with them.

We have offered sanctuary to young people. At least half, and probably more, of the people who stay in our church are under 30. We live in a society and a world that throws away their children. We want them to live and to thrive. We have lost too many young people, with such gifts to give the world, and so we have opened specifically for our young people, who are deeply marginalized and hated in the community.

We do this in hope. We do this in the hope that Jesus’ first followers found. Hope for the end to oppression and suffering. Hope that our young people have a better future. Hope that we can see ourselves as human beings and fight together to build a different world.

I don’t know if any of you remember the Disney movie, Hunchback of Notre Dame, but I am going to leave you with some of the lyrics of the soundtrack. When Esmerelda, the Roma girl who found sanctuary in Notre Dame, sings in the church:

I don't know if You can hear me
Or if You're even there
I don't know if You will listen
To a humble prayer
They tell me I am just an outcast
I shouldn't speak to You
Still, I see your face and wonder
Were You once an outcast, too?

God help the outcasts
Hungry from birth
Show them the mercy
They don't find on earth
The lost and forgotten
They look to You still
God help the outcasts
Or nobody will.

A God Who Cares

Isaac and the Wells (Genesis 26)

All through the Bible, there is this theme of the refugee. Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and his descendants spend a lot of time wandering. They spend a lot of time moving from place to place. They spend a lot of time as refugees. And sometimes as slaves.

In our story this morning, Isaac finds himself and his family living as strangers and even as refugees in the land of the Philistines, the area now known as Gaza. They are afraid. They eventually get kicked out. And then their water supply gets vandalized.

God is concerned about basic needs

You know, the Bible is almost always about real things. In the Christian tradition, we often talk a lot about spirit and soul. We tend to want to spiritualize things. But, the Bible rarely does that.

God’s promises are usually always about concrete things. Water. Land. Safety.

God promises to give a homeless family land.

God is invested in people and animals having enough water.

God cares that Isaac’s actions put Rebecca in danger.

In my life and in my work, I think a lot about things like land and food and water and a safe place to sleep.

Right now, I’m working with an encampment on the Chehalis River of about 50-60 people. They are camping close to where people camped last year. Some of them have been displaced from hotels that have shut down. Some of them are there just because there is nowhere to go.

A few guys from the camp went to city hall last week and told city council that the hundreds of people who find themselves homeless in Aberdeen had no access to water or sanitation. According to DSHS, about 750 people in Aberdeen (around 70 in Montesano, by the way) are homeless or nearly so. They were asking the city to work with them to find solutions.

"What are you doing right now? Where do we go to the bathroom? Where do we shower? These are the things on our minds every day... Basic needs need to be met."

I am always struck by people’s courage in showing up and fighting for each other for basic human rights. And I am always reminded, that in the wealthiest country in the history of the world, we have millions of people who do not have access to basic needs like water on a very hot day.

But most of all, when I read this passage in light of my week, I think about how God is invested in struggles like these. God cares about whether or not you have water. God cares about whether or not you have food or a place to sleep. Or if you are safe.

God cares if people have safety and dignity

I keep wondering what it must be like for Rebecca. Here she is, a refugee in a strange land. And her husband is so afraid that he puts her at risk and basically is willing to throw her under the bus and trade her safety for his own. This happens to women all over the world pretty often.

I think about so many people when I read this story. I think about the woman I met on the US Mexico border who jumped trains from El Salvador to make it across the border. She was assaulted. She also fell off the train as it was moving at one points, cutting a deep gash through her leg.

I think about the myriad of women I know across the country who have ended up on the streets or couch surfing because they lost a job or they ended up in prison or they just could never find a job in the first place.

I think about the young Palestinians who live—right now—where this story took place, in Gaza, where they are living in tents on piles of rubble.

In the years after the story we are looking at today, God lays down laws for his people. And one of them is this: In Leviticus 19:34

“You shall treat the stranger who sojourns with you as the native among you, and you shall love him as yourself, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt: I am the LORD your God.”

God has special care for people who are displaced. For refugees. For economic refugees. For the dispossessed. For the scared and the suffering. For the vulnerable and the alone.

This camp that I mentioned earlier: they have been given until today to vacate the property. Bulldozers are supposed to come this afternoon. The people living there are people who once were supervisors at sawmills. The people living there are young women who have been forced out of hotels and are trying to find a little safety in the bushes. The people living there are young men who may have just been released from jail but who can hold a prayer meeting that would bring you to tears.

Just a couple of weeks ago, a few guys from town went down to this camp and starting bashing tents and calling people names. It was a classic case of “bum bashing.” One of the women I know well was sleeping alone in her tent when they came by, in the middle of the night. They broke her tent down, kicked her little puppy, and told her, in language I will not repeat here, that she needed to “get off the river, get out of town.”

We like words like that these days. “Go back where you came from.” “Get off this place or that.”

God, however, says differently. Love the stranger as yourself. Remember you were once refugees.

This is really personal for me right now. I just drove across country and, as I did so, I visited the little town in Alabama where my great grandpa was born. During the great depression, that whole side of the family moved—with thousands of others—from the deep South to California, looking for work, looking for a better life. Some of them found it, some did not. My great grandpa died in an old hotel and no one found his body for days.

God cares that people have somewhere to live and belong

When God meets Isaac as homeless wanderer in a strange land, the promise God gives is the promise of land. The promise of a place to live in peace and safety. Its what every human being longs for.

There is that beautiful verse in Micah 4:4: “Everyone will sit under their own vine and under their own fig tree, and no one will make them afraid, for the LORD Almighty has spoken.”

That is what we all long for.

A place to belong. Enough to eat and drink and rest.

We human beings rarely act like it, but the earth, the land is a gift. We think we can own it, we think we can use it however we want to, but we often forget who created it.

The earth is the Lord’s, says the Psalmist, and the fullness thereof.

When God created the earth, God gave it as a gift. There was—and still is—enough for everyone. The land is rich with all the things we need. And, in the end, it belongs to all of us. It is our birthright.

Rebecca and Isaac settled on land and it gave them enough. The dug wells for water and there was enough to drink. Until, of course, angry neighbors decided to fill in the wells.

They is a lot of well filling going on in our world. Whole neighborhoods and communities in Detroit are fighting for water, because, in many poor communities like theirs, if they can’t pay the water bill, no one has water. In Flint, the water is nearly undrinkable in some places. Right now, more Native nations than have ever come together before are on the prairies of North Dakota, protesting an oil pipeline that they believe will permanently pollute their water supply. Right now, on our very own Chehalis river, a few hundred people are begging city council to provide them access to water for drinking and sanitation.

God created enough. There is enough—there is abundance. But people are denied access to it.

Here, in this beautiful amazing place that I love so much, in the middle of fertile farmland, people go hungry. And in the foothills of a rainforest, people go thirsty. And in the middle of the most beautiful timber in the world, people have no housing. And their cries are reaching the ear of God, a God who created all things for all people, a God who stands with the hungry and the poor and the thirsty.

I was at this river camp late one night this week and in the gathering dusk, a young man noticed my collar and asked if we could pray. He brought his friends and a half dozen of us stood and held hands.

His voice echoed through the campsite as he prayed for himself and his friends, for those he loved who were locked up, as he begged for protection and for God’s love and for people’s needs to be met. He prayer brought us to tears. We were on holy ground and holy land, land God created for us all to share.

And of one thing I was absolutely certain. This young man’s prayers reached the ears of a God who cares.