Uprooting Hate

Author: Pastor Mike Gutzler (from sermon on 3/14/2021)

Hate is a strong word, maybe that is why we try to use it sparingly. We tend to use the word hate in reference to something we dislike or don’t care for, say: “I hate this song” when it comes on the radio or pops up on a playlist or “I hate this particular food” when it is not your favorite and served for dinner. And sometimes, we use the word hate when we have a dislike for a particular show or movie or even actor/character, but when we get down to using hate in direct relationship to an individual person or people – it carries a deep significance.

The section I just read from the Gospel of John is the one place in all the Gospels where Jesus discusses the word hate, as it relates to people and more specifically his followers, in detail. It comes right after probably one of the most famous sections of all of scripture where Jesus talks about how he is the vine, and we are the branches. When we abide in the vine, the branches produce the same kind of Gospel-like fruit. A very beautiful and meaningful text for all of us. Especially during Lent when we are all taking some intentional abiding time with God.

It is also right after Jesus talks about abiding that he offers his disciples the commandment to love one another. We will talk more about love next week in the final segment of our preaching series, but it is important to note here that for Jesus the reminder of God’s love and presence is presented before he talks about the challenges of this world and the reality that we as individuals and disciples will experience hate.

So to talk about hate we need to start with its origins, and our author has some ideas. Howard Thurman starts by saying our “modern life is so impersonal.” This statement in and of itself is kind of incredible coming from the late 1940s – a time when people did not have cell phones, internet, or even televisions in their homes. If the late 1940s were considered impersonal, I wonder what Howard Thurman would think of our culture today.

This element of impersonal community, he believes, is the soil where hate first gets planted. He calls it “contact without fellowship.”  Where there is contact without fellowship, the seed of hate grows into a living and thriving unhealthy part of life. Thurman’s ideas is developed in this way:

We are in a society and modern culture with a lot of different people. We see the “other” outside of our close network or come in contact with different people in passing, but we don’t know them or their culture or have any real depth of relationship with them.

Without any depth of knowledge or understanding of the other, because no significant relationship exists, we then don’t have true empathy or even sympathetic understanding for the other or their life situation.

Without understanding, relationship or fellowship we tend to make assumptions about others, their way of life and their culture. Then we share those same assumptions with the people in our close community and network. If those assumptions are incorrect or wrong, but still shared without being proven as incorrect, then they grow.

Finally, when a whole community, neighborhood or group of people who are in the same network start to make assumptions about another group based on incorrect understanding then empathy for the other starts to deteriorate. Without empathy and understanding, dislike, rejections and eventually hate start to grow.

To help illustrate this idea, I will use an example from my own experience and then you are encouraged to find a corollary from your own experience.

So here we go. As most of you know I grew up outside of Boston. Boston is known for having a deep love for its sports team. Growing up in the Boston area in the 80s and 90s there was nothing more intense for Boston sports fans than the rivalry between the Boston Red Sox and the New York Yankees. Even as I let the words roll off my tongue, the New York Yankees, it’s as if the words actually have distaste.

As a child hearing about the greatness of the home team, and how bad the rival team was – even if they were really good – you start to hear those words and they become a part of your understanding of the other. As a child, with limited exposure to other people and cultures just in general, you start to embrace and know the other by what people tell you. So for a kid from Boston, I never met, interacted or even spent time with a New Yorker, or a Yankee fan, but I knew they were associated with a terrible team and even a potentially terrible people.

As I grew up and started to see, read and understand the symbols and history of my team they started to become a part of me – take root if you will. In the same way when I saw the rival’s historical symbolism, especially a black cap and with a white NY insignia, it became a sign of the “other.” And if such a person were to come to your stadium, or sit close to you while watching a game, whoa to them.

As my identity as a Red Sox fan grew and developed, I embraced the team, its merchandise and historical “hatred” for the other. And to Thurman’s point, I did so without any real fellowship, interaction or relationship with a Yankee fan. I was raised to hate without knowing a single person from that demographic.

And what makes my personal story even worse, is that I was born in New York City. My mother and her family are long-time New Yorkers going back many generations. In a weird way, growing up in Boston as a Red Sox fan, and not understanding or interacting with the other, I came to hate something and a group of people who were part of my own personal identity and family history. How messed up is that?

Now, as you start to think of the roots of hatred that have grown up within you, maybe the sports examples do not work. But, I am sure you can think of something. Maybe it was a rival high school, maybe it is a rival company where you work, or the town where you group up. Maybe it was, or still is, a different group of people ethnically, racially, religiously or otherwise different from you.  Can you follow the pattern of seeing the other exist but not having any interaction or fellowship? As a result there is a lack of understanding. Assumptions are made and shared and then we embody a hatred for the other?

This, we know, is sin. This is the pain and brokenness Jesus talked about that resides in this world and between others. This hatred, born out of a lack of relationship is at the heart of what Jesus is up to in this world and central to his death and resurrection.

For Jesus, hatred was what killed the mind. Hatred killed the spirit of love and the ability to be in a relationship. Jesus, in his attempt to bring love into the world, sat down with people who the world hated – the roman soldier, the tax collector, the prostitute, the leaper and the daemon possessed. Jesus broke down the walls of hate by bringing others with him so they too could help uproot and kill the plants of hatred from within.

When there is fellowship, there is understanding and then empathy. When we have understanding and empathy we can have appreciation and then, possibly, love. It may have been easy for Jesus to meet with the hated, but I am sure it was not for his disciples. Jesus radically changed their world view to the point that the disciples wanted to continue in his work long after his resurrection up until where we are today.

How does the roots of hate die? It starts with hearing the story of those whom we hate. For me, and it makes me comfortable to say this let alone consider it, it may mean I need to go to Yankee Stadium, read about their Yankee team history, their famous players and coaches and the significant events (even the ones that involve the Red Sox). I need to see the pictures, even the uncomfortable ones, and learn. I should, dare I say, sit down with Yankee fans, hear their stories, be with them in their special moments, and even – can I even mouth these words, watch a Red Sox vs Yankee game together?

To talk or even consider such activities seem like utter craziness, but at the same time it is the hard work required to uproot hate. Its like the suborn bush or invasive plant in your back yard or garden that just does not want to come out, but you know it has to come out.

In some ways, my personal example is fun and somewhat superficial compared to the deeper and more meaningful work that needs to be done between races and cultures. We all need a healthy self-examination of our assumptions about the other, but we also need the encouragement of Christ to do the hard work. The hard work of love towards the other. And if you needed extra help, fittingly, Christ offers in the very next section of John’s Gospel the reality of Holy Spirit’s presence with us now and forever to make the bold and courageous steps.

Like Jesus before us, we are called to affirm life. Whoever is your Yankees, may they be the object of your love and understanding this Lenten season.