Covenant Celebration
November 15, 2019
Central Reform Temple and Emmanuel Church

In our celebration of our new covenant between Central Reform Temple and Emmanuel Church, the prayer that I usually pray at the beginning of my sermons – you know, about searching always and everywhere after truth, come when it may and cost what it will, seems particularly apt, because truth is costly, both in the sense of consequences and even sacrifice, and in the sense of precious and dear (teuer in German).

Here is some truth. Several years ago, Rabbi Berman suggested creating a covenant document for our two congregations, I agreed. The idea, like a seed was planted. I didn’t see the growth, though, until I’d come back from my sabbatical travel last fall. Many of you know that I was reading about and traveling to places that had experienced periods of time of interreligious regard or tolerance, and also periods of murderous ruptures in those relationships. Joy and I started in Istanbul, then went to Vienna, and then to the Iberian Peninsula. It was when we landed in Vienna that we learned the devastating news of the massacre at The Tree of Life L’Simcha Congregation in Pittsburgh.
Our first stop in Vienna was the Judenplatz, where the Holocaust memorial, and Jewish Museum and archaeological dig in the heart of Vienna, are built over the ruins of a medieval synagogue. Among the museum artifacts were documents testifying to good relationships between Jews and Christians. Our next stop was the nearby Stadttempel. That temple, along with its extensive archives, was the only synagogue out of 94 Jewish houses of worship in Vienna to survive Kristallnacht. The Nazis desecrated the sanctuary but did not burn it to the ground because of its proximity to the oldest Christian church in the city, the early 15th century Maria Am Gestad. The Nazis didn’t want to risk the church catching fire because they feared jeopardizing the support of the local Christians. Our Israeli-Austrian tour guide surmised that in a way, the Church saved the Synagogue and the Synagogue saved the church. Joy and I heard that and said we have a similar story, albeit considerably less dramatic. I felt strongly, in that moment that documenting our understanding of what our beautiful life together looks like was urgent. I saw the growth of that seed that Howard had planted popping up out of the ground. Now we are celebrating the growth of a fruit bearing tree.
The thing about apocalyptic literature like the passage we heard this morning from the Gospel of Luke, is that it reveals – it points to a sense of hope that the present moment, however calamitous or treacherous or devastating, is being transformed by the presence of the Divine even and especially in the midst of suffering. Apocalyptic means revelation or uncovering or articulating. Apocalyptic literature in the bible insists that an unrealized and longed-for future is already and always coming into being, that the Holy One is with us in the midst of it all, redeeming and reclaiming and loving us through and through.
Indeed walls come tumbling down and the world ends for people every day, in every generation. In times of calamity, of tribulation and suffering – whether in the world at large, in our local community, or in our personal lives, do not be led astray. Do not go after false prophets. Do not be paralyzed with fear, Jesus teaches. Such times will be for us an opportunity to testify – for us to turn into a living testimony. So rather than preparing our defense, let the Love of God and the hope of justice and acts of reconciliation and peace breathe through us, in and around us. That’s how we all will gain our souls.

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