February 15, 2009

Geno Sisneros

Epiphany 6

Last November the UK Guardian ran a story about a pair of gay male penguins who were caught trying to steal eggs from their heterosexual counterparts in a Chinese zoo. In order to hide their deception, the couple attempted to replace the eggs they had stolen with stones, laying them at the feet of the expectant parents in a bid to swindle them out of their yet-to-be hatched offspring.

Because of their attempted crime, the pair eventually fell out of favour with the rest of their penguin group and were later isolated by zookeepers. Zookeepers were quick to point out that their isolation of the couple was not ‘homophobic’ in nature but more of a ‘peace-keeping’ initiative to ensure there was no disruption to the all-important hatching season, to ensure there was no disruption to the penguin social order.

In the penguin population it is the male’s responsibility to look after the eggs. Though this couple was, for obvious reasons, incapable of producing their own offspring together, this did not dull their instinct to nurture. If anything, it appears this instinct was so strong that they went to a great deal of trouble to satisfy it.

Needless to say, I don’t think any of us are condoning the theft of eggs by gay, radical penguins by any means. Though you have to admit, it is a very cute story.

This story made me think about our own human instinct to nurture. Humans, like other animals, have the inherent need to nurture and to be nurtured. This instinct for humans is often the catalyst to love and the payoff helps us to thrive. When we say we love someone we are expressing in the very simplest but most powerful of terms a deep affection for that person’s being, their existence, indeed their life. In saying “I love you”, we are saying that there is something sacred about this person’s presence in our own life. So when we talk about love, we are in essence talking about a profound appreciation of life and our desire to connect to a life outside of our own. Love and Life are tightly wound together. You cannot talk about one without implying something about the other.

In our Gospel reading this evening, Jesus is approached by a man with leprosy who begs Jesus to make him “clean”. According to Levitical law this man would have been considered impure, and the Law prescribed exile for people like him, total disconnection from society. He would have literally been an outcast living on the outskirts of town possibly in a leper colony with others who suffered the same physical and social condition.

Medical conditions like leprosy and impairments like blindness were thought to be a curse or punishment from God. Indeed the Bible is rife with examples of the exclusion and marginalisation of various groups of people based on superstition and fear of what they did not understand.

Though our 21st Century medical knowledge can help us explain away these Biblical superstitions, it would be a mistake for us to engage this text entirely on medical terms. In all the Gospel healing narratives, there are socially restorative implications to Jesus’ actions. Mark tells us that, “moved with pity, Jesus stretched out his hand and touched him…” This is very risky behaviour on both Jesus’ and the man’s part. In first century Palestine, a person living with leprosy approaching someone without it was unacceptable and touching or being touched by someone with leprosy made you ‘unclean’ as well. Jesus was challenging that accepted social order and in the process restoring this man to life in the community.

The man reaches out to Jesus and Jesus reaches back, at that moment a sacred connection is made. Jesus’ deep affection for life and his instinct to nurture and the man’s deep desire for life and his need to be nurtured are both made manifest and bring about healing. They are both nurturing and being nurtured in this mutual exchange of transgressive behaviour. Supply and demand, they have both reached out to life and both are doing their part to make a connection.

We form our understandings of Love based on our experiences of it. We realise how risky love really is once we’ve been hurt or when we reach out and no one is there reaching back. We’re more guarded the next time around or if we’re very cynical we swear off love altogether.

We also form our understandings of Life based on our experiences of it. The Mars rover is searching for signs of water on the Martian surface as an indication of the possibility that life exists or has existed there at some point. From our human experience, we know that water is a necessary element for life to exist so we look for water. Scientists now tell us that life could have evolved in the universe in an infinite number of ways. One example is the possibility of ammonia among other solvents, replacing water making it a potential building block of life. This idea challenges what we know based on the limitations our human experience tells us exist.

If scientists are right, it would appear that it is we who place limits on life and not the other way around. Might it be the same for love? If the universe is infinite, that must mean there are an infinite number of possibilities. Life and love reach out to us in a myriad of ways and if we’re adventurous or brave, we decide that life is short and throw some caution to the wind and reach back knowing there is always the potential for hurt or disappointment but also the potential for healing and miracles.

Sometimes a hand reaches out to us in the form of a holy man over 2,000 years old, sometimes it reaches out to us in the form of an outcast who society has relegated to the margins, and sometimes, just sometimes if we let our imagination flow it reaches out to us from the vast universe to assure us that we are not alone.

There is no doubt that to reach out or to reach back comes with risks. Sometimes it means challenging the social order, sometimes it means scrapping what we think we know but it always means opening up ourselves, not just to vulnerability but to possibility, a resource apparently quite abundant in the universe.

Jesus took a risk; the man with leprosy took a risk. In our first reading tonight, Ruth and Naomi both took risks all of them making themselves completely vulnerable but in doing so, leaving themselves wide open to possibility. For Ruth and Naomi, declaring their love to each other in the hopes that they could remain together in a male-dominated world, in the midst of patriarchy, was to open up to possibility.

And what of our gay penguins? There is a myth that when penguins find a companion, they remain together for life. This is a pleasant thought, a very romantic notion, however, it’s hardly a scientific fact. But there I go again, not allowing for possibility, putting my own limitations on love and life. And the funny thing about those limitations; is they sure have a way of proving me wrong and making an ass out of me, but when it comes to love and life and possibility that’s a very good thing.

I leave you tonight with the following quote by a Zen priest, he said, “In the beginner’s mind there are many possibilities, but in the expert’s mind there are few.” – Shunryu Suzuki.

My hope tonight is that I never become an expert in life or in love.