In 2012, a girl named Malala, living in Pakistan, was on her
way home from school, having just finished her exams, when a gunman boarded her
bus. Though only fifteen years old,
Malala was already well known for advocating for girls education in
Pakistan. She knew this would make her a
target to the Taliban, that her life could be in danger.
When the gunman boarded the bus that day, he demanded to
know which girl was Malala. No one said
a word, but several girls looked at Malala and as it happened, Malala was the
only one there with her face uncovered.
The gunman shot her, point blank in the head.
Miraculously, she survived.
And two years later was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.
Let me tell you about another fifteen-year-old girl, sitting
on a bus, on her way home from school. Her
name was Claudette Colvin and in 1955, she refused to move her seat when
several white women boarded. You may be
thinking, “Haven’t I heard this story before?”
Didn’t Rosa Parks do this? And
here is where it gets interesting.
Claudette Colvin knew Rosa Parks, but Claudette was arrested for
protesting segregation laws a full nine months before Rosa Parks.
Why is Rosa Parks so well-known but not Claudette
Colvin? Partly because Claudette was a
teenager and a short time later, she became a pregnant teenager. Her status as an unwed mother made her easily
dismissible. Rosa Parks would go on to become
the face of the Montgomery Bus Boycott, but many would say Claudette Colvin was
the spark.
How about one more fifteen-year-old? This time, a young Jewish woman, who, along
with her family, hid from the Nazis for two years in a secret annex in a
building owned by her father’s company.
Two years of hiding, of never going outside, of watching the world through
a thin curtain. Two years of wondering
if every scrape outside the hidden bookcase door was one of the green police
coming to arrest them.
Anne Frank was fifteen when she was finally captured. She was fifteen when she died in a
concentration camp. Would we even know
her name, though, if it weren’t for the diary she left behind? The
Diary of Anne Frank has inspired millions worldwide and has helped insure
that such things as the Holocaust will never be forgotten. Anne Frank’s diary put a face to the millions
who died with no name, with nothing but a number tattooed on their arms.
And let’s be clear, just the fact that Anne Frank wrote her
diary, was an act of rebellion. The
diary was not just for her. She had
great hopes that someone, someday, would read her words.
Three examples, Malala, Claudette Colvin, and Anne Frank …
who represent the tiniest fraction of children who, throughout history and
across the world, have taken the lead in forcing societal change, by not being
afraid to speak up, for refusing to sit down.
Three examples of children who hoped the world would take
notice.
You would think, in this day and age, with everyone having a
presence and a voice thanks to social media that getting the world to notice
you would be easy.
This summer, students from Parkland’s Marjory Stoneman
Douglas High School will be embarking on a nationwide bus tour entitled the
Road to Change. These students, all
survivors of the Valentine’s Day school shooting that took the lives of fourteen
of their classmates and three staff members, are on the road seeking to, at the
very least, start a conversation about gun violence in this country.
But in the days immediately following the shooting, when the
Parkland students began speaking out on gun violence, they were told things
like, “You’re too young to understand,” or “Why do we have to make this
political?” or “This isn’t the time.”
Individual students were ridiculed on social media by adults who
supposedly “knew better.” These children
who had just been attacked with a gun were now being attacked in a far more
intimate way. Their very spirits were
under assault.
Nobody knew better than Jesus just how hard it is to do good
work in this world, whether it be in today’s world or the world of two thousand
years ago. Surprisingly little has
changed.
Like Malala, Jesus knew what it felt like to be attacked
physically.
Like Claudette Colvin, Jesus knew what it was like to be
rejected for not having the right “image,” for not behaving the correct or
expected way.
Like Anne Frank, Jesus lived day to day knowing that he was
being hunted and that death ultimately would find him.
Like the students from Parkland, Jesus knew what it was like
to be dismissed.
In today’s Gospel reading from Luke, we see Jesus addressing
this very thing, telling the people around him that they have not listened,
they have not seen. They have been sent
sign after sign and yet they have dismissed everything.
John the Baptist came and did not eat bread and did not
drink wine and they accused him of being possessed. Jesus came and ate bread and drank wine and
they accused him of being a drunkard and a glutton.
Whenever I picture this scene, I see Jesus pacing, hands
pulling at his hair, most likely searching for a wall to bang his head against.
“What will it take?” I hear him say. “What will it take to make you see?”
Listen again to Luke 7:32 as Jesus says: “We played the flute for you, and you did not
dance; we wailed, and you did not weep.”
Now, contextually he appears here to be comparing that
generation to children, fickle in their whims.
But, honestly, he also seems to be making a deeper point and
issuing, perhaps, a dire warning.
Throughout the gospels Jesus makes a point of including
children, of welcoming them. He tells us
in Matthew 19:14: “Let the little children come to me, and do not stop them;
for it is to such as these that the kingdom of heaven belongs.”
And earlier in Matthew 18:6:
“If any of you put a stumbling block before one of these little ones who
believe in me, it would be better for you if a great millstone were fastened
around your neck and you were drowned in the depth of the sea.”
What is Jesus’ message?
Children are precious. Children
inhabit a unique place in God’s heart.
In today’s world, it has become increasingly difficult to
hear God’s message. It has become
increasingly difficult to sort out the good through the millions of awful
things our brains and souls are assaulted with on a daily basis. It has become difficult to sort out what’s
real … and what’s fake.
But I believe that Jesus has left us an important clue here
to help us sort it all out, to teach us what to focus on.
Watch the children.
Watch them when they play the flute, but also, and more
importantly, watch them when they wail.
And woe to any of us who ignore the wailing and refuse to
weep with them.
Watch the children, the Malalas, the Claudette Colvins, the
Anne Franks, the Parkland students and any and all children throughout the
world who show us injustice and suffering and beg us—beg us, to act.
And don’t turn your back.
Welcome them and support them.
As Jesus would.
Amen.
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