{"id":25511,"date":"2022-01-06T07:00:48","date_gmt":"2022-01-06T11:00:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/freelancechristianity\/?p=25511"},"modified":"2022-01-05T17:23:31","modified_gmt":"2022-01-05T21:23:31","slug":"the-real-reason-why-january-6th-is-important","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/freelancechristianity\/the-real-reason-why-january-6th-is-important\/","title":{"rendered":"The REAL Reason Why January 6th is Important"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

One year ago, a mob of insurrectionists stormed and temporarily occupied the U.S. Capitol building in an attempt to stop Congress from fulfilling its Constitutionally mandated duty of certifying the results of the November 2020 presidential election. \u201cIt wasn\u2019t pretty\u201d is an understatement. I suspect that \u201c1\/6\u201d will become as memorable as \u201c9\/11\u201d and \u201c12\/7\u201d as days in American history that will live in infamy.<\/p>\n

\"\"I also suspect that the news and social media today will be filled with more retrospectives and analyses of what happened a year ago than could possibly be digested. Instead of jumping into the fray, this essay is about the\u00a0real<\/strong> reason that January 6th is an important date on the calendar. It is the Feast of the Epiphany, the beginning of a two-month long liturgical season that celebrates Jesus\u2019 coming out party. It reminds me of the Sunday several years ago when I had a real epiphany. \u201cEpiphany\u201d means to reveal or show forth. It common parlance it often refers to an unexpected insight or revelation. I\u2019m often reminded this time of year of one Sunday when I had one of those.<\/p>\n

\u2014\u201cIt\u2019s the cold mornings that it\u2019s the hardest. You want nothing more than to wake up in your own place, look out the window, make some coffee, and not have to go anywhere.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u2013\u201cThey\u2019ve given me 10 days. Who the hell can find a place to live in 10 days? The only place you can find in the winter in 10 days is an abandoned building.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2014\u201cBut I\u2019ll live anywhere instead of going to a shelter. Some of the people in shelters are nasty. No matter how hard you try to mind your own business, somebody just has to get in your face and then it\u2019s on.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u2013\u201cYou\u2019re telling me. A lot of those people never take showers, not that I blame them because the shelter bathrooms are disgusting. Animals wouldn\u2019t want to use them.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2013\u201cI\u00a0sat too close to someone\u2019s backpack one time and he kicked me.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

Not the sort of conversation I usually hear\u00a0on a Sunday morning. But then I don\u2019t usually ride the RIPTA\u00a0#1 bus to church. \u201cIt\u2019ll be fun,\u201d I thought to myself; \u201cIt will be an adventure.\u201d And it was. A few years ago, I wouldn\u2019t have walked across the street to go to church, but here I was spending two hours riding buses, waiting for buses, and walking just to get to church, a trip that takes 10-15 minutes in a car. But Jeanne had the car in New Jersey and I felt like going to church. I spent a half hour on the RIPTA website the night before, eventually calculating that it\u00a0is<\/b>\u00a0possible to get there from here, but just barely.<\/p>\n

Eight-fifteen on a cold, January Sunday morning at Kennedy Plaza in downtown Providence. The local #50 bus just deposited me at the central RIPTA station. In a perfect world, the bus would have picked me up at my front door, the driver would have handed me a Dunkin\u2019 Donuts black iced coffee with a shot of coconut as I boarded, and she would have dropped me off at Trinity Episcopal in 20 minutes. In the real world,\u00a0 all bus lines go through Kennedy plaza.<\/p>\n

With 25 minutes before the #1 bus arrives, I look inside the terminal. It is filled with at least 100 people of various sizes, shapes, ages and races. Most are dressed in some sort of winter garb, designer or makeshift\u2014given the light Sunday bus service on all lines, I\u2019ll bet half of them aren\u2019t even waiting for a bus. This is the only warm place they can find this morning. A few muffled conversations are going on, and everyone is giving me the look. I decide it would be fun to freeze my ass off and check out what the Riverwalk a few blocks away\u00a0is up to while I wait for the #1.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m followed onto the #1 bus by two gentlemen\u2014early forties and late fifties, I\u2019d guess\u2014who \u00a0sit across the aisle and converse about trying to preserve a shred of dignity while being homeless. Neither of them \u201clooks\u201d homeless\u2014it always shocks me how easily I fall into stereotypical thinking. But as I listen to them I am grateful for my good fortune and blessings and silently ask for a blessing on them. Please help our elected officials to figure something out. You are a God of love and justice and these men need a lot of both. Amen\u2014and they get off the bus at Eddy and Thurbers, leaving me to travel the remaining ten minutes to Trinity in silence.<\/p>\n

It is the season of Epiphany\u2014\u201cepiphany\u201d means \u201cto show forth.\u201d This is the liturgical season during which we celebrate Jesus\u2019s coming out party, first to the wise men, then at his baptism.\u00a0The Old Testament readings are great. Psalm 29 tells us that \u201cthe voice of the LORD flashes forth flames of fire . . .\u00a0the voice of the LORD causes the oaks to whirl, and strips the forest bare; and in his temple all say, \u2018Glory!\u2019\u201d Now that\u2019s what I\u2019m talking about! That\u2019s a God who can straighten things out and bring on justice like a flood. Enough with our puny human attempts! But Isaiah continues by saying something different about the one who is to come, the one who \u201cwill bring forth justice to the nations.\u201d<\/p>\n

He will not cry or lift up his voice, or make it heard in the street; a bruised reed he will not break, and a dimly burning wick he will not quench; he will faithfully bring forth justice.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Now I\u2019m confused. How is someone so gentle that he won\u2019t break a bruised reed or snuff out an almost spent candle going to bring about justice?<\/p>\n

But then it dawns on me\u2014a little epiphany, I suppose\u2014that I encountered the bruised reeds and dimly burning wicks of my day and age this morning on the way to church. These are the people I read about in the paper and hear the talking heads screech about on MSNBC and Fox News, but with real faces, wearing real winter clothes, and living real histories. These guys really exist, not as units in a collection or specimens from the social category labeled \u201chomeless,\u201d but as men, exactly like me, who were one day stamped with a special mark by affliction and misfortune.<\/p>\n

But how to respond? I might begin just by paying attention. Simone Weil writes that \u201cthose who are unhappy have no need for anything but people capable of giving them their attention . . . The soul empties itself of all its own contents in order to receive into itself the being it is looking at, just as he is, in all his truth.\u201d In other words, before I try to solve your problem, tell me your story. Justice for bruised reeds and almost-extinguished wicks must begin in peace, gentleness, and silent attentiveness. Various sorts of force have just about finished them off. Any more might be the end.<\/p>\n

But who on earth could do this? Isaiah\u2019s answer is disturbingly direct.<\/p>\n

I am the LORD, I have called you in righteousness . . . I have given you as a covenant to the people, a light to the nations, to open the eyes that are blind, to bring out the prisoners from the dungeon, from the prison those who sit in darkness . . . See, the former things have come to pass, and new things I now declare; before they spring forth, I tell you of them.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Epiphany basks in the glorious light of the Incarnation, of the divine made flesh. And nowadays that\u2019s me. That\u2019s you. That\u2019s us. Only from that very unpromising source will justice roll down like waters, and righteousness as a mighty stream.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

One year ago, a mob of insurrectionists stormed and temporarily occupied the U.S. Capitol building in an attempt to stop Congress from fulfilling its Constitutionally mandated duty of certifying the results of the November 2020 presidential election. \u201cIt wasn\u2019t pretty\u201d is an understatement. I suspect that \u201c1\/6\u201d will become as memorable as \u201c9\/11\u201d and \u201c12\/7\u201d […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2938,"featured_media":25515,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,14,21,29,35,40,41,47,56,57,77,87,101],"tags":[765,242,518,278,369,439],"class_list":["post-25511","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-bible","category-books","category-christianity","category-episcopal","category-faith","category-god","category-grace","category-hope","category-jeanne","category-jesus","category-prayer","category-simone-weil","category-truth","tag-epiphany","tag-god","tag-incarnation","tag-isaiah","tag-old-testament","tag-simone-weil"],"yoast_head":"\nThe REAL Reason Why January 6th is Important<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"One year ago, a mob of insurrectionists stormed and temporarily occupied the U.S. Capitol building. 1\/6 will join 9\/11 and 12\/7 as dates that will live in infamy in American history. 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