One of the things the Episcopal Church says about itself is
that it is “a big tent.” As Paul M.
Spellings writes in his blog (http://paulmspellings.wordpress.com)
that means “we like to see ourselves as almost obsessively accepting.” (“Big
Tent Church: Possibility and Hypocrisy”
February 6, 2014) Everyone is welcome
and everyone is part of the church:
people of all races, ages, nationalities, sexual preferences, those with
disabilties, the poor, the homeless, and even the rich. At least this is the ideal.
(I did not give that last sentence its own paragraph,
because this is not about the failure of the church and of individuals to live
up to the ideal. We are trying, if not
always successfully.)
When I first saw the phrase, I thought of the tents of the
Israelites. But those tents, even if
large, were not inclusive. And then I
thought of a circus tent.
For what are religion and Christian life if not a
circus?
We can look at the circus metaphor in two ways (probably
more, but I haven’t thought of them yet.)
A circus is a place of wonder, full of miracles where people fly through
the air, twist themselves into unimaginable shapes, and squeeze themselves and
a dozen friends into tiny cars. There
are beautiful costumes, processions, and music. Does that remind you of anything? (Not the flying, twisting, or car loading, at
least in my experience.) There is
manmade magic in the circus and God-made magic in the church.
Then there is another meaning of circus, the half humorous
chaos that inspires us to sigh and say, “That was a real circus.” I’m thinking particularly of getting the
family off to school and work in the morning, creating the best Christmas,
Thanksgiving, Easter, or Halloween ever, or going on vacation, when a day at
the beach is no day at the beach. Your
whole life can be one big circus. And it
doesn’t stop after the children are grown!
And isn’t church life one big circus? Not just the Churchianity, worrying about
roofs and furnaces, and pageants and candles, but the Christianity, too. How can we best love God, our neighbors, and
ourselves, especially when the church offers so many ways to do it and so many
opinions on each way?
Not only do all kinds of people make up the church, but they
bring with them all kinds of beliefs. My
small church contains creationists and literalists. There are those who say that Bible is
allegory and symbolism. And, of course,
there are the different tastes in worship.
How do we handle this?
(I apologize if this sounds like a sermon. What I am really trying to do here is show my
struggles with the circus, not offer any suggestions or solutions.)
There is an old Polish saying, (I found it on Facebook) “Not
my circus. Not my monkeys.” That can be
very helpful when it comes to feuds with distant relatives or office politics
or just as a reminder to stay out of other people’s business. But how does it work in the Big Tent?
It can be easy to say which things are not your circus. Creationism isn’t mine. Neither is the Rapture. My laissez faire attitude about theology is
not the circus of some of my friends.
And other denominations and other religions aren’t our circuses either.
But aren’t we all each other’s monkeys? Under the big circus tent we are to love and
care for each other, even if we disagree.
We can ignore or celebrate differences because as Christians we share
more similarities. And this goes for
those outside the tent, too.
There are many circuses
inside and outside the big tent. We
don’t need to claim them all. But we do
need to claim all those monkeys.
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