You may or may not be aware that for 25 years, my husband and I have shared a “mixed” marriage. He is a Republican and I am a Democrat. Yes, we are that odd kind of household with two sets of bumper stickers, two sets of signs in the front yard, and unfortunately, the recipients of twice as many computerized messages on our answering machine… In the two weeks leading up to the election, we heard from every single prominent Democrat AND Republican in the country, calling to ask us for our vote…

I live in a “mixed” family as well – my parents vote the Republican ticket and my sisters vote the Democratic ticket. My two oldest daughters are Democrats, but since both vote in Florida, we’re just praying that their votes were actually counted… Art’s father, aunt and uncle, sister and brother-in-law are all staunchly Republican. Art’s brother is a committed Democrat.

The members of my large, extended family differ sharply on a number of issues, and interestingly enough, we all feel strongly that our political beliefs, as different as they are, are based on our understanding of scripture, the tradition of the church, and our own God-given reason. We interpret scripture differently. We see different implications stemming from the same passages. We find justification for opposing viewpoints in the Bible. We understand the tradition and history of the church differently. And we are convinced that our God-given reason, used alongside scripture and tradition, make us absolutely “right” in our diametrically opposed viewpoints.

My own family, in other words, is a microcosm of the kinds of divisions we see in our country between Democrats, Republicans, and Independents. My family is proof of the split we see in Christianity between conservative and liberal Christians. The polarization within my own family mirrors the polarization we are experiencing within the Episcopal Church and member churches of the Anglican Communion around the world. By now you are probably praying that you never receive an invitation to join my family for extended conversation around the dinner table…

Recently, we’ve read and heard a lot about polarization in our country and within Christianity around the world. We’ve certainly experienced that division in the months leading up to the election. We’ve found ourselves on opposite sides within the Church (Church with a capital “C”) and even this church, our beloved St. Andrew’s, on a number of issues in recent years. Are we becoming a nation that is becoming segregated into wholly new and ever-nastier camps? Are we becoming a church that is moving toward an unhappy split and splintering, much like the Catholic Church split and splintered into a myriad of denominations at the time of the Reformation?

Is there hope? Can we stay in relationship as citizens and church members? Is there no common ground? Is there no place to lay down our opposing viewpoints and positions and lay claim to ties that bind us rather than divide us? I think I have to go back to my own family and say that certainly there is hope, if my own extended family can serve as a humble example.

While you might not want to sit around the dinner table listening to my family debate politics, whether civic or religious, there is no question that the ties that bind my family are greater than the issues that divide us. We love each other, despite our differences. We are committed to each other, regardless of viewpoint. We don’t have to agree with each other to stay a family, we only have to love, honor, respect, and attentively listen to one another to stay a family.

Which leads us right back to Jesus, because his Beatitudes paint a portrait of what it means to be related to God and to each other. If we can lay claim, together, to the vision of the world that Jesus presents to us in the Beatitudes, that is and always has been the way forward. Blessed be, Jesus says to his disciples and to us, those that are humble enough to acknowledge their need of God. Blessed be, Jesus says, those that mourn their own sins and the sufferings of all other human beings in the world. Blessed be, Jesus says, those that want only that God’s will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Blessed be, Jesus says, those whose hearts seek to be aligned with the very heart of God. Blessed be, Jesus says, those who desire reconciliation and relationship with all other human beings.

Where we lose our way is when we try to write our own Beatitudes and live by them. The Beatitudes we are partial to go something like this: Blessed are those who agree with me, for I shall like them. Woe to those who disagree with me, because they are wrong and God will curse them on my behalf. Blessed are the Democrats or Republicans or conservatives or liberals (take your pick), for “our” way is the only way. Woe to those who are in the other camp, for God will consign them to hell. Blessed are those who do what I want them to, for I will respect them. Woe to those who don’t do what I want them to, for I will cut them off without a second thought, and God will second the motion.

You see where I’m going… we don’t get to write our own Beatitudes, much as we are tempted to and try to. The Beatitudes, as Jesus gives them to us, holds the vision, the dream, and long range plan of God himself – the vision of a world full of loving and respectful human relationships that reflect God’s own love and compassion for us. Let me state as clearly as possible that John Kerry never was or could be the Savior of the world. And let me state equally as clearly that George Bush never was or will be the Savior of the world. We already have a Savior of the world, and that is Jesus Christ. It is to Jesus we owe our first and primary pledge of allegiance.

And ultimately, it is that allegiance to Jesus Christ that allows us to find common ground as human beings with such differing views. It is our allegiance to the dream of God for human beings to live together in love and compassion, honor and respect that is the sum total of the Beatitudes.

I would also submit to you that as Episcopalians, part of the Anglican Communion of churches, we have a life-saving and life-giving tradition during these hard and divisive times, and that is that we are a people of “common” prayer. In our common prayer, we pray week by week that the Beatitudes might come true in our own lives and in our own time. We pray in common, “for our families, friends and neighbors, and for those who are alone. For all who work for justice, freedom, and peace. For those who minister to the sick, the friendless, and the needy. For all who proclaim the Gospel, and all who seek the truth. For all who serve God in his Church.”

We pray in common for the church, “that we all may be one.” We pray for ourselves as servants of the Gospel, “that God’s name may be glorified by all people.” We pray for Republicans and Democrats, liberals and conservatives, for monarchs and dictators and prime ministers around the world; “for all who govern and hold authority in the nations of the world, that there may be justice and peace on the earth.” We pray for all human beings that are hurting in mind, body or soul, “that they may be delivered from their distress.”

We are a people with differing viewpoints, with differing solutions for the problems that beset us, with passionately held convictions about what is right and what is wrong. But we are also a people with a common vision; that is, God’s vision for a world that will be better than this one; one in which love, compassion, peace, honor, and justice will come true for all people. If in our being Republican or Democrat we have vastly differing ideas on how to get there, our common identity as Christians has us already hard at work, praying, in common, for the world God seeks to establish.

Our politics matter a lot. We can thank God we have a voice, through vote, in the way our country is governed at election time. But our prayers matter more, and we can pray every day. I thank God, as I hope we all do, that God has given us a vision of a blessed world, the world envisioned in Jesus’ Beatitudes, the world God has been seeking all this time, from the beginning of time, to create. I thank God, as I hope we all do, that through politics and prayer, and daily acts of kindness and care, we can serve him as he creates that blessed world through us.

I thank God that in the parish family of St. Andrew’s, like my own family, the ties that bind us are greater than the issues that divide us. Much like a marriage, much like a family, we here have committed to love and cherish each other, to honor and respect and listen to one another through the good times and the bad, through our agreements and our disagreements. And when we eat together at this Table, as we are so privileged to do week by week, may our loving communion with God and each other, and indeed with all the company of heaven, unite us and bring us peace.

Amen.