[The minister began by standing in front of the communion table and tearing his outer robe, and then walked to the pulpit to deliver the sermon.]

I'm tempted to let that be the sermon-the sound of torn fabric, the sound of this black cloth being rent-because I think it speaks far more eloquently to the state of our divided national psyche than I could express with my own words. I find it strangely satisfying to hear that wordless sound as an expression of my own grief-perhaps it might also express some of the inexpressible and ambiguous feelings we all share about this war, whatever our perspective on it. And I believe steadfastly that now is precisely the time for such expressions-of grief, of sorrow, and of anger. Now is the time-as the distant clouds of dust trail our tank battalions moving inexorably onward in the Iraqi desert; as the mass media, mesmerized by the computerized war machine we've created, promise us a miraculously quick and clean war; as all our lawmakers do a unison bow before the idol of wartime patriotism, and fall in line behind our president. As we gather together in the name of God and wonder: what will come of all this? Will we be safer? Will we live in a more just and free world? And purchased at what cost?
One thing is for sure, those on all sides of the debate agree: we now live in a different world, now that we have attacked the nation of Iraq and begun remaking it in our own image; now that we have engaged in this unprecedented pre-emptive war, and turned our back on decades of national security policy.

The tradition of rending one's clothes is, of course, an ancient biblical tradition that we often read about in the Hebrew Scriptures-most usually as a response to extreme tragedy. Scholar Sam Meier writes that the practice of tearing one's garment marks "the liminal events and significant boundaries where [life, or] one's life is dramatically changed…. The tearing of one's garment is a picture of the irrevocable tearing of life." It is a response to tragedy that acknowledges that life has been irrevocably torn. We cannot re-weave this fabric. We cannot give back life to the American soldiers and Iraqi children who have died, and will die. And I'm especially mindful today of the soldiers who, we just learned this morning, were captured, and some of them apparently have been killed.

Perhaps you think I'm being histrionic. That this stunt is an over-reaction. Perhaps you begin to doubt, as the news pours in, whether we who opposed the war really knew what we were talking about. As I witness the well-polished choreography of this war, brought to us up close and personal by cameras mounted on tanks halfway across the world, I have to admit if I'm honest that I sometimes doubt that myself. What if George W. Bush is right? What if those people in the White House are smarter than those of us who disagree with this policy? What if this war will make us safer? What if this convenient rending of garments serves only to make me feel good about my own self-justifying convictions? Despite the strength of our convictions-I believe we also do well to be self-critical about them.

But such doubts have often been the hobgoblin of our nation's and our churches' peace movement in every major conflict. War comes, and we let our idealism slip and wonder if maybe the war-makers are right-that war is still the only way to preserve freedom in a world hopelessly addicted to violence. Maybe there's a sort of Hegelian war-dance that we're part of: we anti-war protesters protest, hawks go to war anyway; America wins, and we can all go home feeling good about ourselves. And the American Kingdom Come. And America's will be done.

I want to submit to you today, that whatever the outcome of this war, we would do well as Christians to be angry. This is a time for US-not the Iraqi people-to feel shock and awe at what we have done, as we are all part of this fabric, as we are all citizens of this great and powerful nation.

Let me tell you why I am angry; let me tell you why I stand here today and am not proud of the country I love. I am angry that we are spending about $100 Billion that has never been allocated by our lawmakers at a time of unprecedented federal red ink, as the rich get a hefty tax break, and our schools go to hell, along with all our other social programs. As we sit by our televisions transfixed by the rockets' red glare, we forget that we're mortgaging our country's future as the cries of the jobless, those without health care, those who've been cast aside by this good society, go unheeded. I'm angry because some of the members of our armed forces, made up disproportionately of those from the lowest rung our economic ladder, will lose their lives, and I'm afraid for their lives and their well-being; and I do care for and support them-and I oppose this war because I want them home. But I'm even more troubled that they may never see the terrible consequences of a war they launch with joysticks and computer screens. "It's like Nintendo," said one 21-year-old soldier in a recent newspaper article. I'm mad at what this war is doing to our humanity. I'm mad at what this war is doing to the way the rest of the world sees America. I'm mad that America is acting more like an empire than a republic seeking to live up to the true meaning of it's creed of liberty and justice for all. I'm mad at the lack of anger and moral disgust, now that we have entered this war. I'm mad that I'm not mad enough, and mad at how little I can do.

Today is a day to learn how to be angry, as the world dances along to the tune of the new American empire.

But, that's a dangerous thing: being angry. We need to be careful. Anger is like fire: it can warm, it can create movement and alchemy, but it can also burn, beyond our control. In a chemical reaction, heat can create change. But, it also has a habit of constellating itself into violence; it has a nasty habit of destroying not only those it's aimed at, but those who possess it. And, our righteous indignation can quickly, if we're not careful, simply evolve into justifying self-righteousness. Yes, we need to be careful of our anger.

So, the question for today I'd like to explore just a bit further: How shall we get angry as people of faith, and use anger as an appropriate tool to motivate us for the work we're called to do?

It's interesting…I like that word a lot, somehow-a good Midwestern word…. It's interesting today that we have this text; I find it just short of awe-inspiring that the lectionary has handed us this text for today. Whatever you call it-synchronicity, the working of the spirit, providence-it is an amazing coincidence that this text has a sort of uncanny consonance with what's going on today. And, I think it also has something to teach us about anger.

Let's take a look at this story, of Jesus "cleansing" the temple. I find it ironic that that's generally what we call this story-Jesus "cleansing" the temple, as if we encounter a Jesus armed with Mr. Clean, with mops and brooms, ready to give this institution a good sprucing up, chase away the bad stuff with a squirt of holy disinfectant. Instead, if we look closer, it's a story about Jesus messianic protest at an institution that had become rotten to the core, whose values of justice and liberation had become co-opted by not only the religious establishment, but also the empire.

So, let's travel along with Jesus for a while. It's Mid-April, Passover season. Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year's all rolled into one in the Jewish tradition. And thousands of pilgrims from all over the world would be coming for the festival in Jerusalem, to perform their religious obligation to go to the Temple, not only to pay the obligatory temple tax, but also to make a sacrifice. If you were rich, you could by a lamb or a goat; if you were poor, you could buy a pair of turtle-doves.
Now, here's the ironic regression that occurs when you mix religion and our human will to power. The regression of religion has to do with people in power using religion to exploit people. Using religious values to cloak their own agenda and self-serving purposes.

So, the Sadducees controlled the Temple; the Romans, the empire, controlled the Sadducees. And you see the way it worked: you go into the temple, and you've got to pay the temple tax. But, you can't pay it with a coin that had the image of Caesar on it-or any other graven image. People were coming from all over the world, with all kinds of coins. They had to get them changed over. The temple tax was over two days' wages-and the cost to change the money to ritually acceptable currency was an additional days' wage. That money went to the Sadducees and who in turn paid the Romans a portion.
Also, like bringing your own popcorn to the movie theater, you couldn't just bring your own animal to the feast; the animal had to be ritually acceptable-"unblemished"-to be allowed into the temple. A goat purchased outside the Temple might have cost ten times less than what you'd have to pay outside the temple precincts!

So-the temple had become big business; a racket. Instead of being a place of holiness to lead people to God and to teach people the principles of justice and freedom, it had become a place of domination of the poor, and the masses. If Jesus had coined the phrase, he might have said that "that giant sucking sound" might have been the Temple, vacuuming up the scarce resources of the poor.

We can imagine Jesus, going up to the temple precincts; and maybe he sees a Gentile couple, trying to pray to the Hebrew God in the court of the Gentiles-just before you get to the "real" temple-and somebody is arguing over the relative perfection of a turtle-dove, and whether it's Temple-Approved. Maybe they're haggling over the exchange rate for Phrygian Drachmas. And he loses it. He's not just mad. His anger is white-hot. He finds some ropes and makes a whip. He smashes a table, and some silver and brass coins fall onto the stone floor. He unleashes the animals and lets them loose in the temple precincts. Not because of some obscure lack of holy quiet and awe-but because the whole thing had become a racket. Like the Soprano crime family was running the holy institution of the people of God. This is far from the gentle Jesus, meek and mild of our Sunday School lessons-the Jesus whom we often seek to imitate in what often seems to be our religious addiction to being and seeming "nice" at all times, and at all costs.
Have you ever taken an inventory over what makes you mad, and how you express your anger? I can remember getting mad about a few things in the past month: someone who wouldn't honor a warranty for my camcorder. Stepping barefoot on one of Will's little cars. I have, I suppose, a pretty healthy facility for getting angry, like most Americans. If Americans have a problem with anger-it may be that we don't have a reputation for being bashful about expressing it; but perhaps we ought to examine what kind of anger we tend to express. Is it anger that serves to assert myself? Or is it anger about what's wrong with the world around us?

In many ways, I think of the anger that I've felt over this war as a gift: because that is the kind of anger that takes us beyond ourselves, that moves us beyond what's often our preoccupation with ourselves, toward compassion for the other. That kind of anger creates HOPE, when people truly are able to see what is wrong, and find within themselves an anger that moves them toward action and change. I do have some hope that the media coverage of this war might do that: how can we remain neutral when we begin to see the terrible cost of bombs exact from innocent people, when we see the ripped flesh and innocent bloodshed they will cause?

So, if we're concerned about how we approach our anger, I want to suggest one good litmus test for what I'd like to call "religiously useful anger": whether our anger is an expression of love. We might ask ourselves: is it possible that our anger can be an expression of love, if we are angry at those we love, for the sake of love? Is it possible that we're angry at George Bush because we love him? That's a radical idea for some of us-but that's at the heart of what we believe as Christians. Is it possible that our anger at George Bush, for those of us who are upset about this war, is born of our desire that he live up to the high calling of his office, and he fulfill the best ideals of his people? Is it possible we can be angry with our children, precisely because we want what is best for them?

And it's interesting (once again) that we encounter this line from Psalm 69, which Jesus' disciples recount in relation to this story: "And zeal for thy house shall consume thee." It's not that Jesus is unpatriotic. It's not that he's anti-temple-it's precisely because he cares so deeply about the values that are supposed to be undergirding this institution that he shows this messianic display of anger. And John is careful to point out that THIS IS WHAT GOT JESUS KILLED. Jesus radical "patriotism"-his love of what the Temple stands for; his love for these people-got him killed by those who claim to be "patriotic", those who are defending the institution, but for their own purposes, not God's. I find it very disturbing when those of us who do not fall into line with the president are accused of being unpatriotic, because we are voicing our opposition to this war now that it's underway. "We're not supporting the troops", when we're simply trying to bring them home. Is our anger motivated by our deep love for our country, for the living out of its ideals, for all people? Is that not what true patriotism is about?
For, love without anger at what's wrong quickly becomes sentimentality. If we seek to act out of love, our love eventually compels us to take a look at the world, and if we pay attention, we cannot avoid seeing what's cruel and unjust and wrong with this world of ours. And if we are not moved to anger by that, our love is mere sentiment: Pat Boone, feel good, and shallow.

But, on the other hand: anger without love becomes self-justifying fanaticism, and itself is a form of violence. Again: anger without love is itself a form of violence. And we need to guard ourselves from such violence, lest we become co-opted by what we're fighting against.
So-today is a day to commit ourselves to displays of shock and awe. Not displays of grief and anger that will deaden or consume us, but that will enable us to "do the work" of transforming violence into justice and love. And there is hope! Despite the inexorability of war, I believe the peace movement will not shrink. I believe it will continue to be strong. I believe that George W. Bush and this current war has strengthened the peace movement immeasurably-George Bush is probably the best thing that's ever happened to peace movement! And that's a sign of hope.

We may not have succeeded in stopping this war-but we will truly be defeated if we let it diminish our desire-our passion, our anger-to create a peaceful and just world.

So-the work now becomes Easter work, as we look toward Easter. I suppose it may be unwise to speak of Easter in the middle of Lent-especially on such a dark day as today. And yet, that's what we have to do: look toward Easter as we're surrounded by death. To begin to contemplate the work of transforming this violence into love and redemption.

Jim Burklo, Campus Chaplain at Stanford, describes this whole idea of transforming and redeeming violence far better than I can. So, I'd like to end my sermon this morning with the words he sent to his students in an email this week:

"[Now is a] time to re-commit ourselves to the peaceable cause of the man who died on the cross, that ultimate symbol of imperialism-and to remember that his followers transformed that symbol of state terror into a symbol of salvation and redemption. The Romans wanted to "shock and awe" their subjects with the cross. May we instead be emboldened by it to stand against the manifestations of imperialism," and work even harder for peace and just world for all people.

May it be so. Amen.