“Paying for past iniquities”
By Rev. Michael Stonhouse
Meditation – Sunday, September 18, 2022
Psalm 79:1-9 (Forward, p. 51) CEV p. 604
Somehow this psalm has more than just a fleeting or tangential relevance and application to modern times. The psalmist begs God not ‘to make us pay for the sins of our ancestors’ (verse 8) and prays that God will help them, rescue them, forgive their sins and bring honour to Himself (verse 9).
How to deal with sins from the past, make amends for them, and bring healing and restoration to them impacted by those sins, is a very real and vital issue these days. It may concern the Roman Catholic Church in the abuse it allowed or tolerated (and sometimes covered up), or with the federal government and the churches in the case of the residential schools, or with various levels of government in their failure to honour the treaties, or in the legacy of slavery, or in the overall impacts and legacy of colonialism and imperialism on the nations of the developing world.
Our psalmist freely admits that his ancestors did wrong, that they sinned against God, but then asks when this judgment will finally end. He alleges that the present generation has paid the price, have reaped the terrible consequences of those past misdeeds, and wonders out loud when all of this can finally quit. This is all the more compelling and poignant when it is realized that the present generation were not numbered among the perpetrators but that are paying the price.
All of these questions are very much with us today. In the United States there are questions floating around about paying reparations to the living descendants of former slaves. And in the churches people openly ask about what they should be doing in response to past abuses and injustices when they weren’t part of them and usually weren’t even aware of them. More than simply wanting ‘to move on’, they would like to see healing and restoration take place, for this present uneasy, festering ‘dis-ease’ is quite untenable. And, as for the legacy of colonialism and imperialism, how can anyone ‘undo’ what has happened in the past and what has left us with lasting, and should I say, an indelible mark and stain upon the present—a mark or stain that isn’t necessarily all that bad on occasion. (I say that because the commerce, transportation and industrial patterns that are relatively entrenched in modern society, and that we owe much of our prosperity—particularly in the Western world—owe much of their existence to colonialism and imperialism. Without these twin influences much of the Western world would be suffering in stunted, ill-developed isolation.)
So, let us come back to our original question, namely, what can be done today? One answer lies with Israel itself and what it was called upon to do. There were twin answers to its calamity. Firstly, they needed to leave off with their idolatry and return to their whole-hearted worship of, and obedience to, Almighty God. And secondly, they needed to pursue justice in personal, corporate and societal dealings and to care for the most needy and ill-served in their midst. Maybe those are our answers as well. For Israel, these actions did not result in healing and restoration overnight; there was much work to be done, but it came—eventually. Maybe we need to do the same: to work at it, to do what we can to pursue God, and justice, and then God do the rest. Amen.
Forward notes: “Remember not our past sins” (verse 8a).
“What if you were defined by the worst thing you’d ever done? Prisoners and ex-prisoners in our country are often seen in a one-dimensional way, through the lens of the worst thing they have ever done.
“I recently visited an art exhibition on New York’s Governor’s Island that featured art by incarcerated and formerly incarcerated men and women. One artist had vividly painted a forest landscape. This artist has been incarcerated since 1980. He wrote that he liked to paint forests and landscapes because he missed being in the woods and outdoors in nature. He also mentioned that he had access to National Geographic and
Outdoors magazine. I will never experience what this man’s life has been like while being held in a prison for 40 years. But our baptismal covenant asks us if we will agree to ‘strive for justice and peace among all people, and respect the dignity of every human being.’ I know my answer can only be, ‘I will, with God’s help.’”
Moving Forward: “Bryan Stevenson, an attorney and social justice activist, writes in his book, Just Mercy, ‘Each of us is more than the worst thing we’ve ever done.’ How does that fit within the promises we make at baptism?”
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A concluding note: in one sense, the colonizers, the settler generation and the colonial nations, even those who have the legacy of slavery, are being defined by ‘the worst thing they—or their ancestors--have ever done’. Maybe, as with the convicts, there is more to the story, their story, than this