Loving our Enemies

We had a serious discussion at young disciples’ time this past Sunday about how easy it is to love family, friends and enemies. I was amazed at how much the kids wanted and needed to share about when their friends have hurt them or they have hurt their friends, and how they had to forgive. The idea of loving an enemy shocked them. Jesus is asking a lot when he asks us to do this.

Also this weekend came the revelation that Jean Vanier, the founder of L’Arche community, sexually abused women. I so wanted it to not be true and hoped that it was a product of the rumour mill or a smear campaign. But yesterday the comments and actions of the L’Arche organization made it very clear that this was real. A man who had done so much for so many differently abled people who had been left by the wayside had hurt women under his spiritual leadership.

Love your enemies…In my sermon I talked about how Jesus exemplified this, serving food to the one who He knew would betray Him and washing the feet of the one who He knew would deny knowing Him. Even on the cross Jesus would ask God to forgive the blood-thirsty all around Him saying that they didn’t know what they were doing. Love your enemies…I don’t know if I would call Jean Vanier an enemy, but I certainly do not view him now in the same way I did last week.

What do we do about this, and about other Christian leaders and role models who we find out were weak and harmed those they were called to serve? All of us have a shadow side, a side that leans towards wrong and evil. The higher we are on a pedestal the further we can fall. The more pressure placed on us to be a Messiah and all things to all people, the more likely we are to buckle and turn to harmful ways of coping.

While it would be easy to judge and vilify Jean Vanier (and certainly we can’t accept this kind of behaviour) perhaps we need to look at who the enemy really is. It is not so much a person but evil itself. This is a cautionary tale reminding us to be constantly aware of how we and others in leadership around us are actually doing beyond the face shown to the world. This is a warning to not allow colleagues or ourselves to be raised to hero status but to maintain a healthy humility and accountability.

I’m concerned that in my denomination and others, leaders can be very isolated. Where once Presbytery meetings were a few hours to include a full worship service and dinner where connections and relationships were formed, now there is a short coffee break and people celebrate when the business is done quickly and everyone can go home. This trend has turned a Synod-wide annual meeting that once was two days with speakers and professional development and nurturing fellowship into a business meeting that lasts a few hours.

I get that there is always work needing to be done at home, but I believe that down the road we will pay the price for not providing for healthy opportunities to gather and find support and care. This harks back to my time and research at The Centre for Clergy Care and Congregational Health and the statistics about minister burnout and mental health and other issues. Wise leaders find a cohort to check in with regularly and to help keep each other grounded. Wise leaders are pro-active about safe-guarding their physical, mental, emotional and spiritual health and about protecting their values and family life. But this doesn’t come easily to everyone and people can get lost in the shuffle.

As leaders, we need to be self-aware of how we’re really doing and to identity safe people with whom we can share our concerns, fears and struggles. Finding people outside our immediate ministry is very helpful for perspective and protecting confidentiality. We need to be unafraid to identify what is weighing on us and the temptations we have to cut corners or act in ways that are less than we know we are called to be because we are stressed or anxious or exhausted. Spending the time with God to confess to our challenges and short-comings and to be renewed by His strength is so important. Asking to see with the eyes of Christ what to do in our situation of leading can give us clarity on how to handle tricky situations.

Jesus teaches us in Matthew 5:44 that we are to love our enemies and to pray for those who persecute us. In ministry we will encounter those who misunderstand us or because of their own issues project intense feelings on us. Perhaps for some of us, our greatest enemy is ourselves. May we have the humility and compassion to be like Christ - quick to forgive and to extend love to those who meant Him harm because He saw the bigger picture. He could fully see the brokenness of humanity and knew that God was more than capable of saving us from ourselves and the evil of this world.