For We Know Not What We Do

The world that surrounds us is daunting,
       too many voices speak truth
       and prophetic words from false prophets
sow division.
God cannot be both compassionate 
       and a defense through which morality props
       up the unjust 

But the most persuasive voices
       can tailor the emperor’s clothes
       to align with God’s will
                or is it man’s?

So that the immigrant is still detained
the prisons overflow
race is divisive
the poor are criminalized
the natural world degraded
walls are built
And weapons are beat not into plowshares, 
      but into proclamations that they alone
      can make us secure.  

The drumbeat goes on

And then, in stillness
      the God who is addressed in prayer
      who is challenged and cursed and loved
      and condemned 

responds:

       Enter into discomfort,
             dispel rational thought
             that has normalized hate,
       and do not tread on the surface,
             but abandon it for the deep

for it is there
that the truth will be uncovered
 revealing that all are created
 in the image and likeness of God
 all are made holy and sacred and just.

It is a profound truth,
if only because the voice that responds is feminine
    and courageous, 

as though all of the daughters and sisters and mothers 
had preached a holy Gospel that for too long had gone
    unheard in the echo chambers of the ordained
    and the backroom channels of the elected
    and the boardroom coffers
    of an ever-present greed

and the people would plead, 
and the faithful would gather:

We must rise from dust and ashes
      to a sermon on the mount that was once proclaimed
      not mere allegory or callous refrain
      but a prophetic truth that has always been

that has always been until it wasn’t
because we had strayed so far from the road 
      that the Judean was left to rot and decay 
      and Lazarus awoke only to die again
and the fishermen did not walk on water
but capsized in the storm,
      their bodies washed to shore
      not as fishermen, not as disciples, 
but as refugee children drowned 
      and the rich man walked through
          the eye of the needle
      and the mob picked up the pile of stones
      and the loaves and fishes were hoarded away
      and the other cheek was not turned to the side,
              but instead a gun was drawn
              and the bullets pierced those hands
                  that once held nails
And we wept.

For so long we wept and cried out:
  My God, my God why have you forsaken me?

And in reply her voice dispelled any rumor or denial:
  My child, my child it is you who have forsaken me.
For in that moment our truth had finally been revealed

For we cannot claim a compassionate God 
     if the God we choose is a placeholder
     to uphold unjust views
     or whose ears fall deaf to the cries of the poor
     or who promotes a prosperity
      that benefits a few and no more.

For we cannot claim a compassionate God
    and proclaim the Gospel as the only truth
    when that very same God is rejected by us
    because he or she does not look like us

but rather the image that appears 
reflected in our mirror is
            the immigrant detained by us
            the refugee excluded by us
            the inmate who profits us
            the detainee tortured by us
            the gay man shamed by us
            the child abused by us
            the woman silenced by us
            the poor forgotten by us

And all of it in my name.

So forgive us, we know not what we do.
Forgive us, even though we know 
that it’s not quite true:
        for we know exactly what we do.  

                                  Amen.

About the Rabble Rouser

Michael Krueger

Michael Krueger first met Sister Julia in La Crosse, Wisconsin, while an undergraduate student at Viterbo University and dishwasher at St. Rose Convent. She was the only sister who didn’t leave a generous tip. (All joking aside, the one and only tip he actually received was the priceless call to FSPA affiliation in 2009). He credits that “top-notch Franciscan education” for putting him on a path to La Crosse’s Place of Grace Catholic Worker House (where he lived for two-and-a-half years), SOA peace vigils, work with developmentally disabled adults (inspired by Jean Vanier and L’Arche), commitment to social justice and a chance dinner with Roy Bourgeois. He currently lives near Madison and is a stay-at-home dad to two creative and adventurous kids, and is an active member of the Catholic Worker community there.