In 1858 after Abraham Lincoln was nominated as the Republican candidate for Senator in Illinois he gave a famous speech in Springfield. He said, “A house divided against itself cannot stand. I believe this government cannot endure, permanently, half slave and half free. I do not expect the Union to be dissolved … but I do expect it will cease to be divided. It will become all one thing or all the other.” The image that he used of a “house divided” is taken straight from St. Mark’s gospel. Jesus used that image to defend himself against his critics. The power of the image comes not just from how Jesus applied it but also from the broader ramifications implied by a divided house. The direct reference to a divided house in Jesus’ metaphor was the kingdom of Satan. How can Satan be fighting against Satan? But lurking in the background was the divided house within Judaism – the opposition that Jesus experienced from the scribes would eventually lead to his death. The people of God were fighting among one another. And, as St. Mark relates, there was a divided house within Jesus own family. His “relatives” said he was out of his mind and his mother and his brothers felt estranged from him. Such divisions were the prelude to tragedy.
We live in an age characterized by divided houses. The nations of the world don’t seem to be able to cooperate but divide up into their respective camps. Society in the US is divided into fractious factions. The blue states are not like the red states. The NRA opposes those who want to regulate guns. Black folk and white can have completely opposite views about the operation of police in the community. And what keeps the house divided is that everyone is absolutely sure that they are right and the other side is wrong. Go back to the example of Abraham Lincoln where slave owners and abolitionists both justified their positions with an appropriate Bible quote. The pro-slavery forces would cite St. Paul who said slaves should be obedient to their masters. Abolitionists would retort “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” Religious leaders are just as divided as the rest of us. Some old timers here (like me!) might remember Reverend Ike, one of the first TV preachers. Reverend Ike once said, “The best thing we can do for the poor is not to be one of them” – a direct ancestor to those who preach prosperity nowadays. That contrasts sharply with a vision of the Christian life build on generous service to the least of the brothers and sisters. During the Viet Nam war Archbishop Spellman who was head of the Military Ordinariate for the US Bishops would quote from the same Bible Dorothy Day did – he to find a place for a just war, she for pacifism. The solution that Jesus proposed to overcome a divided house, whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother, does not provide an immediate remedy to the disagreements which separate us. So are we condemned to a divided house? Are the divisions, factions, parties, blocs which make up our world going to keep us in our respective corners until we come out swinging again?
That is certainly not what God intended and to feel so trapped is to deny the power of the Holy Spirit. So what is the solution? How can we make our divided house into a united one? When we look again at Jesus’ response to a divided house we find it to be much more personal than it seemed at first. Jesus claimed that the ones who do the will of God are kin to him only after, St. Mark tells us, he looked around at those seated in the circle around him and said, “Here are my mother and my brothers.” He had a personal, intimate connection with the assembled circle and that was what enabled him to envision a house united. What enabled Jesus to look beyond the divisions all around him was the personal relationships that he had developed with his followers.
That might be where we need to put our efforts as well. No doubt in our neighborhoods, our homes, even here in our parish we will have differences. What enables us to disagree without being disagreeable is when we have a relationship with one another. When Jesus said, “Here are my mother and brothers” he was staking a claim that what bound the Jesus Movement together was the same kind of connectedness that exists in a family. Let’s think about that for a moment. If you family is anything like mine, being family does not preclude the fact that there are all sorts of stresses and strains that go by the name “dysfunction.” But at the end of the day, we are family, we belong to each other, we have one another’s back … even should they disagree with my humble, but correct, opinion. So when we can look around and say, “Here are my mother and my brothers and sisters” it does not mean that we all get along and sing kum-ba-ya together. Rather, it means that we are willing to hang in there with one another despite the differences which arise between us.
To stretch the metaphor of a house divided to within an inch of its life I am thinking of the TV show: This Old House. For almost forty years this show has shown that even broken down and dilapidated houses are worth fixing up. If you work at it a “fixer upper” can become an architectural gem. What works for TV shows can also work in the fractured world that we inhabit. Yes, our house divided by politics, by race, by nationality, can seem beyond repair. But when we are willing to do the work of genuinely coming to experience each other as children of the one God, as made in God’s image and likeness, as precious in God’s sight, as our mother and brothers, then we can renovate our broken world so that it better reflects the eternal dwelling place we have in heaven. This old house becomes the place of dreams.