Text — Mark 1:40-45

A leper  came to him begging him, and kneeling  he said to him, “If you choose, you can make me clean.”  41 Moved with pity, Jesus  stretched out his hand and touched him, and said to him, “I do choose. Be made clean!”  42 Immediately the leprosy  left him, and he was made clean.  43 After sternly warning him he sent him away at once,  44 saying to him, “See that you say nothing to anyone; but go, show yourself to the priest, and offer for your cleansing what Moses commanded, as a testimony to them.”  45 But he went out and began to proclaim it freely, and to spread the word, so that Jesus  could no longer go into a town openly, but stayed out in the country; and people came to him from every quarter.

A few Sundays ago, in worship, I read a letter from a man named David Messenger whom I’ve been visiting at the Whiting Forensic Unit at CVH.  Many of you are familiar with his story by now, but just to summarize — Dave grew up as part of a fairly typical church-going family in a small town in Kansas where his family owned a local furniture business.  David wasn’t too excited about the furniture business.  Instead, he did a lot of graduate work to become an environmental scientist and he found his way into a fairly intense and lucrative job selling scientific instruments and providing technical support.

He and his wife Heather and 5 year old son lived in eastern Connecticut and had a summer home in Maine.  To all appearances they were living the American dream, but it turned into a nightmare when the pressures on David broke him down.  In the course of just a few weeks, he descended into a psychotic delusionary state.  He thought his wife was plotting to kill their son, and David killed his wife.

This case got a fair amount of publicity.  He was not prosecuted.  Everyone agreed that he was clearly not guilty by reason of insanity.  But he spent several years in prison while the legal process unfolded.  Now, he is confined to the hospital for a period of 0-20 years, where he is under the jurisdiction of the Psychiatric Security Review Board.  He appears (to me at least) fully recovered.  He’s on no medication.  And even though these memories and experiences are still quite painful he is willing to speak quite openly about them.

In his letter to us, he mentioned the guilt and remorse that left him feeling spiritually and emotionally dead in the aftermath of this terrible thing he did.  But, he has slowly found his way back to faith, and hope, and a reason for living.  His mission in life now — one of the only missions available to him from inside the walls of Whiting — is to tell his story, the story of his nightmare journey through mental illness and back, and his journey through the criminal justice system.  (David is quite aware that, if he had been in almost any other state than Connecticut, he would not be in a hospital now, but in a prison cell.  Connecticut has a more enlightened approach to the relationship between mental illness and crime than most states.)

Al Sanders went with me to visit him.  Bob Dutcher visited him.  Several other Deacons plan to visit him.  He can speak with us on the phone, and if any of you would like to do that, I’ll arrange it.  I see David as a very warm and gracious person.  He’s intelligent.  He knows what it means to be an outcast, a leper, to use the language of the Bible — and he used the word “leper” in his letter to us.

The reason I’m re-visiting this story today is this.  In the course of our conversations, David has been very encouraged and touched by our interest in him, by the fact that anyone outside the hospital cares about him at all.  And so David asked if there would be any possibility that he could somehow, or on some basis, have an “affiliation” with First Church.  He didn’t use the word “membership.”  I brought that designation up for discussion.

He can’t come to worship here.  He can’t leave the building he’s in for any reason.  But he gets Tidings.  I gave him a cassette of the Senior Choir’s music.  I gave him some pictures of the church.  Right now, aside from his family who live far away, we are a major source of hope for David.  But could he be a member? 

In our tradition, the Deacons and the congregation approve and vote into membership people who want to join.  Usually, this is a formality.  We generally don’t screen members.  If someone is willing to come to an Inquirer’s Class and spend a morning hearing about who we are — our theology and our being an Open and Affirming Church and a few things like that — and if they still want to join, that’s good enough for us. 

After I read the letter from David, a boy in our Church School told his mother he’d be afraid to have someone like that come to church.  What if he got sick again?  Maybe he’d kill someone else.

This congregation (I believe) is about as open, understanding, and sensitive a group of people as you’ll find anywhere.  But I also know that this boy who expressed that fear isn’t the only one who would feel that way. 

David has been committed for up to 20 years.  That could be extended for his entire life.  He might be allowed to move to a less restrictive part of the hospital — and that’s his hope.  The day could also come when he’ll be allowed to leave the hospital; at first that would be under the supervision of a hospital staff person, just as other patients from CVH have worshipped here in the past. 

So imagine this.  What would it be like to have someone in worship who had killed his wife?  Even if it was a long time ago.  Even if he was psychotic when he did it.  Even if he was terribly sorry.  Even if he showed no signs of illness for many years.  Could he get sick again?  Would we be afraid?  Could we trust him enough, or could we trust the Psychiatric Security Review Board enough, to welcome him genuinely? 

And whatever our answer to that is, should that be the decisive factor in whether we would vote, or whether you personally would vote, to accept him as a member?

This is one of those situations, those opportunities, like the decision whether to become an Open and Affirming church in the first place, that takes us to the heart of what it means to us to be a Christian community?  What does it mean to be a member of this church — for David Messenger or any of us?  Who are we?  What do we stand for?  What do we expect, or require, of anyone who wants to be a member?  Some things in life have amazing power to focus our minds.  This is one of them. 

Whether David Messenger could be a member of First Church isn’t a decision for me to make.  This is something for us to discern together.  More Deacons need to meet David.  This will take some time.  This is something we need to ponder, and pray about.  David knows what it means to be under suspicion, that’s for sure.  He’s knows he’s even under our suspicion.  What is our role, not just in David’s life, but in the world? 

We are not the Psychiatric Security Review Board.  It’s not our place to decide whether or when or to what extent David should be given more freedom or when he can leave the hospital.  That’s not our job.  I’m glad that’s not our job. 

Our job is to be the church.  What is the church of Jesus Christ? 

Should there be anywhere, in the world, a group of people whose job is to befriend David, or anyone in a similar situation, simply as another human in need of mercy, like all of us?  Are we that group of people? 

In our gospel lesson, a leper says to Jesus, “If you choose, you can make me clean.”  Being “clean” or “unclean” is not a medical diagnosis.  It has to do with being included or excluded from a community. 

In our 2^nd hour today, we’re going to re-visit the place in our society of same-sex couples who are designated “unclean” in the sense that they don’t have the same civil rights or protection under the law that husbands and wives do.  By being an Open and Affirming Church, we declare these people are “clean” — at least in this community, this church.

Jesus is approached by a leper, who comes to him begging, and kneeling.  The leper says to Jesus, as David Messenger says to the church, or as homosexual people say to the church, “If you choose, you can make me clean.” 

Jesus touches the leper — something considered not only dangerous but against the law.  This could spread the disease.  The leprosy leaves the man, but that’s not the end of the cleansing process.  Jesus sends the leper to the priest, to undergo the ritual, the ritual of the community that would give him back a place in society.

But notice what Jesus does then.  This is fascinating.  After touching the leper, Jesus himself can’t go into the town openly.  He goes out to the country and stays in the country.  Staying outside in the country picks up on the Old Testament idea of being outside the camp, outside the group, ritually unclean.  So Jesus and the leper trade places.  The leper is sent in, to become clean, and Jesus is now unclean, on the outside.  Now he’s suspect. 

Where are we in this story?  What a delicious question.  What kind of people are we called to be, as the church of Jesus Christ?  When we’ve figured out who we’re called to be, then the question is, are we willing to be it? 

Jesus does put some interesting challenges before us.