Finding And Claiming our Roots

I have not done a lot of genealogical work, but I know many people who have. There is a fascination many of us experience with knowing our family tree and/or the lineage of people who have come before us. I have also appreciated shows like the PBS series Finding Your Roots where Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates, Jr. explores the ancestry of famous people – finding unexpected connections and a few surprises along the way as people uncover their past. There is something about knowing who we are connected to that tells us about who we are.

That’s a lot of what is happening in today’s readings.

In Genesis 15, we witness one of the initial dialogues between God and Abram (we will come to know him as Abraham at a later point). God says to Abram, “I am the LORD who brought you from Ur of the Chaldeans…” God then goes on to promise Abram a land upon which future generations will establish themselves.

This is a foundational identity text in our scriptural tradition related to trusting in God and following what might seem to be counter-intuitive or counter-cultural ideas, inclinations, or promises from God.  And, yet, that is just what Abram (and his wife Sarah) do. They step out in faith and become the “ancestors” that we all trace our spiritual roots to. 

And quite often throughout the scriptures, God refers back to this moment and encourages the people of Israel to “remember” who it is that has been there with and for them since the beginning. In fact, God was with them even before there was a “them”!

Learning to trust is an integral part of our lineage.

Skip ahead to the gospel from Luke 9 in the passage that is referred to as the Transfiguration. In this scene, Jesus takes a few of his trusted disciples up a mountain with him and, in what can only be described as a mystical experience, Jesus becomes illuminated and is seen in the company of Moses and Elijah. The disciples witness Jesus speaking with them. The scene ends with Jesus alone with the disciples on the mountaintop.

This is another lineage story.

Now I do not know for certain what may have happened on that mountain top (or even that it happened as written). What I do know, however, is that the authors of Luke want us to know that Jesus is in the direct lineage of Moses and Elijah.  Jesus is being named as embodying both the liberating energy of Moses and the prophetic energy of Elijah.

[Note: It’s also REALLY important to keep saying that while someone like Moses is mentioned, it was not just Moses alone who liberated Israel from the Egyptians. People like Moses’ sister, Miriam, were central figures in the liberation of the people but – through patriarchy – get erased like a lot of other central women figures. Jesus is in their lineage too, and remembering this community of leaders also helps to decrease the power of the narrative of the single, heroic, male leader who gets everything done by himself…).

Liberation and living into the prophetic are part of our lineage.

Which is why I love the line from our second reading from Philippians 3 where Paul describes the people who don’t recognize this lineage with the phrase, “their God is their stomach.” Paul is saying that if the only thing that you can trust is what is right in front of you or your own safety and security, then, of course, following Jesus is going to seem like foolishness.

Our readings today – as part of our Lenten journey – are meant to awaken us and help us remember our lineage and ancestors in the faith. These are people who took risks without having guarantees. These are people who trusted in a God who was with them even if they did not recognize it. These are people who were committed to liberating people from oppression and speaking truth to power. These are people who were dedicated to the repair of the world through non-violent love.

We do not need to take a spiritual “23 and Me” test to know our roots. We, too, are in the lineage of Abram and Sarah, Moses and Miriam, Elijah and Jesus – and so many others.

One of my friends and mentors in social change work is Vikki Reynolds. Vikki encourages the use of a practice that she calls “Solidarity Teams.” Solidarity teams are a group of people who form a network to help shoulder-up people doing social change work. The team can be constructed using people who are alive and in our circles, but it can also include people we do not know and people who have gone before us (activists, authors, significant historical figures) whose energy we wish to wrap ourselves in.

Our scriptural tradition offers us many people who we might want to include in our solidarity team. And there might be a lot of other people we’d want to include in that list as well. Who would you want on your solidarity team these days? In the catholic tradition, we tended to call our solidarity team the “communion of saints.”

As we continue to move through Lent and move through a world that offers us much to reflect upon and act on, may we do so remembering that we are not alone and live in a lineage of people who have prepared us to live fully in this moment – no matter what we are facing.