Preached on Maundy Thursday (Year C), April 17, 2025, at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Seattle, Washington by The Reverend Stephen Crippen.
Exodus 12:1-4, 11-14
1 Corinthians 11:23-26
John 13:1-17, 31b-35
Psalm 116:1, 10-17
I would like to read you a story. Would you like that?
The story, written by Barbara M. Joosse, is called “Mama, Do You Love Me?”. It is set in an Alaskan First Nations community. It’s a conversation between a mother and child. Let’s begin.
“Mama, do you love me?” “Yes I do, Dear One.” “How much?”
“I love you more than the raven loves his treasure, more than the dog loves his tail, more than the whale loves his spout.”
“How long?” “I’ll love you until the umiak flies into the darkness, till the stars turn to fish in the sky, and the puffin howls at the moon.”
“Mama, what if I carried our eggs — our ptarmigan eggs! — and I tried to be careful, and I tried to walk slowly, but I fell and the eggs broke?” “Then I would be sorry. But still, I would love you.”
“What if I put salmon in your parka, ermine in your mittens, and lemmings in your mukluks?” “Then I would be angry.”
“What if I threw water at our lamp?” “Then, Dear One, I would be very angry. But still, I would love you.”
“What if I ran away?” “Then I would be worried.” “What if I stayed away and sang with the wolves and slept in a cave?” “Then, Dear One, I would be very sad. But still, I would love you.”
“What if I turned into a musk-ox?” “Then I would be surprised.” “What if I turned into a walrus?” “Then I would be surprised and a little scared.”
“What if I turned into a polar bear, and I was the meanest bear you ever saw and I had sharp, shiny teeth, and I chased you into your tent and you cried?”
“Then I would be very surprised and very scared. But still, inside the bear, you would be you, and I would love you.”
“I will love you, forever and for always, because you are my Dear One.”¹
Jesus commands us to love one another. This is a serious commandment indeed. Loving one another asks everything of us. We talk in our psychologically-minded age about “attachment theory,” a clinical, tinny way of describing a devastating, life-altering, heart-searing emotional bond.
When we hear tonight that Jesus “loved his own who were in the world,” and that he “loved them to the end,” we hear about an emotional bond that actually kills Jesus. Loving his friends until the end meant that he gave up his life for them, for all of them, including the ones who turned into musk-oxen and walruses and polar bears. He loved the ones who broke the community’s ptarmigan eggs. But he didn’t just love the klutzes, or the mischievous members of the movement.
He loved the ones who stuffed smelly fish into his coat and boots, the ones who threw water on his lamp, the ones who ran away — the ones who ran away and stayed away. And that love is terrible. It is disturbingly painful.
When Jesus tells us to love one another, he is commanding us to stay, to live here, to work things out, to face one another and talk to one another and both ask for and offer forgiveness to one another.
I think my mother knew this when she would remind us kids of this new commandment. We would be quarreling, and when it got heated she would say — she would sometimes snap — “Love one another!” In one particularly dramatic moment, I told my mother I didn’t need to work things out with one of my sisters, and I didn’t want to. “She is your sister,” my mother replied. “You will love her.” It was non-negotiable.
The love commandment has blossomed in my imagination. It has shaped how I understand the world, and world history. When I learned that Abraham Lincoln deliberately called the Confederates “rebels” and denied the legal existence of the Confederacy, I thought of my mother: Lincoln did not recognize secession from the Union as a thing that actually exists. There is no such thing as secession. We will stay together. We will be one union. It is non-negotiable.
That’s why, a few years ago, I was moved but not surprised when another sister of mine reached out to me for reconciliation. We had fought much more bitterly than I could have imagined back in the days when our mother snapped “Love one another!” at us. Our rift persisted for many, many months. But finally my sister asked for reconciliation. She owned her part in the story. She wanted to work it out, to talk, to embrace. This remains one of the most powerful experiences of my life. There is no estrangement. We will stay together. We will be one family. It is non-negotiable.
This can be harder to do at church. Better said, this is easier to avoid at church. We can come here for the aesthetic glories of liturgy and music, and not challenge each other in costly love. We can come here for the pleasant connections of friends at coffee hour, and not challenge ourselves to go deeper, to meet and get to know those we don’t know, to “go there” with a concern, a complaint, a grievance, a sorrow.
Just the other week I was in a meeting and I had to consciously compel myself to be vulnerable, to be open and honest, and in this case, to apologize for something. It’s painful. It’s often much easier to gloss it over, to avoid it, to just give it time, to just give up. But my mother was right: she learned the New Commandment well. There is no estrangement. We will stay together. We will be one community. It is non-negotiable. Even if one of us runs away and stays away and sings with the wolves and sleeps in a cave. Even then, our companion will still be one of us. We will be very sad, but that person will always be one of us.
But here’s something interesting about the New Commandment: it’s not new at all. “Love one another” has been around since the days of the Torah, the days of the ancient Hebrews. It’s not new. But there is something new that Jesus does with the commandment. He calls it new because he teaches the commandment for the first time after he has washed the awful feet of his friends. That’s the new part. Washing their feet: this was a disgusting task in their time and place. Their feet were stained with manure, smelly from heavy labor, from walking dusty and muddy roads.
And that’s the new thing my sister did, some years ago when she sought reconciliation with me. She loved me enough to reconcile with me even though my actions had been, well, smelly. Neither of us had been our best selves. But this is the New Commandment: we love one another even when our feet stink — even when the problem between us is terrible, wretched, repugnant. We work on it. We make it work. We love one another.
This is why I always, always think about Judas Iscariot at this time of year. When Jesus gave the New Commandment, Judas was in the room. The other disciples were there, too, and with the notable exception of the women, the other guys were just about to run away. Even though they came back, they betrayed him. Jesus gives the New Commandment to a breaking and broken community, not an ideal one, not one where everyone’s feet smell just fine. And then he gets up and goes to his death, because that is what needs to happen for him to love his own until the end.
Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end. He loved them even though they said to him — even though we may say to him — “What if I turned into a polar bear, and I was the meanest bear you ever saw and I had sharp, shiny teeth, and I chased you into your tent and you cried?”
When we say that to Jesus, he says this back to us: “Then I would be very surprised and very scared. But still, inside the bear, you would be you, and I would love you.”
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¹ Barbara M. Joossee, Mama, Do You Love Me?, Chronicle Books, 1998.