Sometimes, the Bible confronts us with things we find very hard to hear. In today's Gospel, we just heard Jesus say that he comes not to bring peace to the earth, but rather division! To sharpen the point, some translations have Jesus saying that he comes not to bring peace, but a sword. But wait a minute - elsewhere in scripture, Jesus rebukes Peter for taking up arms to defend him, saying "Those who take up the sword will die by the sword." (Mt.26:52) And let's not forget the Angels who hail Jesus' birth as Prince of Peace, or his parting words to the disciples, "Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you" (John 14:27).

What are we to make of these apparent contradictions? I think we make of them what we make of so many other apparent contradictions in the Bible; the God of love and the God of Vengeance; Blessings and Curses; the steadfastness of God and God's abandonment, divine presence and absence. All we can do is step back far enough so that they no longer appear as contradictions, but as things seen from different vantage points, two sides of the same coin, recognizing that human language fails to fully explain God or express our experience of God.

In this case, there seem to be at least two levels on which to read and understand this text. There is the literal level, in which Jesus speaks a clear and uncomfortable truth. His teaching, his being and his call to follow him all bring people to an infinite number of decision points. Not everyone in our lives is going to like or accept the choices we make in following Christ. When Francis of Assisi was born, his mother dedicated him to a life of service in the Church and named him after John the Baptist. But his father expected the boy to enter the family business and when he learned of this, he flew into a fury, overruled his wife and changed the boy's name.

As a young man, an experience of the living presence of Jesus caused Francis to renounce his former life of wealth and ease in order to serve Christ in the poor. Francis' father objected violently, first beating him, then dragging him through the streets in public humiliation, and finally disowning him. In Francis' family, a decision to follow Christ pitted husband against wife and son against father, just as Jesus predicted. And so it may be that our own faith decisions or those of someone we love may bring us into conflict, sometimes leading to estrangement.

In the aftermath of 9/11, a friend of this congregation publicly shared his conviction (based on Jesus' teachings on non-violence) that military action should be unacceptable to Christians. In response to this witness, a former member told me that the Christian pacifist position was indefensible and that he personally had no use for "all this business about turning the other cheek." Clearly, the sword of Christ's truth cut more than one way, deeply dividing the two men.

Just yesterday, I was saddened to see many flyers posted around town by former members of St. David's, inviting the people of Brown County to worship where true faith-based values are upheld. I'm sorry that such Christian values apparently do not include valuing others whose interpretation of scripture might differ from one's own, or working for reconciliation. In this instance, Jesus was right; his coming has brought division, aligning brothers and sisters in Christ against one another.

But that's not the whole story, is it? We also see the Peace of Christ expressed in the life of the Church. This congregation is made up of very different people with diverse social and religious backgrounds, sometimes brought together by little else beyond our common faith. We stick together and work things out when we disagree on certain things, because Christ expects nothing less of us. Haven't we all seen, here and in other faith communities, how the commitment to love one another as Christ loves us has enabled brothers and sisters to overcome division and be reconciled?

It's the same in families. Mine was not always an easy relationship with my parents. We often disagreed on what felt like important social or political issues and were somewhat at odds, you could say, over our priorities in life. My own faith led me to adopt positions and take actions that my parents could not understand or support. And yet, I was taught from my earliest days on the spiritual path that a primary life task was to learn to truly love my mother and father. And although they might not have put it quite that way, my parents' religious training and experience must have played a role in their faithful effort to express their love for me. Even though our own ways of following Christ sometimes seemed to provoke division in the family, the desire to obey Christ in keeping his love commandment enabled us to climb down from confrontation, affirm a connection that could bridge any gulf, and continue to grow in patience, communnion and affection, right up to the end.

There's another way to read this passage, you know; that is, on the symbolic or metaphorical level. When Jesus speaks of a divided household, is it possible that he is speaking not of the opposition of a literal father and son or daughter-in-law and mother-in-law, but of the opposition of a divided self? After all, Jesus used just this kind of metaphor in Matthew 12: "No house divided against itself can stand." In psychology, the house often stands as an image of the whole person; thoughts and feelings, both conscious and unconscious. In the world of dream studies, the household is a "consistent metaphor for the self." The upper floors and attic symbolize higher functions, such as consciousness, thinking, and spiritual perspective. The lower floors and basement represent subconscious feelings and awareness. The purpose of both dream interpretation and psychotherapy is to recognize that these separate parts of a structure are all part of a whole, and to work for re-integration.

Another way of understanding this as followers of Jesus might be the way in which we tend to fall short of our ideals. I know that personally, I am constantly torn between my role as a bridge-builder and peacekeeper in the fellowship and my sense that true obedience to Christ would (if I let it) lead me into a deeper commitment to work for his peace and justice in the world. There have been times when I have held my tongue or spoken elliptically, rather than risking prophetic speech that might offend or drive others away. There are times when I have failed to act, either out of cowardice or pragmatism. This is a house divided, too, and it is my long-term project as a priest and as a believer to allow the Prince of Peace to reconcile these disparate parts of myself.

Perhaps the most daunting thing about Jesus' gospel message is that his indication that we can expect this state of affairs to persist indefinitely; "From now on. . . ", he says. The very good news is that this unsettling condition is the result of the holy action of Jesus himself, whose message (for all it's apparent ambiguity) has the effect of challenging each one of us to examine, proclaim and embody what life in his Spirit means and looks like. And so, through the difficulties this brings, both within our own beings and in our relationship, we are being constantly refined and prepared for the even greater work that lies before us in these troubled times.

AMEN