One of the joys of travelling is using 4G sticks to connect to the internet. at $20 a gigabyte. I was chewing through the data and wondered why until both sons told me to stop watching youtube — I had been trying to find carols to add to a post. And today the lectionary in the BCP says “No reading”.

As if. There is always a reading. So I switched lectionaries. And the teaching here is clear. If you tell the truth, you will pay. In these times, the truth is subversive. So tell the truth.

2 Chronicles 24:17-22

¹⁷Now after the death of Jehoiada the officials of Judah came and did obeisance to the king; then the king listened to them. ¹⁸They abandoned the house of the Lord, the God of their ancestors, and served the sacred poles and the idols. And wrath came upon Judah and Jerusalem for this guilt of theirs. ¹⁹Yet he sent prophets among them to bring them back to the Lord; they testified against them, but they would not listen.

²⁰Then the spirit of God took possession of Zechariah son of the priest Jehoiada; he stood above the people and said to them, “Thus says God: Why do you transgress the commandments of the Lord, so that you cannot prosper? Because you have forsaken the Lord, he has also forsaken you.” ²¹But they conspired against him, and by command of the king they stoned him to death in the court of the house of the Lord. ²²King Joash did not remember the kindness that Jehoiada, Zechariah’s father, had shown him, but killed his son. As he was dying, he said, “May the Lord see and avenge!”

Acts 7:59-8:8

^7:59While they were stoning Stephen, he prayed, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.” ⁶⁰Then he knelt down and cried out in a loud voice, “Lord, do not hold this sin against them.”

^8:1When he had said this, he died. And Saul approved of their killing him.

That day a severe persecution began against the church in Jerusalem, and all except the apostles were scattered throughout the countryside of Judea and Samaria. ²Devout men buried Stephen and made loud lamentation over him. ³But Saul was ravaging the church by entering house after house; dragging off both men and women, he committed them to prison.

⁴Now those who were scattered went from place to place, proclaiming the word. ⁵Philip went down to the city of Samaria and proclaimed the Messiah to them. ⁶The crowds with one accord listened eagerly to what was said by Philip, hearing and seeing the signs that he did, ⁷for unclean spirits, crying with loud shrieks, came out of many who were possessed; and many others who were paralyzed or lame were cured. ⁸So there was great joy in that city.

No politician wants to hear that the LORD has forsaken him. He wants to say that he is blessed, that the state of the union is good, that justice is rolling like a river. Particularly if none of these things are true. And he wants this said by priests, as a public act of support to his or her government (or junta). No one wants to deal with the flaws in our ideology.

No one wants to deal with the fallout of our ideology, which institutes a sense of self censorship, lest we offend, get charged, find ourselves facing non violence orders or having to be educated in sensitivity. As if sensitivity trumps the truth.

And that does not count as persecution: if you want that you only need to look to what used to be called Iraq and Syria, or to Africa, where people are being killed because of the faith. In the west we are shamed by words and fear for our jobs. In the ancient churches of the East, people are paying with their lives for the faith.

It is not a time for despair. It is a time for courage, to say the truth, and let the chips fall. Let us not forget that it was Saul, here approving of the death of Stephen, who became the one sent to the gentiles, the goyim.

The truth is subversive to states that are evil: these states are in a spiral to irrelevance and being a footnote in scholarly tomes. Do not listen to their propaganda. Do not be part of them. And do not be like them.