The Prophets: Hosea & James Russell Lowell

Listen to the hymn, the verses and words of the poem as we go along. You may remember 

Once to every man and nation
Comes the moment to decide,
In the strife of truth with falsehood
For the good or evil side;
Some great cause, God’s new Messiah,
Offering each the bloom or blight,
And the choice goes by forever
‘Twixt that darkness and that light.

James Russell Lowell was a prominent poet, scholar, Harvard professor, international lecturer, magazine editor (The Atlantic Monthly), active Republican, ambassador to both Spain and England, who believed, as did God’s prophet Hosea, also a poet, that poets have a call and responsibility to be prophets, to speak prophetically, especially against evil in society. 

In 1845 Lowell wrote a poem “The Present Crisis” 

Then to side with truth is noble,
When we share her wretched crust,
Ere her cause bring fame and profit
And ’tis prosperous to be just;
Then it is the brave man chooses,
While the coward stands aside
Till the multitude make virtue 
Of the faith they had denied.

Sung to the Welsh tune “ton-y-botel” (tune in a bottle), to which we just sang our gospel hymn “Singing Songs of Expectation”, our hymn “Once to Every Man and Nation” was lifted from Lowell’s poem “The Present Crisis”. Protesting slavery, it is a call to recognize changing "truth" and a prophetic rail against social and political evil, more powerful and outspoken than any hymn ever in the hymnody of The Episcopal Church. So outspoken in fact, that in moving from The Hymnal 1940 to our present Hymnal 1982, theologically purist and politically correct deleted Lowell’s hymn. We do not sing it anymore, the same “experts” who wanted to delete “Onward, Christian Soldiers” had the last word, and it’s lost to us. 

By the light of burning martyrs
Jesus’ bleeding feet I track,
Toiling up new Calvaries ever
With the cross that turns not back.
New occasions teach new duties,
Time makes ancient good uncouth;
They must upward still and onward
Who would keep abreast of truth.

Lowell’s prophetic hymn is current and contemporary in every age and nation, society and culture in which evil prospers. Including ours now, today, where we are so hatefully divided against each other, with name calling and degradation of entire classes, groups, political parties, religions, categories, races and national origins of other American human beings. Courtesy, good manners and the rules and practices of common human decency have been abandoned, it’s “road rage on the internet”, and we are rude and wickedly epithetic to and about each other, especially when we can hide anonymously, out of reach, as on social media, where cowards lurk and post hate.

Hatred has dehumanized America as a nation, and Americans as people. And it worsens: to spew hate, especially as a political strategy for appealing to populist prejudice and fears, stirs the worst of us into the mainstream of what was once called our "melting pot nation of immigrants", where everyone but Native Americans is an immigrant from across the sea. Spewing hatred fosters evil, and is making racism, bitter division and violence our erupting national character: two mass shootings this weekend, Jesus Christ, what have we become?

We baptized Christians profess to follow Christ crucified - - crucified, dead, buried, and by God his Father raised to new life because of love - - for love of us and no other reason. In response, our one obligation as Christians is love: to BE the love of Jesus. 

To bring it up yet one more time again: can’t we, don’t you, pay attention and take seriously to heart the vows and promises we make to God, and especially to each other, in our Baptismal Covenant? The five vows that grow progressively deeper and more personal from front to back - - 

Will you continue in the apostles' teaching and  fellowship, in the breaking of the bread, and in the prayers? 

Will you persevere in resisting evil, and , whenever you fall into sin, repent and return to the Lord?

Will you proclaim by word and example the Good News of God in Christ?

Will you seek and serve Christ in all persons, loving your neighbor as yourself?

Will you strive for justice and peace among all people, and respect the dignity of every human being? 
And respect the dignity of every human being, and respect the dignity of every human being. And respect the dignity of every human being.


This is what would “Make America Great” - - not reverting to a time when America was “white male Protestant ‘Christian’” and a black woman arrived at the back door every morning to cook, clean house, do laundry, and mind the children as nanny - - while a black man worked in the yard. I remember, I was there, there was nothing Great about it. America can only be "made great" by keeping our promises to God and each other, of kindness instead of hatred; humility instead of certainty. Decency instead of meanness. Instead of contemptuous name-calling, respect, thoughtfulness, courtesy, consideration, generosity, acceptance - - precisely the definition of ἀγάπη, agapē, the Gospel word for Love.

From Luke’s gospel, we recently read and heard Jesus’ parable of the Good Samaritan, in which Jesus' one and only message is the startling and uncomfortable news that you are wrong, that you have been wrong all along; that the neighbors whom you are to love, are the people unlike you whom you despise and hold in contempt.

Though the cause of evil prosper,
Yet ’tis truth alone is strong;
Though her portion be the scaffold, 
And upon the throne be wrong,
Yet that scaffold sways the future,
And, behind the dim unknown,
Standeth God within the shadow
Keeping watch above his own.

What is present in both Hosea’s prophecy and Lowell’s prophetic hymn, though in Lowell it’s so subtle you can miss it, is Hope, offering a future for those who live into the covenant with God who loves us; with, as Lowell has it, “God’s new Messiah”. Hosea especially, after his doomsday damnation, is bright with promise and hope for those who live under the Lord. And for us Christians there is hope in Jesus. 

Only in Jesus: will you respect the dignity of every human. being?

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Sermon preached in Holy Nativity Episcopal Church, Panama City, Florida on Sunday, August 4, 2019, the Rev Tom Weller. Text: Hosea 11:1-11, Colossians 3:1-11, and the hymn "Once to Every Man and Nation" from James Russell Lowell's 1845 poem "The Present Crisis".

I post totally sans pride, only to keep a promise to a dear friend.

The Prophet Hosea, by Duccio di Buoninsegna, in the Siena Cathedral (c. 1309–1311)