Loving My Enemies

Did you love the scribes,

The Pharisees, the Sadducees

Who spilled your blood 

By Pilate’s well-washed hands

At the dump on the edge of town?

Did you pray for them

Before raining seven woes on them,

After, 

Or neither?

Were they the ones you wept over,

Longing to cover them

With strong protecting wings?

You were no hypocrite, so I think

You must have prayed 

and wept for them

In those few precious moments 

In the middle of the night 

When no one clamored

For your attention 

Your miracles

Your teaching

And you could be alone

With your beloved father.

If you could do that

For men who hated 

everything about you,

Who mocked and scorned you,

Crowned you with thorns,

Spat on you and ripped

Your back into a slurry

Of blood and torn flesh,

And hung you naked to suffocate

In a public, shameful place,

Despised, rejected,

Acquainted with grief —

If you could love them,

Then surely I can love

These fearful hand-wringing

Reactionary nutjobs 

Who invent conspiracies 

About stolen elections,

Who deny our responsibility 

To steward the world you gave us,

Who would rather suppress dissent

Than see justice flow down like waters,

Who think they’re victims 

Of a new Holocaust

Because they tweeted something offensive 

And got dragged for it.

O Lord Christ,

I cannot love such a love

Unless it is your love in me.

Remove my disdain,

My sarcastic judgments 

On these brethren,

Your adopted sons

And my fellow servants.

Cast out my demonic pride

And replace it with your grace.

Help me to see their pain and fear

And to weep with their weeping.

Let my speech be unerringly kind,

Seasoned with salt,

And rare enough

To be significant.

May I be quick to hear,

Slow to speak,

Slow to anger,

And may everything I do say

Be born of Your Spirit in me.

Love them through me

With your divine love, O Lord,

For you know my own

Is cold and insufficient.