Truth, Lies, and the Power of Fiery Flowering

You’re probably wondering about the photo accompanying this post. It’s a hunting vest, with handy little pockets for shotgun shells. I discovered it months ago at a Goodwill Outlet and added some flowers to create a wearable art statement. It’s odd, yes, and I’ll tell you more about it in a few minutes.

I'm a homilist at a wonderful social-justice focused church in our area, and the reflection below is based on a sermon I wrote for this past Monday. Here's the gospel reading from which it sprung:

The scribes who had come from Jerusalem said of Jesus, “He is possessed by Beelzebul,” and "By the prince of demons he drives out demons. "Summoning them, he began to speak to them in parables, “How can Satan drive out Satan? If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand. And if a house is divided against itself, that house will not be able to stand. And if Satan has risen up against himself and is divided, he cannot stand; that is the end of him. But no one can enter a strong man’s house to plunder his property unless he first ties up the strong man. Then he can plunder his house. 

Amen, I say to you, all sins and all blasphemies that people utter will be forgiven them. But whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit will never have forgiveness, but is guilty of an everlasting sin.” For they had said, “He has an unclean spirit.” Mark  3:22-30

It’s a passage about the ability to recognize what the actions of God look like, and the depth of wrongness in calling good works evil. Incredible timing for the things we’ve been witnessing this week.

It all reminds me of George Orwell’s novel 1984, which is a prophetic vision of a totalitarian dystopia. Here’s a quote from the book that rings loud at this moment:

“The Ministry of Peace concerns itself with war, the Ministry of Truth with lies, the Ministry of Love with torture and the Ministry of Plenty with starvation.”

I couldn’t help but think of our nation’s newly established “Board of Peace” in charge of the takeover of Gaza, each seat of which bears a price tag of one billion dollars.

Here’s another quote:

“If you want a picture of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face—for ever.”

Cuts rather close, doesn’t it? One final snippet:

“The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.”

It almost hurts, reading those words, because we’re watching scenes of violence and murder unfold while being told by the federal government not to believe our own eyes.

In the Mark passage, Jesus explains that divided kingdoms, countries, and houses cannot stand. It’s hard to imagine our nation standing given the extremity of division, but we really don’t know what to do.

The scribes and Pharisees claimed Jesus had an unclean spirit, and his rebuke was overt, and clear. His words echoed Isaiah who warned that God proclaims woe to those who call evil good, and good evil.

Their accusation that Jesus got his power from Satan was a kind of Orwellian doublethink which feels familiar. We look around and see the proliferation of assault weapons, systematic racism, brutalization and targeting of immigrant populations, threats to the freedom of speech and assembly, degradation of queer and trans people, and actions of American imperialism. These tragedies are held up by our Federal government and many of its Christian supporters as good things and call them “freedoms” or “protections.”

Meanwhile, citizens are shot in the face in front of their spouses by federal agents, or surrounded by a circle of thugs, beaten, then executed by unlawful firing squad. Children are stalked by masked figures outside schools and at bus stops. Used as bait for the adults in their lives.

The current administration and it’s Christian-in-name supporters proclaim themselves to be Ministries of Truth, like the scribes and Pharisees did with Jesus. And like those authorities and religious experts of old, when someone stands before them radiating the power of the Holy Spirit, proclaiming God’s desire for compassion, mercy, and justice, those “truth ministers” declare them evil, and then sacrifice them to their own bloodthirsty gods.

So what are we supposed to do with this?

We take a deep breath, and turn to Paul’s instructions to his beloved young friend Timothy:

Stir into flame the gift of God; a spirit of power, and love, and self-control.

In contrast to the horrors of recent days, we’ve also witnessed some of this stirring. We saw it in the 700 clergy who showed up in Minneapolis to participate in observation and protest. We heard it in the words of a bishop who instructed his priests to get their affairs in order because the time to put our priestly bodies on the line has come. And we see it lived out by a group of monks, walking thousands of miles on a holy pilgrimage of peace.

God’s flame of power, love, and self-control is alight.

In October of 1967, a squadron of soldiers was dispatched to confront and intimidate Vietnam War protesters assembled at the Pentagon. The soldiers formed a semi-circle against the marchers, with M14 rifles pointing toward them. You’ve probably seen a picture of a young person placing carnations in the soldiers’ gun barrels that day. Their name was George Edgerly Harris III, a counter-cultural queer performer who used the stage name “Hibiscus.” And just like that, in a single moment of action, from a single photograph, the phrase Flower Power started being used around the world.

Its message still resonates.

Flower power.

And that brings me back to the flower-bedecked hunting vest.

While it’s not military issue, it’s designed to make the act of killing easier and is the kind of thing a newly recruited ICE agent might wear because they aren’t outfitted as officially as Border Control Officers or members of other agencies putting boots on necks. That’s one way you can identify them in an occupied city. I imagine a recruit pulling a vest like this from a closet where it normally waits until deer season and wearing it like armor. A costume of authority donned after drinking the ICEy Kool-Aid. The anti-kill art vest I made subverts the little pockets of violence into flower vases, just as George Harris III—Hibiscus—did with the gun barrels.

Flower power.

Today, the peace-walking monks receive and give flowers as they travel, an action which is connected to their understanding of expanding peace. Here’s a blog post written by one of the Monks about their journey:

Some people may doubt that our walk can bring peace to the world—and we understand that doubt completely. But everything that has ever mattered began with something impossibly small. A single seed. A first mindful breath. A quiet decision to take one step, then another.

Our walking itself cannot create peace. But when someone encounters us—whether by the roadside, online, or through a friend—when our message touches something deep within them, when it awakens the peace that has always lived quietly in their own heart—something sacred begins to unfold.

That person carries something forward they didn’t have before, or perhaps something they had forgotten was there. They become more mindful in their daily life—more present with each breath, more aware of each moment. They speak a little more gently to their child. They listen more patiently to their partner. They extend kindness to a stranger who needed it desperately.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

And that stranger, touched by unexpected compassion, carries it forward to someone else. And it continues—ripple by ripple, heart by heart, moment by moment—spreading outward in ways none of us will ever fully witness, creating more peace in the world than we could possibly measure.

This is our contribution—not to force peace upon the world, but to help nurture it, one awakened heart at a time. Not the Walk for Peace alone can do this, but all of us together—everyone who has been walking with us in spirit, everyone who feels something stir within them when they encounter this journey, everyone who decides that cultivating peace within themselves matters.

One step becomes two. Two become a thousand. A thousand become countless. And slowly, gently, persistently—not through grand gestures but through ten thousand small acts of love—we can help make the world more peaceful.

This is our hope. This is our offering. This is why we walk.

The flaming gift of God is working powerfully through this group of Buddhists as they walk through increasingly bad weather, handing out flowers, receiving them, and giving them away again.

Their words are a reminder that it’s not our job to make sure the divided house of our country doesn’t fall. We don’t have that kind of power. It will fall if it needs to. It is our job to feed and grow what is true and beautiful. To refuse to call evil good. To affirm that love looks like inclusion, feeding, healing, and comfort. To ask ourselves each morning “what does love look like for me today?” and then do that thing.

The monk’s blog post closes with the following prayer:

May you and all beings be well, happy, and at peace.

May this be our prayer also. May the gifts of God be stirred into a fiery flowering. May we have hope. Amen.

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Suzanne DeWitt Hall (she/they) is the author of the Where True Love Is devotional series, the Living in Hope series of books supporting the loved ones of transgender people, The Language of Bodies (Woodhall Press, 2022), and the Rumplepimple adventures.