Everyone Belongs

Galatians 5:13-25 and Excerpts from the Gospel of Thomas

June 29, 2025

By Nicole M. Lamarche

Welcome again with whatever you are holding or bringing into the room. I

invite you now as you are moved to take some deeper breaths, letting

ourselves arrive a bit more fully, giving thanks for the gift of this day, tuning

into whatever message the Universe has for each of us today. And as you

are moved join me in Psalm 19. God may the words of my mouth and the

meditations of all our hearts be acceptable in your sight, our rock and our

redeemer. Amen.

“I am really lucky to be a scientist during an era when my science realized

it knew very little…” that is how Dr. James Hendrickson, responded to a

question on Science Friday this week when asked how much is understood

about micro-organisms. He was joyful when sharing about slime that just

might save us. Because it turns out that microorganisms are gatekeepers

for methane and nitrous oxide, holding way more power than we ever knew

they had, playing a significant role in our carbon cycle.

And now after a long time of thinking we humans know everything,

scientists in many fields are realizing how much we still have to learn; how

vast and expansive and so far beyond our understanding our universe

really is. All the microbes that have ever been studied are merely a tiny

fraction of what is out there, which means even with all of our great

inventions, we are now looking to learn from these tiniest beings, seeking

solutions from what is basically as I understand it cosmic goo. We are

learning how much we do not know. And it turns out that some of the

unexplored diversity these microbes really might save us. We didn’t know

how much we didn’t know. And as much as this is true in microbiology and

a range of other scientific fields, this is also true in the field of biblical

studies, which is part of what got us all going on this journey we are on,

uncovering what was there all along.

As some of you might remember in July of 2022, when religious

scholar Diana Butler Bass shared a sermon at a festival in North Carolina

where she put a whole bunch of pieces together, bringing to light new

scholarship on the Gospel of John and pointing out the latest research

uncovering redactions and edits in chapter 19.

We have evidence from the oldest manuscript of that gospel, Papyrus

66, that names were changed, and things were crossed out, basically

rearranging not just that text, but in some ways our entire tradition,

reducing Mary Magdalene to a minor character and limiting her role, when

in fact she was likely the apostle to the apostles, the main disciple, the right

hand to Jesus.

So, I want to say thank you again for saying yes to this we have spiritual

treasure hunt, doing bible studies and book studies, research and retreats,

workshops and webinars, integrating what we have learned, welcoming

new ways of thinking and even experimenting with some of the new

practices we have learned along the way. You have been so wonderful

welcoming to all of this. Thank you!

And wow! And now here we are together, with so much transformed,

softened and opened since then. I feel like we are seeing some of the fruits

of this journey, daring to learn the truth, even as it has rattled the cages of

our old paradigms that’s what Cynthia Bourgeault says. The truth as it says

in John 8:32 does and will set us free. It turns out we aren’t the only ones

who have wondered if the Church Fathers got some things wrong and left

some things out. It turns out we aren’t the only ones who read the gospels

and saw Jesus as a teacher of higher consciousness, a path to perennial

wisdom, rather than someone God killed to spare us all from hell. It turns

out many of us are ready for something else and it turns out that something

was there all along. And I think of this as the great rebalancing, the great

undoing in some ways. It’s some of what the patriarchal power structures of

the first century and of now gave to us as a means of control. So just like

the scientists finding hope in what not long ago was dismissed or unknown,

we are lucky to be alive in an era when religion realized how little it knew!

At least our flavor! I do think we are blessed to be alive for this moment that

changes everything. Which means we are compelled to question our

answers, reread every Christian text with fresh eyes, knowing what we

know now. Over this month, we have explored how Christianity looks

different by including the Divine Feminine and what was there from the

start. And last week we talked about power with instead of power over and

we read part of that letter that we got more of today. We talked about how

they practiced together a new kind of social order, knowing the Empire

ranked them on their worth and actually still does now, but each time we

gather in Jesus name, we get to create a little heaven here because social

distinctions fall away, as we live out a radical reordering, where God is in

everyone and for everyone. We talked about how the very thing Jesus was

challenging at its core, was the hierarchy of worthiness manufactured by

men. When we gather there is no ladder. No pyramid; it’s a circle. (Love

that our sanctuary reflects that!) When we gather together we live that out,

Jesus’ vision, that equalizing vision that he held for the world. We are not

subjects to any Empire.

And today we continue looking at that same letter in the final part of this

series. This writing to the early church in Galatia and is kind of funny. It’s

Paul’s list of no-nos, which you might now know that this means it was

happening. Which is why he lists them out. Paul seems a bit frantic here.

He gives a big list of no-nos, telling them that the kin-dom of God won’t be

available to them if they carry on like they are and he tells them to focus on

actions. Instead of drunkenness, how about gentleness? It has the vibe of a

college dorm monitor. It seeks to modify behaviors and in some ways, it

sort of demonizes anything related to the flesh. As if he is yelling, it’s all just

sin! Everything you do! We can feel the frustration. One commentator

wrote, “Paul's letter to the Galatian churches is one long, angry,

passionate…” piece.

But the part to focus on… and remember at this point it’s still Jewish

Christians, proselytes, it’s early enough on that they haven’t separated,

now that they aren’t Judaism, but they aren’t sure what they are and it’s a

wildly mix of different people. I think the thing to focus on is that Paul

redefines freedom and what that means for those who have gathered

around the teachings of Jesus. What are they free to do? Who are they free

to be? Paul posits that perhaps there is a connection between love and

freedom. And perhaps sin is what happens when we use our freedom to do

something other than what is good for us and others. And as we learned

from the Gospel of Mary Magdalene, there is no ultimate reality to sin, it is

the word used to describe anything that separates us from God who is

called the good. Similar to our text for today, as Rob Fringer writes about

the passage in Galatians, “It is not the dos and don’ts that separate us from

God, it is the absence of love. What if we thought of sin this way—as the

absence of love or as anti-love?”

Perhaps freedom is relational? Because in the same lines that he talks

about freedom and being enslaved to passions, he says that the whole law

can be summed up with love: love your neighbor as yourself.

Many who claim Jesus as their main teacher get lost in the weeds of the

dos and don’ts because that is easier than internal transformation and

radical inclusion, watering it down to a management system for sins,

forgetting that in the context of the time, this letter is really capturing an

ancient argument. But because not all of the Christian writings were

included in our Bible, we only get one tiny fragment of the bigger

discussions being had and the teachings that were shared. As we heard

from the Gospel of Thomas, an early Christian writing that wasn’t included,

the spiritual path that Jesus lays out is about connection and integration,

being free from whatever stops us from living from our hearts. I am

convinced it is a higher level teaching. You will notice it is not narrative and

most of the ones not included are “different.” I am convinced these writings

were like Jesus 201. And so I read this text to be more about managing the

shadow cast from our ego, it makes sense, “When you make the two one,

and when you make the inside as the outside, and the outside as the

inside, and the upper as the lower, and when you make the male and the

female into a single one, so that the male is not male and the female not

female…” I think part of what it is getting at it in its First Century way, when

we free ourselves from the illusion of separation, both inside and from each

other, when we free ourselves from the illusions of the categories humans

created, even of gender, when we stop dividing and separating from God

who is the good internally and externally, we shall experience something

that can be described as heaven. With more of the pieces put together and

looking at more of the early Christian writings, we can see more clearly and

ask better questions. How do we remain free from what separates us from

all of the parts of ourselves, from the truths of ourselves? How do we

remain free s from anything separates us from God who is love? How do

we see freedom as relational? What does my freedom mean to yours? We

shift to doing the work inside instead of trying to change everything and

everyone else.

It is clear to me that the early Christian community was super diverse and

looked differently in each of the places it started to form. And I am

convinced that this band of believers committed to a higher way, did include

everybody. I am convinced that part of why the Jesus movement grew was

that it was one of the few places where everyone could be included and

belong. You might remember that everything changed in the year 313, that

was when Constantine said Christianity was no longer illegal with the Edict

of Milan. And I bet there was an impulse to manage this holy chaos a bit.

Freedom isn’t always predictable or easily manageable.

So then what Paul wrote could easily be misinterpreted, turned into a list of

things to avoid as religious crowd control, when really he was reminding

them that not every choice connects us to one another and to God, not

every thing we do will lead to good things, not all of our choices build

belonging. Some actions are simply anti-love, separating us from our true

selves and from others. It is a reminder that there is a relationship between

love and freedom. I am also convinced that part of what made Christianity

grow was the fact that everyone belonged. In part because the category of

gender wasn’t really recognized once you got to the second level teaching,

the higher level work, less public teaching. The male is not male and the

female is not female. I am convinced this is what this really means is that

none of that matters on the Jesus path. Those are categories that quickly

fall away. Another equalizer that changes everything. Everyone, every body

has access to the sacred thing. Everyone, every body has a gift to uncover

and bring to the group. Everyone, every body belongs. I believe that’s what

drew people to him.

Just like the scientists, we are lucky to be alive in an era when

religion realized how little we knew! Well in some ways we are learning

what we knew before we knew it. The Jesus movement was one where

anyone willing to live at higher level was welcome. Everyone belongs! May

we continue to live into this in deeper ways!

Communal Reflection

How can we individually and collectively live into our call to more fully

being a place and a people where everyone belongs?

Everyone belongs. Thanks be to God! May it be so. Amen.