I was watching the National Prayer Service online on Tuesday, January 21, when a WhatsApp message asked me the name of the bishop who was speaking. Canon Gideon Byamugisha was following the service from Uganda; he knew that I lived right by the Washington National Cathedral and had long connections with it. As we exchanged messages in real time, I felt his surge of hope, both in the United States and in his Christian community.
Canon Gideon was tuned-in to the event at the Cathedral that is part of America’s presidential inauguration rituals. An interfaith service, its messages were of hope and common destinies as well as America’s rich diversity. Bishop Marianne Budde, the Episcopalian bishop of Washington, DC, since 2011, preached at the service. Her words have been intensively parsed and she has commented often on them, but this finale, her call for mercy, reflect their essence: “Our God teaches us that we are to be merciful to the stranger, for we were all once strangers in this land. May God grant us the strength and courage to honor the dignity of every human being, to speak the truth to one another in love and walk humbly with each other and our God for the good of all people. Good of all people in this nation and the world.”
It is a striking commentary on our times that Bishop Budde has been praised as a courageous truth-teller, simply for saying what for millennia has been widely understood as the essence of her faith tradition. Canon Gideon is another courageous truth-teller, who also ventures across fraught terrain. Diagnosed in 1992 with HIV/AIDS, during a time when the disease sparked deep fears and was associated with dark sins, he decided to speak publicly about his situation, with full awareness that he was a religious cleric. Focusing on those who were suffering, he challenged assumptions, true and false, and tied attitudes to consequences. He inspired the International Network of Religious Leaders Living with or Personally Affected by HIV and AIDS (INERELA+), and serves as a tireless champion for what to me is the “best of religious witness”: deep care for those who suffer, and a constant deep and honest grappling with core existential questions that face all human beings. A longtime admirer and friend of Gideon, I am awed by his gracious humanity, persistence, and power to communicate and persuade. He and his wife Pamela (also HIV positive) named two daughters, born since he began his powerful AIDS ministry, Hope and Love.
Gideon asked me to pass on his admiration to Bishop Marianne: “She had made my night and the night of many more millions praying, leading, and serving, to deliver a more equitable world where no one is left out of accessing love and grace, compassion and solidarity, and equity and solidarity.”
The bishop’s sermon is the talk of the town this week. Many admire and salute her courage and grace even as they fear that one result of her words may be a need for special security protection. With her sermon, Marianne Budde accomplished many things that, we hope, will reverberate. Among the most important consequences is that we were reminded, in a time where religious roles in society face tumultuous debate and polarized views, that mercy and care for those who are most vulnerable bind different faiths and can be seen as their powerful common anchor. And that events in Washington are, in real time, seen and heard across the world. Canon Gideon’s hopeful reaction reminds us of the powerful human bonds, across diverse cultures, nationalities, and faith traditions, that confirm the importance and power of our shared common humanity.
