A Springfield faith leader remembers Desmond Tutu
Rev. Kenneth Chumbley
Early on a recent Sunday morning, I read the newspaper headline announcing the death of the Most Rev. Desmond Tutu, Archbishop of the Anglican Church of South Africa, at age 90.
I was saddened by the news but grateful that I had known Bishop Tutu. He helped form my faith in Christ and ministry as a priest in the Episcopal Church.
I remembered the fall of 1984, when I was a master of divinity student at General Theological Seminary in New York City, the oldest seminary in my church.
It was a sunny, chilly day on the close, or campus, the golden leaves of its many trees drifting to the ground.
I was in a Christian ethics seminar when the bells of the Chapel of the Good Shepherd rang. And rang. And rang, as if heralding an epic event.
History had been made, and soon we seminarians would know why.
The Most Rev. Desmond Tutu, Archbishop and the seminary's Visiting Professor of Anglican Studies for the 1984-1985 academic year, had received the Nobel Peace Prize in recognition of his non-violent opposition to apartheid, his government's policy of racial separation and oppression.
Bishop Tutu was an enemy of racism, the diminishment and degradation of other human beings because of their color. He believed that God loved all people, for every human being, regardless of race, was created in the image of God and should be treated as sacred.
After he received the Nobel, Bishop Tutu sponsored and hosted a sumptuous and delicious dinner in the seminary refectory. He did so to show his appreciation for the seminary community. That meal was the best one we would ever have there. He spoke, acknowledging others who were part of the struggle for racial justice in his homeland. Humility was who he was.
I often saw Bishop Tutu at meals in the refectory or on the close. I once shared an elevator with him, and we talked about the white South African author Alan Paton's novel, "Cry the Beloved Country," which had been my introduction to apartheid many years earlier.
Early mornings, with my deli coffee in hand and the New York Times under my arm, I would approach the seminary chapel, sometimes look inside, and there the bishop would be — alone, his hands clasped and raised to God in prayer before the white marble altar. I did not intrude on his time with God.
A person of prayer and worship, Bishop Tutu's passion for social justice and activism sprang from his deep connection with God, which was also fed by the Holy Scriptures, especially the Hebrew prophets and the gospels.
During Trinity term 1985, I was a student in Bishop Tutu's course, "The Church and the World." I went to General in part because I knew he would be a professor there during my time.
In his lectures, often gesturing, his voice rising and falling for emphasis, he was more the eloquent prophet than the erudite professor, although his scholarly credentials were impressive.
He knew the God of love personally and made God real for me. Listening to him, I could hear Amos, proclaiming, "Let justice roll down as waters, and righteousness as a mighty stream."
Bishop Tutu showed me what it meant to be a person of faith — to speak and act in divine love, striving to promote the flourishing of every human being. No exceptions. And even if doing so meant criticism and controversy.
I concluded his course, certain that I would live my faith not only in a church's pulpit and at its altar, but also in the public arena.
Bishop Tutu, serious about his faith but not about himself, would often flash an impish grin as he joked and laughed while he lectured, even as he preached in the seminary's otherwise solemn, hallowed chapel.
Reflecting on Bishop Tutu's life and witness to Christ, I recognize how much he shaped my faith and my ministry, inspiring me, in my own small way, to take public stands on social, economic and political issues, sometimes generating criticism and controversy.
The world is a better place because of the Most Rev. Desmond Tutu. May it be a better place —one of justice, freedom, peace — because of me, you and every person of faith.
May he rest in peace and rise in glory.
The Rev. Kenneth L. Chumbley is an Episcopal priest, writer, spiritual director and, beginning in January, chaplain to staff at the Council of Churches of the Ozarks.