Atticus Finch has a habit of stepping in between.

Atticus is the protagonist of the 1962 film To Kill A Mockingbird, based on Harper Lee’s book,  set in the small town of Maycomb, Alabama, in the 1920s. He’s a single parent to Jim and Scout. An early scene shows how Atticus steps in between. Jim is swinging on his tire swing counting the church bells. When he discovers that it’s 5 p.m. he calls for Scout and they run off to meet their dad.

On the way, they have to go past Miss Dubose. She sits on her porch and yells at the kids. Atticus steps in between the kids and the bitter woman and compliments her flowers. “Well, they were better last year,” she laments.

Sometimes we encounter unhappy people. Life has made them bitter. They often take it out on those who are smaller than they are. Maybe you have a neighbor who was just crabby. Always commenting on the state of your lawn. Or asking why you didn’t fix a shutter. Maybe it was a teacher who was really unfair to you in school, almost making you hate whatever subject they taught. Maybe it was a family member whose standards you could never quite live up to.

Atticus steps in between because he has a hunger and thirst for righteousness. Righteousness, according to our scholar of this worship series, M. Eugene Boring, means to be actively doing the will of God. This is a key concept of Matthew’s gospel that stems from the Old Testament as well. This is not those who merely long to be personally pious or idealistic dreamers or do-gooders, but those who long for God’s coming kingdom with tangible actions.[1]

The kingdom where we love God and our neighbor as ourselves. That means we don’t harass kids on the way to greet their father walking home from work. In that early scene, we see the nature of Atticus, his relationship with his children, and the attitude of the town all in one scene. It’s a powerful scene that is a thread throughout the movie.

Atticus agrees to defend Tom Robinson, a black man falsely accused of raping a white woman. This is a reflex we learned about in our church study of James Cone’s book The Cross and the Lynching Tree. The lynching era ran from 1880 to 1940.[2] Historians estimate that 3,446 black folk were lynched in this time. They weren’t the only ones lynched but made up 72% of those strung up by mobs.[3] The common claim used was sexual assault or some sort of transgression of that sort. Which is what we get here in the movie.

Many of us do not wish to remember such a time. It makes us feel uncomfortable. Or guilty. Or we worry about what our kids will think. It is amazing what you can and can’t speak about in our society. When we get uncomfortable, we try to ignore. When that fails, we accuse. When that fails, we take matters into our own hands.

That truth of our human condition is portrayed in the movie. A lynch mob shows up at the jail. Atticus is there, because Atticus steps in between. He’s there to ensure Tom is given a fair trial. Atticus is there because he knows his town and the nature of humanity. It looks like the crowd is going to push past Atticus. Or worse, lynch Atticus next to Tom.

The kids show up. Scout is six years old when these events take place. Kids have a highly tuned sense of fairness. If you’ve ever been around young children at desert time, you know what I’m talking about. Siblings crying that “He got a bigger piece than me!” showcases children’s sense of fairness. Just spend a day in the house of a young family, and you’ll hear “that’s not fair!” half a dozen times. Maybe you have fond memories yourself of your own children at mealtime. Maybe you’ve managed to block them from your memory.

There’s a mob. There’s Tom in jail. There’s Atticus. Then the children come in and they won’t leave. It is then that Scout sees a face in the crowd. She calls him by name. “Hey, Mr. Cunningham.” He won’t look at her. “I said, hey Mr. Cunningham…Don’t you remember me? You brought us some hickory nuts one time. I go to school with your boy, Walter. Tell him hey for me won’t you. He’s a good boy. I beat him up once, but he didn’t tattle. Say hi for me, huh?”

The innocence of Scout diffuses the mob’s sinister purpose. “No harm done, young lady. I’ll tell Walter you say hey. Let’s go boys!”

When we are little, we have a simplistic view of fairness. We love strongly. We see the world through our innocence. I still hold onto my innocence around the words that come from the Declaration of Independence, what this day celebrates. “We hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal.” Words penned by Thomas Jefferson.

Jefferson was taking a swipe at King George the Third. Royal blood doesn’t count for anything anymore. You’re just the same as us. These are radical words, and it is still a radical concept. Jefferson wrote “all men” but really meant those who held property. Only land-owning white men would be able to vote for a good long while. The truths Jefferson was writing about were not self-evident. The phrase, “all men are created equal” that created a hunger and thirst in people. It drew people to our nation. The promise of equality. Equal justice under the law. A nation of laws. Life. Liberty. And the pursuit of happiness.

This inspired countless immigrants. Most of us in this room can boast a long list of where our ancestors came from. We can go back just a few generations and find someone from somewhere else. They came here for a reason: The promise and dream of this great country. Even when society fell short and we as a nation lost the narrative, there have always been those who remembered the promise and held onto their innocence.

It is usually those at the margins. The outcasts. Those yearning to breathe free who remember the promise so clearly because they have been abused for so long by those who lost the narrative. The abusers unspoken motto is “the promise stops with me and those who look like me and those I deem worthy.” Often those in places of power scoff at the people in the streets, but eventually the people win and the society inches towards the promise that all are created equal by our God. But the dream isn’t here fully.

Tom is found guilty. Justice is once again denied. He is deemed unworthy to share in the promise and to add his story to the story of his community. When Atticus walks out, the black community stands. One black man says, “Scout, stand up. Your father is passing.”

Atticus states, “I think there’s just one kind of folks. Folks.” Yet our backgrounds inform our worldview. Each family story, each heritage adds the story. It is true, as Atticus says, that “you never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view… Until you climb inside of his skin and walk around in it.” We must understand one another and find unity within our diversity. To see that those folks over there are really just our folks. Their story added to ours. Our story part of theirs. Their story might be informed and sound different due to race, creed, class and a whole bunch of other factors, but I promise that God has placed moments of connection in each person’s story.

We as Christians are about building a just world for all. We are about a just society where all stories are told and justice is dealt impartially. A nation of laws that regard all as equal, no matter their creed, class, race, or anything else. We are to be like Atticus and Scout. We are to step in between.

We can show up here every Sunday. Sing all our favorite songs. We can pray all the flowery prayers. We can quote all the great theologians, but it is meaningless according to the Prophet Amos, if there is not justice in the land. If the courts are depriving the poor of justice. If we are silent on these matters. Hate evil, love good; maintain justice in the courts.

The prophet doesn’t mince words. I like how Pastor Eugene Peterson paraphrases Amos 5:21-24 in his Message translation of the Bible.

“I can’t stand your religious meetings.
I’m fed up with your conferences and conventions.
I want nothing to do with your religion projects,
your pretentious slogans and goals.
I’m sick of your fund-raising schemes,
your public relations and image making.
I’ve had all I can take of your noisy ego-music.
When was the last time you sang to me?
Do you know what I want?
I want justice—oceans of it.
I want fairness—rivers of it.
That’s what I want. That’s all I want.

Jesus said in Matthew 18:3, “I assure you, unless you are converted and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.” Unless you hunger and thirst for righteousness, fairness, like children making sure their deserts are the same size, you won’t get what Jesus is about.

If you come across a piece of news that troubles you… If you encounter a story that is very different from your own… instead of resisting it… Learn from it. Consider it. Maybe even risk saying, “Well, that’s not fair.”

We are called to step in between. You might find yourself like my friend the Rev. Kaji Dousa, talking about immigration justice. Or the Rev William Barber the III about poverty. Father Greg Boyle about gang rehabilitation and job training. Or so many good people of faith working to create a just world for all through all sorts of ministries: prison reform, environmental justice and creation care. Maybe you have an idea. It might feel small compared to these wide-ranging societal issues. You might have a curiosity around hospitality. How can we fully welcome people. This curiosity might lead you to discover new ways to make our building more accessible for those with mobility issues. A new ministry might form.

We are called to step in between. In between the oppressor and the oppressed. Step in between hunger and the hungry. To step in between loneliness and the lonely. To be God’s beloved community. Where stories are heart. Hurts healed. And hope proclaimed. God has already gifted you with this work. God has already blessed what work has been done by our ancestors of faith in this place.

This is how the world gets better. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness… and get to work. Actively. In tangible ways. For they shall be filled. Thanks be to God. Amen.

Works Cited

^[1][1] New Interpreter’s Bible, Volume VIII page 179.

^[2][2] James Cone, The Cross and the Lynching Tree, Page 3

^[3][3] https://naacp.org/find-resources/history-explained/history-lynching-america