May 4, 2025: Conversions

Third Sunday of Easter           

New Testament Reading  Acts 9: 1-20
The Gospel:       John 21: 1-19

Jesus had already appeared to the disciples twice. The first time without Thomas and the second time with him. He greeted them with “Peace be with you” and breathed the Holy Spirit on them.  He gave them the tasks of forgiving the sins of those who were repentant and retaining the sins of those who chose to continue sinning. In other words, he asked them to put their beliefs into action. 

But what are they doing when we see them next? They have gone back to their normal way of life - they are fishing, not to relax with a pole at the edge of the shore, their feet cooling in the water, but out in a boat with a net. And guess what? They were not successful in catching fish because that was not what they were supposed to be catching - they were supposed to be fishing for people. 

So Jesus shows up for a third time with a gentle reminder. It is gentle because he starts by helping them catch the fish and it is only in their incredible success, another miracle, that they see that this is Jesus. “It is the Lord,” John cries out as Peter jumps into the water to swim to Jesus. 

It took 153 fish, Jesus cooking breakfast for them and one more motivational speech where Jesus emphasizes to Peter that he needs to “Feed my sheep” for the disciples to get out of their comfort zones and start teaching about the peacemaker Jesus who helped and healed, who died and rose again. 

In contrast, Saul, who will become Paul, was an enemy. He threatened murder of the disciples for spreading the teachings of Jesus, so we might begin to better relate to the disciples' reluctance, despite many miracles, to get moving with this important work. They knew what happened to those who went against the Pharisees or the Roman government, they had seen that happen with Jesus. Saul was intent on capturing and harming anyone following Jesus’ way. 

But in the end, it was Saul himself who was captured. He was struck blind by the risen Christ who had a different kind of work for him: rather than persecuting disciples, he ends up becoming one, getting his sight back and proclaiming Jesus to be “the son of God.”

Jesus sure works in strange ways sometimes, doesn’t he? While he gently encourages his own followers, who had plenty of evidence to get them moving earlier, he takes a dramatic approach with an enemy that works much faster.  

I can imagine Ananias’ doubt and frustration as he informs the Lord, “I have heard from many about this man, how much evil he has done to your saints in Jerusalem.” But God, as usual, approaches things differently.  God is an out-of-the-box thinker knowing that sometimes multiple approaches are needed. The disciples needed to feed the Jewish sheep, teaching them about Jesus. Saul, soon to be Paul, would expand the message to the Gentiles and beyond. 

The fact that Paul was a former persecutor of Christians makes his conversion a great testament to the power of God’s love and forgiveness. There was more work than just the disciples could do and Paul working for the cause was likely a greater motivation to the disciples as well, not to mention that it took a bit of pressure off of them because at least he would no longer be persecuting them. 

There were several conversions here. The disciples were converted from their inactive phase to an active one and Saul was converted from a persecutor of Christians to a recruiter of Christians. 

In his homily at Pope Francis’s funeral, Cardinal Battista Re said that Pope Francis lived Jesus’ message to “Feed my sheep.” He was a pope of the people who went to them. He reached beyond the traditional Catholic practices to make it easier for divorced and remarried Catholics to receive communion, to oppose the death penalty, to bless same sex marriages, to baptize transgender people, to recognize humans as the primary cause of climate change and to work to protect God’s creation, to apologize to indigenous peoples for the crimes during colonialism, to forge ties with Sunni and Shite religious leaders in shared goals of peace, and to support migrants and the poor. 

In many ways, Pope Francis’s actions could be looked at as a conversion from the way the Catholic Church had approached some issues and people before. But Cardinal Re was correct, the Pope was working to feed all of Jesus’ sheep.

According to a recent article in The Vermont Standard, Mohsen Mahdawi was born in a three-generations-old Palestinian refugee camp near Ramallah on the Israeli-occupied West Bank of the Jordan River. He and his family of five shared two 12 x 12 foot rooms in a tiny concrete block home. Growing up, the only Jews he knew were Israeli soldiers in full battle gear who terrorized them, once shooting him in the leg and killing his best friend and his uncle. He grew up hating the Jews and the Americans who supported them but later, coming to America, he had his own conversion. He learned through exposure.  Speaking at a film screening of a documentary based on a humanitarian trip to Israel and Palestine by a Woodstock, VT group he turned to Rabbi Dov Taylor, who led the group and said, “I have to apologize to you’ and then turned to the audience and said, “I have to apologize to all of you too. Now I see that there are other Jews and Americans and even Israelis who understand the situation and are sympathetic to our quest for justice. I apologize for cursing you.” 

Rabbi Taylor and others were very moved by Mahdawi and what he said. Mahdawi who worked at Ledyard Bank in White River Junction and later Dan & Whit’s General Store in Norwich, went to many of the screenings of the documentary to share a Palestinian perspective. Taylor even had him speak to his former congregation in Highland Park and said of that, “He won the hearts of all his listeners, because if you listen to him, you realize that he doesn’t have an angry bone in his entire body. He doesn’t have an ounce of violence in him. He doesn’t have an ounce of antisemitism in him.” 

Mahdawi had a conversion from his earlier beliefs because he experienced situations and people who changed his mind. He became a peace activist seeking help for Palestine. However on April 14 as he went in for his naturalization interview,  in Colchester, VT, what he thought was his final step to becoming an American citizen, he was handcuffed and taken away by masked, plain-clothed immigration officials ostensibly for his involvement in Pro-Palestinian protests at Columbia University, where he is set to graduate this month. He went quietly, flashing peace signs despite the handcuffs.

On Tuesday, April 22, 15 UCC pastors joined the clergy-led Vermont Interfaith Action Network’s protest in Montpelier to work to free Mahdawi raising their prophetic voices to speak out against his detention and intimidation as violations of our sacred traditions to uphold the dignity and humanity of all God’s children and to seek due process for him under United States Law.

Their actions and those of many others and our legal system worked and Mahdawi was released from jail on April 30. 

Conversions happen all the time and not just due to miracles and not only on the road to Damascus. They can happen to each one of us as we embrace Jesus’ message to “feed my sheep”. Feeding Jesus’ sheep means emulating Jesus’ life. We need to lead with love towards all people. We need to welcome all. Help all in need and fight for justice as he did. I am proud of my fellow clergy for doing that in Montpelier a week ago and would have joined them if I wasn’t in Idaho visiting my sons at the time. 

Jesus was active in his work for peace, love, help, and inclusion and we are called to be active as well. It might take us a while to be converted out of our comfort zones to enter our active phases in whatever way we can, but Jesus is patient. He will provide more fish and even cook it if we need it but he will eventually look us in the eyes and say, “feed my sheep” and we need to be ready to do just that. Amen. 

Pastor Michelle Fountain

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