I was stunned to read the results of an al.com poll about how people of faith should respond to the shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri and the failure to indict the police officer who shot him. Here are the results:

3.9%      Hold a peaceful protest as a statement of solidarity
13.6%     Work to prevent racial violence because it could happen in Alabama too
28.0%     Pray for the Brown family and everyone who is hurting
54.4%     This isn’t a faith issue. It’s a matter of law and order.

Over 54% chose “do nothing” (“This isn’t a faith issue”) over prayer (“Pray for the Brown family and those who are hurting”)!

Not a matter of faith? In one of the most highly churched, religious, charitable states in the country, what isn’t a matter of faith?

It reminds me of the old knock-knock joke. “Knock-knock. Who’s there? Nunya. Nunya who? Nunya – nun ya business!”

You know when someone tells you that something is nunya business, or bidness, as we say in the south, it means something to the effect of, “don’t you worry your pretty little head about things you don’t understand,” which usually means something to the effect of “these are things we don’t want you to understand!”

To say it’s nunya bidness to the church is like saying it’s nunya bidness to God. I’m trying to figure out what in the Ferguson situation could be nunya bidness to God? I’m trying to figure out what in this entire creation could be nunya bidness to God?

I’m trying to think of a time that Jesus restricted himself to only matters of faith, so narrowly defined. I’m trying to think of times when he chose to stay uninvolved in certain situations because they were “matters of law and order” rather than matters of faith? It seems to me that Jesus saw matters of law and order as urgent matters of faith.

He was deeply concerned about how his people were affected by the Roman occupation, about the oppressive and abusive enforcement of the law against his people – not unlike the experience many communities of color have with law enforcement in our country.  He was deeply concerned with any barriers that caused a people to be treated as “the other,” as less than human – whether they were Samaritans, Canaanites, tax collectors, or people with afflictions physical or spiritual – not unlike the undocumented immigrants in our state.

Why would the most religious people, in the most highly churched state, the most charitable people in the country, say that this urgent matter is nun of our bidness?

Race matters, as Cornell West says, race in the United States is a faith matter. Life and death are faith matters. Hope and despair are faith matters. When something is killing a people spiritually, economically, psychically, physically, it’s a faith matter. For that matter, when one part of the body is injured, all are injured. When one rejoices, we all rejoice together (1 Corinthians 12:26)

Of course the poll forces only one choice, but as a friend of mine recently said, “we have become a tribal people.” We defend our tribes. It used to be that Auburn fans would root for Alabama to win every game but the Iron Bowl, and Alabama would do the same for Auburn. No longer – we want our tribe to win at all costs and we want the other to lose every time. Period.

Maybe that helps explain why, when forced to choose, people of faith in Alabama would choose Do Nothing over prayer. To choose to “Pray for the Brown family and others who are hurting” might suggest we are disloyal to the “tribe” of police officers and people who look like us. We are forced to choose sides.

There is a long sad history in our own families and in biblical families where conflict leads to bitter division and taking sides – Cain and Abel, Sarah and Hagar, their sons Isaac and Ishmael (which led to Israel and Palestine), Esau and Jacob, Leah and Rachel – when in truth, the only side should be God’s side.

As people of faith, we are called to choose sides. When we find ourselves in the midst of controversy and conflict, we are called to speak and to stand and to work and to sing and to cry out for justice, as Jesus people, not as Republicans or Democrats or Libertarians or Independents, not as conservatives or liberals, or tea partiers, not as advocates for big government or limited government – as Jesus People.

As people of faith, we are called to choose sides, to stake our ground with the least of these – knowing that there is a cost, that it may or may not be in our individual self-interest, it may or may not be in the best interest of our families or “our people” or “our tribe,” whatever that may mean to us.

Which is beside the point, anyway, because Jesus’ words about separating the sheep and the goats – “as you did unto the least of these, you did unto me” – are not about individual deeds of mercy leading to individual salvation. They are about the destiny of nations, the salvation of societies. Those nations that care for the least of these will thrive; those that trample the least of these will perish. Historically this has been proven – every nation in history that has had extreme disparities in income & wealth has perished.

That isn’t to say that the choices we make as individuals don’t matter: of course they do. Our choices make the church what it is, and make the nation what it is.

Part of the lesson is that when we fail to recognize the least of these as our own kin, we cut ourselves off from the Source of all Life. When we share our bread with the hungry, bring the homeless poor into our own house, see the naked and cover them, “we will be like a well-watered garden, like a spring of water, whose waters never fail.” (Isaiah 58:11)

I know it is not always easy to live as One. We may be kin, but kinfolk don’t always get along. After all, what if the least of these don’t want you to help them?

What if you don’t know their language? What if they don’t know yours?

What if they offend you? What if you offend them?

What if they reject you? What if they feel rejected by you?

What if they attack you? What if they feel attacked by you?

What if they are the enemy you are supposed to love? What if they see you as the enemy?

What if you are afraid of them? What if they are afraid of you?

This I know, from my own sojourns. Jesus is in there, in the midst of it all, in the muck and the mire of humanity. Jesus, Son of Man, the Human One, is there where it is as real as it can get.

It helps to remember when we get stuck in that way of thinking that results in “us” and “them.” We are all a mix of darkness and light, beauty and mess  – we are all sheep and goat.

I take heart from the many images in the Bible that promise that the lion will lie down with the lamb. So it isn’t so hard to believe that the sheep will also lie down with the goat.

Like Jesus said, he was sent that we might all be One.