![The steeple of the Memorial Church](/sites/g/files/omnuum7126/files/styles/hwp_21_9__1920x825/public/2025-02/160725ChurchCalArt4.jpg?itok=rG9ZvXzh) # Sermon: Nineteenth Sunday after Pentecost October 23, 2025 - [ Blog ](/news-categories/blog) *By the Rev. Dr. Charles (Chaz) Lattimore Howard* *University Chaplain and Vice President for Social Equity & Community at the University of Pennsylvania* *(The following is a transcript of the service audio, Oct. 19, 2025)* I have to offer gratitude first to Dr. Potts and Reverend Sullivan, Dr. Jones, our friends from the Divinity School, and all the brilliant musicians and singers. You all sound wonderful today. And everybody who makes Memorial Church the amazing place that it is. I'd be remiss if I didn't say the name of friend and mentor, Peter Gomes, who poured a lot into my life, whom I saw preach many times here, and certainly wouldn't be where I am today without him. And greetings to everybody —friends and family —who came out to be here today. It truly means a lot to see you all here. I bring your greetings from West Philadelphia. It's a blessing to be back up here in Massachusetts, where I went to seminary. And it's lovely to be up here at Harvard, or, as we refer to you back home, the Penn of the north. My wife told me not to tell that joke, but I had to. I had to. Sorry. I also, if you'll allow, want to say one more name. My favorite aunt, Elizabeth Fitzgerald Howard, passed away nine years ago. And she attended Radcliffe. She was in the class of 1948. My Aunt Betty, she was the first Black class president and first-class marshal in Radcliffe history. And she went on to have a successful career as a children's book author. And she wrote some of my favorite books that I read growing up. One was called Virgie Goes to School with Us Boys, and she wrote a famous book called Aunt Flossie's Hats. I have a very clear memory of my Aunt Betty on one of her book tours when I was in elementary school, and I was so excited that my aunt was coming down to Baltimore, I thought to see me. And I'm sitting there, and I heard she was coming to our school. I'm like, "This is great." I got to sit in the front row, which was unusual. This is wonderful. And they give her this big introduction. I'm like, "Who are they talking about? This is Aunt Betty," and Aunt Betty comes on stage, and I'm waving and waving. And she walked off stage. She came down the stairs. She was supposed to go right to the podium and talk and read the book to us, but she walked down the stairs and got right in front of me and kissed my cheek and then kneeled down and tied my shoe because the laces were just flailing out there, and that just wouldn't do for my Aunt Betty. And she read the story, but the thing I remember most about that day was that she came down to be with me. She loved me that much. These are not normal times. It's a very challenging moment in the world, in our nation. A very hard moment in higher education. It's hard to be human right now. It's hard to be you. It's hard to be us. And I think, in order to navigate challenging times, we may be called to move in a different way. Different times call for maybe a different strategy. And I think that the lesson that we heard from the Gospel lessons so wonderfully read, and I think this little lesson I see in my Aunt Betty, and a lesson that so many of the religious leaders of time throughout time, might be a clue into how to move. This is true for individuals like Moses, who was raised in Pharaoh's palace but leaves all that behind, and after a time in the wilderness, goes down to be with the enslaved Hebrews. Harvard Memorial Church · The Dr. Rev. Charles (Chaz) Lattimore Howard - Oct. 19, 2025 | Sunday Sermon This is true for individuals like Siddhartha Gautama, the Buddha, who leaves the protection of his father's safe palace there, too, and goes out to see suffering on a journey toward enlightenment. This is true for more contemporary individuals like Gandhi who leaves a promising career in law and organizing in South Africa to go and become Mahatma Gandhi. So many of the saints throughout time. Saint Francis, who leaves wealth and power and knighthood behind to become one of the friars and miners. Saint Francis. Sister Teresa of Avila, who left her father, who was a knight, and the wealth there to become a discalced Carmelite nun. These individuals who leave safety and security up here to come down and be with those who are suffering down here. This is the truth in the Gospel of Jesus Christ that I think we miss. We've heard it so many times, I think it's easy to miss it. Christians believe that Jesus is a part of the Godhead, that Jesus is up there, and comes down and robs God's self in humanity and is born not in the religious center in Jerusalem, not in the political center in Rome, but in Bethlehem and raised out there in Nazareth. Can anything good come from Nazareth? And moves through life as a carpenter's son, a carpenter, and a nomadic, almost homeless, traveling preacher. This Messiah who was prophesied, we thought, was going to ride in like King David and strong, thought was going to ride into Jerusalem on a horse with an army, instead rides in on a donkey with people waving palm branches. The way up is down. And then, in this moment in the Gospels —this bananas moment that makes no sense —this God, this Messiah, the one we've been waiting for to come and take over and run things, sitting here at the Last Supper, everyone must have known something big was about to happen. Tomorrow's the day. He's about to take over. This is it. And instead, Jesus gets up and kneels down and washes their feet like a servant. The way up is down. I think that we often, when aiming for success, when aiming to further our vocations, our careers, our journey, when anything, we think that we have to sort of work hard and climb the ladder upward. That in order to sort of change things, we have to try to get power in whatever form that might be. But Jesus presents some different message to us. A different calling for this moment, a moment where we feel like we're being pushed down by power, where cruelty and fear is the currency of the moment. We think that we also need power to push back and change things. Jesus says something very different, that the way up is down. What does that mean? It first means a type of incarnational love. You want to be great? Be the servant of all. You want to go up there? Come down here with us. What does an incarnational love mean? Pope Francis said that a shepherd should smell like their sheep. That means you're getting in the mud with them. One of the people who taught me this the best was my youngest daughter, Evangeline. Every Friday night is movie night in our house. I have three daughters. Two are college age, and now Evie's a middle schooler. When she was little, we were watching a movie all together as a family. And it was a Disney movie. We were watching The Princess and the Frog. Great movie. I'm about to spoil it, so if you haven't seen it yet, I'm sorry. And toward the end of the movie, one of the little sort of bug companions, this little bug named Ray, gets squished and dies. And I'm a crier. I was a mess. I was tears. I was ugly crying. It was so sad. And Evie's looking back and forth from the TV to me and sees me crying. And she's little at this point. "Daddy's crying. Daddy's crying." I'm sitting on the floor, and they're on the couches. Evie gets down from the couch, walks over, sits on my lap, and looks me right in my face and says, "No," and took the tears off my cheeks and put them on her cheeks. She got down with me and cried my tears. That's incarnational love. Coming down to be with those who are feeling it, down with to cry each other's tears, and then to serve while we're down there. It's that kind of thing that changes somebody. When Jesus is washing the feet of the disciples, it's not just sort of a symbolic thing of who Jesus is. It changed them. When we read this, it can change us too. This is also a part of the way up is down. This inner transformation that changes things outside of us. Inner transformation for outer transformation. You want to change the world? Change in here first. You want to make a difference around you? You want to change the cruel space that we're walking through in this country and world right now? Start in here. Make a world of kindness and generosity in here. It was an interesting detail, too, about this night before it all goes down for Jesus. He's washing the feet of the disciples. You know who else is there? I think a lot of us miss this. Judas was still in the room. It's not just Peter and John and James, the Thunderboys, and not just the nice ones, all that stuff. It's Judas. Judas who I imagine at this point sort of had this grumpy look on his face, knew what was about to happen, and Jesus going person to person. I interpret that Jesus gets down and washes Judas' feet too. What? This mad love of one's enemies. Jesus knew what was about to happen. He knew he was going to betray him and still washed Judas' feet. This is the way up is down. Loving those who are cruel to us. This is such a hard invitation for Americans right now, to love the other side. Pew has these studies that 50 years ago, 60 years ago, one of the greatest fears of parents was that an individual would marry someone of a different race. We've changed very differently on that one. And then 30 years ago, that my child might be gay or queer. We've changed on that one. Now, the greatest fear of parents, that my kid's going to marry someone of the opposite political party. For real. Jesus calls us to something a little bit different. To love. To wash the feet of people across the aisle. My wife, who's a political scientist, she does this thing called a political empathy lab where she takes students and professors all around the state of Pennsylvania, Pennsylvania's swing state, purple state, and they go county to county, every single county, and meet people across political difference. They don't try to change votes. They're just listening and humanizing people. She's better than me. But she's gone three times on this trip, and I've seen it change her, and she's seen it change people. Not change in votes but changing hate to a little bit more empathy and compassion. The way up is down. The one thing I loved about, among many things I loved about my Aunt Betty, was what she wrote about. When she became a children's book author, they told her to write kind of stories that everybody could relate to. Stories that would be for a popular audience. Instead, she chose to tell small stories about our family. She wrote about her grandparents, her parents, her nieces and nephews. I make a cameo in one of her books. This was awesome. She wrote stories about what it was simply like to be Black in America. She won book award after book award after book award. She was beautifully, defiantly, proudly Black, proudly woman, proudly simple. She came down and wrote stories about people at the margins. And not only did her career take off by her going down, she went up, but she brought a lot of us up with her, too. We need you right now, all of you, anyone who dares bear the name of Christian, to go on this very complicated journey downward because, if you do, I think you'll find Jesus down there. And I think you'll find the way back up for all of us. Amen. ## Full Sunday Service ## See also:- [ Sunday Service ](/blog-categories/sunday-service) - [ Sunday Service ](/archive/sunday-service) - [ Sermon ](/archive/sermons) Share on:- [ Facebook ](#) - [ Twitter ](#) - [ Linkedin ](#)