On the Plain Part 2: Enemies

Text:    Luke 6:27-38

The cluster of sayings about dealing with enemies probably goes back to the historical Jesus as a whole: “Love your enemies”; “When someone strikes you on the cheek, offer the other as well”; “When someone takes away your coat, don’t prevent that person from taking your shirt along with it.”  Luke ends the series there, and adds: “Give to everyone who begs from you.”  Luke then offers explanations that generally soften the original.  Luke’s Jesus expands on “love your enemies” with“do favors for those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for your abusers.”  The admonition to “turn the other cheek” is associated with “pray for your abusers.”  This is all good advice for getting along in your local community, and collaborating with the foreign army that has taken over the town square.

But Matthew’s Jesus tells his listeners, “Don’t react violently against the one who is evil; when someone slaps you on the right cheek, turn the other as well.  When someone wants to sue you for your shirt, let that person have your coat along with it.” Matthew’s version is vintage Jesus (Matthew 5:39-42a), beginning with the suggestion that violence be countered with non-violence.  One theory about the “right cheek/left cheek” dichotomy certainly would undermine the Roman occupiers.  A back-handed slap (which is the only way to hit the left side of someone’s face with the right, dominant, hand) was a demonstration of master-slave contempt.  To then offer the left cheek as well transformed the insult into an encounter between equals.  Jesus’s next suggestion would leave most folks falling out laughing – the age-old counter to oppression.  In a society where most people had only one or two garments, giving up both coat and shirt would leave you naked.  Finally, Matthew’s Jesus advises subversion.  Walk a second mile when conscripted by a Roman soldier and force your captor to break his own law.  The JS Scholars suggest that Luke left that part out because Luke was highly likely to have been attempting to make Christianity look safe and legal for Roman consumption.  It would be politically expedient not to be too critical of his Roman readers, as represented by his mysterious friend, Theophilius (the “god lover”).

Luke’s version removes the radicality that corrects the imbalance of power.  The commandment to love your enemies has been reduced to a suggestion.  Luke’s Jesus goes from turning the other cheek to “give to everyone who begs from you, and when someone takes your things, don’t ask for them back.”  The immediate objection among Luke’s readers would be, “but then I won’t have anything!”  In God’s realm of distributive justice-compassion, which the historical Jesus demonstrated, individual possessions are meaningless.  But outside the kingdom, in normal civilization, adjustments to God’s radical fairness must be made.  A fascinating quotation from the Didache of the 2nd Century, c.e., could have been written to the editor of any local newspaper just last week:  “Remember, if anyone accepts charity when in need, that person is blameless.  BUT if such a person is not in need, that person will have to answer for what and why he or she accepted it.  He or she will be imprisoned and put to the test for every deed performed, and will not get out until the last cent has been repaid. . . . Let your contributions sweat in the palms of your hands until you know to whom you are giving” (The Five Gospels, p. 295).

In that spirit, New York Times conservative pundit David Brooks wrote, “Haiti, like most of the world’s poorest nations, suffers from a complex web of progress-resistant cultural influences. There is the influence of the voodoo religion, which spreads the message that life is capricious and planning futile. There are high levels of social mistrust. Responsibility is often not internalized. Child-rearing practices often involve neglect in the early years and harsh retribution when kids hit 9 or 10.”  The historical, social, and political realities that Brooks ignores and misrepresents have been discussed elsewhere.  The point here is that Brooks not only blamed the victims, he trotted out the usual “cultural” argument, which barely passes the racism smell test.  That his article advocates some kind of “tough love” treatment for marginally viable nations like Haiti does not redeem Brooks from his own culturally based disdain for Haitians (and presumably anyone else) who does not live up to Western standards.  He seems to have forgotten Luke's version of the Golden Rule. “Treat people the way you want them to treat you,” Luke’s Jesus says, “If you love those who love you, what merit is there in that?  After all, even sinners love those who love them . . . Even sinners lend to sinners in order to get as much in return . . . do good and lend, expecting nothing in return . . . and you’ll be children of the Most High.  As you know, [God] is generous to the ungrateful and the wicked. . . . Be compassionate as your Father is compassionate. . . forgive and you’ll be forgiven . . . For the standard you apply will be the standard applied to you.”

Careful readers may be feeling a bit confused by this point.  Wait a minute!  Aren’t we mixing metaphors here?  We started with subverting an enemy, and now here we are talking about compassion toward the poor.  Indeed.  That is precisely what Luke apparently did with the tradition.  Luke was creating his gospel for non-Jewish “God-worshipers,” 30 years after the sacking of Jerusalem.  His readers were highly likely to have been part of the richer classes of villa owners, artisans (such as Lydia, whom we have met before and will meet again in Acts 16), merchants, and traders.  Most were citizens in good standing with the Roman empire.  Just as today, most Western citizens are in good standing with the global “Pax Americana.”

The tables have indeed turned, and the metaphor has become mixed.  Today, to speak about non-violence in the face of terrorism is close to treason.  Bringing it all back home, up close and personal, 21st Century Americans would rather continue water-boarding Khalil Sheik Mohammad than give him a fair trial by a New York jury.  Of course, the expectation that the jury will convict and impose the death penalty is hardly showing love to an enemy.

Jesus’s radical indifference to the consequences of literally giving away everything so that others can live is considered detrimental to the poor, who ought to be able to save themselves with a few micro-business opportunities and surplus food from NGO providers.  As if that weren’t enough to illustrate the breath-taking lack of compassion of U.S. heroism, medical evacuations from Haiti were stopped for two days, while the Governor of Florida argued with the feds and other states about who would pay.  Apparently no one in any of the layers of administrative leadership realizes that the failure to provide food, clothing, shelter, education, and medical care to those who cannot get it on their own leads directly to the kind of reactionary despair that feeds terrorism.

The metaphor is not mixed.  The poor and disenfranchised, the oppressed, the disrespected, are all enemies of unrestrained business-as-usual.  The twist to Jesus’s original prime directive has been lost in familiar glibness.   Love your enemies and you have no enemies. 

BLOG ARCHIVE

Sermon On the Plain Part 1: Blessed are the Telegenic??

Text:    Luke 6:17-26

For the past three years, these commentaries have followed the Revised Common Lectionary. This year, because the commentary will be concentrating specifically on the Gospel of Luke, in its entirety and without regard to the Christian Liturgical year, Luke’s version of Matthew’s Sermon on the Mount can be fully explored.  Both the Year of Matthew (Year A, 2008) and the current Year of Luke (Year C, 2010) shortened the season of Epiphany, thereby eliminating from the lectionary readings both Matthew’s and Luke’s liturgical setting for the heart of Jesus’s life and teaching.   (See No Time for Justice )
All that remains are a couple of carefully cherry-picked verses during Lent.  The reason for this is that back in the 7th Century, at the Council of Whitby, Roman Easter got tied to the Northern European Spring Equinox instead of the Jewish celebration of Passover (with which the Eastern rite coordinates its Orthodox Easter).

The Jesus Seminar’s Five Gospels discusses in depth the differences between Matthew’s and Luke’s versions of what is known as the Beatitudes (pp. 290-293).  Without quoting extensively from that essay, it is important to point out that the JS Scholars are of the opinion that Luke’s version is closer to the words of the historical Jesus than is Matthew’s version.  The reason is that Luke more closely follows what appears in the reconstituted Q gospel and the corroborating form in the sayings gospel of Thomas than Matthew does.  Matthew edited his version to reflect concerns of Matthew’s early Jewish-Christian community.

It is also important to realize that Jesus probably did not sit down on a mountaintop, or on “a level place” and deliver the sermon in any form in which it appears, whether in Q, Thomas, Matthew, or Luke.  The sayings were part of an oral tradition that circulated among the people who had known Jesus, and who may have been part of a “kingdom movement” that developed after Jesus’s death.  Matthew organized the sayings into his great Sermon on the Mount.  Luke reduced Matthew’s Sermon to a relatively brief discourse, delivered to his disciples after he had called them, and during a lull in teaching and healing.  Luke then scattered much of Matthew’s collection throughout the rest of his gospel.

The first three Beatitudes quoted by Luke are the sayings that most likely do go back to the historical Jesus.  They are:

        “Congratulations you poor!  God’s domain belongs to you.
        Congratulations, you hungry!  You will have a feast.
        Congratulations, you who weep now!  You will laugh.”

Luke follows these three with a fourth that says “Congratulations to you when people hate you . . . because of the son of Adam!  Rejoice on that day . . . Just remember, your compensation is great in heaven.  Recall that their ancestors treated the prophets the same way.”  The JS scholars are of the opinion that this one may go back to Jesus, but it more likely reflects the conditions of Luke’s community after persecution of the Christian movement had begun.

Finally, Luke includes a series of condemnations: “Damn you rich!  You already have your consolation.  Damn you who are well-fed now! You will know hunger.  Damn you who laugh now!  You will learn to weep and grieve.  Damn you when everybody speaks well of you!  Recall that their ancestors treated the phony prophets the same way.”  Luke may have found these in the Q source, but it is just as likely he made them up as a literary counter to the blessings listed in the beginning.  The JS Scholars are convinced that Jesus’s life and words were non-violent, non-apocalyptic, and non-judgmental.  Therefore, these sayings from 6:24-26 were probably not Jesus’s words.

Matthew’s softened version is the most familiar.  Matthew waffles the blessings to the poor “in spirit,” and to those “who hunger and thirst for justice.”  He effectively dodges the injustice bullet by adding a few extra blessings to the exclusive list from Q, perhaps on behalf of the members of his community who were gentle (meek); merciful, with “undefiled hearts,” and “who work for peace.”  But Luke meets distributive injustice head on.  Careful readers will remember that Luke’s Jesus announced in his home synagogue on the Sabbath day that the scripture he read had been fulfilled (4:14-19): “[God] has anointed me to bring good news to the poor . . . announce pardon for prisoners, recovery of sight to the blind, to set free the oppressed, and to proclaim the year of the Lord’s amnesty.”  Luke’s sermon on the plain confirms all of it.

Luke’s Jesus congratulates the poor and says that God’s domain (realm, kingdom) belongs to them.  Then he condemns the rich in no uncertain terms.  This portion of his “sermon on the plain” reflects Mary’s song – which of course Luke created (1:46-55):  “[God] has pulled down the mighty from their thrones and exalted the lowly; he has filled the hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty.”  Mary’s song in turn echos the song of Hannah (1 Samuel 2:1-10), celebrating the dedication of her son Samuel to serve the Lord as a prophet: “Those who were full have hired themselves out for bread, but those who were hungry are fat with spoil. . . . [God] raises up the poor from the dust; he lifts the needy from the ash heap . . . .”

Thousands of sermons have been delivered over the past two millennia on these passages.  The fourth principle of Catholic social teaching on the obligations of Christians in today’s society is, “We are called to emulate God by showing a special preference for those who are poor and weak.” But Jesus was not calling for a “special preference.”  In God’s realm of distributive justice-compassion, the rain falls on the just and the unjust.  In his letter to the Romans (2:6-11), Paul talks about the judgment of God that shows no distinction among people regarding the consequences of justice or injustice.  “There will be anguish and distress for everyone who does evil . . . glory and honor and peace for everyone who does good.  For God shows no partiality.”  Interpreting this phrase in the light of what scholarship suggests, if we are to participate with the risen Christ in the establishment of God’s realm of distributive justice-compassion, then what is required is not “partiality,” but radical inclusiveness.

The outpouring of assistance to the desperately poor citizens of Haiti after the worst earthquake in memory has been criticized on a number of appalling points.  One that is popular and self-serving is to ask why are U.S. citizens still displaced from the ravages of Hurricane Katrina?  Shouldn’t we help them first?  A public forum published daily in the Martinsburg Journal included  these two comments: “. . . We’ll give and take from foreign countries and we don’t even take care of our own people”; and “I don’t recall if the Haitian people helped the United States when we had September 11.  I think this charity thing is getting way out of hand . . .”

But the most unsettling argument is the one discussed on National Public Radio on January 20.  “Reporters who are MDs find the Lines Blurred in Haiti.”  Journalists are not supposed to become personally involved in the stories they cover.  Journalists who also happen to be trained medical professionals who have gone to Haiti to cover the story have been caught actually helping people instead of just taking pictures and writing words – as though the reporter was supposed to allow the person s/he was interviewing to bleed to death, cameras rolling.  Instead, several individual Haitians have been helped, if not saved, by the intervention of medical personnel who were supposed to be reporting the story, not creating it.  Perhaps they should have turned off the cameras.  But the criticism is much more serious.

        “What disturbs me about the media doctors is that they are basically pulling telegenic people out of the queue and giving them exceptional resources,” says Dr. Steven Miles, a medical professor and bioethicist at the University of Minnesota.

If that is the case, it is not only merely “disturbing.”  It is exploitation at its most cynical – aiding victims in order to win the ratings game.  Surely American journalism has not devolved to that level?

The NPR report continues:

        Miles says viewers are unaware of the distortions caused by the intervention of the doctor-reporters. “We don’t see the impact of that in terms of soaking up staff time, in terms of the people who are working on the ground, and also the diversion of resources to these patients who are selected for television portrayal,” Miles says.

“Soaking up staff time” along with the blood is somehow unethical for Dr. Miles. 

But beyond that, Miles says the stories that focus so much on heroic Americans undermines the support of the U.S. viewing public for helping Haitians help themselves build a functioning civil society and public health system. He says by far the greatest number of people aiding Haitians are their fellow citizens.

This is cynicism at its worst.  Unfortunately, this is not the first time that victims have been expected to get themselves out of their own predicament.  In a blog post from February 13, 2004, Daniel Pipes reported:

        Gen. John Abizaid, the head of Central Command and the man running the U.S. effort in Iraq, . . . declar[ed] that "We have to take risk to a certain extent, by taking our hands off the controls…. It’s their country, it’s their future. Our job is to help them help themselves." In a direct application of this approach, an Associated Press report explains, "Abizaid responded sharply when a battalion commander of the 505th Parachute Infantry Regiment described his frustration at getting the Iraqis to adopt a way to dispose of trash. ‘It's their problem, not your problem, Abizaid told the officer.’”

Of course, the Iraqis would not have had these problems if the U.S. had not overthrown their government, thereby destroying the economy, and eliminating infrastructure and public services.  As for present-day Haiti, how can a people even begin to think about building a functioning society when their arms and/or legs are missing, and they haven’t eaten for 10 days?

        If reporters who are also physicians want so badly to step out of their journalistic role to help, [Dr. Miles] argues, they should volunteer instead with relief agencies in Haiti — and set aside an hour a day to grant interviews to their network employer.

A scene from the master of social commentary, Charles Dickens, illustrates the problem with Dr. Miles’ attitude:

        “At this festive season of the year, Mr Scrooge,” said the gentleman, taking up a pen, “it is more than usually desirable that we should make some slight provision for the Poor and destitute, who suffer greatly at the present time. Many thousands are in want of common necessaries; hundreds of thousands are in want of common comforts, sir.”
        “Are there no prisons?” asked Scrooge. . . . “And the Union workhouses? . . . Are they still in operation? . . .The Treadmill and the Poor Law are in full vigour, then?”
        “Both very busy, sir.”
        “Oh! I was afraid, from what you said at first, that something had occurred to stop them in their useful course,” said Scrooge. “I’m very glad to hear it.”
        “Under the impression that they scarcely furnish Christian cheer of mind or body to the multitude,” returned the gentleman, “a few of us are endeavouring to raise a fund to buy the Poor some meat and drink, and means of warmth. We choose this time, because it is a time, of all others, when Want is keenly felt, and Abundance rejoices. What shall I put you down for?”
        “Nothing!” Scrooge replied.
        “You wish to be anonymous?”
        “I wish to be left alone,” said Scrooge. “Since you ask me what I wish, gentlemen, that is my answer. . . . I can’t afford to make idle people merry. I help to support the establishments I have mentioned: they cost enough: and those who are badly off must go there."
        “Many can’t go there; and many would rather die.”
        “If they would rather die,” said Scrooge, “they had better do it, and decrease the surplus population . . .”

God forbid we should “bring good news to the poor, announce pardon for prisoners, recovery of sight to the blind, set free the oppressed, and proclaim the year of the Lord’s amnesty.”  Luke’s Jesus is well justified to throw up his hands in frustration. “Damn you rich!  You already have your consolation” along with all the other false prophets who assume that salvation depends on who is telegenic.

BLOG ARCHIVE

Sermon On the Plain Part 1: Blessed are the Telegenic??

Text:    Luke 6:17-26

For the past three years, these commentaries have followed the Revised Common Lectionary. This year, because the commentary will be concentrating specifically on the Gospel of Luke, in its entirety and without regard to the Christian Liturgical year, Luke’s version of Matthew’s Sermon on the Mount can be fully explored.  Both the Year of Matthew (Year A, 2008) and the current Year of Luke (Year C, 2010) shortened the season of Epiphany, thereby eliminating from the lectionary readings both Matthew’s and Luke’s liturgical setting for the heart of Jesus’s life and teaching.   (See No Time for Justice )
All that remains are a couple of carefully cherry-picked verses during Lent.  The reason for this is that back in the 7th Century, at the Council of Whitby, Roman Easter got tied to the Northern European Spring Equinox instead of the Jewish celebration of Passover (with which the Eastern rite coordinates its Orthodox Easter).

The Jesus Seminar’s Five Gospels discusses in depth the differences between Matthew’s and Luke’s versions of what is known as the Beatitudes (pp. 290-293).  Without quoting extensively from that essay, it is important to point out that the JS Scholars are of the opinion that Luke’s version is closer to the words of the historical Jesus than is Matthew’s version.  The reason is that Luke more closely follows what appears in the reconstituted Q gospel and the corroborating form in the sayings gospel of Thomas than Matthew does.  Matthew edited his version to reflect concerns of Matthew’s early Jewish-Christian community.

It is also important to realize that Jesus probably did not sit down on a mountaintop, or on “a level place” and deliver the sermon in any form in which it appears, whether in Q, Thomas, Matthew, or Luke.  The sayings were part of an oral tradition that circulated among the people who had known Jesus, and who may have been part of a “kingdom movement” that developed after Jesus’s death.  Matthew organized the sayings into his great Sermon on the Mount.  Luke reduced Matthew’s Sermon to a relatively brief discourse, delivered to his disciples after he had called them, and during a lull in teaching and healing.  Luke then scattered much of Matthew’s collection throughout the rest of his gospel.

The first three Beatitudes quoted by Luke are the sayings that most likely do go back to the historical Jesus.  They are:

        “Congratulations you poor!  God’s domain belongs to you.
        Congratulations, you hungry!  You will have a feast.
        Congratulations, you who weep now!  You will laugh.”

Luke follows these three with a fourth that says “Congratulations to you when people hate you . . . because of the son of Adam!  Rejoice on that day . . . Just remember, your compensation is great in heaven.  Recall that their ancestors treated the prophets the same way.”  The JS scholars are of the opinion that this one may go back to Jesus, but it more likely reflects the conditions of Luke’s community after persecution of the Christian movement had begun.

Finally, Luke includes a series of condemnations: “Damn you rich!  You already have your consolation.  Damn you who are well-fed now! You will know hunger.  Damn you who laugh now!  You will learn to weep and grieve.  Damn you when everybody speaks well of you!  Recall that their ancestors treated the phony prophets the same way.”  Luke may have found these in the Q source, but it is just as likely he made them up as a literary counter to the blessings listed in the beginning.  The JS Scholars are convinced that Jesus’s life and words were non-violent, non-apocalyptic, and non-judgmental.  Therefore, these sayings from 6:24-26 were probably not Jesus’s words.

Matthew’s softened version is the most familiar.  Matthew waffles the blessings to the poor “in spirit,” and to those “who hunger and thirst for justice.”  He effectively dodges the injustice bullet by adding a few extra blessings to the exclusive list from Q, perhaps on behalf of the members of his community who were gentle (meek); merciful, with “undefiled hearts,” and “who work for peace.”  But Luke meets distributive injustice head on.  Careful readers will remember that Luke’s Jesus announced in his home synagogue on the Sabbath day that the scripture he read had been fulfilled (4:14-19): “[God] has anointed me to bring good news to the poor . . . announce pardon for prisoners, recovery of sight to the blind, to set free the oppressed, and to proclaim the year of the Lord’s amnesty.”  Luke’s sermon on the plain confirms all of it.

Luke’s Jesus congratulates the poor and says that God’s domain (realm, kingdom) belongs to them.  Then he condemns the rich in no uncertain terms.  This portion of his “sermon on the plain” reflects Mary’s song – which of course Luke created (1:46-55):  “[God] has pulled down the mighty from their thrones and exalted the lowly; he has filled the hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty.”  Mary’s song in turn echos the song of Hannah (1 Samuel 2:1-10), celebrating the dedication of her son Samuel to serve the Lord as a prophet: “Those who were full have hired themselves out for bread, but those who were hungry are fat with spoil. . . . [God] raises up the poor from the dust; he lifts the needy from the ash heap . . . .”

Thousands of sermons have been delivered over the past two millennia on these passages.  The fourth principle of Catholic social teaching on the obligations of Christians in today’s society is, “We are called to emulate God by showing a special preference for those who are poor and weak.” But Jesus was not calling for a “special preference.”  In God’s realm of distributive justice-compassion, the rain falls on the just and the unjust.  In his letter to the Romans (2:6-11), Paul talks about the judgment of God that shows no distinction among people regarding the consequences of justice or injustice.  “There will be anguish and distress for everyone who does evil . . . glory and honor and peace for everyone who does good.  For God shows no partiality.”  Interpreting this phrase in the light of what scholarship suggests, if we are to participate with the risen Christ in the establishment of God’s realm of distributive justice-compassion, then what is required is not “partiality,” but radical inclusiveness.

The outpouring of assistance to the desperately poor citizens of Haiti after the worst earthquake in memory has been criticized on a number of appalling points.  One that is popular and self-serving is to ask why are U.S. citizens still displaced from the ravages of Hurricane Katrina?  Shouldn’t we help them first?  A public forum published daily in the Martinsburg Journal included  these two comments: “. . . We’ll give and take from foreign countries and we don’t even take care of our own people”; and “I don’t recall if the Haitian people helped the United States when we had September 11.  I think this charity thing is getting way out of hand . . .”

But the most unsettling argument is the one discussed on National Public Radio on January 20.  “Reporters who are MDs find the Lines Blurred in Haiti.”  Journalists are not supposed to become personally involved in the stories they cover.  Journalists who also happen to be trained medical professionals who have gone to Haiti to cover the story have been caught actually helping people instead of just taking pictures and writing words – as though the reporter was supposed to allow the person s/he was interviewing to bleed to death, cameras rolling.  Instead, several individual Haitians have been helped, if not saved, by the intervention of medical personnel who were supposed to be reporting the story, not creating it.  Perhaps they should have turned off the cameras.  But the criticism is much more serious.

        “What disturbs me about the media doctors is that they are basically pulling telegenic people out of the queue and giving them exceptional resources,” says Dr. Steven Miles, a medical professor and bioethicist at the University of Minnesota.

If that is the case, it is not only merely “disturbing.”  It is exploitation at its most cynical – aiding victims in order to win the ratings game.  Surely American journalism has not devolved to that level?

The NPR report continues:

        Miles says viewers are unaware of the distortions caused by the intervention of the doctor-reporters. “We don’t see the impact of that in terms of soaking up staff time, in terms of the people who are working on the ground, and also the diversion of resources to these patients who are selected for television portrayal,” Miles says.

“Soaking up staff time” along with the blood is somehow unethical for Dr. Miles. 

But beyond that, Miles says the stories that focus so much on heroic Americans undermines the support of the U.S. viewing public for helping Haitians help themselves build a functioning civil society and public health system. He says by far the greatest number of people aiding Haitians are their fellow citizens.

This is cynicism at its worst.  Unfortunately, this is not the first time that victims have been expected to get themselves out of their own predicament.  In a blog post from February 13, 2004, Daniel Pipes reported:

        Gen. John Abizaid, the head of Central Command and the man running the U.S. effort in Iraq, . . . declar[ed] that "We have to take risk to a certain extent, by taking our hands off the controls…. It’s their country, it’s their future. Our job is to help them help themselves." In a direct application of this approach, an Associated Press report explains, "Abizaid responded sharply when a battalion commander of the 505th Parachute Infantry Regiment described his frustration at getting the Iraqis to adopt a way to dispose of trash. ‘It's their problem, not your problem, Abizaid told the officer.’”

Of course, the Iraqis would not have had these problems if the U.S. had not overthrown their government, thereby destroying the economy, and eliminating infrastructure and public services.  As for present-day Haiti, how can a people even begin to think about building a functioning society when their arms and/or legs are missing, and they haven’t eaten for 10 days?

        If reporters who are also physicians want so badly to step out of their journalistic role to help, [Dr. Miles] argues, they should volunteer instead with relief agencies in Haiti — and set aside an hour a day to grant interviews to their network employer.

A scene from the master of social commentary, Charles Dickens, illustrates the problem with Dr. Miles’ attitude:

        “At this festive season of the year, Mr Scrooge,” said the gentleman, taking up a pen, “it is more than usually desirable that we should make some slight provision for the Poor and destitute, who suffer greatly at the present time. Many thousands are in want of common necessaries; hundreds of thousands are in want of common comforts, sir.”
        “Are there no prisons?” asked Scrooge. . . . “And the Union workhouses? . . . Are they still in operation? . . .The Treadmill and the Poor Law are in full vigour, then?”
        “Both very busy, sir.”
        “Oh! I was afraid, from what you said at first, that something had occurred to stop them in their useful course,” said Scrooge. “I’m very glad to hear it.”
        “Under the impression that they scarcely furnish Christian cheer of mind or body to the multitude,” returned the gentleman, “a few of us are endeavouring to raise a fund to buy the Poor some meat and drink, and means of warmth. We choose this time, because it is a time, of all others, when Want is keenly felt, and Abundance rejoices. What shall I put you down for?”
        “Nothing!” Scrooge replied.
        “You wish to be anonymous?”
        “I wish to be left alone,” said Scrooge. “Since you ask me what I wish, gentlemen, that is my answer. . . . I can’t afford to make idle people merry. I help to support the establishments I have mentioned: they cost enough: and those who are badly off must go there."
        “Many can’t go there; and many would rather die.”
        “If they would rather die,” said Scrooge, “they had better do it, and decrease the surplus population . . .”

God forbid we should “bring good news to the poor, announce pardon for prisoners, recovery of sight to the blind, set free the oppressed, and proclaim the year of the Lord’s amnesty.”  Luke’s Jesus is well justified to throw up his hands in frustration. “Damn you rich!  You already have your consolation” along with all the other false prophets who assume that salvation depends on who is telegenic.

BLOG ARCHIVE

Gone Fishin’

Text:    Luke 4:31-6:17

If John Dominic Crossan and Marcus J. Borg are correct in their thesis that Luke’s birth story was written as a direct counter to the claims to divinity of the Cesars of Rome, it might also follow that the entire gospel supports that claim as well.  But what does all this matter in the 21st Century in a time when divinity has little meaning, and myth misleads the gullible?  What does it mean to be a follower (not a worshiper) of Jesus in the 21st Century?

Western democracies have more or less given up on colonialist empires.  Imperial governments now are mostly confined to third- and fourth-world dictator-induced disasters such as Korea, Zimbabwe, and – most recently in the news – Haiti.  Food, clothing, shelter (i.e., basic social services), medical care, and education are the basic needs required for sustainable human life in the 3rd Millennium, c.e.  On December 10, 1948, the General Assembly of the United Nations adopted and proclaimed the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Following are excerpts.

        Article 25.   (1) Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services, and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood in circumstances beyond his control..
      
        (2) Motherhood and childhood are entitled to special care and assistance. All children, whether born in or out of wedlock, shall enjoy the same social protection.
      
        Article 26.  (1) Everyone has the right to education. Education shall be free, at least in the elementary and fundamental stages. Elementary education shall be compulsory. Technical and professional education shall be made generally available and higher education shall be equally accessible to all on the basis of merit.
      
        (2) Education shall be directed to the full development of the human personality and to the strengthening of respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms. It shall promote understanding, tolerance and friendship among all nations, racial or religious groups, and shall further the activities of the United Nations for the maintenance of peace.  

        (3) Parents have a prior right to choose the kind of education that shall be given to their children.

The kind of repressive imperialism that Jesus et al were looking to God to save the world from now resides in multi-national corporations, not governments – which likely explains why the United States government (among others) has not signed onto the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and why non-governmental organizations (NGOs) have.  The irony is that while multi-national corporations carry tremendous political weight with governments, NGOs – which are largely non-profit, humanitarian organizations – have little influence with the multi-nationals, and much less with governments, when compared to the corporations.

Luke reorganized Mark’s story, and added a level of hierarchical authority to Jesus’s loose organization of followers.  In 6:12-16, after spending a night in prayer on “the mountain,” Jesus selects 12 to be elevated to the position of Apostles:  Simon (Peter – aka “Rocky”), Andrew, James and John, Philip, Bartholomew, Matthew, Thomas, James the son of Alphaeus, Simon (the Zealot), Judas the son of James, and “Judas Iscariot, who turned traitor.”  Mark says that these 12 formed a group of companions to be sent out to speak, and to have authority to drive out demons.  Luke’s Jesus does not confer that authority until much later in Luke’s narrative.

Following Jesus is a fundamental metaphor for discipleship in Luke.  But apostleship comes only by appointment from Jesus.  And here lies one of the initial conflicts over leadership in the early Christian movement that still haunts Christianity today.  For the writer of Mark’s gospel, the realm of God arrived with Jesus, and everyone who follows Jesus’s way has the power Jesus had.  But Luke makes a clear distinction between leaders and followers.  This formula may have gotten him into trouble when he wrote Volume 2 (see Acts 9:1-9; Acts 13:9).  The Apostle Paul – clearly the most influential of the earliest interpreters of Jesus’s life and teachings – claimed to have seen Jesus just as authentically as the others who actually belonged to Jesus’s entourage.  In fact, Paul claims that after Jesus’s resurrection as many as “500 brothers and sisters at one time” saw him.  With exquisite one-upmanship, he goes on to say that after the 500, “he appeared to James [the brother of Jesus!], then to all the apostles.  Last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared also to me” (1 Corinthians 15:6-8).

Why are we still fighting over who gets to wear the stole, carry the staff, light the candles, lead the rituals?

Jesus is the divine actor in Luke’s story.  His divinity is recognized by the demonic world, but also recognized by the human world (Peter and the first disciples).  His power and authority are demonstrated, but not on Satan’s terms (see 4:1-13).  In a clear demonstration of the need for Biblical literacy among contemporary Christian leadership, Pat Robertson, of the 700 Club, recently opined that the earthquake in Haiti was the result of a “pact to the devil” in exchange for independence from France in 1804. “You know, the Haitians revolted and got themselves free. But ever since, they have been cursed by one thing after the other,” Robertson said.  Perhaps Robertson thinks that Voudoun and Santeria, which are religions indigenous to Haiti, are Satanic.  Actually, both are African transplants, rooted in Catholicism.

Lily Coyle, who wrote a response to the editor of the Minneapolis Star Tribune on behalf of the much-maligned ruler of Hell, is much more familiar with either the Biblical or cultural understandings of the Devil than Robertson.  I especially like her reference to “a golden fiddle”:

        Dear Pat Robertson, I know that you know that all press is good press, so I appreciate the shout-out. And you make God look like a big mean bully who kicks people when they are down, so I’m all over that action. But when you say that Haiti has made a pact with me, it is totally humiliating. I may be evil incarnate, but I’m no welcher. The way you put it, making a deal with me leaves folks desperate and impoverished. Sure, in the afterlife, but when I strike bargains with people, they first get something here on earth –  glamour, beauty, talent, wealth, fame, glory, a golden fiddle. Those Haitians have nothing, and I mean nothing. And that was before the earthquake. Haven't you seen “Crossroads”? Or “Damn Yankees”? If I had a thing going with Haiti, there’d be lots of banks, skyscrapers, SUVs, exclusive night clubs, Botox – that kind of thing. An 80 percent poverty rate is so not my style. Nothing against it – I'm just saying: Not how I roll. You’re doing great work, Pat, and I don’t want to clip your wings – just, come on, you’re making me look bad. And not the good kind of bad. Keep blaming God. That’s working. But leave me out of it, please. Or we may need to renegotiate your own contract. Best, Satan

Unlike Robertson’s claim regarding the hapless Haitians’ interaction with demonic realms, evidence in Luke’s gospel of the interruption of normal activity by divine agency is seen in Jesus’s exorcism of the man with the unclean spirit, in the healing of Simon’s mother, and in the exorcisms of other demons and the healing of other illnesses, including the paralytic who was let down through the roof to reach Jesus.  The Jesus Seminar scholars suggest that verse 24, which Luke lifted without change from Mark, may suggest that all humans have the power to forgive sins.  The narrator says, “But so that you may realize that on earth the son of Adam has authority to forgive sins, he said to the paralyzed man, ‘You there, get up, pick up our pallet and go home!’”  The fact that the story follows the call to Simon, James, and John to leave their normal activity (fishing) and follow Jesus might support that idea.  (Matthew disagreed.)

Exorcisms and faith healings are the province of charlatans, fakes, and scam artists in the 3rd Millennium of the common era.  Even the more reasonable aspects of emerging or evolving human consciousness and the power of intentionality get sidelined to day-time talk shows and public television fundraisers.  Suze will tell you how to get rich; Dr. Phil will tell you how to save your marriage; Oprah will tell you how to lose weight, and they all are happy to take your money in exchange for their version of the “gospel.”

For Luke, Jesus is divine, and his story shows that divinity.  It is not a gradual revelation as it is in Mark’s gospel.  It is no accident that Simon is suddenly called Peter by the narrator as soon as he saw the miracle of the catch of fish.  It is a foreshadowing of what Luke’s audience already knew – that Peter was a sinful man, who denied Jesus in the end.  The call to join prophetic action and leave normal life behind is a Biblical motif that runs from shepherds to the “dresser of sycamore trees” and beyond.

Pat Robertson could have suggested that Haiti’s rulers from the 19th Century slave revolt through the 2004 coup that overthrew Jean Bertrand Aristide had betrayed their people for their own self-interest.  That would lend itself more accurately to the Devil’s usual deals, as admitted in the letter quoted above.  Former President Bill Clinton’s attempt to foster investment in Haiti – which may have eventually succeeded in eliminating Haitian government red tape and at least had the potential for economic justice for the people – has now suffered a set-back of Biblical proportions.  But the Devil had less to do with the earthquake than the conditions that set up the people for the disaster they now are suffering.

Jesus’s remark (Luke 5:10) that “from now on you will be fishing for people” reflects Jeremiah’s warning that God is sending for many fishermen and hunters who will find the people who have been scattered and bring them back to God’s ways (Jeremiah 16:14-16).  The outpouring of humanitarian assistance to Haiti is a start.  But how long can the United States and international financial institutions pour money and resources into the country before “fiscal responsibility” demands either a halt or a payback?  The ratification of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights would be another step in the right direction.  But of course, signing onto the Declaration would mandate access to food stamps, affordable public housing, funding social services and regulating financial and environmental entities, establishing universal health care, and federal guidelines for educational goals.

What political party is going to have that as its platform in 2010?

BLOG ARCHIVE

The Voice in the Wilderness

Text: Luke 3-4:30; 1 Kings 17:1-6; 2 Kings 5:1-14; Isaiah 40:3-5; Isaiah 58:6; Isaiah 61:1-2

The underlying assumption in this study of Luke (and eventually Acts and the authentic letters of Paul) is that Luke wrote his gospel and his account of the Acts of the Apostles as a subversive counter to Roman oppression, and the Roman imperial theology that proclaimed Cesar (whether Augustus or Tiberias) as the son of God.  The voice of John the Baptist screamed from the edges of civilization about “repentance” until Herod Antipas had had enough.  Perhaps if John had not gotten personal with his criticism of Herod, he might have survived.  So, too, if Jesus and his followers had not presented a threat to the authority of Rome.  While no one knows the circumstances of Paul’s death – whether by disease in a Roman prison or execution by Roman authority – we can be sure that he too paid for his conviction with his life.

Luke sets up Jesus’s cousin John the Baptist as the one charged with the task of getting the people ready for Jesus’s message.  In his home synagogue, Luke’s Jesus miraculously opens the scroll and claims portions of Isaiah 58 and 61 for himself: “I have come to proclaim release to the captives, recovery of sight to the blind, and to let the oppressed go free.”  Mark’s Jesus declares that “the kingdom of God has come,” while Matthew describes Jesus as the fulfillment of the declaration from Isaiah 9:1-2 that “the people who sat in darkness have seen a great light . . .” Despite the difference in purpose, in all three gospels, in order to hear Jesus’s message, John the Baptist preached that the people must turn back (repent), and return to God’s Covenant of distributive justice-compassion.

Notice that Luke does not have John attack the Pharisees – as Matthew does.  Luke’s John preaches to the “crowds that came out to be baptized by him.”  It is the people – not their leaders – who are the “brood of vipers.”  The “wrath of God” is usually understood to mean punishment for sin, which descends upon the wrongdoer like a thunderbolt from heaven.  But “wrath” really means “consequences,” or actions taken that are justified, given the circumstances.  Under the circumstances of Empire, the people are the ones who are likely to lose their inheritance as children of God if they do not turn back from the sin of collaboration with Empire, and “bear good fruit.”  The solution is radical fairness.  “Whoever has two coats, must share with anyone who has none; and whoever has food must do likewise.”  Tax collectors must collect no more than was required, and soldiers were to refrain from extorting money with threats and false accusations.  “No more shakedowns!  No more frame-ups either!” says the Scholar’s translation, and “be satisfied with your pay!”

Already, Luke’s bias is clear.  In 21st Century terms, John the Baptist is talking to the middle and upper classes.  In 21st Century language, Luke urges a “preferential option for the poor,” the strata of 1st Century society with no clothing, no food, who were required to pay taxes or lose their homes, and who were the victims of those soldiers who would extort even more money than their wages already paid them.

Then Luke sends John off stage, as though the stage manager had snatched him into the drapery with a long hook.  “Herod the tetrarch, who had been denounced by John over the matter of Herodias, his brother’s wife (see Mark 6:12-29), topped off all his other crimes by shutting John up in prison.”  He leaves the circumstances of Jesus’s baptism in murky waters.  After John is out of the picture, “as [Jesus]  was praying, the sky opened up and the holy spirit came down . . . and a voice from the sky [proclaimed] “You are my son; today I have become your father.”  Then Luke goes on to list Jesus’s ancestral heritage as proof positive that Jesus – not Cesar – is indeed “the son of God.”

Jesus’s temptation in the desert has been analyzed ad nauseum over the years.  What is worth lifting up is that Jesus definitely turned his back on whatever rewards might be offered by the normal rules governing civilization.  Perhaps his friends and family in Nazareth were unable or unwilling to do the same.  When he claims Isaiah’s words as applying to himself, they all congratulate him on his wonderful sermon, and smile and say (with some degree of smugness, perhaps?), “Isn’t this Joseph’s son?”  What young minister has not had to deal with similar reactions the first time she preaches in her home church?  Who wants to be reminded that Elijah was sent to save a widow and her son in Zarephath, not to the Israelite King Ahab, who married the pagan Queen Jezebel, worshiper of Baal, and brought famine on the land?  Or who wants to be reminded that Naaman the Syrian – the commander of the enemy army – had more trust in the healing justice of God than the Israelites did?  What reaction would the newly-ordained minister of the gospel get if he implied that the bank president who approved the loan that allowed him to attend seminary was responsible for the foreclosures that are now putting his friends and family on the street?  “Biting the hand that feeds him” comes to mind.

Jesus may well have said at some point that “The truth is, no prophet is welcome on his home turf.”  Indeed, prophets are seldom welcome anywhere, as John the Baptist learned.  In the 21st Century, Barack Obama was forced to disassociate himself from Jeremiah Wright’s all-to-accurate reading of systemic American social injustice.  Otherwise, Obama would likely not have been elected President.  In 21st Century cynical politics, the end justifies the means, or it does not.  We can only speculate how that conundrum was ultimately resolved in Obama’s mind.  Many who count themselves among the liberal base of the Democratic Party today are beginning to imagine that in Obama’s case, the end indeed does not justify the means.  The “public option” for providing affordable health care to all Americans is reportedly dead, and Obama himself put the stake through its heart.

Compromising principle ultimately compromises justice.  But – those 1st Century folks asked –  what are the people to do?  Arianna Huffington proposes that homeowners who are “under water” with their loan-to-value ratios simply walk away from their obligations.  She says that will force banks to revalue those home loans, and begin to return the housing market to some semblance of equitable order.  Perhaps.  But who wants to risk homelessness in the face of the first real winter since before Al Gore took on Global Warming?

For every suggestion of how to return to a Covenant-based relationship with the Cosmos, there is a “yes but.”  Cap and trade coal production?  Yes but the miners will be out of work – not to mention the coal companies will lose profits.  Tax so-called “cadillac” health plans to partially pay for health insurance reform?  Yes but the unions already gave up wage increases in order to get high quality coverage.  You don’t want them voting Republican do you?

What about issues closer to home?  Hire more police, fire, emergency teams?  Yes but the state/county has no money in the budget.  Use stimulus funds for that?  Yes but what happens when it is gone?  Raise Taxes?  So the Democrats can tell us what to do with our lives, our fortunes and our sacred honor?!

As John the Baptist discovered, humans are fond of apocalypticism.  The current apocalypse is now expected to happen in 2012, which is as far as the Mayans were able (or thought it worthwhile) to project their calendar.  What has not occurred to most of us since the 1st Century is that the apocalypse is not about sinners who refuse to believe in some interventionist god who will save us.  John the Baptist was very clear about that: “Don’t even start with ‘We are the chosen of Abraham.’  I’m telling you, God can raise up children for Abraham right out of the rocks.”  Indeed, as Jesus reminded his hometown friends, the legendary history of the Jewish people tells us both Elijah and Elisha were instruments of liberation for the enemies of Israel.

Nor is the apocalypse – judgment day – about petty sin, as we might define petty sin in the 21st Century.  It’s not about politicians claiming to hike the Appalachian Trail while snogging their lovers in Buenos Aires.  It’s not even about making sweet-heart deals for free medicaid in exchange for a vote for health insurance “reform.”  It’s not about arranging an abortion for your 15-year-old daughter who decided you were wrong about birth control.  It’s not about calling in sick and going to the movies.

It’s about living in Non-violent Covenant, distributive justice-compassion, and peace.  In other words, it’s about repenting from violent consumption and embracing sustainable life.  Lester Brown has been an unwelcome prophet for non-violent Covenant since 1974.  But who has been listening?   One might object that economic issues like consumption and sustainability are different from social justice issues like poverty and access to political power.  But economics – the management of the home in the original Greek meaning – is the heart of the matter.  Without food, clothing, shelter, education, and health care, human life is unsustainable.  When humans live from a sense of entitlement and consumption, the balance of the entire planetary support system shifts.

John the Baptist did his best, but he was only one man.  He may have convinced a few folks to throw money at the social problems they found at the edges of town.  But ultimately, when John lost his head, so did his movement.  As John Dominic Crossan puts it, John the Baptist was a sole proprietor, but Jesus started a franchise.  The question for today is, what kind of franchise, and is it still worth signing up for, given the work and the end result?

BLOG ARCHIVE

Epiphany: January 6, 2010

Text: Luke 1-2; Exodus 13:2; Leviticus 12:6-8; Malachi 3:1-3, 4:5-6; 1 Samuel 2:1, 2:26; Psalm 103:17;
Marcus A. Borg and John Dominic Crossan, The First Christmas Harper One, 2007)

Epiphany traditionally is the day when the Three Kings arrived at “the house” where Jesus was living.  Because Matthew’s narrative is conflated with Luke’s grand pageant, most Christians fail to realize that the “Kings” (if “kings” they were) arrived at least two years after Jesus’s birth, so they never mixed it up with the angels and the shepherds at the Caravanserai outside Jerusalem.

A careful reading of Luke’s first two chapters reveals that Luke’s purpose was actually to create a birth story for Jesus that would counter the birth story for the Roman Emperor, Augustus.  Augustus was hailed as king of kings, lord of lords, god of gods, begotten not made, born of an earthly woman (Atia), fathered by a heavenly ruler (Apollo).  Luke countered the birth of Empire with the new birth of Covenant.  Worse (from the point of view of imperial public relations departments), Luke declared that the crazed prophet known as “the Baptist” was the one who prepared the way for the one who was soon to be born, “King of the Jews.”

If the imperial appointee Herod Antipas, declared “King of the Jews” by Augustus, had gotten wind of such a parody, Luke’s life would have been in deep jeopardy.  But because Luke wrote his story 80 to 100 years later (and likely not in Jerusalem), the irony was largely missed by everyone but the folks on the inside track.  As scholars and others now realize, even the folks on Luke’s inside track didn’t really get the joke.  By the time the early Christian church had organized itself, the story had taken on a literally interpreted life of its own.

This story may begin to take on real meaning for 21st Century post-Christians by considering the following five motifs.

The Birth of John the Baptist (Luke 1:57-80)

Zachariah’s prophesy invokes Malachi 3:1: “See, I am sending my messenger to prepare the way before me, and the Lord whom you seek will suddenly come to his temple.  The messenger of the covenant in whom you delight – indeed, he is coming, says the Lord of Hosts.”  The messenger is not the harbinger of imperial peace through war and the power of imperial rule. The messenger – in language developed in these commentaries over the past three years – will give his people knowledge of non-violent liberation from injustice through the free gift of Covenant, “to shine on those sitting in darkness, in the shadow of death, to guide our feet to the way of peace.”

What the Angels Really Sang (Luke 2:14)  

“Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to people whom he has favored!”  It’s not about “goodwill to men (and women)”; or “peace to men of good will with whom he is pleased.”  The angels sang peace to those whom god favors.

Probably the most challenging description of a post-theistic god-concept is John Dominic Crossan’s description of a kenotic god. “whose presence is justice and life, and whose absence is injustice and death.” Whatever post-modern people of the 20th Century learned about God and death had to have been crystalized at Auschwitz.  In a 21st Century, non-theistic, myth-rejecting world, the Angels might suggest that those who find favor with such a god who occasionally is nowhere to be found are those who participate in Covenant:  non-violent, distributive justice-compassion.  The cosmic joke is that those who find such favor may discover that death is the reward.  Who wants to sign onto that kind of deal?  The answer, of course, explains why Empire still holds sway on humanity’s Planet Earth.

Child Dedication (Luke 2:21-24)

Luke has Jesus’s parents pay careful attention to the rituals surrounding the birth of a child.  Jesus was a Jew.  That fact has long been denied, covered up by the dogma about divine destiny. Misunderstandings and mistranslations of Exodus 13:1-2 and Leviticus 12:6-8 further confuse and obscure what Luke was trying to show when he made sure that the child Jesus was properly “redeemed,” and that Mary was properly “purified.” None of this was originally about a foreshadowing of Jesus’s death as “redemption” for sinners.  Nor was it an illustration of the patriarchal oppression of women.  (As a footnote, the Jesus Seminar Scholars translation of verse 22 says “their purification,” as though the offerings were required for Joseph and Jesus as well.  This is probably not accurate.  The NRSV is very clear that the purification was for Mary as described in Leviticus:  “. . . then she shall be clean from her flow of blood” [Lev. 12:7b].)  The “purification offering” assured that Mary had recovered from the birth.  She did not die in the process as most women did; she did not become ill with post-natal infection in a world where medicine consisted of herbal trial and error; and the infant was born alive and survived not only for 8 days, but 40 days.  Medicine since 1930 has made the whole process much less dangerous, although the United States (the sole remaining imperial power of the last two centuries) still ranks near the bottom in infant mortality.

Finally, in the 21st century, “sacrifice” is a word contaminated with Anselm’s 11th Century theories about substitutionary atonement.  All Luke is saying is that Jesus and his parents were proper Jews, who performed the rituals that would allow Jesus to be raised as the child of his parents, and not turned over to the Temple to serve God – an interesting point, given the rest of Luke’s gospel story.

Confirmation of Divine Destiny (Luke 2:25-38)

Luke establishes Jesus’s divine credentials through both an outsider and an insider.  Old Simeon, who believed he would not die until he had seen the “Lord’s Anointed,” happens to arrive in the Temple at the time the rituals were being carried out.  “. . . [N]ow my eyes have seen your salvation [deliverance from oppression] . . . a revelatory light for foreigners, and glory for your people Israel.”  The prophetess Anna – the “insider” who had lived in the Temple all her life – came upon the scene “at that very moment. . .  and began to speak about the child to all who were waiting for the liberation of Jerusalem”  The inclusive nature of the realm of God is clear.  Cesar and his empire have been overthrown.

Jesus’s Ownership of His Own Identity (Luke 2:41-52)

Luke is the only New Testament writer to make it into the Canon who has a glimpse into the life of the young Jesus.  At age 12, he is not quite old enough for bar mitzvah, but he is also no longer a naive child.  The stage is set for Act II.

So What?

An “Epiphany” is a personal manifestation of a god, according to the Oxford Dictionary of the American Language.  Creative writers have begun to use the word to describe a transforming “Aha!” moment – a realization, a revelation of profound truth about life.  The first of the year 2010, which according to some is the first of the second decade of the 21st Century, is a good time for personal, social, religious, and political epiphanies.  For 21st Century post-Christians, the question becomes whether Luke’s story is relevant.  What gods may be revealed at this time?  What Empire has been overthrown?

Like Luke, we often do not go on past Malachi 3:1.  When we do (as G.F. Handel did), the question echoes down the ages:  “But who can endure the day of his coming, and who can stand when he appears?  For he is like a refiner’s fire and like the fullers’ soap; he will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver, and he will purify the descendants of Levi and refine them like gold and silver, until they present offerings to the Lord in righteousness [distributive justice-compassion].”

Malachi is not writing about petty sin.  Malachi is writing about the nature of injustice.  Pick any incident or issue in a local context:  An accident caused by a drunk driver, for example, in which the driver of the vehicle the drunk hits is killed, and the drunk walks away unscathed.  The media are all over it, interviewing the grieving family, who of course want revenge; demanding accountability from local law enforcement, or stricter penalties, or prohibitions on drinking alcohol.  No one is asking why the person who committed the crime was drunk in the first place.  The assumption is that person is evil beyond redemption.

Or – a far more troubling example – the case where a man who hated “liberals and democrats” walked into a Unitarian Universalist church on a Sunday morning in Knoxville, Tennessee, and started shooting.  Seven people were wounded.  Two died.  The shooter pled guilty and got a life sentence.  The focus for grief and support was on the members of the church who had been traumatized by the experience.  Much of the support also was for liberal religion, liberal thought, which had been lethally attacked by someone consumed by hatred.  These responses are normal and needed.  The Rev. Chris Buice, pastor of the church, said that in the end Adkisson himself was a victim of the hate that he carried.

        “It was more than just a hatred of liberalism; it was just hatred,” Buice said. “Hatred is blind. Ultimately, his hatred is what has now confined him. He will spend the rest of his days in prison. He is now a victim of his own hatred. [The guilty plea and life sentence represent] a measure of closure, as far as the legal aspects go. The verdict feels like justice, not in terms of punishment but more for the protection of those vulnerable in society.”

Unfortunately, and perfectly normally, Rev. Buice and those who offered the usual support for the victims remain trapped in justice as retribution and revenge.  The verdict allows only “a measure of closure,” and only in terms of the legal system.  He does not ask about some systemic cause for Adkisson’s actions.  They are due to “blind hatred,” as though “hatred” is a defining condition of human life.  Rev. Buice reluctantly acknowledges that the verdict renders some unsatisfactory justice in terms of “protection of those vulnerable in society.”  But he does not mean protection for Adkisson and others like him.  The life sentence is not likely to rehabilitate someone who is so lost that he sees no option other than a killing rampage.  Rev. Buice means that now – with Adkisson in jail for life with no possibility of parole – innocent church-goers are safe from being mowed down by blind hatred, over which they have no control.

At least until the next one comes along.

The layers of imperial systems of injustice are many and thick.  Like the proverbial DUI menace, no one is asking what made Adkisson into a vessel of uncontrollable hatred.  Is it possible for those who experience the results of that hatred to forego being helpless victims, and become activists for justice-compassion?  When will it occur to us that until we repent from our imperial victimhood and work for rehabilitation, the evil will continue to haunt us?

That is the transformation Luke’s birth story invites us into.  Jumping far ahead in Luke’s story, that is the transformation one of the criminals experienced, as he died with Jesus (Luke 23:40-43).  So far, like the other criminal, we have declined the invitation.

“This child,” old Simeon said, “is destined to be a sign that is rejected.”

BLOG ARCHIVE

What's next?

Liberal Christian Commentary will re-start January 6, 2010.  The texts for 2010 will include Luke/Acts, Paul’s authentic letters, and Old Testament scriptures.