Thirteenth Sunday after Trinity 2021

 

Thirteenth Sunday after Trinity 2021

Gospel: Mark 7:1-8, 14, 15, 21-23

This Sunday’s Gospel is a passage from the Gospel According to Mark. At face value, it appears to recount a confrontation between the Pharisees, who are hung up on rules, and Jesus, who advocates personal choice. But if we take a second glance, look beneath the surface, that might not be what is going on after all.

It is worth noting that the Pharisees have not come looking for a fight. They have come, a distance, to see Jesus, exploring the idea that this might be one sent by God. And when they witness Jesus’ disciples doing something that causes them cognitive dissonance—if this man is from God, why are his disciples flouting the rules?—they ask Jesus for clarification. On all counts, we would do well to learn from them.

Jesus responds by calling them hypocrites. Literally, people who wear masks, face masks. Actors, playing a part. But not a word that necessarily carries the negative value judgement that it has come to convey since.

The conversation centres on the idea of ‘defilement’—koine, literally making something common, stripping it of its specialness, its sacredness. And here it is worth noting that the entire of the New Testament was written in defiled Greek, koine Greek, as opposed to high, classical Greek. Written in the common tongue, of Gentiles and Jews, of the common people.

The Pharisees ask, why do your disciples eat in the way that is common of all the surrounding peoples, and not in the way that marks us Jews as set apart? The Jewish laws concerning hygiene were inspired, and deeply practical. Centuries later, when bubonic plague swept through Europe, Jewish hygiene observance kept them safe—set apart—from the devastating loss of lives suffered by their Gentile neighbours. Why forsake that kind of literally life-saving practice?

That’s when Jesus calls them hypocrites—mask-wearers—not because of the rules they kept, but because the outward observance or appearance was not aligned with their inward attitude. Though their actions were aligned with the wisdom of God, as shared with humanity, their hearts were not aligned with the heart of God towards humanity.

Jesus goes on to make it clear that nothing that goes into a person can defile them, can strip them of their specialness, their sacredness. But what comes out of them can.

Nothing that goes into a person can strip them of their God-given specialness. Not even a virus. This weekend, I stepped in to cover a wedding that was supposed to have been taken by another vicar in the deanery, who, the day before, had discovered that he had Covid. He is presently unable to do the things he is set apart to do; but Covid does not negate his vocation. And even if, in the most extreme of instances, Covid should kill us, it cannot separate us from the love of God.

That said, what comes out of us can defile us. The belief that we are more important than others, that we can act with impunity, exercising our rights in our self-interest, without concern for our neighbours.

Until recently here in the UK, it was legally mandatory to wear a mask in public, for the common good, in a pandemic. Since then, the rules have changed. The law has been stripped of its special status, its sacredness. Now it is down to the individual to exercise their own judgement, their freedom of conscience, to wear a mask or not according to their own personal choice. Under such circumstances, what ought we to do? At the wedding I took, for my friend who had Covid, not one of the sixty + guests chose to wear a mask.

It should be clear by now that we cannot simply read off what to do by how we read a particular passage from the Bible. What such a passage might do, however, is help us to navigate complex and confusing circumstances, from a faith perspective.

We continue, for now, to wear masks when we gather, out of love for our neighbour. But masks are not enough. The outward expression must be in line with our heart, which in turn must seek to be in line with God’s heart. If we wear a mask, but despise those who don’t, we miss the mark. We might protect them from Covid, but not from the virus of our hatred. We wear a mask, and sanitise our hands, and keep our distance, for the common (koine) good of a defiled (koine) people.

On the other hand, to refuse to wear a mask, and take other simple and reasonable precautions for the common good, because we see these things as a taking away of our liberty, is to abandon the law of God, which is summed up in the command to love our neighbour as ourselves.

As we navigate a season where we will wear a mask on some occasions, and not others; where we will wash our hands, perhaps more often than before Covid but not as often as we have become accustomed to; whether we choose observance or not to observe certain practices, our guide should be the law of love. May we continue to grow as such disciples. May we, like the Pharisees, continue to seek Jesus, to see him more clearly, to love him more dearly, and follow him more nearly, day by day.

Festival of the Blessed Virgin Mary 2021

 

Festival of the Blessed Virgin Mary 2021

Lectionary readings: Galatians 4:4-7 and Luke 1:46-55

 

Today we hear again Mary’s song declared before us, perhaps declared over us. The words may be familiar, especially if it is your habitual practice to say or to sing Evening Prayer. And yet the words are rooted in a particular time and place in history, quite alien to our own. These are not, primarily, personal words in response to a personal salvation. Nor do they, primarily, reveal a universal principle of God’s nature, siding with the oppressed against the oppressor. Rather, these words, in the mouth of a young Jewish woman living under Roman occupation in first-century Palestine are a prophetic utterance addressed to the people of Israel at a moment when God steps in to act decisively.

This people, the descendants of Abraham, were called to be a priestly people living among the nations, through whom all the other families on earth would be blessed. Yet they had repeatedly turned away from that calling; had chosen to live in such a way that brought the Lord’s name, his reputation among the surrounding nations, into disrepute. Again and again, their God had sent the prophets to them. Again and again, he had handed them over to the consequences of their unfaithfulness, bringing down defeat and exile and foreign occupation upon themselves. Again and again, the Lord had preserved a faithful remnant; had heard the cry of his people in their oppression and moved to rescue them, to restore them. And now, God was about to act once again, in judgement. The corrupt religious and political elite would be thrown down, and a faithful remnant restored, through whom Israel would be restored as a priestly people.

The fulfilment of Mary’s song would look like the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 AD, when Herod’s palace is burned down (the Herodian ruler of the day actually siding with the Romans in besieging the city) and the Temple destroyed, its stone walls thrown down into the valley below. A literal throwing down. And in the aftermath of judgement, the emergence of a remnant, of the Jesus community, that would grow and spread across the Roman empire, holding out such a light that the pagan peoples were drawn to it, drawn to worship this Jewish God, until the entire Roman Empire would bend the knee and bring their tribute before him. What flows from these words is Christendom, nations shaped, however imperfectly, by a philosophy of the human condition under the sovereignty of God conveyed in the story that unfolds in the Bible, now opened to more fully include the Gentiles; a society within which the Church served as priests, invoking God’s blessing.

That is what is going on in Mary’s song. A prophetic word that looks out over the following thousand years. But it is not our song. Oh, we still sing it, and we do so in order to be formed by it, but our moment in history is not hers. There was a crisis, a moment of profound judgement, and a glorious new chapter; but we are living on the far side of all of that. We are living in a post-Christendom Europe, among neo-pagan peoples who, folk religion rituals concerning babies and brides and the burial of the dead aside, do not much call on us to serve them as a priestly people. So, what, if anything, might these words mean to us today?

And then, the lectionary has paired Mary’s song with part of Paul’s letter to the church in Galatia, in which he confronts the desire of the Gentile Christians to adopt the Jewish law. Paul insists that the law has been fulfilled in Jesus, Mary’s son: that is, it has served its purpose, as a guardian over the inheritance of God’s children until they come of age; but now, in and with Jesus, we have come into our inheritance. But, says Paul, that freedom is not an opportunity for self-indulgence or promotion, but rather, we ought to use our freedom to freely take on the role of serving one another, for the whole law is summed up in the command to love your neighbour as yourself. Again, what might these words mean to us today?

Theologian Walter Brueggemann wrote, “The dominant script of both selves and communities in our society, for both liberals and conservatives, is the script of therapeutic, technological, consumerist militarism that permeates every dimension of our common life.” That is, we are shaped to assume that life may be lived without discomfort or inconvenience; that there is no problem, however complex, we cannot fix by our own ingenuity; that the resources of the world are available to us without regard to our neighbour; and that we will protect and maintain this system at all cost. This week has seen the publication of the latest report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), which spells out the global crisis facing us, at least some of which is now inevitable; but we aren’t prepared to give up our cheap flights to the Mediterranean, which is burning. This week has seen city after city in Afghanistan fall to the Taliban; but we aren’t prepared to welcome the refugee. No matter how bankrupt the dominant script, we do not want to change it; we believe that we can carry on doing the same things while hoping for a different outcome. Nonetheless, it will fall, and, in the long term, this may prove to be good for the world, but not before suffering for the poor and the hungry as well as the rich and the proud. Mary is no Disney musical princess.

In the light of a Mary-shaped hope, we are called, as God has always called us, to be a faithful remnant. To offer up prayer for our world, for those in power and those whose lives are impacted by those in power. And to act with prophetic voice, in what we say and what we do, in the choices we make for ourselves and as a community, resisting the temptation to believe that nothing we might do makes any difference. As Paul reminds us, to love our neighbour, not fearing the loss of what we might hoard for ourselves but drawing on the resources of heaven to bless others. Not as mighty rulers, but as children of a loving heavenly Father. And as sons and daughters of Mary—sisters and brothers of Jesus. Though not our song, the Magnificat is our mother’s song. May we so hear her words, read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest them, that we may sing a new script in and for our generation, in keeping with hers. Amen.

 

Tenth Sunday after Trinity 2021

 

Tenth Sunday after Trinity 2021

Lectionary readings: 2 Samuel 18:5-9, 15, 31-33 and John 6:35, 41-51

Our Old Testament reading this morning recounts the remarkable and tragic death of David’s son, the prince Absalom. It comes as the climax of an unravelling that has occurred in the life of David and his family stemming from his sin of shedding the blood of Uriah. His first son born to the wife of Uriah died only days old. David and Bathsheba’s second son, Solomon, would grow up to become David’s heir to the throne in Jerusalem. But among his other children, by his many wives, David would know even more suffering. David’s firstborn son, Amnon, whom he loved, raped his half-sister, Tamar, and, when David failed to bring him to justice, another son, Tamar’s full-brother Absalom, murdered Amnon in revenge. Growing to despise his father, Absalom went on to have very public sexual relations with David’s concubines, before rallying many in Israel in rebellion against David, in order to take the throne from him. As we heard in our reading, Absalom died in the rebellion, despite David’s desire that he be treated with the greatest leniency. David is recorded as weeping for Amnon twice, and for Absalom seven times. Towards the end of David’s life, when he is bedridden, his eldest surviving son, Adonijah, proclaims himself king, before Bathsheba and the prophet Nathan—who had prophesied such consequences as befell—ensured that Solomon was crowned as David’s legitimate, if not natural, heir.

It is a mess, and that mess is not swept under the carpet but brought into the light, for us to learn from. Sexual relationships are a holy thing, and treating them lightly, or in contempt, or as a weapon, results in great pain, for all involved, whether directly or indirectly. Nonetheless, even amid such pain, God is at work to redeem our lives. We would do well to heed David’s call to deal gently with people’s lives, for the sake of a heart after the heart of God. We would do well to lament, with David; to know in our hearts that it would be preferable for us to be cut off from the future of the people of God than to have to bear the loss of a young life from participation in the future of God’s people. We would do well, also, to learn from David’s failure to instruct his household in how they ought to relate to one another and live together in love and faith.

One of the insights of this passage is that God is faithful to his covenant promise to Abraham and his descendants, and to David and his descendants, that those who blessed them, God would bless, and those who cursed them, God would curse. In other words, God’s hand is raised in blessing to and through his people; and raised against those who would attack them. When Absalom persuades God’s own people to rise in rebellion against God’s anointed king in Jerusalem, God’s hand is raised against their plot. In an incredible and sobering verse, ‘and the forest claimed more victims that day that the sword,’ we see that even the very Land of God’s promise revolts against the rebellion.

At the heart of our passage, Absalom, the son whom David loves, is suspended, hanging between heaven and earth, while soldiers stand below, mocking and striking and piercing him with a spear. A beloved son, bridging heaven and earth; and a father lamenting his death. This tragic young man, the product of the consequences of David’s sin but also God’s faithfulness towards sinful David, becomes a window in time and space through which we see Jesus. Jesus come down from heaven and raised up from the earth, suspended between the two, who dies in order that those who receive him in their hands and deal gently with him for his Father’s sake might live. The one in whom all our hungers and thirsts, all our appetites and longings including those relating to identity and relationships and sexuality, are satisfied. The one who redeems our lives from the Pit, raising us up to life in the fullness God desires for us.

It is a mystery indeed, one that sustains us and does not fail. In the words of the Post Communion prayer for this day, according to the Common Worship liturgy,

God of our pilgrimage, you have willed that the gate of mercy should stand open for those who trust in you: look upon us with your favour that we who follow the path of your will may never wander from the way of life; through Jesus Christ our Lord.

 

Ninth Sunday after Trinity 2021

 

Ninth Sunday after Trinity 2021

Lectionary readings: 2 Samuel 11:26-12:13 and Ephesians 4:1-16 and John 6:24-35

Today’s Gospel reading records a conversation between Jesus and some of those who, the day before, had experienced the feeding of about 5,000 adult men and an unspecified number of women and children. Jesus tells them not to work to produce the meal that gets destroyed, but instead to work for the meal that is lasting, that does not come to an end. This meal is understood, by all, to be at the initiative of God.

Therefore, the crowd ask Jesus, What must we construct to perform this work of God? That is, what are the ingredients, and what is the recipe, for this meal? Jesus responds, The way to create this meal is to believe in me. That is, I am the head chef. They reply, What is the distinguishing mark of the meal you serve, by which we will know that you are the head chef? What is your signature dish?

Jesus responds, My signature dish is bread, bread that comes down from heaven and gives life to the world. Bread that satisfies the hunger and thirst of humanity.

This exchange is paired with a passage from Paul’s letter to the Church at Ephesus, the community from where the whole of the Roman province of Asia Minor heard the gospel. In it, Paul speaks of the one who descended from heaven and who is distributed through and to others. The distinguishing marks of this signature dish are apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors and teachers, combined to create something nutritious and nourishing, a meal that sustains and is itself sustained.

This is what it looks like to work to create the heavenly meal on earth. This is the Church, not only as a community that shares a meal—the body and blood of Jesus experienced in the bread and wine of the Eucharist, or Holy Communion—but also, the Church as a meal, for the world.

This is a meal as the hospitality of many different cultures, not just one;

meal as bringing people together in good faith, over which enemies may become friends, and friends become allies;

meal as celebration of life in all its goodness;

meal as comfort food, and medicine, for the hurting and heart-sick;

meal as a life-skill passed down from one generation to another, with faithful improvisation.

This is the Church as a meal, as a metaphor and as a core practice for communal living that transforms the world.

In our Old Testament reading from the life of David, when God sends the prophet Nathan to confront the king with his sin, Nathan does so by telling the story of a meal, in which a rich man, unwilling to offer hospitality that cost him anything, took and served up the poor man’s lamb. In his response to the tale, David passes judgement on himself.

Meals are risky. The author of the Letter to the Hebrews encourages the practice of hospitality because, in so doing, some have entertained angels unawares. In the pages of Scripture, when angels are fed, it is a sign that God is about to do something, to intervene, to act in the world, for judgement and deliverance. As we seek to learn from one another, in the diversity of our life experiences, and to discern together God’s will, meals are both a helpful metaphor and a helpful practice.

With the apostles, we dare to enter worlds very different from our own experience, worlds with different textures and flavours.

With the prophets, we dare to admit our own hypocrisy, repent and return to God.

With the evangelists, we dare to create space to celebrate the love that makes life good.

With the pastors, we dare to feed the hungry and honour the heartbroken, whoever they might be.

With the teachers, we dare to discern meaning and curate wisdom for living life well.

As we seek to grow together in Christ, what might happen if we simply prepared meals and ate together more?