Homily for Lent 1
March 1, 2009
March 1, 2009
Genesis 9:8-17
1 Peter 3:18-22
Mark 1:9-15
"The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news." [1]
As we begin this season of Lent, (and I believe we should see the whole season of Lent through Easter to Pentecost as one season) two themes dominate our readings today. The first is Baptism. The second is Jesus' announcement that the Kingdom of God has come near.
Jesus' baptism is linked, by the author of our epistle reading, both with the cross and with Jesus' crucifixion and resurrection. It is also, as we saw also in our reading from Genesis, linked with the story of the flood, with the covenant between God on the one side and humanity, the animal and plant kingdoms and the physical universe on the other. All this is represented by the sign of the rainbow.
A number of current writers [2] have also linked the cross with the message of the Kingdom of God. For them the gospel is not primarily about our personal salvation, but about the world of power and politics, and the cross is what happens when the Kingdom of God meets with the Empire of Caesar. This drama is played out across all the pages of our Christian scriptures, and indeed down through the early centuries of the Church, at least until the Empire of Caesar capitulated to the church from the time of Constantine onwards. Or was it the church that capitulated to the Empire? That I believe is an open question, and remains open for us in today's world as well.
A number of these writers, especially those from the United States in the past few years, have seen this narrative of Church versus Empire being played out with reference to a particular regime and I am sure that those who come hear regularly will have noticed some of that spilling over to my sermons. Now, of course, in the words of Molière, Nous avons changé tout cela. [3]
The original context of this remark in Molière's play was that a man, against his better judgment, is forced into the role of doctor, but rouses suspicion when he checks the heart on the right side of the patient's body. So I pose the question as to whether the change in regime in the most powerful country in the world has changed everything. Although there is evidence of real change and desire for change in many areas, which continue to give room for hope, yet behind political power in the United States and in most other countries of the world there is a more formidable, yet usually less visible, force which, for short, we can call The Market.
From the time of the Renaissance onwards, Europe was slowly freed from the thralldom of the feudal system as, first, agricultural and trading capitalism and, subsequently, industrial and post-industrial capitalism became the driving forces in the political and social life and international relations of the world's peoples. With the almost complete failure of any alternative springing from the thinking of Karl Marx, the free market economy today dominates how the world works. Maybe one should point out the last symbol of that alternative option of which our partner Dean in Havana is so proud. But how long can that last?
Let me make the comment for the moment that whatever we may feel or think about the free market economy, we are all part of it. Our whole life, our jobs, our education system, our social services, our leisure activities, our pensions, our life style, everything that we do is bound up with the global economy. Our diocese and Cathedral Church, through our investment portfolios and our participation in the development beneath and behind, is tied up with it all. So what can we do to be faithful to the gospel challenge which pits the Kingdom of God against the Empire?
As we open the season of Lent we hold two ceremonials which may have something to say about this. The first is Shrove Tuesday, when many of us enjoyed our pancakes and sausages. The word shrove is a grammatical part of the word shrive which refers to making a confession. That name is probably a medieval reminder of the need to keep under control the wilder excesses of what, in the Latin countries, is called Mardi Gras. Good as the pancakes and sausages are, they are but a pale remnant of a feast, probably of pagan origin, which included enjoyment, consumption and lasciviousness of every kind. The next day we celebrated Ash Wednesday, also probably of pagan origin, but which, superficially, is quite the opposite. It is a time to speak about abstinence from the pleasures of the flesh. What both these celebrations have in common lies in suggesting that there is an alternative. The medieval peasant or serf, for at least one day each year, could taste the distant possibility of a different kind of life. The monks might suggest that the true way to that alternative was through prayer, almsgiving and fasting. In either case however the locus of the alternative is beyond this world, in a life after death in heaven.
So while both feasts reinforce the Gospel idea that there can be an alternative to the status quo, they have tended to loose touch with the Gospel message, that the conflict between the status quo and the Kingdom of God is located in this world. The question is, how can we reinterpret the tradition in our modern world, maintaining, on the one hand that there is an alternative way to be followed, yet realizing, on the other, that there is no way we extricate ourselves from the forces of the Market. One tradition in the Christian world has been monasticism, a total withdrawal from the world. But we notice that, by the early medieval period and even after the Benedictine and Cistercian reforms, the monasteries were fully integrated into the feudal system. Not only that: at a later stage in history they carefully transformed their place in the feudal system into a place in the capitalist economy.
Another way of resolving the conflict has been the way of withdrawal within the world. For many Christian faith and spirituality have become purely private inward options. My Christian faith just has nothing all to do with my participation in either the benefits or ills of capitalist (or communist) economy. But such a private faith seems to have little to do with the gospel witness or with the tradition of Christian social ethics. Of course another way of withdrawal (with only tangential reference to Christian faith) was entertained by the Hippie communes of our youth. It didn't last long, and most of the hippies I knew are now about-to-retire members of the baby boomers or generation x. So the way of withdrawal does not seem to be a particularly fruitful one to pursue
What Mardi Gras, Ash Wednesday and Lent can hold before is, I believe, the possibility of living out symbolic alternative actions. To explain what I mean by this, let me give some examples, first from the field of artistic endeavor, in all its forms and dimensions. It is clear that art and culture cannot be extracted from the society in which they are set, but one function, whether on the side of the giver or receiver is to maintain a witness to an alternative vision. Think of the difference between Beethoven's Eroica, composed to celebrate victory and power and the Ninth symphony composed to celebrate joy. Or think of the difference between Elgar's Pomp and Circumstance marches and Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring, composed with in the same time frame. Or think of the difference between the works of Evelyn Waugh and those of Franz Kafka or of the contrast between Cubism and Socialist Realism.
My second example is from the field of social action. I could take you to our end-of-the-month lunch, to Fr Emmott John's Le Bon Dieu dans la rue, to Auberge Madeleine or the Old Brewery Mission. Let us not be romantic: none of these actions solve or will solve the fundamental problems of poverty and homelessness, which lie deep in the capitalist system. But they do provide palliative care for some members of society and, I believe more importantly, they keep before us and our political leaders the need to find alternative ways of being a society which sees compassion as equally important as wealth and profit.
I could take many more examples of symbolic action, but I will end with just one, Facebook. One the one hand, Facebook is a way of communication thoroughly tied up with the capitalist world of information technology, and a way some people share the most banal experiences of their lives. On the other hand it creates a new kind of community in an increasing atomised, self-absorbed and lonely world. It also spins off groups of people interested in making changes in our society.
I repeat none of these symbolic actions will do much to solve the problems of our world. In fact some of the most severe problems, such as the threat of environmental collapse may be unsolvable in the time frame of the presence of Homo Sapiens on our planet. But, like Mardi Gras and Lent, although they belong clearly in the world of the status quo, they can keep before us an alternative vision, and that alternative vision can give us hope. Hope is for me one of the springboards to authentic humanity. For the Christian living with such symbolic actions can be ways of keeping the demands of the Kingdom of God before the powers of the Empire-Market.
So maybe this Lent you should set yourself to read a book, watch a film, listen to music, volunteer in a social action programme or maybe even join Facebook and explore it!
[1] Mark 1:15b
[2] Among them Marcus Borg and John Dominic Crossan
[3] Médecin Malgré Lui, act ii. sc. vi. (1666.)
