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Twenty-Sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle B<\/em> I have a young colleague at CTU where I teach While filled with passion and energy Analogously That was true this past week Then, of course, there is what one Republican Senator dubbed No, not once this week But every morning, and most afternoons and evenings Unfortunately, the scripture readings slated for today Decades ago, I studied with a celebrated Methodist liturgical scholar My professor commented that very often He said, by contrast, the lectionary is not safe His comments could hardly be truer including Moses’ challenge and then there is that gospel from Mark and in response the Only Begotten uses So how to preach the ecclesial and societal chaos today One approach is to revisit the texts, especially that gospel I am helped here by commentators Jesus borrows this rhetorical approach The paradox arises because The hyperbole precisely comes The purpose of \u201cbetter than\u201d proverbs according to one blogger Ok \u2026 I\u2019m in \u2026 One thought was to image the biblical conflicts in today\u2019s Word The Jesus tribe in the gospel As I was exploring tribalism A former university professor LaPlante has given up the university classroom In a YouTube clip on the \u201cdangers of tribalism\u201d Tribes give people a sense of security The danger, as LaPlante points out LaPlante argues that the result of growing polarization Another casualty of extreme polarization is a grasp on reality Jesus was a wall-demolisher Instead he pursued social and religious interactions Thus it is no surprise And what about our own day In the hyperbolic language of the gospel The way of the ax is to chop off our limbs The other option is the way of the cup Sounds simple, right? That is what Pope Francis, I believe, has mirrored for us and yet it seems so foreign to us And so the foreboding of the poet:<\/p>\n [piano dissonant Haugen, \u201cSend down the fire\u201d]<\/p>\n Six humans trapped by happenstance, in bleak and bitter cold. The asbestos fire for those authentically in the Jesus tribe but a baptismal light that cannot be extinguished but stand boldly in the presence of the ever-living God and pray<\/p>\n Send down \u2026 send down \u2026 send down [Haugen, reflective singing of \u201cSend down the Fire\u201d]<\/p>\n
\n Old St. Patrick\u2019s,\u00a0Chicago<\/em>
\nEdward Foley, Capuchin<\/em><\/p>\n
\nnew on the faculty
\nvery gifted, in demand
\nteaching, publishing, consultations, speaking<\/p>\n
\nthe colleague also noted how full life had become
\nin this new life as professor and mentor
\nconcluding, \u201cI don\u2019t wake up any morning\u201d
\nand wonder what I should do today\u201d<\/p>\n
\nif and when I am scheduled to preach
\nI do not wake up any morning in the preceding days
\nwondering what I should preach about
\nAs a matter of fact
\nhaving to preaching
\nin the face of so much violence and division and scandal
\nregularly keeps me up at night<\/p>\n
\nas we experienced 5 more days of riveting testimony
\nin the Lacquan McDonald case
\nThen when a former TV star
\nwhom the media once dubbed \u201cAmerica\u2019s Dad\u201d
\nwas sentenced to 3 to 10 years
\nfor sexual assault
\nas pressure mounted for the Pope
\nto accept the resignation
\nof the cardinal archbishop of the nation\u2019s capitol
\nfor failing to protect the innocent from abusive clergy<\/p>\n
\nthe intergalactic freak show
\nsurrounding the confirmation process for Brett Kavanagh
\nalmost surreal testimony
\nincendiary denials
\npolitical machinations on both sides of the aisle<\/p>\n
\ndid I wake up after restless sleep
\nand wonder what I should preach about<\/p>\n
\nI was haunted with the thought over and over again
\n\u201chow\u201d \u2026 how to preach
\nin such a divisive, truly toxic environment<\/p>\n
\ndo not ease the burden<\/p>\n
\nwho promoted the value of the lectionary
\nwhen lectionary usage was virtually never the custom
\namong U.S. Protestants
\nand instead most Protestant preachers in this country
\nweekly selected the scriptures to preach<\/p>\n
\npreachers would choose innocuous or safe scriptures
\nwhat he dubbed \u201cuser friendly texts\u201d<\/p>\n
\nas it assails us week after week with
\nwhat he characterized as \u201cThe sword of God\u2019s word\u201d<\/p>\n
\nthan for today’s readings
\none of the toughest amalgams
\nof challenges and chastisements scripturally imaginable<\/p>\n
\nto the territoriality and jealousy of Joshua
\nin the first reading
\nJames\u2019s tirade against the rich
\nand jabs against employers
\nin the second reading<\/p>\n
\nin which inept disciples crash and burn
\nin their attempts to corral the Jesus spirit<\/p>\n
\nsome of the most severe and condemnatory language
\nthat populates the gospels<\/p>\n
\nthrough the lens of biblical texts
\nthat seem to sear with the same intensity
\nof the asbestos-proof fire to which they allude?<\/p>\n
\nto consider if it is really as condemnatory as it first sounds<\/p>\n
\nwho clarify a form of proverbial wisdom
\nsometimes called the \u201cbetter than\u201d proverbs[1]
\n<\/a>such proverbs present sharply opposed choices
\none of which is clearly good and the other not<\/p>\n
\nbut both hyperbolizes it to the nth degree
\nwhile simultaneously framing it as a paradox<\/p>\n
\nJesus presents the painful and distasteful
\ndrowning tethered to a millstone
\nand multiple amputations
\nas the better choices<\/p>\n
\nthrough 200lb millstones and triple amputations<\/p>\n
\nis through exaggerated judgment
\nand extreme demand
\nto jolt the listener \u2026 the disciple
\nto look at human behavior in a whole new way.<\/p>\n
\nbut what\u2019s the new way?
\nHow does this exaggerated and demanding proverb
\nsummon new eyes
\nin an era of such mean spiritedness
\nand social toxicity?<\/p>\n
\nas reflections of our own ecclesial and societal traumas
\nracial divisions
\nabuse of the innocents
\npolitical intolerance
\nand xenophobia
\nthrough the lens of tribalism<\/p>\n
\ndisciples as a self-appointed orthodoxy committee
\nhad decided, without consulting their leader,
\nto excommunicate others who are actually doing good
\nbecause they were not wearing the blue and gold
\ndid not sport the OSP logo on any clothing
\nwere sporting no Cubs Jersey
\nor otherwise demonstrating that they belonged<\/p>\n
\nas an appropriate frame
\nfor examining biblical and contemporary divisions
\nI ran across a series of YouTube presentations by Kevin LaPlante<\/a><\/p>\n
\nchair of the department of philosophy at Iowa state
\nand respected scholar<\/p>\n
\nfor the internet and other modes of discourse
\nwhere he gets to ply his considerable gift for clarity
\nand his artistic ability as an illustrator<\/p>\n
\nLaPlante first surprised me by asserting
\nthat tribes aren\u2019t bad
\nas they are basically a group of people who feel connected
\nin a meaningful way
\naround religion, or sports, or language or ethnicity
\nSo in some ways the members of OSP, \u201cwe\u2019re\u201d a tribe<\/p>\n
\nwhile allowing people to identify folk who are other
\nto make distinctions between us and them
\nThat also is not a bad thing
\nrecognizing that everyone is not like us
\ndoes not share our world view or values
\ncan be both enlightening and enlarging<\/p>\n
\nis not tribalism
\nbut the polarization that tribalism feeds
\nthe in-group solidary fed by animosity toward the out-group<\/p>\n
\nis a permanent attitude of suspicion, hostility and fear
\ntoward the other
\nSound familiar?<\/p>\n
\nExtreme tribalism erects systems of belief
\nincreasing unmoored from reality
\nresulting in moral and political isolation from the truth
\nThus we live in a society in which truth telling
\nis dismissed as fake news<\/p>\n
\nbubble-burster
\nand anti-isolationist<\/p>\n
\nwith Jews and Samaritans and Syrophoenicians
\nPharisees and fisherman and lepers
\nwomen and men and children
\nall glimpses of the in-breaking of God\u2019s reign in his mind\u2019s eye<\/p>\n
\nthat he would spiritually bushwhack his own disciples
\nintent on building their own religious bubble
\nand decrying the healing by someone outside their tribe
\nas fake news
\nand through hyperbole and paradox
\nlays down a new law
\nthat if these chosen ones
\nwanted to remain in the Jesus Tribe
\nsuch polarizing attitudes
\nattempts at character assassination
\nand rendering of truth as fake news were anathema to him<\/p>\n
\nHow do we take up this new law?
\nHow do we remain in the Jesus tribe?
\nHow do we resist such insidious polarization?<\/p>\n
\nour options are stark: either the ax or the cup<\/p>\n
\npluck out our eyes
\nand probably have our tongues surgically removed
\nso that we are no longer capable of slurring
\nor demeaning
\nor erasing another
\nA pretty drastic antidote<\/p>\n
\nWhat does Jesus say?
\nWhoever gives you a cup of water to drink
\nwill surely not lose their reward<\/p>\n
\nSharing a cup of water with the other
\nacknowledging the well of their own dignity
\nadmitting that the ocean of humanity outside our tribe
\nis beloved of Christ
\nand belongs to God<\/p>\n
\nA true cup bearer not ax wielder
\nwho in the early days of his pontificate
\nscandalized many in the Roman Catholic Tribe
\nby admitting that even atheists can get to heaven
\nand calling those without belief \u201cprecious allies\u201d
\nHow\u2019s that for a spiritual ambush on the orthodoxy committee?<\/p>\n
\noften so far beyond our individual and social instincts
\nand so we eschew the cup
\nand reach for the ax \u2026
\nand while we often attempt to wield it toward
\nanother individual, another tribe
\nwe so often end up axing our own
\nsevering our social and spiritual jugular
\nbleeding our own tribe
\nand the whole of the human race.<\/p>\n
\n<\/em>Each one possessed a stick of wood.\u00a0 Or so the story’s told.
\n<\/em>Their dying fire in need of logs, The first woman held hers back,
\n<\/em>For on the faces around the fire, She noticed one was black.
\n<\/em>The next man looking cross the way, Saw one not of his church,
\n<\/em>And couldn’t bring himself to give, The fire his stick of birch.
\n<\/em>The third one sat in tattered clothes, He gave his coat a hitch,
\n<\/em>Why should his log be put to use, To warm the idle rich?
\n<\/em>The rich man just sat back and thought of wealth he had in store
\n<\/em>And how to keep what he had earned, From the lazy poor.
\n<\/em>The black man’s face bespoke revenge as the fire passed from sight
\n<\/em>For all he saw in his stick of wood, was a chance to spite the white
\n<\/em>the last man of this forlorn group, Did naught except for gain
\n<\/em>Giving just to those<\/strong> who gave, was how he played the game.
\n<\/em>The logs held tight in death’s still hands, Was proof of human sin
\n<\/em>They didn’t die from the cold without, They died from the cold within<\/em>[2]<\/p>\n
\nis not a hell fire that sears eternally
\nsome damned group repelled by holiness<\/p>\n
\nHoly Spirit tongues that rain down in the justice of God
\nthe electric passion of chastened disciples
\nwho do not crouch fearfully in such times of spiritual chaos<\/p>\n
\nThe fire of your justice
\nInto our world \u2026 and into our hearts
\nSo we never again
\ndie from the cold within,
\nthrough Christ our Lord.<\/p>\n
\n[1]\u00a0See Alyce McKenzie, “Hi, Perbole! Exaggeration, Anyone? Reflections on Mark 9:38-49<\/a>“<\/h5>\n
[2]\u00a0James Patrick Kinney, \u201cThe Cold Within,\u201d public domain.<\/h5>\n