Month: January 2015

… Jesus challenges all fundamentalisms, all extremes. His backyard birth and foot-washing style of servant leadership, satirises both the powerful and those on the outside agitating for power. His ‘Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God’s’ lampoons the idolatry of the economic system as the basis of human flourishing and the battles fought by opposing sides within it. His donkey-Messiah performance on Palm Sunday mocks both the prevailing kings of the day and those seeking to follow a Messiah who will rule by terror and force of arms. His death on the cross derides the motivation of rulers who manipulate the law to keep their version of the peace, and the equally aggressive ambitions of subversives who challenge authority by acting outside the law.

One problem with worldly satire is that it appeals to elitism, that it stands outside and above those whom it lampoons, treating them as a different species, not-like-us. This is the way of the world; the way which leads to crucifixions, jihads, holocausts and Reigns of Terror.

The beauty of Jesus’ satirical way – a way of life he called the Kingdom of God – is that it does not stand outside the world or apart from others but inside, alongside, but in a wholly different way. …

– from my talk today, I am Charlie Hebrew: Jesus, the world’s satirist par excellence.

Revelation 5.1-10, John 1.43-51

Epiphany 2, 18 January 2015

Queen Camel, Corton Denham, West Camel, Weston Bampfylde

 

‘Can anything good come out of Nazareth?’ 

It’s satirical – what Nathanael said to Jesus in Galilee that day. 

We could easily imagine Nathanael’s question on the front cover of a first-century equivalent of Private Eye, a Jerusalem version of Charlie Hebdo, let’s call it Charlie Hebrew: a cartoon picture of a figure with a messianic look about him but emerging not from a royal palace or military HQ but from a ramshackle carpenter’s shed in the backwoods, holding not a glistening sword in his hand but a blunt chisel. And the caption below: ‘Can anything good come out of Nazareth?’ It’s satirical. [1]

And when Jesus saw Nathanael coming towards him, he said of him, ‘Here is truly an Israelite in whom there is no deceit!’ 

That’s satirical too – Jesus had seen Nathanael and Philip talking under the fig tree, and either heard what Nathaniel had said about anything good coming out of Nazareth, or worked out from his body language that he was a sardonic sort, given to sarcasm, open to satire. So Jesus met satire with satire: welcoming Nathaniel as ‘an Israelite without deceit’! Rather like Private Eye running a front cover picturing Richard Dawkins entering a church, the vicar at the door greeting him with the words, ‘Here’s an evolutionist with an open mind towards our faith’!

Start to look at it this way and you’ll begin to see that the gospels are full of satire. That Jesus himself is the satirist par excellence.

Picture our fictional magazine Charlie Hebrew, covering events back in Bethlehem in AD.1 with the headline, ‘A King is Born’ over an incongruous picture of a motley collection of people and animals gathered around a newborn in a backyard stable.

Roll forward thirty years to imagine our publication again where the headline now reads ‘The Messiah arrives’ over the picture of a kingly looking figure entering Jerusalem – but through a back gate, and riding not a gleaming chariot but a glum-looking donkey.

Jesus is the satirist par excellence – nothing shows that more than what he did to the cross – subverting its power and reversing its meaning entirely, turning the empire’s ultimate symbol of punishment and death into God’s glorious symbol of forgiveness and eternal life. 

We will come back to that soon, but first let me make this observation – that the sort of satire I’m suggesting Jesus epitomises, is of a different order from that used by Nicodemus, who was a sort-of Charlie Hebdo man of his day. Nicodemus’ satire puts Jesus down, tries to undermine him, put him in his place. It’s ungenerous, it’s diminishing. It gives the crowd an opportunity for a cheap laugh, a petty sneer at both Nazareth and Jesus himself. In this, Nicodemus shows the same sneering spirit as Pilate later did, when he ordered the words ‘Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews’ to be fastened above him on the cross. [2]

Satire is defined as ‘a genre of the arts, in which vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, ideally with the intent of shaming individuals, corporations, government or society itself, into improvement … its greater purpose is often constructive social criticism, using wit as a weapon and as a tool to draw attention to both particular and wider issues in society.’ [3]

In the wake of the terrible killings of the Charlie Hebdo journalists there are many debates taking place about the appropriate use of satire as social criticism – last Thursday Pope Francis spoke in defence of free speech – as a fundamental human right and a duty to speak one’s mind for the sake of the common good, but said that there are limits to freedom of speech, especially when it insults or ridicules someone’s faith: ‘You cannot provoke. You cannot insult the faith of others. You cannot make fun of the faith of others,’ he said. But others would disagree. [4] 

Such debates take place in a world of extremes – where the fundamentalism of Islamic extremism  clashes with the fundamentalism of liberal secularism and we are all caught up in the crossfire.

And this is the world which Jesus satirises – by not getting involved in these debates which require the taking of sides, by not being scandalised by the opposition, by not pointing the finger, the pen or the gun. But by directing us outside this conflict to show us another way.

Jesus’ satire is firmly grounded in this world but introduces a whole new way of seeing and of being. It is a satire which opens one’s eyes to understand society, which provides the keenest insights into our collective psyche, revealing our deepest values, our society’s structures of power. [5] Highlighting their limitations. Showing them to be wholly self-destructive. And offering something different altogether.

In a world which can only imagine power as being gained through wealth and influence – from his humble birth to his undistinguished death, Jesus introduces the servant spirit as being the way one can be lifted high. 

In a world which can only put things right by eliminating those who upset our equilibrium – by the cross, Jesus reveals the sacredness of the scapegoat, the innocence of the victim.

In a world which can only imagine stopping people killing by killing them – a world absurdly locked into endless spirals of violence – by the resurrection, Jesus kills death and introduces reconciliation through forgiveness as the higher force.

Jesus challenges all fundamentalisms, all extremes. His backyard birth and foot-washing style of servant leadership, satirises both the powerful and those on the outside agitating for power. His ‘Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s’ lampoons the idolatry of the economic system as the basis of human flourishing and the battles fought by opposing sides within it. His donkey-Messiah performance on Palm Sunday mocks both the prevailing kings of the day and those seeking to follow a Messiah who will rule by terror and force of arms. His death on the cross derides the motivation of rulers who manipulate the law to keep their version of the peace, and the equally aggressive ambitions of subversives who challenge authority by acting outside the law.

One problem with worldly satire is that it appeals to elitism, that it stands outside and above those whom it lampoons, treating them as a different species, not-like-us. This is the way of the world; the way which leads to crucifixions, jihads, holocausts and Reigns of Terror. [6]

The beauty of Jesus’ satirical way – a way of life he called the Kingdom of God – is that it does not stand outside the world or apart from others but inside, alongside, but in a wholly different way.

Where the world says, ‘Love your neighbourand hate your enemy,’ Jesus says, ‘Love your enemies’ – opening up for us the potential in putting down our weapons of war and learning dialogue and understanding and reconciliation. 

Where the world says, ‘Love your neighbourand hate your enemy,’ Jesus says, ‘Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you’ – opening up for us the potential in being freed from the dark forces of hatred and revenge, enabling us to move into the light of forgiveness and hope. [7]

Paul once wrote, ‘The message about the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.’ [8]

Jesus reveals the wisdom of God in ways which look ridiculous to the world. 

Jesus reveals the truth of God in ways which look to the world like silly little lies.  

Jesus reveals the judgment of God in ways which look imprudent to the world.  

Jesus reveals the love of God in ways which the world finds incomprehensible.  

But – consider this. The Jesus way is the real way that God intends the world to work. This is the keenest insight of all; which emerges into our collective psyche like a candle in the darkness, like an antibiotic into our infected body. 

I am Charlie Hebrew: is what we are saying as we worship him today. I have seen the light; I have taken the dose. I’m trying to live in the world with one foot in the Kingdom of God. I am trying to follow the way of Jesus, the world’s satirist par excellence.

 

Notes

[1] This sermon was preached in the wake of the Paris murder of 12 journalists from the French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo, by Islamist gunmen.

[2] John 19:19.

[3] Elliott, Robert C (2004), “The nature of satire”, Encyclopædia Britannica, cited in Wikipedia: Satire.

[4] Pope Francis On Charlie Hebdo: ‘You Cannot Insult The Faith Of Others’, Huffington Post, 15 January 2015. Nick Cohen, Yes, words hurt, but that doesn’t excuse a punchy pope, Guardian, 17 Jan 2015

[5] Wikipedia: Satire offers the writings of Harold Rosenberg, Vine Deloria, and Roderick Frazier Nash as proponents of these insights about satire’s role, but my suggestion is that Jesus’ satire supports, but is once – and radically – removed from all of these.

[6] Wikipedia: Reign of Terror. As Giles Fraser points out, ‘The glorious triumph of atheistic rationality over the dangerous totalitarian obscurantism of the Catholic church is one of the great foundation myths of republican France. And coded within this mythology is the message that liberty, equality, fraternity can flourish only when religion is suppressed from the public sphere. It is worth remembering what this ideological space-clearing involved.’ (France’s much vaunted secularism is not the neutral space it claims to be, Guardian, 17 Jan 2015), 

[7] Matthew 5.44.

[8] I Corinthians 1.18.

A Farewell to Mars: An Evangelical Pastor's Journey Toward the Biblical Gospel of Peace by Brian Zahnd
My Goodreads rating: 5 of 5 stars

This is not about giving up Mars the chocolate bar; this is about abandoning the god of War to follow the Prince of Peace. And it is a thrilling ride.

The book was everything that I'd been led to expect by previous enthusiastic reviewers whose opinions I respect deeply. It is a tour-de-force and a great gift to everyone seeking to follow their hunch that Christianity is not a warring religion, despite centuries of warped history which suggest otherwise; in fact in Jesus it offers the distinctive way to live in a peace reliant on nothing other than love. The greatest encouragement for me (in a book in which there are encouragements on every page) was that this project of 'peace reliant on nothing other than love' – otherwise known in Jesus' terms as the Kingdom of God – is for the here and now, it is 'an alternative political vision for humanity'. I'm very grateful to Brian Zahnd for this book, it encourages me to continue to seek to follow the Jesus he celebrates so vividly here.

Having met Herod in Jerusalem behaving the way of all kings, the pilgrims found in the child Jesus in the most unlikely of places, in a Bethlehem stable, a new form of kingliness, a new form of authority, altogether. It dawned on them that this child was not a king, this child was the king, but a king with no position – except the position of complete vulnerability, a king with no power – except the ‘soft’ power to fill them and all people with overwhelming joy. 

So they left by another road – avoiding a King Herod who was flexing his muscles in a show of hard power, and – transformed by their joyful  encounter with the new-born king – embarking on a journey forwards into the ways of soft power.

Their story resonates for us today, especially for those who might feel that the road we are on is a dead-end, a road too dependent on things which won’t last; for those who feel at a crossroads in our lives; for those who feel we’ve arrived at our Jerusalem but long to get to our Bethlehem. For those longing to learn how to exercise soft power in a world where hard power appears to hold sway.

– celebrating Ravi Singh and the volunteers from his Sikh international aid agency Khalsa Aid who helped in the Somerset Levels flood relief efforts last year, and Malala Yousafzai, Pakistani schoolgirl the youngest-ever Nobel Peace Prize laureate in 2014, for her activism for rights to education and for women … among the magi and other outsiders … in my talk for Epiphany, They came from another place – they left by a different road.

 

Isaiah 60.1-6, Matthew 2.1-12

Sutton Montis, Epiphany, 4/1/2014

 

They came from another place – they left by a different road. 

We can spend our time with the Epiphany story worrying over the astronomical problem of the star, the number of magi, the date – adding to the endless and largely fruitless debates on these topics. Or we can spend time instead with the key element of the story; the most obvious: that Christ was visited by non-Jews, who had worked out who he was, and his significance to them; Christ was visited by pilgrims who had no ethnic or ritualistic ties to Judaism. [1]

They came from another place – this is a message that bears repetition.  The wise men came from the East – from a different society, a different culture, a different belief system to the one practiced in Bethlehem. The Epiphany story invites us to consider the roots of our Christian faith: that we are inheritors of a form of Judaism affirmed by Eastern religion. In a world where religious and social identities are hardening, the Epiphany story invites us to embrace humility and openness towards others. In a society whose doors are closing to people who are different from ourselves, the Epiphany story invites us to dialogue with those who come from another place.

And one area of human life which sorely needs redirection is the religious life. The road which the world’s religions are on often seems to be a road which divides people of faith from each other, with fatal consequences. That the child Jesus was visited by pilgrims from the East prefigures for us the mission of the adult Jesus: to challenge those who followed the old ways to ask whether they were ‘living in a bubble, confusing their world with the whole world, lost in their little rituals and taboos, failing to see or embrace others’. [2] Epiphany also prefigures for us the message of the adult Jesus: that the good news of the Kingdom of God is for all people – not just our own. They came from another place – Epiphany invites us to reconsider our religious life as we live it out in relation to others.

In his New Year’s message the Archbishop of Canterbury reviewed the daily ‘toll of bad news’ in 2014, the persecution of Christians in the Middle East and north-east Nigeria, the massacre of schoolchildren in Peshawar, Pakistan, but despite all this, he cautioned against the temptation to ‘look inwards in despair’. [3] 

It is worth recalling that Archbishop Welby previously ran the reconciliation work at Coventry Cathedral, working extensively in the field in the Middle East and Africa, working on reconciliation with armed groups in the Niger Delta, with religious and political leaders in Israel and Palestine, once reopening the Anglican Church in Baghdad shortly after the allied invasion. [4] Last month he led a debate in the House of Lords on the role of ‘soft power’ and non-military options in preventing conflict, in which he stated that ‘the church, the Anglican Communion globally, is consistently at the forefront of conflict prevention’. [5]

The Lords Committee on Soft Power and the UK’s Influence recognised the role of diplomacy, of non-governmental organisations, of culture, trade, sport and education in counteracting conflict without resorting to force, in building understanding and goodwill across human boundaries.

And whilst the Lords’ debate also recognised the truth that ‘hard power’ is sometimes necessary to neutralize extreme acts of terrorism or violence, the point of the Archbishop’s debate is that the more we learn to use ‘soft power’, the more we open ourselves to dialogue with those who are different from ourselves, the more likely we are to build a world at peace with itself. [6] And this connects us with the other main point of the Epiphany story, which is that the visitors left by a different road. 

We can see it now, from Herod’s perspective – that the magi showing up at Jerusalem and excitably telling the citizens that they were looking for the new king who had been born there, was like you or me showing up at the airport of a country with a dictator, stating the purpose of our stay as a visit to the leader of the underground resistance. [7] These not-so worldly-wise ‘wise men’: their search for a king of peace got them embroiled in the troubles of a king in torment, got them entangled in Herod’s nasty vengeful conspiracy. What began as a hopeful journey for the magi ended in an anxious escape.

No wonder Herod reacted as he did, for that was the sort of king he was, a temporal, temporary, vulnerable, volatile ruler who only knew the ways of hard power. It was all that the magi would expect, ‘a world of crowns, fawning courtiers, royal robes, and hard cash’. 

But after meeting Herod and realising that the star was leading them towards an altogether different power source, the magi witnessed another world breaking through:

The reality [of this world] was the reek of livestock, a comfortless barn, a crude delivery, and an overwhelming fear for the future. Forget the colourful cards with docile animals, self-satisfied parents, and a handmade cradle filled with sanitised straw. The epiphany scene sends materialism and sentimentality packing. What is left is a profound sense of holiness, an overwhelming current of love, a reverence for all things so deep that the visiting kings … knelt, and a poverty that shimmers with prayer. [8]

Having met Herod in Jerusalem behaving the way of all kings, the pilgrims found in the child Jesus in the most unlikely of places, in a Bethlehem stable, a new form of kingliness, a new form of authority, altogether. It dawned on them that this child was not a king, this child was the king, but a king with no position – except the position of complete vulnerability, a king with no power – except the ‘soft’ power to fill them and all people with overwhelming joy. 

So they left by another road – avoiding a King Herod who was flexing his muscles in a show of hard power, and – transformed by their joyful  encounter with the new-born king – embarking on a journey forwards into the ways of soft power.

Their story resonates for us today, especially for those who might feel that the road we are on is a dead-end, a road too dependent on things which won’t last; for those who feel at a crossroads in our lives; for those who feel we’ve arrived at our Jerusalem but long to get to our Bethlehem. For those longing to learn how to exercise soft power in a world where hard power appears to hold sway.

The Bethlehem pilgrims could not return to the old ways of kings – they left by a very different  road. That’s what we mean by epiphany – a situation which causes one to be transformed, to see things a whole new way, to travel from thereon in another direction altogether. To leave by a different road. ‘We cannot encounter the Christ and remain unchanged,’ says David Bryant. ‘The old signposts get knocked sideways, and our thought-forms are fundamentally realigned. This is precisely what happened to the kings.’ [8]

So is 2015 to be a year in which people of goodwill of all religious realign themselves – to seek positive transformations in their relationships, to learn how to travel as companions in altogether healthier directions? If it is then we must learn to use our soft power well. 

Epiphany invites us to positively recall those times in our lives when we may have travelled into a new situation from another place, and those encounters we had with others there who welcomed us, helped us find new perspectives or set out in a new direction. Epiphany invites us to remember those times when outsiders have come into our lives – people quite different from ourselves whose words and ways have educated, challenged and changed us.

At Epiphany we can celebrate those occasions where people of different faiths have found a demanding common task at which to work together, and strengthened relationships between each other in the process. Think back to the relief efforts in the flooded Somerset Levels last year, of the contribution of Ravi Singh and the volunteers from his Sikh international aid agency Khalsa Aid who helped there, and positive effect for interfaith understanding of that intervention; [9] think of the witness of Malala Yousafzai, Pakistani schoolgirl and at just 17 the youngest-ever Nobel Peace Prize laureate in 2014, for her activism for rights to education and for women, currently a pupil at the all-girls’ Edgbaston High School in Birmingham. [10]

We can today give thanks for interfaith groups operating in universities and colleges, in workplaces and local communities where relationships are being developed to the extent where people from different cultures are unafraid to deeply question each other, developing healthy understanding between those who come from a different place; for where such positive conversation is absent, there extremism will flourish. [11] We can be encouraged by the prolferation of opportunities for Christians, Muslims and Jews to debate and dialogue together about their scriptures and their varying interpretations of them. [12] 

They came from another place – they left by a different road. May the journey which the magi took influence our own journeys this year as we seek to wield our soft power, and contribute to the wellbeing of all.

 

Notes

This talk references a sermon first preached as They left by another road, Devon, Epiphany 2013

[1] Leader comment, Disorganised religion, Church Times, 3 January 2015.

[2] I owe this sentence to Nick Cohen, whose article The Great Betrayal: How Liberals Appease Islam, Standpoint, January/February 2015, underlies the course of the discussion.

[3] Madeleine Davies,  Welby: 2014 was a tough year, Church Times, 3 January 2015.

[4] About Justin Welby, Justin Welby, the Archbishop of Canterbury website.

[5] Archbishop’s House of Lords soft power debate – opening speech, Justin Welby, the Archbishop of Canterbury website.

[6] For nuanced discussions on the interplay between soft and hard power see the House of Lords website The Committee on Soft Power and the UK’s Influence and also Nick Cohen, [2] above.

[7] Rosalind Brown, Readings: Epiphany, Church Times, 4 January 2013.

[8] David Bryant,  Returning by another way, Church Times, 4 January 2013.

[9] See reports on the Khalsa Aid website.

[10] Wikipedia: Malala Yousafzai.

[11] ‘For the young in particular, what their friends argue against and deride will have more effect on them than the lectures of government ministers.’ Nick Cohen, [2] above. The Interfaith Network for the UK.

[12] Last year I joined an online discussion group doing just this, Nurani, the Scriptural Reasoning website where ‘small groups of Jews, Christians and Muslims, and sometimes people of other faiths, gather to read and reflect on short passages from their scriptures together.’