![]() ![]() We are continuing to work through Mark’s gospel we are at the eighteenth verse. If you’re using one of our church Bibles, you’ll find that on page 837. Inspiration for this week’s banner image: What does it mean to follow Jesus? I believe that we are invited to gaze upon the image of the crucified Jesus to soften our hearts toward all suffering, to help us see how we ourselves have been “bitten” by hatred and violence, and to know that God’s heart has always been softened toward us.So please take a copy of the Scriptures in your hands and turn with me to Mark’s gospel, chapter 2. Image credit: Crucifixion (detail), Georges Rouault, 1937. We keep saying, “We love Jesus,” but it is more as a God-figure than someone to imitate.Īdapted from Richard Rohr with John Bookser Feister, Jesus’ Plan for a New World: The Sermon on the Mount(Franciscan Media: 1996), 30-31. He was marginalized as a bit of a fanatic or eccentric by mainline Catholicism, as illustrated by no Pope ever taking his name until our present Pope Francis.Įven today many Christians keep Jesus on a seeming pedestal, worshiping a caricature on a cross or a bumper-sticker slogan while avoiding what Jesus said and did. Take for example the father of my own religious community, Saint Francis of Assisi. They tried to create some new wineskins, but often the church itself resisted their calls to structural reform. Christianity has shaped some wonderfully liberated saints, prophets, and mystics. But by and large we Christians did not produce positive change in culture or institutions that operated differently than the rest. ![]() That’s not to say our ancestors didn’t have faith, that Grandma and Grandpa were not good people. Our societies are more often based not upon the servant leadership that Jesus modeled, but on the common domination and control model that produces racism, classism, sexism, power seeking, and income inequality. So-called Christian nations are often the most militaristic, greedy, and untrue to the teacher we claim to follow. Unfortunately, Christianity has not always had a positive impact on Western civilization and the peoples it has colonized or evangelized. It’s easier to talk about the wine without the wineskins, to talk about salvation theories without any new world order. As Dorothy Day (1897–1980) often said in her inimitable Kingdom style, “Nothing is going to change until we stop accepting this dirty, rotten system!” Personal “salvation” cannot be divorced from social and systemic implications. Without new wineskins-changed institutions, systems, and structures-I would argue that transformation cannot be deep or lasting. It’s not enough to talk about some kind of new inebriating wine, some new ideas. ![]() People say they are saved, they are “born again,” yet how do we really know if someone is saved? Are they actually following Jesus? Do they love the poor? Are they free from their ego? Are they patient in the face of persecution? Rather, they pour new wine into fresh wineskins, and both are preserved.” -Matthew 9:17Ĭhristians have often preached a Gospel largely comprised of words, attitudes, and inner salvation experiences. Otherwise the skins burst, the wine spills out, and the skins are ruined. Jesus said, “People do not put new wine into old wineskins.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |