The Prodigal Son

There was a man with two sons.

He was rich. He had property. He had land. He had slaves. He had two sons. The younger asks for his inheritance and squanders it. He goes back home and is welcomed back by his father. With a feast, a robe, sandals, and a ring. The older is angry, feels slighted, and left out so the father reminds him that “you are always with me and all is mine is yours.” 

In the end, everybody lives happily ever after. Father and sons. Still propertied. Still landed. Still slaveholders. Still rich.

My friends, we should stop identifying rich fathers, rich landowners, and rich slaveholders with God. Parables of Jesus were subversive speech. They indicted the status quo. They challenged Pax Romana.

They were the reasons Jesus was executed.

The Centurion and his Beloved

Palestine had been under Roman Occupation for almost a century during the time of Jesus. With the death of Herod the Great, direct control was put in effect. Thus, a Roman Governor, Pontius Pilate, run Judea by the time of Jesus’s ministry.

Historians tell us that most Jews hated the Romans. They hated Roman Centurions more. And the feeling was mutual. Hatred for centurions was especially pronounced because the centurion, not the emperor nor the Roman senators, served as the face of the empire for majority of the occupied peoples. In other words, centurions were the enemies; the concrete presence of the occupying forces; the oppressor; the colonizer. Moreover, a centurion led the detachment that executed Jesus.

If we agree with the historical argument that Matthew and Luke shared a source that predates both gospels, then we have a Jesus tradition that celebrates inclusivity at its finest. 

The narrative, especially Luke's version, introduces Jewish leaders that defy our stereotype. They love the centurion. It also presents a centurion that defies our stereotype. This centurion loves the Jewish people, even building a synagogue for them. Finally, it presents a Jesus who makes many uncomfortable. He heals the centurion’s younger male lover or boyfriend who was very ill and close to death.

Many of you here know that two words play important functions in the narrative. Doulos and pais. Doulos is always translated slave. While pais is usually translated servant. But we also know that pais can be translated servant, son, daughter, child, child servant, or younger male lover or boyfriend. Or beloved.

Caesar Augustus, probably because of the debacle the Legions experienced in Germany because there were so many wives, children, and slaves with the soldiers decreed a ban on heterosexual marriages for members of the Roman Imperial Forces. The ban was still in force during Jesus’s time. The ban lasted until 197 CE. Thus, it was not uncommon for Roman soldiers to have same sex relationships, especially with younger men.

The Occupied Jews knew this meaning of pais, Matthew, Luke, and their source knew this meaning of pais, Greek writers and philosophers spoke of pais this way, I’m pretty sure Jesus did as well. And when the centurion came to him, most probably at his wits end looking for healing for his ill and dying beloved, Jesus healed him.

Jesus did not heal him because he loved the sinner but hated the sin. He healed him because he was sick and close to death. Lest we forget, the Jewish elders, the centurion, and Jesus were united by one objective, the healing of the Centurion's younger partner; his beloved. 

Jesus did not care whether the centurion was a Gentile, an enemy of his people, and uncircumcised. He did not care if he had the right religion, the right creed, the right skin color, the right sexual orientation and gender identity …

What Jesus saw instead was this enemy who loved the Jews so dearly that the Jews loved him back. He only saw the love of the centurion for his ill and dying boyfriend, a love that transgressed borders in order to seek healing and restoration for the beloved.

This love is akin to the love that feeds the hungry, gives drink to the thirsty, welcomes the stranger, visits the sick, proclaims good news to the poor, liberates the captives, clothes the naked, and sets the oppressed free!

This is the love that believes that hope is greater than despair; that faith is stronger than fear; and that life will always conquer death. This is the love that transforms the world. 

#MarcosNoHero

Jose Rizal is not buried in the Libingan Ng Mga Bayani.
Nor is Antonio Luna. Not Claro M. Recto. Nor Gabriela and Diego Silang. Not Macli-ing Dulag!

Nobody really knows where lie the bodies of thousands of Filipinos—heroes and heroines—who offered their lives fighting against the Spaniards, the Americans, and the Japanese.

Nobody really knows where lie the bodies of countless students, church workers, laborers, farmers, fisher-folk, comrades—heroes and heroines—who disappeared during the Marcos Regime. And the countless more who have disappeared during the Aquino, Ramos, Estrada, Arroyo, and Aquino regimes.

Philippine soil from the Cordilleras to Mount Apo is nourished by the blood of fallen sisters and brothers in unmarked, mass, shallow graves. Just like Andres Bonifacio, the First President of the Philippines, who at 34 was executed with his brother, Procopio, and whose bodies were robbed of garments and then thrown naked into a hastily dug grave.

Heroines and heroes, all of them. And each of them are alive. In our collective memories. In our shared history of struggle. In our hearts. In the visions of justice, peace, land, and liberation for all that their sacrifice offered us.

Marcos, on the other hand, is no hero. A hero’s burial does not make one a hero. Never has. Never will.

#MarcosNoHero

Jose Rizal is not buried in the Libingan Ng Mga Bayani.
Nor is Antonio Luna. Not Claro M. Recto. Nor Gabriela and Diego Silang. Not Macli-ing Dulag!

Nobody really knows where lie the bodies of thousands of Filipinos—heroes and heroines—who offered their lives fighting against the Spaniards, the Americans, and the Japanese.

Nobody really knows where lie the bodies of countless students, church workers, laborers, farmers, fisher-folk, comrades—heroes and heroines—who disappeared during the Marcos Regime. And the countless more who have disappeared during the Aquino, Ramos, Estrada, Arroyo, and Aquino regimes.

Philippine soil from the Cordilleras to Mount Apo is nourished by the blood of fallen sisters and brothers in unmarked, mass, shallow graves. Just like Andres Bonifacio, the First President of the Philippines, who at 34 was executed with his brother, Procopio, and whose bodies were robbed of garments and then thrown naked into a hastily dug grave.

Heroines and heroes, all of them. And each of them are alive. In our collective memories. In our hearts. In the visions of justice, peace, land, and liberation for all that they shared with us.

Marcos, on the other hand, is no hero. A hero’s burial does not make one a hero. Never has. Never will.

THE PARABLE OF THE WEDDING BANQUET

Why do we identify the King in the parable with God?

The King is a King. He is on top of an intricate system of honor and shame, patronage, property, and privilege. He is rich. He is powerful. He hosts a banquet. His invite is turned down. He is shamed. He gets back at those who shamed him. He has them killed and burns down their city.

Then he gathers the dregs of society to his banquet. He finds one of the dregs not wearing the wedding robe which the King obviously provided (where do you expect the dregs of society to get clothes for a royal wedding?).  The King is a King. He is rich. He is powerful. He is benevolent but he has been shamed again! He has his minions bind the man, hand and foot, and thrown out to where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

And this is how we imagine the Kingdom of God?   

Parables are the opposite of myths. If myths are stories that create order, parables subvert. Parables are subversive speech. The Roman Empire killed Jesus. Historians Josephus (Jewish) and Tacitus (Roman) both report the crucifixion. Jesus was, most probably, executed for the movement he started and the parables he weaved. 

COMING OUT

#nationalcomingoutday #comingout #kabahaghari

I would like to believe that the incarnation is really about God coming out. In the Gospel of Mark, God comes out of heaven. One can argue that God actually escapes from heaven. Compared to the Matthean and Lukan versions which state that “the heavens were opened,” the Markan passage states “the heavens were torn” apart. In Mark, God comes out of heaven and does not return!

I would like to believe that the incarnation gives us a clearer vision of who God really is: the God who wants to be one of us; the God who takes sides; the God who is waiting ahead of us in Galilee where many of us do not want to go; the God who loved sinners, prostitutes, lepers, rebels, outcasts, and eunuchs; the God who dearly loved Mary of Magdala, Simon Peter, the Beloved Disciple, and, yes, the young man in the garden; and, finally, God-with-us, Immanuel, the One who will never, ever, forsake us.

I would like to believe that you believe these as well.

THE PARABLE OF THE SAMARITAN AND THE INN-KEEPER

We know this story already. Surveys show that this story is one of the two most Christians call their favorite. The other is the Prodigal Son. Both come from Luke. Those of us who have read and studied Luke know that this gospel has a particular bias for the poor, the marginalized, the oppressed, the foreigner, and the outsider…

A man is near death along the bloody way that connects Jerusalem and Jericho and the people we expect to stop and help ignore him. Two people actually help. The Samaritan and the Inn-keeper. Both nurse the man back to health.

In the past 100 days, several thousand people have died. They were near death but because we, like the Priest and the Levite in the story, chose not to stop and chose to ignore them. We chose to let them die. We found them near death, victims of a menace we call drugs, but we chose to let them die rather than nurture them back to health.

In the next 100 days, more will die. Thousands.

Unless we, all of us, decide to be Samaritans and Inn-keepers. We must demand a stop to the killings. We must carry our near-death sisters and brothers to safe places where they can heal. If we do not know how to do this, we must learn. We must open our hands, our hearts, our homes, our churches, our hospitals, our schools, so that we can nurture our near-death sisters and brothers back to health.

And we must do this now!

OF GARDENS AND WEEDS

In Memory: Bishop Alberto Ramento
Luke 13. 18-19

Gaius Plinius Secundus (aka Pliny the Elder) in his Natural History 19.170-171 wrote that “mustard [sinapi kokkos] …grows entirely wild… and when it is sown, it is scarcely possible to get the place free of it, as the seed when it falls germinates at once.”

John Dominic Crossan tells us that the mustard in the parable was a wild weed shrub that grew to about five feet or even higher. Even in their domesticated form they were a lot to handle. Mustard in a well-kept garden not only spread beyond expectations but also attracted birds of all forms thus disturbing the natural balance of a well-manicured garden, with the birds’ unpredictable feeding habits, and worse, their droppings. St. Francis of Assisi, who, as legend has it, was very close to wild creatures, and who, as the story goes, would not even hurt a fly, was also against the pulling out of weeds.

Gardeners, of course, did not want weeds in their gardens. They did not want wild mustard at all cost. They spend time creating the perfect balance in their gardens: putting in the best, throwing out the worst. A well-manicured garden has no room for wild mustard so they cut mustard young and at the roots. The mustard weed though have a way of coming back.

They always do.

The parable likens God’s reign, God’s empire to a weed. It grows where it is not wanted and eventually takes over the place. Jesus, who advocated an alternative culture of radical egalitarianism, an open commensality of free healing and eating, of miracle and meal among the peasant and marginalized communities of Galilee was executed at age 30 when his vision clashed with that of the urban religious and political structures of power in Jerusalem.

The wild mustard from Galilee that sprung in the domesticated garden of Judea, that attracted all kinds of birds that gardeners despised, was swiftly cut down. Do not forget this—The God we worship is an executed God. He was executed by the empire for the life he lived in solidarity with the poor and the stories of compassion he told.

Many scholars of first century Palestine now agree, enemies of Rome who were executed by crucifixion had their naked bodies left hanging on crosses for the vultures and wild dogs to feast on, thrown into mass graves, or hastily buried in borrowed tombs.

Nobody really knows where lie the bodies of hundreds of students, church workers, community leaders, farmers, fisher-folk, laborers, and activists who disappeared during the Marcos Regime. And the countless more who have disappeared during the Aquino, Ramos, Estrada, Arroyo, and Aquino administrations. Philippine soil from the Cordilleras to Mount Apo is nourished by the blood of fallen sisters and brothers in unmarked, mass, shallow graves. Just like Andres Bonifacio who at 34 was murdered with his brother and whose bodies were robbed of garments and then thrown naked into a hastily dug grave.

All were wild mustard that had to be cut down lest they disturb the domesticity of the gardens tended by the rich, the powerful, and the religious elite the majority of whom take pride in calling themselves, their institutions, and their structures “Christian.”

But Jesus’s vision lives on. And those of the others live on. Today, we especially remember the vision, the mission, and the ministry of Bishop Alberto Ramento. Like his Lord, he was executed by “domesticated gardeners who do not want wild weeds that invite unwanted birds.”

But wild weeds have a way of coming back. When you least expect them. Ask any gardener. You can never completely eradicate wild weeds like mustard. They have a way of sprouting in places where they disturb, disrupt, and dismantle the status quo.

They always do!

Jeepney Hermeneutics

"There are examples, however, of critical theory that is distinctly Asian or a modification of Western modes of thought with Asian interests. Using Western theory and method is inescapable and can even be considered a witting tool, used by the colonized when they try to “write back and work against colonial assumptions, representations, and ideologies” (Sugirtharajah, 1998, p. x). The Filipino Jeepney hermeneutics is one such venture, demonstrating the capacity to transform tools of mass destruction into resources for life (as in the writings of Revelation E. Velunta). Thus while cultural studies is not just an Asian American interpretive mode of discourse, it may be utilized by Asian interpreters in a more critical manner."

(Asian/Asian American Interpretation, Source:
The Oxford Encyclopedia of the Bible and Gender Studies, accessible online at http://www.oxfordbiblicalstudies.com/article/opr/t453/e1)

PAIN HAS NO SABBATH

Luke 13: 10-17 10 Now he was teaching in one of the synagogues on the sabbath. 11 And just then there appeared a woman with a spirit that had crippled her for eighteen years. She was bent over and was quite unable to stand up straight. 12 When Jesus saw her, he called her over and said, “Woman, you are set free from your ailment.” 13 When he laid his hands on her, immediately she stood up straight and began praising God. 14 But the leader of the synagogue, indignant because Jesus had cured on the sabbath, kept saying to the crowd, “There are six days on which work ought to be done; come on those days and be cured, and not on the sabbath day.” 15 But the Lord answered him and said, “You hypocrites! Does not each of you on the sabbath untie his ox or his donkey from the manger, and lead it away to give it water? 16 And ought not this woman, a daughter of Abraham whom Satan bound for eighteen long years, be set free from this bondage on the sabbath day?” 17


When he said this, all his opponents were put to shame; and the entire crowd was rejoicing at all the wonderful things that he was doing. (NRSV) The Gospel of Luke is a favorite among many Filipino Christians. Two of the best loved parables of Jesus are in Luke, the Samaritan in Chapter 10 and the Prodigal Son in Chapter 15. The Roman Catholic Church’s Preferential Option for the Poor is grounded on this gospel. The UCCP particularly loves Luke 4 (and Matthew 25). Lest we forget, the gospel that Jesus was anointed to proclaim is good news to the poor. And Luke is the best source for understanding the challenge of this gospel that takes the side of those whose only hope is God, of those who need God the most.

Critical parts of Jesus’s mission are to proclaim release to the captives and to let the oppressed go free. Both mean the same thing: liberation! Our reading for today is Jesus doing his mission of liberation. In Jesus’s response to the leader of the synagogue (verse 15) he mentions three characters who are all bound and have to be released. The ox and the donkey are both tied. They have to be released in order to get water. If they are not released, if they do not get water, they might get dehydrated or worse, die. The woman, whom Jesus calls a daughter of Abraham—which incidentally is the only time in the whole Bible that the description is used—is also bound. Satan has bound her for 18 long years. Medical experts who have studied this passage say that those were 18 agonizingly painful years. Whether she had tuberculosis of the spine, spondylitis ankylopoietica, osteoarthritis of the spine, or osteoporosis of the spine, she was in terrible pain. Every single day. She had to be released. She had to be set free.

My friends, the exchange between Jesus and the synagogue leader is not about good and bad. It is about good and good. How do we choose? Justly. The synagogue leader was saying: you can heal her any other day except today. He was arguing: what is one more day of suffering to someone who has already endured 18 years of agonizing pain? That’s 6570 days of pain. What is one day more? Jesus, on the other hand, was saying: why do I need to heal her any other day when I can do it today! For Jesus, suffering is suffering. Why wait for tomorrow when we can stop it today! The synagogue leader’s opinion is justice delayed. Jesus’s retort was justice right now! The woman despite her agonizing pain, despite her suffering went to the synagogue regularly. Did you think for one second that her pain rested during those Sabbath days? Did you think her suffering stopped while she sang, chanted, and studied the Torah? Do not forget this, ever: suffering does not have Sabbaths. Oppression has no rest days. Evil does not rest.

Do you think the suffering, humiliation, and discrimination that Palestinians experience as they go through Israeli checkpoints twice a day stop during Sabbath? Do you think the daily average of 45,000 people, half of them children under 5, who die in the Congo, stop because the killers behind the world’s worst genocide have to go to church on Sundays? Do you think our Lumad sisters and brothers get Sundays off from the displacement, dispossession, and militarization they experience from the AFP, CAFGU, and private armies of mining corporations? Do you think the pains, the suffering, and the diseases that afflict close to a billion of the world’s children caused by malnutrition, poverty, and hunger cease every time they attend mass or praise and worship? Suffering does not have sabbaths. Oppression has no rest days. Evil does not rest!

Thus, the struggle for life, for liberation, for wholeness, for abundant life for all has no rest days as well. This is why Jesus always healed on the Sabbath. This is why he proclaimed release to the captives and set the oppressed free on the Sabbath. This is why we are challenged to do the same! My friends, today is the day of liberation. Of course, we can wait for tomorrow but tomorrow might be too late. Proclaim release to the captives! Let the oppressed go free!

TODAY!

Fish and Bread

Context: Antiquity. Roman Empire. Colony. Palestine. Puppet government. Caesarea. Tiberias. Cities in honor of emperors. Dispossessed farmers. Dislocated fisherfolk. Taxes and more taxes. Debts and mounting debts. Text: The Gospels. Fishing all night. No catch. Tending nets. No catch. Parables of Workers and Tenants in Vineyards. Daily wages. Subsistence pay. No work. Dispossessed farmers. Dislocated fisherfolk. The Gospels: Thousands fed with bread and fish. A child offers five loaves and two fish. A ritual of bread and fish. Taking sides with farmers and fisherfolk. Then and now: Taking sides with those who need God the most. Taking sides with those whose only hope is God. Taking sides with farmers and fisherfolk.

BORDER CROSSING...

Going outside boxes is hard. Leaving our comfort zones? Equally hard. The Magi’s quest took over two years, border-crossing, in search of a child, a complete stranger; a stranger they believed would liberate his people from oppression. Crossing boundaries, discarding prejudices, tearing down walls: very, very hard. And very, very scary! And taking another road back is hard and scary, as well. The Magi went against the orders of Herod the King and innocent children were massacred. More often than not, then and now, when the Powerful are threatened, the most powerless get hurt. Who among us have flown on airplanes? Who among us have looked out the windows of those airplanes and seen the land masses below? What did you see? Did you see the lines, the borders that separated one nation from another? Did you see the markers that identified each country's territory apart from another? Like in our maps? The boxes we make, our comfort zones, our prejudices, the thick and high walls around our homes and even our churches, our accurate maps, even that Apartheid Wall in Israel, the borders that separate us are all man-made. We put them up, which means we can tear them down!

When Typhoon Yolanda devastated the Visayas, we saw the borders created by the political lines: the Cojuangcos and Roxases, and the Romualdezes and Marcoses; the national and local government; international relief organizations and the DSWD; the survivors who have no choice but to remain in Tacloban and the survivors who were able to leave immediately because they had homes elsewhere. But we have also seen how volunteers from different sectors, of different ages, and from different races cross boundaries and go where many of them, where many of us, have never gone before. The international community have crossed the lines and broken the walls to express compassion for and solidarity with our Filipino sisters and brothers, more than what our government has done. In the verses that we have been reflecting on from the first chapters of Matthew and of Luke since December 16, one element is crystal clear. Except for Mary and Joseph, all the characters who come together to celebrate the birth of the Messiah are strangers. Complete Strangers. Empires and Kingdoms create systems and lifestyles that create strangers, that divide, that pit one against the other, whether the division is based on class, race, creed, gender, religion… The birth of the Messiah, the fulfilment of the promise of Immanuel, the coming of Yeshua—which means Yahweh Liberates—brings complete strangers together, births community! The birth of the Messiah, my dear friends, can tear down walls. If you read your Bible and pray every day you will grow, grow, grow in the realization that the Gospel of Matthew starts and ends with Immanuel, God-with-us. And today’s lectionary reading, Matthew 25: 31-46, is Immanuel in Action… Feeding the hungry, giving drink to the thirsty, visiting the sick and the imprisoned, clothing the naked, welcoming the stranger. How many times have we spent waiting for God’s presence, Immanuel, in our lives… The key is not to wait for Immanuel but to be Immanuel to those who need God the most, to those whose only hope is God! Today, as people struggle for life in places like Tacloban and many towns in the Visayas, each of us is invited to be active participants in the quest for a just and lasting peace, to be agents of love and faith and hope in the healing of our world, to tear down the walls that divide the fed and the hungry, the healthy and the sick, the rich and the poor… Despite the tragedies that have befallen our country, many of us here tonight have much to be thankful for. God has been good to us. But thanksgiving unless shared and celebrated with those whose only hope is God is not really thanksgiving, it is investing, waiting for returns. The Magi gave their very best. They did not go to Bethlehem to have an exchange gift or monito-monita. To be thankful is to share, to take risks, to cross borders, to tear down walls and thus encounter the stranger. Scary? Yes. Hard? Yes. Dangerous? Yes. But this is what the incarnation is all about. No one deserves to be alone so God took the first step. God crossed borders. God left heaven to be with us. God chose to be one of us. God took sides. And God took the side of the poor, the oppressed, the marginalized… those who are totally different from us. And we, those who confess to follow God, should do the same. My friends, as we welcome 2014, I invite us all to cross borders like the Magi, to tear down walls that divide, to be God’s presence in others’ lives, to change our ways and take another road. And like the Magi, by taking another road, the road less traveled, let us participate in the healing of our world and in our own healing. Happy New Year! [NEW YEAR'S EVE HOMILY,PCCL UNIVERSITY CHURCH]

NO ROOM...

The first Christmas. We re-enact it almost every December in our school plays and in our church pageants. St. Francis started the tradition in the 1200s. In our re-enactments, Joseph and a very pregnant Mary find no room in any inn. No one is ready and willing to welcome the couple. Eventually, they find shelter among animals, in a manger, where Jesus is born. Soon, visitors arrive: angels, shepherds, even the Little Drummer Boy in some of our plays, and then the magi bringing gifts. Incidentally, in one TV spot I saw abroad, one of the magi brings the Baby Jesus the newest Android Smartphone. In an artwork going around in our social networks, the magi cannot visit Jesus because an apartheid wall blocks their path. In the image above, Mary and Joseph experience an IDF checkpoint. Our plays usually end on a happy note because we either end it with everyone singing carols or with a rendition of Handel’s Hallelujah Chorus, sang by the choir or blasted through our sound systems. And we forget that the play ended the way it began: there was no room in the inn. In rare occasions we do find people going against the script. Sometimes, someone from the audience, someone from our congregations would volunteer to welcome Joseph, Mary, and Joseph to their homes. Sometimes, we hear someone crying out: “There is a place for them in our home.” Today is one of those times when we are challenged to affirm that “there is a place in our homes.” Today, more than ever, we need to go against the script. We cannot afford to close our doors. We cannot afford to put up walls. We cannot afford to be inhospitable. We cannot afford to spend Christmas without opening our homes to the Christ who confronts us through the least among the least: the hungry, the thirsty, the sick, the prisoners, the unclothed, the complete stranger, the orphan, the widow... the thousands left homeless and devastated in the Visayas by the tragedy we call Yolanda; the thousands victimized by years of unabated mining, logging, militarization, and the culture of impunity. Today, we are called to have open hearts, open minds, open homes, open tables, open doors... ------ *[image from cifwatch.com]