DAY OFF

One of the more fascinating characteristics of God in Genesis 1 is one many of us miss. God rests on the seventh day.

In other words, God takes a day off.

Sunday's lection offers us a glimpse of Jesus declaring a break for himself and his discples. Mark 6:31 reads: Then, because so many people were coming and going that they did not even have a chance to eat, he said to them, “Come with me by yourselves to a quiet place and get some rest.”

They did go away to a quiet place and got some rest.

My friends, almost everyone needs a break. I say "almost everyone," because there are people who are born wealthy and who will die wealthier without ever working one minute of their entire lives. This post is not about them.

There are Church Workers whose official day off falls on Mondays. But they have never, ever, had a single day off. Even the land needs a Sabbath. And so does Mother Earth.

On July 19, Monday, please take the day off.


#IAmWithJesus
#EndTheCultureOfImpunity
#StopTheKillingsPH
#FreePalestine
#JusticeForMyanmar
#JunkTerrorLawNow

*art, "take no cloak or sandals," from readingacts.

SALOME AND KAKAY

Kakay Pamaran's work on Salome is a brilliant thesis using Historical Jesus Research methods. She argues that the "princess's dance which led to the prophet's death" tradition is part of a much bigger extra-canonical Salome Corpus that is still waiting to be collected, catalogued, and celebrated.

Salome and Mary Magdalene are two of the most attested interlocutors of Jesus in extra-canonical Christian literature. There are scholars whose research have shown how Mary Magdalene has been systematically erased from orthodox traditions. Kakay's research pursues a similar trajectory. There are copies of Mark where Salome completely disappears from the list of the women who discovers the empty tomb. Matthew’s and Luke's accounts do not mention Salome.

Many people today would call Magdalene a prostitute or adulteress and Salome a temptress or seductress. All these are false. Fake news. Kakay's work calls the church to repent of its violent sins of systematic erasuring and institutional forgetting.

More importantly, Kakay's work challenges the church to open the canon and discover the diverse, pluriform, and multivocal Christian traditions that make up the 99% that orthodoxy have marginalized.

*Kakay Pamaran, Salvae Salome: Corpus, Myth, Canon, and the Quest for Salome (Union Theological Seminary, Philippines Master of Theology thesis, 2021).

HOMECOMING

Homecomings conjure up positive images for a lot of people, especially these days. For many, homecoming is almost synonymous with reunion--especially during these trying days.

We can touch again. We can hug again. We can play again. We can talk in person again. We do not have to worry as much about infecting each other with unknown illnesses. This is the homecoming, the reunion most of us picture.

But Sunday's lection on Jesus's homecoming paints a different picture. His townmates ask, "Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary and brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon, and are not his sisters here with us?" Mark's 'The carpenter from Nazareth, the son of Mary' (read, bastard) was a hard sell. It was certainly a hard sell for the other Nazarenes; in the Lukan version of this story, they tried to throw Jesus off a cliff.

I always ask my students to imagine a daughter or sister or friend who is barely out of her teens being pregnant and telling everyone that the father of her child is the Holy Spirit. Mark's 'The carpenter from Nazareth, the son of Mary' (read, bastard) was a hard sell. Then and now.

To this day, the bastard from Nazareth who lived his life with and for those whose only hope was God; who preached good news to the poor; who challenged the rich to sell everything they have and give the proceeds to the destitute; who defied empire and its life-negating systems; and who commanded everyone who followed him to offer one's life for a friend; remains a very hard sell.

You can't exactly sell a way of life that carries a high risk of being executed by the state, can you?

#IAmWithJesus
#EndTheCultureOfImpunity
#StopTheKillingsPH
#FreePalestine
#JusticeForMyanmar

*art, "Jesus as a child in Nazareth," (JESUS MAFA) available at the Vanderbilt Divinity Library digital archives.

TOUCHING MOMENTS

Like many people I know, I was nurtured in a "touchy-feely" culture. Many of our pains, physical or otherwise, were soothed and massaged away by the healing touch of our loved ones. Holding, hugging, and kissing were all integral parts of our growing up years. Touching helped in making us feel safe, loved, and not alone. We learned the science behind all these "touching moments" much later. 

If we read our Bibles and pray everyday, we will grow, grow, and grow in the realization that many of the healing narratives in the Gospels involve touching. Sunday's lection has two sections: the first part has a woman suffering for twelve years who touches Jesus's cloak; in the second part, Jesus touches a twelve-year old girl's hand and tells her to rise up.

The pandemic has left millions dead and tens of millions disenfranchised. Most of the quarantine protocols are anti-poor because these assume that everyone has a home to work from and that everyone has work. 

Physical distancing has made so many socially distant. Alone. Depressed. Afraid. In desperate need to touch someone, or be touched.

If there's a will, there's a way. Even in a pandemic. 

*art, "Healing of the Daughter of Jairus," (JESUS MAFA) available at vanderbilt divinity library archives.

**read How to Hug During a Pandemic (The New York Times) 

 

STORM AT SEA

In Sunday's lection, the disciples find themselves in the middle of a raging storm. Jesus is with them but he is asleep. Only the Gospel of Mark shares the detail that he was sleeping on a pillow. Scholars say that pillow was actually a sack of sand for ballast.

What's fascinating about this narrative is that the fisherfolk did not wake Jesus up until they themselves were already afraid.

Jesus, the carpenter, was sleeping in the safest part of the boat, beneath the stern deck. So, when the disciples--who lived by and off the sea in calm and stormy weather--came to wake him up, there was really reason to be afraid. The storm was life threatening!

Jesus woke up and calmed the storm.

When fisherfolk--then and now--sound the alarm, lives are at stake. When indigenous communities cry out for help, they have done everything possible to avert disaster. When farmers declare that their livelihood is endangered, they have exhausted all avenues for relief.

Many among us, despite the storms of life, are asleep and safe because of what others are doing. But there are storms that are so dangerous, for everyone, that we need to be awakened and be put to task.

It is time for us to arise and face the raging storms.

#EndTheCultureOfImpunity
#IAmWithJesus
#JunkTerrorLawNow
#JusticeForMyanmar
#StopTheKillingsPH


*art, "Jesus lulls the storm," JESUS MAFA, available from Vanderbilt Divinity Library digital archives.

THE SEED

 

Most of us were required to do this science project early in grade school. Bring soil in see-through pots or containers, as well as some seeds. In many cases in the Philippines, we brought mongo beans. We called this project, "The Life Cycle Of A Plant."

Many times our next science project was "The Life Cycle Of A Frog." But this is topic for another time.

Back to the mongo beans. We waited patiently for the seeds to break ground. For six year olds, waiting for hours takes forever. Then we see the surprise. Slowly but surely, the tiny seeds become plants...and we watch in awe and wonder.

People whose hearts beat with the heartbeat of Mother Earth know this parable. Not as a story, but as the reality of life. Life begets life. Each seed bears a promise. All life breathes!

Many times we forget that God's creation helps God create. The waters bring forth fish of all kinds; the earth brings forth plants and animals. Many times we forget that we--you and I--are latecomers to the cycles and dances of life.

Maybe it's time we just step back and watch in awe and wonder. Like we did when we were six years old.

#IAmWithJesus
#EndTheCultureOfImpunity
#SpiritIsMatter

*image from Science 101: Iowa Agriculture Literacy

BINDING THE STRONG MAN

Parables are subversive. Subversion is often considered a crime. A crime warrants punishment. A punishment's severity depends on the magnitude of the crime. If a crime is considered severe, like insurrection, then it warrants execution. Therefore, parables can get one dead.

With that logic in mind, consider this: Sunday's lection is one of Jesus's most subversive.

"If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand. And if a house is divided against itself, that house will not be able to stand. And if Satan has risen up against himself and is divided, he cannot stand, but his end has come. But no one can enter a strong man’s house and plunder his property without first binding the strong man; then indeed the house can be plundered."

One word: insurrection.

Many scholars say the kingdom refers to the State, more specifically, Rome and its puppet government in Palestine. The house refers to the Temple, more specifically, the religious elite beholden to empire. Satan, of course, refers to Rome. As a side note: Pontius Pilate, the Roman Governor of Judea, and Joseph Caiphas, the High Priest, the two people directly responsible for Jesus's execution, were close friends. Both were removed from power in 36 CE. Many historians agree that the "cleansing of the temple" was Jesus and his followers' attempt to "bind the strong man and plunder his house."

Lest we forget, Jesus led 5,000 in that "cleansing" and was executed as an enemy of the State, as an insurrectionist. The charge, "King of the Jews," supports that. He was crucified with two other insurrectionists or rebels, not thieves or robbers.

We do not like this Jesus.

This Jesus is so unlike the one we grew up with, so unlike the one our colonial masters taught us to obey without question, so unlike the one whose portraits and paintings-- usually blond and blue-eyed--adorn our places of worship.

*art, "Binding the Strong Man, " [Arrest of St. Patrick] available from vanderbilt divinity library archives.