BLESSED ARE THE POOR

The Greek word we translate as "blessed" is makarioi. Makarioi refers to those whom God favors. It is an affirmation that God takes sides; that God plays favorites. And God’s favorites are the last, the least, the lost, and the left out. A beatitude, or declaration of God's favor, is makarismos. We transliterate beatitudes as makarisms. Sunday's lection is the Lukan version. Most of us know Mathew's version.

Blessed are you who are poor...

The Greek word for poor is ptochos, people who are destitute, people who are so poor that begging and stealing become options for them to survive. They are drowning in misery.

One way to become destitute in the first century was to lose land and one's place in their family. For most people, land was not just property; land was life. Family identity was exceptionally important in the ancient world. People were known as the "son of" or "daughter of" their father, or mother, or clan. War, slavery, and indebtedness left people widows and orphans and strangers. War, slavery, and indebtedness left people destitute, displaced, and dispossessed.

The Hebrew Bible, over and over and over, challenges the Israelites to care for widows, orphans, and strangers. War, slavery, and indebtedness were all part of the structures and systems of evil that made the rich richer and the poor miserable.

During the time of Jesus, the 1% owned and controlled the land and practically everything else. Half of the population was slowly starving to death. Life expectancy was 28 years.

When the gospel of Luke talks about the poor, it does not mean the rich who are spiritually poor. It does not include the wealthy who live in poor relationships nor the powerful who feel poor. It does not include the rich who think they are poor compared to other rich people.

The poor that Luke talks about are people who have to beg God in prayer to give them today the food they need because that's how they get to tomorrow.

There are people who love to pray this prayer while they have cupboards--or even storehouses--of food enough for a week, a month, a year, or longer. These people are not poor.

#ChooseJustice

#IAmWithJesus

#JunkTerrorLawNow

#StopTheKillingsPH

#FreePalestine

#JusticeForMyanmar

#NoToMarcosDuterte2022

*art, "The Sermon on the Mount," JESUS MAFA (from the vanderbilt diviniyt library digital archives). 

FISHING FOR PEOPLE

When we were growing up we used to sing a song in Sunday School that went, "I will make you fishers of men, fishers of men, fishers of men. I will make you fishers of men if you follow me."

Life during the time of Jesus was extremely difficult. Historians paint a Roman-occupied Palestine where the average life expectancy was under 30, the majority was suffocating in debt, and half of the population was slowly starving to death.

At the bottom of the social structure were farmers and fisherfolk. Nothing has changed. Farmers and fisherfolk remain at the bottom of the social structure today. Approximately 1.5 million families in the Philippines are fisherfolk. The poorest two out of every five poor people in the country are fisherfolk.

In Sunday's lection Jesus calls fisherfolk to follow him in order to fish for people. A carpenter calls fisherfolk to fish. Jesus does not call anyone to worship him. Or to believe in him. Or to accept him as their Personal Savior and Lord. Or even to be a carpenter. Jesus calls us to follow him. To do what? To fish for people.

Many ancient peoples were afraid of the seas. They feared drowning; they feared the turbulent waves; they feared the ancient, eldritch leviathans they imagined lurked beneath the surface. But Jesus does not call us to fish people out of their fear of the deep.

During Jesus's time, the Empire owned and controlled the seas and the fishing industry! Taxes were imposed on fishing, on boats, on nets, on fishing areas, on everything! In our lection, Simon tells Jesus that they were fishing all night and caught nothing.

Jesus's call to fish for people is a call for us to follow him in taking out people from systems and structures that oppress, that dehumanize, that subjugate, that murder.

And who are the people who experience the evil of these systems and structures every single moment of their lives? Fisherfolk. Genuine transformation always comes from below, from among those at greatest risk of drowning, from among those whose only hope is God. The call has not changed.

People, especially the most vulnerable, are drowning in imperial waters. And the situation has gone from bad to worse with COVID-19. Jesus is calling us right now to follow him and fish for people.

#IAmWithJesus

#EndTheCultureOfImpunity

#ChooseJustice

#StopTheKillingsPH

#FreePalestine

#JusticeForMyanmar

*image, "Fishing and Fishermen," Life in the Holy Land (www.lifeintheholyland.com/fishing_fishermen

 

THE PARABLE OF THE ONE-PESO LOAN

Juan and Maria deposit their hard-earned peso in a bank. Government propaganda have convinced them that banks help the poor. So, being poor farm-folk, they have identified with bank commercials that go, "Ayokong maging dukha!" (I do not want to be poor!). The bank pays them 5% a year. That's 5 centavos less final tax of 20% so they net 4 centavos.

The economy being what it is drives the couple to ask a one peso loan from the same bank. Again, government sponsored info commercials that went, "Isip entreprenyur!" (Think entrepreneur!) helped. Their peso deposit serves as collateral. The bank charges them 30% on the loan. In effect, on the peso they deposited and actually loaned, the bank earned 25 centavos. From another perspective, Juan and Maria paid the bank 25 centavos for allowing them to use their own money!

It's no wonder banks are among the most profitable businesses in the world today. (Don’t get me going on the oil cartels that bleed our economies dry.). But let's go back to that one-peso loan of Maria and Juan.

The couple earns a peso so they go back to the bank to pay their loan. 30 centavos is used to pay for the interest. 70 is left for the principal. They still owe the bank 30 so they get another peso loan. 30 centavos of that is used to pay for the balance of the first loan. They leave the bank with 70. If this cycle continues, Juan and Maria will be perpetually making new loans just to pay their maturing loans. But what if tragedy strikes, in the form of land grabbing, pestilence, typhoons, sickness, COVID-19, or worse, death? They cannot pay their loan and the bank forfeits their collateral. Without collateral, loans require higher interests. The cycle continues at a much painful level: Maria and Juan take new loans just to meet the interest on their maturing loans.

This happens every single day: at the level of the 5/6 operators, at the local banks, in the IMF and the World Bank. Most people do not know that private banks actually run the economies of many countries. Study the financial system of Hong Kong, for instance.

Sunday's lection from Luke 4 is based on the "the acceptable year of the Lord's favor" which is the Jubilee Year. This vision is found in Leviticus 25 and it is probably one of the best pieces of Ancient Israelite legislation ever written. The celebration of the Sabbatical year--and more importantly, the Jubilee--is rooted in justice. Justice requires that all slaves are set free, that all lands are returned to their rightful and original owners, and all debts are canceled.

When the Bible says debts, they are really debts, not trespasses, nor sins. Indebtedness dispossess, displaces, disenfranchises, and dehumanizes. Thus, cancellation of debts, all debts, is a major proclamation of the Jubilee. Cancellation of debts is also a major plea in the Lord's Prayer.

It is heartbreaking but it is true. Then and now, Juan, Maria, farmers, fisher-folk, laborers, and indigenous peoples remain the most indebted people on earth.

“Scattered across the countryside one may observe certain wild animals, male and female, dark, livid and burnt by the sun, attached to the earth which they dig and turn over with invincible stubbornness. However, they have something like an articulated voice and when they stand up they reveal a human face. Indeed, they are human beings...Thanks to them the other human beings need not sow, labour and harvest in order to live. That is why they ought not to lack the bread which they have sown.”+

They ought not to lack the bread which they have sown. Yet in the Philippines, and in many parts of the world, they, unfortunately, do lack bread. And much more.

#IAmWithJesus
#JusticeForMyanmar
#FreePalestine
#EndTheCultureOfImpunity
#ChooseJustice
#StopTheKillingsPH

+Jean la Bruyere, French moralist of the late seventeenth century (cited in J.D. Crossan's The Essential Jesus (New York: HarperCollins, 1994), v.
*art, "Christ in the Synagogue," Nikolai Nikolaevich, 1868 (from the vanderbilt divinity library digital archives).

US, THEM, AND ALL OF US

The pronoun “us” assumes belongingness; being a part of a whole. In particular, “us” are insiders. As far as the people of Nazareth were concerned, Jesus was “one of us.” Isaiah was “one of us.” The promises from Scripture were “for us.” Jesus’s proclamation of said promises fulfilled in their hearing was also “for us.” Ultimately, all these presuppose that God is always and only “for us.”

“Us” also presumes another group. Those that do not belong: them. The outsiders. The empire--built on privilege, power, possession and commodification--divides and conquers peoples. The empire creates “us” and “them.” Sunday's lection from Luke 4 presents both groups and posits an alternative.

Jesus proclaims the alternative to the Kingdom of Caesar. In the Kingdom of God, there is no "us", there is no "them"; there is only "all of us".

At first, those who listened to Jesus read Isaiah were happy. Then, as they listened to him interpret the challenge of the Jubilee, they metamorphosed into a mob bent on throwing him off a cliff! Why? Because Jesus dared to change the beneficiaries of God’s jubilee. Leviticus 25, the year of the Lord’s favor, proclaimed land, liberty and cancellation of all debts. Jubilee meant gospel to those whose only hope is God; good news to a people suffering under Roman occupation. Jesus challenged their interpretation of “us” to include “them.”

For Jesus, there is only “all of us.” If God is our parent, then we, all of us, are God’s children. We are all sisters and brothers. Not just his fellow Nazarenes. Not just his fellow Galileans. During the time of Elijah, when drought and famine ravished the land, there were many widows in Israel, yet God sent Elijah to a widow at Zarephath in Sidon. There were also many lepers in Israel in the time of Elisha, yet none of them were cleansed except Naaman the Syrian. For Jesus, God’s children include the widow at Zarephath in Sidon and Naaman the Syrian.

For Jesus, the poor, the captives, the blind, the oppressed and everyone waiting for the year of the Lord’s favor were not just “us” Israelites but also “them,” the Gentiles, who were poor, captives, blind, oppressed and everyone waiting for the year of the Lord’s favor.

Thus, the jubilee, then and now, is not just for “us” but also for “them,” and therefore for “all of us.”

#IAmWithJesus
#ChooseJustice
#EndTheCultureOfImpunity
#FreePalestine
#JusticeForMyanmar
#SavePatunganNow

*art, "The Poor invited to the Feast," JESUS MAFA 1973 (from the vanderbilt divinity library digital archives).
 

THE WEDDING AT CANA

New Testament scholars--among them Rudolf Bultmann, Raymond Brown, and several members of the Jesus Seminar-- have argued for a hypothetical "Signs [Semeia] Gospel" or tradition that is embedded in the Gospel of John.

There are no miracles in the gospel. Instead, there are seven signs which scholars say resonate with the seven days of creation in Genesis 1. The Gospel is expicit on which one is the first sign: the creation of wine from water during the wedding at Cana.

Yes, my friends, God has not stopped creating. Aside from creating wine from water, what else were created during the wedding at Cana? The water put in those six 20-30 gallon stone jars were for purification and cleansing purposes. They were not for drinking. They were to be expelled in the ritual process. Jesus more than creates wine from water; he creates wine for drinking, for taking in, from water dedicated for throwing out.

Jesus more than creates wine from water. In doing so, he creates a new community that privileges servants over masters. The servants were the first to experience the sign, then the chief steward, and then the bridegroom. The servants, who toiled yet did not even get to eat during feasts and weddings, were the first recipients of the best wine.

Finally, the creation of wine from water births a discipleship of the unnamed. Many times we forget that the most dedicated disciples of Jesus in the Gospel of John were unnamed: the child with five barley loaves and two fish; the Samaritan woman at the well; the Beloved Disciple; and Jesus's mother.

Many times we forget the role of Jesus's mother in this creation narrative. Many times we forget that the most dedicated disciples that God works through as God continues to create are people who remain unnamed, unrecognized, and uncelebrated.

We forget but God does not.

God always remembers.

#IAmWithJesus

#JusticeForMyanmar

#FreePalestine

#ChooseJustice

#EndTheCultureOfImpunity

#StopTheKillingsPH

*art, "The Wedding At Cana," (JESUS MAFA, 1973) available at the vanderbilt divinity library digital archives.

CROSSING THE JORDAN

We know what we are supposed to do: help change the world. But before we even think of changing the world, we need the world to change us.

Thus, integration with communities-- immersion into different ways of life--is a prerequisite. The late Fr. Carlos Abesamis, in conversation, said that having the Bible in one hand and a newspaper in the other is not enough. Newspapers will never be a substitute for immersion. Nor will television, radio, or social media.

Immersion transforms people! Immersion has done so for many of us! In the fullness of time, even God went on immersion. Immersion changed God.

Sunday's lection reminds us that one of the most powerful images of immersion in the Bible is baptism. Baptism is about taking sides. When John baptized people in the Jordan, they crossed from one bank to the other; from one side to the other side. They re-enacted the crossing of the Jordan.

It is about doing what Ernesto "Che" Guevarra did: swimming from one bank to the other bank of the Amazon River; knowingly putting himself at risk of a deadly asthma attack and/or drowning, yet choosing the side of those whose only hope was God.

Baptism is crossing the Jordan: choosing justice and taking possession of liberty, land, and fullness of life that God wants for all people, especially for occupied peoples. Crossing the Jordan can lead to death. John the Baptist crossed the Jordan and was executed by Herod. Jesus crossed the Jordan and was crucified by the Romans.

And you and I are called by our baptism to cross rivers of Jordan wherever we are. Every moment of our lives, we need to choose justice. May we have the courage to do as John and Jesus did.

#IAmWithJesus
#ChooseJustice
#StopTheKillingsPH
#FreePalestine
#JusticeForMyanmar
#EndTheCultureOfImpunity

*art, "John baptizes Jesus," JESUS MAFA, 1973 (available at the vanderbilt divinity library digital archives).
 

THE INCARNATION

 

The four gospels begin their narratives in four different ways. Mark begins with an adult Jesus who is baptized by John in the Jordan. Matthew has a birth narrative that features Magi who spent about two years searching for the child. Luke's has shepherds who visit Jesus as a baby. John's origin story, which is Sunday's lection, begins in "The Beginning."

Incidentally, a lot of people who memorize Bible verses know John 1.1 (with Genesis 1.1 and, almost everyone's favorite, John 3.16). The Word became Flesh and lived among us. God has stopped watching from a distance.

Stories of Gods taking on human form abound in many of the world's mythologies. Many of the heroes of ancient peoples were demigods or super humans. For the Gospel of John, when the Word became Flesh, the Word was totally and fully Flesh. In other words, God was not Superman disguised as Clark Kent. God was Clark Kent.

For the Gospel of John, God Incarnate gets tired and thirsty; eats and drinks with family and friends; experiences love and loss, and cries, like all of us. God Incarnate takes the side of the poor, feeds the multitudes, experiences betrayal, and suffers torture and crucifixion by empire. Like many among us.

And then God dies. Like all of us will.

My Friends, to believe in the incarnation is to embody justice, accompaniment, solidarity, and life-giving, like Jesus did. The incarnation requires warm bodies: yours and mine.

Today, more than ever. 

#IAmWithJesus
#EndTheCultureOfImpunity
#JusticeForMyanmar
#FreePalestine
#StopTheKillingsPH
#ChooseJustice

*"In the Beginning" (relief sculpture at Westminster, London), photograh by Diane Brennan. Vanderbilt Divinity Library image collection.