YOU'LL NEVER WALK ALONE

"You'll Never Walk Alone" was part of Carousel, Rogers and Hammerstein's 1945 Broadway musical. Many artists have covered this song. These include Gerry and the Pacemakers, The Lettermen, Elvis Presley, and, my favorite, The Righteous Brothers. Sunday's lection reminds me of the song.

If Pentecost happened 50 days after Jesus’s resurrection in Acts, in John it happened on Holy Week. (The Spirit comes on Easter evening.)

Sunday's reading is part of the gospel's Farewell Discourse. Jesus, bidding his disciples goodbye, promises the coming of the Advocate or Comforter. Jesus knows the sadness they feel so he promises them someone who will take his place: someone who will do more for them than he did; someone who will help them bear their sorrows; someone who will always be there for them; someone who will always lead them to seek truth-- the truth that sets people free.

Someone who will make sure that, through life's storms, they will never, ever, walk alone.


*art, "Pentecost," JESUS MAFA, 1973 (Cameroon), from the vanderbilt divinity library digital archives.
The Righteous Brothers singing "You''ll Never Walk Alone."
The Ed Sullivan Show, November 7, 1965.

MOTHERS AND GOD

 

Students of the Bible call John Chapters 14-17 Jesus’s "Farewell Discourse". Jose Rizal's "Mi Ultimo Adios" is akin to it. Jesus gives his before his crucifixion. Rizal writes his before his execution. Both die because of love.

In Sunday's lection from John 17, Jesus knows that Golgotha was hours away. He knows that his followers will be like sheep without a shepherd. He knows that he cannot protect them anymore. Jesus knows. And so he commits them to God. The God who is like a mother in the gospel. The God with a womb.

The church is the community that Jesus committed to God. It is not a building. Never has been, never will be. The church is people who love, like Jesus did. Those who love unconditionally. Like Jesus's mother in John. Like our mothers.

Like God-with-a-Womb.

This is why we have hope despite all the pain, the suffering, the greed, the indifference, and the evil around us. This is why we believe that a new world is possible. There are those who love unconditionally. There are those who are willing to offer their lives for others.

Like our mothers.



*art, "Madonna " by Catlett, Elizabeth, 1915-2012 (available at the vanderbilt divinity library digital archives).

NO GREATER LOVE

Lord. Savior. Rabbi. High Priest. King. Messiah. Good Shepherd. Son of God. Son of Man. Brother. Most of us are familiar with these terms that are all ascribed to Jesus in the New Testament-- terms we ourselves use to describe who he is for us.

In Sunday's lection, the Gospel of John offers another one. Friend.

Friendship. What does it mean? What is its greatest motivation? What is its greatest expression? Friendship is almost always experienced as a circle. It is a relationship of equals and of mutuality, of accompaniment and of solidarity.

Friendships are based on decisions. We choose our friends. Friendships are neither based on emotions nor on relations.

Agape is always a decision. It is always a choice. Agape is neither based on emotions nor on relations.

Thus, agape's greatest expression: no one has greater love than this, to lay down one's life for one's friends. Not lovers. Nor family. We choose to offer our lives for the people we choose. Including those who do not know who we are.

Jesus did. Many have done the same. How about us who call ourselves Friends of Jesus? Can we? Really?


*art, "Love for One's Neighbor," National Museum of Scotland (vanderbilt divinity library digital archives).

GOD IS A FARMER

 

More often than not, we read this passage like we do the Parable of the Sower. We ask, "What kind of soil are we?" We want to be the good soil that brings forth grain. We lose sight of the Sower. Yes, we lose sight of the Farmer.

In Sunday's lection from the Gospel of John, we ask what kind of branch we are. We want to be the branch that bears fruit. We lose sight of the vine. Moreover we lose sight of the Vine Grower. Yes, again, we lose sight of the Farmer.

God is the Vine Grower in today's passage. God plants the vine. God does the pruning. God does the cutting off. God is a farmer.

During Jesus' time, farmers and fisherfolk comprised the bulk of the population: 7 out of 10. (Nothing has actually changed.) Then and now, farmers and fisherfolk are among the poorest of the poor. Dispossessed farmers and dislocated fisherfolk were worse off.

In First Century Palestine, the poor could afford only barley bread and fish, dried, smoked, or salted. These were what the urban poor, slaves, and peasants had when they were able to eat. The masses were slowly starving to death. Have you ever wondered why the majority of Jesus's stories and sayings in the gospels are about bread and fish, farming and fishing, and farmers and fisherfolk? Have you ever wondered why Jesus's Gospel is the Gospel to the Poor?

Unfortunately, we lose sight of farmers and fisherfolk. And we forget that the lestes-- badly translated as robbers and bandits in English Bibles; better translated as rebels and freedom fighters--were composed mostly of dispossessed farmers, fisherfolk, and runaway slaves!

But God does not forget! God always takes sides. And farmers and fisherfolk are closest to God's heart.

God is a farmer. God plants. God prunes. God cuts off branches that bear no fruit, and throws these to the fire to be burned.

*art, "True Vine," from the vanderbilt divinity library digital archives.

THE GOOD SHEPHERD

I believe most of us know Psalm 23 by heart. We are not talking about one or two verses here. This is a whole chapter from the Bible that most of us have memorized since Kindergarten. This is one chapter that has given courage to so many when they were afraid. This is one chapter so many people have held onto when they crossed over to the life beyond. Shepherd works as a metaphor for God in the Psalm. The good shepherd will never abandon the sheep. The sheep will never, ever, be alone.

In Sunday's lection from John 10, Jesus talks about sheep and shepherds. Sheep do know the voice of their shepherd. Sheep do follow their shepherd in and out of the sheepfold. Sheep do run away from those whose voice they do not know. The good shepherd wil never abandon the sheep. The sheep will never, ever, be alone.

Lest we forget--then and now--women make up more than half of the world's shepherds. Let's stop imagining that the good shepherd in the Bible has to be male. Rebekah, Rachel, Miriam, Zipporah and her sisters were shepherds. The shepherds who visited Jesus when he was born were probably all women. Most importantly, many faith communities celebrate Mary of Nazareth, the mother of the Lamb of God, as a shepherd!

My dear friends, for many among us, the good shepherd is a woman.

*image: Palestine: A Bedouin Shepherd spinning yarn in the Sharon Region. 

BROILED FISH FOR A STRANGER

Who are the hungry, the thirsty, the naked, the sick, the unwelcomed, and the prisoners that Jesus challenges us to serve, to take sides with, and to love? The stranger.

Who are the widows, the orphans, the indigenous peoples, and the foreigners that-- over and over--the Law, the Prophets, and the Psalms enjoin us to care for, to hold dear, and to treat as sisters and brothers? The stranger.

Who are the daily wage earners, the laborers who survive from paycheck to paycheck, the homeless, the jobless, and the most vulnerable in a world ravaged by life-negating capitalism that we are supposed to prioritize? Yes, the stranger.

If we read our Bibles and pray every day, then we will grow in the realization that--most often than not--God comes as a stranger. God did when God shared the promise of Isaac's birth. God did when God judged the arrogance and inhospitality of Sodom and Gomorrah. God did when God wrestled with Jacob at Jabbok.

God came as a stranger when God was born in a manger instead of a palace; in Galilee instead of Jerusalem; among the odorized and the otherized; and grew up in a mud hut instead of a white house.

In Luke 24, two disciples on the road to Emmaus encounter the Risen One as a complete stranger. Their eyes were eventually opened and their hearts strangely warmed when they broke bread with him. In Sunday's lection, the Risen One suddenly appeared to the gathered disciples who were startled and terrified and thought he was a ghost!

God always comes as a stranger. This is why we welcome the dispossessed, the displaced, the disenfranchised. This is why we open our homes, our churches, our spaces to Lumads, to People Living with HIV and AIDS, to refugees, to Palestinians, to those whose only hope is God.

God comes as a stranger.

This is why we always, always offer sanctuary. And during these trying times, sanctuary can mean that extra room in our house, the available spaces in our church offices and buildings, the vacant rooms in our dormitories, and, yes, that extra bed. Safe spaces. A simple meal. Even a piece of broiled fish.

*art, "Jesus appears at Emmaus," JESUS MAFA, 1973 (Cameroon), from the vanderbilt divinity library digital archives.
 

THE RESURRECTION REQUIRES WARM BODIES

We always imagine the resurrected body. I have heard long discussions on how resurrected bodies are supposed to look, including what superhuman abilities these new bodies will have. Sometimes, our imagination gets the better of us.

Of this, I'm sure: despite their differences (and there are a lot), the four gospels all tell us that the Risen One has a body. In Sunday's lection from the Gospel of John, Jesus tells Thomas, "Put your finger here and see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it in my side." The Risen One has a body, and that resurrected body still bears the marks of the crucifixion. God knows who is responsible for each wound.

Every single day so many of our sisters and brothers--who serve the poor, the oppressed, and the marginalized--are red-tagged, abducted, tortured, brutalized, and crucified. The horrors inflicted on the Palestinian People in Gaza and the West Bank continue unabated.

But take heart! God knows. God will never forget the crucified. God knows everyone under the rubble. God will raise up each and every one of them. God always remembers the marks of each crucifixion. And God knows who is responsible for each of those wounds!

Dear Friends, then and now, the resurrection requires warm bodies that embody justice, solidarity, and life-giving. The resurrection requires warm bodies that will rise up for those who have fallen, that will continue the struggle for peace based on justice, and that will inspire more live-giving.

The resurrection always requires warm bodies: yours and mine.


*art, "Jesus appears to Thomas," JESUS MAFA, Cameroon 1973 (from vanderbilt divinity library digital archives).