pain

 

In the first half of life, we accumulate many blessings. We may get married. We may have children. We may discover and grow into the gifts that have been uniquely bestowed upon us, and found ways to bring them to bear in a professional capacity. None of these things are inevitable, but all of them are common to human experience.

In the second half of life, the longer we live, the more we experience bereavement, of every kind. Our marriage may break down, irretrievably; or we may need to accept that we will never marry. Or else, we may need to face up to the knowledge that, statistically speaking, it is likely that one of us will die first and the other will be left to live on, alone. Our children may leave home. Our bodies start to betray us. The technologies and methodologies of our workplaces change beyond our capacity to keep up. The songs they play on the radio, or that we sing in church, are ‘rubbish,’ compared to the songs we listened to, or sang in church, when we were younger.

Pain is inevitable, and unavoidable. And pain has a purpose. Its purpose is to bring us to the end of ourselves, so that we might discover, there, beyond our means, the immeasurable, unchanging compassion of God towards us.

But this is not inevitable. If this is the invitation of pain—of the losses of the second half of life—then the temptation of pain is to find something, however small, we might take control of. Whenever we do this, we cause both others and ourselves great heartache.

Jesus told a parable about forgiveness—which is the art of letting go of control, and abandoning ourselves to the compassion of God.

A certain servant of a certain king had accumulated—from the king’s hand—incredible, over-the-top, blessings. Yet the thing that defined his life was not gratitude but fear, the pain of the knowledge that one day he would lose everything he had been given. And so, when the king decided to settle accounts with his servants, the servant was thrown into torment. Despite being the king’s servant, he did not know the king’s character. He did not know that compassion was the very, steadfast, nature of the king. The king sought to test the servant’s heart—how well was he known? The servant failed to recognise the one before him; thought, if I can come up with a good enough plea, perhaps I can persuade the king to show mercy. The servant failed the test. And yet, the king did what the king had always intended to do: he wrote off the great debt of every blessing the servant had received from his hand. There was nothing to pay back. It was always gift.

The servant departed the king’s presence, released from debt but still in pain, the pain of the knowledge that one day he would lose all that he had gained. And he succumbed to the temptation of pain, to take control of whatever circumstances he still could. Which turned out to be the debt owed him—an incredibly small and trivial thing—by a fellow servant. When that servant could not pay, he had him thrown in the debtors’ prison. When this was reported to the king, the king brought about the consequences of the servant’s decision: that he, himself, would find himself trapped in a prison cell of his own making.

We heard this parable read this morning at our mid-week Holy Communion, a service attended by the Elders of our congregation and those of us who are becoming Elders. By which I don’t primarily mean the elderly, but those of us in the second half of life, those of us who have known and walked with God for a lifetime.

We are also blessed with an increasing number of members in the first half of life, in the process of accumulating the blessings God has for them, and who are coming to an awareness of their deep hunger and thirst for God.

And it is the dual vocation of those of us who find ourselves in the second half of life to allow our experience of pain to bring us to an ever-greater experience of God’s compassion towards us, and to model this response—resisting the temptation, choosing the invitation—for those who are younger, in life (for the most part) and in faith.

Those people connect mostly with our 10.30am Sunday service. And that service is for them: it is no longer ‘for’ the Elders. It is no longer the place where the Elders come to be fed, but has become the place where the Elders are needed to help feed the lambs. Elders, mature sheep, are able to feed themselves—at the midweek service, through daily prayer and bible reading in our own homes, through joining the hymns of the weekly Sunday service on Radio 4 or Songs of Praise on the BBC, and in a great many other ways. Elders are those who have either inherited wells that enable them to draw on the great underground river of God that flows below the surface of our lives, or who have dug their own wells in their youth; they do not need to dig new wells, but they are those who can teach those, new to faith, how to dig. The younger generation needs to be introduced to the old hymns that carry something of our faith, and ground us in a story bigger than our own time; but also need the opportunity to respond to God in praise that is of their own time, a new generation pouring out praise (where we had been told, over many long years, that noone is interested in praising God anymore). It has ever been thus (and every age has struggled to affirm the accents of the generation below them).

We need Elders who know enough of the compassion of God to let go of seeking control. Who demand no debt be paid in return, from those who, as yet, think they are immortal.

For all its challenges, I am thankful that we have, among us, both those in the second and the first half of life.

Matthew 18.21-19.1

‘Then Peter came and said to him, ‘Lord, if another member of the church sins against me, how often should I forgive? As many as seven times?’ Jesus said to him, ‘Not seven times, but, I tell you, seventy-seven times.

‘For this reason the kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who wished to settle accounts with his slaves. When he began the reckoning, one who owed him ten thousand talents was brought to him; and, as he could not pay, his lord ordered him to be sold, together with his wife and children and all his possessions, and payment to be made. So the slave fell on his knees before him, saying, “Have patience with me, and I will pay you everything.” And out of pity for him, the lord of that slave released him and forgave him the debt.

‘But that same slave, as he went out, came upon one of his fellow-slaves who owed him a hundred denarii; and seizing him by the throat, he said, “Pay what you owe.” Then his fellow-slave fell down and pleaded with him, “Have patience with me, and I will pay you.” But he refused; then he went and threw him into prison until he should pay the debt.

‘When his fellow-slaves saw what had happened, they were greatly distressed, and they went and reported to their lord all that had taken place. Then his lord summoned him and said to him, “You wicked slave! I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me. Should you not have had mercy on your fellow-slave, as I had mercy on you?” And in anger his lord handed him over to be tortured until he should pay his entire debt. So my heavenly Father will also do to every one of you, if you do not forgive your brother or sister from your heart.’

‘’When Jesus had finished saying these things, he left Galilee and went to the region of Judea beyond the Jordan.’

 

new day dawning

 

I stood on the half-landing at the turn in the stairs and watched the sun rise into the sky. It was immeasurably more beautiful than the partial eclipse.

If you are reading this, you have been given the incomparable gift of life, the miracle of a new day, that has never been given before and will never be given again.

May your joy open you to that which is beyond, and greater than, yourself.

May your pain lead you to the end of yourself.

May your To-Do list bring you to your knees.

And there, may you discover that you are Loved.

May you meet the God who created you; who has rescued you from the powers of darkness; who sustains you daily; who provides for your every need, and more than you could ever ask or imagine; who leads you into all freedom, and further along the Way of Life in all its fullness, if you will only dare to follow; who fights your battles; who sings over you with sheer delight; who surrounds you with goodness and utterly faithful loving-kindness.

May you have a good day, whatever this day might bring.

 

ascent

 

Some of my friends go for a run on Sunday mornings, from the pub carpark across the street from St Nic’s, and I’m usually done taking the first service and setting up for the second in time to go across and chat with them before they set off. But I am on holiday, back home yesterday but not back to work until tomorrow, so this morning I ran with them.

At 15 kilometres, or 9 miles, it was fully 50% further than my distance-of-choice, but it was the relentless hour-long ascent that really got me—and got me thinking theologically. (You can take the boy out of church, but you can’t take the church out of the boy...)

In the imagination of the Bible, mountains (which can be actual mountains, or hills, or high places) are places of encounter with gods. Moses encounters Yahweh on Mount Sinai. Elijah encounters Yahweh on Mount Horeb. Centuries, millennia even, later, Moses and Elijah return, encountering Jesus on Mount Tabor. Elijah confronts the prophets of Baal on Mount Carmel. The composer of Psalm 121 looks around at the high places where people went to encounter Canaanite gods, and asks, where does my help come from? My help comes from the Lord. This particular psalm is a Psalm of Ascents, a psalm sung by pilgrims on the 1000 metre, or 3500 foot, climb from Jericho up to Jerusalem.

It is on a mountain where Jesus delivers the Sermon on the Mount, and on a mountain where he feeds five thousand men, plus women and children.

And Jesus said to his disciples that faith can move a mountain and throw it into the sea. Somewhere along the line, we have got muddled as to what that means. We have reframed mountains as seemingly immovable obstacles, that can be overcome by faith. We sing songs on this theme. This misses the point, entirely. Mountains are places of divine encounter. In the same biblical imagination, the sea represents chaos, the dwelling-place of chaos demons such as Rahab, Yam, Tiamat, Leviathan, and Behemoth. Yahweh is depicted walking the ocean depths, while Jesus walks on (top of) the water of the Sea of Galilee. Both images speak of mastery over chaos.

Jesus says, faith can bring the mountain-top experience of encounter with God—experiencing the divine glory, or felt weight of God’s presence—to bear in the places of chaos.

Elsewhere, Jesus also said that faith can replant a ‘mulberry’ tree in the sea. Again, in biblical imagination, trees represent people; and the ‘mulberry’ tree was associated with healing properties. Jesus’ claim is that faith should cause us to transplant ourselves into the places of chaos, as healing presences.

So today, I ran. Today, I climbed, up, up. Today, I pushed through the strong urge to Regret My Life Choices, and thought about the places where we experience chaos, and the encounter with the divine that faith can bring to bear there, because encounter with the divine is meant to transform us in some ‘visible’—visibly different—way.

Tomorrow, when I return to the valley—to the place where people live within the shadow of death; to the places of bitter tears, which might just be transformed into a place of joy—may my encounter with God on a rain-soaked hill today make all the difference. May the mountain be levelled so that the valley can be raised up. May the mountain be moved into the sea.

 

139

 

In a couple of weeks’ time, I shall be preaching on Psalm 139 (text below). The psalm—or song—rejoices in life lived in intimate nearness to God’s presence, from the womb to the grave. In the experience of being known, and loved, by One whose love for us causes them to want to know us fully. Of discovering that God is alongside us in the highs and lows of life, in ecstatic joy and in the depths of despair. And that this God, who is beyond our capacity to know, is nonetheless knowable.

For Christians, this God does not only know us from the outside, from beyond human life, as we might study and learn about the way of life of other species with whom we share this planet. We proclaim that in the man Jesus, born of the woman Mary, the eternal Word of God took on human nature, becoming what God loved. The God who is with us from our mother’s womb and will be with us in our grave, or urn, has known both womb and tomb firsthand, as one of us. And has broken out of both.

Ignatian spirituality invites us to take time each day to ask ourselves, where have we been attentive to, aware of, the presence of God with us, in the joy and sorrows of our hours? And where has that presence been hidden from us?

The psalm takes a turn towards the end, the psalmist crying out to God to bring an end to the wicked. It is a raw and heartfelt prayer, and one that God chooses to answer in a stunning way. Rather than slaying the wicked, God allows the wicked to slay the innocent One—God’s very self in our midst, become one of us—and as they do so, from the executioners’ scaffold, proclaims, ‘Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.’ And forgiveness is so disarming that the power of the bloodthirsty, which is their ability to draw us into their own game, is broken. Forgiveness does not proclaim, ‘what you did is okay,’ but, ‘what you did has no hold over me.’

The psalm concludes with a declaration of perfect hatred against God’s enemies. As Paul will write to the church in Ephesus (Ephesians 6.12) our enemies are not flesh and blood—not other human beings—but spiritual realities that hold us captive and obscure our vision of God. To hate such things is to desire to have nothing whatsoever to do with them, to distance ourselves from them.

Such enemies include:

For the older generation in particular:

Pervasive sadness—grief is an appropriate response to loss, but pervasive sadness chokes gratitude and wonder.

The belief that we are responsible for providing for ourselves in our old age—which fosters a scarcity mindset, causes us to hoard our resources, and prevents generosity.

For people of any age:

Chronic pain—which can turn us in on ourselves, and away from the source of life that sustains us even in our pain.

Among younger people in particular:

Anxiety—which pulls us in every which way at once, away from the present moment, the moment, whether high or low, where we might discover again God with us; where we might find stillness, rest, peace, wholeness.

P*rn*graphy—available from every mobile phone, desensitizing is towards and dehumanising how we see others, into a commodity for consumption, and so desensitizing and dehumanising ourselves.

Distraction—whether the insatiable demand to be productive and never rest, or the exponential availability of entertainment, including the idol of social media. An idol is a good thing that has been accepted as an ultimate thing; a thing that promises what it cannot deliver, and demands more and more of ourselves without ever being sated in its appetite for consuming us.

If you want to be set free from any of these enemies of the soul, free to learn to be aware of God’s nearness, I would love to pray for you and with you.

If you would like to experience something of the pilgrimage through life, accompanied by God and God’s people, you are welcome to join us at St Nicholas’ church (other local churches are available).

Psalm 139

To the leader. Of David. A Psalm.

1 O Lord, you have searched me and known me.
2 You know when I sit down and when I rise up;
you discern my thoughts from far away.
3 You search out my path and my lying down
and are acquainted with all my ways.
4 Even before a word is on my tongue,
O Lord, you know it completely.
5 You hem me in, behind and before,
and lay your hand upon me.
6 Such knowledge is too wonderful for me;
it is so high that I cannot attain it.
7 Where can I go from your spirit?
Or where can I flee from your presence?
8 If I ascend to heaven, you are there;
if I make my bed in Sheol, you are there.
9 If I take the wings of the morning
and settle at the farthest limits of the sea,
10 even there your hand shall lead me,
and your right hand shall hold me fast.
11 If I say, “Surely the darkness shall cover me,
and night wraps itself around me,”
12 even the darkness is not dark to you;
the night is as bright as the day,
for darkness is as light to you.
13 For it was you who formed my inward parts;
you knit me together in my mother’s womb.
14 I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.
Wonderful are your works;
that I know very well.
15 My frame was not hidden from you,
when I was being made in secret,
intricately woven in the depths of the earth.
16 Your eyes beheld my unformed substance.
In your book were written
all the days that were formed for me,
when none of them as yet existed.
17 How weighty to me are your thoughts, O God!
How vast is the sum of them!
18 I try to count them—they are more than the sand;
I come to the end—I am still with you.
19 O that you would kill the wicked, O God,
and that the bloodthirsty would depart from me—
20 those who speak of you maliciously
and lift themselves up against you for evil!
21 Do I not hate those who hate you, O Lord?
And do I not loathe those who rise up against you?
22 I hate them with perfect hatred;
I count them my enemies.
23 Search me, O God, and know my heart;
test me and know my thoughts.
24 See if there is any wicked way in me,
and lead me in the way everlasting.

(Psalm 139, NRSVue translation)

 

dis/enchanted

 

There are no gods in Christopher Nolan’s retelling of The Odyssey, only dis/belief in the Greek gods, expressed as attribution for (e.g.) storms, wishful thinking, or guilt-induced hallucinations.

One of the tensions of the film is that between those who still believe, those who don’t believe, and those who wrestle with a deconstruction of what they have believed (passing through disenchantment with the world, to disenchantment with the self, before, at the end, the hope of re-enchantment).

A central theme is how common belief in Zeus’ Law—the codified rules for hosts and guests—has actually held civilization together; and that with the loss of belief in the god who holds mortals to account on the basis of that code, so the code itself is defied, and so civilisation itself falls into a dark age.

A disenchanted world leads to disenchantment with the world. Though Nolan holds out the possibility of re-enchantment that may lie beyond first reaching the point of disenchantment with ourselves, our presumption.

At St Nicholas’ Church we are running through a summer sermon series on the Psalms, and today we are exploring Psalm 19 (text below).

It is a psalm that proclaims the world is, in fact, enchanted.

Beginning with an enchanted creation, which we may experience not as unbearable judgement but as gift, the bard goes on to extol God’s Law as the thing that sustains and renews all that we might enjoy—again, as gift—before turning to address the presumptuousness that so easily leads us into disenchantment.

This is a film, and a psalm, for our disenchanted times. The gift of the church to such a time as this is re-enchantment.

Psalm 19

God’s Glory in Creation and the Law

To the leader. A Psalm of David.

1 The heavens are telling the glory of God,
and the firmament proclaims his handiwork.
2 Day to day pours forth speech,
and night to night declares knowledge.
3 There is no speech, nor are there words;
their voice is not heard;
4 yet their voice goes out through all the earth
and their words to the end of the world.
In the heavens he has set a tent for the sun,
5 which comes out like a bridegroom from his wedding canopy,
and like a strong man runs its course with joy.
6 Its rising is from the end of the heavens
and its circuit to the end of them,
and nothing is hid from its heat.

7 The law of the Lord is perfect,
reviving the soul;
the decrees of the Lord are sure,
making wise the simple;
8 the precepts of the Lord are right,
rejoicing the heart;
the commandment of the Lord is clear,
enlightening the eyes;
9 the fear of the Lord is pure,
enduring forever;
the ordinances of the Lord are true
and righteous altogether.
10 More to be desired are they than gold,
even much fine gold;
sweeter also than honey
and drippings of the honeycomb.

11 Moreover, by them is your servant warned;
in keeping them there is great reward.
12 But who can detect one’s own errors?
Clear me from hidden faults.
13 Keep back your servant also from the insolent;
do not let them have dominion over me.
Then I shall be blameless
and innocent of great transgression.

14 Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart
be acceptable to you,
O Lord, my rock and my redeemer.

 

xenia

 

In the ancient world, hospitality towards strangers was incredibly important—and, therefore, highly codified, or ritualised. Such rituals provided a framework for transforming strangers into friends, created networks of shared resources, and helped to provide loose social cohesion (or alliances) between communities across significant geographic distances.

The Greek concept of ‘xenia’ placed certain obligations on both host and guest. If a stranger, on a journey, turned up at your door, you were obliged to offer them a bath; food and drink; to not ask too many questions about them, and none at all until they had eaten; perhaps to present them with gifts; and even to provide safe escort on the next leg of their journey. Guests were obliged not to be a burden to their host; not to repay hospitality with dishonour; to tell stories of the outside world (this was an important part of the code); and to reciprocate hospitality should their host turn up at their door at a future date. Indeed, this reciprocal obligation extended to the children and grandchildren of parties who had shared xenia.

Xenia was rooted in and upheld by the belief that Zeus, and also Athena, were patrons to all and any traveller on a journey—that travellers were under their protection —and that to treat a stranger badly would incur the wrath of the gods.

Any version or telling of ‘The Odyssey’ records several instances of Xenia, extended and received, and violated—by both hosts and guests. Much of what takes place is understood within this framework. For example, Aeolus, ruler of the winds, extends hospitality (as required and expected) to Odysseus and his men, which includes giving Odysseus the gift of a bag containing the wind that will carry him home (gift; safe escort to next destination). But when, within sight of Ithaca’s shore, Odysseus’ men open the bag, and the escaping wind blows them all the way back to Aeolus from whence they had come, he refuses to help them a second time, assuming that, in fact, Odysseus must have incurred the wrath of the gods (freeing Aeolus from obligation).

There is a parallel stranger-hospitality code in ancient Judaism, which dates back at least to Abraham (broadly-speaking a contemporary of Homer) who entertained three angels in human form—and perhaps even earlier to oral traditions of angels walking the earth and fathering giants and heroes by human women.

Both Jewish and Greek hospitality codes feed into early Christian hospitality codes. The writer of the Letter to the Hebrews reminds her recipients not to neglect showing hospitality to strangers, for by so doing some have entertained angels unawares. And, of course, all the letters that form much of the New Testament, such as the letters written by Paul and his travelling companions, were written, sent, and received under xenia expectations.

Jesus himself made the treatment of strangers, according to hospitality codes expectations, the basis on which the surrounding nations of the ancient world would be judged (the parable of the sheep and the goats).

My own society has lost sight of hospitality codes (perhaps because it has lost sight of a belief in any gods who might protect strangers and travellers) and has become fearful of strangers. Not only strangers who look different from ourselves, whose skin is dark, but indeed anyone not already personally known to us who might turn up at our door unannounced. We increasingly put signs on our doors saying that a long list of strangers are not welcome. And we have a now endemic health crisis of isolation, which takes a huge toll on our wellbeing. I live in a city where hospitality generally does not extend beyond the extended family, which leaves us exposed to isolation when extended family moves away.

What might a stranger-guest-hospitality code look like today?

 

mirror

 

Elon Musk has said that he will produce a telling of the Odyssey that is more historically accurate and better than Christopher Nolan’s. For this, he has been laughed out of court—how can a myth be historically accurate!? But the scorn misses the point, as much as Musk does, albeit for different reasons. A myth is a story that transcends its original context. It survives because we can employ it to explore the issues we are facing, in our time and place. And what we think those issues are depends on our perspective. Depends on how the story relates to other stories we have been told.

In Homer’s ‘The Odyssey,’ Odysseus undertakes no voyage of discovery, no soul-searching. He is utterly deceitful in his dealings with everyone, including the men he leads, every last one of whom died, sooner or later, on account of his hubris. He is serially unfaithful to his wife. He is vainglorious. He lacks wisdom and never learns any. He returns home, eventually, unchanged.

Whether we see Odysseus—in whatever telling of the story—as hero, villain, or antihero; as exemplar or dire warning; says little about the absent king of Ithaca, and a great deal about us. This has been the case at least since the Romans retold the Greek sources, if not from the beginning.

Whether you believe that Others are coming to steal what is rightfully yours, or wrestle with the guilt that your own actions have left a scar on the lives of Others, you will be able to fashion this story in your likeness.

The Odyssey of Musk is less problematised than that of Nolan, and in one historical sense less problematic. That we find ourselves at a stalemate fighting over the text is, perhaps, ironic. The battle may eventually be won, one way or another, by deception; and the victor will need to live with the consequences as much as the loser.

As with every myth, this is a story for our times.

 

happy ever after?

 

Homer’s ‘The Odyssey’ has a happy-ever-after ending, of sorts. But in ‘Theogany,’ Homer’s contemporary Hesiod gives Odysseus a different ending.

Here, Circe bears sons fathered by Odysseus. Eventually, after Odysseus has returned home to Ithaca and been reunited with his wife Penelope, and their son, Telemachus, Circe informs her youngest son, Telegonus, of his father’s identity. Telegonus travels to Ithaca in search of his father, who is away at war (again), but, on discovering this, Telegonus sets about in a rage. Odysseus returns, confronts him, and Telegonus, not knowing who stands before him, kills his father with a poison-tipped spear, given him by his mother for protection.

Telegonus goes on to reveal his identity to Penelope and his half-brother Telemachus. Together, they sail to Circe with Odysseus’ corpse, and he is buried on her island. Circe grants her son, her lover’s son, and her lover’s widow the gift of immortality. On the advice of Athena, Circe married her lover’s son, Telemachus; and Penelope marries Telegonus, her husband’s son by his lover.

It is messy.

And there is no happy-ever-after. Even immortality cannot secure that.

Whether we get a happy ending or not is, perhaps, always a matter of perspective, certainly rather than wish-fulfilment or rushing to wrap the narrative up.

We cannot escape the consequences of our actions. We can, perhaps, together, make and maintain peace. We can rebuild a life, though not one we can control as it impacts the lives of others.

Our stories—which may be told at our funeral if not before—can be told from a variety of perspectives; some more positive than others. We ought to try to listen to whatever story is offered, even those we find hard to hear—especially those we find hard to hear—as they contain an element of common ground we have fought over.

 

pigs

 

In ‘The Odyssey’ Book X, Odysseus lands on the island of the ‘polypharmakos’ (one who weaves many drugs into potions) Circe, who lives in exile without a father, or brother, or male guardian to protect her.

Seeing smoke rising from her chimney, some of Odysseus’ crew set out to investigate. Coming close to her hall, they are drawn by her singing, as she sits and weaves at her giant loom. All but one enter her hall, whereupon she bids them eat and drink drug-infused fare, and then transforms them into pigs, and corrals them in her sties.

This is a pre-emptive defence, based on years of ships’ crews landing, coming to her door, revealing in their eyes intention to take first her body, and then her treasured possessions, for themselves (see Virgil’s ‘Aeneid,’ Ovid’s ‘Metamorphoses’—and, for a beautiful modern retelling of Circe’s story, see Madeline Miller’s ‘Circe’).

Informed of their fate by the one more wary sailor, and both instructed and protected by the god Hermes, Odysseus confronts Circe and forces her to return his crew to human form.

In Christopher Nolan’s new big screen adaptation, she does so saying, hauntingly, ‘Return to your disguise, Return to your disguise.’

(For a contrasting view, Plutarch’s ‘Moralia’ (Book XII, 67) contains ‘Beasts are Rational’ (Bruta animalia ratione uti) in which Circe permits Odysseus to have a conversation with Gryllus, a fellow-Greek transformed into the body of a pig while retaining the mind of a man, in which Gryllus argues that his life is happier in his present state, and that pigs are more noble than men.)

(An aside: I have written elsewhere about the wider parallels between ‘Odyssey’ chapter X and ‘Luke’ chapter 8.)

In ‘Journey to the West’ the General of the Heavenly Navy-soldiers, or marine commandoes, is thrown out of heaven for drunkenly attempting to seduce the moon goddess. Falling to earth to be (re-)incarnated, he lands in a well for watering pigs, and takes on a monstrous half-human, half-pig form. Many years later, this lazy, gluttonous, lustful being encounters the personification of Mercy, and is given the name Zhu Bajie, or Pig Awakened to Abstinence—that is, to the power and ability to exercise self-control.

Both stories, one 3,000 years old from Greece, the other 500 years old from China (though each sits within traditions that weave them into both earlier and later texts) employ zoomorphism to explore the shadow personality we try to hide; the true, or noble, form of a healthily integrated life; and the possibility of transformation—in either direction. Neither story arises within a Christian context, but both speak to the Christian concepts of vices—including lust, gluttony, and laziness—and virtues—including chastity, temperance and diligence.

Appetite is common to humans and other animals. To become fully human is not to transcend appetite but to learn mastery—leadership, captaincy—over our appetites, which can make for good companions but sometimes make unwise choices (such as Odysseus’ men letting the wind that had carried them to within sight of home out of the bag, blowing them back from where they had come, before they arrive at Circe’s shore). There is a nobility to this, that does not arise from status among men (or pigs) but is inherent to every creature—human, pig, otherwise (so, at the end of the ‘Journey to the West,’ Zhu Bajie, who has not yet fully embraced the virtues of Abstinence, is not given back his divine form but remains half-human, half-pig, and is restored to the lower, earth-bound, rank of Cleaner of the Altars).

We are also more than capable of debasing ourselves and becoming what we are not (whether or not pigs are more noble than humans; whether or not men make very good pigs). Of needing to be saved from our own actions, or intentions—even unacted on—by Mercy intervening to protect others and to send us into an experience of desolation and of consolation—of coming to the full, terrible, consequences of our lostness, and to the re-orienting, re-conferring promise of grace, that points us towards the homecoming we long for, and strengthens us for the still-long and at times arduous journey it will take to get there.

Every culture has to wrestle with such things. And every tradition—including faith traditions—has a framework for this work.

Where have you seen yourself, with newfound clarity, for less-than fully human?

And where have you experienced the intervention of Mercy, to restore you to humanity?

What practices have you found helpful in engaging with this process?

 

zoomorphism

 

The west window at St Nicholas Church, Sunderland depicts Jesus on the throne of heaven, surrounded by the evangelists Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, who are traditionally depicted as a human, a lion, an ox, and an eagle.

I am thinking about the representation of human character, and of the transformation of character, through animals (zoomorphism.

In the sixteenth-century Chinese epic Journey to the West, the monk Tang Sanzang is accompanied on a pilgrimage by the Monkey King, Sun Wukong (Monkey awakened to Emptiness); the pig demon, Zhu Bajie (Pig awakened to Abstinence; also known as Zhu Wuneng, Pig awakened to Power, or Ability), formerly general of the Heavenly navy, disgraced for attempting to seduce the goddess of the Moon; the fish demon Sha Wujing (Sand awakened to Purity), formerly bodyguard and attendant to the Jade emperor, disgraced for breaking the Queen Mother’s crystal cup; and the dragon prince transformed into a white horse, Bai Longma, disgraced for setting fire to a pearl gifted by the Jade emperor.

These represent different shadow aspects of human character—avarice (the attempt to fill internal emptiness by hoarding knowledge) (I am a Monkey); lust, gluttony; anger; pride, ambition—which are transformed, through self-inflicted suffering (a desolating experience) and then being shown Mercy (a consoling experience), into enlightened characteristics of wisdom; companionship; purity; and service to others. Each character receives a measure of reward, though the pig demon remains a work-in-progress by the end of the tale.

In my own faith tradition, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John accompany Jesus in the forms of a human, a lion, an ox, and an eagle.

Matthew is also known as Levi, the tax collector. He has chosen a path in life that places him outside of the community, considered a sinner, one to be shunned. He has chosen to gamble on his own skills to survive, believing that he will get farther alone (or, at least, in the company of like-minded others) than in the matrix of community. When Jesus finds him, he is alone, sitting in his tax booth. Yet Jesus calls him out from there, back into community—into a community, the Twelve, that explicitly harks back to the family of Israel. It is only in community that our humanity is given form. So, Matthew composes his account of the life of Jesus in a five-fold structure that mirrors the five books of the Torah, the account of a people, often unfaithful to one another, shaped, together, by divine instruction.

Mark is cowardly. We first meet him as a young man (albeit unnamed) who wriggles out of his clothes to run away naked from the scene of Jesus’ arrest. We meet him again running away from accompanying Paul and Barnabas on a journey to carry the good news into Asia Minor. Yet, Barnabas, the Son of Encouragement, encourages him—literally, builds up his courage—until the scaredy-cat becomes a lion, who writes down Peter’s memoir in Rome, a stone’s throw from where Christians were fed to the lions.

Luke is a Greek, perhaps a sea-going captain of ships (traditionally identified as a doctor, but that may refer to another Luke; his knowledge of ships is informed as only an insider would know). Luke ploughs his furrow through the Great Sea, rudder in hand. And at some point—most likely through Paul—he encounters the story of Jesus, and is captivated. Drawn back to land. Searches out Mary, the mother of Jesus, living with John in Ephesus. Sits at her feet and listens as she takes out the treasured memories of her son’s birth and holds them up to the light. Luke becomes the ox whose manger becomes a crib for the incarnate Word. His words—the two-part work, Luke-Acts—will carry the story further, all around the world.

John is the youngest of Jesus’ disciples, his mother’s golden boy for whom (along with his brother, James) she wants special recognition. He is the one who shines like the noonday sun in response to love, but whose countenance darkens with anger when he perceives a sleight. John will remain at the foot of the cross; will outlive all his fellow companions; will have to hear news, again and again, of their untimely deaths by execution. John will endure; and be purified by love until he can gaze into the sun of love’s light without being blinded. John will write his good news of Jesus from a very different perspective, a sweeping overview. John will become an eagle.

And what of you? What animal represents you, and the transformation you have experienced through life, and the transformation you have yet to know?

 

Monkey King

Many of my friends are writing about Odyssey, but [1] I wrote extensively about the parallels between The Odyssey and the Acts of the Apostles—the voyage of Odysseus and the missionary journeys of Paul and his companions—last summer, and [2] I have yet to see Nolan’s Odyssey, so instead I will say something about the sixteenth-century Chinese epic Journey to the West (Book 1) and the enigmatic Monkey King, Sun Wukong, born from a stone egg nurtured by both heaven and earth.

Having been appointed Protector of the Heavenly Peaches of Immortality—the fruit by which the gods gained their longevity—the Monkey King eats them himself, and sets about a rebellion against heaven. When no one in the Heavenly realm can defeat him, the gods appeal directly to the Buddha, who entraps the vain Sun Wukong with a wager: if he can leap out of the Buddha’s palm, he will be given the throne of heaven.

The Monkey King accepts, for he can travel 34,000 miles in one leap, and also fly. And so, he jumps onto the Buddha’s open palm, and leaps out again, travelling to the very end of the universe. There he comes to the Five Pillars, writing ‘Great Sage, Equal of Heaven’ on one, and urinating against another, before returning all the way back to the Buddha...whose fingers bear a tiny inscription—‘Great Sage, Equal of Heaven’—and smell monkey urine...

Before he can escape, the Buddha slams his palm on the ground, transforming it into a mountain, under which the Monkey King is held captive for 500 years, until the personification of Mercy offers him an opportunity for growth and transformation of character, accompanying a monk on a pilgrimage, along with a pig demon and a fish demon as fellow disciples, and a dragon transformed into a white horse, on which the monk rides (each companion represents a human shadow side, that will be transformed: impulsiveness to wisdom; gluttony to faithfulness; hatred to purity; ambition to service).

There are obvious parallels here with both the heavenly rebellion of a third of the angels led by Lucifer, and of the taking and eating of the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil by the first humans, Eve the Mother of all the Living, and Adam who is both animated earth and Keeper of the Heavenly Garden on earth. But there is also a parallel with Paul’s engagement with the philosophers of Athens.

Paul tells the Athenians that no one is far from God, for, as one of their own number had said (that is, a story from outside of Paul’s Jewish faith tradition; just as Journey to the West is outside of my Christian tradition) ‘in him we live and breathe and have our being.’

Just as the Monkey King cannot leap out of the Buddha’s palm, so no one is far from God.

‘Sin’ is the illusion of separation from God—and ‘hell’ is the awareness of that illusion, and disillusionment that necessarily precedes re-enchantment (Jesus tells a parable—a made-up story, an analogy—in which Abraham says that the gap between hell and heaven cannot be crossed. The point is not that the gap can never be closed, but that torah, the instructions given though Moses that includes the story of Abraham, the ‘father of faith,’ cannot bridge the gap. A different enlightenment is needed).

That is not to say that sin is of no consequence. An illusion can be deadly—think of the illusion of an oasis in the desert. Sin needs addressing, and in the person of Jesus, God does so address the problem of sin. But the nature of that problem was never separation from God.

If sin separates us from God, God could not have dwelt in the tabernacle in the camp of the Israelites who had come out of Egypt. Could not have dwelt in the temple in Jerusalem—nor risen up and departed from the temple to accompany God’s chosen people on their Exile into Babylon. Could not have taken on our humanity and dwelt among us in the person of Jesus. Yet our tradition insists that God did all these things.

Sin does not separate us from God. Indeed, Paul insists that nothing can separate us from the love of God that is ours in Christ Jesus—ours, before we recognise it, being under the illusion of separation.

And this love is key. Our not being able to remove ourselves from God’s presence is not to say that we are under constant surveillance, not that we do not possess genuine freedom. It is to say that we are held; that we are safe. Sometimes, even, kept safe—saved—from our own actions.

Jesus is the Light in whose light we are enlightened. In union with whose life our lives are transformed. Without him, much of reality is distorted to us. We see, but not with confidence. Chinese folk tales, as much as Greek—or any other culture; epic stories that belong to humanity—point to truth. Jesus is the truth to which they point.

You are not far from God. Never far from God. Nothing, good or ill, can keep you apart. This is good news. And it can be your story, your journey, your transformation.

 

on the ecology of community

 

The Gospel passage set for this Sunday is Matthew 13.1-9, 18-23, see below. [We are not following the Lectionary at St Nicholas at the moment—we are in the middle of a summer sermon series on the Psalms—but I am covering at another church this weekend.]

In this passage, Jesus tells a parable about a sower. If we are familiar with the parable, we most likely view it through the lens of individualism, and a culture that promotes polarisation. We are invited—tempted—to view ourselves as ‘good soil,’ and label others as compacted, stony, or thorny soil. Or, we compare ourselves unfavourably with others, lamenting the poor quality of the soil of our life in contrast to their greater worthiness.

But, in common with the majority of human experience, Jesus lived in a society that was more communal, where neighbours lived in greater interdependence.

Most lived in villages we would consider hamlets. While families owned land—and if you found yourself needing to sell it, you did so to the nearest possible relative, and with a return clause—each village also had its common field. This field was divided into strips that different families took responsibility to care for, alongside their primary role in the community (e.g. building, fishing).

The Holy Land is hilly, and cultivated land is terraced. Agriculture requires certain features. Places where the bedrock is close to the surface are necessary, providing the foundation for the stone walls that create the terracing. The perimeter of the cultivated land was surrounded by thorny plants, necessary to keep wild animals away from food intended for humans. The field also required paths, allowing access to each strip without trampling the entire field.

A sower scattering seed on the ground would inevitably send some seed into those areas. But in the parable, the field produces a one-hundred-and-ninety-fold return. The compacted, stony, and thorny ground contribute their part in that, as does the good soil they encompass and bisect.

As well as the common field, the village also had a common granary. The harvest was pooled, and distributed according to need, not according to the yield of the strip your family had tended. The family whose strip included thorny ground received what they needed, as much as the family who had only good soil to tend. And from the common granary, next year’s seed for sowing also came.

(And yes, there were privately owned fields and granaries too; and elsewhere Jesus tells another parable about a man who seeks to increase the size of his private granary.)

So this is a parable about a common field—think, the community listening to Jesus. We might call that common field a church congregation. Within that congregation, there are different kinds of ground, necessary for its survival. Note that nowhere does Jesus say, break up the stony ground, or root out the weeds. (How tempting it is, for those of us who scatter seed, to believe we must break every hard ground, without discernment.) This is, in fact, the ecology of community—of any kind of community.

In our congregations there are those whose service, over time, has enabled us to live together in relative harmony, not trampling over one another’s lives. Who have created, and maintain, habitual paths, or ways of doing things. Think governance. Yes, there may be times when they get stuck in their ways—when the path becomes the most important thing, where paths become barriers, where way-makers become toll-keepers unhelpfully restricting access. But the paths themselves, and those who tend them, play an essential part in the whole, even if it doesn’t look directly fruitful. Even if they miss out on the opportunity to produce a harvest, they don’t miss out on being fed.

In our congregations there are those who respond to everything with enthusiasm, that does not last. They may be ADHD, needing a different structure, but also bringing a different—and needful—gift or perspective. They—we—may be looking at the wrong metric, for what being part of the village, the field, the community looks like. They may be shoring up a defense against the odds in their personal lives. They may be discouraged that their presence in the community is taken for granted, or not valued as highly as that of others. They may have a valid point. They certainly have pastoral needs. They, too, should not miss out on being fed.

In our congregations there are those whose lives contain many cares, including financial worries. The elderly, whose bodies have begun to betray them. Their adult children, simultaneously being there for aging parents and their own children. The parent who is concerned about the bad actors who have influenced their children for harm. The one who is struggling to pay the bills, to keep food on the table and a roof over their head. These are legitimate concerns—and we rightly look to maintain both safeguarding and practical pastoral care, as a framework within which all can flourish. But it is hard work. This is one reason why in some places the strip within the common field that each family tended would be reallocated year on year, so no one had to maintain the wall or the hedge for too long. It can be disheartening work. Those who have many cares deserve special attention and care; and to not have additional burdens of judgement placed upon them. Jesus does not identify them for our censure but for our compassion.

Within our congregations, everyone has a part to play; everyone has a gift to bring; and, yes, no one is uniformly receptive to the word of the kingdom. And yet, overall, the field and the seed together produce a harvest.

So, where do you find yourself today, in relation to the common field? (Which could be, entirely outside of it.)

Whatever your answer, you are part of a village.

Where there are well-worn paths, boundaries, defence mechanisms, and a good harvest in our personal lives, may all be offered and shared to the common good.

 

good

 

The first reading set for Morning Prayer today is Judges 11.1-11.

The Book of Judges tells the story of the loosely federated tribes of Israel, after they settled in Canaan and before they were united into a kingdom. Throughout this period, various of the tribes were in conflict with various of their neighbours, who were either already living in the same territory or also seeking to take control of it. The Book of Judges presents a cycle of defeat to and oppression by neighbouring peoples, followed by successful uprising and temporary liberation under the leadership of a usually flawed hero.

Judges 11.1-11 introduces Jephthah, whose story (spoilers!) will ultimately end in tragedy. Jephthah is the child of an adulterous relationship, and though he grows up to be described as a mighty man of valour, his half-brothers drive him away, determined that he will not share the inheritance with them.

What interests me is that the account tells us that Jephthah flees to the land of Tob. Tob, or towb, means good, or pleasant. It describes an environment where healing from abuse can take place. Where someone who has been wronged might be seen, and affirmed, for who they really are. And as Jephthah removes himself to such a place, we are told that others gather to him. Men described as worthless gather to a man described as being of valour.

It is worth reflecting on who has assigned these descriptions. Jephthah himself is considered worthless by his brothers—indeed, at least for now, by his wider community; though they will come to fetch him back when they think his skills as a warrior might serve them: this, too, is abuse—though the narrator clearly has a different perspective. Likewise, the worthless fellows, or outlaws, who gather to him are outlaws because they have been driven out by their families or communities.

And in the place of Tob, the good and pleasant place, they experience healing and come to see themselves not as worthless but as skilled warriors. As a thorn in the side of the communities who drove them out.

Sometimes families can be toxic, and sometimes the wisest and bravest course of action is to cut ties (though to be clear, Jephthah will go on to make some disastrous decisions as a parent: trauma can beget trauma, even where there has been a measure of healing). But healing doesn’t happen in isolation. We need the land of Tob, the good and pleasant place. The community that honours our stories, that sees us without rejection, that is good to us. That chooses, again and again, to love someone who, because of their brokenness and baggage, resentment and bitterness, or simply because their response to potential danger is stuck on high alert, may be hard to love.

Whatever your story, may you know a ‘land of Tob.’

 

on Psalm 65

 

Our summer sermon series at St Nicholas’ explores the Psalms. This coming Sunday, our psalm will be Psalm 65 (text below).

Psalm 65 is written for the person who presides over the public worship of the gathered community, which makes it very appropriate for this weekend, when my colleague Katherine will step into that role for the first time.

It is a ‘David psalm’—a psalm composed in the tradition of David, with a David outlook, from a David perspective. And it speaks of the temple, which, at the time of David, did not exist. It is future-oriented.

For Christians, that future orientation points to Jesus—who claimed that the temple was a ‘type’ fulfilled in his own body—and to the community who proclaim him as Lord—as the rightful heir of David—those whom the disciple Jesus gave the nickname ‘stone’ imagined as living stones being built into a temple.

Psalm 65 speaks of people rooted in place, a community close nearby, or surrounding, the temple. We might call that a parish. A community, of young and old, of many different kinds of people, who find their lives blessed by proximity to the temple, or to the community who is rooted in both this place and that Lord Jesus.

We are told, in our neo-liberal world, that there is no such thing as community any more, only (increasingly polarised) individuals. But, in fact, we are created as persons, who only find the fullness of identity in relation to other persons—not just like-minded persons, but in the diversity of persons found in, and committed to, the place we are found. This diversity is the glory of a parish; and the tragedy of many a local church congregation has been their inability to embrace certain identities as divine gift. The local congregation, within the local parish, should function as a community that holds us, grounds us, nurtures us, such that we discover who we are—whom God has created us to be—and are able to flourish. Too many people have felt that they have had no choice but to leave the community behind in search of a more nurturing one.

But Psalm 65 goes on to speak of salvation, of God at work to save, to bring us into a place of healing and wholeness. To calm the storms that rage, within us and around about us. To usher in something new: morning and evening; fruitful creativity and harmonious order, and joyful celebration and rest.

Hard ground softened. Barren ground swollen with good things.

Again and again, in time, in season.

There’s a hymn often sung at funerals and cup finals that says, ‘change and decay in all around I see; O, thou who changest not, abide with me.’ But this is, at best, only part of the picture; for God is continually bringing about change, drawing life out of death, hope out of hibernation.

And it is the role of the one called to oversee the worship of the community to notice that which is not yet; to call the people back to a future-orientation; to remind us of hope that is grounded in God’s faithfulness in every age before us.

Psalm 65

To the leader. A Psalm of David. A Song.

1 Praise is due to you,

O God, in Zion,

and to you shall vows be performed,

2 O you who answer prayer!

To you all flesh shall come.

3 When deeds of iniquity overwhelm us,

you forgive our transgressions.

4 Happy are those whom you choose and bring near

to live in your courts.

We shall be satisfied with the goodness of your house,

your holy temple.

5 By awesome deeds you answer us with deliverance,

O God of our salvation;

you are the hope of all the ends of the earth

and of the farthest seas.

6 By your strength you established the mountains;

you are girded with might.

7 You silence the roaring of the seas,

the roaring of their waves,

the tumult of the peoples.

8 Those who live at earth’s farthest bounds are awed by your signs;

you make the gateways of the morning and the evening shout for joy.

9 You visit the earth and water it;

you greatly enrich it;

the river of God is full of water;

you provide the people with grain,

for so you have prepared it.

10 You water its furrows abundantly,

settling its ridges,

softening it with showers,

and blessing its growth.

11 You crown the year with your bounty;

your wagon tracks overflow with richness.

12 The pastures of the wilderness overflow;

the hills gird themselves with joy;

13 the meadows clothe themselves with flocks;

the valleys deck themselves with grain;

they shout and sing together for joy.