Saturday, November 25, 2017

Keeping the Systems Running: Reflection and Poem for Feast of Christ the King


A Reflection for Feast of Christ the King All Saints’ Church, Southern Shores, NC November 26, 2017 Thomas E. Wilson, Rector


Keeping the System Running


Before I went to seminary I was a social worker, and I taught social work. There was a story that I stole from someone - and I cannot remember who - and it goes like this: A social worker was walking through the woods one day and came across a waterfall and was alarmed that people were being swept over the waterfall. He dove into the river and swam to one and then another, pulling them onto the shore and safety. He kept diving back in, but as soon as he pulled one out, another would be swept over the falls and into the pool of water. Another person came by on the walk and the social worker pleaded, “Help me, these people are drowning.” The other person said, “You bet!” But he started to climb up the embankment on the side of the falls. The social worker called out, “Wait, the people are in trouble down here!' The other person said, “You do your work down here! I'm going upstream to stop the one who is throwing . . . them into the water.” Before I was ordained I used a lot more colorful language.


What I was trying to teach them is that helping people in trouble has the allure of heroism, of being a savior, but the deeper problem is the root causes of people's troubles. We tend to use pity as a motivation for helping, but I was trying to tell them that we’re needed to a rage against business as usual which causes the victims’ troubles. Systems need to change so that people are not treated as things but as full humans, images of God.


The challenging of systems of business as usual was the consistent message of the prophets in ancient Israel. The Temple clique tended to bless whatever was the vogue with whoever King was in power, but the prophets kept holding up a vision of the Kingdom of God. During the time of the Babylonian exile, we see the prophet Ezekiel in today's lesson casting a vision that, in the longed for restored kingdom after the exile, there would be one King, the Shepherd. Ezekiel hears God saying that, in this new restored Kingdom, the Shepherd would make sure the poor do not get exploited and there would be justice for all: “I myself will judge between the fat sheep and the lean sheep. Because you pushed with flank and shoulder, and butted at all the weak animals with your horns until you scattered them far and wide, I will save my flock, and they shall no longer be ravaged; and I will judge between sheep and sheep.”

This vision is repeated in the story that Matthew remembers about how the Kingdom of the Heavens under the Resurrected Lord will stand in solidarity with each person, and every citizen will be counted on to care for one another. There will no longer be business as usual with disposable people, for we are all fellow sons and daughters of God, children of the Most High. The editor of the Matthew Gospel sets this last story as the last public teaching before Jesus is betrayed, arrested, tried, and executed. Jesus speaks about the Kingdom of God and in a few days after this teaching, the Kingdoms of this world, personified by the figures of King Herod and Pontius Pilate, will do business as usual to get rid of the troublemakers. Then just when they think they have won, the resurrection makes them question the limits of their Kingdoms. 
 
Today is the last Sunday before Advent, and in the older Prayer Books up through the 1928 Prayer Book in which I was raised, it was unofficially called “Stir up Sunday”, because the Collect, the Prayer for the Day, started with the petition “Stir up, we beseech ye, O Lord, the wills of thy faithful people . . .”. When I heard those words, I knew that all around the world in Anglican and Episcopal churches the Sunday school lesson, and probably the Sermon, was going to have a bit about the need to stir up the Christmas pudding. In the English tradition, this was the time to begin making the yearly Christmas pudding and adding the fruit and liquor to the recipe, a process that would be repeated for the five weeks before it was ready to be served on Christmas Day.


When the Book of Common Prayer was revised in 1979, the “stir up” Collect was moved to the third Sunday of Advent in an ecumenical gesture to coincide with the Roman Catholic Solemnity of the Feast of Christ the King. Christ the King is a relatively new celebration in the liturgical calendar; it was promulgated in 1925 under Pope Pius XI. Pius had seen many of the kings of this world crumble during World War I as Kaisers, Emperors, Czars and Sultans, the protectors of official religions were consigned to the past and shaky republics were experimenting with increasing secularization of the culture. Business as usual had destroyed the old order and now Pius hoped for a new kind of Kingdom. Pius wanted to underline that the whole world was under the Kingship of Christ and there would be a judgement of all that world when Christ returns. He called for each person to remember that Chirst was to reigh in our hearts, minds, bodies and our social interactions to be aware that we were instruments of Christ's justice in this world.


Pius, as the modern day heir to the Prophetic Office, was wary of the rising tide of secularism which suggested that humans had been abandoned by God and we were left to our own devices. He warned against growing anti-Semitism in Germany, France, Croatia, Hungary, Poland and America, for this Jesus had been Jewish. He was nervous about the rise of Socialism and the spread of Communism from the new Soviet Union. He was bothered by the continuing dehumanization of workers being exploited by rampant capitalism and totalitarian regimes. Pius spent the rest of his life to 1939, on the eve of the 2nd World War, trying to come to terms with a changing world and praying for the best. Pius was a prophet, but unfortunately was also a priest like in the old Temple. He negotiated agreements with Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy, and Spain - which seemed to give the bullies some legitimacy - in order to save what remained of Roman Catholic Church property and prestige in those areas and, in this way, preserve business as usual.


After the the next World War, looking at all the rubble and damage, there was a felt need to have judgment on how we, by our inaction as part of business as usual, had so enabled our addiction to violence and later embraced the carnage with millions dead as we stood looking on. There were trials of war criminals by the victors, but the churches realized there was, in Seward’s words before the American Civil War, “A higher law than the Constitution and a greater judge than the Supreme Court.”

The question for your meditation for today was: ‘If Jesus were on the ballot for King, would you vote for him?” To have Jesus as our King does not mean a change in secular governments, but a change in each one of us who are governed. If Christ is our King, does that mean that we will no longer allow our representatives in office to be sold to the highest bidder? Does it mean a change that we will no longer turn a blind eye to exploitation? Does it mean we will no longer tolerate the bullying tactics of the fat sheep and the portraying of the poor as inadequate persons? Does it mean we will no longer just sigh when we hear of how people work hard all day and do not have a living wage? Does it mean we will no longer see a sick person and ask if they have enough money for treatment, but will be willing to reach deeply into our combined treasures and pay for it? Does it mean we will no longer use our jails, courts, and laws as a means of social control of minorities? Does it mean we will no longer support the easy access to violence to solve relationship difficulties between persons of nations? Does it mean we will no longer see elections as a spectator sport, but as an obligation to claim our informed citizenship with our precious vote?

If Christ is our King, what does it mean?


Keeping the System Running
Denying the injustice Pilate washed his hands
feeling sorry; but said heck what could he do?
Not holding status quo will lose place in queue
of an advancement furthering his career plans.
He thought it is best to avoid rocking the boat.
After showing some mercy, how would it stop?
Next thing, paying living wage up would pop
which would threaten his bank balance bloat.
I know what I will do, I will send some aid
to his family to make it through the Passover,
maybe some beans to help sorrow's hangover,
contribute bit to help a temple service's paid.”
Things haven't changed much over the years
as the fearful bullies still cry crocodile tears.

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