A piece of the space shuttle Columbia was discovered yesterday in east Texas, a remnant of the fiery explosion a year and a half ago that destroyed the shuttle and killed all aboard. It was shortly after that disaster that I launched Progressive Theology and wrote the first article, entitled "Who Mourns for the Others?" In the article, I talked about the grief that our nation felt because of the loss of the shuttle crew, but I wondered why we didn't feel other, equally terrible losses just as greatly. The prophet Jeremiah wrote during a time when his country's national identity was crumbling around him, and he felt the pain of his fellow countrymen deeply. "O that my head were a spring of water, and my eyes a fountain of tears, so that I might weep day and night for the slain of my dear people!" (NRSV renders the phrase traditionally translated "the daughter of my people" as "my poor people," a phrase chosen to indicate Jeremiah's emotional attachment to the people. This rendering is unfortunate, because it might tend to make English readers believe that the present passage contains one of several Hebrew words for "the poor," which it doesn't. I've substituted "dear people.") Like many Americans, I felt pain as the number of U.S. soldiers killed in Iraq passed 1000 last week, and I've watched the body count continue to rise (more than 50 so far this month alone) with a feeling of sorrow. Surely many of the wives and husbands and parents and children of those who have fallen ask themselves, "Is the Lord not in Zion?" Isn't God in control? "Is there no balm in Gilead?" Why doesn't God heal this painful wound in our nation's heart instead of allowing it to fester? As I ponder that earlier article on the space shuttle, though, I think we're asking the wrong question. Or rather, not the wrong question, but not the only right question. It's certainly legitimate to grieve for those closest to us, either by blood or by nationality, but as Christians, we should also grieve for the others: the Shiite woman whose husband was killed in a bombing run, the Sunni man whose son was killed by a car bomber while walking down the street, the Kurdish girl who lies in the hospital missing an arm, the family of an Arab journalist killed while reporting live from an anti-American demonstration. Yes, and even the Iraqi citizen, whom our government calls a terrorist but who sees himself as a patriot defending his country, whose lifeless body is crushed beneath the tracks of a Bradley armored vehicle after being shot in a gunfight with American or British soldiers. There are many for whom to mourn in Iraq, and many more in Afghanistan, the Sudan, Chechnya, Russia, Israel, Palestine, Indonesia, India, Pakistan, Sierra Leone, . . .; the list goes on. Jeremiah saw what was happening to his people, and he knew that, at least in part, they were paying the price for their sins. Much, perhaps most, suffering can be said to be caused by sin--either the sin of the person suffering or, very often, the sin of someone else--but, paradoxically, most suffering is also innocent. Assigning cause and blame for suffering is often difficult, involving complex analysis of often incoherent, ambiguous, or incomplete data, but our reaction to suffering doesn't have to be difficult. We can simply have compassion. Like Jeremiah, we can be aware of the faults of many of those who suffer without losing our sense of connectedness with them. Perhaps if more of us felt connected to Shiite wives and Sunni fathers and all the others who live in vulnerable places around the world (and after 9/11, who doesn't live in such a place?), we would work together to alleviate much of the suffering that is clearly attributable to human action. That would be true compassion.
It is accepted wisdom that the "good guys" won World War II, while the "bad guys" lost. Similarly, those who were "right" won World War I, the U.S. Civil War, and the American Revolution. It may be the accepted wisdom after the fact, but as history unfolds, people on both sides of a conflict can make plausible cases for their side's position. Weren't the Germans justified in rebuilding their nation after the cruel settlement terms imposed on them after World War I? Weren't the states that made up the Confederacy truer to the intent of the framers of the Constitution concerning both slavery and states' rights than their adversaries in the Union? Weren't the revolutionaries in New England guilty of treason, unlike their brave contemporary, Benedict Arnold? Military victory is not the best arbiter of right and wrong, and a study of history usually reveals both good and bad on both sides of a conflict. Nevertheless, when people do not yet have the benefit of hindsight, they often view the conflicts in which their nations are involved as having an obvious good and an obvious evil side, and of course, their nation's side is always good. Politicians and demagogues who try to instill in their fellow citizens a simplistic, Manichean view of world conflicts as "right or wrong," "us or them," or "good or evil" are leading people in a dangerous direction. As this psalm shows, however, when they do so, they are doing nothing new. The psalmist cries out to God over the injustice of the destruction of Jerusalem by "God's enemies." He describes the unwarranted suffering of his people, both physical and emotional. What remedy does he seek from God? "Pour out your anger on the nations that do not know you, and on the kingdoms that do not call on your name. For they have devoured Jacob and laid waste his habitation." It is human nature to want God to punish our enemies. What we often don't realize, however, is that our enemies are not God's enemies. In fact, God has no enemies. Yes, God disapproves of injustice and oppression, selfishness and cruelty, but God disapproves of those traits in us as well as our enemies. I like the Psalms, because they often present an unvarnished glimpse of humanity's relationship with God. Sometimes we praise God for all we're worth, and other times we invoke God's wrath on our enemies. Often we do both at about the same time, not realizing that praising God and hating people whom God loves are incompatible attitudes. Still, they're the attitudes we often have. What shall we say, then? Should we continue sinning that grace may abound? May it never be (to quote Paul)! We can't completely escape the culture in which we live or the worldview that we share with our neighbors, but we can at least be aware that our culture and worldview are our own; they're not universally shared. Once we acknowledge that, we can begin to view those with whom we or our nation are in conflict not as enemies but as potential friends. As Ajax says in Sophocles' eponymous play, "I am newly aware that our enemy is to be hated but as one who will hereafter be a friend." That's good advice from a legendary Greek hero to the psalmist and to us as well.
When Aaron Copland wrote the musical suite "Appalachian Spring," he incorporated in it an old Shaker hymn called "Simple Gifts." He popularized the tune, which had not received much fanfare previously, and today its simple beauty is widely recognized by many who may have never heard of the Shakers. Hymns are often powerful conduits of meaning and feeling. People who have not been to church in years still remember hymns that they sang, even if they don't remember any of the sermons they heard. Today's reading from 1 Timothy incorporates a fragment of an ancient Christian hymn, probably one that was familiar to the recipients of the letter. "There is one God; there is also one mediator between God and humankind, Christ Jesus, himself human, who gave himself a ransom for all, attested at the right time." That the hymn is ancient is attested by its "low" Christology, which portrays Jesus as human but does not mention an innately divine side, although the fact that he is called the sole mediator between God and humanity may suggest an adoptionist view. Why does the author quote this hymn fragment here; what is its relation to the immediate context? The letter comes from a time when Christians are still a distinct minority in the Roman Empire, and they only want to be allowed to live their lives and practice their religion in peace. Christians are summoned to pray for their political leaders, which, in addition to the benefits to the leaders from the prayers of the saints, will also demonstrate to those in power that they have nothing to fear from Christians, whose only political ambitions are to be good citizens. How things changed with the ascension of Constantine to the throne of the empire! Now Christians were in power, and they lost little time in doing their best to eliminate opposing viewpoints, either by persuasion or by force. Since that time the sword has been as much the symbol of Christendom as the cross, and at times the two symbols have been viewed as synonymous. Remember that old hymn: "Onward Christian soldiers, marching as to war, with the cross of Jesus, going on before." Today we live in a pluralistic society. Many Christians see pluralism as a bad thing, but I disagree. We can learn from people with different points of view and different beliefs, and what is more, we need to learn from them. And they need to learn from us as well. Our reading says that God wants everyone to be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth, but truth cannot be instilled by the barrel of a gun. Missiles and bombs and bullets and landmines and depleted uranium only turn people away from the truth that God loves them. If we really believe that Christ is God's mediator to the world, it's time we started acting like Jesus. Regardless of the fact that Christianity is the majority religion in many parts of the world today, the gospel message is more likely to spread in a setting of peace and dignity. You can't preach Jesus to a group of people after you've terrorized them with guns and bombs. That's just not effective evangelism. It's time to put our trust in Christ Jesus, God's unique mediator, whose message alone can change the world.
The parable of the dishonest steward is probably the strangest and most confusing of all Jesus' parables. A steward is found to be cheating his master, who promptly dismisses him from his post. The steward, thinking quickly, reasons that his only hope of survival is to get into the good graces of his master's debtors, so he reduces the amount they owe to his master. The master, far from condemning the steward, praises him for his shrewdness. By telling this story, is Jesus praising dishonesty? In the notes to the New Oxford Annotated Bible, the commentator suggests that the steward was not acting dishonestly in discounting his master's debtors' accounts but was merely eliminating his own commission. Although this reading gets around the problem of the master praising the steward for his dishonesty, it has no support from the text itself. It is more likely that the whole story was intended to be taken ironically. In this reading, the master realizes that the servant has gotten the better of him by acting shrewdly, if not honestly, and he chuckles at the steward's ingenuity. And why not? The master is rich, and the discounting of a few debts won't send him to the poorhouse. Maybe he thinks to himself, "I can use a devious, amoral person like this; maybe I should hang onto him!" Or maybe he sees a little bit of himself in the steward's dishonesty, since the acquisition of wealth, in that day as in this, often involved shady deals, half-truths, and outright injustice. The irony of the story seems to be confirmed by Jesus' summarizing comment in verse 9: "And I tell you, make friends for yourselves by means of dishonest wealth so that when it is gone, they may welcome you into the eternal homes." The word translated "homes" here is literally "tents," which are the most impermanent of dwellings, and the juxtaposition of "eternal" and "tents" suggests an impossible situation, a paradox. Regardless of one's precise understanding of the parable itself, the following comments are clear. Money is a great tempter. Jesus explicitly calls it "dishonest wealth" to contrast it with the true riches that come from God, and he suggests that if one has an abundance of one, he cannot have an abundance of the other. Many churches today offer wealth management classes, and that makes me uneasy. I have a retirement plan myself, but I sometimes think that it reflects poorly on the faith I have in God. The solution I've arrived at personally is to continue to build my retirement nest egg but not to count on it actually being there when I retire. With corporate pension raids, poorly performing markets, and the ever-present possibility of runaway inflation, there's at least a reasonable possibility that my retirement plan won't amount to much anyway. And as for social security, forget about it! I've given up hope that Congress will do anything to save it; the last chance was back when America had budget surpluses--remember the Clinton era? I do think that God wants us to plan for our futures, and that includes financial planning, but I also know that it's easy to fall into the trap of becoming enslaved to money. "No one can serve two masters," Jesus said. "He will either love the one and hate the other, or be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and wealth." It's true that money has its benefits, but it also has its dangers. Our culture tells us all the time about the benefits of money. The church needs to remind us periodically about its dangers as well.