Saturday Night Theologian
9 October 2005

Exodus 32:1-14

Austin District Attorney Ronnie Earle this week indicted former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay a second time on charges relating to DeLay's alleged involvement in a scheme to redirect money from corporate donors into the campaign war chests of Texas politicians, a practice illegal in Texas. Earle's friends and acquaintances describe him as a person who is driven to eradicate the corrupting influence that money plays in the political arena. If this characterization is accurate, Earle may be up against an adversary whose reach is too extensive to overcome. I'm not talking about Tom DeLay, "The Hammer," as he likes to call himself. I'm talking about money and the power it wields over society. I'm talking about the call of gold. When Moses delayed (no pun intended) coming down from the mountain, the people grew restless, for they saw themselves without either a human or a divine leader. Aaron took their gold earrings, melted them, and cast a golden calf for the people to worship. Even though they themselves were the source of the gold, the people willingly worshiped the golden calf that Aaron produced. The text also suggests that the people initiated a celebration, which devolved into an orgy. Apparently gold has the power to corrupt both the religious and the moral sensibilities. The lure of money continues to corrupt society today. Setting aside blatantly illegal activities that involve money, such as money laundering, influence peddling, and bribery, the public condones many uses of money that are clearly harmful to the fabric of society itself, including allowing money to influence--and often determine--who is elected to public office and which laws are passed or struck down. It is no accident that the vast majority of "public servants" who inhabit the House and Senate, not to mention the White House, are rich. It is very difficult to get elected today without substantial financial resources, preferably of one's own. Although Texas law prohibits both corporations and labor unions from donating directly to candidates for office, it is corporations that are far and away the greatest threat to democracy. Today's big corporations can put almost unlimited resources in the hands of those who hold public--public, not corporate--office. As a result, the government regularly passes laws that benefit large corporations, and their shareholders, rather than ordinary people. The tragedy in this situation is that we the people acquiesce in our own subjugation. We pay our money, in taxes and in exaggerated retail prices, and we watch complacently as corporations use our money to bend the government to their will. We accept the ruling of the courts, also corrupted by money, that says that corporations have the same rights as real people. We shake our heads as corporations pressure Congress to gut the Environmental Protection Act, so that businesses no longer have to maintain sufficient habitat for threatened and endangered species to avoid sliding into the oblivion of extinction. We say we support campaign finance reform, but little reform ever gets passed, and what is passed is quickly struck down by the courts or watered down by further legislation. In short, we are a society that worships the golden calf, to our detriment, and we aren't even usually aware of it. Who among us will hear God's angry voice, calling us to see how the corrupting influence of money is hurting the weakest among us? Who will have the courage to point out the golden calves among us and call for their destruction?

Psalm 106:1-6, 19-23

The Jewish holiday Yom Kippur, or the Day of Atonement, begins at sunset on October 12. In the Bible it was a national day of fasting and repentance, a day of introspection on which to confess one's sins and to commit oneself to a new life. Psalm 106 is a psalm that might have been read on Yom Kippur, for it rehearses the nation's past sins and thanks God for divine forgiveness. The importance of corporate confession of sins escapes the notice of too many Christians today, and it is completely absent from the American national consciousness. America has a great history, but it is also a terrible history. Deeds of incredible courage mix with acts of unspeakable cruelty. Triumphs of justice are interspersed with depravities of injustice. In this respect Americans are no different from citizens of any other country or group of people. Our problem is that we too often fail to acknowledge our past sins, and even if we do acknowledge them, we often refuse to identify with those who committed them. "If we had been in that situation, we would never have committed such atrocities," we tell ourselves. But how do we know? Our ancestors did, and are we better people than they were? It is a common practice nowadays, when considering a prospective Supreme Court justice, to hearken back to the nation's founders and invoke their wisdom, and indeed they did exhibit great foresight in crafting the U.S. Constitution. However, the Constitution was also a seriously flawed and unjust document in its treatment of women and especially of slaves. When we are able to see both the strengths and weaknesses of our predecessors, we are able to acknowledge that we have strengths and weaknesses as well, though from our own vantage point in the present it is sometimes hard to see in what ways we are sinning against our brothers and sisters both here and abroad. On this Day of Atonement, this time of introspection, let us then acknowledge the sins of our past: our virtual extermination of the native peoples of North and South America; our participation in the kidnapping, torture, murder, and enslavement of millions of people from Africa and their descendants; our persecution of people who worshiped God in a different manner from the dominant, accepted forms of worship; our numerous travesties of justice, including the Salem witch trials, the trial of the Haymarket anarchists, and the trial of Julius and (particularly) Ethel Rosenberg; our interment of Japanese Americans during World War II; our lynching and persecution of innumerable African Americans; our culture of violence, that produces almost as many weapons as there are U.S. citizens; our institutionalized racism manifested in our ghettoes and prisons; our state-sponsored humiliation and torture of prisoners in our "war on terror"; our sanction of judicial murder; our history of discrimination against women and people of color; our wars of imperialism, from the Spanish-American War, to Vietnam, to Iraq; our failure to provide adequate housing, medical care, and education to many of our citizens. The list goes on, with some events from our distant past and others that continue into the present. The purpose of listing our sins is not to devalue our nation or to portray it as more wicked than any other nation. The value of proclaiming such a litany of sins is three-fold. First, when we acknowledge our past sins, we are reminded of them and are encouraged not to repeat them in the future. Second, when we identify ourselves with our predecessors who committed these sins, we admit that we too are capable of great evil and miscarriages of justice and are thus in need of divine mercy and forgiveness. Third, when we see ourselves as sinful people in need of God's mercy, we are less inclined to label other nations as evil, as though we lived in a Manichean world where we were totally good and our enemies totally evil, and we are therefore more willing to engage in dialog and persuasion rather than force. The psalm ends with a cry for God's help, and we too must cry to God for forgiveness for our sins, for they are numerous--but not too numerous to be forgiven!

Philippians 4:1-9

The first Nobel Prizes for 2005 were announced this week, and it got me to thinking about what people are remembered for. How would you like to be remembered? Most of us would like to be remembered for our wisdom, or our compassion, or our courage. We wouldn't mind being remembered because of an athletic or academic accomplishment, for holding political office, or for winning a prestigious award of some sort. None of us would like to be remembered for our shortcomings, failures, or sins. Nor would we like to be remembered for our pettiness, but that's exactly what we think of when we hear the names Euodia and Syntyche, two women leaders in the Philippian church who had some sort of disagreement with one another. The verses that mention them are often overlooked when people read this passage from Philippians, because we want to get on to the verses that talk about rejoicing, prayer, and the peace of God. We bypass the message to Euodia and Syntyche at our own peril, however, because it is a message we need to hear. When church members fight with one another, the church becomes ineffectual. Prospects don't want to join a church where they see bickering. On a larger scale, potential converts might be frightened away by Christians fighting with one another. This is not to say that Christians should agree with one another on everything. That will never happen, nor should it. We are going to have differences of opinion on matters of faith and practice, and we must accept that. Some people see the multitude of different denominations as a problem, but I don't think it's necessarily a problem. We all need places where we can worship God with a measure of comfort. On the other hand, we also need to remember that we have no guarantee of comfort in the church. In fact, if we are always comfortable, we are probably not being challenged, and we're certainly not being confronted with new ideas. We Christians need to learn to accept one another's differences of opinion and approach to Christianity without feeling the need to convert others to our own opinion. Even worse, we should never assume that our understanding of the truth should be normative for everyone else. My biggest problem with fundamentalists is not the beliefs that they hold but rather their assumption that their doctrines and practices are required of all good (or true) Christians. I'm perfectly happy for people to hold views of the Bible, of faith, of salvation, and even of God that are quite different from mine. I believe that I can learn more from people who have a different perspective than I can from people who share my approach to religion. All I ask is that those who approach Christianity differently extend me the same courtesy. If Christianity ever ceases to be an important religion in the world, it won't be because "Christian" nations have been conquered by people of different faiths, it will be because Christians are so busy fighting among themselves that they don't even notice when the world finally dismisses Christianity as a serious contender for their loyalty.

Matthew 22:1-14

When early Christians retold the parable of the Wedding Banquet, they interpreted the guests who were invited first but refused to come to the feast as the Jews, and they saw themselves as the people from the streets who were invited to attend. In the first century, such an analysis might make sense, although of course the bulk of the earliest Christians were Jews themselves, but how can this parable be applied in the context of a predominantly Gentile church in the midst of a Gentile world? Now it is reasonable to associate the first group of invitees with those who have grown up in the church and take its blessings and benefits for granted, who see themselves as God's chosen people. What the parable teaches us is that God's "chosen people" can never take their chosenness for granted. The God who chose one group can un-choose the same group and substitute another. Similarly, the group that responded positively at one point can grow complacent and satisfied, no longer worthy of the moniker "chosen people." Matthew adds to this parable another, originally separate, parable, about the guest at the feast who wasn't dressed properly. The king orders him to be cast outside, where he cannot participate in the joys of the feast, and the parable concludes with the words of Jesus, "Many are called, but few are chosen." In fact, even those who are chosen at one time may not be chosen at another, because they have neglected to conduct themselves properly as inhabitants of God's kingdom. The good news is that, if they amend their ways, they can be chosen again. This is not to say that only the worthy are chosen. On the contrary, no one who is chosen is worthy of the indescribable blessings of God. However, once we are chosen, we are responsible for living our lives in accordance with the precepts of the kingdom: loving our neighbors, praying for our adversaries, helping those in need, etc. Some people avoid Christianity, and other organized religions, because they believe that they will have too many rules to follow and their lives will be too restricted. Yes, there will be restrictions, which are for the benefit of both those in the kingdom and others, but there will also be great blessings. After all, Jesus compares the kingdom of God to a wedding banquet, not a funeral.