What we are reading, in Mark s text, is a liturgical recreation of the final days of Jesus life, designed for use in worship.

Transcription

1 Pitt Street Uniting Church, 29 March 2015 A Contemporary Reflection by Rev Dr Margaret Mayman Palm Sunday B Isaiah 50: 4-9; Mark 11: 1-11; Contemporary Reading i This morning we tell the story of Jesus entry into Jerusalem. We recall it in our liturgical palm procession. We call it a parade, but it was not an idyllic picnic. There was jubilation, but underneath a sinister note of foreboding was present. It was a protest. It set in motion the events of the passion, the challenge to authority, the last meal with friends, the anointing of Jesus by the unnamed woman, the night in the garden, the betrayal, arrest, denial and crucifixion. The gospels are not records of straightforward historical facts remembered by the authors, but stylized interpretations of the believing community. The gospels, especially the Gospel of Mark, were written to be used in the worshipping community. The gospels tell the story of faith in the context of religious and political power. The passion is not about Jesus as a sacrifice or substitution to pay the price for sin. The story of the events of the last week are pointing us toward the incarnation of God s justice which subverts the status quo of political oppression, economic exploitation, and religious legitimation. When we examine the order in which Mark has told the story of the passion of Jesus, it begins to be clear that the events that brought the Christian people into existence as the people of God have been recounted in a liturgical pattern quite similar to the one used by the Jews on the day of Passover. What we are reading, in Mark s text, is a liturgical recreation of the final days of Jesus life, designed for use in worship. This story of Jesus death was never intended to be an eyewitness account of objective history. the written gospel tradition was initiated for and by the liturgical needs of the early Christian community. The story is not to be engaged as literal facts but as literary imagination. The power of this account is that it is story It is a story that has gripped my life, shaped my life since I was a child I don t need literal truth to appreciate human truth I enter the story, I bring my story into conversation with it - but not just my story because I am not Christian as an individual A Reflection by Rev Dr Margaret Mayman Page 1 of 5

2 I am Christian in community, at this time in my life, I am Christian with and among you - your stories intersect with mine and our stories engage with the passion of Jesus. Think about the parades you have been part of: I remember attending my first ANZAC parade as a Girl Guide. Protests against the Springbok Rugby tour on New Zealand as a student in 1981, including being arrested and held in a dirty old concrete gaol with about thirty other women for ten hours until we were finally released in the middle of the night. Women s march for reproductive rights in Washington DC million people in 1990 Protests against the Iraq war in 2003 in Wellington, and also in Washington DC and with women from around the world in New York In Wellington, the 2004 march/parade at parliament as part of the campaign for civil unions that stood against a huge anti-gay march organised by a fundamentalist church. Two years of participation in the Sydney Mardi Gras parade, this year with the Uniting Church LGBTI and Friends Network, protesting the treatment of LGBTI asylum seekers and the plight of LGBTI people in countries where it is still illegal and dangerous to be queer. And last year, on holy Saturday, I attended a liturgy at Scott Morrison s office in Cronulla, witnessing against the unjust and oppressive treatment of asylum seekers held in indefinite detention in Australia, on Nauru and on Manus Island in PNG. This year, I plan to be part of a similar liturgy at Tony Abbott s office. These experiences help me undomesticate the Palm Sunday parade it was a protest parade feelings were hot and strong it was dangerous it was empowering, it was an act of resistance. Palm/Passion In the lectionary of the church, this Sunday is both Palm Sunday and Passion Sunday. Last year, we dramatised the passion story. It s important to tell that story on a Palm Sunday because not everyone will come to a Good Friday service, and it makes no sense to move from the Parade to the resurrection next Sunday without telling the story of the last Supper, the betrayal and the crucifixion. But this year, I want to return to a focus on the Palm Parade because it is also important in its own right. The story is told in all four gospels. We are meant to pay attention. A Reflection by Rev Dr Margaret Mayman Page 2 of 5

3 Marcus Borg and Dom Crossan s book The Last Week is based on paying careful attention to the last week of Jesus life as described in Mark s gospel. In their comments on Palm Sunday, they discuss the domination system in Jerusalem that was characterized by political oppression, economic exploitation, and religious legitimation. Jesus was sharply critical of the temple in the city and its collaboration with the domination system. Borg and Crossan insist that our contemporary interpretations do not perpetuate centuries of anti-semitism. The conflict was not about priests and sacrifice. Jesus protest was against the domination system legitimated in the name of God, a domination system radically different from what the already present and coming reign of God, the dream of God, would be like. It was not Jesus against Judaism, or Judaism against Jesus. Rather Jesus was a Jewish voice, one of several first century Jewish voices, concerned with what loyalty to the God of Judaism meant. Borg and Crossan tell us that two processions entered Jerusalem in the days before the feast of the Passover in the year 30 of the Common Era. Passover in Jerusalem was a volatile time. The Jewish people were celebrating their divine deliverance from the past Egyptian Empire while they were currently living under the Roman Empire. The Romans feared that the Jews would get stirred up again with all their talk about freedom from bondage to the empire. That s why the first procession into Jerusalem was a military cavalry led by the Roman governor Pilate. He brought his troops to the city to quell any over-zealous Jews who might be calling for freedom from the Roman Empire. Pilate s procession arrived in the city from the west. Jesus entered the city from the east in another procession, a counter-procession. Pilate rode into the city on a war horse, but Jesus entered on a borrowed donkey. It s clear that Jesus planned this well in advance when he tells his disciples to go get a donkey and say to the owner, "The Rabbi needs it." Ched Myers suggests that Jesus is intentionally planning a piece of subversive, even comical, street theatre. The king of peace comes riding on a donkey, making a clear reference to the prophecy of Zechariah, which speaks of a king of peace on a donkey who will banish the war horse and the battle bow from the land. The contrast is clear. It s Jesus versus Pilate, the nonviolence of the reign of God versus the violence of empire. He is turning imperial notions of power and rule on their head. His theatre is political parody. In his triumphal entry he lampoons the powers that be and their pretensions to glory and domination. He comes as one who identified with the poor, who is vulnerable, who refuses to rely on violence. He takes the role of the jester, who enacts in a humorous disorienting way a totally different understanding of power, and invites people to see and live in the world in a new way. Jesus message to the crowds was to repent, not in the sense of contrition, but "to embark upon a way that goes beyond the mind that you have." Jesus brought hope to peasants who desperately needed a way out of their misery. His preaching about the Reign of God emphasizes the present moment, not life after death. The great message of Palm Sunday is whether our loyalty is to Jesus or to Caesar; to the Reign of God or to the System of the State, that is both economically and politically oppressive. A Reflection by Rev Dr Margaret Mayman Page 3 of 5

4 Sometimes we hear the claim that the church should stay out of politics; but it s clear from the Palm Sunday story that Jesus confronted the political leaders. While we may cherish the principle of church-state separation, that does not mean that we separate our faith from political choices. If Jesus is Lord, which simply means that Caesar is not Lord, what position do we take on the practice of war and the sending, yet again, of troops to Iraq while cutting foreign aid and side-lining diplomacy? The troops purpose is to build up a failed Iraqi military to fight ISIS a force led by former generals of the Iraqi military, in an unending cycle of terrible violence that never results in peace. Do we ride into the city with the warhorses of Caesar, or do we follow Jesus band of palm wavers hailing him as the Prince of Prince? Do we follow the politics of Jesus or do we stand with the politics of Caesar? Do we dismiss Jesus as a trouble-maker? These are questions that confront us when we take seriously our commitment to be disciples. If we are followers of Jesus, we will be counter-cultural people in the minority. And we will be faced with the temptation to go along with crowd this week, those who say, Get rid of the trouble-maker. We have no king but Caesar. Today is an odd day. We are rejoicing and hailing Jesus as he rides in, weeping over the city saying Would that they knew the things that make for peace! I don t really see us as the sort of people who will be joining the crowd on Friday shouting, Crucify him. But there is another equally dangerous temptation. If not actually joining in the condemnation, will we perhaps more likely opt to stand on the sidelines as bystanders, watching Jesus be demonized and dehumanized. And saying nothing? Genuine discipleship, following Jesus, means following him to Jerusalem, to the place of confrontation with the domination system and following him to death and resurrection. Two processions entered Jerusalem. The same question, the same alternative, faces those who would be faithful to Jesus today. Which procession are we in? Which procession do we want to be in? This is the question for today, for Palm Sunday, and for the holy week that lies before us. As we go through this week, are we open to experience the hope of Easter? Are we willing to let God s new covenant be written on our own hearts, so that we too may passionately follow along the paths of compassion and peace and justice? These are the questions for the week ahead as we enter the story - as we bring our stories into conversation with the palm and passion stories - as we allow ourselves to once again be challenged and changed. This story reminds us that the God who creates us also loves us and frees us. The love of God is not an empty feeling but a powerful force. We are called to love as we have been loved, to extend ourselves in real acts of compassion. Jesus getting on a donkey and parading among the palms towards Jerusalem reminds us that to love is to risk. Christian mystic Simone Weil wrote: Those who are unhappy have no need for anything in this world but people who are capable of giving them their attention. The capacity to give one s attention is a miracle. A Reflection by Rev Dr Margaret Mayman Page 4 of 5

5 This story tells us of the miracle of God s complete attention. In Jesus, we recognise God s love for the world. In the knowledge that we are not alone, this story invites us to love as God loves. i Excerpts from Last Chance: The Final Week of Jesus Life by James Taylor A Reflection by Rev Dr Margaret Mayman Page 5 of 5