Say again!?

I suppose if I worked on it, I could tease out of one corner of my mind some sense of this news. But I think the following item is bizarre. It's drawn from page 2 of the Winter 2007 issue of the Spectrum, the apparently aptly named alumni magazine of the Yale Divinity School (YDS):

One of the most dynamic new student groups at YDS draws from a long
unrepresented constituency at the divinity school: nonbelievers. They are the
Left Behind, a group of agnostics and atheists who aim to provide a "caring and
inclusive atmosphere to those who already subscribe to our beliefs," ion the
words of Matt Riley '08 M.A.R., who helps lead the group.

I don't quite get why an atheist would want a graduate degree in religion -- and especially why he or she would go to a divinity school to get it (even Yale's). How does one proceed to earn a degree when one denies the very premise upon which the education is built -- viz., the reality, in some, way, shape, or form of a "divine"? I understand that the (presumably) young man is in an academic program, not in the M.Div. sequence. But still ... .

I don't know whether to be happy or not that when "Riley approached the dean of students about organizing likeminded students," he "received an encouraging response." Come on now, folks, isn't that leaning a little heavy on the inclusivity staff?

Wednesday of Holy Week

In preparation for the Triduum, I invite your visit to this site, a kind of virtual Stations. Some of the works of art are quite moving.

And I offer blessings for memorable Pascha.

R.I.P., Brother Herman

The Rev. Dr. Herman G. Stuempfle who served Gettysburg Seminary as professor, chaplain, dean, and president has died.

Eternal rest grant him, O Lord;
And let perpetual light shine upon him.

I was privileged to study preaching with Dr. Stuempfle -- along with a January course on Bernard of Clairvaux and a course on literature and theology. The integration of the fine arts into the task of preaching was of particular skill to Dr. Stuempfle, and he was always generous, clear, and committed in promoting his approach.

For those who want to read on, here is the entire communication from the synod in which Dr. Stuempfle served:

Lutheran Educator, Seminary President, and Prolific Hymn Author Herman G. Stuempfle Dies (Gettysburg, PA)

The Rev. Dr. Herman G. Stuempfle Jr., a Lutheran church leader known for his outstanding contributions as a preacher, professor, president and poet died Tuesday, March 13, 2007, following a long illness. StuempfleÂ’s life and work will be remembered in a memorial service to be held at the Church of the Abiding Presence, the chapel of the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg, Saturday, March 17, 2007, at 2pm.

Stuempfle, born April 2nd 1923 in Clarion, Pennsylvania, was a resident of Gettysburg for more than five decades and best known as the President of the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg, serving as professor, dean and president for a total of 27 years. Beginning in 1962, he served the seminary as the John and Susannah Ulrich Professor of the Art of Preaching, teaching seminarians as late as the spring semester of 2003.

The Rev. Michael Cooper-White, President of the Gettysburg Seminary, said "During the latter half of the 20th century, no other individual left a larger imprint on the life of Gettysburg Seminary than Dr. Herman Stuempfle." "On his watch as dean and president the Seminary fortified its reputation for academic excellence," Cooper-White continued, "doubled housing capacity for students, launched the widely renowned Music Gettysburg! Concert series, welcomed the local YWCA to our campus, and navigated the turbulent times as the newly formed Evangelical Lutheran Church in America struggled to solidify its system of theological education. But it was in the classroom and chapel where Dr. Stuempfle's most enduring legacy was forged. As professor of homiletics, and author of the widely acclaimed Preaching Law and Gospel, he sounded a defining tone for a whole generation of us who were blessed to be his students."

Stuempfle, a product of the public schools of Hughesville, PA, was a graduate of Susquehanna University and the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg. He received additional advanced degrees from Union Theological Seminary in New York and the doctoral degree (Th.D.) at Southern California School of Theology at Claremont. Before coming to Gettysburg Seminary in 1962 as professor of preaching, he served congregations in York and Gettysburg, PA and in Baltimore, MD. For four years he was associate director of the Board of Social Ministry of the United Lutheran Church in America. In addition to his teaching, he served as seminary chaplain for a brief time and in 1971 he became dean of Gettysburg Seminary.

Following his inauguration in 1976 as the 10th president of the Gettysburg Seminary, the oldest Lutheran graduate and professional school in North America, he spent thirteen years of service as its president. He retired in 1989, remaining a rostered pastor of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA).Stuempfle is the author of several books and numerous articles and lectures on preaching, history and theology.

The Rev. Donald McCoid, Bishop of the ELCA's Southwestern Pennsylvania Synod and chairman of the Seminary Board of Directors, said "Herman Stuempfle will long be remembered for his preaching, his hymnody and his personal graciousness. Years after he preached them, we can still remember some of his sermons."

His most widely read theology text, Preaching Law and Gospel, was published by Fortress Press in 1978. He also wrote Preaching in the Witnessing Community (1973) and Theological and Biblical Perspectives on the Laity (1973), and Images for Ministry: Reflections of a Seminary President (1995). He contributed to preaching resources such as Proclamation: Lent. In addition, he wrote scholarly and popular articles for journals, the Lutheran Magazine, and adult Christian education curriculum. Stuempfle and his wife of 50 years, Gretchen S. Parkinson, are the parents of two sons, Stephen and David, and one daughter, Kristin.

Presidency

In the years of Stuempfle's presidency, the seminary faculty continued to evolve with more than ten appointments. The presence of women in the student body increased from 13% to more than a third of seminarians. The Seminary initiated its Washington, D.C. based program of study and established its House of Studies there during Stuempfle's tenure. At the same time, Stuempfle helped develop the Town and Country Church Institute, created a permanent chaplaincy for students, and initiated a support program for the seminary's overseas students. A major chapel renovation resulted in the installation of the Andover tracker organ and the beginnings of the Music, Gettysburg! concert series. Also under his leadership, the Seminary entered into a long term agreement with the YWCA permitting its facility on the seminary campus. The Seminary also expanded the A. R. Wentz library. Annual support for the seminary grew 400% during his 14 year presidency and a successful capital campaign added significant resources to the seminary's assets.

The Hymn Writer

Stuempfle is among the most honored and respected of hymn writers of the 20th and 21st Centuries. His four volumes of hymn texts, published by GIA Publications, include songs of devotion and reflection; dancing and jubilation; sorrow, wonder, and delight. The collections are entitled: The Word goes Forth : hymns, songs, and carols (1993), Redeeming the time : a cycle of song for the Christian year (1997), Awake our hearts to praise : hymns, songs, and carols (2000), Wondrous Love Has Called Us (2006). His texts have graced Lutheran congregational anniversaries, consecrations of Roman Catholic bishops, and English hymnal supplements.

It was in retirement that he became an active hymn writer. He has written an estimated 550 texts, more than half of them already published. Stuempfle is among the most published hymn writers in Evangelical Lutheran Worship, published in 2006, which features eight of his hymn texts. Stuempfle has always been mindful of the link between preaching and hymn writing, saying "Hymns are the sung testimony to God's mighty acts of grace and judgment," and creating hymns always remained for him a part of his "fundamental vocation to communicate the Gospel." Dr. Mark Oldenburg, the Seminary's Steck-Miller Professor of the Art of Worship, and fellow hymn writer said his "language is simple, glorious, and deep, whether he's preaching or writing."

Community Leader

Dr. Stuempfle was known throughout the Central Pennsylvania area, and Gettysburg in particular, for leadership in community and civic projects. Always taking an active stance in social issues, he participated in the creation of day care centers, served on the Gettysburg area Inter church social action committee, and the community wide observance of the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday. He helped create and support prison ministries and a local homeless shelter. He tutored young people in the after school program of Christ Lutheran Church of Gettysburg, where he was a member, and where and chaired the congregation's most recent building expansion and renovation efforts. He was a trustee of both Susquehanna University and Gettysburg College.

Honors

Stuempfle has been honored everywhere he has served, spoken and contributed. Symbolic of the esteem with which he was held in many communities over decades, Susquehanna University, Gettysburg College and Thiel College, Greenville, PA. presented him with a honorary degrees. He became the first recipient of the Gettysburg Seminary Distinguished Alumni Award in 1989. The Seminary named a student apartment facility for him and recently began a major project to fund the Herman G. Stuempfle Chair of the Proclamation of the Word in his honor. That endowment project1 milliony crossed the $1million mark on its way to full funding at $1.5 million.

The Gettysburg Rotary organization presented Stuempfle with its fourth 2006 Eisenhower Humanitarian Award, the first going to Eisenhower himself and Bob Hope. He was granted the "Peacemaker Award" from the Gettysburg area based Interfaith Center for Peace and Justice. He was admitted to the Academic Hall of Fame of Hughesville High School in 2003. The Hymn Society of the United States and Canada awarded Stuempfle the elite status of "Fellow of the Hymn Society" in 2004, demonstrating the deep and abiding appreciation for his dynamic creativity in the pulpit, at the lectern, and at the writing desk.

The Rev. Carol Hendrix, Bishop of the Lower Susquehanna Synod, ELCA, gave thanks "to God for the gift of the Rev. Dr. Herman G. Stuempfle Jr., pastor of the church, whose pastoral presence and words have impacted the lives of people throughout the world. A consummate churchman, Dr. Stuempfle used his many God-given gifts in service to Christ's church and as a faithful disciple of the lord Jesus Christ. Through his books, his teaching and preaching, and the hymns he wrote he helped to keep the church faithful. He was a gracious, gentle man whose life we celebrate."

All in there Family

-- with apologies to Norman Lear. There is a fascinating discussion going on over at The Volokh Conspiracy, here, that wrestles with issues of familial essentialism, biology-is-destiny, adoption, artificial insemination, and -- while they don't address is there -- public policy regarding child protection. Chuck Colson is always good for a good and controversial quote. (Does he really mean to suggest that there is something theologically suspect about adopting a child?) Thanks to Eugene Volokh (one of the conspirators) for highlighting the issue. This is an issue that cuts me at several levels. I have served as a family lawyer in divorce and custody cases. (Thank God I had the good sense to leave that behind.) And I have served as a guardian ad litem in juvenile court -- charged to represent not children or parents or others, but in the lingo of the law the "best interests of the child." (And that can be a painful and important distinction.) Beyond that, I wrote my M.S. thesis on ethnic connections (and variations) in family structures, and I wrote my law review article (I might add, "award-winning" law review article) on same-sex marriage. Before those experiences, I was originally trained and ordained as a pastor, so theological issues are never far from the surface. (In case anyone is interested, even though I am no longer "rostered," i.e., serving as pastor on the roles of any denomination's clergy, I still believe myself bound by the vows I made at my ordination -- primary among them to stand fast against false doctrine and inadequate scriptural representation.) To assert that we are in the midst of a social upheaval regarding what constitutes "family" is to test other's patience with its obviousness. So when Brother James Dobson urges politicians to "Focus on the Family," I wonder what "family" he references with that definite article. When I remember back to my first child-protection case, I wonder what we all think a family is, that we so blithely consign children to their biological roots regardless of the chance for harm to them. In my first child protection case, "my child" -- i.e., the child whose best interests I was charged with representing to the court -- was a 6-month-old baby whose mother was 13 years old, (She had become pregnant at age 12 by a high school senior of her acquaintance, and the "father" was no where to be found.) The case came to child protection from the baby's pediatrician, who was concerned that the mother kept leaving the baby with friends so that she could do the things young teenagers do and then forgetting for days on end where she had left her child. Mother and child were living with mother's 42-year-old grandma (who was herself pregnant) because mother's mother couldn't control mother. Under state law, the court was charged with doing all in its power to keep that "family" together -- or "reunifying" the "family" if the child had been taken from the home, as she had been. In other words, the system was geared to returning the child to the care of the mother (with the county's providing appropriate supports to help her succeed as a parent, commonsense doubts of the effectiveness of that service notwithstanding). After several months of wrangling in and out of court, sure enough, baby was placed in custody with her great-grandmother so that mother could continue to "parent" her under guidance of the great-grandmother. I read Chuck Colson to say that there is something biblically, sociologically, psychologically, and all else healthier and "normal" about that situation for a child than there is when a separating lesbian couple each desire custody of the child they had been raising together (even though only one of the mothers had a biological connection with the child). I also read him to say that society has played an unholy game with children by allowing artificial insemination (in all its various guises, I suppose, but primarily in its third-party donor variety) and even adoption. That strikes me as faulty theology, if not just damned silliness. Biology is not destiny, according to Scripture. If the resurrection doesn't prove that, nothing does. Additionally, family ties are important; no dispute there. But Jesus also cautioned his followers of the contingency of familial ties. And marriage and childbearing within marriage have been blessed by God; that is undeniable. But the rest, it seems to me is argument from silence. There may be good prudential reasons for cautions about artificial insemination. (I hear that there are lawsuits at least pending that seek to pierce the veil of secrecy surrounding donors for purposes of finding one's "real" father or gaining child support or whatever. But they will only succeed in a structure which presumes that "fatherhood" is exclusively biological, as opposed to social, bond and experience.) And one may argue against same-sex marriage on prudential, moral, and theological grounds. But I think it completely wrong to ignore that children borne into a relationship are children of the relationship, regardless of whether the partners are married straights or partnered gays/lesbians. Children who are adopted need to be socialized to see that their "real" parent (how I loathe that talk) is the one who wiped up the puke when they were sick, and drove them to soccer, and put up with their sass -- not the one who biologically "fathered" the child or bore her to birth. (I'm willing to be convinced otherwise, but I think that Jesus' experience with Joseph is probably not something that we can analogize from.) Chuck Colson is on sinking sand with his argument. Perhaps more later. But in the meantime, check out the controversy.

"Versus Populum" versus "Versus Orientam"

When I named this blog "Versus Populum," I chose the title deliberately. Because of my interest in liturgy, I intended a slight nod in the direction of what had been for some time a relatively minor controversy among church-types -- viz., whether the mass ought to be celebrated with the presbyter/pastor/priest facing the altar or facing the people. "Versus Populum" translates as "facing the people," but I did not intend to act as a proponent of that liturgical posture: I, in fact, prefer (for aesthetic, theological, liturgical, and pastoral reasons) the opposite -- called "ad orientem" or "toward the East" -- in which the pastor faces the same direction of the people, traditionally east, to face the rising sun/Son. I was convinced of the propriety of this position -- in contradiction of what I was taught by Robert Jenson decades ago -- by no less an authority than then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, in a book written "before he changed the color of his cassock" (as Fr. Newman -- see below -- describes the situation).

I chose the title because I wanted to raise issues of church life face-to-face, as it were, with the people of the Church. I want to speak eye-to-eye, not from some great tower from which my wisdom can fall like rain on the needy. Just so it's clear: My choice of a title was word play.

Now comes a blog with a title the opposite of mine which does, in fact, stand for what it says: Fr. Jay Scott Newman writes "Ad Orientem," and he strenuously argues regularly for all kinds of re-orientation in the Church. Fr. Newman is a robust scholar, debater, writer, and priest. Even when I disagree with him (as I often do), I find that he is worth reading. (That, in this case, we agree both in principle and in level of enthusiasm on the matter of east-facing priests pleases me.) At this entry, he commends a book on the subject of the direction a priest ought to assume in leading the mass. I will try to read the book soon, especially given that it argues for a position with which I agree (and that it is endorsed by the person who convinced me of the propriety of the posture).

I commend further Fr. Newman's blog to you. He is a good friend of Fr. Al Kimel, whose work in "Pontifications" I regularly recommend here. And by reading the two of them (with a critical eye), one could get a quite decent education in classic Christian theology.

By the way, my title to this post is also meant humorously. I do not mean to suggest that there is a battle of the blogs going on between Fr. Newman and me. I'm smarter than that: I'd lose any such contest hands down. The lawyer in me just couldn't resist using "versus" three times in one heading.

A Guest Reflection

I haven't been doing my work for Versus Populum because I've been obsessing over a task I've undertaken in my church: I'm leading a four-session study of Genesis 1-3 -- one which tries to read the text anew and to unpack things that may be new to people. (I'm trying to avoid a "distillation" of the Genesis "meaning" into simple concepts such as "creatio ex nihilo" -- which, frankly, is not supported by the text -- or "Fall" -- which I think needs to be defined rather carefully.

It's a lot of fun -- even though it's proceeding in a kind of sporadic way: For various reasons, some involving scheduling and others resulting from God's gift of a foot of snow last weekend, we've ended up meeting every other week -- something that makes for difficulty in maintaing continuity.

The point, though, is that I've been thinking about little else than Genesis. I've been exploring the Hebrew, a real stretch for me in that I can barely decipher the script, let alone analyze the words. (Thank God, sincerely, for good lexical aids.) I've been reading von Rad (even though I didn't plan to read commentaries) and Colin Gunton and Westermann because they are scintillating and beautifully written pieces of work. (With respect to the Gunton work, which is basically a historical study of the Christian doctrine of "creation": I didn't anticipate getting excited reading about the Christian response to Thales and Plato. But I am.)

I'll get back to harumphing shortly, however. There are too many things going on.

For now, however, I can't resist posting (and I hope it falls within the fair-use doctrine in copyright law) this recent offering from the Marty Center at the U of Chicago -- it's biweekly e-mailed "Sightings," to which you can subscribe by following the link at the end of the piece. The Ted Haggart fiasco has given me a crick in my neck from shakling my head in amazement, outrage, open-mouthed shock at the stupidity of the deal. Here, Jack Stackhouse provides some good
insight into a decent, non-celebrity model for ministry that takes into account human frailty without adopting an everything-goes approach (which is where the American Church seems to be heading).

Without further ado:

Sightings

2/22/07

Wounded Healers

-- John G. Stackhouse, Jr.

By now we've all heard the latest about Ted Haggard, former pastor of New Life Church in Colorado Springs, Colorado, and former head of the National Association of Evangelicals. Brother Haggard -- and, as a fellow Christian, he is my brother -- was found to have been having sexual relations with a male prostitute in Denver. He resigned in disgrace, and has since been in counseling.

According to the February 6 issue of the Denver Post, the four pastors in charge of overseeing New Life Church in the wake of this disaster made a surprising -- to some, an astonishing, and to others, an absurd -- announcement. One of them, Rev. Tim Ralph of Larkspur, Colorado, was quoted as explaining Haggard's three-year relationship with the man in these terms: Haggard "is completely heterosexual. That is something he discovered. It was the acting-out situations where things took place. It wasn't a constant thing."

Columnists have had a field day with this recent announcement, of course, with many wondering what stresses could possibly drive a "completely heterosexual" man into the arms of a male lover. Others have simply gotten the story wrong, saying that Haggard is claiming to have been "cured" of homosexuality in just three months, rather than the years that might be expected for rebuilding such a basic component of one's personality -- if indeed such a thing is possible at all. The media circus continues.

In all of this, I am reminded of the late Henri Nouwen, the superb spiritual writer who taught at Harvard and Yale before spending his last years in pastoral service at L'Arche, Jean Vanier's community for the developmentally disabled. Nouwen also wrestled with homosexuality -- "wrestled" with it because his religious beliefs, like Haggard's, diagnosed it as a deformation of the personality.

Also like Haggard, Nouwen maintained a position of spiritual advisor to many. His sexual difficulty did not disqualify him from offering his
considerable gifts to others -- nor should Haggard's have kept him from pastoral service.

Unlike Haggard, however, Nouwen refused to engage in preaching or public activism against homosexuality. He avoided, that is, any risk of incurring the taint of hypocrisy, which is a far more serious problem -- in the Bible and in the public eye -- than is homosexuality.

Nouwen gave us the lovely phrase, the "wounded healer." Some have exploited this term -- as all lovely things are vulnerable to exploitation -- to suggest that you can be entirely comfortable with all manner of sins and still be a spiritual leader. You can be proud, you can be lustful, you can be greedy, you can wrathfully dismiss dissenting colleagues, and on down through the seven deadlies -- but hey, you're a "wounded healer" and darned popular -- in other words, "blessed in your ministry." So it's okay, right?

No, says Nouwen, by word and by example. Serve, yes, offering your God-given talents to make God's beloved world a better place. But serve out of consciousness of your wound, which means to serve in humility, in compassion, in patience. "There but for the grace of God go I."

Nouwen's insight is that, clergy or not, we must not wait to become perfect before we help others. We can help them, that is, precisely as fellow sufferers, with genuine fellow feeling -- but also with a strong and clear sense of our limitations. And even if you've never been a fan of Ted Haggard, nor of the populist celebrity-evangelicalism that he exemplifies, you can still cultivate sympathy for him, for his family, and for his church.

And, thanks to Brother Nouwen, we can also better recognize that our wounds may not be healed right away, nor even over months or years. According to Nouwen's theology, God may well allow some of those wounds remain a while -- for as we endure their pain, their shame, and their debility, we may be given the gift of remembering just how needy each of us is, and how great the possibilities of restoring love.

John G. Stackhouse, Jr., is Sangwoo Youtong Chee Professor of Theology and Culture at Regent College.
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The current Religion and Culture Web Forum features "The Earth Charter as a New Covenant for Democracy" by J. Ronald Engel. To read this article, please visit: http://marty-center.uchicago.edu/webforum/index.shtml.
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Sightings comes from the Martin Marty Center at the University of Chicago Divinity School.

Lutheran Romani?!

I can hardly deny that I am both narrowly educated in matters of the world and painfully naive as to my own families' cultures. I mean I don't know very much -- say, compared to Sister Dash, who's a fiend on her Swedish identity -- about my Norwegian and Icelandic heritage, let alone my Bohemia-Czech-Slovak-Polish side. So I was surprised and delighted to run across this article about Lutheran Romani (otherwise known as "gypsies") in Transylvania/Romania. Now, I have no personal investment in Transylvania (although I'd really like to master that "Dracula" accent!), but the Romani (or Romany) are another matter: A family legend, presumed factual, is that the Penas family ended up in Bohemia because their gypsy travels brought them there. There is support for such a story, too. For example, my Fulbright-Fellowship-winning uncle was unable to trace the family back in Bohemia and Eastern Europe much beyond the days before they moved to the States. And our name is a Greek-related name, meaning "poor" (when Jesus says "blessed are the poor" the word translated "poor" is "penas" -- pronounced "pen-ace," which is how some in the family tree pronounce it): I had a Greek doctor in Illinois who took great delight in greeting me in Greek and addressing me as the "beggar," because in modern Greek our patronym refers to the gypsy-beggar. So there is circumstantial evidence that there is "gypsy blood" in these, my veins. Now I find out that some maybe-distant cousins are fellow Lutherans. How exciting is that? For me: quite!

Ted Haggard

It's a great relief to me personally that Ted Haggard is "completely heterosexual" according to the team of loving pastors that has been overseeing his recovery. See here. It's also a great relief to me that the loving pastors overseeing his recovery have counseled him to leave his home area and to give up church work -- where he might have expected some sort of support during his time of reconciliation and healing -- in favor of secular employment in some other area of the country. (Same article.) It would likely be a bad example for the 14,000 members of New Life congregation and the National Association of Evangelicals to have ever before their eyes a human being who must struggle with sin and malfeasance and the consequences thereof. And God forbid that they actually be called on to understand the struggle and perhaps to forgive.

It is, of course, only natural that a person with as much psychological baggage as the (formerly Rev.?) Mr. Haggard carries to be encouraged to seek a career (along with the wife to whom he was unfaithful) in psychology. It's good to know that the universe is still filled with irony.

And now, if I could dislodge my tongue from my cheek, I'd get on with other business.

Church and World: A Sermon

Friend Art Halbardier preached at Mount Olive Sunday, on the Gospel text wherein Jesus preaches in his home synagogue and ruffles a few feathers. (Art is a member of Mount Olive, and he was substituting for the pastor, who was on vacation.) For his focus, Art raised the charge, "When the Church rises up to be the Church, the World rises up to be the World." It was an eloquent, quietly urgent bit of preaching. And it powerfully made the point that to live faith is not to be at ease in the world we live in. It was wonderfully Hauerwasian, which Art said he did not intend (but so what, eh?). Hauerwas says that the world needs the Church to be the Church so that the world knows that it is the world. (That is SO Hauerwas, I think.) The Church is not simply the religious aspect of living a regular life in the culture; the Church is the new culture, its own culture, brought into being, modeled, and enabled by the Triune God. The "world" is that which has not yet been won over to the ways of God. And we shade the borders between the two at our own peril -- as Art suggests. I commend his sermon to you (even though I don't often recommend sermons). You may read it here.

And now for something completely different ...

Anyone who knows me will tell you that I am a complete sports know-nothing. Oh, I like to watch football and dear friend Bjoern continues to try to encourage a love of European handball and I've been known to take part in a game of beach volleyball, but beyond that, I'm pathetic. But I have a great love of watching horse racing. Again, no knowledge, just "know what I like." So I was very saddened by the news that Barbaro had been put down. He's the 1-year-old who won the Kentucky Derby and then broke his leg right afterward. He's been battling for 8 months to return to integrity, but the struggle was finally too much for him and for his owners. And the world lost a creature of God who (I suppose I should say that or which) demonstrated class, beauty, fortitude, and (by all accounts) courage and good spirits all through his short life. I remember a seminar during seminary years, led by Robert Jenson (who might like to disown the who project, for all I know) in which we spent a lot of time arguing about whether animals would be in heaven. It was one party's view that there is nothing in Scripture to suggest that there will anything other than human animals. But the other party argued from the structure of creation and millenia of experience that if heaven was to be in any sense continuous with life on earth (thus fulfilling the creation, not cancelling it out), then animals -- pets, penguins, and (I'd now add) race horses -- must be a part of the scheme. Well, regardless of the outcome of that argument, I think it appropriate to thank God for "fashioning" (in the word from Genesis) such a magnificent creature and for the brief chance that most of us had to see him in play. This all arises because of a comment to one of my posts from David over at American Legends, a blog he maintains with other presumably sports nuts. He blogged an obituary there, which I appreciated finding among all the commentaries on the Super Bowl and the like by people who take their sports seriously. (Me, I'm just rooting for Chicago because it's Da Bears and I lived and continue to love the City of Chicago -- even though Tony Dungy used to coach here in Minnesota!) Well, David suggested a cross-listing of our blogs and I'm pleased to be asked. So, you;ll find a new reference in my list of blogs. Especially if you're a sports fan or an afficionado of sports sociology and culture, I invite you to check it out: http://americanlegends.blogspot.com/ David, if you're reading, I hope I get to know you and your cohorts better.

Update, with Bibliography (with later correction)

I haven't been able to raise much controversy here lately, because I've been working on gunning up the adults in my congregation: In February, I'm going to do a four-week adult forum on Genesis 1-3 (which I'm calling "Reading Genesis Together") in which I hope to lead a discussion, chapter by chapter, of this marvelous section of that marvelous book. I hope not to lecture TOO MUCH (that is very difficult for me, despite by Great Books background), but rather to work with whoever shows up to uncover new appreciation for the language, the drama, the whatever. I don't want to just jump into a discussion of such dogmatic issues as "The Doctrine of Creation" or "Creatio ex nihilo" (which is not very well supported by these chapters, anyway, incidentally). But I'm confident that with some due seriousness about the text, we will grow in reverence, awe, and gratitude to the God who created, redeemed, and sustains all that is.

I'm using a variety of what are for me nontraditional sources. My reading and thinking are being guided by references that are new to me. (A few years ago, I read von Rad's commentary on Genesis and fell in love with reading commentaries as books, in their entirety. I am, however, refraining from reading commentaries-as-commentaries this round, so I won't be quoting the dear Doktor Professor.)

First on my list is Leon Kass' The Beginning of Wisdom. Kass is not a theologian; he's not even a religous Jew. Rather, he's trained as a physician and a philosopher who now teaches at the University of Chicago. (Some may remember that he headed up the President's commission on biomedical ethis a few years ago. That gives you some indication of where he sits.) But he had been required to teach the book as a part of a core-curriculum program at the UofC, and it finally got in his craw and he began a diligent study of the book. (He's also something of an expert on evolution, so there was a connection there, too.)

Kass tries to think about Genesis a priori -- that is, philosophically, not theologically, to see what opens with a close reading. In the process, he lays out some of the linguistic fun of the book. But he spends most of his time positing a kind of "what if the book leads us to think this" rhapsody. It's a brilliant boo, I think. And it's giving me a new perspective on a book that I thought I rather knew.

From the other end of the spectrum, I am spending a lot of time with Robert Alter's The Five Books of Moses. Here's anaother non-religious treatment of the book, this time a translation by one of the country's finest experts in comparative literature. He doesn't intend his book to be a commentary or reflection, but he so amply footnotes his translation, providing lucid explanations for why he translated something the way he did, that it's almost like reading a commentary.

As for commentaries, as I said, I'm pretty much avoiding them -- except for the Ancient Christian Commentary on the Scriptures volume on Genesis. For those who don't know it, this is a compilation of comments on the Scripture by the early Christian fathers -- that is, the Christian preachers, teachers, and mystics from the Church's early years. It's a successor to Thomas' catena auria (or gold chain), which was a listing of pearls of wisdom that the early Christians offered on the lectionary readings. Here, under the editorship of an evangelical scholar (!), Thomas Oden of Drew University, the effort is to collect such wisdom for each book of the Bible.

The upshot for my class is that I'll have tidbits of wisdom to bring in from readings in the Scriptures from earliest times. Thus, my title "Reading Genesis Together" will be an attempt to read as a community in Minneapolis that is informed and in communion with the community of the Church's history. It doesn't look like I'll have time to read Luther (woe is me!), but I'll put that up the group, too.

Finally, friend Susan Palo Cherwien (the poet and hymntext writer) recommended Everett Fox's translation of the Torah for the Schocken Bible. Also called The Five Books of Moses, this is an effort to translate the Bible (obviously understood as what Christians call the "Old[er] Testament") in such a way as to preserve its Hebraic quality -- and thus, a kind of foreignness to the text. The translation is meant to sound (when read aloud) more like the Hebrew would have sounded -- and, yes, I understand the problem with such a statement. And it's given me some interesting insights, too. (If I recall correctly, Jaroslav Pelikan -- may his memory endure -- used the Schocken translation in all his reflection during the last years of his life.)

Here I try to make two points: First I explain my lack of postings: I have been immersed in Scripture study, and have not sought to put thoughts to paper that do not relate to that endeavor. I have not grown humble and, thus, shut up about matters theological. I intend to continue blogging -- even though a significant number of my blog-models have quit doing so. I'm wrestling with a couple of books as bedtime reading, and I hope to comment on them soon. Second, the books I cite here are all worthy resources for your attention, and I commend them to you.

On an entirely different track, I am also involved in trying to make sense of William Faulkner's The Sound and the Fury. We're reading it for my Saturday book group, and since I have never read this work by Faulkner, I'm giving it the old college try. (Joan Buckley, this one is for you.) I can't imagine the response to the book when it was published. I can only reflect on comments that fellow-readers are having -- e.g., "I read that first chapter and I'm thinking, 'What the hell is this?'" I don't think it's as incomprehensible as one review suggested, but we'll see! I've always been a Faulkner fan (God knows why -- maybe because I got a really good grade and comments on my paper on Light in August -- more Joan Buckley.)

So, read you Bible -- especially Genesis. And if you have thoughts about it, the comments section is open.

Pax.

Lutheran? Find Out

OK, we get a little parochial here. Give this a try and you may surprise yourself. (Unfortunately, I can't find a way to figure out where I screwed up on my 1%.)

You are 99% Lutheran! This is most certainly true.

Nicely done! Martin would be proud of you! You may or may not have room for growth in understanding Lutheran terminology and culture. Good thing Salvation is by Grace and not by merit. We can add nothing to what God has done for us in Christ Jesus. But it never hurts to learn a little more about the church on earth. Thanks for taking the quiz!

How Lutheran Are You?
Create a Quiz

After you've finished that quiz, switch over to big-time Lutheran discussion at Concordia: The Lutheran Confessions, here, with its open discussion of the Book of Concord.

On the Morning of Christ's Nativity

I'm a couple of days late with this, but I offer to you with my prayers that Christmas is all that it is meant to be for you and "yours."

On the Morning Of Christ's Nativity

by John Milton

I

On the Morning of Christ's Nativity

This is the month, and this the happy morn

Wherein the Son of Heav'n's eternal King,

Of wedded Maid, and Virgin Mother born,

Our great redemption from above did bring;

For so the holy sages once did sing,

That he our deadly forfeit should release,

And with his Father work us a perpetual peace.

II

That glorious Form, that Light unsufferable,

And that far-beaming blaze of Majesty,

Wherewith he wont at Heav'n's high council-table,

To sit the midst of Trinal Unity,

He laid aside, and here with us to be,

Forsook the courts of everlasting day,

And chose with us a darksome house of mortal clay.

III

Say Heav'nly Muse, shall not thy sacred vein

Afford a present to the Infant God?

Hast thou no verse, no hymn, or solemn strain,

To welcome him to this his new abode,

Now while the heav'n, by the Sun's team untrod,

Hath took no print of the approaching light,

And all the spangled host keep watch in squadrons bright?

IV

See how from far upon the eastern road

The star-led wizards haste with odours sweet:

O run, prevent them with thy humble ode,

And lay it lowly at his blessed feet;

Have thou the honour first thy Lord to greet,

And join thy voice unto the angel quire,

From out his secret altar touched with hallowed fire.

Nativity: A Christmas Poem

Nativity
by John Donne

Immensity cloistered in thy dear womb,
Now leaves His well-belov'd imprisonment,
There He hath made Himself to His intent
Weak enough, now into the world to come;
But O, for thee, for Him, hath the inn no room?
Yet lay Him in this stall, and from the Orient,
Stars and wise men will travel to prevent
The effect of Herod's jealous general doom.
Seest thou, my soul, with thy faith's eyes, how He
Which fills all place, yet none holds Him, doth lie?
Was not His pity towards thee wondrous high,
That would have need to be pitied by thee?
Kiss Him, and with Him into Egypt go,
With His kind mother, who partakes thy woe.

An Advent Poem

Advent Sunday

Awake--again the Gospel-trump is blown --
From year to year it swells with louder tone,
From year to year the signs of wrath
Are gathering round the Judge's path,
Strange words fulfilled, and mighty works achieved,
And truth in all the world both hated and believed.

Awake! why linger in the gorgeous town,
Sworn liegemen of the Cross and thorny crown?
Up from your beds of sloth for shame,
Speed to the eastern mount like flame,
Nor wonder, should ye find your King in tears,
E'en with the loud Hosanna ringing in His ears.

Alas! no need to rouse them: long ago
They are gone forth to swell Messiah's show:
With glittering robes and garlands sweet
They strew the ground beneath His feet:
All but your hearts are there--O doomed to prove
The arrows winged in Heaven for Faith that will not love!

Meanwhile He passes through th' adoring crowd,
Calm as the march of some majestic cloud,
That o'er wild scenes of ocean-war
Holds its still course in Heaven afar:
E'en so, heart-searching Lord, as years roll on,
Thou keepest silent watch from Thy triumphal throne:

E'en so, the world is thronging round to gaze
On the dread vision of the latter days,
Constrained to own Thee, but in heart
Prepared to take Barabbas' part:
"Hosanna" now, to-morrow "Crucify,"
The changeful burden still of their rude lawless cry.

Yet in that throng of selfish hearts untrue
Thy sad eye rests upon Thy faithful few,
Children and childlike souls are there,
Blind Bartimeus' humble prayer,
And Lazarus wakened from his four days' sleep,
Enduring life again, that Passover to keep.

And fast beside the olive-bordered way
Stands the blessed home where Jesus deigned to stay,
The peaceful home, to Zeal sincere
And heavenly Contemplation dear,
Where Martha loved to wait with reverence meet,
And wiser Mary lingered at Thy sacred feet.

Still through decaying ages as they glide,
Thou lov'st Thy chosen remnant to divide;
Sprinkled along the waste of years
Full many a soft green isle appears:
Pause where we may upon the desert road,
Some shelter is in sight, some sacred safe abode.

When withering blasts of error swept the sky,
And Love's last flower seemed fain to droop and die,
How sweet, how lone the ray benign
On sheltered nooks of Palestine!
Then to his early home did Love repair,
And cheered his sickening heart with his own native air.

Years roll away: again the tide of crime
Has swept Thy footsteps from the favoured clime
Where shall the holy Cross find rest?
On a crowned monarch's mailed breast:
Like some bright angel o'er the darkling scene,
Through court and camp he holds his heavenward course serene.

A fouler vision yet; an age of light,
Light without love, glares on the aching sight:
Oh, who can tell how calm and sweet,
Meek Walton, shows thy green retreat,
When wearied with the tale thy times disclose,
The eye first finds thee out in thy secure repose?

Thus bad and good their several warnings give
Of His approach, whom none may see and live:
Faith's ear, with awful still delight,
Counts them like minute-bells at night.
Keeping the heart awake till dawn of morn,
While to her funeral pile this aged world is borne.

But what are Heaven's alarms to hearts that cower
In wilful slumber, deepening every hour,
That draw their curtains closer round,
The nearer swells the trumpet's sound?
Lord, ere our trembling lamps sink down and die,
Touch us with chastening hand, and make us feel Thee nigh.

-- John Keble (1792-1866)

Advent, Justification by Grace, Life of Faith

Yesterday's Gospel reading promised the coming of the Lord with "winnowing fork" in his hand. To my eye, Jesus did not repudiate that picture -- although he complicated it some. And that raises my perennial Advent question: When the Lord returns, what will he be looking for, what will he expect, what will he do? Lutherans of a classic stripe seem content with their answer: If you simply allow Jesus to love you, it doesn't matter what you've done, who you are, why you have lived the way you have. As long as you don't put up a big "no" to him, he will usher you into his Father's kingdom. I, of course, as a Lutheran, don't have total problem with that formulation. But I'm waiting for those "classic-stripe" Lutherans to deal with the Baptizer, the Sermon on the Mount, and all the rest. I have recently discovered Paul Althaus' classic (I think) little monograph (in the old "Facets" seiers published by Fortress Press), Divine Command. I have happily learned that my view of the on-going validity of the Ten Commandments and of the commands of Jesus toward love of neighbor, justice in the marketplace, and the like has bona fide Lutheran bona fides. I intend to set out some thoughts on Althaus' thesis in the near future, so for today, I'll simply make a comment and offer a quote. Lutheran talk about "justifiation by grace through faith" refers to "achieving salvation" -- i.e., it addresses what needs to be done to overcome the rift between being human and being acceptable to God. The Lutheran answer, consonant with the whole of Holy Scripture and most of the Great Tradition, is "nothing; God has taken the initiative to love us even in our most profound unlovablility." Lutherans, unfortunately (and of course, not ALL Lutherans), stop there. All that matters, apparently, is day by day reassuring myself of my personal salvation by repeating the mantra, "I am saved by God's gracious loving act." The question which ought to occupy preachers, teachers, parents, and us is never addressed -- viz., "So what?" or "What are we to do with this?" or "Where do we go from here?" Those are questions of "sanctification" or "growth in grace" or "theosis" (I suppose). And the stereotypical Lutheran response is "Well, it pretty much doesn't matter, because your works don't matter." That is an inappropriate response to questions of how to live if those questions do not rise out of questions about earning/meriting/keeping God's love, as Althaus makes clear (and as I shall try to explain later) and as this citation from St. Symeon the Theologian (thanks to Pontificator for the reference) also makes clear: If we desire the kingdom of Heaven we must have great care and diligence and willingness in practising the commandments of God. In order to be saved, it is not sufficient to believe in the true God and to be Orthodox Christians. We must also fight “the good fight”, live “worth of the vocation we are called”, tht is to say perform Christian acts since we are baptised Christians and we are honoured with the name of Christ. Let us not think that we shall be saved by faith alone. Faith without works do not benefit in anything. Of course the Lord said “he that believes and is baptised shall be saved; but he that believes not shall be damned”, but He also said this “not every one that says to me, Lord, Lord, shall enter the Kingdom of Heaven”. If one would be saved by faith alone then everybody will easily secure salvation. Because “the devils also believe and tremble. As the body with out the soul is motionless and lifeless so faith without works is dead. Let us hear St. James the brother of God, who very lucidly stresses “what does it profit, my brethren, though a man says he has faith, and has no works? Can faith save him? If a brother or sister be naked, and destitute of daily food, and one of you says to them, depart in peace, be warmed and filled; not withstanding you give them not those things which are needful to the body; what does it profit? Even so faith, if it has not works, is dead, being alone”. After these it is obvious that we must have works together with faith. For this reason whoever believes in God and his providence shares out his money to the poor, hoping that he will receive “a hundredfold wage” and will inherit everlasting life. Whoever believes, struggles to be humble, repents for his sins, he is meek and peaceful, hates injustice and loves justice, because he remembers the verse from the Psalms “he who loves injustice hates his own soul”. He who believes endures without grumbling every temptation in order to be crowned with the crown of the incorruptible glory. He is prudent and does not molest himself. He, who truly believes, is not lazy and negligent of prayer, does not condemn anybody and does not follow the “broad road”, but the “narrow and sorrowful road”. He does not love the world, neither parents, nor brothers and sisters nor wife and children, more than the Lord. Those who believe love the Lord and hate evil acts. They do not bear a grudge against his brother and do not return evil for evil. They do good to those who treat them badly, they bless those who curse them and they bear patiently those that persecute them. Those who believe do not practise hypocrisy, flattering or person favouritism, because in all their activities they are straight, honest and sincere. They have no pride and are not magnanimous for the sake of praises and flattering that others give them. They detest the world of sin, following the exhortation of Apostle Paul “no man that war entangles himself with the affairs of this life; that he may please him who has chosen him to be a soldier. And if a man also strives for mysteries, yet he is not crowned, except he strives lawfully”. Those who believe never lie, they are not greedy, they do not have Holy Communion without having confession, they do not condemn others. In brief, they follow carefully and steadfastly the way of the commandments of Christ and they have faith in Him, not in words but “in deeds and truth”. Do you now see how, those who believe live? So how can we consider somebody as faithful if he is poor in works? If we truly believe, let us fight sin and abandon every evil that we have been doing so far. Let us struggle with willingness in order to be ready to stand before the Lord on the fearful day of Judgement. Let us wake up from the sleep of negligence. Let us correct our thoughts and let us drive away the evil thoughts. Let us try to fulfil the commandments of God, in order to be crowned by Him and to inherit the Kingdom of Heaven. -- St Symeon the New Theologian

To continue a theme ...

To continue a theme: The Theotokos has been revealed on the earth in truth, Proclaimed of old by the words of the prophets, Foretold by the wise patriarchs and the company of the righteous. She will exchange glad tidings with the honor of women: Sarah, Rebecca, and glorious Hanna, And Miriam, the sister of Moses. All the ends of the earth shall rejoice with them, Together with all of creation. For God shall come to be born in the flesh, Granting the world great mercy. -- from the Orthodox liturgy, in Thomas Hopko, The Winter Pascha (St Vladimir's Seminary Press, 1984)

Mary in Advent

I missed the Immaculate Conception, a feast of which I confess little knowledge and with which I confess little sympathy. But given the incredibly beautiful literature that has flowered around that observation, I wonder yet again why Mary has fallen into that great well of unfamiliarity and disregard among even us Catholic-Evangelical proTESTants. In my stream of the tradition -- viz., middlle-of-the-road Lutheranism -- we have the model of our namesake to guide us: Luther was, by all accounts, devoted to the Virgin -- not of course, in the manner of many of his contemporaries, but sincerely reverential nonetheless. So, it seems to me, one need not be content with the Vatican's declarations of the origins and disposition of Our Lady to pay homage to her -- and homage we do indeed owe. Why, the sheer numbers of this and that for which she serves as metaphor (and more) would press that responisibility on us, let alone her literal place in the drama of salvation.

Today, I offer this from my favorite Christian poet, the deacon Ephrem of Syria (fourth century). Not only does he get so much right and beautiful, but he testifies to the earliness of the devotion paid to Mary, thereby demonstrating that while various Mary-cults may be a more recent development in Church history -- see Jaroslav Pelikan's book, Mary Through the Centuries -- the propriety of honoring her and even praying to her is not.

“O Immaculate and wholly-pure Virgin Mary”

O Immaculate and wholly-pure Virgin Mary, Mother of God, Queen of the world, hope of those who are in despair; thou art the joy of the Saints; thou art the peacemaker between sinners and God; thou art the advocate of the abandoned, the secure haven of those who are on the sea of the world; thou art the consolation of the world, the ransom of slaves, the comfortress of the afflicted, the salvation of the universe. O great Queen, we take refuge in thy protection: ‘We have no confidence but in thee, O most faithful Virgin.’ After God thou art all our hope. We bear the name of thy servants; allow not the enemy to drag us to Hell. I salute thee, O great Mediatress of peace between men and God, Mother of Jesus our Lord, who is the love of all men and of God, to whom be honor and benediction with the Father and the Holy Ghost. Amen.

St Ephrem the Syrian

It is part of Advent's "retting up" to honor His Mother as an aspect of awaiting The Lord's return. (Read the prayer carefully, and you may discover some of the sources of discomfort that force me to re-examine much that I take for granted about the Virgin, too.)

As Advent Approaches, ...

OK, boys and girls, Advent is ready to begin. And I'm thrilled: As some await Christmas morning, I await the Advent season -- its themes of eschatology and hope and expectation, its hymnody (I'm assured that the new ELCA "worship resource" -- don't get me going on that designation -- contains all the beloved Advent hymns from LBW; I'll check to see what else!), its challenges (to maintain it's-not-Christmas-yet in the midst of "It's Christmas Time in the City" -- which began playing about October 1). Advent is my favorite season, and I realize that that is a risky thing for someone to say who prizes liturgical scholarship and seriousness -- but it's true.

Key to Advent reflection ought to be the Virgin Mary and her wonderful song, what we call "Magnificat." If I were able to link music to this site (no, Sister Kate, if I were able to set music into this site), it would be versions of Mary's song.

Well, then, imagine my delight to see posted to the Christianity Today webmail page the reflection on the BVM -- the Blessed Valorous Mary -- by an evangelical who teaches at a quite conservative evangelical college. And then imagine my delight to discover that it's a high-quality, reverent, devotional reflection.

So at the risk of violating the Fair Use doctrine of the copyright act, I provide this re-print, rather than just a link, to this fine article by Scot McKnight, which I commend to you along with my wishes for a peaceful, inspiring, reverential, and radical Advent. (At the end of the piece is a link to the original.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

The Mary We Never Knew:
Why the mother of Jesus was more revolutionary than we've been led to believe.
Scot McKnight

There are two Marys. One wears a Carolina blue robe, exudes piety from a somber face, often holds her baby son in her arms, and barely makes eye contact with us. This is the familiar Blessed Virgin Mary, and she leads us to a Christmas celebration of quiet reflection.

Another Mary—the Blessed Valorous Mary—wears ordinary clothing and exudes hope from a confident face. This Mary utters poetry fit for a political rally, goes toe-to-toe with Herod the Great, musters her motherliness to reprimand her Messiah-son for dallying at the temple, follows her faith to ask him to address a flagging wine supply at a wedding, and then finds the feistiness to take her children to Capernaum to rescue Jesus from death threats. This Mary followed Jesus all the way to the Cross—not just as a mother, but as a disciple, even after his closest followers deserted him. She leads us to a Christmas marked by a yearning for justice and the courage to fight for it. Like other women of her time, she may have worn a robe and a veil, but I suspect her sleeves were rolled up and her veil askew more often than not.

Instead of asking what the real Mary was like, we tend to debate what she was not: whether she and Joseph refrained from sexual relations and whether she had a sin nature. A cursory reading of Jaroslav Pelikan's brilliant Mary Through the Centuries will acquaint any reader with the fulsomeness of such debates. Because Protestants have spent their time debating about Mary, they have rarely attempted to claim her as their own. Consequently, she has become little more than a delicate piece in a Christmas crèche, whom we bring out without comment at Christmas and then wrap up gently until we see her again next Advent.

But there are signs that those days are coming to an end. On the horizon today is nothing less than a Protestant reclamation of Mary, seen most completely in Tim Perry's new book, Mary for Evangelicals(InterVarsity, 2006). For the purposes of this article, we first need to ask, "Which Mary?" A good place to begin our search for answers is Mary's Magnificat. There we will discover not so much the Blessed Virgin Mary draped in piety, but the Blessed Valorous Mary dressed for action.

Subversive

If we read the Magnificat as the heartfelt release of a woman yearning for what God was—finally!—about to do in Israel and in historical context, we see it as a call to subvert unjust leaders. To turn this song into simple spirituality strips it of its meaning and leaves injustices—personified by Caesar Augustus and Herod the Great—on the throne.

Luke tells us that as soon as the angel Gabriel left Mary, she hurried down to the home of her older relative, Elizabeth, to share the Good News. Mary knew that aging Elizabeth would also, by God's grace, give birth to a special son. As New Testament scholar R. T. France has noted so poetically, "One is old and has no children; the other is young and has no husband. But both are pregnant." And both are ready to announce the Good News to the world.

The moment Mary crosses the threshold of Elizabeth's home, the formerly barren woman bursts into a poetic blessing for Mary. Mary echoes back with what God is doing in her womb: "My soul glorifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior."

Mary rejoices over what Gabriel has told her and what Elizabeth has confirmed: Her son is the Son of David, the Messiah and future king. She exults that God is about to establish justice by ushering in the kingdom that all of Israel, especially the poor, have yearned for. Yes, like Hannah of old, she is happy that she will be a mother. Yes, she is happy that God has "been mindful of the humble state of his servant. From now on all generations will call me blessed, for the Mighty One has done great things for me—holy is his name" (Luke 1:46-49).

But her next words move beyond the personal exultation of a poor, pregnant woman. They are a declaration—on the order of Luther pinning his 95 theses to the door—from a voice at the bottom of society. It is a voice crying from the depths that God's Messiah was finally bringing justice for the poor (such as Mary, Simeon, and Anna). It is a voice proclaiming a new order—an order centered on her son, the One who would save his people from their sins (Matt. 1:21).

If we want to enter the world of the real Mary that first Christmas, listen once again to her song in the context of Herod the Great. Herod, we might recall, had assassinated members of his own family for anything that even smelled of treachery. That same Herod had taxed Israel—felt more by the poor than by anyone else—beyond its means. Hear her words in that context. They are words of subversion, words that reveal why unjust rulers might worry over their public recitation, words that tell the first Christmas story:

His mercy extends to those who fear him,from generation to generation.He has performed mighty deeds with his arm;he has scattered those who are proud in their inmost thoughts.He has brought down rulers from their thronesbut has lifted up the humble.He has filled the hungry with good thingsbut has sent the rich away empty.He has helped his servant Israel,remembering to be mercifulto Abraham and his descendants forever,just as he promised our ancestors (Luke 1:50-55).

When Mary announced that God "has brought down rulers from their thrones," anyone within earshot knew what that meant for Herod the Great, if not also for Rome. And, in noting that God "sent the rich away empty," she pointed her finger at Herod the Great with his insatiable appetite. God "has lifted up the humble" and "has filled the hungry with good things" meant that Mary and the poor of Israel would experience justice.

Had Mary sung this song—and probably she sang it more than once—in Nazareth among the peasants of Israel, they would have hoisted a toast and shouted, "It's about time! Blessed be the Lord (and Mary)!"

I recall sitting in my high school gymnasium in 1970. During an all-school assembly, African American students, wearing black, sang "Black is Beautiful" and "We Shall Overcome." Their steely protest, expressed in song, was more than a concert. It was an announcement, much like the Magnificat, that a new day had dawned and that justice was about to roll down our hallways. Mary's Magnificat, like those songs of change, can be seen as a rally cry, a revival song. It subverted the unjust reign of Herod the Great.

If you were a poor woman in the first century, if you were hungry, if you had experienced the injustices of Herod, and if you stood up in Jerusalem and announced that God would yank down the proud, the rulers, and the rich from their high places, you likely would be tried for subversion. If you were Herod or one of his ten wives or one of his many sons or daughters with (unexpressed, of course) hopes for the throne, you would conclude that Mary was a rebel, a revolutionary, a social protester. And you would be right: The real Mary was a subversive.

We can quietly repeat the Magnificat during evening prayers, or we can stand with Mary, sing it full throttle, and declare that justice ultimately will be established. The Herods of this world will be dethroned because Mary's son, the newly conceived Son of David, has gained a foothold in our world. Herod dethroned and Jesus enthroned was Mary's rallying cry. You can paint the Blessed Virgin Mary as tender and a splendid example of spirituality, or you can celebrate the Blessed Valorous Mary, who heralded a socio-religious protest against injustice in the person of her own Messiah-son.

But there is much more to Mary's song than justice for the poor. Like the rest of those who followed Jesus, Mary would learn that Jesus ushered in a new kingdom not by wearing Herod's crown but by dying on a Cross, rising from the dead, and sending the Spirit. This is first hinted at by Simeon, when Jesus was presented in the temple: "This child is destined to cause the falling and rising of many in Israel, and to be a sign that will be spoken against, so that the thoughts of many hearts will be revealed," he said. "And a sword will pierce your own soul too."

The hope for a political Messiah, as natural as it was for a people suffering under Roman oppression, would itself be subverted by an altogether different kind of Messiah—one who would establish justice by dying and rising for the forgiveness of sins. Justice for the poor would come not through political revolution but through God's kingdom and its vision for a new society, embodied in the church.

But the larger point remains: Mary, before anyone else, sees and announces the radical nature of Jesus' mission.

Dangerous

Subversive Mary was also dangerous—both to the powers that be and to anyone connected with her, especially Joseph and Jesus. To use today's parlance, we might say that Mary was "radioactive." We need only think of Herod wanting to know where Jesus was born so he could murder him—or of Herod's subsequent slaughter of the innocents. But Mary seemed unfazed.

"Nice girls," Lynne Hybels of Willow Creek Community Church writes, "don't change the world." It may seem counterintuitive, but Mary was not a "nice" girl. If "nice" means meek and mild and mind-your-own-business, then Mary scared the saintly piety out of nice girls. Mary minded Herod's business and, as we are about to see, Caesar Augustus', too. (She would later mind Jesus' business, before discovering that his business was his Father's business. But that's getting ahead of ourselves.)

"And it came to pass in those days," the King James Version of Luke 2:1 reads, "that there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus, that all the world should be taxed." There is a reason why Luke tells us that Jesus' birth occurred during the reign of Caesar Augustus. Luke is contrasting the gospel of Rome with the gospel of Jesus.

Rome's gospel told of the significance of Caesar Augustus for the world. Rome's history took a new turn with Augustus, the adopted son of the dictator Julius Caesar. After his death, Julius Caesar was officially declared to be a god. When Augustus seized power, he was deemed a savior because he ended bitter civil wars and created the peace of Rome (pax Romana). The gospel of Rome was that Augustus, a "son of [a] god," saved Rome by bringing peace to the world.

Luke's Christmas story, told largely through the eyes of Mary, sets the birth of Christ in the context of the gospel of Rome. Luke counters and upstages each element in Rome's gospel—Good News, peace, the Son of God, and the Savior. The gospel that angels announced to Mary and the shepherds was the Good News that Jesus, the Son of God, was the Savior who would bring true peace to the world.

Gabriel tells Mary that the "holy one to be born will be called the Son of God" (Luke 1:35). Nine months later, angels tell the shepherds outside Bethlehem, "Do not be afraid. I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people" (Luke 2:10). Jesus, the Son of God, is the Good News for his people. Furthermore, the angel says, "Today in the town of David, a Savior has been born to you; he is the Messiah, the Lord" (Luke 2:11). And then we hear a chorus of angels: "Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace to those on whom his favor rests" (Luke 2:14).

Caesar Augustus supposedly was a savior, a son of a god who brought good news of peace to the world. Luke tells his readers that Jesus is the real Son of God, the Savior, who brings Good News of peace to the world. Not only do we have a tale of two Marys; we have a tale of two kings. Who, we are led to ask, will be the king? As with the Magnificat, so with Luke's story: Augustus dethroned, Jesus enthroned!

Mary in the Middle

Mary was in the middle of both of the angelic announcements. Gabriel appeared to Mary and, when the angels spoke to the shepherds, the shepherds reported their Good News to Mary and Joseph. Mary had a dangerous story to tell that would subvert injustice and establish justice through her son, the Messiah of Israel.

Luke says that Mary "treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart" (Luke 2:19). The traditional take on Mary's pondering is that she quietly reflected, perhaps in a corner when everyone else was dancing and clapping, and then humbly kept everything inside. But in Scripture, the word ponder denotes observing and thinking and then interpreting (Gen. 37:11; Dan. 7:28). The language of pondering refers to Mary's deliberating in order to comprehend the divine plan now at work.

Mary was a subversive and she was dangerous, first, because she knew the identity of her son and, second, because she began to tell his story. Remember, Gabriel told Mary her son would be "Jesus" (Savior) and "Son of the Most High God" and that he would sit as a Davidic king on the eternal throne. At the bottom of the entire history of Christology are the titles and categories given to Mary to pass on to others. God first tells her the true identity of Jesus. Thus, we first learn to see who Jesus was and is through her witness. Mary was the only person in the world who could have told the stories that now appear in our Gospels. She alone heard the potent words of Gabriel; she alone was with Elizabeth; perhaps she is the one who told Luke about Zechariah's song; only she and Joseph knew about the shepherds and the magi.

Like Harriet Beecher Stowe, who wrote Uncle Tom's Cabin to reveal the injustice of slavery, or Harper Lee, whose To Kill a Mockingbird revealed the insidiousness of racial hypocrisy, Mary also had a (true) story to tell about her son. She took the terms Gabriel gave her—Son of God, Savior, Messiah—and began to interpret who he was and what he was to do.

The Gospels come from many voices, and one of those was Mary's. Her voice tells us what God would do through her son to subvert the injustices of Herod and the pretentiousness of Augustus. Her voice tells us that somehow, some way, someday, God would establish a kingdom of peace for the whole world. The real Mary, in the story rarely told, changed the world by surrendering to the angel Gabriel with three words: "May it be." And God used her to set loose the power of God, the gospel of the kingdom. This is the real Mary, and we need to reclaim her voice as our own.

Scot McKnight is the Karl A. Olsson professor in religious studies at North Park University, Chicago. This article is adapted from The Real Mary: Why Evangelical Christians Can Embrace the Mother of Jesus (Paraclete, 2006).

http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2006/december/8.26.html

"Eve Names the Kiss"

Here's something pretty cool from First Things (Aug/Sept 2006):

Eve Names the Kiss
by Gwen Hart

He sat upon the garden wall.
She had her fingers on his knees.
The smallest leaves began to fall.
A subtle difference in the breeze

Prompted the tiger and the hare
to linger there. Even the snake
slithered closer so to hear
what sound she'd make. They'd heard him speak

a thousand times, define the world
from bumblebee to elephant.
His syllables were muscled, bold.
But she, they felt was different.

The future trembled on her lips.
Her mouth was like an apple split,
two halves as supple as her hips.
And when she said the word, he bit.

-30-

What do you think?