The ‘scandal’ of Christmas: A Christmas Devotion

The ‘scandal’ of Christmas

St Luke 2:1-20

Key verses:

“And she gave birth to her first born son and wrapped him in bands of cloth, and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for him in the inn.”(v.7)

“The angel of the lord stood before them, and the glory of the lord shone around them, and they were terrified.” (v.9)

“…Mary treasured … and pondered…” (v.19)

“The shepherds returned… praising ... glorifying…” (v.20)

To put it straight, Christmas is the coming down of God to assume humanness in all its totality; with its strengths as well as weaknesses. As such, the divine visitation was not unexpected; scriptures say the whole Israel was waiting for the coming of messiah. Clearly speaking, they were awaiting the messiah in the lineage of David, who was expected to reestablish the glorious Davidic kingdom. But the scandal of the Christmas is that, it turned the human expectations upside down. The nucleus of the ‘scandal’ of Christmas lies in the fact that the divine splendor, which transcends the whole created universe, was revealed in the innocence of the baby at the manger in Bethlehem. The political situation of the Roman Palestine must be taken into the serious consideration to comprehend the totality of the scandal the narrator is trying to create. The situation in the entire roman world was that, by the enthronement of Caesar Augustus, a new era of Peace was dawned, which is usually known as the Pax Romana. This peace was not as the result of the experience of welfare and contentment by the people of varying ethnicities and religious affiliations. But it was clearly because of the intimidating tactics of the mighty Roman Empire, which silenced every voice of independence and free imagination. Luke unlike Matthew tries to put Jesus’ birth in the simplest possible terms to contrast it with the unrighteous pomp and luxury of the empire. There is no visit of the Magi here, not many people realize the uniqueness of the baby in the manger as the future King as in Matthew. The emphasis is very much on the ordinariness of the baby.  One of the important aspects highlighted in the story of Jesus’ birth is the content of the angelic proclamation. The good news the angels proclaims is about the hope of redemption of the whole earth and peace as a gift from God for those who please God through their lives; especially for those who are at the fringes and margins.

The ‘scandal’ of “no room”

The brief but clear description of the birth of Jesus is very much down to earth than that is in Matthew. Jesus’ ordinary parents are seen struggling very hard to pull their life ahead. They are said to be brought to Bethlehem by force of the mighty Roman Empire. The census could be for the purpose of taxation as it used to happen in the provinces of Roman dominion. Whether it was mandatory for the pregnant Mary to travel all the way to Bethlehem to show herself for the census is bit doubtful. But one thing that we have to take note of here is the intension of the writer to link historic incidents of Roman world of the time is not to heighten the historic value of the narration, but to depict the pathetic picture of brokenness of ordinary human beings in the Roman Palestine. The ordinary Palestinian homes were said to be a one room affair. The Greek word used in verse7 (kataluma), translated as ‘inn’ in English bible signifies a one room typical Palestinian home of that time. It may resemble the present day adivasi homes of India, where one corner of the room is used for cooking, another to sleep, another one for dining and yet another one to store meager agricultural produces, if at all there are any. The problem of no room was not simply a problem faced only by Jesus’ parents at the time of his birth. But this was a problem commonly faced by the pregnant mothers of the place at the time of their delivery. Thus Jesus shares in the common predicament of the socio-economic deprivations of the ordinary Palestinians. Here the picture of God, sharing in the predicament of the ordinary human beings is indeed a great scandal. The creator God does not simply abandon God’s creation to its brokenness, but God by being a helpless child lying in the trough of the manger assumes the vulnerability of the creation to redeem it. The Bible is full of narratives describing the ‘scandal’ of God being vulnerable to be a redeemer to the whole world.

The ‘scandal’ of tumbling priorities

Luke’s narration of the story of birth of Jesus progresses into another scandal, because of the choice of the shepherds to be the first receivers of the good news of the birth. Shepherds were outcastes in the Palestinian Jewish society. Because of their particular spatial location, they were far removed from the socio-political happenings of the Roman Palestine. In a way they were least bothered about the socio-political changes in the country as those changes were not going to have any positive impact on their lives. The place of birth of Jesus was not far away from the station of the shepherds watching over the sheep during the night. The mention, “in that region”, about the location of the shepherds(v 8), points to the fact that in spatial terms also, Jesus’ birth was his identification with the marginalization of the shepherds. The spatial location of the shepherds was always at the fringes or outside the gates. God opts for the manger at the margin of the Roman, Jewish, Palestinian city as the location of Jesus’ birth. The night also signifies the hopelessness with which the shepherds had to live. Luke’s narration of the event of angelic proclamation clearly describes the brightening of the life situations of the shepherds. The glory of the Lord is said to be shone around the shepherds (v 9). The glory and pomp of the lords whom the shepherds have experienced in their lifetime never had any kind of redeeming effect on their lives. But their glory was always at the cost of the welfare of the ordinary men and women like the shepherds. Here they are greeted by the good news of the birth of a new Lord, whose glory really illuminates their otherwise darkened lives.

The priorities of God thereby tumble the priorities of the empire. When shepherds are the last to be informed of the happenings in the empire in Roman Palestine, in God’s reign they become the first to hear the good news regarding the birth of Jesus. They are also invited to be part of the celebration.

The scandal of God-centered celebration

Rome had a lot of emphasis on celebrating events of imperial importance. These were life-denying and emperor centered celebrations. A lot of innocent lives were taken literally for no reason and the village resources are mercilessly drained to fuel the pomp and majesty of the celebrations. The religious celebrations of the temple cult were also discriminatory as the poor Galileans found the long journey tiresome and expensive. Whenever they approached the ‘immaculate’ temple and its priestly leadership they were constantly reminded of their inadequacy to be considered as complete human persons. Thus the shepherds had nothing to do with the celebrations initiated by the political and religious aristocracy of the place. Here an invitation extended to the shepherds, to be part of a God-centered celebration, by the angel becomes another scandal. God is not pictured as an unapproachable reality residing in the holy of holy place with a very wide and irreconcilable gap in between the devotee and Godself. Instead the shepherds are informed of the presence of God in the sign of a new born wrapped up in bands of cloth.  The initial response to the divine revelation was shock and awe. The bible records this as the standard response of the people to the experiences of divine manifestations. This shock, I think, has to be considered as a kind of awakening. It is an awakening of the shepherds from their life in compromise with the oppression and complacency. The shepherds were not led into anything unfamiliar, but to very familiar settings of a typical Palestinian birth. There is no mention about them spotting anything extraordinary in the child. But they had a sharing and an experience of fellowship with the people at the manger. Their encounter with the child had brought a new mood in their life. We see them, returning by singing praises and glorifying God for all they have experienced. They are really into a God-centered celebration. One thing we have to note here is that, this is not a kind of irrational making of sounds and noises. There celebration initiates the formation of a new community of faithful who anchor the hope of the wider community of the coming of Messiah. Mary as part of this community celebrating the hope of the messiah treasures the words and ponders them in her heart. Thereby she finds this god-centered celebration as a continuation of her faith journey than the momentary ecstatic celebrations of the Roman Empire, which lacks any clear purpose.

Conclusion

Christians are called into a ‘scandalous’ ministry!

The first Christians in the Roman Empire and the Jewish community were addressed as a scandalous group. This was because of the fact that they were challenging the prevailing life-negating values of the empire and the religion. The God-centered church was always reminiscent of God’s impending Judgement on the Life denying empire. At the root of the scandalous ministry of the church was their God-centeredness. This choice of God-centeredness many a time put them in strict opposition to the life-negating values of the empire. They opted to stand firm at the face of persecution than compromising to the injustices promoted by the empire. In today’s world the church is encountering with varying situations of emergence of new kinds of imperialism, which dictates the lives of our people and denies them the freedom to be themselves. A lot of people are denied of any space in our social system to build their lives up. Their needs and issues are not considered by the authorities as they occupy the last rungs in the list of priorities. For the majority, life remains as an irresolvable puzzle than a celebration of life. Why the church is not creating scandals today by stepping into the solution of issues in the lives of ordinary men and women, who are sidelined by suggesting their social inadequacy? Why the celebrations initiated by the church do not transmit hope to the thousands of hopeless around us? May this time of celebration be also a time ‘to treasure the words and ponder them in our hearts.’

Incarnation: an Expression of the Beauty of Body

Incarnation: an expression of the beauty of Body

John’s Gospel depicts incarnation beautifully as “the word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory of a father’s only son, full of grace and truth” (John 1: 14). In our theological talks we usually make a distinction between spiritual and carnal dimensions of life. This is not a neutral way of seeing things, but as we make this distinction between these two aspects our existence we add value to each and make one superior to the other. As one would rightly infer, it is always the spiritual that is given a superior status over the carnal, which many a times is regarded as something that has a sinful inclination. The world could not ever think about the flesh becoming this beautiful as John reports it in his gospel.

But in the Old Testament narrations of bodily existence, especially when it talks about the creation, we come to realize life as a result of the indwelling of the divine in the body (Gen. 2:7). God breathes life into the body and thus human become a living being. And in this being Spirit and body has hardly any distinctions but they are seen as going together as a unit. But it speaks about occasions in which this divine breath is displaced by the evil (Genesis 6:3, 1samuel 18:10), which makes the human lose their divine image imprinted in them by the master Creator. We see the bodily existence becoming very ugly in such occasions. Therefore the OT presents body as a gift and blessing from God. Body is also seen as the medium that carries the divine mandates of caring for God’s creation as a whole. Body helps the human realize the interconnectedness of life. It speaks to one through the experience that life suffering at a point in the vast network on this earth brings sufferings to the whole created order. It is through the body only we feel that we are part of vast matrix of life created and sustained by God the Creator.

But it was the Greek philosophical thoughts that become widespread towards the latter part of the 4^th century BCE (especially through the conquest of Alexander the Great in and around Palestine ca. 322 BCE), which initiated a very negative attitude towards body. Gnosticism was one of the major Greek philosophical strands and it talked about knowledge (Gnosis) as the core of the existence of our being. And this knowledge was not something that the human acquired through the experiences of their bodily existence, but it was a knowledge that had to come from above and release the being from the captivity of the body. Therefore the Greek philosophical schools emerged to train the people in acquiring this celestial knowledge to lead them to salvation. Body or flesh in Greek thoughts were expressed as bondages that we experience as we exist and every being is said to be longing for that perfect knowledge to get released from their bodies.

John the gospel writer pens his gospel in a context like this, where the body was seen negatively as something that each being has to overcome. When the dominant philosophy of the dominant religion of the time talks about salvation and fullness as a movement away from the body, he wants to counter it by saying that salvation on the contrary is a movement towards body. God in Jesus moves towards body to make its existence beautiful and complete. The word“Incarnation” connotes this movement of God towards body (In-Carnation or into the body). According to John, Incarnation is an incessant movement of God towards the world (Ch. 1: 10). That movement keeps on happening eternally as God loves the world through God’s only son eternally (John 3:16).

John wrote the gospel in a world governed by a dictatorial government that unleashed horrendous violence on the bodies of the men and women of that time. And it justified such violations using the philosophies that negated the value of body. Many bodies were thrashed down, many were discriminated on the basis of their “imperfections” in terms of color, ritual impurities, disabilities etc. The time and cultural context of the writing of this gospel had an obsession with perfection of the bodies. The understanding that led to such an overemphasis on perfection of body was that only a perfect body in ideal ritualistic settings can contact the divine. People with bodily infirmities and ritual uncleanliness were not allowed to enter the temples and worshipping places in those times. The whole rituals and the worships were attempts do away with the imperfections of the body. While the animal sacrifices were done, they made it sure that no animal with any imperfections are sacrificed.

But incarnation brought new understandings on the bodily existence. Incarnation was historically experienced as a search of God after the shattered bodies. In his gospel John presents a lot of bodies which were broken, discriminated and declared ritually unclean. Jesus, God’s incarnation, depicted in the gospel renders healing, completeness and moreover holiness to all the bodies he touches or encounters. Incarnation makes God one among our bodies. It makes God vulnerable as we see Jesus’ body been crushed eventually at the cross.  But on the other hand God’s holiness and wholeness become something contagious and it presents body as a real blessing from God. Jesus’ acts of healing, casting of demons, forgiveness of sins, feeding of the bodies, touching the bodies, blessing the bodies were all acts that redeemed the blessedness of bodies that was created by God. Incarnation in short affirms the goodness of body and it declares that life becomes beautiful when bodily existence is taken seriously.

How do we deal with our bodies now a days? Many times we do employ a narcissistic approach towards body. Our body is our own and it has to be kept sanitized from all outside intrusions that pollute it. We hate pain and troubles, we hate proximity unless it benefits us and we love to resign from everything to remain disengaged. We love leisure than involvements, thus our attempt in these days is to make the body as much as “comfortable” as it can be. But incarnation left for us a paradigm of engagement, where we get proximate to our neighbors risking us to be hurt by the “harshness” of our neighbors in an attempt make our bodies as well as the bodies of our neighbor whole. This paradigm tend to ask the most pertinent question in these discussion, that is nothing but why we have our bodies? God’s gift of Body is definitely with a particular purpose of God. The biological nature of body is, it wears as it grows older. But as it grows and wears God intends it to contribute to the nourishment of bodies around. Jesus speaks about the wheat grains and says “unless the grain fall and die it will remain single and if it falls and dies it will bring forth many grains.” We are gifted with the body to live in this body as a living sacrifice to the Lord of the body, so that the bodies created by God in this world will be enriched. It makes the body and its existence meaningful and of course beautiful.

Conversion as a Transformed Vision of Power and Authority

Conversion as a Transformed Vision of Power and Authority

Homily on Acts 19:1-20

The narration of conversion of Paul is thrice repeated in the Acts of Apostles in chapters 9, 22 and 26. It means that it is an important model event of transformation that runs through the whole Lukan narration of the life and conversions of the early church and gives the reader a vantage point to see how a new power discourse rooted in the divine help the transformation of persons. The Conversion of Paul signifies very clearly a change of perception in the understanding of power. We read in the passage that Saul had secured power and authority to persecute the Christians living in the midst of diaspora Jews in Damascus. Power is an important theme that is substantially dealt within the Lukan writings on the history of early church. There are instances of misunderstanding the divine power in other writings of Luke in Acts. There is mention about a certain Simon the magician in Samaria in Acts 8: 18ff trying to bribe Peter and John to receive the power of God. This perception of commoditized and commercialized power stands against the biblical understanding of power as something coming from God and going back to God. Peter and John are seen rebuking Simeon for reducing God’s power of transformation as something transactional in monetary terms. For young Saul power and authority meant the official consent to destroy that which is different and hence threatening to the homogenized religiosity of Jews. His intention was therefore to manipulate the power entrusted to earthly institutions such as High Priest by God to torture the poor followers of Christ, which was originally meant to exercise its resources and power to the service of the poor and marginalised. The biblical revelation of divine always occurs in the context of persecution due to the hegemonic build up of power dictating the destiny for certain people by tampering with their future that God offers them. The divine revelation to Moses and therefore to the Hebrew people is an instance of a counter discourse of power rooted in the divine to that of the hegemonic power imposed on them by Pharaoh. God intervenes in such situations by blinding those who wield power to destroy people. This blinding is not simply to destroy them but to help them have self reflexive introspection to deconstruct the hegemonic notions of power. If somebody is not able to manage this blindness in creative ways that will lead them to total destruction as it had happened in the case of the Pharaoh. Here in this passage revelation of Jesus, whom Paul was trying to persecute, is the revelation of divine power that would counter the power that destroys the different expressions of faith other than Jewish, in God. The blindness that engulfs Paul is too symbolic that it primarily denotes a divine interference with the power discourses that unmindfully destroys the lives of innocent people. And it also signifies the veiling of common sense perceptions on power as something repressing the differences and the opportunity for self reflexivity and new insights for those who exercise power.

Paul’s conversion ultimately is a change in perception of power that he exercised. He could understand that it is not a license to manipulate situations to push through someone’s selfish agendas. But it is the resourcefulness God entrusts someone to fulfill the divine imperatives that is linked to the building up of lives of the poor and marginalised. Thus Paul a staunch practitioner of Pharisaic faith transforms to the apostle of Gentiles, a servant of God ready to sacrifice his very own life to extend God’s love to the people beyond the boundaries of Palestine to the ends of earth.

Our call as servants of God today involves this aspect of managing the power and authority in the respective responsibilities we undertake or going to undertake. What will be modality in which we are going to deal with such situations of exercising power and authority? Is it the modality of Jesus who had seen his authority as the freedom to cross the repressive boundaries that created and sustained by the hegemonic power discourses of his time and dared to be called the friend of the sinners? Is it the modality of Paul who saw power and authority as the freedom to reach out the people beyond the boundaries of the conventional salvation history in divine compassion and love and dared to be called the apostle of the gentiles? Power is bivalent in the sense that it is both repressive and creative. It is our perception of power that is going to decide how we are going to use power. Are we realizing divine interventions in our midst many a time blinding us so that we may respond with kind and constructive acts rooted in a transformed vision of power and authority that God entrusts us?  May the triune God initiate such transformed visions of power and authority in us.

Amen.

A Reflection on the Gracious, Nurturing Meal

Genesis 14: 17-24

Blessed be the name of the Lord!

This is a strange or rather odd passage in the body of the patriarchal narratives. Strange in the sense that in no other places in the whole patriarchal narratives, Abram the great father of Israel’s faith in YHWH is presented as a warrior. Abram in the Patriarchal narrative is generally a figure that understands the contexts of life and avoids the development of a polemical relationship with the neighbors. The historicity of the persons and places in this narration is difficult to precisely fix. Four eastern kings go to war against pentapolis, ie, the five cities or five kings. These cities were said to been under the subjugation of Chedorlaomer, the king of Elam. Therefore it can be assumed that this war was a revolt to declare the freedom from political oppression. It also reflects the ancient west Asian history of frequent imperial aggressions, subjugations and spiraling violence. The mention of the five kings including the King of Sodom where Lot, Abram’s nephew, resided is to highlight the ruthlessness of the power of the four kings who defeat them in the war. But then they in turn are defeated by Abram with the help of only 318 odd men again highlighting the greatness of the deliverance act led by the Patriarch. This passage can be read in many ways, and mostly it has been read to highlight the nature of priestly vocation that Melchizedek represents. Since this passage is also seen as a precursor to the Holy Communion I would like to read it in that line. Abram and the accompanying men chased the kings and defeated them through strategic interventions. They could redeem all the goods and riches captured by the enemy Kings. Their arrival to the valley of Shaveh or the King’s valley was indeed a victory procession with all its probable pomp and pride. Now the team of victors is encountered by two people in the narrative; The King of Sodom and the king of Salem. Genesis 14: 17-24 deals with these meeting of kings with Abram.  The nature and outcome of these two meetings had been extremely contradictory. I would like to focus on the intricacies of these meetings to develop a few points for our reflection.

Holy Communion is the celebration of Reciprocal Circulation of God’s Blessing

Melchizedek as the etymology of the term denotes, combines two important offices in the ancient west Asian communities; the office of the priest and the office of the King. Melchizedek has mention at least in three places in the Bible including this passage. The other instances are Psalm 110; 4 and Hebrews chapters 5-7.  Melchizedek cannot be dismissed as a distant shadowy figure from the past. But it was an ideal type that was kept and celebrated throughout the history of the Israelites to counter the aberrations in the Levite cultic priesthood historically practiced in Israel and even in its political leadership. The etymology of King of Shalom can also be derived as the King of uprightness/righteousness and peace. This aspect is reflected in the prayer in our thaksa when he is characterized as “vedippulla purohitanaya melchizedek.”In the Canaanite traditions Kingship is understood as a sacral/political office. Melchizedek is viewed as the precursor of leadership in both royal and priestly lines. T. K. Thomas in BTF writes “by saying that the first priest ever mentioned in the Bible is neither a Jew nor a Christian; means God establishes God’s priesthood in a distinct order that will never be allowed to be captivated by any human made categories.”[1] Bible places priesthood in a more broad and general plane of the whole created order. The origin of Melchizedek’s line of priesthood pre-exists that of any Judaeo-Christian origins of priesthood. Melchizedek greets Abraham in the name of El Elyon- God Most High. The bringing of a meal to battle-drained Abraham by Melchizedek was followed by a blessing. That blessing was in fact a blessing on Abraham by the creator God. In verse 19 we see this blessing uttered as “Blessed be Abram by God Most High, maker of heaven and earth.” It is interesting to note here the fact that Abram’s pride of a victor of the war was humbled by the presentation of a meal. The refreshing meal to the battle-exhausted Abram and his men points them towards God’s gracious providences that nourish life. Eventually it places the victory against the kings in God’s gracious providence and life sustaining power. Therefore the whole community is enabled to see the deliverance as a blessing of God. That means God is blessed by the worshippers for God’s mighty acts of deliverance. The power that worked the deliverance has really come from God. Abram reciprocates the blessing with the offering of the tithe. It is in fact an acknowledgement of God’s blessing in the life of his family and in the life’s of Amorite brothers and other neighboring communities who accompanied him in the battle. Here the blessing is seen to be circulating between God, Melchizedek, Abram and the people and environment associated with them. Therefore the meal in which Abram and his men participate becomes a precursor of the Holy Meal in which the circulation of the divine blessings in the life of the people is celebrated.  The liturgy of the Holy Qurbana, very well describes life as an experience of mutual blessing. When the priest utters the blessings of the triune God, the congregation reciprocates the blessing. The mission of the church at its core has been the extension of this communion to peoples and communities. Here the direction of the blessing does not privilege any one over the other, but a constant interflow of the blessing between God, the worshipper and the neighbor makes it a continuum. It can further be seen as a reflection of the perichoretic movement within the trinity.

Holy Communion is the Celebration of the power of God to provide always and in all ways

The first one to meet Abram and his men according to the narrative of the text is the king of Sodom. But the meeting of the King Melchizedek takes precedence over this meeting. The details of the former’s meeting are described later towards the end of this narrative only. It may not be an accident but a deliberate crafting by the writer to highlight the importance of the second encounter over the former. The king of Sodom in this text represents the imperial motive to capture, possess and subjugate than be open to share the blessings. According to Terence E Fretheim, the King of Sodom is concerned simply about the power of the men who won the battle and the disposition of the booty of the war. His offer of the whole booty to Abraham in exchange of his men may appear as his magnanimity to share the riches with Abraham. But Fretheim says that it is not the case. By putting claim on the men, the king of Sodom in fact is putting his claim on the power that brought the victory and booty. The possession of the men will be followed by the possession of the booty as a major share of it belongs to them. The empire desires that there should not be any power over its absolute power of dominion. The king’s attempt is nothing but to tame this new exposition of power to be manipulated lately to achieve his purposes. Here the power is conceived as self originating in the empire and not as something entrusted from God for common good, as is expressed through the words of Melchizedek. But Abram resists this attempt to tame the expression of divine power by refusing to accept the offer of the booty from the king. He spells clearly that the king cannot have the claim on the deliverance that he and the whole community has experienced but it is an outcome of the manifestation of power of God.

The carefully crafted ascent to power of Narendra Modi was analyzed effectively by a report came in Pachkuthira. Written by Kamalram Sajeev and titled Maadhyamangalude Bimba Nirmithi. It speaks about the way people, media and capital have been manipulated to create an image of absolute and self originating power centre in the person of Modi to effect an electoral victory. The most dangerous and disturbing truth about this new politics is that the power of the ruler in a democratic political order is no more emerging from the constitutional framework or public morality, but from a combination of personal moral authority and the corporate and a majoritarian communal endorsement of that imposing morality.

Holy Meal is an occasion of encountering God Most High, one who nourishes life over the whole face of Earth. Melchizedek greets Abram in the name of God Most High. Here Holy Communion provides the faith community with an alternate vision of power that originates from God and extends to all creation. Holy Communion comes also as a pledge to God as Abraham points it out to the King of Sodom that “I have sworn to the Most High that I would not take a thread or sandal-thong”. It is a pledge to ever remain as the agent God’s justice and peace for the whole world. The occasion was not taken up as an opportunity to establish hegemony or to make one extremely rich. But Abraham takes it as an issue of justice as he talks about the just sharing of the resources to restore and refresh the broken lives of the people who had to bear the brunt of the excesses of the war.

If the communion is not bringing a vision of just sharing of resources, we become people who hold back the blessings. Who take pride in the deliverance but fail to replicate it in our surroundings. Let us take the vow to carry the energy of Holy Communion to the world to bless the world in the name of God Most High and also to be blessed by its goodness.

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[1] T.K. Thomas, “Melchizedek, King and Priest: an Ecumenical Paradigm?”, Bangalore Theological Forum, 31/2 (December, 1999)