At St. Columba's, we have a study group that meets to engage the Gospel for the upcoming Sunday. We meet early on Wednesday mornings at 6:30. I make much about the insanity of the hour, but I am there most of the time. The opportunity to study the lessons for Sunday with the people that will hear my sermon is invaluable. Knowing the questions, that some have, is very useful for sermon preparation.
This morning, we grappled with John 13:31-35. It is the text where Jesus speaks of his glorification in betrayal, and commands the disciples to love one another, as He loves them. It is a foundational text for the Church, and it should be the music playing in the background to all we do.
This morning after the Bible study, I had a funny thought. Jesus is preparing his disciples for his departure. He is reminding them, that the heart of the Gospel and the coming Kingdom are bound up in agape:love. The Gospel according to John is, obviously, written after the life, death, resurrection and ascension. So, the material preserved is shaped by the past and present of the Christian community. They remember how and what Jesus said to encourage them, and form them as his disciples to make it through his exit. Yet, they remember, principally, to live and follow forever.
Every time we gather around the Bible, we remember. Yet, we remember to live now and forever.
Wednesday, May 2, 2007
Tuesday, May 1, 2007
Reading the Scriptures
Below is a quote from the Larkin Stuart Lecture given by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams. The lecture addresses the Church's engagement with the Bible. This quote captures the dymanic quality of that engagement in a useful and beautiful fashion. If you want to read the full text, it is available at archbishopofcanterbury.org. It is well worth the time.
A written text inevitably has about it a dual character. It comes before the reader/hearer as a finished product, and so as something that can in some ways be treated as an object. If we are not careful its written character can be misused by working with the text as if it were passive. In contrast to the event of a voice speaking, it can be abstracted from the single occasion when the hearer has no control over what comes to her or him from outside. At the same time, a written text requires re-reading; it is never read for the last time, and it continuously generates new events of interpretation. It is fruitful of renewed communication in a way that the spoken word alone cannot be. So to identify a written text as sacred is to claim that the continuous possibility of re-reading, the impossibility of reading for the last time, is a continuous openness to the intention of God to communicate. Just as the text itself contains re-reading, is almost constituted by re-reading, so that it repeatedly recreates a movement towards conversion (towards the cross of Jesus, in Christian terms), so the eternal possibility of ‘reading again’ stands as a warning against ignoring the active ‘restlessness’ of the text in summoning the reader to change. The writtenness of the text is from one point of view risky as a strategy of communication: it risks the appearance of passivity, and the re-readability of the text risks the appearance of indeterminacy. Yet from another point of view it can be seen as inseparable from the risk of the communication it itself describes as well as enacts – a divine communication that is never without human speech and narrative, never just an interruption of the created continuum but a pressure upon it that opens up to the divine by the character of its internal relations and connections, the shifting, penitent perspective of a story enacted in time. The writtenness of the text is like the sheer factuality of the historical past as the vehicle of revelation: it is something irreversibly done, but for that very reason continuously inviting or demanding.
A written text inevitably has about it a dual character. It comes before the reader/hearer as a finished product, and so as something that can in some ways be treated as an object. If we are not careful its written character can be misused by working with the text as if it were passive. In contrast to the event of a voice speaking, it can be abstracted from the single occasion when the hearer has no control over what comes to her or him from outside. At the same time, a written text requires re-reading; it is never read for the last time, and it continuously generates new events of interpretation. It is fruitful of renewed communication in a way that the spoken word alone cannot be. So to identify a written text as sacred is to claim that the continuous possibility of re-reading, the impossibility of reading for the last time, is a continuous openness to the intention of God to communicate. Just as the text itself contains re-reading, is almost constituted by re-reading, so that it repeatedly recreates a movement towards conversion (towards the cross of Jesus, in Christian terms), so the eternal possibility of ‘reading again’ stands as a warning against ignoring the active ‘restlessness’ of the text in summoning the reader to change. The writtenness of the text is from one point of view risky as a strategy of communication: it risks the appearance of passivity, and the re-readability of the text risks the appearance of indeterminacy. Yet from another point of view it can be seen as inseparable from the risk of the communication it itself describes as well as enacts – a divine communication that is never without human speech and narrative, never just an interruption of the created continuum but a pressure upon it that opens up to the divine by the character of its internal relations and connections, the shifting, penitent perspective of a story enacted in time. The writtenness of the text is like the sheer factuality of the historical past as the vehicle of revelation: it is something irreversibly done, but for that very reason continuously inviting or demanding.
Philip and James, Apostles
May 1st is a red letter day on the Episcopal Calendar. It is the day we remember Philip and James, both apostles of Jesus. History records little about the two. Most everything we know about them comes from the Gospels.
James is, mainly, distinguished from the other followers of Jesus that bear the same name. Yet, this James is found at the foot of the cross at the crucifixion. Philip is known by the questions he posed throughout the ministry of Jesus. Philip strikes me much the way Thomas does. He has pragmatic concerns, and dares to speak them aloud.
Philip calls his friend Nathaniel to come and see. Philip expresses concern about Jesus' ability to feed the multitude. Philip insists, in the Gospel according to John, that Jesus show them the Father.
In my experience, you need persons of all temperaments. You need the low-key individuals that vote with their feet, and serve simply by being present. This seems like James. You also need those that will speak up for themselves. Those individuals are, probably, asking the questions that others have, but don't articulate. This sounds like Philip.
Today we remember Philip and James. We give thanks for their witness, but particularly for the different temperaments they represent. Pray that we might honor our different ways of being and seeing.
James is, mainly, distinguished from the other followers of Jesus that bear the same name. Yet, this James is found at the foot of the cross at the crucifixion. Philip is known by the questions he posed throughout the ministry of Jesus. Philip strikes me much the way Thomas does. He has pragmatic concerns, and dares to speak them aloud.
Philip calls his friend Nathaniel to come and see. Philip expresses concern about Jesus' ability to feed the multitude. Philip insists, in the Gospel according to John, that Jesus show them the Father.
In my experience, you need persons of all temperaments. You need the low-key individuals that vote with their feet, and serve simply by being present. This seems like James. You also need those that will speak up for themselves. Those individuals are, probably, asking the questions that others have, but don't articulate. This sounds like Philip.
Today we remember Philip and James. We give thanks for their witness, but particularly for the different temperaments they represent. Pray that we might honor our different ways of being and seeing.
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