Sunday 8/14/16

Christ taught a religion of peace and gentleness, empathy and compassion. But it was disruptive and, as such, wrenching and painful. The spiritual elements are in contradistinction to the very emotional and material gifts that allow for success and advancement in the world. Gifts that allowed the species to evolve. Displacing them require serious effort because the material is more than natural, it is advantageous. To rise above the material requires the identification of those currents so basic in us, so helpful in our early development, and to substitute Christ's spirituality. And the foundation stone of that old world--that ancient homo sapien, that Old Testament--is identity. We are a product of our ability to see ourselves in a larger context, as a part of a larger group of people: Family, Friends, Community, Tribe, Nation and Race. That identification strengthens us against our opponents. What is called "xenophobia" by our moderns was, in history, a lifesaver. And now, in our more crowded world, a killer. Christ asks that we eliminate the old and limiting context of exclusion and expand it to include all humanity, the New Testament of inclusion.

In today's Gospel Christ says how hard that evolution will be:

Jesus said to his disciples:
“I have come to set the earth on fire,
and how I wish it were already blazing!
There is a baptism with which I must be baptized,
and how great is my anguish until it is accomplished!
Do you think that I have come to establish peace on the earth?
No, I tell you, but rather division.
From now on a household of five will be divided,
three against two and two against three;
a father will be divided against his son
and a son against his father,
a mother against her daughter
and a daughter against her mother,
a mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law
and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law.”

Well, at least the first part of it is working.