REL331 essay 2

REL331 Module 4 AVP Transcript SLIDE 1 – IMAGE OF JESUS DANCING MURAL AT SAINT GREGORY’S Image: Jesus Dancing mural at St. Gregory’s

Do you associate Jesus and dancing? In Jesus’ culture, dancing was routinely a part of rejoicing. David danced before the ark of the covenant. People danced at weddings and on occasions like the return of the Prodigal Son (Luke 15:25). And Jesus himself is said to have compared following him to being at a wedding banquet, a time for rejoicing, not fasting (Matthew 9:15). There’s even an old English Christmas carol, “Tomorrow Shall Be My Dancing Day,” in which Jesus speaks of his being born of Mary as his “dancing day.” Here are some of the lyrics:

Then was I born of a virgin pure

Of her I took fleshly substance

Thus was I knit to man's nature

To call my true love to my dance.

There’s a video of the “Dancing Day” carol being sung in a cathedral here: http://tinyurl.com/ny9btd Sara Miles and others regularly dance at St. Gregory’s. Inspired by traditional theologians like Gregory of Nyssa, Donald Schell and Rick Fabian developed a theology of liturgy as “Dancing with God,” as one of the church’s DVD’s is entitled. And they dance around a Table in which everyone (Christian or not) is invited to share in Holy Communion.

2

At their food pantry – initiated by Sara -- they give away food, standing around the Table, beneath the murals of the dancing saints. SLIDE 2 – IMAGE OF FOOD PANTRY AT SAINT GREGORY’S Image: food pantry at St. Gregory’s

Murals of Dancing Jesus, dancing saints, the Table in the center, sharing food…. Within the usual American context, all of this is “outside the box,” as we say. Some of our denominations don’t want anyone dancing at any time, and even in more liberal denominations, if people are dancing they’d better not be doing it in church. Dancing, of course, is very expressive and physical – sacramental, one might say, since sacraments typically unite meaning and physical object. And what of the sacramental quality of the general setting at St. Gregory’s? The whole thing – building, people, murals, gestures, food -- is one large sacrament, uniting Jesus and human beings in one blessed act of sharing the most fundamental of necessities, food. When you consider the usual level of violence, prejudice, and hunger in the world, you wonder if there is not some sort of alternative, a vision that has the potential to absolutely overcome the kinds of divisions that make things like the murder of Etty Hillesum and Archbishop Oscar Romero impossible. It’s this sort of vision – a vision of life “outside-the-box” of prejudice, violence and hunger -- that is animating the people at St. Gregory’s. It’s what Sara Miles means by “take this bread.”

3

SLIDE 3 – IMAGE OF BENEDICTINE HOSPITALITY Image: Benedictine hospitality

A whole flurry of issues arises with our second module on Sara. The sharing of bread, for instance, is an act of “hospitality,” and this is one of the Benedictine virtues. This is by way of contrast to hermits or cloistered contemplative orders which do not encourage guests. SLIDE 4 – IMAGE OF ABBEY OF MONTE CASSINO Image: Abbey of Monte Cassino

A Benedictine motto is “pray and work.” They sought to maintain themselves by their own labor, and this included manual labor. In Pasco County, where Saint Leo is located, the monks were the first to have a cattle dip! You might note the Roman earthiness of this. Benedict was of a practical bent, as Romans were. But his Christian difference here was that all orthodox Christians were “brothers” (and “sisters”) and social rank was largely ignored, and all were expected to work in some manner.

As for guests, “all guests who present themselves are to be welcomed as Christ.” (Rule 53:1). Christians did not invent hospitality as a virtue, of course. It is one of the most ancient virtues. It is especially evident in Homer’s Odyssey, where Zeus is recognized as Zeus Xenios, “Zeus the Hospitable,” protector of guests. The Odyssey has several scenes where a guest is treated badly and suffers for it. The Greeks, however, were thinking primarily of other Greeks. Benedict is thinking of other Christians, but that is not an ethnic group.

4

SLIDE 5 – IMAGE OF JESUS FEEDS 5,000 Image: Jesus feeds 5,000

Did Jesus welcome all orthodox Christians? No, he didn’t. One important reason for this is, as we said previously, Yeshua bar Miriam wasn’t a Christian. He had not even heard the term. He was a Jew, almost entirely working with Jews, but in a way that would later open this movement to Gentiles. Jesus’ way included eating practices where women, tax collectors, and sinners were welcome. These were all kinds of people who could be reckoned ritually unclean for one reason or another. Jesus believed that the Kingdom of God transcended this purity/impurity distinction. But this kind of distinction was essential for the operation of the Temple and the jobs of priests. A lot of the Temple sacrifices had to do with getting favor with God and with rites of cleansing. It is unpleasant to say this in today’s culture, but priests were much like holy butchers. You know that there is none of this as a focus in Jesus’ teachings. For one thing, he wasn’t a priest. The Jesus movement was a lay movement; no priests. His focus was on the heart itself and our actions – love God, your neighbor and your enemy. The human heart, as we all know, is a very mixed bag, and he was especially hard on socially high-ranking people who pretended to a holiness that they didn’t have – “hypocrites,” from a Greek word for “actor.” You will recall that in the parable of the Good Samaritan priests pass by the robbed Jew, while a Samaritan gives him compassionate aid. A despised (Samaritans had racially mixed with Gentiles) and unorthodox person is Jesus’ example of living “in the Kingdom of God.” SLIDE 6 – IMAGE OF BENEDICT XVI NEW ENCYCLICAL

Image: Benedict xvi new encyclical

If we then look back on Jesus’ actions, there is a trajectory of openness to all. He is overcoming barriers between people – race, gender, religious orthodoxy. Paul explicitly extends this to slaves.

5

SLIDE 7 – IMAGE OF ONE EARTH, ONE FAMILY Image: One earth, one family

There is here the potential for a radical vision of social justice which includes the whole human family. And in fact, this is precisely the emphasis and message of Caritas in Veritate “(Charity in Truth”; 2009), the most recent papal encyclical form Benedict XVI Ratzinger. The Pope argues that the “truth” of the matter is that “love” includes the whole human race as one family, and that God’s plan – and vocation – for all human beings to live in solidarity and fraternity as one global family (nn.1, 7, 13, 55, 57). Charity includes justice and a striving for the “common good” of all humankind (n.7). Sometimes people speak of the common good as if it were restricted to a particular country, but Benedict -- like John XXIII before him -- takes it in a universal sense, just like universal rights. SLIDE 8 – IMAGE OF FEEDING HUNGRY IN AFRICA Image: feeding hungry in Africa

He insists that there is a universal responsibility of human beings for each other, and especially of rich nations for poor nations. There is in fact a global economy and what people do in the US affects everyone else. Benedict is particularly hard on financial institutions that dreamed up arcane financial instruments and speculated in them, actions “which wreaked such havoc on the real economy” (n.65), and he calls for “regulation … to safeguard weaker parties and discourage speculation” (n.66).

Benedict calls for a “large scale” (n.42) “redistribution” of wealth (n.32) and energy (n.49). There is need here, he says, for political action which doesn’t simply follow “commercial logic” (n.36), “the logic of contract” (n.38), or the “logic of exchange” (n.39). SLIDE 9 – IMAGE OF HELPING DEVELOPING COUNTRIES Image: helping developing countries

6

What goes beyond such materialistic logic? In Benedict’s vision, love which includes giving to what others what is their due and also giving to others what is mine – sharing (nn.5, 6, and 9). Notice that this is what Sara is doing. Notice also the place of sharing in the Lord’s Supper. Sharing is at the most fundamental level of meaning for Christian life.

Benedict’s view is, in other words, what the opponents of national health care (not all Republicans either) call “socialism.” On this vision, there are young people, sick people, old people, and poor people, and the people who take care of these are those who are able, namely, largely healthy people who can work and rich people.

But there’s more to it than that. Benedict has a global vision, and a similar point of view applies to the whole world: rich and healthy countries have responsibilities toward poor and sick ones.

And how does Sarah Miles fit into this vision? “Take this bread” is her answer, and you should be able to see the Christian roots of this response. Her own personal experience in Mexico, Nicaragua and El Salvador helped imbue her with a strong sense of social justice. SLIDE 10 – IMAGE OF CHRISTIAN AGAPE FEAST Image: Christian agape feast

But what about her own ministry?

She becomes a deacon in the Episcopal Church. She is also gay. Dante had envisioned human beings in a condition where they themselves had “crown” and “miter”; that is, they were their own king and pope. What about Sara?

In the summer of 2009, the Episcopal Church voted for the ordination of openly gay bishops, and for the blessing of gay unions. In 2006 a woman, Katharine Jefferts Schori (who had been baptized a Catholic), was elected the first female presiding bishop of the Episcopal Church. Sara is now operating within the general structures of her Church.

7

She will take this further, however, for you will read that when she is asked for baptismal water by someone who is not asking to become a Christian she doesn’t refuse it, and when she is tending her dying former lover she prays a eucharistic blessing over toast.

(This is all, by the way, illegal in the Catholic Church. But then Pope Benedict doesn’t recognize the validity of non-Catholic [including Orthodox Churches as Catholic] ordination anyway. The Episcopal Church and Baptist Church, etc. are not “churches.” They are to be called “ecclesial communities.” See the June 29, 2007 statement by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, “Responses to Some Questions Regarding Certain Aspects of the Church”: http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/cfaith/documents/rc_con_cfaith_doc_2 0070629_responsa-quaestiones_en.html )

SLIDE 11 – IMAGE OF HENRY DAVID THOREAU Image: Henry David Thoreau

What’s a person to do? Following Dante’s imagination of individual responsibility can be a very, very tough road to take. Nevertheless, it seems that quite a lot of Americans today are taking this route.