EASTER DAY

Sunday 17 April 2022

St. Uriel’s, Sea Girt, N. J.

 

 

Several years back, at a party given by a couple in my parish, I had a mildly awkward encounter with one of the other guests. Knowing that I was the rector of our hosts’ parish, this gentleman told me that he belonged to a church of another denomination down the street. Then he triumphantly announced: “They’ve made me completely welcome, even though they know I don’t believe in the Resurrection!” From the way he said it, his implied accusation was clearly that he wouldn’t be made nearly so welcome at my church.

 

Over the course of my ministry, I’ve occasionally found that people who’ve recently started attending church will uneasily ask, reluctantly and after much hesitation, some such question as: “I really like coming here, but to be a member, do I really need to believe X? Or am I really expected to accept Y?” Often, these questions have to do with doctrines of the Christian faith such as the Virgin Birth or the bodily Resurrection of Christ.

 

So, to take the question on its own terms, what are we expected to believe as members of the Episcopal Church? The traditional Anglican answer to this question is summed up in the Latin tag, lex orandi, lex credendi—which translates roughly as “the law of prayer is the law of belief.” It means that the best way to learn the Church’s beliefs and teachings is to read and study the texts we use in worship. We become members of the Church in the Sacrament of Holy Baptism. And we continue our membership in good standing by regular participation in the Church’s worship and Sacraments, particularly the Holy Eucharist. 

 

Associated with these two Sacraments are the two ancient professions of faith known as the Apostles Creed and the Nicene Creed. These are the Church’s definitive summaries of all things necessary to salvation as revealed by God in the Holy Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments. 

 

When we’re baptized, we recite the Apostles Creed, or else it’s recited on our behalf by our parents and godparents in the hope that we’ll eventually make it our own. On Sundays and major Holy Days, we receive Holy Communion having recited the Nicene Creed together first. So, the best answer is that to continue as Church members in good standing we’re expected to be able in good conscience to profess the Apostles and Nicene Creeds. And it’s worth noting that both Creeds unambiguously affirm Christ’s Resurrection from the dead.

 

While I don’t have a problem with that answer, however, I do find the question a bit odd. It presupposes a view of the Church as an authoritarian and repressive institution that tells people what to believe, and further tells them that they’re not welcome to belong unless they can sign on the dotted line at the bottom of a detailed laundry list of authoritative teachings. But while such denominations may exist, they’re not the Church that I know.

 

Now, I’m not saying that dogmas and doctrines are unimportant—on the contrary, they’re crucially important—but they don’t function as the criterion of eligibility for membership in quite that way. The traditional, premodern, Catholic concept of the Church is much more that of an organic community comprising all sorts and conditions of people, whose life together arises from common participation in worship, fellowship, and mission grounded in a common faith, to be sure, but whose individual grasp of that faith may not always be complete or perfect.

 

Consider: We baptize infants and consider them full members of the church even though they haven’t yet attained the ability to give intellectual assent to any coherent system of doctrinal teachings and beliefs. Then consider individuals who suffer from severe mental disabilities, who can have only the simplest and most childlike understanding of the Christian teachings: nonetheless, we baptize, confirm, and communicate them, considering them just as fully members of the Body of Christ as the most learned and orthodox theologians.

 

The point is that all without exception are welcome, regardless of their beliefs, doubts, questions, and confusions. Certain types of behavior are indeed unwelcome in the Church’s life—and how to define the boundaries between appropriate and inappropriate behavior is an ongoing challenge that merits the most serious attention. But again, while certain ways of acting may need to be checked at the door, nonetheless, all people are invited in; everyone is welcome.

 

So, to return to our original question. What does the Church require us to believe to remain members-in-good-standing? Phrased that way, it’s clearly the wrong question. Assent to the articles of Christian faith cannot legitimately be required of anyone. People can and do believe all kinds of things for all kinds of reasons, but few of us ever believe anything just because some external authority commands us to do so.

 

Our business, then, is not to require acceptance of the Church’s teachings, but rather to proclaim them joyfully and to invite people to hear, consider, and assent to them insofar as it’s given them to do so. A favorite maxim of Pope Saint John Paul II was “the Church imposes nothing, she only proposes.” The point is that faith is a gift; and it goes against the very nature of a gift to be compelled or coerced. On the contrary, it retains its nature as a gift only insofar as it’s accepted and received in the fullness of human freedom.

 

Some years ago, a well-known Eastern Orthodox bishop and theologian visited a prestigious Methodist seminary in the South to lecture on the Nicene Creed. During the question period at the end of the lecture, one of the students rose and earnestly protested: “But I just can’t bring myself to believe the part about Christ rising from the dead.” Without missing a beat, the bishop replied, “Well, don’t be so hard on yourself. You’re still very young. Just keep saying the Creed, and eventually you’ll get it.” 

 

Utterly confused, the student asked, “But wouldn’t it be dishonest and hypocritical of me to profess publicly what I don’t believe in my heart?” “Oh,” said the bishop, “Now I see your problem! But you misunderstand! What the Nicene Creed professes isn’t your own personal faith, but the faith of the Holy Catholic Church! None of us can expect to get it all at once. Just keep saying the Creed, and eventually the Holy Spirit will grant you the faith and understanding you seek.” 

 

Today, then, we joyfully proclaim the Church’s faith in Christ’s Resurrection from the dead. This Easter proclamation is not an oppressive dogma to be required of anyone as a precondition of anything, but a gift of great good news to be treasured and shared: God’s pledge to us of our own resurrection and his offer of eternal life in Christ. Our mission is not to require or demand this faith of anyone, but rather to invite all people everywhere to make it their own as and when God grants them the grace to do so. And then we go forward together, rejoicing in the risen life that is ours in Christ Jesus our Savior.

 

EASTER VIGIL

April 16, 2022

St. Uriel’s, Sea Girt, N. J.

 

 

Unsurprisingly, Christ’s Resurrection is a principal subject of Christian art. In the Western Church, paintings and statues often depict the Risen Jesus emerging triumphant from the tomb, perhaps with the soldiers sleeping on either side of the rolled back stone. Another frequent theme is that of his appearing to Mary Magdalene.

 

In the Eastern Church, however, the artistic tradition is very different. On the cover of this evening’s bulletin is a typical Eastern Orthodox icon of the Resurrection or Anastasis. It depicts Christ standing astride a great set of fallen gates—which in many versions of the icon have landed in the figure of a cross. With the nail-prints visible in his hands and feet, Jesus reaches down with one hand to grasp the hand of a man rising from a tomb. The man is Adam. With the other hand he reaches down to grasp the hand of Eve, rising from her tomb. Other figures stand by, also having risen from their graves, often including King David, John the Baptist, and other great kings and prophets of Israel.

 

This rather strange image depicts symbolically what happened during the interval between our Lord’s death on the cross on Good Friday, and his rising from the tomb on Easter Sunday: namely, his descent into hell. The Apostles’ Creed states that after Jesus died and was buried, “he descended into hell, and on the third day he rose again.” Yet during Holy Week it’s all too easy to go straight from the death and burial on Friday afternoon to the Resurrection on Sunday morning, without pausing to consider anything in between. 

 

The Great Vigil of Easter as we now celebrate it has been revived within living memory. Over the years, people have occasionally asked me the same question about the Easter Vigil: Why are we celebrating Easter when it’s not yet Easter Sunday? Beyond explaining that in Jewish tradition the next day begins at sunset, a substantive part of the answer is that on Easter Day we celebrate what happens during the daylight: the finding of the empty tomb and the Risen Lord’s appearances to the women and the disciples; while during the Great Vigil we focus instead on the deep mystery of what happens in the dark solitude of Christ’s tomb before dawn. Indeed, at the beginning of the liturgy the church is darkened precisely to resemble the interior of a tomb. On this most holy night, then, it seems appropriate to say something about what our tradition calls the harrowing of hell.

 

The New Testament briefly mentions Christ’s descent into hell in several places. Perhaps the best-known reference occurs in the First Letter of Peter. The apostle writes that Jesus was “put to death in the flesh but made alive in the spirit; in which he went and preached to the spirits in prison” (3:18-19). A bit later, he adds: “For this is why the gospel was preached even to the dead, that though judged in the flesh like men, they might live in the spirit like God” (4:6).

 

Paul writes in his Letter to the Ephesians, that Christ “descended into the lower parts of the earth,” and then that later he “ascended far above all the heavens, that he might fill all things” (4:9-10).

 

In the Acts of the Apostles, Peter, in his sermon on the day of Pentecost, quotes Psalm 16, “You will not abandon my soul to Hades, nor let your Holy One see corruption,” and then says that in the psalm David “foresaw and spoke of the resurrection of Christ, that he was not abandoned to Hades, nor did his flesh see corruption” (2:31). These words suggest that while Christ’s body rested incorrupt in the tomb, his soul went to the place called Hades, the abode of the dead, even though he did not remain there.

 

One final point of importance is that in the many places where the New Testament writers speak of Christ being raised from the dead, the phrase “from the dead” in the original Greek means not “from the state of death,” but rather, literally, “from among the dead ones.”

 

Based on this scriptural evidence, the Church’s tradition came to understand that when Jesus died and his body was placed in the tomb, his soul left his body and descended into the place known in Hebrew as Sheol, and in Greek as Hades: not the hell of eternal punishment prepared for the unrepentant after the Last Judgment, but rather that shadowy realm where the spirits of the dead were awaiting their Redeemer. 

 

Here, rather than becoming a prisoner himself, Christ trampled down the gates, crushed the power of the devil, proclaimed the Good News, and set free the imprisoned souls awaiting their redeemer. Finally, his soul ascended and rejoined his body, which was lying incorrupt in the tomb awaiting its resurrection.

 

This doctrine of Christ’s descent into hell points to at least three truths of importance for us today. 

 

First, Jesus truly experienced death. From his conception, he passed through all the stages of human existence, both on this side of the grave and beyond. And this means that he’s present for us in every stage of our life and death. Even as we go down into the grave, he’s already there waiting for us. Not even death can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus.

 

Second, by descending into hell, Christ has made his presence known in every part of creation, from the highest heaven to the lowest depths of the earth. Specifically, by preaching the Gospel to those who died before him, he shows that his offer of eternal salvation extends to all people in all times and in all places, both the living and the dead.

 

And third, by ascending from hell after descending there, he manifests his victory over death and the grave: a victory which will become known when he appears to the women and the disciples on Easter Sunday; and a victory in which we share by being baptized into his Body, the Church. 

 

Tomorrow, we shall celebrate the empty tomb’s discovery and the Risen Lord’s appearances in the full light of day. But this evening, we rejoice, give thanks, and celebrate—for, in the words of the Exsultet that we heard so beautifully chanted earlier in this service: “This is the night, when Christ broke the bonds of death and hell, and rose victorious from the grave.”

GOOD FRIDAY

April 15, 2022

St. Uriel’s, Sea Girt, N. J.

 

 

Isaiah 52:13-53:12

Hebrews 10:16-25

John 18:1-19:42

 

The Saint John Passion Gospel that we’ve just heard is so grand in scope and so rich in detail that it’s impossible to comment on it in its entirety in one sermon. So, preachers on Good Friday often employ the technique of selecting perhaps one or two verses – or a particular phrase, character, or incident – narrowing the focus to a small part that in some significant way illuminates the meaning of the whole. Over the years, I’ve employed this technique myself many times.

 

Today, however, I want to try something different and comment briefly on all three readings: not just the Passion Gospel from John, but also the readings from Isaiah and the Letter to the Hebrews. The text I want to use as my point of focus comes not, however, from any of these readings but rather from an antiphon that comes later in today’s liturgy: “We venerate thy Cross, O Lord, and praise and glorify thy holy Resurrection; for by virtue of the Cross joy hath come to the whole world.”

 

That antiphon embodies a paradox in what we’re about here today. We naturally tend to think of today’s liturgy as an occasion of sadness and mourning, in contrast to the joy of Easter. Today on Good Friday we wear black vestments. The altars are bare. The organ is silent.  Come Sunday, all that will change. We shall be wearing our best white-and-gold vestments. The altars will be decked in flowers. We’ll sing the Easter hymns with gusto. But that contrast risks obscuring the underlying reality that both Good Friday and Easter Sunday, and indeed every offering of Christian worship throughout the year, combine at one and the same time elements of sadness and joy, mourning and celebration. The only real difference is one of emphasis.

 

“We venerate thy Cross, O Lord, and praise and glorify thy holy Resurrection; for by virtue of the Cross joy hath come to the whole world.” Today, the note of celebration is muted but not absent. (As T.S. Eliot put it, “Again, in spite of that, we call this Friday good.”) Conversely, at the Sung Mass on Easter, the most joyful day of the Christian year, the note of mourning and repentance is likewise muted but not absent, because we never forget that the price of our redemption; the source of our hope in our own Resurrection is none other than our Lord’s sufferings and death on the cross. As Saint Paul says, whenever we break the bread and share the cup, we proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.

 

Every Good Friday, we hear the same three readings: an Old Testament reading from Isaiah, a New Testament reading from the Letter to the Hebrews, and the Saint John Passion Gospel. Together, these three readings are like a medieval triptych, a three-paneled altarpiece. Imagine the Saint John Passion as the great central panel, with the Isaiah reading as the panel on the left, and the reading from Hebrews as the panel on the right. The purpose of the side panels in a medieval triptych is to point to and interpret the central panel. And so it is with the Good Friday readings. The Saint John Passion tells the main story; the readings from Isaiah and Hebrews illuminate that story’s meaning.

 

The first reading reminds us that the Jesus we see dying on the Cross is none other than the Suffering Servant foretold in Isaiah’s prophecy. His suffering brings the people redemption and healing. As Isaiah puts it, “He was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that made us whole, and with his stripes we are healed.” Yet in the same passage the Prophet also foretells the Servant’s ultimate triumph and glorification: “Behold, my servant shall prosper, he shall be exalted and lifted up, and shall be very high.”

 

On the other side of the triptych, the reading from Hebrews describes Jesus as the great high priest who opens heaven to us by offering his own flesh and blood. In the strict meaning of the term in religious language, a priest—as opposed to a minister, prophet, or teacher—is one who offers sacrifice on behalf of the people. But the Letter to the Hebrews explicitly describes Christ as a different kind of priest; instead of sacrificing something or someone else, he offers himself, his own flesh and blood, upon the altar of the cross. This sacrifice is the end of all sacrifices because it obtains the forgiveness of all sins. And it opens the possibility of new life. As the author concludes: “let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near.”

 

The left panel, the reading from Isaiah, gives the view from the past, anticipating the Lord’s crucifixion which still lies in the future. All this was foretold long ago. And the right panel, the reading from Hebrews, gives the view from the future, remembering the Lord’s crucifixion as a past event capable of transforming our lives in the present. And between these two, the great central panel of the Passion Gospel tells the story itself, as if in the present, recounting the Lord’s suffering and death for the world’s redemption.

 

As we gaze on the triptych comprising these three scripture readings, sadness and mourning combine with joy and celebration as two sides of the same coin. The Good Friday antiphon sums up and gives expression to our response: “We venerate thy Cross, O Lord, and praise and glorify thy holy Resurrection; for by virtue of the Cross joy hath come to the whole world.”

MAUNDY THURSDAY

April 14, 2022

St. Uriel’s, Sea Girt, N. J.

 

 

The Liturgy of Maundy Thursday commemorates our Lord’s Last Supper with his disciples on the eve of his death: the occasion when he washes his disciples’ feet, institutes the Sacrament of his Body and Blood, and ordains the twelve apostles to the priesthood of the new Covenant. 

 

A key point is that these events are not merely a prelude to Good Friday, a few last-minute items to be checked off and gotten out of the way before he can get down to the real business that will take place on the next day. Instead, they’re integral and interrelated parts of a greater whole: the mystery of our redemption.

 

At supper, he bids his disciples continue gathering to share ritual meals, just as they’ve been doing regularly for as long as they’ve been together. But to the usual Jewish blessings said at the breaking of the bread before the meal, and the sharing of the cup after it, Jesus now adds new, unprecedented, and indeed shocking words: “This is my body which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me … This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.”

 

Known as the Words of Institution, these words demonstrate that the Last Supper and the Crucifixion mutually interpret and illuminate one another. At the time, the disciples likely have no idea of what Jesus means by these words. What he says over the bread and wine will make sense only in retrospect, once his body is lifted high on the cross, and his blood spilt for the life of the world. And thereafter his words will carry that same meaning whenever Christians gather with the priestly successors of those same apostles to break the bread and share the cup in his Name. His Crucifixion thus fulfills and interprets the words he speaks over the bread and the wine.

 

Conversely, those same words interpret and explain the meaning of the Crucifixion itself. We’re able to understand the full significance of Christ’s death on the cross only in light of his words at the Last Supper: “This is my body, which is given for you …” “This is my blood … poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.” So, we can’t fully understand the Last Supper except by looking ahead to the Crucifixion; and we can’t fully understand the Crucifixion except by looking back at the Last Supper. Neither event is fully intelligible on its own. Saint Paul sums up this dynamic of mutual interpretation neatly in this evening’s reading from his First Epistle to the Corinthians when he writes: “For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.”

 

But there’s more. When he says, “Do this in remembrance of me,” the Greek word translated as remembrance, anamnesis, means something more than mere recollection in a subjective psychological sense. It signifies instead the transformation of time itself, a making present of past events. So, his words, “Do this in remembrance of me,” really mean something like, “Do this to call me into your midst again so that I will be present among you as I am now.”

 

This “making present” refers first to the bread and wine of the Eucharist, in which from the beginning the Church has discerned the real presence of Our Lord’s Body and Blood. It refers secondly to the Church itself, the Body of Christ, which continues Our Lord’s life and work on earth until he returns to judge the living and the dead at the end of time. 

 

So, Jesus gives us another sign to show us what his becoming present in his Church looks like when it happens. He girds on a towel and washes his disciples’ feet. On Maundy Thursday we repeat this ritual foot-washing as the symbol of our obedience to his commandment to love one another as he has loved us. (The word “Maundy” comes from the Latin mandatum, or commandment.)

 

But it would be a grave mistake, reflecting a fatal flaw in our understanding of the Rites of Maundy Thursday, to take the foot-washing merely as a bit of exemplary moral advice given as a parting shot to his disciples—along the lines of “here’s how I want you to carry on with me”—which I fear is what we’re so often tempted to make of it. For again, like his words over the bread and the cup, the foot-washing derives its full meaning from the Lord’s death on the cross the next day. 

 

A key text for interpreting Our Lord’s washing his disciples’ feet is the famous passage from Paul’s letter to the Philippians: “Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form he humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even death on a cross.” 

 

This passage makes explicit the connection between Christ’s taking the form of a servant and his becoming obedient to even death on a cross. By taking the role of a domestic servant and washing his disciples’ feet, much to their horror and dismay, Jesus points to his ultimate act of servanthood the next day when he dies on the cross for the sins of the whole world. 

 

So, the foot-washing and the crucifixion are also mutually interpretive: the foot-washing symbolizes death to self in the service of others; and death to self in service to others receives its ultimate expression in the spilled blood that washes us clean from our sins. Understood this way, the foot-washing exemplifies the Christian life’s cruciform pattern of self-sacrificial service to others: loving one another as Christ has loved us, always mindful that the cross is the place where his love for us reaches its perfect fulfillment.

 

In short, the events we commemorate and re-enact on Maundy Thursday—washing feet, breaking the bread, and sharing the cup—are not so much discrete moments following one upon another as they’re interrelated aspects of the single mystery of redemption, culminating in the Lord’s complete self-offering in love for those he came to save. We fully understand and appreciate each of these elements only in light of all the others. 

 

This evening’s liturgy invites us, then, to answer Our Lord’s call to take up our cross and follow him—precisely by meeting together regularly to break the bread and share the cup, and then by going out into the world to serve others in his Name. 

SUNDAY OF THE PASSION: PALM SUNDAY

April 10, 2022

St. Uriel’s, Sea Girt, N. J.

 

Luke 22:47-23:49

 

In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus says, “Judge not, lest ye be judged.” That saying highlights what I like to call the “paradox of judgment.” Much as we rightly hate to be judgmental (or, to use what seems to be the new word, “judgy”), we cannot avoid judging. Those two things—judging and being judgmental—are not the same. From day to day, we inescapably make dozens of critical evaluations and decisions. The paradox, however, is that in the very act of judging, we subject ourselves to judgment.

 

A probably apocryphal story tells of a brash American tourist who went into the Ufizzi Gallery in Florence, one of Italy’s most famous art museums with an indescribably wonderful collection. In less than an hour he breezed through all the rooms containing medieval and renaissance paintings that occupied other visitors for days on end. On his way out, he crassly remarked to the guard at the door, “Well, I don’t think much of your old masters.” With a certain resigned air of old-world weariness, the guard replied calmly, “Yes, sir. And they don’t think much of you either. But unfortunately, they aren’t the ones on trial here, but the viewers.”

 

The former Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, writes that the word “trial” signifies an event (or even an ordeal) designed to reveal the truth. The purpose of a judicial trial in particular is to determine an accused person’s guilt or innocence. But in the process the trial typically lays bare many other truths as well – the honesty and reliability of the witnesses, the competence of the lawyers, the impartiality of the judge, and the wisdom of the jury.

 

In other words, many others are on trial than just the accused. In a real sense, every time it renders judgment our entire justice system itself goes on trial. When the courts find guilty and sentence an innocent person who’s later exonerated by new evidence; or, conversely, when they acquit and set free a guilty person who then goes out and commits further crimes, then they stand condemned by their own false judgment.

 

In every act of judging, then, we subject ourselves to judgment. The judgment may be favorable or unfavorable. The key point is that we have no privileged vantage point from which to evaluate and judge others without subjecting ourselves to evaluation and judgment at the same time.

 

In his famous essay “God in the Dock,” C. S. Lewis pointed out that many of his contemporaries seemed to think they had the luxury of critically examining the claims of Christianity, and effectively standing in judgment over God himself, without any corresponding sense of their own accountability. Describing the difference between previous generations and ours in this regard, he wrote this:

 

“The ancient man approached God (or even the gods) as the accused person approaches his judge. For the modern man the roles are reversed. He is the judge: God is in the dock. He is quite a kindly judge: if God should have a reasonable defense for being the god who permits war, poverty, and disease, he is ready to listen to it. The trial may even end in God’s acquittal. But the important thing is that Man is on the bench and God in the dock.”

 

But what would it really look like to put God on trial? The answer is that almost two thousand years ago, we did precisely that. When God came among us as a human being, we arrested him, tried him, judged him, condemned him, and executed him.

 

What stands out in the Passion according to Saint Luke is how the different characters respond to Jesus in such different ways. Luke seems acutely aware that it’s not Jesus who’s really on trial here, but everybody else.

 

As the story unfolds, many of the characters reach their own verdicts concerning Jesus. The chief priests, scribes, and rulers of the people seem to have their minds made up from the beginning. They press relentlessly for Jesus’ condemnation, thus securing their own condemnation.

 

Representing this world’s ruling powers, Pilate and Herod find nothing to condemn in Jesus. After declaring Jesus innocent three times, Pilate then demonstrates the moral bankruptcy of Roman imperial justice by condemning Jesus to death anyway.

 

The crowds are a bit harder to pigeonhole. At least some of them go along with the chief priests and scribes in taking up the cry, “Crucify, crucify him.” But Luke is careful to tell us that the crowds watch the crucifixion itself in silence, not joining in the taunts of the rulers and soldiers. And then, once Jesus has died, the crowds return to their homes beating their breasts—a gesture of sorrow and perhaps even repentance.

 

The starkest contrast is that between the two thieves crucified with Jesus. One joins in the executioners’ mockery and abuse. The other, against all expectations, puts his faith and trust in Jesus—saying “Remember me when you come into your kingdom”—and receiving in turn the promise, “Today you shall be with me in Paradise.”  There’s no clearer instance of the point that Jesus is not really the one on trial here; in reaching his true judgment of Jesus the good thief gains his own acquittal.

 

Likewise with the centurion who renders the verdict: “Certainly this man was innocent!” In so saying, he acknowledges the guilt of his complicity in a wrongful execution and yet, paradoxically, possibly gains the beginning of his own acquittal before God.

 

In all these different ways, the characters reach their various judgments concerning Jesus, and, in so doing, are themselves judged accordingly. The same is true for us today. As we question, probe, and evaluate God, God questions, probes, and evaluates us. In rendering our verdict, we receive our verdict.

 

The difficult truth is that none of us can stand up to that kind of scrutiny. None of us has clean hands. Throughout our lives, so many of our judgments are misjudgments, so many of our decisions so deeply flawed. So often—as the Catholic priest and writer Richard John Neuhaus once put it—we’re at our worst precisely when we’re trying to do our best.

 

But notice that the characters who come off best in the Passion narrative are not those who are beyond reproach—for, besides Jesus and his Blessed Mother, there aren’t any—but rather those who accept responsibility for their actions and repent of their sins: the thief who acknowledges that he’s receiving the due reward of his deeds; the centurion who admits his complicity in a wrongful execution; the crowds who go home beating their breasts.

 

Our only hope lies in repentance. Yet, once we’ve put God on trial and condemned him to death, what possible hope can remain for us? For the answer to that question, come back a week from today!

LENT 5, YEAR C

April 3, 2022

St. Uriel’s, Sea Girt, N. J.

 

Isaiah 43:16-21

Psalm 126

Philippians 3:4b-14

John 12:1-8

 

All four Gospels record some version of the story we’ve just heard of a woman anointing our Lord’s feet with costly ointment at a gathering for a meal at somebody’s house, although they differ on the details. In today’s Gospel, from Saint John, it takes place in the house of Lazarus in Bethany, a village located on the Mount of Olives a mile and a half outside Jerusalem, and the woman is identified as Mary, the sister of Lazarus and Martha. 

 

In Matthew and Mark, it also takes place in Bethany, but in the house of Simon the Leper, and the woman’s name is not mentioned. In Luke, a similar incident takes place, but in an unnamed village, with the woman a notorious but repentant sinner—traditionally identified as Mary Magdalene, although without a shred of scriptural evidence.

Biblical scholars tend to agree that the existence of such slightly differing versions of the same story attest to its basic historical reliability. Some actual underlying event was memorable enough to get repeated over and over in such a way that these differences in detail crept in before the various Gospel accounts were written down in their final form.  

 

In any case, since the lectionary gives us the account in John’s Gospel, that’s what we’ll engage with today. The key point is that this episode of the anointing of our Lord’s feet by Mary of Bethany takes place in the context of the rising tension that follows directly upon his raising of Lazarus from the dead. 

 

According to John’s Gospel, this wonderful miracle is what precipitates the decision to have Jesus put to death. The members of the Jewish ruling Council, the Sanhedrin, frantically ask one another: “What are we to do? For this man performs many signs. If we let him go on thus, everyone will believe in him and the Romans will come and destroy both our holy place and our nation.” To which the High Priest Caiaphas responds: “It is expedient for you that one man should die for the people, and that the whole nation should not perish.”

 

So, when today’s Gospel begins, Jesus is already a marked man. The authorities are trying to track him down and catch him away from the crowds so they can arrest him and hand him over to the Romans for execution. 

 

Amidst this rising tension, Mary of Bethany lovingly anoints the Lord’s feet with precious and costly oil and wipes them with her hair. The Greek title “Christ” and the Hebrew title “Messiah” both mean the same thing: “the Anointed One.” Mary’s action thus has enormous significance as symbolically identifying Jesus as the Messiah of Jewish expectation: God’s Anointed One, the Christ.

 

It seems to me that in the Gospels Jesus receives three different anointings. The first is at his baptism in the River Jordan. In a later sermon recorded in the Acts of the Apostles, Saint Peter proclaims that “God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power, [and] he went about doing good and healing all that were oppressed by the devil, for God was with him.” The second anointing is that described in today’s Gospel. And the third, at least in John’s Gospel, takes place after our Lord’s crucifixion, when Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus bring “a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about a hundred pounds weight” to prepare his body for burial.

 

Now, what I’m about to say may be a bit of a stretch, but these three anointings could be read as corresponding to what are known as our Lord’s three offices of Prophet, Priest, and King—the three roles for which one was anointed in ancient Israel. The Holy Spirit’s descent in the likeness of a dove at his baptism anoints Jesus for his prophetic office of preaching and teaching in Galilee. His anointing by Mary of Bethany points to his priestly office of offering himself upon the Cross as the one, full, perfect, and sufficient sacrifice for the sins of the whole world. And the anointing at his burial by Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathea identifies his kingly office as Lord of heaven and earth, soon to be made manifest in his Resurrection and Ascension.

 

All these different meanings are implied whenever we name Jesus as the Christ. In this context, several details of today’s Gospel assume special significance. If Mary of Bethany had poured the oil on his head, the symbolism would have been that of a coronation—anointing a king about to enter upon his reign. But anointing the feet is characteristically done in the Jewish rites of burial. This detail tends to confirm the symbolism of Mary’s action as pointing to our Lord’s coming crucifixion, where he offers himself as both priest and victim. Moreover, the costliness of Mary’s offering, her loving extravagance, anticipates the infinitely greater cost that Jesus will bear on the cross as the expression of God’s extravagant love for all creation. 

 

Finally, when Mary anoints Jesus’ feet, “the whole house [is] filled with the fragrance of the ointment.” Similarly, our Lord’s approaching death on the cross is a sacrifice of sweet savor that brings life, health, and salvation to the whole world.

 

So, today’s Gospel identifies Jesus as the Anointed One, the Messiah, or Christ of God. A point not to be overlooked, however, is that as Christians we’ve all been anointed too! In the Church’s sacramental life, we’re anointed with the oil of chrism at our baptism, and sometimes at our Confirmation as well. When we get seriously ill, we can be anointed with the oil of the sick in the Sacrament of Unction. At their ordination, priests receive an anointing of the hands to set them apart for handling holy things.

 

These various sacramental anointings point to our common Christian calling, whether lay or ordained, to participate in the exercise of Christ’s prophetic, priestly, and royal offices in a manner appropriate to our circumstances and station in life. We share in the prophetic office by bearing witness to the truth of the Gospel and giving an account of our faith as the opportunity presents itself. We share in the priestly office by joining faithfully and regularly in the Church’s worship, its continual offering of the sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving to God. And we share in the royal office by taking responsibility for our part in the stewardship, care, and governance of the wider world in which we live. 

 

Most of all, today’s Gospel suggests that the authentically Christian life is marked by radical self-giving born of love. We’re called to give it our all. Mary of Bethany enacts this extravagant generosity in her anointing of our Lord’s feet, just as Jesus will soon offer himself for the whole world in his self- sacrifice on the cross. And it’s precisely this same quality of costly, all-outpouring love that we’re called as the Church to make manifest in the world today, as we seek to follow Christ, and serve God and our neighbor in his name.