Revelation 3 BFC World Communion Sunday 2019
Selected reading from The Gospel of
Truth; Selected reading from Thunder Perfect Mind; Revelation 8:1-8
October 6, 2019
German philosopher Friedrich
Nietzsche wrote, “Beware that, when fighting monsters, you yourself do not become
a monster... for when you gaze long into the abyss. The abyss gazes also into
you.”[1] Not only in Revelation, but deep within the
tradition of Christianity is loaded language which gives license to a
Christianity that is no longer speaking as those traumatized and the victims of
empire but now uses its tradition and texts to act like the innocent and
persecuted even though Christianity and Christians now hold the reins of
imperial power from the 4th Century onward. Scholar of early Christianity, Richard
Horsely, is strongly critical of a faith that used the language of the Roman
Empire to critique the Roman Empire.
For
example, Jesus references the Roman Empire to talk about the decidedly
different Empire movement happening with the community of poor and oppressed,
outcast and sinner that is forming around him.
Jesus references this as the Empire of God. John of Patmos, the author of Revelation,
uses the iconic, mythological goddess Roma, often seen in Roman art in her
long, flowing, victorious robe. John
satirizes her with the Whore of Babylon, sitting atop the monstrous beast,
drinking the blood of the martyrs.
John’s whole point is to not allow the reader or listener be drawn into
the dressing up of Roman violence and bloodshed. “See Roma for what she is!” John might say,
intending strongly misogynistic rhetoric aimed at Rome’s mythological goddess.
As
Christians, we must be honest and critical of our own tradition to not only see
the historical, social context for when our holy texts were written but to also
acknowledge the historical, social context in which we live. For when we have not, Christians have
oppressed Jewish people, burned strong women as witches, enslaved African
people, committed genocide against indigenous peoples, and created shame and
harm for the LGBTQ+ community. White,
straight North American Christians are not the innocent, oppressed victims of
the New Testament. The book of Revelation, in particular, has
been used from very early in the Christian tradition to create irreparable
harm. Those in power use the violent
imagery to punch down and suggest that we are the chosen, given license to do
the very thing Revelations condemns—oppression and violence in the name of the
very God who condemned the same activity authorized by the goddess Roma.
Or,
as progressive Christians, we have simply ignored our obligation to engage our
own tradition to discern the good and the evil found within it. By ignoring our obligation to engage our
tradition, we allow evangelical Christianity’s interpretation of Revelation to
stand alone as a book that encourages the perfect hatred of our enemies.
In humility, Scripture tells
us to speak truth to power and call out evil when we see it. We must be forever aware of our own
collaboration with evil, not to limit our courage or our refusal to speak with
a strong voice, but to know that God is slowly working out our inner
transformation as we partner with God to transform the world.
Even
though the book of Revelation holds many gifts for us, we must also be critical
of the way it easily categorizes how black and white, good and evil are
named. In contrast, there are early
Christian writings, like the ones read today, that suggest life is more
spectrum than polar binary. And, if
polar binary, both black and white, good and evil can be found within our own
souls. No good theology is so simplistic as to suggest that I am wholly good
while you are wholly evil.
We may all want to see
ourselves as the “innocents” or the “victims” in the world and there may be
times in all of our lives where that is true in personal relationships or in
wider dynamics of power within our communities.
Even as a white, straight, cis-male, living in the United States, I
often feel diminished by people in the social justice community as a simpleton
because I am a person of faith. And then
I find myself drowning out other voices in other ways because I broaden and lengthen
my innocence and victimhood.
On
this World Communion Sunday, it is more important than ever to find a way to
acknowledge our common destiny. As
scholar of early Christianity, Elaine Pagels writes of orthodox Christianity’s
apocalyptic stories:
Left
out are the visions that lift their hearers beyond apocalyptic polarities to
see the human race as a whole—and, for that matter, to see each one of us as a
whole, having the capacity for both cruelty and compassion. Those who championed John’s resurrection
finally succeeded in obliterating visions associated with Origen, the ‘father
of the church’ posthumously condemned as a heretic some three hundred years
after his death, who envisioned animals, stars, and stones, as well as humans,
demons, and angels, sharing a common origin and destiny. . . . [W]e need such
universal visions more than ever.[2]
Today we ate bread and drank grape to say that we
would be formed around a table of shared endeavor and common status. We do that, almost impossibly, within a
culture and economy that wants us to believe we do better when it’s everyone
for themselves, and we would do better to get our own, and hoard and protect
our treasure. We eat the bread and drink
the grape to say, over and over again, we are a people woven together in a
single garment of destiny, in shared endeavor, and blessed by God in common
status as the Beloved Children of God.
May we practice this common table so much in our own lives that it
becomes the reality in our wider world.
Amen.
[2]
Elaine Pagels, Revelations: Visions,
Prophecy, & Politics in the Book of Revelation (New York: Viking, 2012), p. 176.
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