Among the 'Things that Catch my Attention', this one never made it to my junk drawer file, but the triggering event it occurred only recently and has since trailed off in all sorts of directions in my mind.
I am a member of a facebook group which consists of clergy from the Disciples of Christ – of which I am one. It’s one of those groups were you can share questions, ask for information, and pass around ideas and discussions. One recent discussion dealt with the “rules” around baptism and communion.
This discussion went on for several days and in that context one person told a brief story about Dorothy Day who, if you’re not familiar with her, was a social activist perhaps best known for being one of the co-founders of the Catholic Worker Movement in the 1930’s. She worked for non-violence and for justice for the poor and homeless her whole life. A very earthly saint.
The story that was told was about a time when she was in jail – a fairly common event in her life – where she was fasting in protest, but broke that fast in order to share bread with a starving friend.
When I read that I was immediately reminded of one of my favorite stories about St. Francis. The movement which would become the Franciscan orders (there are several) began, as such things do, with a group of idealistic young friends following Francis and choosing to live his life of extreme poverty. They owned nothing and had to beg for even the food they ate. There was no “monastic rule” – there were basically no rules at all at the beginning --- except to live freely and share everything and rejoice in loving and caring for those who were even poorer than they.
Once when Francis had declared a fast, for some reason, he was disturbed at night by the sound of weeping. Following the sound he discovered one of the young brothers in the kitchen eating – eating and weeping at his failure to stick with the fast because of his hunger. According to one version, Francis' response was to send the young brother out to gather greens and herbs to add to the food while Francis woke the other brothers to come and join them and eat with the weeping brother, so that if he sinned he would not do so alone, but surrounded by those who loved him enough to sin with him.
While thinking about the Dorothy Day version and the St. Francis version, I realized that this is very much a Jesus sort of story as well so I pulled up my on-line Bible and went looking through the gospels. As expected, I found quite a few bits that meshed well with the two stories, but this one seemed to fit them best.
It’s from Mark 2: 23-28:
One Sabbath Jesus was going through the grainfields, and as his disciples walked along, they began to pick some heads of grain. The Pharisees said to him, “Look, why are they doing what is unlawful on the Sabbath?” [because picking the grain to munch on was technically “working” which was strictly forbidden on the Sabbath]
He answered, “Have you never read what David did when he and his companions were hungry and in need? In the days of Abiathar the high priest he entered the house of God and ate the consecrated bread, which is lawful only for priests to eat. And he also gave some to his companions.”
Then he said to them, “The Sabbath was made for humankind, not humans for the Sabbath. So the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath.”
Throughout the gospels Jesus continually scandalizes and outrages the Pharisees by blithely ignoring their “rules” when he believes his owns actions are the more righteous choice., such as healing someone suffering even if it happens to be on the Sabbath day.
He explains this behavior, somewhat, when he is asked to say which is the greatest of the commandments and he answers with a hierarchy of importance. “ ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the greatest, and a second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the others are contained within these two.”
In our world, there are rules that are important – ones meant to keep us safe and healthy and living well in community – stop for red lights, don’t steal from others. There are also rules that exist simply to control others, some necessary, perhaps, others not. There are lots of these, unfortunately. It’s an interesting exercise to figure out just who most of the control rules are actually designed to control.
And then there are the “rules” that aren’t even actually rules at all, but just one person’s opinion on how things “should” be. These, even more unfortunately, are probably the most plentiful. Every body has rules about what everyone else “should” do.
But Jesus’ 2-point hierarchy of “shoulds” allows us to see quite clearly which rules fall in the “must do” category – stopping for red lights is actually loving our neighbor as ourselves. Allowing others to freely love who they love is in the same category.
‘Don’t casually destroy the earth with your greed and laziness’ falls into the Love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind category, because the earth belongs to God, not us. ‘Women must wear high heels and men must wear neckties’ falls into the ‘rules to control others’ category – or maybe even the someone’s personal opinion category.
‘Some human races are less important than others’ is nothing more than someone’s ignorant opinion and therefore can be freely disregarded as a rule.
In the end, what most of us want more than rules is grace, because grace is what we rely on more than rules – whether we are willing to acknowledge it to ourselves or not. Grace is what gets us forgiven and given a second – or third – or fourth chance when we ourselves are cruel or lazy or act like jerks.
As put in the wonderful words of Anne Lamott, “The mystery of grace is that God loves Henry Kissinger and Vladimir Putin and me exactly as much as He or She loves your new grandchild. Go figure. The movement of grace is what changes us, heals us and heals our world, helps us breathe again and again and gives us back to ourselves, and this gives us faith in life and each other. And remember — grace always bats last’.
The most important thing to remember about both the number 1 and number 2 commandments Jesus claimed is that both are based in love – always love.....That, and grace bats last.
Thanks be to God.
I am a member of a facebook group which consists of clergy from the Disciples of Christ – of which I am one. It’s one of those groups were you can share questions, ask for information, and pass around ideas and discussions. One recent discussion dealt with the “rules” around baptism and communion.
This discussion went on for several days and in that context one person told a brief story about Dorothy Day who, if you’re not familiar with her, was a social activist perhaps best known for being one of the co-founders of the Catholic Worker Movement in the 1930’s. She worked for non-violence and for justice for the poor and homeless her whole life. A very earthly saint.
The story that was told was about a time when she was in jail – a fairly common event in her life – where she was fasting in protest, but broke that fast in order to share bread with a starving friend.
When I read that I was immediately reminded of one of my favorite stories about St. Francis. The movement which would become the Franciscan orders (there are several) began, as such things do, with a group of idealistic young friends following Francis and choosing to live his life of extreme poverty. They owned nothing and had to beg for even the food they ate. There was no “monastic rule” – there were basically no rules at all at the beginning --- except to live freely and share everything and rejoice in loving and caring for those who were even poorer than they.
Once when Francis had declared a fast, for some reason, he was disturbed at night by the sound of weeping. Following the sound he discovered one of the young brothers in the kitchen eating – eating and weeping at his failure to stick with the fast because of his hunger. According to one version, Francis' response was to send the young brother out to gather greens and herbs to add to the food while Francis woke the other brothers to come and join them and eat with the weeping brother, so that if he sinned he would not do so alone, but surrounded by those who loved him enough to sin with him.
While thinking about the Dorothy Day version and the St. Francis version, I realized that this is very much a Jesus sort of story as well so I pulled up my on-line Bible and went looking through the gospels. As expected, I found quite a few bits that meshed well with the two stories, but this one seemed to fit them best.
It’s from Mark 2: 23-28:
One Sabbath Jesus was going through the grainfields, and as his disciples walked along, they began to pick some heads of grain. The Pharisees said to him, “Look, why are they doing what is unlawful on the Sabbath?” [because picking the grain to munch on was technically “working” which was strictly forbidden on the Sabbath]
He answered, “Have you never read what David did when he and his companions were hungry and in need? In the days of Abiathar the high priest he entered the house of God and ate the consecrated bread, which is lawful only for priests to eat. And he also gave some to his companions.”
Then he said to them, “The Sabbath was made for humankind, not humans for the Sabbath. So the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath.”
Throughout the gospels Jesus continually scandalizes and outrages the Pharisees by blithely ignoring their “rules” when he believes his owns actions are the more righteous choice., such as healing someone suffering even if it happens to be on the Sabbath day.
He explains this behavior, somewhat, when he is asked to say which is the greatest of the commandments and he answers with a hierarchy of importance. “ ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the greatest, and a second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the others are contained within these two.”
In our world, there are rules that are important – ones meant to keep us safe and healthy and living well in community – stop for red lights, don’t steal from others. There are also rules that exist simply to control others, some necessary, perhaps, others not. There are lots of these, unfortunately. It’s an interesting exercise to figure out just who most of the control rules are actually designed to control.
And then there are the “rules” that aren’t even actually rules at all, but just one person’s opinion on how things “should” be. These, even more unfortunately, are probably the most plentiful. Every body has rules about what everyone else “should” do.
But Jesus’ 2-point hierarchy of “shoulds” allows us to see quite clearly which rules fall in the “must do” category – stopping for red lights is actually loving our neighbor as ourselves. Allowing others to freely love who they love is in the same category.
‘Don’t casually destroy the earth with your greed and laziness’ falls into the Love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind category, because the earth belongs to God, not us. ‘Women must wear high heels and men must wear neckties’ falls into the ‘rules to control others’ category – or maybe even the someone’s personal opinion category.
‘Some human races are less important than others’ is nothing more than someone’s ignorant opinion and therefore can be freely disregarded as a rule.
In the end, what most of us want more than rules is grace, because grace is what we rely on more than rules – whether we are willing to acknowledge it to ourselves or not. Grace is what gets us forgiven and given a second – or third – or fourth chance when we ourselves are cruel or lazy or act like jerks.
As put in the wonderful words of Anne Lamott, “The mystery of grace is that God loves Henry Kissinger and Vladimir Putin and me exactly as much as He or She loves your new grandchild. Go figure. The movement of grace is what changes us, heals us and heals our world, helps us breathe again and again and gives us back to ourselves, and this gives us faith in life and each other. And remember — grace always bats last’.
The most important thing to remember about both the number 1 and number 2 commandments Jesus claimed is that both are based in love – always love.....That, and grace bats last.
Thanks be to God.
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