The Violent Will Not Take the Kin-dom by Force

The Wall that Imprisons Palestinians

The Wall that Imprisons Palestinians

The divine drama continues to unfold in Isaiah (41:13-20). God is not pleased with Israel. In God’s divine pathos, Israel is called a worm and a maggot—not very godlike speech; however, it expresses the pain God feels when Israel chooses death instead of divine life. God quickly asserts that God will help Israel in spite of its transgressions.

Transformation will take place. Israel will become a threshing sledge which separates the cereals from the straw, the wheat from the chaff. Israel will be delivered from her enemies. Israel will once again rejoice in God.

God will care for the afflicted and needy. He will quench the physical and spiritual thirst of the people. We thirst for God like a deer thirsts for the flowing stream.

Read aloud and listen to the poetry of transformation. Rivers will burst forth on barren heights. Fountains will spring up in broad valleys. The desert will become marshland. Springs of water will flood the dry ground. All kinds of trees will flourish in the desert. Other trees will prosper in the wasteland. God is saying once again, “Fear not. Take heart. I am making all things new. You know that this is My work.”

Yes, our God is gracious and slow to anger. Our God is loving mercy and compassion. Our God is with us. God reigns among us. Like the rivers in the desert we burst forth into praise and gratitude, “Praise God. Thanks be to God.”

In the Gospel (Mt 11:11-15), Jesus is telling the crowd about his friend and precursor, John the Baptizer. John had a great influence on Jesus. When empire struck back and Herod beheaded John, Jesus knew that the handwriting was on the wall—challenge empire and you will pay the price.

Jesus laments the fact that, since the days of John, the violent have been taking the Kin-dom by force. In Matthew, the reluctance to speak the word G_d leads to the saying “Kingdom of heaven.” Jesus is here proclaiming Kin-dom. The violent will not take his kin-dom by force. Jesus is nonviolent and there is no place for violence in the Kin-dom.

While the kin-dom is in the process of becoming, while the desert is being transformed into marshland, the violent are still taking the kin-dom by force. Violence rules.

Militarized force has become our ordinary and common response to solving differences. Obama a war president, who just authorized a surge in Afghanistan, today received the Nobel Peace Prize. Justifying his position on America’s current wars in his acceptance speech, Obama’s underlying belief is that war is inevitable. The violent are taking the kin-dom by force. The Israeli Supreme Court has ruled that student, Bertlanty Azzam, a 4th year student at Bethlehem University, cannot return to the university to complete the studies she has begun. Bertlanty was taken blindfolded and handcuffed on 28 October 2009 from Bethlehem to Gaza. The violent are taking the kin-dom by force. A British national who is legally in this country is arrested by Homeland Security and detained for a misdemeanor that occurred years ago. ICE is following it s usual practice of moving the immigrant detainee from detention center to detention center to make it difficult to give him legal counsel. His “hearing” is scheduled for February. The violent are taking the kin-dom by force. Thirty thousand more American troops are being sent to Afghanistan. The violent are literally taking that kingdom by force. Roberto Martínez Medína, an undocumented immigrant detainee at the Stewart Detention Center in Lumpkin, Georgia complained for days of not feeling well before he died last March of a treatable heart infection. The violent are taking the kin-dom by force. America has spent over one trillion dollars on the immoral wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and yet Congress has quibbled for months over spending 800 billion over 8 years to provide health care for our citizens. The violent are taking the kin-dom by force.

Sometimes overwhelmed by the violence that is overtaking the kin-dom, we cannot allow ourselves the luxury of despair. Advent is the season of hope. We must believe that nonviolence will prevail in the end. We, the nonviolent disciples of the Man from Galilee, must take back the kin-dom by nonviolent resistance to the injustice we experience all around us. Our threshing sledge is nonviolence.

Nonviolent resistance to injustice will separate the cereal from the straw. Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr. have shown us that nonviolence is first of all a way of life and not just a strategy. They have also shown that nonviolence can overcome violence. We cannot let ourselves believe that war is inevitable. Jesus promises deliverance from violence. King believed that the universe bends toward justice. The Kin-dom is coming. “Come, O come, Emmanuel. Be God with us. Make your presence in the world real.”

Rise Up on Eagles’ Wings

After a grey wintry, mountain day followed by a stormy, rainy night, I can see the sun coming over the mountains to the east. A new day is dawning. The Creator is shining forth in Splendor and Glory.

God reminds the people through Isaiah that God is the Creator (40:25-31). God is responsible for all that is. God is still bursting forth in creation as it unfolds. Continue reading

Monday 2nd Week Leap like Stags and “Blaspheme”

The Splendor of the North Georgia Mountains

If silence is God’s first language, God’s second language is poetry. As I was looking at snow flurries last week, I thought, “Rain is prosaic; snow is poetic.” Isaiah (35:1-10) speaks the language of poetry to describe the saving power of God. God will bring the people back from exile. God will restore all things. God will renew all things. The Spirit of the Risen Christ—the Cosmic Christ—dwells within us and within all of creation and is ever making things new as creation continues to flare forth. The Christ presides over the chaos and void in our world and in our lives and is making all things news—a new heaven and a new earth where justice is at home according to Paul. We await the fullness of the promise. Continue reading

Sunday 2nd Week–Prepare ye the Way

John the Baptizer's Desert Region

John the Baptizer's Desert Region

Baruch, a disciple of Jeremiah, encourages the people with a great vision (Bar 5:1-9). Baruch spoke during a time of exile. He promises a glorious return.

Many of the refugees from the Israeli invasion in 1947 are still living in refugee camps. Many of them still have the keys to the doors of the houses they abandoned. Understanding the plight of today’s Palestinian refugees helps us to understand what exile meant to the people in Baruch’s time. It was a painful experience filled with minute by minute longing for return to their land and to their homes. The same holds true for refugees in other parts of the world today in places such as Darfur and Iraq. All refugees long for return. Continue reading

Saturday 1st Week–Dan Berrigan and John Dear

I just received a copy of  Daniel Berrigan: Essential Writings which was edited by John Dear. One section of John Dear’s brilliant introduction and tribute to Dan brings me to thoughts of Advent and Isaiah. Like Isaiah (Is. 30:19-21; 23-26), Dan calls us to hope. Dear writes:

Reading and hearing his poems confronts, inspires, uplifts and heals. They offer hope to those struggling with cultural despair. That to me is the best clue to his poetry. Dan invites us to hope. He insists on hope. Despite all. And he can do this because he himself essentially hopeful. He keeps a long haul view toward the resurrection. (28) Continue reading

Friday 1st Week–The Messiah

From the moment the tenor intones “Comfort ye my people” to the majestic Halleluiah Chorus Handel’s Messiah captures the essence of Advent—comfort, hope, change. The blind will see and the lame will leap. The people who have seen a great darkness will see a great light. Halleluiah!!! Hope abounds for we have seen a great light, Jesus the Christ dwells among us. Rejoice!

Today’s reading from Isaiah (29:17-24) says all this and adds:

The lowly will ever find joy in the LORD,
and the poor rejoice in the Holy One of Israel.
For the tyrant will be no more
and the arrogant will have gone;
All who are alert to do evil will be cut off,
those whose mere word condemns a man,
Who ensnare his defender at the gate,
and leave the just man with an empty claim.

The incarnation has a social dimension. It has a political dimension. The poor will rejoice because they will be exulted while the proud and haughty oppressors will be brought low.

Matthew (9:27-31) recounts that Jesus healed two blind men. Jesus heals us. We who were walking in darkness have indeed seen a great light—Jesus the Christ living among us, living in us is us.

We attended the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra and Chorus performance of the Messiah last night. God was there in all God’s glory from the opening “Comfort” to the final “Halleluiah!” The mystery of the Incarnation, Light of Lights, the beauty of the music with harmonious sounds of the instruments and the beautiful blending of human voices served to create glory and praise to our God. The Halleluiah Chorus was magnificent and powerful! It left me breathless. It filled me with awe.

Beautiful music stirs us to belief and hope. Hearing the Messiah, we have to hope. We can envision the lame leaping, the deaf hearing, the blind seeing, and the poor exulting.

As I write this, I realize that words can never capture an experience like this. The only thing to do is to listen to the Christmas portions of the Messiah and to enjoy God’s presence among us.

Awake! Rejoice! Leap for joy! Shout “Halleluiah! Halleluiah! Halleluiah!”

Thursday 1st Week–The City of God

Isaiah (26:1-6) is speaking hope—return and restoration. God will bring the people back and reestablish them. The nation that is just will be ushered into the city. There will be right order and right relations among the people.

Ignacio Martín-Baró, S.J was one of the Jesuit martyrs in El Salvador in 1989.  He analyzed the effects of war and violence on the people of El Salvador. Violence and, in the case of Israel—exile, will disrupt relations among people. People will be polarized into us and them. The right order requisite for justice will be diminished or destroyed. Continue reading

Wednesday 1st Week–Rich Foods, Choice Wines

God’s serendipity never ceases to amaze me. I recently got a copy of Berit Olam: Psalms. It is part of a series of “Studies in Hebrew Narrative and Poetry.” To check it out I turned to the analysis of Psalm 23, today’s responsorial psalm. The psalm has three parts: a pastoral scene, a banquet in a nomad tent, and a conclusion. The point is that God is walking with us through a lush pastoral scene, even through the valley of darkness and death. God is with us! Not only is God with us, God invites us into God’s house, God’s tent for a banquet in the sight of our enemies. God spreads a sumptuous banquet table before us and anoints us with oil. God is with us! Continue reading

Tuesday 1st Week–Holy Wisdom

Isaiah (11:1-10) paints a beautiful word picture of hope. Salvation and wholeness will come to the people. Jesus will be the bud that will blossom forth. The Spirit of the Lord will endow him with many gifts.

He shall have, among the other gifts, a Spirit of Wisdom. At times in the scriptures, Wisdom is identified with the Spirit. At others, Jesus is Wisdom, “in the beginning was the Word” dancing before God as creation blossoms forth. Continue reading