The Island Parson

Resources for Easter Sunday 2020: The Sunday of the Resurrection in the Year of the Great Pandemic

Posted on April 11, 2020 by Bruce Bryant-Scott

These are resources meant mainly for The Anglican Church of St Thomas the Apostle, Kefalas, on the island of Crete in Greece, but others may find them helpful!

The Cross of Flowers 2020, decorated by David & Mary Hurley with flowers from Jan Lovell and Jo Cheslyn-Hall.

Read

The Bible readings appointed for Easter Sunday are:

If we had been meeting in the Tabernacle in Kefalas today we would have used the second set of readings, from Jeremiah, Psalm 118, Acts, and Matthew.

Here is the Gospel of the Resurrection according to Matthew:

After the sabbath, as the first day of the week was dawning, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to see the tomb. And suddenly there was a great earthquake; for an angel of the Lord, descending from heaven, came and rolled back the stone and sat on it. His appearance was like lightning, and his clothing white as snow. For fear of him the guards shook and became like dead men. But the angel said to the women, “Do not be afraid; I know that you are looking for Jesus who was crucified. He is not here; for he has been raised, as he said. Come, see the place where he lay. Then go quickly and tell his disciples, ‘He has been raised from the dead, and indeed he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him.’ This is my message for you.”

So they left the tomb quickly with fear and great joy, and ran to tell his disciples. Suddenly Jesus met them and said, “Greetings!” And they came to him, took hold of his feet, and worshiped him. Then Jesus said to them, “Do not be afraid; go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee; there they will see me.” Matthew 28.1-10

A tomb near Nazareth, probably similar to the one in which Jesus was buried.

Reflect

I have posted the sermon I might have preached this year. You can find it here.

I have done a close reading of Psalm 118, our psalm for today, which I posted several months ago.

Remember

We are not gathering for a Sunrise Service this year, but perhaps this video from 2019 will have to do. Next year, in Kefalas!

The Archbishop of Canterbury, the Most Reverend Justin Welby, will lead an Easter Sunday service at 9:00 am BST, which is 11:00 am EEST here in Crete. You can find it here.

The Right Rev’d Dr Robert Innes, our Diocesan Bishop, will lead an Easter Sunday service tomorrow morning at 10:00 am EEST here in Crete (9:00 am CEST); the video will be available on the Diocese in Europe YouTube Channel.

A Church Near You, a service of the Church of England, lists over a thousand possible live streams of services, including the ones provided by churches in the Diocese in Europe.

The Episcopal Church (“TEC”) based in the United States has a set of live streamed services, including an Easter Vigil. Grace Cathedral in San Francisco starts its Vigil at 9:00 PM PDT Saturday, which is 7:00 am EEST on Sunday morning here in Greece.

If you feel like braving Zoom, Father Leonard Doolan will hold an Easter Liturgy at 10:15 am EEST (but sign in around 10:00 am). You may need to download the Zoom app to your computer, tablet, or smartphone, and you will need to enable your microphone and camera. If this seems overwhelming, download A User’s Guide, prepared by the clever folk at the Diocese in Europe office: Zoom – A User Guide – Apr 2020
The service leaflet for St Paul’s Athens can be downloaded here: Easter Sunday 2020 Here are the details for logging in:

Leonard Doolan is inviting you to a scheduled Zoom meeting.

Please join us in Athens (God and technology willing) for our Easter Sunday worship. You can join the ‘meeting’ from 10.00am but the service will begin at 10.15 which is our normal service time here. Afterwards we can make a coffee and have a chat.

You will see that this facility is available each Sunday until the end of May by which time I hope we will be able to meet together in ‘social proximity’. Please also see attached the order of service that you might like to print out before Sunday.

Just click on Join Zoom Meeting which you will see just below, and follow a couple of easy clicks to join with us. Don’t worry about the other info, but if you have trouble joining you can find at the bottom of this message the meeting number and password. Hopefully you won’t need it.

Join Zoom Meeting

https://zoom.us/j/227360090?pwd=eWY5bmp4SHU2T0VHQWhIalFkdDRLQT09

Meeting ID: 227 360 090 Password: 422061

Pray

Collect

Lord of all life and power,
who through the mighty resurrection of your Son
overcame the old order of sin and death
to make all things new in him:
grant that we, being dead to sin
and alive to you in Jesus Christ,
may reign with him in glory;
to whom with you and the Holy Spirit
be praise and honour, glory and might,
now and in all eternity. Amen.

(or)

God of glory,
by the raising of your Son
you have broken the chains of death and hell:
fill your Church with faith and hope;
for a new day has dawned
and the way to life stands open in our Saviour Jesus Christ. Amen.

Intercessions

H1 In joy and hope let us pray to the Father.

That our risen Saviour may fill us with the joy of his glorious and life-giving resurrection
we pray to the Father. Hear our prayer.

That isolated and persecuted churches
may find fresh strength in the good news of Easter,
remembering at this time to pray:
for the Peace of Jerusalem and thepeoples of the Holy Land,
including the people of the Episcopal Diocese of Jerusalem
and its Archbishop Suheil Dawani;
our own bishops in Europe, Robert Innes and David Hamid,
and the Archbishops of the Church of England, Justin Welby and John Sentamu;
giving thanks for the Lutheran Churches of the Porvoo Agreement in Europe;
and grateful for our partnership with the USPG (“United Society Partners in Gospel”):
we pray to the Father. Hear our prayer.

That the one who was a servant of all may grant us humility
to be subject to one another in Christian love
and we pray especially for those experiencing great stress as they stay at home,
we pray to the Father. Hear our prayer.

That the one who fed the multitudes
may provide for those who lack food, work or shelter,
remembering especially all those
who have been laid off or whose employment has been terminated,
and those who have little food security,
we pray to the Father. Hear our prayer.

That the one who did not strike back with violence may cause
wars and famines to cease through all the world,
remembering especially the peoples of Syria, Sudan, Iraq, Afghanistan, and Yemen,
we pray to the Father. Hear our prayer.

That the healer of the sick may reveal the light of his presence to the sick,
the weak and the dying, to comfort and strengthen them,
praying especially for those afflicted with Covid-19,
and for the nurses, physicians and all health care staff who care for them,
we pray to the Father. Hear our prayer.

That, according to his promises,
all who have died in the faith of the resurrection
may be raised on the last day,
we pray to the Father. Hear our prayer.

That the fire of the Holy Spirit may descend upon us, his people,
so that we may bear faithful witness to the resurrection of Jesus,
we pray to the Father. Hear our prayer.

Heavenly Father,
you have delivered us from the power of darkness
and brought us into the kingdom of your Son:
grant that, as his death has recalled us to life,
so his continual presence in us may raise us to eternal joy;
through Christ our Lord. Amen.

Sing

And the premiere classical music radio station in the United States, WQXR in New York City, has the article “Top Choral Directors Share Their Favorite Easter Music” with links to even more music.

Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Do Not Be Afraid: An Easter Sermon for the Year of the Great Pandemic of 2020

Posted on April 11, 2020 by Bruce Bryant-Scott

A Sermon that was NOT preached at the Anglican Church of St Thomas, Kefalas,
in the regional municipality of Apokoronas, on the island of Crete, in Greece
on Easter Sunday, April 12, 2020, 11:00 am
because of the Great Pandemic of 2020.

“Behold, I tell you a mystery; we shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. (I Corinthians 15: 51-52)
The trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible,
and we shall be changed. For this corruptible must put on incorruption
and this mortal must put on immortality. (I Corinthians 15: 52-53)
From Messiah by G. F. Handel. Philippe Sly: Bass-Baritone. Julian Wachner: Conductor. Trinity Wall Street Baroque Orchestra. Performed December 26 2015,
Trinity Church, Wall Street, New York City

Readings for this Sunday – the ones I would have used – are: Jeremiah 31:1-6, Psalm 118:1-2, 14-24, Acts 10:34-43 and Matthew 28:1-10.

Alleluia. Christ is risen.
He is risen indeed. Alleluia.
Praise the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.
He has given us new life and hope.
He has raised Jesus from the dead.
God has claimed us as his own.
He has brought us out of darkness.
He has made us light to the world.
Alleluia. Christ is risen.
He is risen indeed. Alleluia.

“Do not be afraid; go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee; there they will see me.”Matthew 28.10

An Age of Anxiety

We live in a time when we are justified in being afraid.

Although we here on Crete seem to have been spared the worst of the Covid-19 pandemic in Greece – Athens and Attica seems to be worse off – we are not yet through this. We do not know when and how this will end.
When I read the reports written by people who have had the disease and recovered, I get the impression the symptoms are far worse than any influenza.
Young and old are both being killed. Here on Crete a 48 year-old German man died of it, and he had no “underlying conditions.” I hear of the very sick being put into induced comas so that they may be intubated, and I shudder. We wonder, “Will this happen to me? To someone I love?”
And, of course, it is worse elsewhere. We hear of numbers in the upper hundreds dying each day in other countries; over two thousand people people died of Covid-19 in the USA on Friday, and over 900 in the United Kingdom.
Our friends and families back in these home countries are more exposed, and many of them are unemployed. Almost all of them are confined to their flats and houses. Some are struggling with working from home. Many are providing child care, and suffering under expectations that somehow children will receive an education over the computer.
Here in Greece the economy, barely recovered from the financial crisis of 2008, has screeched to an utter halt.
Those of us with investments and properties have watched as their value dropped, and the change in exchange rates is reducing our income from investments and pensions.
Whether we may agree with him or not, it is a shock to hear of the Prime Minister of the UK being so ill that he needed to go into intensive care.
And we all know people in essential services – medicine, delivery services, supermarkets, and pharmacies – who are now those most at risk of becoming ill.

Even if we personally are doing all right, the fear and concern across the globe is palpable.

A tomb near Nazareth, Israel, dating from the first century. Similar to Christ’s tomb with the stone rolled over the entry.

“Do Not Be Afraid”

And in the midst of this, in what one wag has called “the season of Coronatide”, we hear the old Good News of the resurrection of Jesus. An angel at the empty tomb – a messenger from God – tells the two Marys:

“Do not be afraid; I know that you are looking for Jesus who was crucified. He is not here; for he has been raised, as he said. Come, see the place where he lay. Then go quickly and tell his disciples, ‘He has been raised from the dead, and indeed he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him.’ This is my message for you.”

And then, as if to underline it, Jesus himself appears to these women, and says to them:

“Greetings! Do not be afraid; go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee; there they will see me.”

The Destructive Power of Modern Skepticism

The resurrection of Jesus is not a rational, scientific proposition. It is a proposition of faith. Human beings do not die, and then come back to life – this must be admitted. So obviously the claim that Jesus rose from the dead, in a new transformed body, is an exceptional claim that does not fit our modern notions of scientific method, historical methodology, and repeatable results. So, if we want to be properly modern and skeptical, we can explain the resurrection away in naturalistic terms. For example:

Someone stole the dead body. This was already being rumoured in the early days of Christianity, according to Matthew 28.11-15, given credence by some modern scholars, and it plays a part in the plot of the novel A Time for Judas (1983) by Morley Callaghan.
Kirsopp Lake (1872-1946) suggests the women went to the wrong tomb, an empty one. In time their mistake was transformed into the story of meeting an angel there, and even Jesus.
Hugh Schonfield, in The Passover Plot (1965), proposes an elaborate conspiracy that went wrong. Jesus intended to fake his death, and only involved certain disciples sworn to secrecy, including Joseph of Arimathea. He was merely drugged (from the sponge of hyssop) when he appeared to die on the cross. It was planned that Joseph would place Jesus in the tomb, and emerge after three days as the Risen Messiah. Unfortunately, a soldier pierced his side. He lived until the Sunday, appeared to a few of his disciples with his wounds, but ultimately succumbed to his wounds.
The New Testament scholar and theologian Rudolf Bultmann (1884-1976) said that the historical Jesus – and thus the facts of his death and resurrection – was largely unrecoverable by historical methods. Maybe Jesus said “Amen” and “Abba”, but he would not affirm much else. He believed that the proclamation of Jesus needed to be demythologized and understood in existential terms. The resurrection of Jesus only has a meaning insofar as we accept it as a reality for ourselves – that we have died to death and sin, have overcome our natural dread of suffering, and are detached from the world.
The NT scholar Gerd Lüdemann suggested in his 1994 book Resurrection of Jesus: History, Experience, Theology that

Peter, having denied Christ, was so consumed with guilt that he found psychological release in projecting a vision of Jesus, which led him to believe that Jesus was risen from the dead. Thereby the crucified Jesus showed himself to be the living Jesus, so that Peter could once again apply to himself and this time with profound clarity God’s word of forgiveness present in Jesus’s work.” Peter’s experience was infectious in the early Christian community, and soon others, too, who did not share Peter’s trauma, also saw hallucinations of the Risen Lord. From William Lane Craig’s Critique of Lüdemann.

One cannot disprove these skeptical theories. However, there is a problem with all of them. They are rational, yes, but they fail to explain the power of Christianity. In the minds of modern skeptics the disciples are conspirators, fools, or hallucinators. However, we know them as the founders of a faith that has somehow lasted for twenty centuries and inspired peoples and cultures around the world. How can this be?

The Power of Resurrection Hope

A pre-modern perspective, in which the world is shot through with the Divine, has no problem with the resurrection. Interestingly, a post-modern Christian perspective can accept the literal resurrection as well. Objective rationalism is seen as one narrative, and a very powerful one, but its supposed objection to resurrection is a category mistake. It is like asking what causes gravity. We might answer with Newtonian mechanics and Einsteinian Relativity, but these only address the “how” and not the “why”; we still do not have an understanding as to why the universe is the way it is. Faith might answer that something beyond the universe, which we might call metaphorically “The Creator” or “God” is somehow responsible, but this is an unproveable thesis – like the theory of the multiverse, or string theory. Likewise, when we acknowledge the resurrection of Jesus as a fact, we are doing so on the basis of faith.

I believe in the resurrection of Jesus because I can find no other explanation for the growth and resilience of the Church, which is called the Body of Christ. Without a doubt the early disciples experienced something they called the resurrection of Jesus. Paul lists the witnesses in 1 Corinthians 15:

3 For I handed on to you as of first importance what I in turn had received:
that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures,
⁴and that he was buried,
and that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures,
⁵and that he appeared to Cephas [i.e. Simon Peter],
then to the twelve.
⁶Then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers and sisters at one time,
most of whom are still alive, though some have died.
⁷Then he appeared to James,
then to all the apostles.
⁸Last of all, as to someone untimely born, he appeared also to me.
⁹For I am the least of the apostles,
unfit to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God.

As well, of course, he appeared to the women at the tomb, including Mary Magdalene, as well as to the two disciples on the road to Emmaus.

These are a lot of people. Paul, in that letter to the Corinthians, is essentially saying, “Look, don’t just take my word for it, here are a whole bunch of other people who have also seen the resurrected Jesus.” While the resurrection accounts are diverse, there is enough commonality that the witnesses affirm the same thing, that Jesus had been resurrected. The resurrection of humanity was hoped for by most Jews at the time. The unusual thing was that Jesus was raised first and alone, “the first fruits of those who have died” as Paul puts it later in Chapter 15. His resurrection was not expected. His death was thought to be the end, a complete failure. The death of Jesus on the cross did not have any meaning of sacrifice, ransom, debts being paid, dying for sins – that kind of thinking only came in the light of the resurrection. The Messiah was not supposed to die, so the thinking went, he was supposed to restore the Kingdom of Israel. But God had other plans that could only be understood in the context of the resurrection.

Christianity should not have carried on. It should have died shortly after Jesus died. The resurrection was a preposterous idea. Indeed, as the Romans in the first few centuries found, it was a subversive faith, disrespectful of the Emperor and Rome itself. It was, in our modern terms, a cult in tension with society. It was, as Nietzsche later observed, a faith of slaves, of weakness. The Romans persecuted the early church. But still, it persisted.

Indeed, it grew, so much so that by the time Constantine converted to Christianity in the early Fourth Century this perverse faith may have already have become the largest religion in the Empire. With the decriminalization of the Christian faith, and later its establishment as the official religion, Christian leaders were released from persecution, and gained powers that earlier Christians could only have dreamed of. This power was at times a corrupt force, and yet time and again it called emperors, kings, and princes to repentance.

When the church went down the wrong path, it constantly reformed itself.

As Christianity became the social norm as early as the Fourth Century, and began to lose its radical character, men and women heard the words of Jesus and retreated into the desert, to let go of possessions and devote themselves to prayer. Thus began the monastic movements.
When these monastic movements became corrupted, God brought forth teaching orders, and a return to the basics of the Sermon on the Mount with the life of St Francis.
When the medieval church became consumed with temporal power and grand buildings, selling the remission of sins for cash donations, the reformers of the Sixteenth Century called Christians to a simpler faith and the Bible.
When the reformed liturgies became dull and intellectual the Pietist movement in Germany and the Wesley brothers brought back emotion and experience into faith, using powerful preaching, the “methodism” of meeting in small groups, and hymn singing.
Across Eastern Europe, as Greeks, Romanians, Bulgarians, and Russians groaned under oppression and violence, the Eastern Orthodox churches became the rallying place of safety for Christians.
When European powers became complacent about the oppression of slaves, God raised up radicals such as William Wilberforce.
Church of England clergy rediscovered the heritage of the English Church before the reformation and all that was good about it, and began the Anglo-Catholic Movement, focussed on the dignity of worship and serving the marginalized people in the slums. Similarly, the Church of Ireland reclaimed pre-Roman Catholic Celtic spirituality.
When people forgot about the Holy Spirit God created a revival in the Apostolic Faith Mission on Asuza Street in Los Angeles, that became known as Pentecostalism and the Charismatic Movement.
God raised up prophets such as Martin Luther King, Jr and Desmond Tutu to speak the truth of the gospel to those in power.
When Communist China expelled the foreign Christian missionaries in 1949 it seemed that the faith would be extinguished in that land, yet when the veil lifted in the 1980s it was discovered that Christianity there had returned to the ways of the early church, meeting in small groups in homes – and it had not only survived, but grown many times over.
While Christianity seems to be in decline in Europe and North America, it has grown in Asia and especially in Africa. While the human institution of the church is far from perfect, as a means of God’s grace it now claims the adherence of over two billion persons.
And I have seen the power of the resurrection in the lives of ordinary people around me, as well as my own.

Time and again faith in Jesus Christ and a knowledge of the faithfulness of Christ has spoken to peoples of every land and nation. It is not merely a faith of the elite or the opiate of the masses, but something which constantly works within people to change and transform themselves, and to hope for things that seem impossible, to which no reasonable person could aspire.

This is why I believe in the resurrection – because I have seen the same power which raised Jesus from the dead at work in so many of God’s people.

The Cross of Flowers 2020, decorated with flowers by David & Mary Hurley from Jan Lovell and Jo Cheslyn-Hall.

“Do Not Afraid: Go and Tell My Brothers to go to Galilee; There They Will See Me.”

On this Easter Sunday in “Coronatide”, let us not deny our justified fears, but let us not be overcome by them. Let us have hope that, in the midst of so much suffering and death, and for most of us, experiencing simple anxiety and boredom, that God is with us, and that the Creator of the Cosmos is making all things new.

As Twenty-First century people we are not normally blessed with resurrection appearances of Jesus, as the early disciples were. But we can go to our modern Galilees and see the resurrection in the good deeds of people around the world. We see it in the health care workers as they challenge the powers of sickness and death. We see it in the novel ways people are finding to connect with each other through technology. We see it in the kind deeds that people are doing for one another.

As the resurrection of Jesus empowered Mary Magdalene, the other Mary, and the disciples to spread the good news of God’s coming kingdom in Jesus of Nazareth, as it convinced them of the forgiveness of sins and raised them up to do more than they could ask or imagine, may we all be changed, and live the resurrection today.

Alleluia. Christ is risen.
He is risen indeed. Alleluia.

Posted in Uncategorized | 3 Comments

Descendit ad Inferos: Reflecting with Balthasar on Holy Saturday and Jesus’s Descent to the Dead

Posted on April 11, 2020 by Bruce Bryant-Scott

This is from a first version of my PhD dissertation, which was submitted for examination last year. The examiners requested a major revision, and specifically said I could do without the chapter on the Swiss Catholic theologian Hans Urs von Balthasar, so it has been cut. I still think it says some important things, so here it is.

Η Αναστασις (Ικον)

The Apostles Creed, unlike the Nicene Creed, describes what happens to Jesus upon his death: descendit ad inferos. This has been translated in the English Book of Common Prayer (1549) as “he descended into hell” and by the International Consultation on English Texts (“ICET”)(1975) as “He descended to the dead.” These words are derived from two passages in scriptures:

He was put to death in the flesh, but made alive in the spirit, in which also he went and made a proclamation to the spirits in prison. 1 Peter 3.19-20

When it says, ‘He ascended’, what does it mean but that he had also descended into the lower parts of the earth?” Ephesians 4.9

Since the Eighth Century this has been depicted in Orthodox icons of the Resurrection as The Harrowing of Hell, where Jesus destroys the gates of hell, tramples down Satan, and releases the Old Testament saints, typically Adam and Eve, and David and Solomon. Dante in the Inferno Canto IV.52-63 has the Roman poet Virgil (70 BC – 19 BC) describe the arrival of Jesus:

I was still new to this estate of tears
when a Mighty One descended here among us,
crowned with the sign of His victorious years.

He took from us the shade of our first parent,
of Abel, his pure son, of ancient Noah,
of Moses, the bringer of law, the obedient.

Father Abraham, David the King,
Israel with his father and his children,
Rachel, the holy vessel of His blessing,

and many more He chose for elevation
among the elect. And before these, you must know,
no human soul had ever won salvation.^[1]

Balthasar is wary of such a concrete imaging. In Chapter 4 of Mysterium Paschale (English translation 1970; first published in German as Theologie der Drei Tage in 1969), “Going to the Dead: Holy Saturday”, he takes a minimalist approach to the dogma. He describes the “descent” as a “being with the dead,” a continuation of the solidarity with humanity found in the Incarnation in that Jesus was truly dead as much as any other human.^[2]

He discusses 1 Peter 3.19-20 and Ephesians 4.9 in the context of a multitude of New Testament texts, concluding that,

it is neither a question of a ‘struggle’ nor of a ‘descent’, but of absolute, plenary power, due to the fact that the Lord was dead (he has experienced death interiorly) and now lives eternally, having vanquished death in itself and for all, making it something ‘past’.^[3]

After discussing the relevant New Testament passages he reviews the theological tradition. The first thing he does is argue that inferos should be understood as שְׁאוֹל (Sheol), the shadowy underworld to which all the dead go, in most of the Tanach/Old Testament. It is less than full existence, a place of passivity and inaction where one cannot even praise God.

This idea of Sheol appears inconsistent with later Jewish beliefs in which people are rewarded with going to heaven and others condemned to hell, such as in the story of Lazarus and the Rich Man (Luke 16.19-31); these understandings are undoubtedly influenced by contact with Persians and early Zoroastrian beliefs, and fit uncomfortably with the early beliefs about Sheol. Balthasar discusses Augustine’s attempt to harmonize the account, so that Lazarus was in a higher level of Hell than the Rich Man.^[4] This is complicated even more by the emergence of the belief in the general resurrection, and Jesus’s own resurrection. Balthasar reviews the theological opinions about the reality of Hell, but ultimately concludes that these theological speculations diminish the import of death. “It tells us nothing about a ‘descent’, much less a ‘combat’ and least of all a ‘triumphant victory procession’ across Hades.”^[5] For Balthasar, death is about being cut off from the living, and the dead do not communicate even with each other. They do not “wait” for Christ, because they are not really in time, and they are deprived of the vision of God. It is this otherwise indefinite state that Balthasar sees Christ entering upon death, in solidarity with all humanity.

Balthasar develops this understanding of the “descent” as a kenotic passion that continues and goes beyond what happened on the cross. He challenges the Reformation belief of Luther, Calvin, and Melanchthon that “Jesus experienced on the Cross Hell’s tortures in place of sinners”^[6] and places against it Nicholas of Cusa’s belief that Christ was obedient even to death, and that, “Christ’s suffering, the greatest one could conceive, was like that of the damned who cannot be damned any more.”^[7] Christ experiences a second death, a vision of death, which is nothing less than “the pure substantiality of ‘Hell”, which is ‘sin in itself’.”^[8] It is through this suffering in Hell that Jesus becomes the apocalyptic figure in Revelation 1.18: “I was dead, and see, I am alive for ever and ever; and I have the keys of Death and of Hades.”^[9] Sheol, Hades, Hell – whatever one calls it – the fact that Christ has entered into it means that he has “transformed what was a prison into a way.”^[10]

The “descent” thus becomes a moment of salvation. Even in death a human being is not cut off from the divine; within eternal death a manifesto of eternal life is planted.^[11] Balthasar reads the Orthodox icons of “Anastasis” as a conflation of the Three Days into one moment, and the Medieval Mystery Plays, which have Christ preaching to the dead, as anticipations of Easter.^[12] Icons and Mystery Plays go beyond what theology can affirm, and the theologian must follow at a distance, even while contemplative imagination strides forward.

And so, riffing on Hegel’s description of his own thought as a “speculative Good Friday” Henri de Lubac called Balthasar’s theology “a contemplative Holy Saturday.”^[13]

^[1] Dante Alighieri, The Inferno translated by John Ciardi (New York NY: Mentor/New American Library, 1954), p. 51.

^[2] Balthasar, Mysterium Paschale: The Mystery of Easter translated by Aidan Nichols (San Francisco CA: Ignatius Press, 1990, p. 150.

^[3] Balthasar, Mysterium Paschale, p. 156.

^[4] Balthasar, Mysterium Paschale, p. 161-162.

^[5] Balthasar, Mysterium Paschale, p. 165.

^[6] Balthasar, Mysterium Paschale, p. 169.

^[7] Nicholas of Cusa, Excitationes 10, (Basle 1565), p. 659, quoted in Balthasar, Mysterium Paschale, p. 170.

^[8] Balthasar, Mysterium Paschale, p. 173.

^[9] Balthasar, Mysterium Paschale, p. 174.

^[10] Balthasar, Mysterium Paschale, p. 175.

^[11] Balthasar, Mysterium Paschale, p. 180.

^[12] Balthasar, Mysterium Paschale, p. 179-180.

^[13] Quoted in Aidan Nichols, A Key to Balthasar: Hans Urs von Balthasar on Beauty, Goodness, and Truth (Grand Rapids MI: Baker Academic, 2011), p. 44.

Posted in Lent | Tagged Balthasar, Hans Urs von Balthasar, He Descended Into Hell, Holy Saturday, The Burial of Jesus Christ | 2 Comments

Dying With Us: A Sermon For Good Friday 2020

Posted on April 10, 2020 by Bruce Bryant-Scott

unknown-artist-ethiopia-tempera-acrylic-on-parchment

The crucifixion by an unknown Ethiopian artist.

Struggling With The Theology of Atonement

I have been struggling with the cross of Jesus for over thirty years.

I have accepted the Resurrection. The radical idea that God did not abandon Jesus, but raised him from the dead, and that through him all things were being made anew – including you and me – is something I have never had a problem with. It is hopeful. And, likewise, I have never had much problem with the Incarnation, that Jesus is the Word made flesh, and that if we want to understand who the Creator is, and what our destiny as human beings is supposed to be, Jesus is that revelation from the Divine. I can take both of these theological propositions “literally” and in that sense I am very orthodox. The more theology I read about the Resurrection and the Incarnation the more I think I understand, and paradoxically I also know how little I comprehend (which is fine).

The cross has been a stumbling block for me.

Screenshot 2020-04-10 at 1.18.23 PM I have read Anselm of Canterbury and I understand his Satisfaction Theory of Atonement. I had the evangelical Bridge diagram and penal substitution explained to me. I understand that Christ died for our sins. In the Doctrine of Original Sin I am told that, in Augustine‘s words, we are a massa damnata, and that all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. In Calvin’s language, we are subjects of total depravity. In this theology of atonement nothing that I can do could possibly merit forgiveness – I deserve death and damnation – and yet forgiveness is given, despite my unworthiness. In certain Augustinian thought even the faith that I have in Jesus is a gift from God; it only appears that I have willed my faith. Anything right that I do is due to God working in me, and anything wrong that I do is my own fault and deserves eternal damnation. Jesus has paid a ransom for us, Jesus was sacrificed for us, he paid a debt, and, most importantly, he suffered on our behalf. Jesus, who is wholly innocent, is able to take on the punishment due to all the rest of humanity, and thus release us from the effects of sin and death. As a result, we have been justified in the sight of God by what Jesus has done. Righteousness is imputed to us, even though we remain active in our sins.

This theology leaves me cold.

It is all very legalistic. It presents the Divine as an outraged judge, a righteous ogre who demands an eternal penalty for our temporal sins. Whether we have told a small lie or whether we are a mass murderer, it is all the same in God’s eyes – we deserve the second death, the lake of burning oil. God, as a just being, is angry and repelled by our sinful nature.

Further, what does this say about the Father and Jesus? The Father demands that the Son die for others, a form of filial murder, it seems.

Some would say that it was all preordained, in which case the death of Jesus upon the cross is nothing but the payment of accounts, a kind of supernatural balancing trick. Jesus, while genuinely suffering, foreknew the result, so he just had to bear down and get through it. But the problem with this is that the cross comes across as unnecessary fussing; Jesus did not have to die – could the Father as judge not simply forgive, without all the suffering and the blood? Recall that, in the Parable of the Prodigal Son, the father in the story welcomes the son back even before the child makes his confession of sin, and he does not demand that the wayward son suffer, or that someone else suffer on his behalf. So why, in Atonement theology, does God require that the Son suffer on behalf of the rest of humanity?

All of these theological issues are tied up in the theory of substitutionary atonement – the idea that the preeminent metaphor for understanding the cross is that Jesus died on our behalf, that his death was required by the father on account that someone human needed to be punished for humanity’s sins. The seemingly infinite sins could only be paid by a human who was also divine, the infinite joined to the finite in the person of Jesus Christ. His undeserved suffering overflows the deficit of sins.

I know that this is a powerful theology throughout history, and there are many millions of Christians for whom it is deeply meaningful. But for me it is deeply problematic. It reduces Jesus to a mere sacrifice, and ignores his teachings, his healings, and other parts of his life. If all that mattered that Jesus die, why not let Herod the Great kill him as an infant, along with all the other little boys massacred?

Further, is there no discriminating among sins? The sins of a small child cannot be compared to that of a mass murderer. A person who sexually abuses children is surely worse than someone who occasionally gets angry, or steals a pen from work. What is worse, someone who lies habitually, or someone who launches a war of aggression that kills millions? As someone who has lived a fairly dull life I will admit to my sins before God and a confessor, but I wonder if they are deserving of death and eternal damnation, and that they are on the same level as Stalin, Hitler, or a Dr Harold Shipman.

There must be more going on. Fundamentally, God is presented by Jesus as a loving father, not as an angry judge. Recognizing that substitutionary atonement really only dominated western Christian thought for the second half of the two millennia of Christian faith, what other approaches might there be?

Christus Victor

Another approach was discerned and recovered by Gustav Aulen, a Swedish Lutheran. In his book Christus Victor (1931) he discerned three types of Atonement theology over the course of history. One was the theology of penal substitution, or satisfaction theology, described above. He also noted that there was a reaction in Medieval Theology to Anselm of Canterbury. Peter Abelard promoted what is now called “the moral influence theory of atonement”, in which Christ’s obedience to the Father – “Not my will but yours be done” – influencing believers to become likewise obedient. Abelard’s theology is better for me that substitutionary atonement, as God’s love is paramount, but it is rather weak. It just points to Jesus and says, “Be like that”. It stresses obedience to a higher authority without explaining why the Father requires the death of the Son.

Aulen believed that there was a theology of atonement that was older than these two, and in his book he demonstrated its biblical roots and use in the first millennium. He saw the narrative not in legal terms, but as an epic struggle between Christ and the forces of evil. For example, in the Gospel of Mark we see the battle in three stages: first, the temptation in the desert; then the challenges to Jesus by demons whenever he would exorcise them; and finally on the cross, when the powers and principalities worked through the Sanhedrin and the Roman Imperium to have Jesus crucified. Of course, with the resurrection, Jesus is shown to be the winner (hence the title, Christus Victor), and the powers of sin and death are defeated. Jesus will come again, not so much to act as a judge on sinners, but to complete the work begun in his earthly life, and destroy every spirit that warps God’s creation.

I like this approach. While it does not account for all the metaphors used to describe the cross, it seemed to encompass the whole narrative of Christ’s life and teachings, and expands to include the eschatological vision of Jesus returning and transforming creation into a new heaven and a new earth.

The problem with this is that human beings seem to be reduced to being spectators. It is not clear what I, as a follower of Jesus Christ, am supposed to do. Applaud and rejoice, yes, and challenge the powers and principalities of my time, but as part of the mainstream of western society, what does that mean?

The Cross in Black Theology

71TL6ZHN0zL To understand the real meaning of the cross, and to get at a real theology of atonement, we need to listen to those who have suffered. In the United States African-Americans have suffered greatly. Four hundred years ago they were captured and sold into slavery, transported across the Atlantic, and made to work in forced labour camps called “plantations”. Even after Emancipation and the Reconstruction Amendments to the Constitution they suffered, under the Jim Crow laws and segregation. As the late theologian James Cone pointed out in The Cross and the Lynching Tree African-Americans were subject to terror unmitigated by law. The Ku Klux Klan paraded at night and burned crosses on the lawns of Blacks, and frequently beat those they considered “uppity”. The homes, businesses, and churches of African-Americans were burned as a warning.

The worst form of violence was that of lynching, the summary murders of Black men and women by hanging them on a tree, usually accompanied by torture, and the burning of the corpse as it still hung. These lynchings, some 5000 of them over the period from the Civil War down to the 1950s, were not private affairs. Indeed, it was not uncommon to have them advertised in the newspapers, and thousands of white folk – men,women, and children – would show up to watch and jeer. Food would be sold as if at a fair, and photographs would be taken and reproduced as post cards. And all of those involved in these lynchings were Christians. The lynchings were a warning and a threat to Blacks: “We Whites are in power and we will never let go, and we can do whatever we want with you.”

Rebellion was not an option; the use of violence in defense would only engender a worse response (the Second Amendment only seemed to apply to White folk). In the first half of the 20th Century many Blacks travelled north, to get jobs working in factories, to get away from the sharecropping of the South. However, even in the North they encountered much discrimination. The sufferings of the Blacks found expression in two places. One was the Juke joint on Saturday nights, the places men and women could dance to Jazz and listen to performers sing the Blues. The other was the historic Black Church, where they sang about a Saviour who had suffered like them. Thus we got music like this:

While the African-Americans received Christianity from the Whites, they could not stay in their churches, sitting in the back or in the galleries, for the hypocrisy was too great. So they founded their own churches. While many of their pastors were educated, just as many were not. This resulted in a faith that grew out of experience in dialogue with scripture. They saw Jesus as one of them – someone unjustly suffering, betrayed and executed by a foreign power.

While the churches did not sing directly of lynching – it was just too painful – popular music did. Thus Billie Holiday sang Strange Fruit as a protest song. When she began singing it in the 1940s people walked out, but ultimately it became her signature song, always sung last in her performances, as a reminder to her audiences of the outrages of White Americans upon Blacks.

The catalyst for the Civil Rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s was one of the last of the lynchings, that of fourteen year-old Emmet Till in Mississippi. The atrocity was exacerbated by the subsequent trial of his killers and the verdicts of “Not Guilty” delivered by the all White jury. Shortly thereafter, Rosa Parks attended a rally protesting Till’s murder, in Montgomery, Alabama, led by a young newly ordained pastor named Martin Luther King, Jr. A few weeks later she got on a bus, and sat down. When she was told to give up her seat to a White person, she refused. “I thought of Emmett Till and I just couldn’t go back” she later said. This began a boycott of bus system by African-Americans, which launched the Civil Rights movement. It seems that Black Americans decided that if they were going to suffer, they should suffer in the attempt to achieve something.

In Black Theology it is not so much that Jesus suffers for us, it is that Jesus suffered with us. This reveals the love of God, which is for the downtrodden and abused. The ultimate vindication is found in the resurrection, which seems impossible – but, then, equal rights for Blacks seemed impossible in the 1950s. Yes, it may be that Jesus died for sins, too, but far more important was that God was on the side of justice for the oppressed.

I want Jesus to walk with me
I want Jesus to walk with me
All along my pilgrim journey
I want Jesus to walk with me

In my trials, Lord, walk with me
In my trials, Lord, walk with me
When the shades of life are falling
Lord, I want Jesus to walk with me

In my sorrows, Lord walk with me
In my sorrows, Lord walk with me
When my heart is aching
Lord, I want Jesus to walk with me

In my troubles, Lord walk with me
In my troubles, Lord walk with me
When my life becomes a burden
Lord, I want Jesus to walk with me

Standing at the Foot of the Cross

So where does this leave us?

We are not Black or African-Americans, and not many of us have suffered as they have suffered. Speaking for myself, I am, if anything, recovering from generations of unconscious low-level racism and bigotry, and quite surprised when I find it in myself, thinking that I was more enlightened than I actually was. I am the product of a settler society in Canada which benefited from taking the land of the indigenous peoples living there and forcing them onto marginal reserves, and sought to assimilate them into settler society, extinguishing their languages, economies, and identities. If I was prone to feeling guilt (which I am not), I could wallow in the past injustices and weep. Or I could move on, as if a Stoic philosopher, and just continue to live my life.

But today, Good Friday, we stand at the foot of the cross. Jesus, a colonized indigenous man, not a citizen but a man with no real “rights” as we would understand them, belonging to a people who were considered by Roman authorities to be suitable for slavery, is being put to death by the Romans, at the instigation of their collaborationists among the elite of Jerusalem. We watch his death, and this forces us to a decision.

Whose side are we on?

Do we ally ourselves with the oppressors, or with those who are suffering? Do we respond to Immanuel, “God with us”, by settling into the satisfaction that we are saved because Jesus has died in our place? Or are we stirred by outrage at the powers and principalities that continue to murder and execute? Are we willing to let go of power and privilege, as Jesus emptied himself out into human form, so that we might have more just institutions and a righteous society? As Reinhold Niebuhr said, Love in its public form is justice – can we love with the same love that God had in Jesus?

As the alternative collect for Good Friday states, let us pray:

Eternal God,
in the cross of Jesus
we see the cost of our sin
and the depth of your love:
in humble hope and fear
may we place at his feet
all that we have and all that we are,
through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Posted in Lent, Sermons | Tagged Black Liberation Theology, Good Friday, James Cone, Theologies of Atonement | Leave a comment

Resources for Good Friday

Posted on April 9, 2020 by Bruce Bryant-Scott

These are resources meant mainly for The Anglican Church of St Thomas the Apostle, Kefalas, on the island of Crete in Greece, but others may find them helpful!

Christ on the Cross, made in Tirol or Salzburg (Austria), ca. 1125-1150, now in the the Fuentiduena Chapel in the Cloisters, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York NY

Read/Listen

In the western Christian tradition (Catholic, Anglican, Lutheran, and others) the core of the Good Friday Liturgy is the reading or chanting of the Passion according to John.

The Passion is chanted in English by Kevin Vogel, a Roman Catholic priest in Nebraska, in this Youtube video.

St. Thomas Church (Thomaskirche), Leipzig

If you want a musical version in German you might listen in to Bach’s St. John’s Passion, which is being live-streamed from Bach’s church in Leipzig where it premiered in 1724. Details are on this page, and the live stream will be on their Facebook page. It starts at 3:00 PM CEST, which, of course, is 4:00 PM EEST in Greece, 9:00 am EDT in Ottawa, and 6:00 am PDT in Victoria.

Arvo Pärt set the Passion in Latin translation to music in 1989. I find it particularly powerful.

The full readings for Good Friday are here.

From the Stations of the Cross by artist Chris Woods, originally in St. David of Wales Anglican Church in Vancouver.

Pray

After the reading of the Passion according to John, the next most important part are the prayers, which come in two parts. First, the Reproaches, or an anthem of penitence, punctuated by the Trisagion. Common Worship from the Church of England has a form of it here, but I confess I prefer the version used by the Anglican Church of Canada in my old Diocese of British Columbia. Here it is:

Is it nothing to you, all you who pass by?
Look and see if there is any sorrow like my sorrow
which was brought upon me,
which the Lord inflicted on the day of his fierce anger.
Holy God, holy and mighty,
holy and immortal one, have mercy upon us.

O my people, O my Church,
What have I done to you,
or in what have I offended you?
Testify against me.
I led you forth from the land of Egypt,
and delivered you by the waters of baptism,
but you have prepared a cross for your Saviour.
Holy God, holy and mighty,
holy and immortal one, have mercy upon us.

I led you through the desert forty years,
and fed you with manna.
I brought you through tribulation and penitence,
and gave you my body, the bread of heaven,
but you have prepared a cross for your Saviour.
Holy God, holy and mighty,
holy and immortal one, have mercy upon us.

What more could I have done for you that I have not done?
I planted you, my chosen and fairest vineyard,
I made you the branches of my vine;
but when I was thirsty, you gave me vinegar to drink,
and pierced with a spear the side of your Saviour.
Holy God, holy and mighty,
holy and immortal one, have mercy upon us.

Celebrant: I went before you in a pillar of cloud,
and you have led me to the judgement hall of Pilate.
I scourged your enemies and brought you to a land of freedom,
but you have scourged, mocked, and beaten me.
I gave you the water of salvation from the rock,
but you have given me gall and left me to thirst.
Holy God, holy and mighty,
holy and immortal one, have mercy upon us.

I gave you a royal sceptre,
and bestowed the keys to the kingdom,
but you have given me a crown of thorns.
I raised you on high with great power,
but you have hanged me on the cross.
Holy God, holy and mighty,
holy and immortal one, have mercy upon us.

My peace I gave, which the world cannot give,
and washed your feet as a sign of my love,
but you draw the sword to strike in my name,
and seek high places in my kingdom.
I offered you my body and blood,
but you scatter and deny and abandon me.
Holy God, holy and mighty,
holy and immortal one, have mercy upon us.

I sent the Spirit of truth to guide you,
and you close your hearts to the Counsellor.
I pray that all may be as one in the Father and me,
but you continue to quarrel and divide.
I call you to go and bring forth fruit,
but you cast lots for my clothing.
Holy God, holy and mighty,
holy and immortal one, have mercy upon us.

I grafted you into the tree of my chosen Israel,
and you turned on them with persecution and mass murder.
I made you joint heirs with them of my covenants,
but you made them scapegoats for your own guilt.
Holy God, holy and mighty,
holy and immortal one, have mercy upon us.

I came to you as the least of your brothers and sisters;
I was hungry and you gave me no food,
I was thirsty and you gave me no drink,
I was a stranger and you did not welcome me,
naked and you did not clothe me,
sick and in prison and you did not visit me.
Holy God, holy and mighty,
holy and immortal one, have mercy upon us.

The second part of the prayers are the Solemn Intercessions, which can be found here; you’ll need to scroll down to The Prayers of Intercession.

Reflect

I wrote a reflection last year on Good Friday on George Herbert’s A Dialogue-Anthem.

I also wrote a meditation on the reading from Isaiah 52.13-53.12.

Last year Justin Welby, the Archbishop of Canterbury, with others, created a series of short podcasts on the stations of the Cross.

Hymns

Posted in Isaiah, Lent | Tagged Good Friday | Leave a comment

Resources for Maundy Thursday 2020

Posted on April 8, 2020 by Bruce Bryant-Scott

These are resources meant mainly for The Anglican Church of St Thomas the Apostle, Kefalas, on the island of Crete in Greece, but others may find them helpful!

Ο Νιπτήρ O Niptir The Washbasin – the Icon of Maundy Thursday, when Jesus served his disciples by washing their feet. This icon hangs in our kitchen, and was a gift to me from my Beloved.

As Common Worship puts it:

Maundy Thursday (from mandatum, ‘commandment’, because of the use of John 13.34 in the Antiphon) contains a rich complex of themes: humble Christian service expressed through Christ’s washing of his disciples’ feet, the institution of the Eucharist, the perfection of Christ’s loving obedience through the agony of Gethsemane.

On this Maundy Thursday 2020 I planned to meet with members of the congregation and visitors around a dinner table at the Tabernacle, where we normally gather for worship. Last year we did this, and it looked like this:

Well, not this year. In its place here are some resources you may wish to use to mark the day.

Readings

The readings for Maundy Thursday may be found here.

Prayers

Home Liturgies
The Diocese in Europe has sent us this resource, which can be downloaded and used as an agape liturgy over bread and wine. It is not communion, but it is an echo of it. Agape Order of Service Alternatively, one might use this order for a Spiritual Communion. spiritual-communion-2.

The Collect
Let us pray that we may love one another as Christ has loved us.
Silence is kept.

God our Father,
you have invited us to share in the supper
which your Son gave to his Church
to proclaim his death until he comes:
may he nourish us by his presence,
and unite us in his love;
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever. Amen.

(or)

God our Father,
your Son Jesus Christ was obedient to the end
and drank the cup prepared for him:
may we who share his table
watch with him through the night of suffering
and be faithful. Amen.

Prayers of Intercession
In the power of the Spirit let us pray to the Father
through Christ the saviour of the world.

Father, on this, the night he was betrayed,
your Son Jesus Christ washed his disciples’ feet.
We commit ourselves to follow his example of love and service.
Lord, hear us and humble us.

On this night, he prayed for his disciples to be one.
We pray for the unity of your Church.
Lord, hear us and unite us.

On this night, he prayed for those who were to believe through his disciples’ message.
We pray for the mission of your Church.
Lord, hear us and renew our zeal.

On this night, he commanded his disciples to love,
but suffered rejection himself.
We pray for the rejected and unloved.
Lord, hear us and fill us with your love.

On this night, he reminded his disciples
that if the world hated them it hated him first.
We pray for those who are persecuted for their faith.
Lord, hear us and give us your peace.

On this night, he accepted the cup of death
and looked forward to the new wine of the kingdom.
We remember those who have died in the peace of Christ.
Lord, hear us and welcome all your children into paradise.

Reflections

Father Leonard Doolan of St Paul’s, Athens has recorded a meditation for Maundy Thursday:

In modern times Maundy Thursday has been a day during which clergy would gather with their bishop and renew their ordination vows; we in the Diocese in Europe will be doing this this year via Zoom with Bishop Robert Innes. Last year on Maundy Thursday I reflected on being a priest in this blog on George Herbert’s poem The Priesthood.

Hymns

Posted in Lent | Tagged Maundy Thursday, Maundy Thursday Resources | Leave a comment

Resources for Palm Sunday 2020

Posted on April 3, 2020 by Bruce Bryant-Scott

These are resources meant mainly for The Anglican Church of St Thomas the Apostle, Kefalas, on the island of Crete in Greece, but others may find them helpful!
The Diocese of Europe featured us in their website news this past week – you can read all about it here.

Being alone on Sundays is becoming the short-term normal. It feels strange not to gather for Holy Week. But we are still the Church, so what can we do? We can still read, reflect, pray, and share.

The Collects for Palm Sunday

Almighty and everlasting God,
who in your tender love towards the human race
sent your Son our Saviour Jesus Christ to take upon him our flesh
and to suffer death upon the cross:
grant that we may follow the example of his patience and humility,
and also be made partakers of his resurrection;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever. Amen.

(or)

True and humble king,
hailed by the crowd as Messiah:
grant us the faith to know you and love you,
that we may be found beside you on the way of the cross,
which is the path of glory. Amen.

Read (or Listen to) The Lessons for Palm Sunday

The Entry into Jerusalem

The Gospel Reading for the Procession
Psalm 118, which might be chanted in procession.

A post I did a little while ago about Psalm 118.

Readings for the Sunday of the Passion

The Reading from the Hebrew Scripture is Isaiah 40.5-9a.
The psalm is Psalm 31:9-16.
The Reading from the New Testament is Philippians 2.5-11 .

The Passion according to Matthew

You can read the text of the Passion here, or listen to it below,

In the Lutheran Church in Germany in the 18th century people gathered in churches to listen and participate in musical versions of the Passion. This is the origin of one of the greatest pieces of classical music, Johann Sebastien Bach’s St Matthew’s Passion (1727), and you can listen to it below (it is about three hours long). The text, in German with an English translation, can be found here.

Reflect

Our curate and deacon, the Rev’d Julia Bradshaw, has written a sermon for this Palm Sunday, and you can download a copy by clicking at the right. With palms and scattered garment strowed.

Fr Leonard Doolan of St Paul’s Athens has made available his sermon in both text and audio.
Text: Palm Sunday 2020 Sermon
Audio:

Last year I preached this Sermon.

Pray

Prayers appointed for Palm Sunday

We stand with Christ in his suffering.
For forgiveness for the many times we have denied Jesus,
let us pray to the Lord. Lord, have mercy.

For grace to seek out those habits of sin which mean spiritual death,
and by prayer and self-discipline to overcome them,
let us pray to the Lord. Lord, have mercy.

For Christian people,
that through the suffering of disunity there may grow a rich union in Christ,
let us pray to the Lord. Lord, have mercy.

For those who make laws, interpret them, and administer them,
that our common life may be ordered in justice and mercy,
let us pray to the Lord. Lord, have mercy.

For those who still make Jerusalem a battleground,
let us pray to the Lord. Lord, have mercy.

For those who have the courage and honesty to work openly for justice and peace,
let us pray to the Lord. Lord, have mercy.

For those in the darkness and agony of isolation,
that they may find support and encouragement,
let us pray to the Lord. Lord, have mercy.

For those who, weighed down with hardship, failure, or sorrow,
feel that God is far from them,
let us pray to the Lord. Lord, have mercy.

For those who are tempted to give up the way of the cross,
let us pray to the Lord. Lord, have mercy.

That we, with those who have died in faith, may find mercy in the day of Christ,
let us pray to the Lord. Lord, have mercy.

The Trisagion
Holy God, holy and strong, holy and immortal,
have mercy upon us.

Prayers in a Time of Pandemic

There are liturgies and prayers on the Coronavirus pages of the Church of England, and also the Diocese in Europe. This one is very good, and was borrowed by Bishop David Hamid from the Jesuits USA.

Jesus Christ, you travelled through towns and villages “curing every disease and illness.” At your command, the sick were made well. Come to our aid now, in the midst of the global spread of the coronavirus, that we may experience your healing love.

Heal those who are sick with the virus. May they regain their strength and health through quality medical care.

Heal us from our fear, which prevents nations from working together and neighbours from helping one another.

Heal us from our pride, which can make us claim invulnerability to a disease that knows no borders. Jesus Christ, healer of all, stay by our side in this time of uncertainty and sorrow.

Be with those who have died from the virus. May they be at rest with you in your eternal peace.

Be with the families of those who are sick or have died. As they worry and grieve, defend them from illness and despair. May they know your peace.

Be with the doctors, nurses, researchers and all medical professionals who seek to heal and help those affected and who put themselves at risk in the process. May they know your protection and peace.

Be with the leaders of all nations. Give them the foresight to act with charity and true concern for the well-being of the people they are meant to serve. Give them the wisdom to invest in long-term solutions that will help prepare for or prevent future outbreaks. May they know your peace, as they work together to achieve it on earth.

Whether we are home or abroad, surrounded by many people suffering from this illness or only a few, Jesus Christ, stay with us as we endure and mourn, persist and prepare. In place of our anxiety, give us your peace. Amen.

In this chaplaincy (i.e. parish, congregation) we are sharing by e-mail, social media, and the telephone. Please keep doing so!

We also may gather with others outside the chaplaincy by video and live-streaming. Here are some options:

Facebook Video Stream at 11:00 am EEST Greek time (9:00 am BST): Building on the Archbishop of Canterbury and Archbishop of York’s weekly broadcasts which have engaged a large audience, the Palm Sunday broadcast has been recorded by the Bishop of Manchester, David Walker, and the Archdeacon of Manchester, Ven Karen Lund, with Lucy Hargraves from St Peter’s Church in Bolton leading prayers, all from their own homes.

Holy Trinity, Corfu has a link to their Palm Sunday worship. This appears to be a prerecorded service.

Holy Trinity Geneva is doing a service with a Zoom Conference. at 10:30 am CEST (11:30 am EEST, our time here in Greece).

Through Holy Week

The Venerable Dr. Leslie Nathaniel, Archdeacon of the East and of Germany and Northern Europe, has passed on these simple service for prayer During Holy Week; they were devised by Fr Louis Darrant, Chaplain to St Christopher’s Anglican Church on the Costa Azahar in Spain. It is a downloadable PDF: Praying at home in Holy Week.

Posted in Lent | Tagged Palm Sunday, Palm Sunday 2020, Palm Sunday Pandemic | Leave a comment

Passion in Exile

Posted on March 29, 2020 by Bruce Bryant-Scott

A Sermon that was NOT preached on Passion Sunday (The Fifth Sunday of Lent) during
The Great Pandemic of 2020,
at
The Anglican Church of St. Thomas the Apostle, Kefalas, Crete
on
March 29, 2020 11:00 am

The readings for this day are Ezekiel 37:1-14, Psalm 130, Romans 8:6-11, and John 11:1-45.

The Bones

Mortal, can these bones live? Ezekiel 37.3

Just as Wolfgang the Wolf wondered if the olive tree would come back, so the prophet Ezekiel is asked if the dry bones would live again. The dry bones are a metaphor for the people of Judea who were in exile in Babylon. Would the people of Israel would ever return home to Jerusalem and Judea? Would they ever rebuild the Temple? Would the Judeans survive as a distinct people?

Ezekiel lived in the first half of the 6th century BCE. He was an adult and a priest in Jerusalem when the Neo-Babylonians came and besieged it in 597 BCE. King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon conquered the city, and King Jehoiakim of Judah appears to have died in the siege. His son and heir, Jeconiah, along with the elite and perahps some ten thousand other Judeans were deported to Babylon. as well, the Temple of Solomon was emptied of its treasures. Jehoiakim’s brother and Jeconiah’s uncle, Zedekiah, was appointed king by Nebuchadnezzar, although he ruled over only the poorest of the people who remained. While in exile in Babylon Ezekiel began to have his visions. Ten years after the first seige and conquest Zedekiah revolted, and Nebuchadnezzer again came and took Jerusalem by force. This time he destroyed the Temple, tore down the walls, and ravaged the city, driving out the survivors from the city. Zedekiah watched as his sons were executed, and then he was blinded and taken as a prisoner to Babylon, where he eventually died. Even more people were taken into exile in Babylon. The House of David and Judea seemed to come to an end.

It was reasonable for Ezekiel to despair. The practice of moving populations around, and cutting a people off from their educated upper class, was common in the ancient Middle East. The Assyrians had done the same with the northern Kingdom of Israel, removing the people from Samaria and placing them in various centres far to the east, in what is now Iraq and Iran. We hear of Israelites being recruited by the Assyrians for their armies after their deportation, but after that they disappear from history, presumably being assimilated into the peoples surrounding them.

The Judeans, the last of the people of Israel, seemed as good as dead. They were suffering, And yet Ezekiel had hope, a hope that was given to him in the vision of the Valley of the Dry Bones. “Can these bones live?”

1102017170_univ_cnt_3_lg

“Prophesy to these bones, and say to them: O dry bones, hear the word of the Lord. Thus says the Lord God to these bones: I will cause breath to enter you, and you shall live. I will lay sinews on you, and will cause flesh to come upon you, and cover you with skin, and put breath in you, and you shall live; and you shall know that I am the Lord.”

So I prophesied as I had been commanded; and as I prophesied, suddenly there was a noise, a rattling, and the bones came together, bone to its bone. I looked, and there were sinews on them, and flesh had come upon them, and skin had covered them; but there was no breath in them. Then he said to me, “Prophesy to the breath, prophesy, mortal, and say to the breath: Thus says the Lord God: Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe upon these slain, that they may live.” I prophesied as he commanded me, and the breath came into them, and they lived, and stood on their feet, a vast multitude. Ezekiel 37.4-10

Ezekiel is told that “these bones are the whole house of Israel”. Just as they came together and lived and breathed, so would Israel live again – a hope that was later fulfilled after the Babylonians were defeated by the Persians and Cyrus the Great told the Judeans they could go home.

Of course, the vision of bones coming to life may also be a vision of the Resurrection – the coming to life of the dead to receive judgement from God. This feeds into the Gospel reading, where Jesus raises Lazarus from the dead as a preliminary to his own resurrection. We are not given the sense that Lazarus is raised to eternal life – but that he was dead and now lives is a prefiguring of Jesus and a witness to who he is.

Dem Bones

This vision was interpreted as hope by another people who were also suffering a long passion. In the 1920s an African-American writer and songwriter namedJames Weldon Johnson recalled how the Black preachers of his youth preached on Ezekiel 37, not just as a text about the resurrection, but about the rebirth and rising of a people sore oppressed; what the Judeans were in the 6th Century BCE the African-Americans were from the 17th to 20th century in America. He wrote the lyrics and melody which then went through various interpretations. While often reduced to being a child’s tune and stripped of any deep meaning, Gospel singer Albertina Walker took it back to its inspiring roots in the version here from 1972.

Her (perhaps improvised) lyrics at the end are fascinating:

We got some deacons in our church, sure ain’t nothin’ but a dry bone.
We got some mothers in our church, sure ain’t nothin’ but a dry bone.
We got some preachers in our church, sure ain’t nothin’ but a dry bone.
Come on and hear the word, hear ye! C’mon and hear ye the word of the Lord!

A Vast Multitude

Today we are required, under penalty of fine and possible arrest, not to gather in our churches, and to remain in our homes except for essential reasons. We might feel we are in a kind of exile, forbidden to meet for meals and coffee, prohibited from our usual activities, needing a permit just to walk the dog, and required even to refrain from gathering for worship. For many of us this raises all kinds of concerns for our church here and beyond. In an era when church attendance is already in decline, this is all quite inconvenient.

Of course, for some, it is more than an inconvenience. Those of us with health issues or are above a certain age are more likely to become very ill, and the mortality rate is frightening. The pandemic does not spare prime ministers and princes, and even the healthy can succumb to it. Many of our friends and relatives are incapable of working, or have to find new ways of accomplishing their tasks; people are spending all their time on internet video conferences, trying to teach, meeting with students, and carrying on as if this is all quite usual. People’s investments are in freefall, and the value of pensions, paid in sterling but spent in euros, is going down. Children are home from school, and families are spending more time together than they are used to, and not surprisingly, tensions are rising. Frontline workers are stressed, wondering if they are overexposed to infection.

Can these bones live? Even in this exile we can still have some hope. In the United Kingdom people are applauding the NHS. In my home country of Canada people are practicing radical “caremongering”, a spontaneous effort to ensure that everyone is alright and has what they need. The Church has rediscovered the fact that it exists even when it is not in the building or carrying on its liturgies.

Dave Walker’s Cartoon in this week’s Church Times

Just as an olive tree recovers from a severe pruning, so we will come back. The pandemic will end. The economy will roar back. Greece will get back to tourism and great food. And the Church will come together, and these dry bones will once again stand up and put on flesh.

As we suffer the indignities of this pandemic, let us not forget the promises of God. Hear the word of the Lord!

A Note on the Calendar: In the liturgical tradition of the Western Church (Roman Catholic, Anglican Lutherans, and others) this was commonly known from Medieval times as “Passion Sunday“. It was a time in Lent when various practices began, such as veiling the crosses in the church. In the liturgical renewal that began of the 1960s, and was implemented in the reforms of Vatican II in the Catholic Church, and in many provinces of the Anglican Communion, it was felt that this name properly belonged to the Sunday before Easter, as it was the traditional day on which one of the synoptic gospel passions would be read. In the Anglican Church of Canada and The Episcopal Church in the United States this Sunday, then, is simply called “The Sunday of the Passion”. In the Church of England there is a desire to adhere to the older tradition, and this time is known as Passiontide – the week leading to and including Holy Week. There is a consequence shift in the practices in Lent in the resources of Common Worship.

Posted in Lent, Sermons | Tagged Dem Bones, Dry Bones, Ezekiel 37, Passiontide 2020 | 2 Comments

Prayer Resources for Passion Sunday in the Great Pandemic, March 29, 2020

Posted on March 28, 2020 by Bruce Bryant-Scott

WLANL_-_Techdiva_1.0_-_De_opwekking_van_Lazarus_(naar_Rembrandt),_Vincent_van_Gogh_(1890)

The Raising of Lazarus (after Rembrandt) by Vincent van Gogh 1890 Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam, Netherlands. According to the wikipedia article, “In The Raising of Lazarus (after Rembrandt), van Gogh drastically trimmed the composition of Rembrandt’s etching and eliminated the figure of Christ, thus focusing on Lazarus and his sisters. It is speculated that in their countenances may be detected the likenesses of the artist and his friends Augustine Rouline and Marie Ginoux. Van Gogh had just recovered from a lengthy episode of illness, and he may have identified with the miracle of the biblical resurrection, whose “personalities are the characters of my dreams.””

Good Saturday afternoon from the village of Gavalohori, on the island of Crete, in the beautiful Republic of Greece. While we are under lockdown the Anglican Church of St Thomas the Apostle, Kefalas, will not be able to meet, so I will be presenting a variety of resources for prayer the day before each Sunday or Holy Day. Some of these are written in full here, others are links to other websites that look useful.

I am working my way through the congregational list, checking in on folk and seeing how you are all doing. I am joined in this by our deacon and curate, Julia Bradshaw. If you have any concerns or prayer requests, please let us know. You can reach me by phone at +30 69855 70353 or by email at bbryantscott@gmail.com .

Readings & Published Sermon

The appointed readings for Passion Sunday are Ezekiel 37:1-14, Psalm 130, Romans 8:6-11, and John 11:1-45. Just click on the link and it should bring them up.

My sermon for today – what I would have preached in church on this Sunday – can be found here.

A Hymn

When Jesus Wept, The Falling Tear is a lovely old hymn, new to me, which is connected to the gospel reading.

Live Stream

This Sunday I will join the people of Holy Trinity, Geneva, and the live stream via Zoom of their liturgy there. Remember that clocks go forward this weekend. They will have their service at 10:30 am CEST, which is 11:30 am EEST. The Zoom link is https://zoom.us/j/864442942 Meeting ID: 864 442 942. One click should get you in. Depending on your platform – computer, tablet, or smartphone – you may need to download the Zoom app. As well, you will need to enable audio and video on your computer. They request that you download the service sheet by going to the Holy Trinity website here.

Audio Files

Father Leonard Doolan of St. Paul’s, Athens has prepared an audio version of a short service of Morning Prayer, and a sermon for this Passion Sunday.

MORNING PRAYER:

SERMON:

Prayers For Passion Sunday

The Collect for the Fifth Sunday of Lent, commonly called Passion Sunday

Most merciful God,
who by the death and resurrection of your Son Jesus Christ
delivered and saved the world:
grant that by faith in him who suffered on the cross
we may triumph in the power of his victory;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever. Amen.

(or)

Gracious Father,
you gave up your Son
out of love for the world:
lead us to ponder the mysteries of his passion,
that we may know eternal peace
through the shedding of our Saviour’s blood,
Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Intercessions from Common Worship, Times and Seasons:

Let us bring to the Father our prayers of intercession
through Christ who gave himself for the life of the world.

For forgiveness for the many times we have denied Jesus,
let us pray to the Lord. Lord, have mercy.

For grace to seek out those habits of sin which mean spiritual death,
and by prayer and self-discipline to overcome them,
let us pray to the Lord. Lord, have mercy.

For Christian people, that through the suffering of disunity
there may grow a rich union in Christ,
let us pray to the Lord. Lord, have mercy.

For those who make laws, interpret them, and administer them,
that our common life may be ordered in justice and mercy,
let us pray to the Lord. Lord, have mercy.

For those who still make Jerusalem a battleground,
let us pray to the Lord. Lord, have mercy.

For those who have the courage and honesty to work openly for justice and peace,
let us pray to the Lord. Lord, have mercy.

For those in the darkness and agony of isolation,
that they may find support and encouragement,
let us pray to the Lord. Lord, have mercy.

For those who, weighed down with hardship, failure, or sorrow,
feel that God is far from them,
let us pray to the Lord. Lord, have mercy.

For those who are tempted to give up the way of the cross,
let us pray to the Lord. Lord, have mercy.

That we, with those who have died in faith, may find mercy in the day of Christ,
let us pray to the Lord. Lord, have mercy.

Holy God, holy and strong, holy and immortal,
have mercy upon us.

Let us pray to the Father through his Son
who suffered on the cross for the world’s redemption.
Fill with your Spirit Christ’s broken body, the Church …
Give to Christian people everywhere a deep longing
to take up the cross and to understand its mysterious glory.
By the Saviour’s cross and passion,
Lord, save us and help us.

Bless those who lead the Church’s worship at this solemn time …
In the preaching of the word and the celebration of the sacraments
draw your people close to you.
By the Saviour’s cross and passion,
Lord, save us and help us.

Strengthen those [among us] who are preparing for baptism,
together with their teachers, sponsors and families …
Teach them what it means to die and rise with Christ
and prepare them to receive the breath of his Spirit.
By the Saviour’s cross and passion,
Lord, save us and help us.

Look in your mercy upon the world you loved so much
that you sent your Son to suffer and to die …
Strengthen those who work to share
the reconciliation won at such a cost upon the cross.
By the Saviour’s cross and passion,
Lord, save us and help us.

Bring healing by the wounds of Christ
to all who are weighed down by pain and injustice …
Help the lonely and the betrayed, the suffering and the dying,
to find strength in the companionship of Jesus,
and in his passion to know their salvation.
By the Saviour’s cross and passion,
Lord, save us and help us.

Welcome into paradise all who have left this world in your friendship …
According to your promises,
bring them with all your saints
to share in all the benefits of Christ’s death and resurrection.
By the Saviour’s cross and passion,
Lord, save us and help us.

Holy God, holy and strong, holy and immortal,
have mercy on us.

Let us pray to the Father,
who loved the world so much that he sent his only Son to give us life.
Simon from Cyrene was forced to carry the cross for your Son.
Give us grace to lift heavy loads from those we meet
and to stand with those condemned to die.
Lord, hear us. Lord, graciously hear us.

Your Son watched the soldiers gamble to share his clothes.
Transform the hearts of those who make a profit from their victims,and those whose hearts are hardened by their work.
Lord, hear us. Lord, graciously hear us.

The thief, who was crucified with Jesus,
was promised a place in your kingdom.
Give pardon and hope, healing and peace
to all who look death in the face.
Lord, hear us. Lord, graciously hear us.

From the cross Jesus entrusted Mary his mother
and John his disciple to each other’s care.
Help us also to care for one another and fill our homes with the spirit of your love.
Lord, hear us. Lord, graciously hear us.

In Mary and John your Son created a new family at the cross.
Fill our relationships, and those of new families today,
with mutual care and responsibility, and give us a secure hope for the future.
Lord, hear us. Lord, graciously hear us.

The centurion was astonished to see your glory in the crucified Messiah.
Open the eyes of those who do not know you
to see in your Son the meaning of life and death.
Lord, hear us. Lord, graciously hear us.

Joseph of Arimathaea came to take your Son’s body away.
Give hope and faith to the dying and bereaved,
and gentleness to those who minister to them.
Lord, hear us. Lord, graciously hear us.

Simon and Joseph, Mary and John became part of your Church in Jerusalem.
Bring into your Church today a varied company of people,
to walk with Christ in the way of his passion
and to find their salvation in the victory of his cross.
Lord of the Church, hear our prayer,
and make us one in heart and mind
to serve you in Christ our Lord. Amen.

In the Prayer Diary of the Diocese in Europe, Church of England we are asked to:
Pray for the Church of Sweden. Pray for the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople (Turkey), for Patriarch Bartholomew and the autocephalous Orthodox Churches and their leaders. Pray for threatened Syrian Orthodox communities in Turkey.

In the Ecumenical Prayer Cycle of the World Council of Churches we remember the peoples and Christians in the Balkans – Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Serbia, Slovenia.

Prayers for a Season of Repentance

Today, the fifth Sunday in Lent, is the focus of the Primates’ Task Group’s call for a period of prayer and repentance in the Anglican Communion. The Bishop of West Malaysia, Moon Hing, is a member of the Task Group and has written this prayer, which the Task
Group offers to the Anglican Communion for use today.

Almighty God,
Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, Sovereign Lord of the universe, Creator of humankind,
we, your unfaithful children, are truly sorry for our sins and the lives that we have lived.
We sincerely believe and confess in our hearts that only through the precious blood of our Lord Jesus Christ on the cross at Calvary,
can we obtain Your forgiveness.
We repent that:

In thought, word or deed, we have committed serious offences against You and our neighbours;
In laziness, despair and lust for power, we have provoked hatred, division and hurt within our communities;
In greed, deceit and indifference, we have caused serious damage, unnecessary conflict and aggravated destruction to our
refugee and migrant brothers and sisters;
In selfishness, insensitivity and bias, we have encouraged and emboldened those who inflict hurt, pain and sorrow on our
loved ones and families;
In the name of religion, doctrine and even of Christ himself, we have wounded believers and pursuers of holiness and faith;
In stubbornness, pride and arrogance, we have caused division and strife within Your church and among Your children;

Mercifully send Your Holy Spirit – the Spirit of order and comfort –
and cleanse us from all unrighteousness;
restore in us true faith in Christ which brings truth, peace and harmony;
and help us to walk together with our brothers and sisters
in the peace of our Lord Jesus Christ to the glory of Your name. Amen.

One can download further prayers here: a-season-of-repentance-en.

Prayers in the Great Pandemic

You may want to use some of the prayers from last week’s resources blog. Some great prayers written by Jewish rabbis may be found here. Here are two more from Christian sources.

A ‘New’ Prayer from Rev’d Dr Sam Wells (Vicar of St Martin-in-the-Fields, London)
A Prayer as Things Get Harder:
God of gentle presence,
you knew the ultimate separation
when on the cross Christ felt he was forsaken;
be with all who feel their Good Friday has come today.
Comfort those who have the virus.
Empower all who care for those in distress,
through medicine, acts of kindness or imaginative communication.
Be present to any who feel utterly alone,
without companion or health or hope.
Show us your face amid grief and bewilderment.
Inspire us to find new ways to be one with one another and with you.
And bring this time of trial to an end.
In Christ our Lord. Amen.

A Prayer to Combat the Coronavirus Pandemic

Most merciful and Triune God,
We come to you in our weakness.
We come to you in our fear.
We come to you with trust.
For you alone are our hope.

We place before you the disease present in our world.
We turn to you in our time of need.

Bring wisdom to doctors.
Give understanding to scientists.
Endow caregivers with compassion and generosity.
Bring healing to those who are ill.
Protect those who are most at risk.
Give comfort to those who have lost a loved one.
Welcome those who have died into your eternal home.

Stabilize our communities.
Unite us in our compassion.
Remove all fear from our hearts.
Fill us with confidence in your care.

Jesus, I trust in you.
Jesus, I trust in you.
Jesus, I trust in you.
Amen.

— The author of this beautiful prayer is unknown, except to the Lord. If you know who the author is, please let us know so we can give proper acknowledgement. If a temporary attribution is needed, you are welcome to say: “Author unknown. Posted on AscensionPress.com“.

Fr Leonard Doolan of Athens has prepared a simple format for Daily Worship, which you can download by clicking here: MP&EP Booklet(1)

Posted in Lent, Prayer | Tagged Fifth Sunday in Lent, Passion Sunday Prayers, Prayers in a Pandemic | 4 Comments

The Annunciation and Revolution

Posted on March 24, 2020 by Bruce Bryant-Scott

Some Thoughts on the Feast of the Annunciation
March 25, 2020
during
The Great Pandemic of 2020,

If this were a Eucharist, the readings would be Isaiah 7:10-14, Psalm 40:5-11, Hebrews 10:4-10, and Luke 1:26-38.

The Annunciation, by Mark Urwin of England, after the 1333 altar piece by Simone Martini and Lippo Memmi.

“. . . the power of the Most High will overshadow you” Luke 1.35

The Annunciation and the Greek Revolution

March 25 is a national holiday in Greece, and not simply because it is 95% Greek Orthodox and highly values Mary as Θεοτόκος Theotokos “God-bearer” or “Mother of God. No, Greece also remembers this as the day 199 years ago when the War of Independence began. While the revolt against the Ottoman Turks actually started some weeks before this in different places, and the War carried on for nine long years, this is the day on which Revolution was declared by Metropolitan Germanos of Patras. As Greeks used the Julian calendar still, it was actually April 6 in the Gregorian calendar, but even though Greece now uses the “New Style” one, they keep the commemoration on March 25. Normally there would be parades and such, but not this year, Still, flags are out at peoples homes, so we have our Greek flag out, with the Canadian one to keep it company.

20200323_191651

There is something somehow appropriate about this. The Angel Gabriel brought a message to Mary of Nazareth that she would conceive and bear a child, despite the fact that she did not “know a man”. Mary is told that

. . . the Lord God will give to him the throne of his ancestor David. He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end. Luke 1.32-33

Of course, at the time there was no one on the throne of David. Herod, King of Judea, was not of the House of David, and his family were viewed as Idumeans that had converted to Judaism only for political reasons. Herod the Great was a client king of the Roman Empire, and when in the judgement of the Romans his heirs were not as suitable for rule as he, they did not hesitate to divide up his kingdom into lesser principalities and provinces. Thus, the birth of Jesus, and his proclamation by Gabriel that he would be a king, is a revolutionary challenge to the imperial power of Rome and those who collaborate with it. If Jesus was acclaimed later, as an adult, as the King of the Jews, the Romans rightly saw this as a challenge to their rule.

We who live in the west sometimes forget this. We see Jesus’s kingdom as purely spiritual, putting aside the eschatology of the Second Coming and the dominion that would be established. As modern people we try to spiritualize the meaning of Christ’s reign, perhaps putting it in existentialist terms, as Rudolf Bultmann did.

But the Greeks in 1821 understood the coming of the Word into flesh as an anti-imperialistic act. Of course, Jesus in his life, death, and resurrection was non-violent and one who emptied himself, whereas the Greek revolutionaries were used to being violated and did not hesitate to justify the use of violence. But the desire for freedom is the same.

Rowan Williams on the Three-Fold Nature of the Word

In his recent book, Christ, The Heart of Creation (2018), Rowan Williams reflects on how the Word is presented in scripture and theology. He affirms the pre-incarnate Word, through which the world is made. In Jesus born of Mary that divine nature is united to a human nature in a single person. Because there is a single hypostasis in that person Jesus we are entitled, as affirmed by the Council of Chalcedon, to call Mary the Mother of God, or God-bearer. She freely accepts the role offered to her by God through Gabriel, and so becomes the model of obedience that Christ shows in his own life, and is shown in the lives of his followers. Williams also notes that Christ is present in the church, as the Body of Christ; by the Holy Spirit Christ is present among us. Jesus is bound to the visible community insofar as it is constituted by turning and returning to the foundational and sustaining act of Christ, which is memorialized and made present in communion. Thus, Christ is the unifying and identifying ground of an individual human existence.

Williams calls on Dietrich Bonhoeffer to remind us that we cannot think Christ without his “for the other” nature; therefore, the church must exist for the other, for the world’s reconciliation with God. This is a kenotic action, the pouring out of God in Christ for the world. This is not the way of the world, but it is the way God acts for the world. This anti-worldly attitude is seen in Jesus’s conversation with the disciples:

Jesus called them to him and said, “You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones are tyrants over them. It will not be so among you; but whoever wishes to be great among you must be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you must be your slave; just as the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many.” Matthew 20:25-28

This is the true revolution which is announced to Mary in the Annunciation. She does not understand it, but knows that the pregnancy she will have will undermine the seemingly powerful norms of her society. It is a turning of the lazy-susan of the cosmos so that humanity can return to what God created it to be, the image of God.

The Word in Us

So how is Christ present in the Church? Not through its many failings as a human institution, but in the times and ways in which it has let go of power and turned to others. And the Word is united to the humanity of the Church in the same way that the Word is made flesh in Mary – by the overshadowing of the Holy Spirit. The way in which the Word is made flesh in us is no less a miracle than the Incarnation and a virgin birth. So on a day in which a revolution is remembered, let us remember the great Revolution inaugurated by the Annunciation, and may it continue in us today.

Posted in Lent, Sermons | Tagged Annunciation, Greek Revolution 1821, Rowan Williams | Leave a comment

	What Was Left Out of… on The Nag Hammadi Library &…
	Bruce Bryant-Scott on You are the Coin in this …
	David Phillip Jones,… on You are the Coin in this …
	You are the Coin in… on An Anxious, Desperate God
	Lily on Me and Audrey

	What Was Left Out of… on The Nag Hammadi Library &…
	Bruce Bryant-Scott on You are the Coin in this …
	David Phillip Jones,… on You are the Coin in this …
	You are the Coin in… on An Anxious, Desperate God
	Lily on Me and Audrey

Read

Reflect

Remember

Share

Pray

Sing

An Age of Anxiety

“Do Not Be Afraid”

The Destructive Power of Modern Skepticism

The Power of Resurrection Hope

“Do Not Afraid: Go and Tell My Brothers to go to Galilee; There They Will See Me.”

Struggling With The Theology of Atonement

Christus Victor

The Cross in Black Theology

Standing at the Foot of the Cross

Read/Listen

Pray

Reflect

Hymns

Readings

Prayers

Reflections

Hymns

The Collects for Palm Sunday

Read (or Listen to) The Lessons for Palm Sunday

The Entry into Jerusalem

Readings for the Sunday of the Passion

The Passion according to Matthew

Reflect

Pray

Share

Through Holy Week

The Bones

Dem Bones

A Vast Multitude

Readings & Published Sermon

A Hymn

Live Stream

Audio Files

Prayers For Passion Sunday

Prayers for a Season of Repentance

Prayers in the Great Pandemic

The Annunciation and the Greek Revolution

Rowan Williams on the Three-Fold Nature of the Word

Copyright Notice

Recent Posts

Recent Comments

Archives

Categories

Meta

Recent Posts

Recent Comments

Archives

Categories

Meta