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Why was Jesus a thousand times more frightening than the killer sea? Why did the uncles mutter and the women walk away?
Because he came to turn the world upside down, to say that the last should be first; that the least among us would be first in the kingdom.
“But you know how it is, when something different crosses the threshold.”
The wealthy and powerful were very happy with the accepted order and did not want to hear that they were commanded to share what they had, to reach out to those who were marginalized, to include everyone at the table. The Pharisees were angry that he healed on the Sabbath, “becoming so rigidly attached to following the rules that they forgot why they chose to follow them in the first place.” (Episcopal priest Mary Koppel.) The people of the country of Gerasenes begged Jesus to leave after he cured the demoniac. (Mark 5:17) They were comfortable with the crazy guy in the tombs, and when he became like them, they didn’t know what to do.
Jesus struck at the accepted order, and they all lost their footing. And so they crucified him.
So, whom do I marginalize? When do I start to mutter?
To start, I judge others. I don’t mean to do that, but when I am sitting quietly, I find myself making a list of faults of people who haven’t done things the way that I think they should be done.
The poet Kathleen Norris’s husband would often drive off to “God-knows-where,” and even though she would be worried, she would be angry. “Anger woke me in the middle of the night. Hoping I could get back to sleep, I lay in bed, my mind suddenly racing with all the things, great and small, that I held against my husband. As good as it felt to review this little catalogue of slights and injuries, it brought me no satisfaction.” And then she gets into a stew about someone who had been contemptuous, and on to another. “I was building an impressive storehouse of grievances.” So she got up and prayed the Psalms. (The Cloister Walk)
I like to think that I wouldn’t mutter about healing on the Sabbath, and that I would welcome the demoniac. Those are grand gestures. But it is the small gestures that add up to the large. When I turn away from the man asking for money on the street, when I don’t give my friend my full attention, when I judge people for not doing something I think they should, I am as rigid as the Pharisees. I live in the country of Gerasenes, and beg Jesus to leave so that I don’t have to be reminded. I want to enjoy the slights and injuries in peace. I am only saved from this by seeing myself clearly and remembering that redemption is possible. But I have to ask for it.
“He who sees himself as he is, and has seen his sin, is greater than the one who raises the dead,” St. Isaac the Syrian taught. “Purity of heart is love for those who fall. If you see your brother in the act of sinning, throw about his shoulders the mantle of your love.” (Isaac the Syrian, Sentences.)
The Easter Season is here. Jesus’ ministry on earth is nearly done, and now he will be fully revealed. Fully human, and fully divine. Because he was fully human, he saw us clearly. But he comes to stand among us, and to teach us how to live, in love and charity with our neighbor. He demands this of us, in all his luminous tenderness, and asks us to forsake the accepted order of things, which is why he seems more dangerous than the killer sea.
Susan Garsoe
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