From the Lectionary for 24 September 2023 (Proper 20A)

Jonah 3:10-4:4 (NRSV Updated Edition)

When God saw what they did, how they turned from their evil ways, God changed his mind about the calamity that he had said he would bring upon them, and he did not do it. But this was very displeasing to Jonah, and he became angry. He prayed to the Lord and said, “O Lord! Is not this what I said while I was still in my own country? That is why I fled to Tarshish at the beginning, for I knew that you are a gracious and merciful God, slow to anger, abounding in steadfast love, and relenting from punishment. And now, O Lord, please take my life from me, for it is better for me to die than to live.” And the Lord said, “Is it right for you to be angry?”

Isaiah 55:6-9 (NRSV Updated Edition)

Seek the Lord while he may be found;
    call upon him while he is near;
let the wicked forsake their way
    and the unrighteous their thoughts;
let them return to the Lord, that he may have mercy on them,
    and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.
For my thoughts are not your thoughts,
    nor are your ways my ways, says the Lord.
For as the heavens are higher than the earth,
    so are my ways higher than your ways
    and my thoughts than your thoughts.

Matthew 20:1-16 (NRSV Updated Edition)

“For the kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out early in the morning to hire laborers for his vineyard. After agreeing with the laborers for a denarius for the day, he sent them into his vineyard. When he went out about nine o’clock, he saw others standing idle in the marketplace, and he said to them, ‘You also go into the vineyard, and I will pay you whatever is right.’ So they went. When he went out again about noon and about three o’clock, he did the same. And about five o’clock he went out and found others standing around, and he said to them, ‘Why are you standing here idle all day?’ They said to him, ‘Because no one has hired us.’ He said to them, ‘You also go into the vineyard.’ When evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his manager, ‘Call the laborers and give them their pay, beginning with the last and then going to the first.’ When those hired about five o’clock came, each of them received a denarius. Now when the first came, they thought they would receive more; but each of them also received a denarius. And when they received it, they grumbled against the landowner, saying, ‘These last worked only one hour, and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the day and the scorching heat.’ But he replied to one of them, ‘Friend, I am doing you no wrong; did you not agree with me for a denarius? Take what belongs to you and go; I choose to give to this last the same as I give to you. Am I not allowed to do what I choose with what belongs to me? Or are you envious because I am generous?’ So the last will be first, and the first will be last.”

~

"If we were truly being honest, God is both a scandal and a supreme disappointment to most of us. We would prefer a God of domination and control to a God of allowing, as most official prayers make clear. Both God and the True Self need only to fully be themselves and generously show themselves. Then the major work is done. The Source will always flow out, through, and toward those who want it. ... To allow yourself to be grabbed and held by such a divine wholeness is a dark and dangerous risk, and yet this is exactly what we mean by “salvation.” We are allowing the Great Allower to allow us, even at our worst. We gradually learn to share in the divine freedom and must forgive God for being far too generous."

- Richard Rohr, Immortal Diamond: The Search for Our True Self, pg. 19

~

"Our strongest resistance to forgiveness is that it just isn’t fair. It blows apart everything we think we know and believe about the economics of life. We think everything has a price, or should. We instinctively keep a tally of what we owe and what is owed us. Usually the latter is much higher than the former. This tally makes up a huge amount of our identity, an identity that forgiveness shows to be totally false. The tally is a desperate attempt to separate ourselves from others by letting the figures on our running tally come between us and them. ...

"The Parable of the Vineyard Workers (Mt. 20:1-16) speaks to this resistance. The workers who worked all day grumble when they get only the day’s wage they agreed on after the workers called in at the last hour of the day got the same day’s wage. I think all of us identify with the grumbling workers. The master sees the problem and seems to shrug his shoulders and say with a divine smile: “This is how I operate. Get used to it.” God’s economy takes a lot of getting used to. We are wise to start practicing now."

- Andrew Marr, Moving and Resting in God’s Desire, pp. 249-50

~

"“For many who are first will be last and the last will be first.” ... [This] little phrase is badly translated if we say “the first will be last and last will be first” - it's an English language approximation. Actually it says “all will be first-lasts and last-firsts.” In other words, there's something much much more interesting being taught here which is actually very much in line with our reading from Isaiah about my ways unimaginably greater than your way, and it's this that Jesus is bringing out ... as a way of illustrating all the strange 'upsets' that he's taught ... about all the people who are going to be inside his kingdom. It's all about the oddness of all of us, all those who might be insiders. ... Of all those who are going to be on the inside of this experiment it'll be a question of being 'first-lasters' and 'last firsters'. This is not so much a moralism as a teaching about discombobulation.

...

"Now as far as I can see, the point of this is to do with how we appreciate our relationship with others inside this project. All of us are 'first-lasts' and 'last-firsts' - there are elements in which some of us started very early and there are elements in which someone started very late and there are also elements in our lives which we are the ones who started late and others started much earlier. The problem is comparison. ...

"What he's suggesting is actually all those who are in inside this project have come to life in quite different ways, at quite different times, have let go of different things at different points, who found themselves called in in different ways. The biography of each one is astounding and unique... Everyone's inheriting the same, but everyone inherited a different way and through a different process. There are bits where we are 'last-firsters' and the bits where we are 'first-lasters' but the one thing we mustn't do is to allow ourselves to get caught up in jealousy about what is apparently being given to others, because that means we won't be able to appreciate what we're being given ourselves.

"I think that it's this sense that Jesus is so richly bringing out, that the life stories of those of us who are involved in this are going to be incommensurable one with each other. We've really no idea where we have been caught up in the coming into the kingdom, it's only after a long time that we may discover something that was part of our life and which suddenly blossoms into who we really are. All of these things are not to be measured in advance, not to be worked out by comparison. ... Just think how many ways we are dependent on comparison to judge our being brought into being our sons and daughters, and that's quite literally ... destroying our imagination of the goodness of the one who is trying to give us a gift.

"This for me is, if you like, this is the culmination of Jesus teaching on being on the inside of the life of the new creation coming into being... We're all screw-ups, we're all being called into being in rather extraordinary ways and finding ourselves on the insides of a process of being brought into being daughters and sons, [which is] the unique reward which is glory. And if we can begin to imagine how utterly astounding the lives, the patterns, the ways of being, are of our contemporaries, our friends, our enemies, those of whom we're jealous, just be able to sit back a little bit from our comparative jealousy, the insecurity, to be able to see where they are 'first-lasters' and 'last-firsters', just as we are 'last-firsters' and 'first-lasters' in different aspects of our lives.

"In that sense we might be able to come and enjoy [non-enviously] the sheer goodness, vivacity and strangeness of the one who is bringing us out of the corrupt and futile ways in which our world tends to curve down. That's what's being offered, and that's what Jesus is trying to bring out at the end of his, what's called ecclesiastical teaching - teaching on how it is that we are to live together in the coming into the new kingdom."

- James Alison, from video "Homily for Sunday 25 in Ordinary Time Year A" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0EBAaXdPtf8)

[Source of quotes from Richard Rohr and Andrew Marr, and for discussion and resources on all of this week's lectionary texts, see: http://girardianlectionary.net/reflections/year-a/proper20a/]

From the Lectionary for 17 September 2023 (Proper 19A)

Matthew 18:21-35 (NRSV Updated Edition)

Then Peter came and said to him, “Lord, if my brother or sister sins against me, how often should I forgive? As many as seven times?” Jesus said to him, “Not seven times, but, I tell you, seventy times seven[1] times.

“For this reason the kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who wished to settle accounts with his slaves. When he began the reckoning, one who owed him ten thousand talents was brought to him, and, as he could not pay, the lord ordered him to be sold, together with his wife and children and all his possessions and payment to be made. So the slave fell on his knees before him, saying, ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay you everything.’ And out of pity for him, the lord of that slave released him and forgave him the debt. But that same slave, as he went out, came upon one of his fellow slaves who owed him a hundred denarii, and seizing him by the throat he said, ‘Pay what you owe.’ Then his fellow slave fell down and pleaded with him, ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay you.’ But he refused; then he went and threw him into prison until he would pay the debt. When his fellow slaves saw what had happened, they were greatly distressed, and they went and reported to their lord all that had taken place. Then his lord summoned him and said to him, ‘You wicked slave! I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me. Should you not have had mercy on your fellow slave, as I had mercy on you?’ And in anger his lord handed him over to be tortured until he would pay his entire debt. So my heavenly Father will also do to every one of you, if you do not forgive your brother or sister from your heart.”

[1] The NRSV has "seventy-seven" in the text, and "seventy times seven" in a footnote. I have reversed this, as I tend to agree with those who see this as a reference back to, and subverting of, Lamech's declaration, “If Cain is avenged sevenfold, truly Lamech seventy-sevenfold.” (Genesis 4:24).

~

Matthew 5:25-27 (NRSV Updated Edition)

Come to terms quickly with your accuser while you are on the way to court with him, or your accuser may hand you over to the judge and the judge to the guard, and you will be thrown into prison. Truly I tell you, you will never get out until you have paid the last penny.

Matthew 6:14-15 (NRSV Updated Edition)

“For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you, but if you do not forgive others, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.

~

The latter two passages (from Matt. 5 and 6) are not from this week's lectionary, I have added them to reinforce just how seriously the author of Matthew's Gospel takes the problem of unforgiveness, as the Matthew 18 passage clearly presents.  But why so extreme, to the level of suggesting that "the heavenly Father" will not forgive the non-forgiver but hand the non-forgiver over to torturers?

This question relates, I think, to other passages and parables which refer to exclusion (eg. The Parable of the Wedding Banquet in Matthew 22. And it is a question all human communities need to deal with at some time: what to do with people who themselves are rejecting, excluding - in short not forgiving - others in the community?  And I think what it comes down to is accepting the reality that, even though they seem to want to be part of the community, they are in real way excluding themselves from it by not accepting others.  They are essentially elevating themselves, self-appointing themselves as judge over others.  And this, if it is allowed to continue, is death for the community.

The other aspect of unforgiveness, as others have clearly articulated (eg. Rob Bell in his 'forgiveness' series on the Robcast podcast), is that it imprisons the non-forgiver far more than the one who they will not forgive.  So, I think, in a real way, the "torture" suggested in Matthew 18 is far more a consequence of the person's unforgiveness, rather than an external force applied to them.  The unforgiving servant's actions towards his fellow servant clearly shows that he was still locked in the 'debt-prison' mentality.  All that happens then is that the truth of this is revealed, and he ends up with physical conditions matching his psychological and spiritual condition, which hadn't yet grasped the reality of the grace which had been extended to him.

One of the most difficult aspects of this topic is, of course, the danger of turning forgiveness into a stick in which to beat the victim, adding further pain to what they have already suffered.  The parable in Matthew 18 clearly does not present this case, as the 'non-forgiver' was not in any real way a victim of injustice, in fact he had been forgiven a debt of staggering value (10,000 talents equates to around 300,000 kg of gold).  For a real victim, and there are far too many as we are all too aware, what is needed is compassion, understanding, acceptance and love, not scepticism about their experience or injunctions to forgive the perpetrator.  At the same time, I think followers of Jesus should not encourage unforgiveness in any way, but pray for the eventual 'release' of the victim into renewed wholeness and freedom.

~

"Now please notice that the key figure in this is the second servant - the second servant is the equivalent of the servant boy [from Matthew 18: 1-5]. It's the equivalent of Jesus, who will be in the midst of you [Matt. 18:20]. It's the one who has been scandalized. It's in not forgiving [the second servant] that the person was bringing the whole thing down. You've got to forgive. As you forgive, so forgiveness spreads. It's forgiveness that keeps the whole system going. This is what Jesus is teaching, [it's] very very remarkable.

"Whereas [in] the pagan kingdom it's debts and loans that keep the whole system going, and if you interfere with it you crash the whole system, Jesus is saying, “Actually no. I'm introducing into the midst the real working of creation, the real opening-up of creation, which is going to be from forgiveness. In as far as you keep the system of forgiveness going, carrying on forgiving each other - endlessly, 70 times 7, leaving the 99 sheep [and] going after the one, all of that - in as far as you do that, then with me, you are opening up creation and allowing creation to be brought into being. That is what my Father wants to do and that is why I have come into your midst: to open up the new creation through forgiveness.”"

- James Alison, from video "Homily for Sunday 24 in Ordinary Time Year A" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y_IjeL8taW4)

[For analysis and discussion on all the lectionary texts for this Sunday, see also: http://girardianlectionary.net/reflections/year-a/proper19a/]

From the Lectionary for 10 September 2023 (Proper 18A)

Matthew 18: 1-7; 10-22* (NRSV Updated Edition)

At that time the disciples came to Jesus and asked, “Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?” He called a child, whom he put among them, and said, “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Whoever becomes humble like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me.

“If any of you cause one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for you if a great millstone were fastened around your neck and you were drowned in the depth of the sea. Woe to the world because of things that cause sin! Such things are bound to come, but woe to the one through whom they come!

...

“Take care that you do not despise one of these little ones, for I tell you, in heaven their angels continually see the face of my Father in heaven. What do you think? If a shepherd has a hundred sheep and one of them has gone astray, does he not leave the ninety-nine on the mountains and go in search of the one that went astray? And if he finds it, truly I tell you, he rejoices over it more than over the ninety-nine that never went astray. So it is not the will of your Father in heaven that one of these little ones should be lost.

“If your brother or sister sins against you, go and point out the fault when the two of you are alone. If you are listened to, you have regained that one. But if you are not listened to, take one or two others along with you, so that every word may be confirmed by the evidence of two or three witnesses. If that person refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church, and if the offender refuses to listen even to the church, let such a one be to you as a gentile and a tax collector. Truly I tell you, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven. Again, truly I tell you, if two of you agree on earth about anything you ask, it will be done for you by my Father in heaven. For where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them.”

Then Peter came and said to him, “Lord, if my brother or sister sins against me, how often should I forgive? As many as seven times?” Jesus said to him, “Not seven times, but, I tell you, seventy-seven times.”

* Note that the actual lectionary text is vv 15-20 only

~

"The beginning of the discussion is, “who is greatest amongst you?” In other words, who are the people who are going to be in charge, what's it look like to be running this show? And Jesus takes, not as in some translations, a child, but a small servant boy, a young servant boy, and puts him in the midst of them and says this is the criteria for it. In other words, you're not going to be great except in as far as you become like this one and learn to listen to this one. Of course, servant boys were not considered proper authorities on anything - they were scarcely talked to, they would not have been noticed. ... Jesus is saying, the criterion for what counts as behaviour is a servant boy. And guess what, if you scandalize such people then you are destroying yourselves.

"So the next section is about how not to scandalize one of these little ones because the criteria of his own presence ... is going to be that of the servant boy, whom he very carefully puts in the midst of them. And I bring this out because in our gospel today at the very end of his passage, he says, “For where two or three are gathered in my name I am there among them.” In other words, he repeats exactly the same phrase: I am going to be amongst the decision-making group as a servant boy, the kind of person whose voice wouldn't normally be heard, who just gets on doing things and [looking] after people, who's present and should be present in a non-scandalized way that's the criteria that's at work here.

"Ok, immediately thereafter Jesus tells them not the parable of the Lost Sheep. ...  So here is Jesus teaching something very specific about how the business of authority is going to be exercised. It's going to be exercised in favour of the one that went astray, the lost one. The whole purpose is not to be shoring up the good; the whole purpose, even to the extent of leaving the vast majority, is to go after the one who seems to have gone astray, finding, them - that's the cause of rejoicing.

...

"What I'd like to propose to you is that what Jesus is offering [in vv. 15-17] is actually the mechanism ... to avoid a lynching. So the first tip: if another member of the church sins against you go and point out the fault when the two of you are alone. Now I'm old enough to have been enough situations where I know that this is really really difficult thing to do. It's easy to get into a fight with someone but it's really difficult to take sufficient distance from what has gone on when someone has offended you to work out what's really going on between you and to be able to stand up, without the need to go and search for backup, to gossip to other people about what's happened, to try and present yourself as having been victimized by this person.

"It's tremendously difficult actually to be in a place of peace in yourself where you can go and say to the other person calmly, and not because you want to rub it in that person's face but because you really want to recreate friendship with that person, “Do you know you did this to me? I really want us to get beyond this.” It's an incredibly difficult thing to do, it requires a huge amount of that peaceful calm in your own life. ... It's a hugely important thing, but what is really important about it is what it's not doing. You are preparing yourself because you want to bring back this other person, you want to resolve this, you want this person to be on the same insider basis with you as everyone else.

"And it's only when that's failed, when you've spoken to that person alone so that there's no risk of you humiliating them so that they're not having to keep up appearances before anybody else - you have not told anybody else you, are not whipped up by gossip opinion against that person so that they need to defend themselves - it's only when you've done that and it's failed that you then need to go and talk to two or three witnesses. ... [By doing this], you are exposing yourself to the person who has been offended, you are exposing yourself to other people putting you right and saying, “Actually, I think you're misinterpreting what he or she did or said to you I think that there's a more innocent explanation that you should perhaps get off your high horse and see what's really going on here.” In other words, by all putting yourself through this exercise you're running the risk of learning something.

"And so then if thereon [the witnesses] agree with you and if therefore it seems clear that what you say is true they're prepared to back you up, for it's gone slowly enough so that the person who is being to be confronted has not been pushed into a situation whereby they're feeling paranoid and defensive - if all that's happened and still, that person says actually no, I didn't do that or I was right to do what I did, then before taking any action and before entering to get more gossip and trying to whip up popular opinion, then you talk to the whole of the community and see whether that they too can be won over by an account of events in such a way that they too could work out with you how to bring the person back on board.

"In other words, this is a mechanism for slowing down a lynching. And if at the very end of the process the other person continues either to deny that they did something or to deny the intention with which they did it or to deny that the thing they did was wrong, under those circumstances, having given them every possibility, it then says, treat them as a gentile or a tax collector ... If anything, for me, the use of the word tax collector there is one of Matthew's clever ways of saying, “Remember what this means is, we go back to the beginning and try to find ways of bringing them back in.” Because that's what this is about. And he then stresses to them that there is no way beyond this mechanism - the un-scapegoating mechanism - there's no external reference: God is not an outsider to this process, God is to be found present in the *undoing* of the scapegoating mechanism, which is how he, Jesus, is going to be present to them, occupying the same place as that servant boy [at the beginning of the chapter].

"And he says, no, you're going to have to take responsibility for this whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven in other words, it's you who are going to advance in understanding of how to create insiders together as you learn constantly to find ways of letting each other off awful violent mechanisms of control and policing."

- James Alison, from video "Homily for Sunday 23 in Ordinary Time Year A" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6MnbpZAWoKs)

~

"Matthew’s gospel is replete with midrashim, explorations of Jesus’ teaching on forgiveness. It does not help us to have these general categories like ‘to sin’ where we are then left importing all kinds of baggage to fill it up. Rules and laws and what’s right and what’s wrong. Because everybody fills up this generic category differently, each group defines itself by what it is not; it is not ‘the other.’

"The Gospel shouts that God goes out to ‘the other’ indeed to the ‘enemy other’, you and me. Woven throughout Matthew’s gospel in so many ways from Emmanuel to the Father who cares for the creation, the sparrow, the lost sheep, you and I, God goes to the other. God does this going indiscriminately, wholly in love, reconciliatory in concrete action. ... God is not willing to let even one little sheep get away, God goes after everyone indiscriminately. Everyone counts, even or especially ‘the little ones.’

"Vss. 15-18 then proceed to describe a community situation where followers of Jesus are not exercising forgiveness. They are holding grudges and seeking redress (are they perhaps reflected in 5:25-26?). These are the ‘brothers and sisters’ who are ‘sinning.’ How should Christians handle those who say they follow Jesus but will not forgive, who justify retaliation?

"The process is ordered in a step by step fashion to ... achieve maximum reconciliation. It recognizes the possibility that there will be those who stubbornly insist on their rights, who will not forgive. If these folks, who say they follow Jesus (‘not all who say to me Lord, Lord…), will not forgive, then eventually they are to be treated as those who have not yet known Jesus’ forgiveness of themselves, i.e., as pagans and tax collectors.

"Nothing is said about shunning here. Nor is anything said about exclusion from the church. It may well have been that pagans and tax collectors were shunned in general but this is obviously not the way that Jesus behaved with them? To treat the ‘other as enemy’ is not what is being said here. Such a reading is incongruent with the entirety of Jesus’ teaching as Matthew presents it.

...

"A positive mimetic reading of Matthew 18 frees us to perceive the true connection between scandal and forgiveness. Forgiveness, both to seek forgiveness and to forgive others, is the one attitude and act that can transform rivalry. A posture of forgiveness as a community has great power. It just takes two. Why two or more? Because what is being modelled is the relational character of forgiveness and reconciliation. ... So too, if we chose to read the entirety of Matthew 18 with an emphasis on forgiveness, we will radicalize the church. We remind ourselves as church that we are not about exclusion, but that we are most certainly about forgiveness. A church where forgiveness reigns, imagine that! How beautiful it is when brothers and sisters dwell together in unity!"

- Michael Hardin, lectionary reflections from preachingpeace.org (website no longer available)

[For analysis and discussion on all the lectionary texts for this Sunday, see also: http://girardianlectionary.net/reflections/year-a/proper18a/]

From the Lectionary for 3 September 2023 (Proper 17A)

Matthew 16:21-28 (NRSV Updated Edition)

From that time on, Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and undergo great suffering at the hands of the elders and chief priests and scribes and be killed and on the third day be raised. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him, saying, “God forbid it, Lord! This must never happen to you.” But he turned and said to Peter, “Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling block[1] to me, for you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things.”

Then Jesus told his disciples, “If any wish to come after me, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it. For what will it profit them if they gain the whole world but forfeit their life? Or what will they give in return for their life?

“For the Son of Man is to come with his angels in the glory of his Father, and then he will repay everyone for what has been done. Truly I tell you, there are some standing here who will not taste death before they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom.”

[1] The NRSV has "hindrance" in the main text, and "stumbling block" in a footnote. I have reversed it as the latter is the more literal translation, and also contains a subtle pun to the previous episode in Matthew's gospel, where Jesus gives Simon the name "Peter" (rock).

~

"Here is the same doubleness we have seen threaded through all the Gospel accounts. Peter’s picture of God forbids the Messiah’s identification with a victim. Peter rejects the idea of Christ’s suffering because of his natural human attachment to Christ, the attachment that leads us always to prefer victims who are not part of our closest circle. And he rejects it because he is hoping for a violently victorious God who will crush the enemies of Israel. Jesus says Peter is a “stumbling block” to him, offering a real temptation to deflect him from his path. If Peter were flatly wrong, this would not be a live temptation. But Jesus’ reaction makes it clear that it is.

"The objection affects Jesus for different reasons than it appeals to Peter. It appeals to Jesus because of its fundamental truth. This should never happen to Jesus, or to anyone. The wrongness in the cross is precisely what Jesus aims to oppose and overcome in bearing it. If Jesus’ death can oppose that evil, then that is why he will do it. But that injustice is also the strongest possible argument why he should not accept it. For all the wrong reasons, Peter has hit on the weakest point of Jesus’ resolve, and played Satan’s strongest card: to go through with this trip to Jerusalem is to implicitly cooperate in the most unjust in the long line of unjust sacrifices.

"Why would Jesus want to do Satan’s business for him? Precisely because Jesus is innocent, the strongest temptation to deflect him from his path is the simple truth. This injustice ought not happen. It “ought” to happen only if it can be unlike all the others from the foundation of the world, if it can reverse the practice. We can hardly blame Peter for not seeing how that might be. It requires resurrection, and a new spirit."

- S. Mark Heim, Saved From Sacrifice, pp. 152-153

~

"As we saw last week Jesus’ messiahship is at stake, the question of his character, how he will act, whom he will imitate is at the forefront. Will he be a Son of the Living God or a messiah in the service of just vengeance? This is the critical question posed by the New Testament about Jesus.

"The second critical question posed by the New Testament is how we shall perceive ourselves as his followers. This is explored in vss. 24-26. The fact is, the reality of discipleship consists of cross carrying, a willingness to be persecuted, but more so, a willingness to die forgiving and not retaliating as the Master has done. Jesus is not saying that his followers are to seek persecution, they are not to be masochists. But every follower of Jesus must be willing to die every day, forgiving.

...

"The supreme sacrifice is not service to country but service (death) for the kingdom of God. Bearing witness to peace, as Jesus did, being a peacemaker, as Jesus was, is the counter-cultural expression of faith. Standing for peace robs culture of it’s masking and mything of war and it’s continued use of scapegoats. Bearing witness to peace reveals that cultural justice is not righteous. Peacemaking, or ‘losing one’s life’ is the essence of Christian spirituality. It is the essence of Jesus’ person and work and thus stands at the center of what it means to be a child of God."

- Michael Hardin

~

"In today's reading in the Gospel from St Matthew we're continuing directly on from where we were last time. You remember, Peter somehow surprised Jesus by being able to say who he was - the Son of the Living God. Jesus recognized that this was something that he had been given - this wasn't something he'd made up or worked out - that he'd actually had an insight that was going to make him something very remarkable. And ... Jesus confirmed that by giving him the power of the keys, as you remember.

"So, what we have today is the direct continuation from that: the Davidic son who told his disciples not to let anyone else know that that's what he was at this stage because he had to enact that in Jerusalem now, from this period on. Now that the disciples have discovered for themselves who he is, he has to try and teach them what that actually means.

...

"Then Jesus told his disciples - this is where we get into the meat of this, if you like, ... because effectively he's saying something to all of them: if any want to become my followers; in other words, at this stage he's saying, 'you can get off this bandwagon now if you want' - “If anyone wants to become my followers let them” - our translation says: “deny yourselves” but the word is “disregard” in classical Greek, that's the way this word is used - disregard yourselves, count yourselves as nothing - “and take up your cross and follow me.”

"And people say, well is Jesus prophesying that he's going to be crucified here? We don't know. What we do know is that the cross was the ultimate shameful death. It was a death that the Jewish authorities wouldn't allow themselves to apply to other people. It was something that the Roman authorities used in particularly egregious cases, where they really wanted to humiliate somebody. It was their most humiliating form of execution, and carrying your cross was the person who is walking the walk of complete shame. So basically saying: if you want to follow me it's going to be a shame walk.

"Those who want to save their lives - grasp onto themselves, build themselves up, security, fine reputation, all of that - they'll lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake - those who prepared to go down the shame walk - will actually find themselves being brought in to be. “For what will it profit them if they gain the whole world, but forfeit their life?” In other words, you can have the highest reputation, the most the property, the greatest security in the world, and have completely lost who you are. We see too many examples of that all around us the whole time. “What will they give in return for their life?” There's nothing commensurate with becoming who you are called to be, and for that being something that will not know death.

"“For the Son of Man is to come with his angels in the glory of his Father and then he will repay everyone for what he has done.” In other words, who I am will be known from a place of shame, and the Father's glory will be bringing that place of shame into life and making it radiant and dwellable in, and the angels will carry this news to the four corners of the earth so that the true reputation of who God is and how God loves will be known. “Truly I tell you there are some standing here who will not taste death before they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom.“ So he's prophesying that this is going to happen soon. They're on a learning process and they're going to see this shame held in glory and if they're going to be able to follow that then they'll be on the inside of it."

- James Alison, from video "Homily for Sunday 22 in Ordinary Time Year A" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5s9-YLqu-4o)

[Source of S. Mark Heim and Michael Hardin quotes, and for analysis and discussion on all the lectionary texts for this Sunday, see also: http://girardianlectionary.net/reflections/year-a/proper17a/]