Again, we find ourselves reflecting on what it means to be
human as we observe the tri-partite fall celebration of All Hallows Eve, All
Saints or All Hallows Day, and All Souls Day. Sometimes known as the Days of
the Dead. We mock death, honor death, reflect on the lives of those who have
led the way before us, and ponder our own mortality as we watch autumn leaves
fall and scatter on the ground, blown by the wind, dissolve back into the earth
from where they came.
Jesus sits down to speak on a hillside overlooking the Sea
of Galilee. In the crowd, of course, are his disciples – followers – that group
of folks, men and women, who go where he goes, see what he does and try to
pattern their lives likewise. There are farmers, merchants and fishermen from
throughout the northern region of Israel who were struggling to keep their
enterprises above water as they were heavily taxed for transporting their goods
to market, and had to pay additional tribute taxes to Caesar as well as tithes
to support the Temple in Jerusalem. The presence of armed Roman garrisons and
tax collectors weighed heavily on their hearts. Often in debt, they would lose
the family farm, family vineyard, family boats and business – all of which
would be usurped by those they called the Oiko-Despots, rich mega-absentee
landlords, resulting in thousands of people who the Oiko-Despot saw as
expendables, slave laborers, homeless.
All these folks are sitting the hillside looking, listening
to hear some glimmer of hope from this Jesus they have heard about who has been
giving away free healthcare, meals, and companionship to any and all who come
his way. We only have three loaves of bread and thousands of hungry people?
Give it all away he would say to his disciples. Across the lake were the
hot-springs where folks like the Oiko-Despots from all over the ancient world
would come too pay large sums of money to be healed, and here this young man is
giving it all away.
Eventually, they follow him all the way to Jerusalem, that
city on a hill which was the religious, political and economic center of
Israel. For weeks now we have heard of various religious, political and
economic leaders testing Jesus, trying to ask trick questions, trying to
somehow discredit him publicly in front of his followers. While all along dusty
trek from Galilee to Jerusalem could be seen Roman crosses with fellow
countrymen and women nailed to them as reminders of what your fate would be if
you crossed the Empire, if you dared to challenge the rule of Caesar and those
collaborating with the cult of the Emperor. The crowd on the hillside were
familiar with all of that, and listen to Jesus for a word, a phrase that could
sustain them in the midst of all that felt oppressive, unfair and frightening.
Instead of talking about what to do, Jesus speaks to us of
how to Be – these are Be-Attitudes - Attitudes of Being. He calls us to be
peacemakers, pure of heart, meek and humble, hungry for righteousness and
justice, to acknowledge our sadness and the poverty of our spirit. Yet, at the very
center of these Attitudes of Being stands what Kurt Vonnegut once described in
a Palm Sunday sermon as the “one good idea we have been given so far”: to be
merciful – merciful toward others as we are merciful toward ourselves. It is
this attitude of mercy that lies at his reminder: to love our neighbors as we
love ourselves. To live our lives out of such Attitudes of Being, says Jesus,
is a Blessing and the essence of what it means to be human.
Jesus knows that until one loves oneself it is nearly
impossible to love others. And I suspect we can all agree, to love oneself
takes a heaping measure of mercy. It is easy to be hard on one’s self. It takes
awareness and attentiveness to cut our selves some slack and be merciful to
one’s self. What Jesus says is to become peacemakers, to be meek and humble, to
thirst for justice to roll down like waters, and righteousness like an
ever-flowing stream, to recognize that the true poverty of our spirit all
begins with mercy, with being merciful – full of mercy for oneself and others.
Perhaps being merciful says it all. We are, after all, made in the image of the
God whose property is always to have mercy.
We do well to remember these Attitudes of Being on All
Saints Day and the utter centrality of mercy at the heart of what it means to
be human. We have great lists of those who in the history of Christianity have
been remembered as Saints – those who by their lives exemplified a quality of
mercy in the spirit of Jesus, the Christ. Hugh Bishop of Lincoln who died 16
November 1200 is one we remember for his generosity, his dedication to
educating those under his care, and for protecting the Jews in his diocese,
quelling the anti-Semitic violence that broke out during the reign of Richard
I.
There are others we know, like Harriet Tubman, Martin Luther
King Jr, and those we have never heard of, with names like Fabian, Wulfstan,
and Phillips Brooks, who by the way wrote O Little Town of Bethlehem.
Then there is Laurence, Deacon of Rome who was tortured and
executed by the Empire 10 August 258. As Deacon, Laurence had access to the
funds of the church to care for the poor, the hungry, the sick, the blind and the
homeless of Rome. Swept up in the persecution of Christians by the Emperor
Valarian, Laurence was ordered by a magistrate to turn over the treasures of
the Church. Laurence went about the city and gathered all those for whom he had
cared for with the mercy and love of Christ and presented them to the
magistrate. “What is this?” roared the magistrate at the sight of such a crowd
of indigent street people. “Behold in these poor persons,” replied Laurence, “the
treasures which I promised to show you; to which I will add pearls and precious
stones, those widows and consecrated virgins, which are the Church's crown!"
For this Laurence, this living icon of God’s mercy, was tortured and killed.
On All Saints Day we recall these qualities of meekness, peacemaking, hunger and thirst for justice, and mercy which are at the heart of the lives of All The Saints the Church remembers today. Among the widest known words of Jesus’s teaching are these Beatitudes. All who embody these Attitudes of Being are Blessed and live lives of Blessing others. This is the heart of what it means to be merciful, to be human. Mercy is an outward expression of our Christian Hope that the falseness of this world is ultimately bounded by a greater Truth. We have these weeks leading up to Advent to reflect on how the lives of the Saints, the lives of our ancestors, and Jesus’s teaching on mercy can become the outward expression of all that we say and do with the residue of our lives.
All Saints Day calls us to open our hearts and let the quality of
mercy enter into the very fiber of our Being. Mercy is the essence of Christ
and Being Blessed. Now, as Phillips Brooks wrote it is time to let Jesus into
our soul:
How silently, how silently the
wondrous gift is giv'n!
So God imparts to human hearts the
blessings of his heav'n.
No ear may hear his coming, but in
this world of sin,
Where meek souls will receive him,
still the dear Christ enters in. Amen.
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