GAY PASSION OF CHRIST

3. Jesus Drives Out the Money Changers (from The Passion of Christ: A Gay Vision) by Douglas Blanchard

Jesus in Love Blog is running a Holy Week series of Doug Blanchard's paintings titled A Gay Passion of Christ, along with commentary by Kittredge Cherry.  Doug's paintings are stunning, and Kittredge's excellent commentary does the art full justice.

The protest looks like a scene from Occupy Wall Street, although it was painted a decade before that movement began. Blanchard’s Jesus could be angry about the growing gap between the wealthy one percent and the other 99 percent, or about fundraising tactics that demonize LGBT people, or about countless other forms of economic injustice.

I highly recommend reading today's commentary in its entirety and following the posts during the rest of the week.  The paintings and the words provide timely meditations as we approach the climax of the Lenten season.

DOGS WILL GET THEIR REWARD

Our Diana wearing her Mardi Gras beads

It is taught that in the World-to-Come, dogs will lead in singing the praises of the Almighty. They will say to other creatures "Come! Let us prostrate ourselves and bow, let us kneel before G-d, our Maker".

Throughout classical Jewish literature they are portrayed as the most insolent of animals. How could it be, he wondered, that this very same creature will merit to lead in the singing of praises to G-d in the World-to-Come?

(Rav Yishaya)

A charming commentary on dogs as portrayed in classic Jewish literature.  Thanks to my friend Linda, who posted the link on Facebook.

The answer to the question may be found at torah.org.

Good Shabbos!

WHAT IS THIS CHURCH OF ENGLAND...?

Canterbury Cathedral

In The Times in London, which you cannot read without a subscription, Diarmaid MacCullough writes about the latest statement from the Church of England on the proposal to allow same-sex civil marriage in England.  Of course, I cannot copy the entire article for a number of reasons, but I'll take the risk of giving you a few snippets:

So “the Church of England cannot support the proposal to enable all couples, regardless of their gender, to have a civil marriage ceremony”. That’s odd, I thought that I was part of the Church of England and I can and do support the proposal. And I know quite a few other people who thought that they were part of the Church of England and they support it too.

So what is this Church of England that doesn’t? It doesn’t actually sign its name to the 13-page public submission it has just made to the Government’s consultation on marriage equality, but it is not difficult to ferret out what it is.

It is a curious theme park called Bishop World. This is a collection of middle-aged to elderly males, some gay (though they don’t like to say so in public), some heterosexual (and they remind us of that all the time in public). They have a penchant for wearing mitres, sitting on committees and talking to each other. They are ably assisted by a small group of lawyers and civil servants, again for the most part remarkably male. A high fence protects the environs of Bishop World, so none of the inmates are troubled by opinions from the distressing wilderness beyond its bounds. Within their defences, nevertheless, they are anxious, insecure creatures, who worry incessantly about the breakdown of society.

I hesitate to post the link where I found the entire article, but if you Google the first words of the piece and the author's given name, you should find it.  I would not want to vacation at Bishop World Theme Park.

Geaux, Diarmaid - er - Sir Diarmaid!

FURTHER COMMENTARY ON CHURCH OF ENGLAND STATEMENT ON SAME-SEX MARRIAGE

Here in PDF format is the Church of England's statement in response to the Home Office Consultation on Equal Civil Marriage, if you'd like to read it all.  The very first paragraph of The Church's understanding of marriage made me smile.

1. In common with almost all other Churches, the Church of England holds, as a matter of doctrine and derived from the teaching of Christ himself, that marriage in general – and not just the marriage of Christians – is, in its nature, a lifelong union of one man with one woman. 

 Well, there's sticky matter of divorce and remarriage, which is permitted by the church despite its understanding of marriage as a "lifelong union of one man with one woman," which seems to me to undermine their case against same-sex civil marriage from the very beginning.

Moving on...

Tim Ellis, Suffragan Bishop of Grantham:

‘...in what way can the statements of the prelates be taken to be the mind of the Church of England in this and other related matters?’ For, in truth, the bishops in the media have not spoken for me or the way in which I understand this thorny matter and, I suspect, they do not speak for a sizeable minority or even majority with the life of the Church. However, it is possible that I will soon be approached by the local media to defend the position taken up by my colleagues and the pressure will be on to ‘toe the line’.

Tobias Haller at In a Godward Direction:

The authors hammer away on the alleged "complementarity" of the sexes as a necessary component of marriage without apparently recognizing either the circular nature of that argument or the dangerous tendency towards Christological heresy inherent in its anthropology. The circular nature of the argument is: “Marriage can only take place between a man and a woman because only a man and a woman are of different sexes.” This is, of course, merely restating the premise. The more dangerous, and heretical, trend of this argument lies in the suggestion that the sex difference implies a different order of being for men and women. This is known as sexism, and it undercuts the orthodox doctrine of the incarnation. One would think the church might be more sensitive to that issue, though one wonders how many English bishops actually believe the doctrine.

Alan Wilson, Suffragan Bishop of Buckingham:

The mightiest act of God is his commandment to love him as we love our crooked neighbour with all our crooked heart. It’s shockingly unconditional. Someone wrote to me last month to say it beggared his belief that a bishop should think that “Love thy neighbour as thyself” applied to homosexuals. It beggars this bishop’s belief that anyone should think that it doesn’t.

Themethatisme at conscientisation:

There is the biological usage of complementarity, (not definition) and 'tis this, that is liberally sprinkled through the document as the Bishops seek a good legalistic euphemism for saying men's bits are designed to fit ladies bits and you shouldn't be doing anything else with that arrangement. Which owes more to the traditional definition of the word in which 'This port complements the stilton' or 'that handbag really complements those shoes'.  The two becoming one and being something else, a new ensemble, a new flavour, a fresh expression.

I've suggested a rather long reading assignment for two reasons: The first is that I believe all four posts are worth reading whole and entire.  The second is that three out of the four bloggers are Church of England, all but Tobias, and the statement claims to speak for the church.  Since the statement was released unsigned, the posts quoted and linked above make it clear that whoever put together the statement does not speak for ALL members of the Church of England.