MARY, SISTER OF MARGINALIZED WOMEN

Eleusa Theotokos with scenes from the life of Mary, 18th century

My friend Ann sent me a link to the wonderful sermon about Mary that Ian McAlister will preach this coming Sunday.  Below is an excerpt.

While Mary was one of the original Jewish Christians, she was never a Gentile. It does her no honour, therefore, to take to her Jewishness with a bottle of White King Bleach. Don’t think we haven’t done that, believe me. We have.

We’ve turned her Jewish complexion into that of a blond, blue-eyed Caucasian. Not content with disfigurement, we’ve also taken to her spiritual life and made her into a 20^th/21^st century version of a Christian woman, which she ain’t.

Mary lived in a rural village, Nazareth, whose population consisted largely of peasants and tradies. Married to a local chippie, her life consisted of taking care of her large household. Besides Joseph and Jesus, Scripture tells us there were four brothers: James, Joses, Judas and Simon and some unnamed sisters.

Her days were filled with the hard, unpaid work of women of all ages: the feeding, clothing and nurturing of a growing household. Like other village women of her day, she was, most likely, illiterate.

Times were tough in l’le old Nazareth. This village was part of an occupied state under the heel of imperial Rome. Revolution was in the air. The atmosphere was tense. Violence and poverty prevailed.

To our shame, it’s only in recent days that we’ve even noticed the similarities between Mary's life and the lives of many others. The Flight into Egypt and the death of her son Jesus by execution compares with those who, among other horrors, have had their children and grandchildren disappear or murdered by dictatorial regimes.

Whatever else Mary is, she is a sister of the marginalized women in every oppressive situation. It does her no honour, then, to take her out of her dangerous historical circumstance and transform her into an icon of a peaceful middle-class, western woman dressed in a blue robe.

The sermon is one of the best on the mother of Jesus and offers perhaps the most realistic description of Mary and her life that I've known.  I love the emphasis on Mary's sisterhood with marginalized women.  It makes me somewhat ashamed of my rather flip and superficial question about Mary's perpetual virginity in my earlier post on the Feast of St Mary the Virgin.  How on earth did we get from the accounts in the Gospels to  "an icon of a peaceful middle-class, western woman dressed in a blue robe"?

The icon pictured at the head of the post with Mary and Jesus clothed in finery is hardly realistic, but at least the two are not blond of hair and fair of complexion.

Image from Wikipedia.

ROMNEY AND RYAN - "THE ICEMEN COMETH"

"Think of all the folks we'll leave in the dust."  "Oh yes!  Ha, ha, ha."

What a perfect headline and what a splendid opinion piece by Susan Brooks Thistlethwaite.

We are falling prey, in the United States, to the temptation to equate “freedom” with selfishness.

This is ultimately a counsel of despair and the direct antithesis of the biblical values of love and compassion.
....

Jesus of Nazareth was absolutely clear that we have a responsibility to care for one another. Jesus instructed us to “love one another” (John 13:34). Cultivating the virtues of empathy, compassion, and support for other people is the way we love one another in an individual and in a social sense.
....

Yes, Ryan’s attachment to the works of Ayn Rand is revealing of his own views and it’s deeply problematic. But the problem of selfishness as a virtue is far more widespread and corrosive in American society than the views of any one person.

Through decades of conservative ideology, the concept of freedom itself has been narrowed to mean simply ‘it’s okay to be selfish.’ In fact, caring for our fellow citizens is regarded as the antithesis of our own individual freedom.

The blood running through the veins of the individualistic, freedom-loving conservatives seems to have turned to ice water.  Ayn Rand's philosophy, or "morality" as she chose to call it, of the negation of self-sacrifice is the antithesis of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  The wonder to me is how those amongst the selfish freedom lovers who call themselves Christians reconcile the Randian morality and the teachings in the Gospel.

Thistlethwaite is correct when she says the equation of freedom to selfishness has leached into the consciousness of many in the country who may know little of Rand, while the ardent Rand disciples seem soulless in their lack of empathy.  To run a country putting Rand's philosophy into practice would result in life in a dystopia, the likes of which it would be difficult to imagine. Some brave and gifted soul should imagine and write a fictional account. 

H/T to IT at The Friends of Jake for the link.

FEAST OF ST MARY THE VIRGIN

 And Mary said,
‘My soul magnifies the Lord,
   and my spirit rejoices in God my Saviour,
for he has looked with favour on the lowliness of his servant.
   Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed;
for the Mighty One has done great things for me,
   and holy is his name.
His mercy is for those who fear him
   from generation to generation.
He has shown strength with his arm;
   he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts.
He has brought down the powerful from their thrones,
   and lifted up the lowly;
he has filled the hungry with good things,
   and sent the rich away empty.
He has helped his servant Israel,
   in remembrance of his mercy,
according to the promise he made to our ancestors,
   to Abraham and to his descendants for ever.’

Collect of the Day: Saint Mary the Virgin

O God, you have taken to yourself the blessed Virgin Mary, mother of your incarnate Son: Grant that we, who have been redeemed by his blood, may share with her the glory of your eternal kingdom; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

Do you believe Mary was a virgin throughout her life? I don't, and I hope she wasn't, for Joseph's sake and for her own. There is good evidence in the Scriptures that Jesus had sisters and brothers.

JESUS AND MO - RELY

From Jesus and Mo.

GOD DID NOT CAUSE THE DEATH OF JESUS

God surely anticipated that a person like Jesus would be killed by an order established on violence, but God did not kill Jesus, or require his death, or manipulate others into sacrificing him.  God may have found a way to triumph over this crime, but God did not cause it.  Jesus was killed by the definite plan and aforethought of the Powers, as the New Testament writers clearly state.

Walter Wink - Engaging the Powers, p 110

Picture from Wikipedia.

PERSONAL QUESTIONS AND A DRIVER'S LICENSE

A Mom is driving a little girl to her friend's house for a play date. "Mommy," the little girl asks, "How old are you?"

The mother looks over at the little girl. "Honey, you are not supposed to ask a lady her age; it isn't polite," the mother warns.

"Ok," the little girl says, "then how much do you weigh?"

"Now really," the mother says, "these are personal questions and are really none of your business."

Undaunted, the little girl asks, "Why did you and daddy get a divorce?"

"That is enough questions, honestly!" The exasperated mother drives away as the two friends begin to play.

"My Mom wouldn't tell me anything," the little girl says to her friend.

"Well," said the friend, "All you need to do is to sneak a look at her driver's license. It is like a report card: It has everything on it."

Later that night the little girl says to her mother, "I know how old you are. You are 32."

The mother is surprised and asks, "How did you find that out?"

"I also know that you weigh 140 pounds."

The mother is past surprise and shock now. "How in heavens name did you find that out?"

The little girl continues on triumphantly, "And . . . I know why you and daddy got divorced."

"Oh really?" the mother asks, "Why is that?"

To which the girl replies, "Because you got an F in sex."


Cheers,



Paul (A.)

Ouch! Don't blame me.

MARY BLACK - 'THE THORN UPON THE ROSE'

Mary Black's voice is lovely, and she sings with such passion. 

FOR MY SON AND HIS KIDS AND THEIR CATS.

Thanks to Doug B on Facebook.

MIKE WALLACE INTERVIEW WITH AYN RAND

Well!  So this is the "morality" that the Republican Party embraces.  This is the writer whose books Paul Ryan insists that his staff read when they come to work for him.  The video is a 7-minute excerpt from an interview of Rand by Mike Wallace in 1957 which runs to nearly 30 minutes.  I watched it all and found Rand's words and manner to be chilling.  First of all, Rand's darting eyes and body language are strange, indeed.  She is unable to look at Wallace for any length of time, and she seems to be shrinking back from him during the interview.

Rand's "morality" favors the rational self-interest of the thinkers who never allow emotion to influence their conclusions.  Selfishness rules, and altruism has no place in Rand's "morality".  If the policies of  laissez-faire are in force, then the common good will result.  Greed, which is as evident today as ever it was throughout history, the desire to accumulate more and more money and goods at the expense of those less fortunate, seems not to be noted at all.  By simply leaving rational achievers to their own devices, without constraints, Rand and her disciples believe that all deserving people will benefit...somehow.  By magic?  As for the undeserving, who knows what becomes of them in Rand's morality?

This one interview sheds much light on where the far right, who have now become middle-of-the roaders in the Republican Party, get their ideas.  What I don't understand is how a person who subscribes to Rand's "morality" can claim, at the same time, to be an observant Christian, Jew, or Mormon.  Objectivism is in direct opposition to the Gospel of Jesus Christ and to the teachings in the Hebrew Testament on mercy and justice.

Paul Ryan is Roman Catholic, and I have to wonder if he reads the church's teachings on social justice as assiduously as he reads Ayn Rand.

In an unusually pointed correspondence, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops urged lawmakers to consider the moral implications of their actions as they prepared to vote on the Ryan budget.

"We join with other Christian leaders in calling for a 'circle of protection' around our brothers and sisters at home and abroad who are poor and vulnerable," the bishops wrote in the spring. They said the "moral measure" of the debate "is not which party wins or which powerful interests prevail, but rather how those who are jobless, hungry, homeless or poor are treated." 
.... 

And he [Ryan] pushed back at those who criticized him for abandoning the Catholic principle of "preferential option for the poor and vulnerable." 

"Simply put, I do not believe that the preferential option for the poor means a preferential option for big government," he said.

There you have it from Ryan, the Pericles of Janesville.  (H/T to Charles Pierce.)

The entire 30 minute interview is here at YouTube.

WEEKLY REMINDER