They should, therefore, dwell in unity and mutual respect, I suppose, but the opposite is true much of the time.
Two of the three readings contain references to disputes. (The lovers in the Song of Songs are in harmony with each other.) The question of fasting–that some people do it and others do not–arises in Luke 5. And in 1 Corinthians, that community’s notorious factionalism is at issue. Such divisiveness probably arose from well-intentioned attempts to discern and to act in accordance with the will of God and to hold to correct theology; that is my most charitable guess. However, again and again we human beings have proven ourselves capable of fouling up while trying to do the right thing. Then opinions become tribal boundaries. The result is an unholy mess.
The truth is, of course, that there is such a thing as objective reality, and that each of us is right about some details of it and wrong about others. Laying competing fundamentalisms aside and acknowledging a proper degree of ambiguity (in what Calvinist theology labels matters indifferent) is a fine strategy for working toward peace and faithful community.
KENNETH RANDOLPH TAYLOR
SEPTEMBER 27, 2015 COMMON ERA
PROPER 21: THE EIGHTEENTH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST, YEAR B
THE FEAST OF SAINT LEOBA, ROMAN CATHOLIC NUN AND MISSIONARY
THE FEAST OF THE INAUGURATION OF THE CHURCH OF SOUTH INDIA, 1947
Almighty God, by grace alone you call us and accept us in your service.
Strengthen us by your Spirit, and make us worthy of your call,
through Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord. Amen.
–Evangelical Lutheran Worship (2006), page 23
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The Assigned Readings:
Jeremiah 19:1-15 (Thursday)
Jeremiah 20:7-13 (Friday)
Jeremiah 20:14-18 (Saturday)
Psalm 65:5-12 (All Days)
Revelation 18:11-20 (Thursday)
2 Peter 3:1-7 (Friday)
Luke 10:13-16 (Saturday)
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Those who dwell at the ends of the earth tremble at your marvels;
the gates of the morning and evening sing your praise.
–Psalm 65:7, Common Worship (2000)
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The prophet Jeremiah would have been thrilled for that statement to have applied to Jerusalem. Alas, some people there even sacrificed their children to pagan gods at the valley whose name became the source for the label “Gehenna,” a place of suffering in the afterlife. Jeremiah condemned such idolatrous and violent practices and pronounced divine punishment. For his trouble he faced flogging and imprisonment. Yet those who mistreated him would, he said, die as exiles in Babylon. That prediction came true.
A common expectation in New Testament times was that Jesus would return quite soon. It was an age of apocalyptic hopes that God would end the violent and exploitative rule of the Roman Empire, set the world right, and that the divine order would govern the planet. In that context a lack of repentance was especially bad, as in Luke 10:13-16. In Revelation 18 the Roman Empire had fallen (within the Johannine Apocalypse only), but the imperium survived well beyond the first century of the Common Era. Discouragement and scoffing had become evident by the 80s and 90s, the timeframe for the writing of 2 Peter. Yet the calls to repentance remained applicable.
Divine time and human time work differently, but some things remain the same. Fearful theocrats react badly to honest prophets. The realization that God has not met a human schedule leads to bad spiritual results. Violent, oppressive, and exploitative governments continue to exist. And the promise that God will destroy the evil order then replace it with a holy and just one remains a future hope. In the meantime we would do well to consider the moral lessons of Revelation 18. For example, do we benefit from any violent, oppressive, and/or exploitative system? If so, what is the “Babylon” or what are the “Babylons” to which we have attached ourselves, from which we benefit, and whose passing we would mourn?
KENNETH RANDOLPH TAYLOR
NOVEMBER 23, 2014 COMMON ERA
PROPER 29–CHRIST THE KING SUNDAY–THE LAST SUNDAY AFTER THE EPIPHANY, YEAR A
THE FEAST OF JOHN KENNETH PFOHL, SR., U.S. MORAVIAN BISHOP; HIS WIFE, HARRIET ELIZABETH “BESSIE” WHITTINGTON PFOHL, U.S. MORAVIAN MUSICIAN; AND THEIR SON, JAMES CHRISTIAN PFOHL, SR., U.S. MORAVIAN MUSICIAN
THE FEAST OF SAINT CLEMENT I OF ROME, BISHOP
THE FEAST OF SAINT COLUMBAN, ROMAN CATHOLIC ABBOT
THE FEAST OF MIGUEL AUGUSTIN PRO, ROMAN CATHOLIC MARTYR
let those who love your salvation say always, “The Lord is great.”
–Psalm 40:17, The Book of Common Prayer (2004)
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The words of a dying church, I have heard, are
We’ve never done it that way before.
The Bible speaks again and again of God doing new things and provides examples–the main one being the Incarnation and all that flowed from it. The tension between the traditional and the innovative is an old story. One can find both gold and dross among both the old and the new. Yet how can one distinguish between the dross and the gold?
That is a difficult question, one worth wrestling with over time. My study of the past tells me that hindsight proves useful. Traditional interpretations of the Bible in the Antebellum U.S. South affirmed chattel slavery. Thus, according to that standard, abolitionists were heretics. Yet the alleged heretics were really the orthodox and the alleged orthodox were really the heretics. The new was superior to the old. Yet hindsight does not exist in the moment. That is a problem.
Here is another example: I like hymns with theologically deep words. These hymns might be old or new. Their value does not depend on their age. But “seven-eleven songs”–songs with seven words one sings eleven times–are dross. Thus I despise praise songs and choruses, heaping upon them a great amount of undying contempt for their shallowness.
Striking the proper balance between the old and the new can prove difficult. I propose a standard from Philip H. Pfatteicher, an expert on Lutheran liturgy. He wrote:
…the new is not always found in opposition to the old but arises from the old as its natural growth and development. Stability and continuity are essential elements of catholic Christianity.
—Commentary on the Lutheran Book of Worship: Lutheran Liturgy in Its Ecumenical Context (Minneapolis, MN: Augsburg Fortress, 1990), page 10
It is good to remember that our traditions began as innovations. They became traditions only with the passage of time. And neither theology nor liturgy should function as museums. Yet neither ought the faddish displace the tried-and-true, as my studies of liturgical development have revealed. (Some 1970-1972 liturgies have not aged well.)
Furthermore, some issues are questions purely of taste, with no right or wrong involved. One ought to recall that also.
Isaiah 48:12-21 condemns the faithlessness of both Chaldea and Judah yet ends with the promise of the redemption of the latter.
If you had only listened to my commands,
verse 18a reads in The Revised English Bible (1989). The commands of God are old sometimes and new on other occasions, from our temporal perspectives. May we, by grace, identify these commands and follow them, separating the new and worthy from the new and faddish and the old and worthy from the old and erroneous. So, with the worthy old and the worthy new, may we rejoice in the Lord.
KENNETH RANDOLPH TAYLOR
SEPTEMBER 5, 2013 COMMON ERA
THE FEAST OF MOTHER TERESA OF CALCUTTA, ROMAN CATHOLIC NUN
THE FEAST OF GREGORIO AGLIPAY, PHILIPPINE INDEPENDENT BISHOP
Liturgical time matters, for it sacramentalizes days, hours, and minutes, adding up to seasons on the church calendar. Among the frequently overlooked seasons is the Season after Epiphany, the first part of Ordinary Time. The Feast of the Epiphany always falls on January 6 in my tradition. And Ash Wednesday always falls forty days (excluding Sundays) before Easter Sunday. The Season after Epiphany falls between The Feast of the Epiphany and Ash Wednesday. In 2013 the season will span January 7-February 12.
This season ought to be a holy time, one in which to be especially mindful of the imperative to take the good news of Jesus of Nazareth to others by a variety of means, including words when necessary. Words are meaningless when our actions belie them, after all. Among the themes of this season is that the Gospel is for all people, not just those we define as insiders. No, the message is also for our “Gentiles,” those whom we define as outsiders. So, with that thought in mind, I encourage you, O reader, to exclude nobody. Do not define yourself as an insider to the detriment of others. If you follow this advice, you will have a proper Epiphany spirit.
KENNETH RANDOLPH TAYLOR
NOVEMBER 9, 2012 COMMON ERA
THE FEAST OF MARTIN CHEMNITZ, GERMAN LUTHERAN THEOLOGIAN
THE FEAST OF BARTON STONE, COFOUNDER OF THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH (DISCIPLES OF CHRIST)
For I am certain of this: neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities, nothing in existence and nothing still to come, nor any power, nor the heights nor the depths, nor any created thing whatever, will be able to come between us and the love of God, known to us in Christ Jesus our Lord.
I recall that, when I was very young, I heard my father speak of the presence of God. At the time my age had only one digit and my Piagetan stage of cognitive development reflected literal, concrete thinking. So I wondered where the presents of God were. They might come in boxes wrapped in shiny paper, I thought.
The “Presence of God” figures prominently in the readings from Ezekiel. The people have sinned yet the divine Presence will return to the site of the Temple at Jerusalem, the text says. And we read in Romans 8:18-39 that God, in the form of the Holy Spirit, intercedes for us. Furthermore, nothing can separate us from the love of God.
We are always in the presence of God, who is everywhere. Yet many of us do not live accordingly. And others of us need to live accordingly more often than we do. (I count myself among the latter.) Being aware of being in the presence of God and responding to it positively is the best definition of prayer I can muster. Such a response is far better than any number of gifts in boxes wrapped in shiny paper.
Above: Saul Throws the Spear at David, by George Tinworth
Jonathan, a Good Friend
JANUARY 18, 2024
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Holy Women, Holy Men: Celebrating the Saints (2010), of The Episcopal Church, contains an adapted two-years weekday lectionary for the Epiphany and Ordinary Time seasons from the Anglican Church of Canada. I invite you to follow it with me.
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1 Samuel 18:6-9; 19:1-7 (Revised Standard Version–Second Catholic Edition):
As they were coming home, when David returned from slaying the Philistine, the women came out of all the cities of Israel, singing and dancing, to meet King Saul, with timbrels, with songs of joy, and with instruments of music. And the women sang to one another as they made merry,
Saul has slain his thousands,
and David his ten thousands.
And Saul was very angry, and this saying displeased him; he said,
They have ascribed to David ten thousands, and to me they have ascribed thousands, and what more can he have but the kingdom?
And Saul eyed David from that day on.
…(Saul tried to kill David, who lives anyway and marries Michal, daughter of Saul.)…
And Saul spoke to Jonathan his son and to all his servants, that they should kill David. But Jonathan, Saul’s son, delighted much in David. And Jonathan told David,
Saul my father seeks to kill you; therefore take heed to yourself in the morning, stay in a secret place and hide yourself; and I will go out and stand beside my father in the field where you are, and I will speak to my father about you; an if I learn anything I will tell you.
And Jonathan spoke well of David to Saul his father, and said to him,
Let not the king sin against his servant David; because he has not sinned against you, and because his deeds have been of good service to you; for he took his life in his hand and he slew the Philistine, and the LORD wrought a great victory for all Israel. You saw it, and rejoiced; why then will you sin against innocent blood by killing David without cause?
And Saul listened to the voice of Jonathan; Saul swore,
As the LORD lives, he shall not be put to death.
And Jonathan called David, and Jonathan showed him all these things. And Jonathan brought David to Saul, and he was in his presence as before.
Psalm 56 (1979 Book of Common Prayer):
1 Have mercy on me, O God,
for my enemies are hounding me;
all day long they assault and oppress me.
2 They hound me all the day long;
truly there are many who fight against me, O Most High.
3 When I am afraid,
I will put my trust in you.
4 In God, whose word I praise,
in God I trust and will not be afraid,
for what can flesh do to me?
5 All day long they damage my cause;
their only thought is to do me evil.
6 They band together; they lie in wait;
they spy upon my footsteps;
because they seek my life.
7 Shall they escape despite their wickedness?
O God, in your anger, cast down the peoples.
8 You have noted my lamentation;
put my tears into your bottle;
are they not recorded in your book?
9 Whenever I call upon you, my enemies will be put to flight;
this I know, for God is on my side.
10 In God, the LORD, whose word I praise,
in God I trust and will not be afraid,
for what can mortals do to me?
11 I am bound by the vow I made to you, O God;
I will present to you thank-offerings;
12 For you have rescued my soul from death and my feet from stumbling,
that I may walk before God in the light of the living.
Mark 3:7-12 (Revised Standard Version–Second Catholic Edition):
Jesus withdrew with his disciples to the sea, and a great multitude from Galilee followed; also from Judea and Jerusalem and Idumea and from beyond the Jordan and from about Tyre and Sidon a great multitude haring all that he did, came to him. And he told his disciples to have a boat ready for him because of the crowd, lest they should crush him, for he had healed many, so that all who had diseases pressed upon him to touch him. And whenever the unclean spirits saw him, they fell down before him and cried out,
You are the Son of God.
And he strictly ordered them not to make him known.
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The Collect:
Almighty God, whose Son our Savior Jesus Christ is the light of the world: Grant that your people, illumined by your Word and Sacraments, may shine with the radiance of Christ’s glory, that he may be known, worshipped, and obeyed to the ends of the earth; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who with you and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns, one God, now and for ever. Amen.
I have been watching Bobby Fischer documentaries recently. The brilliant chess master was not emotionally, mentally, and psychologically well for most of his life. And his illness grew worse as he aged.
King Saul reminds of Bobby Fischer in some ways. The Biblical authors understood the king’s mental disturbance as the result of possession by an evil spirit, but today professionals would offer a clinical diagnosis. Nevertheless, one fact remains: Saul had become dangerous to others, especially David. Fortunately, David benefited (in the short term, at least) from the intercession his good friend, Jonathan, his brother-in-law and a son of Saul.
The lectionary I am following will skip to 1 Samuel 24 for tomorrow’s purposes, so I sense the imperative of explaining part of 1 Samuel 20. Many translations of the Bible are overly polite in places. Consider the Psalms, for example. Whereas a literal translation of Hebrew text might be close to “Look, Yahweh!,” many translators have preferred something closer to “I beseech you, O Lord.” Even the Hebrew texts use euphemisms for cursing, so many a modern version of the Bible does also. Then there is The Living Bible (completed in 1971). This is how Kenneth N. Taylor described a confrontation between Saul and Jonathan, per 1 Samuel 20:30-31:
Saul boiled with rage. “You son of a bitch!” he yelled at him. “Do you think I don’t know that you want this son of a nobody to be king in your place, shaming yourself and your mother? As long as this fellow is alive, you’ll never be king. Now go and get him, so I can kill him!”
A 1980s printing of The Living Bible in my library substitutes “fool” for “son of a bitch,” but Taylor captured the flavor of Saul’s outburst well the first time. “You son of a perverse and rebellious woman,” a standard English rendering, does not have the same power.
(Aside: Pay attention. This is probably the only time I will say or write anything nice about The Living Bible. The best way to communicate my attitude toward that version is to tell a story. A few years ago, in a Bible study of the Matthew Beatitudes, someone read them from The Living Bible. The ethos of TLB, so evident in that particular text, inspired me to sing, “I’d like to teach the world to sing in perfect harmony….” I was, of course, echoing an early 1970s Christmas advertisement for Coca-Cola.)
In the short term, at least, Jonathan was able to shield David from his father’s violent rages. Jonathan was in a difficult personal and political circumstance, but he did the right thing. Sometimes doing the right thing is both hard and risky. Yet mere human decency requires us to act properly. Are you, O reader, in a difficult and risky situation with conflicting loyalties? What does mere decency require of you? And how much might it cost you?
Remember that what I do affects others, as does what you do. What you do not do affects others, as does what I do not do. Your circumstance might seem like a small and relatively insignificant one, but it might be more important than appearances indicate, for we are all connected to others. So make the right decision and stand by it because it is the right thing to do, perhaps for more people than you can imagine.
Above: Ruins of the Capernaum Synagogue, Built in the 300s C.E.
Good Works are Lawful Every Day
JANUARY 18, 2023
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Holy Women, Holy Men: Celebrating the Saints (2010), of The Episcopal Church, contains an adapted two-years weekday lectionary for the Epiphany and Ordinary Time seasons from the Anglican Church of Canada. I invite you to follow it with me.
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Hebrews 7:1-3, 15-17 (Revised Standard Version–Second Catholic Edition):
For this Melchizedek, king of Salem, priest of the Most High God, met Abraham returning from the slaughter of the kings and blessed him; and to him Abraham apportioned a tenth part of everything. He is first, by translation of his name, king of righteousness, and then he is without father or mother or genealogy, and has neither beginning of days nor end of life, but resembling the Son of God he continues a priest for ever.
This becomes even more evident when another priest in the likeness of Melchizedek, and who has become a priest, not according to a legal requirement concerning bodily descent but by the power of an indestructible life. But it is witnessed of him,
You are a priest for ever,
according to the order of Melchizedek.
Psalm 110 (1979 Book of Common Prayer):
1 The LORD said to my Lord, “Sit at my right hand,
until I make your enemies your footstool.”
2 The LORD will send the scepter of your power out of Zion,
saying, “Rule over your enemies round about you.
3 Princely state has been yours from the day of your birth;
in the beauty of holiness have I begotten you,
like dew from the womb of the morning.”
4 The LORD has sworn and he will not recant;
“You are a priest for ever in the order of Melchizedek.”
5 The Lord who is at your right hand
will smite kings in the day of his wrath;
he will rule over the nations.
6 He will heap high the corpses;
he will smash heads over the wide earth.
7 He will drink from the brook beside the road;
therefore he will lift high his head.
Mark 3:1-6 (Revised Standard Version–Second Catholic Edition):
Again he entered the synagogue, and a man was there who had a withered hand. And they watched him, to see whether he would heal him. And he said to the man who had the withered hand,
Come here.
And he said to them,
Is it lawful on the sabbath to do good or to do harm, to save life or to kill?
But they were silent. And he looked around at them with anger, grieved at their hardness of heart, and said to the man, “Stretch out your hand.” He stretched it out, and his hand was restored. The Pharisees went out, and immediately held counsel with the Herodians against him, how to destroy him.
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The Collect:
Almighty God, whose Son our Savior Jesus Christ is the light of the world: Grant that your people, illumined by your Word and Sacraments, may shine with the radiance of Christ’s glory, that he may be known, worshipped, and obeyed to the ends of the earth; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who with you and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns, one God, now and for ever. Amen.
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Is it lawful to perform a good and kind work on the sabbath? Or, to state the matter another way, is it ever wrong to do something good and kind? Jesus’ answer is that goodness and kindness are lawful in the eyes of God at all times and all places. This seems obvious to me, but why was it not obvious to our Lord’s critics in the Gospel reading?
There is much depth and subtlety in the reading from Hebrews. Part of it is this: Jesus is the great high priest because of who he is, not due to his lineage. Thus he stands apart from human religious establishments, especially priesthoods. The Gospels tell many stories of Jesus contradicting something one of the religious parties (or a representative thereof) of his time advocated or did. He stood apart from them. Many people become quite defensive about religion, and some take this mindset to malicious extremes.
Religion which is inherently self-defensive is negative, and can turn easily against any good soul who just happens to have another opinion. In the case of these certain Pharisees, they turned against Jesus (truly a good person) and enlisted the help of Herodians, natural rivals. But the enemy of my enemy is friend, as the old saying goes. Even if one were not familiar with the Synoptic Gospel narrative, one reading Mark closely should pick up some foreboding hints about the fate of Jesus by now.
These Pharisees were holding onto their traditions and egos, and others be damned. Jesus be damned, they said, in so many words. The unfortunate man with a withered hand be damned, they said, in so many words. The man with a withered hand could not use that hand to hold onto anything, so he had nothing to lose but everything to gain. These Pharisees, however, had everything to lose.
Jesus taught by his words and his deeds that good works and simple human kindness are always righteous. Today we have other cultural and legal restrictions against good works and simple human kindness. Some basic facts never change, only the details, such as names, dates, places, and clauses. Yet some facts remain constant. God is love. God commands us love God fully, and our neighbors as ourselves. The Golden Rule still applies. And good deeds and simple acts of kindness are righteous at any time and any place.
I encourage you, O reader, to devote yourself to ever-increasing good and kind works for the benefit of others, especially those who will never be able to repay you in any way. Do this for the others and for God. And know that, along the way, you will attract criticism, sometimes from people who should know better. Some things never change, but neither does the divine mandate to love each other.
Let Us Emphasize Our Common Ground and Build On It
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From Evangelical Lutheran Worship (2006), the hymnal of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America:
Isaiah 2:2-4
Psalm 122
Ephesians 4:1-6
John 17:15-23
God our Father, your Son Jesus Christ prayed that his followers might be one. Make all Christians one with him as he is one with you, so that in peace and concord we may carry to the world the message of your love, through Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord. Amen.
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Now, for my thoughts….
We Christians have divided ourselves into competing theological and liturgical tribes since the earliest decades of the Jesus movement. For confirmation of this, read the New Testament epistles. Sometimes these divisions are silly or based on ego gratification. Other times, however, the matters are weightier. Yet the tragedy of schism remains, even after stated issues which people used to justify the schism have become moot points or ceased to points of contention. Inertia preserves a high degree of divisiveness within Christianity.
Sometimes schisms remain insurmountable. Yet this fact should not prevent Christians of good will from reaching across boundaries to identify and build upon common ground, to do something positive and for the glory of God together. I do not expect the Anabaptists and Roman Catholics to reconcile, but they can cooperate. Last Sunday afternoon I listened to a Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) radio interview with a Mennonite pastor who maintains a close faith-based relationship with nearby Catholic monks, often praying with them.
And I believe that when two or more denominations cease to have good reasons to remain separate they should open negotiations to unite organically. But when issues, such as baptismal theology, prevent a merger, the groups can still cooperate on other matters. We Christians have more in common with each other than not. May we build on that.
KENNETH RANDOLPH TAYLOR
JUNE 11, 2010
THE FEAST OF ST. BARNABAS THE APOSTLE
THE FEAST OF THE REVEREND VERNON JOHNS, U.S. CIVIL RIGHTS PIONEER
ADVENT, CHRISTMAS, AND EPIPHANY DEVOTIONS 
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