Thought I'd share it.
FEBRUARY 9, 2003
AN INTOLERABLE
VUNERABILITY
Today’s
Gospel finds Jesus in Capernaum—going to the synagogue for prayers, visiting
the home of Simon and Andrew, healing Simon’s mother-in-law and the townsfolk.
Capernaum was a village on the Sea
of Galilee—a village of those who fished for a living. First century Capernaum
has been largely excavated by archeologists. When I was in Capernaum several
years ago, I sat amid the ruins of the synagogue St. Mark talks about and
visited the site of what may have been Peter’s house. The synagogue was smaller
than the chancel area of this church—nearly as long but only half as wide. And
the foundation of what could have been Peter’s house was even smaller. The
houses were built almost wall to wall and the streets of Capernaum were only
about four feet wide. What struck me about the town was how small and close it
must have felt—how tight and confining.
The house was
only one room. Peter’s mother-in-law must have been on a mattress of straw in
one corner of the room. It would have only taken Jesus a step or two to cross
to her and lift her up, healed of her fever. Jesus and the four disciples with
him would have taken up much of the house while Peter’s mother-in-law prepared
a meal for them. Living in that house would have been much like sleeping and
eating and washing and talking in a space about the size of a modern-day
kitchen—that tight, that crowded, that close.
When we’re
told that the whole city “was gathered around the door”, we need to picture
people crowded into a space about the width of a narrow hallway, stretching
away in both directions. If Jesus sat in the doorway of Peter’s house only a
couple of people at a time could have stood in front of him. A crowded, tight
space—but not too crowded for the broken to find wholeness, for the suffering
to find relief, for those in pain to find relief. So Jesus touched and healed
until darkness fell and all who sought him had found him.
Its little
wonder then that Jesus rose before dawn to go outside to a deserted place to
get away from the confinement and narrowness of the day. He needed some space,
some escape from how crowded and pressed upon he must have felt in Capernaum.
*
I was having
a conversation with a friend and parishioner this week and the conversation
turned, as most conversations these days do, to what may or may not happen in
Iraq. I was saying that I was surprised
and confused by how the coming war seemed so inevitable and that most people
seemed almost to take it for granted.
My friend
told she’d heard someone say that since September 11, 2001, Americans had been
living with “an intolerable vulnerability.” The American people, after that
terrorist attack, had—for the first time in recent history—felt so
“vulnerable”, so unsafe, so exposed, so frightened that it has seemed
unbearable—“intolerable” to us. An
intolerable vulnerability….
Since
September 11, the US government has been granted wide latitude by the public
for anything that claims it will reduce this “intolerable vulnerability” and
make us feel somehow safer. With almost no opposition either within or outside
the government, there has been serious, perhaps irreparable, erosion of civil
liberties and constitutional guarantees.
All the government has needed to convince us to give away precious
rights is to appeal to our fears, our vulnerability. We are promised that
arrests without sufficient evidence, illegal searches and imprisonment without
the due process are justified because we will be safe from terrorists. We are being “closed in” by our fears and
vulnerability.
*
Jesus escaped
to the open places outside Capernaum while it was still dark. He went away from
the crowds and the tightness and the confinement and close quarters so he could
pray. But when his disciples came searching for him and found him, he returned
to the people, to the crowds to proclaim his message—the message he was sent to
bring.
The Collect
for today reminds us of Christ’s message. Set us free, O God, from the bondage of our
sins, and give us the liberty of that abundant life you have made known
to us in…Jesus Christ….
Jesus’ message is
the same today as it was in Capernaum. We are FREE from Sin and given the
LIBERTY of Abundant Life.
Freedom and
Liberty are the enemies of fear and anxiety and that intolerable vulnerability.
Abundant Life is life lived fully in spite of fear. Abundant Life is life lived
with the courage and safety only God can give.
*
Personally, I
question the morality of the coming war. I oppose it strongly. It is, in my
mind at least, a war that will be waged, not out of a longing for justice and
righteousness, but out of our intolerable
vulnerability.
However, I also believe most of
those who support military action in Iraq are convinced of the rightness of
their point of view. Saddam Hussein IS a tyrant and a monster to his own
people. But there is much that can be done to oppose and weaken him short of
unleashing our nation’s military might. I believe we need to act out of courage
rather than fear.
We will be no
safer after much blood has been spilled and Iraq is defeated. The damage that
this coming war will wreck will inflame and embolden those who wish us harm.
As a
Christian, I feel I need to cling to “the liberty of that abundant life” Christ
makes known.
Abundant Life
is life lived fully in spite of fear
and danger. We cannot ever be safe. But all that is most precious and most real
cannot be taken from us by violence and terror.
In fact, I
think there is freedom and liberty
found in facing our feelings of vulnerability.
Vulnerability teaches us humility. Vulnerability opens us to
possibilities beyond returning violence for violence. Vulnerability can give us
access to transformation, to newness, to hope. Living an abundant life takes
much more courage than dealing death.
Perhaps the
most troubling part of our current quandary is how inevitable the coming war
seems. Even people who oppose military action in Iraq seem defeated. “It’s too
late to do anything,” a friend told me about the coming war. “Too much is in
motion,” he continued, “it’s simply too late….”
The
vulnerable people of Capernaum—those sick and weak and possessed of Fear—sought
out Jesus. Their brokenness was intolerable to them, so they sought out Jesus.
And Jesus offered them freedom from sin and fear—he offered them abundant life.
He offers us
no less.
Christ offers us that abundant life
which empowers us to live courageously in spite of fear and danger, to live
with hope and restraint and faith in a time of intolerable vulnerability.
Christ offers us freedom and liberty, and it is never too late to seek him.
It is never
too late to seek peace—though our country’s leaders seem committed to a fight
to give us the illusion of safety at the expense of our national honor and
integrity. It is never too late to bring the Light of Christ to this fearful,
darkling world.
It is never
too late to seek Christ and to seek peace….It is never too late….
The Rev. Dr. Jim Bradley
St. John’s on the Green
Waterbury, CT 06702
