The first dimension of resurrection truth in the 21st
century, according to Rowan Williams, is that humans and humanity matter. We visited that theme last week. The second (and these themes certainly
overlap) is that the world really can change. One of the fascinating features of secular
philosophy is the apparent commitment to not changing. We have all met the person who takes pride in
not changing. There are people who claim
that “some people”, especially certain offenders, “will never change” – and
therefore should be locked away permanently or eliminated. Human history up to the present day, it may
seem in our gloomier moods, scarcely fills us with confidence that the world
will ever change…
Jesus says otherwise.
Jesus’s resurrection is to say that God can turn human inevitability and
human mortality and human history on its pivot (to borrow words from Rowan
Williams) – it is to see that in all sorts of human situations it is
possible for things to be different.
Rowan Williams, who can be a little bit mischievous, then
goes on to point out that this is why Christians so often turn out to be a
nuisance – as Dr Williams himself was more than once, from his episcopal chair –
a nuisance to people who want a tidy world.
The Roman Empire was a very efficient administration – so much so that
it couldn’t find room for another vision of humanity which called for
difference and a re-valuation of human dignity.
Christianity was a terrible nuisance also to Hitler and the Third Reich,
as it was to Stalin, is now in China where the church is acceptable and
permitted only as the state can control it.
Even in the UK or the USA the Christian prophetic resurrection voice is
scarcely what the powerful want to hear or find comfortable.
It is because of the resurrection that Christians insist
that things can be different. In many
cases this is because the believers have found that they themselves have been
changed. It is reinforced in many cases
by the difference in values and attitudes they may see in their own families
and tribal gatherings, between some who are resurrection people and some who
are not, never think about it, ridicule it, or find it incomprehensible. Indeed, there are some people who
can’t and won’t change because of brain damage or psychological trauma of some
kind – we assume then that we care for them, as and if we can, but certainly
not traumatise them further.
Yes, the world can change.
The Spirit of God, whom Jesus said would come, whom Jesus described
memorably as the wind, blows through the ruins, creating, re-creating,
enlivening, making all things new.
Resurrection people can see the signs of that. The most powerful and movingly understated story
of resurrection I ever encountered is[1] in
German. Nine-year-old Jürgen,
in the rubble of Berlin, June 1945, is determinedly guarding the body of his 4-year-old
brother. “Why?” says a stranger who
appears. “Because of the rats,” says the
little boy. “But rats sleep at night,”
says the stranger. It’s a lie, as we
know, but the stranger is able to persuade the boy to share some rabbit meat he
has got, and some edible leaves growing up in the rubble. And so they set off, towards the rising
morning sun.
No comments:
Post a Comment