Will The Real Christians Please Stand Up
All my blogs so far have tried to help the reader to understand the theological import of one or more elements in each Sunday’s readings. But today, being the first Sunday after the results of India’s general elections have been declared, I feel compelled to offer a different kind of reflection. So, let me start by reminding you of these two sentences from today’s second reading that I found very meaningful in the light of the above-mentioned events: “So we do not lose heart. Even though our outer nature is wasting away, our inner nature is being renewed day by day.”
The currently completed Indian elections had become an extraordinary battle between a central government run by a political party which seemed to have it all on their own side - power, wealth, control of the media, a well-oiled grass-roots machine, plus the several allegedly weaponized, constitutionally created vigilance bodies that worked at its behest - as opposed to a fragmented opposition that somehow, just a year ago, was able to cobble together a hotch-potch coalition with many internal contradictions, but which appealed particularly to the economically and socially downtrodden, and to those who felt strangled in the current climate in India. And though the same once-powerful political party finally did get a chance to form the next government, it is now forced to be dependent on coalition partners - so that, as one mainline Indian Newspaper put it, arrogance and domination were brought to heel, and a more democratic rather than fascist environment has a chance to once more bloom in India.
This fight-back was not the battle of a single individual or a single party. In this battle, thousands, nay millions, of ordinary and disadvantaged people decided to stand up and speak through their votes. Individual artists spoke up despite their shows being cancelled, some professors held debates and seminars at the cost of their jobs, a few journalists continued reporting honestly and courageously, and individual influencers, at great risk to themselves, used social media to fight against the well-oiled and heavily funded social media army of the ruling party. They were not ‘connected’ to each other. They just decided to stand up. And throughout this David and Goliath battle, there were times when many of us, scattered as we were around the country, lost heart and we felt we were fighting a battle we could never win.
And therefore, for me, Paul’s words, written in the context of a Christian community which was itself being hounded and tortured by the ruling government of his own time, and was itself rife with internal struggles for prominence and power, felt very apt to our world today in India. For we too had to try not to lose heart, even as externally we seemed to be failing and losing, because by that very struggle, we were being internally renewed. It didn’t seem like it at the time, but the truth is that whenever we stand up for some value and struggle for it, we are internally renewed in our commitment to that value, and are strengthened to fight for it. So, for many of us who had taken our democracy and our constitution for granted, our unequal fight renewed in us our commitment and strength to fight for it. And so the struggle actually strengthened us.
In such times the words of Ravish Kumar, an intrepid journalist and Magsaysay Award winner from India, who was hounded by the central government in India, leading to his suffering much personal loss, resound strongly: “Not all battles are fought for victory. Some are fought simply to tell the world that there was someone on the battlefield.” I think Jesus, on the cross, would have agreed with him completely. To take this idea further, I remember seeing an old photo from Germany of a lone dissenter during one of Hitler’s rallies, a dissenter who showed his dissent purely by keeping his hands folded and refusing to give the Hitlerian salute, even as every single one around him in that large and crazed multitude raised their fists. Did his refusal change the world? Probably not, but at least it told the world that there was someone who was there on the battlefield, choosing to take a stand against the fascism and horrors that Hitler unleashed.
These are the saints of our times. Holiness is not limited to any religion, or even to religious people. Some of these who spoke up during this general election campaign period do not identify themselves with any religion. Such are those who will enter the kingdom of heaven.
In contrast, I am often troubled by the fact that many people (religious and non-religious) when asked to reflect on what is happening around us in society - when, for example, a new law or new rules are introduced that are unjust towards certain groups, but not directly against ourselves - often respond with a shrug, as if to say: “Oh these things keep happening. I don’t get myself involved with such things. There are others, leaders, who are meant to deal with these things. I have to look after my family and my career”. These same people find enough time in their busy schedules to partake of various religious and/or social rituals, but have no time or interest in becoming aware of what is happening in the world around us, the world that Jesus wanted us to get deeply involved in, when he announced his mission:“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to set the oppressed free,…” (Luke 4:18)
And so, when I hear these reasons for not being involved, or not making the effort to even think about such issues, I am often reminded (with sadness) that only a few hundred came to the seat of Pilate when Jesus was being tried, even though just five days earlier (on the day we today celebrate as Palm Sunday) it would seem that far larger crowds had thronged to welcome this new “Messiah” into Jerusalem. Where were these other inhabitants of Jerusalem, when an innocent man, a man who had healed so many of them, who had done so much good for them, was being tried and condemned and sent to be crucified, when history was in fact being made? Perhaps, they did not feel it was important to ask themselves about what was happening, and, like many of us today, felt: “Oh, all this has nothing really to do with me. There are others/leaders who will deal with it. That’s their job. I have other important things to do.”
In this run-up to the Indian elections, there were, of course, Christians too, lay people and priests and a few bishops, who did speak up, but there were also those from the clergy who propagated the ruling party’s hate narrative against the Muslim population, And because these were clergy from another minority community, their reach and their credibility was immense. And even though not everyone towed this hate mongering line, there were several other Christian clergy from all over India, including a cardinal and and many bishops who chose to strategically keep quiet and, in fact, went to meet the leader of the ruling party before the elections, and fawned on him. Isn’t it then to all of us that Jesus’ stark words in today’s Gospel apply, for when he was told that his mother and brothers had come to meet him, he does not call his family in, nor does he go out to meet them, but “looking at those who sat around him, he said, “Here are my mother and my brothers! For whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother.”
Of course, the Indian election is only one significant event that I have used as an example. But there are many other big and small events and situations where many of us have refused to even reflect upon, much less to engage with what is happening outside our own personal, familial and occupational circles. It is, of course, true that we cannot get actively engaged with everything, but surely we can choose to reflect on what is happening and keep ourselves aware, for as Sartre said: “I must know that if I do not choose, that is still a choice”. And keeping ourselves aware, we can then choose when and how to intervene, - sometimes with just a silent refusal to join others in raising our hands in salute, sometimes with a voice, however feeble, and sometimes with action, however halting.
First Reading: Genesis 3: 9-15
But the Lord God called to the man, and said to him, “Where are you?” He said, “I heard the sound of you in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked; and I hid myself.” He said, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?” The man said, “The woman whom you gave to be with me, she gave me fruit from the tree, and I ate.” Then the Lord God said to the woman, “What is this that you have done?” The woman said, “The serpent tricked me, and I ate.” The Lord God said to the serpent, “Because you have done this, cursed are you among all animals and among all wild creatures; upon your belly you shall go, and dust you shall eat all the days of your life.I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers;he will strike your head, and you will strike his heel.”
So we do not lose heart. Even though our outer nature is wasting away, our inner nature is being renewed day by day. For this slight momentary affliction is preparing us for an eternal weight of glory beyond all measure, because we look not at what can be seen but at what cannot be seen; for what can be seen is temporary, but what cannot be seen is eternal. For we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.
Gospel: Mark 3: 20-35
And the crowd came together again, so that they could not even eat. When his family heard it, they went out to restrain him, for people were saying, “He has gone out of his mind.” And the scribes who came down from Jerusalem said, “He has Beelzebul, and by the ruler of the demons he casts out demons.” And he called them to him, and spoke to them in parables, “How can Satan cast out Satan? If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand. And if a house is divided against itself, that house will not be able to stand. And if Satan has risen up against himself and is divided, he cannot stand, but his end has come. But no one can enter a strong man’s house and plunder his property without first tying up the strong man; then indeed the house can be plundered. “Truly I tell you, people will be forgiven for their sins and whatever blasphemies they utter; but whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit can never have forgiveness, but is guilty of an eternal sin”— for they had said, “He has an unclean spirit.”
Then his mother and his brothers came; and standing outside, they sent to him and called him. A crowd was sitting around him; and they said to him, “Your mother and your brothers and sisters are outside, asking for you.” And he replied, “Who are my mother and my brothers ?” And looking at those who sat around him, he said, “Here are my mother and my brothers! Whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother.”
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