20th Sunday in Ordinary Time
That gospel reading this morning would appear to contradict all our received images and perceptions of Jesus. 'The gentle Jesus meek and mild' is a figure that still lives with many of us since our early school days in infant class. In fact if you look at many of the popular icons of Jesus, it doesn't take a perverse mind to recognise there a highly feminised figure. I have in mind in particular those images that have proliferated in this country in recent years, the Divine Mercy image. Its is a highly stylised, etherised, feminine image. That figure certainly wouldn't have got his place on the Limerick team last Sunday!
Our common understanding of Jesus is that he desired unity harmony and peace among the nations of the earth. Yet here he is saying, 'I have come not to bring peace but the sword. I have come to set father against son, son against father, daughter against mother...' and so on. In this passage Jesus is putting himself forward as a figure of division and conflict. So how can we harmonise this text with our more common understanding of Jesus as the peacemaker?
In the life of Israel, there were three institutions that were recognised as essential to the life of the nation. Just as we here in Ireland have opted for a system where our three essential institutions are the Legislature, the Judiciary and the Civil Service, in Israel their three essential institutions were: the Priesthood, Prophesy, and the Monarchy. These three functions were essential if a proper balance was to be maintained in public life. All three kept checks and balances on each other. But the one who most often called 'foul' was the prophet. And very often, the other two institutions turned on the prophet.
We see a very good example of this in our first reading today. Jeremiah is undermining the power of the King by encouraging the soldiers to desert. Jeremiah had a very different view of things. The other two institutions have become corrupt, according to Jeremiah. There is no better cure for a corrupt regime than a decade or two in exile. So Jeremiah begins to work upon the remaining soldiers defending Jerusalem (some have already deserted). "This state is no longer worth defending; Let the Babylonians take us off into exile and we will start rebuilding our lives and our state anew."
Needless to say, the King's leading men didn't agree with this. 'This fellow does not have the welfare of the nation at heart. Throw him into a well.' How often have we seen that in this country: The welfare of the nation is synonymous with the welfare of a particular party or faction within that party. In fact there came a stage in the 1980s when the leader of one of our major political parties complained that, so many were his enemies, he was running out of wells! So the prophetic voice is still around in many shapes and guises. And, as in Jeremiah's day, the prophetic voice will never be welcomed.
In fact, if the prophetic voice is welcomed, then it has been tamed. It is no longer prophetic. It has been gobbled up by the establishment. This will always be a problem for the prophets. Will you fall asleep in your master's loving embrace? And, if you do fall asleep beside him, will he forget that you exist at all? Your other option is to annoy the hell out of him throughout the night! And if you do persist in annoying him, how long will it be before he kicks you out of the bed! It's a very difficult time to be a Green I can tell you!
From the point of view of the Monarchy (or the establishment), the old but difficult balancing act obtains: 'Keep your friends close, but your enemies closer'.
So we are back to this difficult gospel passage. There are two explanations that may be helpful. The first is that Jesus saw himself as a prophet. (Priest and King too...) He was here to speak the truth, and the truth is not always welcome in the corridors of powers, or indeed anywhere else. If the truth is to be stated clearly, as Jesus did in the case of Herod for example, the division and opposition are inevitable. The one who speaks the truth will inevitably bring division. That, in part, is Luke's message about Jesus.
Luke wrote his gospel perhaps between the year 80 and 85. Jerusalem and the Temple had been destroyed by the Romans in 70. The Jewish religious community is now seriously divided. This new religious grouping, the Christians, have been expelled from the synagogue. 'Brother is divided against brother' indeed. Luke is writing to put heart into his community of fledgling Christians. He is saying to them, 'The Lord himself when he was with us told us to expect this division.' So, stay the course. Or, as expressed in our second reading, the Letter to the Hebrews, 'Keep running steadily in the race we have started. Let us not lose sight of Jesus who leads us in faith and brings it to perfection.'