Posts Tagged ‘anger’

I have come to bring fire

August 13, 2022

Pentecost 10 – 2022
Luke 12:49-56
Marian Free

In the name of God, Earth-maker, Pain-bearer, Life-giver. Amen.

The Australian tennis player Bernard Tomic is a controversial player whose matches have featured “epic displays of ranting, racquet-wrecking and trash-talking”. He has thrown tantrums over not having been provided with a white towel, tossed a tennis racquet at a ball boy, and even spat at spectator during a match. At Wimbledon recently he accused a judge of being “a snitch with no fans”. It is hard to know what leads to such outbursts. Is it that he feels under pressure to succeed having been a child prodigy. Could it be that he is frustrated that he is not playing as well as he knows that he can? Are his expectations of himself too high? Is is irritated by comments from the crowd or other distractions that he believes have put him off his game? Or is it as fellow-tennis player and four times Grand Slam winner Kim Cliijsters was reported as saying that: “He feels like he’s being disrespected”. Whatever the cause of his behaviour, it appears that in the moment his annoyance cannot be contained, and it spills out in what is sometimes a vicious attack. His anxiety or frustration builds to a point where he can take it no longer and the sense of injustice, inadequacy or whatever it is spills out into an attack.

One does not expect such outbursts from Jesus. Jesus (at least as we perceive him) is more measured, more in control of his emotions. Certainly, his teachings can be confrontational and challenging but, in general we hear him as encouraging and reassuring. After all, hasn’t he just told us that if God feeds the birds and clothes the grass of the field that God will surely feed and clothe us? When he does have outbursts they are not directly at us but at Pharisees and lawyers (“Woe to you Pharisees”). In our minds, those attacks are justified – after all aren’t the Pharisees hypocrites; aren’t they driven by the letter of the law rather than the intent of the law? They are the opposition. They represent the establishment which holds Jesus in suspicion, and which seeks to discredit him – not the disciples and the crowds who follow Jesus.

The only other instance in which Jesus loses his cool is when he discovers that the Temple is being used as a marketplace. He simply cannot countenance such disrespect for Judaism’s most holy place. Again, that makes perfect sense to us. Of course, he would be incensed by the traders and money changers plying their trade in what should be a place of worship!

It is all very well for Jesus to be angry with and frustrated by the teaching and behaviour of the Pharisees, the lawyers, the scribes, and the priests, but today his outburst is personal and, while not directly aimed at us, is certainly intended for us. Apparently without warning, Jesus launches into an expression of such frustration and exasperation that we cannot ignore it: “I came to bring fire to the earth, and how I wish it were already kindled!” “Do you think I came to bring peace to the earth? No!” This is explosive language, language that has us looking for shelter, a rock under which to hide. It is difficult, confronting and unexpected. This is not the Jesus we are used to.

Jesus, the Prince of Peace, the one whom the angels announced with promises of peace is now declaring that peace is the last thing on his mind! It is true that he has come to “bring good news to the poor, to proclaim release to the captives, the recovery of sight to the blind and to let the oppressed go free.” But that is not all that he has come to do. He sees only too clearly the complacency and self-satisfaction of the pious, the uneasy accommodation that the Jewish leaders have with the Roman colonisers, the neglect of the poor and the abandonment of the marginalised.

Jesus did not come into the world because everything was going well – just the reverse. He has come to put the world to rights – to wake people up to themselves, to expose an institution that had lost its way and to reveal the self-righteousness of the religious leaders. It was not his purpose to commend or to reassure the believers of his day. His task was to shake them to their core, to give them a wakeup call and to urge them to see how far they had strayed from the faith of their forbears.

The religious leaders are so entrenched in their ways, so complacent and self-serving that it will take nothing less than a cataclysmic event – a blazing fire – to bring them to their senses. The place of the church, its practices and observances, is so firmly established, so deeply entrenched in the community, so clearly associated with the God of Israel, that it and its community cannot help but be divided when some respond to Jesus and others hold fast to what they have always known.

We can imagine Jesus’ irritation, his impatience when his teaching falls on deaf ears, when no one but himself seems to be able to read the signs of the times and when those with the authority to effect change are so concerned to hold on to their own power that they seek to destroy anyone who threatens their position. It is little wonder that his frustration should come to a head and that he should let fly and tell it how it really is.

“I came to bring fire to the earth, and how I wish it were already kindled!” “Do you think I came to bring peace to the earth? No!” Jesus’ words are jarring, harsh and confronting but they are apposite. If Jesus were to come today, nothing would have changed. There would be little to show for his life, death, and resurrection. By and large, the church and its members are indistinguishable from the communities in which it finds itself. It is concerned as much with its survival as it is with matters of equity and justice. There are divisions in the church that are apparently insurmountable. In Australia, fewer people than ever identify as Christians. We live in a world in which a few have much, and the majority have less than enough. It is enough to raise Jesus’ ire, to call forth his disappointment, his despair, and his frustration.

We need to take these words to heart, not to brush them off. We need to ask ourselves again – what sort of world do we want/does God want? And we need to allow ourselves to be tempered by fire so that all that is rotten in can be purged and so that we can be part of the solution – not the problem.

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Angry enough to do something?

March 6, 2021

Lent 3 – 2021

John 2:13-22

Marian Free

In the name of God who calls us to do justice, love mercy, and to walk humbly with our God. Amen.

On Friday I attended the UN Women’s International Women’s Day lunch. It was an inspiring, if somewhat gruelling experience – especially in the light of recent events. Australian of the Year, Grace Tame was the key speaker. I imagine by now that most of you know at least the outline of her story. Grace is a powerful and direct speaker, and she doesn’t spare her audience the intimate details of her ordeal. Sadly, her story is not unique, but even if you have heard other stories of abuse, you cannot help but be shocked and brought to tears as she recounts the way in which a much older man, a teacher in a position of trust, targeted her at her most vulnerable and manipulated her to the point where she felt utterly unable to refuse his sexual advances. How, in this day and age, could this man’s behaviour – in his office, on school grounds – go unnoticed? Why, in a world sensitised to child sex abuse, did no one notice or think to question what was going on? 

Equally shocking and revelatory was the speech by Dr Kirstin Ferguson who, at the beginning of her presentation provided a dramatic, visual illustration of the prevalence of sexual harassment in the workplace.  Before she began, Dr Ferguson asked those in attendance (men and women) to stand if they had ever experienced sexual harassment at work. At least two thirds of the room rose to their feet – two thirds of a room filled with professional people. Dr Ferguson went on to tell us that 1,600 hundred women a week, experience some sort of sexual harassment at work. 

Listening to the two women was a salutary and sobering experience.

What does it say about our society that a fifteen-year-old girl can be raped every day at school – in the office of a 58-year-old teacher? Who are we that one woman dies every week at the hands of someone who professes to love her? How is it that our aged care system is so broken that vulnerable older people are over-medicated, mistreated and badly fed? Why is that we cannot assume that our workplaces and schools are safe and nurturing environments? Why can’t we keep our children safe from abuse? 

Something at the very heart of human nature is broken. Countless Royal Commissions and changes to legislation have been powerless to bring about the institutional change that is required so that all people can live and work with dignity. More importantly, no amount of legislation has been able to bring about the personal transformation that is required to build a society in which all the vulnerable are protected and nurtured – not abused or exploited.

In today’s gospel Jesus is angry, very angry. He is angry that the Temple (or at least its forecourt) has been turned into a marketplace. He is angry because he can see the way in which Temple practices exploit the poor, take advantage of the vulnerable and exclude those who cannot take part in the Jewish rituals. 

This event is the most explicit description of Jesus’ anger. It is the moment at which all his frustration and rage reaches boiling point – resulting in his fashioning a whip so that he can drive traders and animals from the Temple and overthrowing tables covered with money. It is the most explicit expression of Jesus’ anger, but it is not the only time that he gets angry.

We know that Jesus got angry at the hypocrisy of the Pharisees, at the indifference of the rich towards the poor and at the apathy of the comfortable towards those who were suffering. Jesus got angry when he saw the religious leaders put the law before compassion while congratulating themselves on their own state of righteousness. Jesus got angry at the complacency, self-satisfaction and judgementalism of those who thought themselves better than sinners, prostitutes and tax collectors. Jesus got angry with those who put burdens on the shoulders of others and who created barriers which prevented them from seeing how much God loved them.  Jesus got angry at the failure of the disciples to understand, at their desire for power and at their belief that they should be rewarded for joining his cause. 

Most importantly, Jesus got angry because the religious institution of his day was broken. Despite John’s call to repentance nothing had changed. Jesus’ contemporaries still believed that the outward practices of sacrifice and ritual were sufficient. Jesus could see that what was really needed was a change of heart, repentance and personal transformation – all of which are much more difficult to achieve than simply presenting a semblance of goodness, observing rituals or consoling oneself with the knowledge that at least one is not as bad as the next person.    

Jesus got angry at injustice and suffering, at pretention and arrogance, at self-serving behaviour and at the refusal to take responsibility for one’s behaviour. Jesus got angry at indifference and inaction. 

Jesus saw a broken world. His grief and angry at what he saw spurred him into action. 

We live in a broken and damaged world, but do we get angry? Do we get angry enough about the exploitation of the poor, the disenfranchised or the refugee? Do we voice our anger loudly enough with regard to people trafficking and slavery? Do we speak out loudly enough against violence towards women or the abuse of children? Do we protest strongly enough about the neglect and abuse of the elderly or the destruction of indigenous sacred sites? Do we rage against injustice, corporate greed and the destruction of the planet? Do we rail against indifference and carelessness? Do we care enough to do something about what we see?

Our world is broken and needs from each of us a change of heart. When will we be angry enough to take action? 

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In the name of God who calls us to do justice, love mercy, and to walk humbly with our God. Amen.

Equally shocking and revelatory was the speech by Dr Kirstin Ferguson who, at the beginning of her presentation provided a dramatic, visual illustration of the prevalence of sexual harassment in the workplace.  Before she began, Dr Ferguson asked those in attendance (men and women) to stand if they had ever experienced sexual harassment at work. At least two thirds of the room rose to their feet – two thirds of a room filled with professionals. Dr Ferguson went on to tell us that 1,600 hundred women a week, experience some sort of sexual harassment at work. 

Listening to the two women was a salutary and sobering experience.

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A frightened, angry Jesus

April 9, 2020

Maundy Thursday – 2020
John 13:1-17,31b-35 (1 Cor 11:23-26)
Marian Free

In the name of God, Earth Maker, Pain Bearer, Life Giver. Amen.

Several years ago, I came across an extraordinary video titled Coach Trip to Calvary. The video followed a mixed group of travellers in the Holy Land and their Palestinian driver. As the small tour group visited the sites of some of the biblical stories, they became a part of the story. In other words, there were two parallel narratives – that of the tourists and that of the events of Jesus’ life – but the characters remained the same. The biblical story was transported into the present and the tourists entered into it as themselves which made the story incredibly real, if a little confusing.

The scene that remains with me is that of the last supper. In this scene the Palestinian bus driver takes on the role of Jesus and the tourists the role of Jesus’ disciples. The group are in a cheap café, seated on benches at a trestle table. The lighting is low, and the meal consists of shared plates, pita bread and wine. Without warning, the driver (who has morphed into Jesus), takes the bread and violently tears it. “This is my body which will be given for you”, he says angrily, handing the bread to the surprised disciples. It is a confronting scene – a far cry from the peaceful domesticity depicted by such artists as Leonardo da Vinci. As I watched, I cringed, whether from embarrassment, discomfort or fear I’m not sure, but this was not the Jesus I knew, the Jesus with whom I was comfortable, the Jesus whom the gospels describe as going quietly to his death. The Jesus presented here was an angry, hurting Jesus, an all too human Jesus, Jesus who knew what lay ahead and who was expressing his fear and anguish that it had come to this.

I suspect that my discomfort lay here. I had allowed myself to think that while Jesus did have some qualms he was relatively accepting about his fate, willing to do what was required (or willing to accept the consequences of his actions). The very domestic setting of the last supper in the gospels lulled me into the belief that Jesus’ final meal with his friends was relatively calm. My reading of the text and my experience of the Eucharist had conveniently ignored the sense of foreboding at that meal and the hint of the violent and the gruesome death that would follow. Witnessing Jesus’ angry, violent tearing of the bread shocked me into a recognition of my complacency and of my comfortable, armchair view of Jesus’ trial and persecution.

I was brought up short and I cannot help but wonder why the disciples were not so moved by Jesus’ distress that they were able to stay awake, to stand by him, to be identified as a disciple and if need be to share his death.

Tonight, we remember that night. We are challenged to hear Jesus’ pain, to stay awake, to watch while he prays and, if need be, to walk with him to the cross.

 

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At peace with ourselves – with the world.

April 11, 2015

Easter 2 – 2015
John 20:19-31
Marian Free

In the name of God who gives us all that we need, if only we were ready to accept what God has to give. Amen.

Of course, I don’t need to tell you that the news is full of bad news stories. This morning for example , I woke to the news that in my own city, less than twenty miles from my home, a man of fifty-five had been killed – his neighbour was upset by the amount of noise that he was making. Later in the day, I heard that a young woman had been arrested for the murder of her father-in-law (her husband having already been arrested for the same offense). The newspaper provided an update on the man who had nearly killed his brother, by knocking him to the ground after they had visited a nightclub together and there was also a report on the guilty verdict for the “Boston bomber”. I could go on – the litany of crimes committed in anger, frustration, greed or need for power is just appalling.

Despite Jesus’ resurrection gift to the disciples, peace and harmony seem to be illusive even on the domestic front. The problem of course, lies with us – with the very human needs to be in control, to feel important and to put ourselves first.

What that means is that as long as there are people who are filled with anger and insecurity; as long as people feel entitled to do what they want and to behave how they want to behave; as long as there are some who are so concerned with their own comforts and own desires that they are able to disregard the concerns and interests of their neighbours: as long as some are filled with self-doubt: as long as there are some who feel that the world owes them something; there will be people who will resent any attempt to limit or curtain their activity, those who vent their fury in violent actions; those who seek to build their own prosperity with little or no regard for the cost to those who labour makes them rich or to consequences for the environment or the wider society and there will be those who will seek to diminish others in order to prove themselves smarter, better, stronger.

It is all too easy to imagine that such people are very different from ourselves – that we are above such petty, nasty, aggressive behaviour. But I wonder, are we really so different? Are we, those who profess the faith, perfect examples of the peace that Jesus gives? When others look at us, do they see our deep contentment with life our satisfaction with who we are and what we have? Are we so secure in our (God created) selves that we have no need to fill our emptiness with possessions, achievements or comparisons with others? Do others looks at us and see in us anything that separates ourselves/our lives from their own? Do we really stand out from the world around us?

Let me be clear that I have enormous respect for members of the Parishes in which I have served. Their life and their faith has often challenged my own. In general though, I suspect that too few of us find our meaning entirely in Jesus, that not enough of us seek above all that peace which only Jesus can give and that not all of us really believe that we can trust God with every aspect of our lives.

For the world to be a better place we would all need to find our meaning, our hope, our security and our peace in the Trinity – in God our Creator, Jesus our Redeemer and the Spirit our enlivener. As long as we look elsewhere we will not be at peace and our striving, our frustration, our fears and our anxieties will be taken out on others (intentionally or otherwise).

As I write this, the words of a well-known hymn are repeating themselves in my head:

Drop thy still dews of quietness,
till all our strivings cease;
take from our souls the strain and stress,
and let our ordered lives confess
the beauty of thy peace,
the beauty of thy peace.

Breathe through the heats of our desire
thy coolness and thy balm;
let sense be dumb, let flesh retire;
speak through the earthquake, wind, and fire,
O still small voice of calm,
O still small voice of calm. John Greenleaf Whittier

May we together seek the beauty of that peace which Jesus alone can offer, and in relinquishing our striving to be other than who we are, find our true selves and know the presence of God there.

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