His
mother said, “Do whatever Jesus tells you.” John 2: 5
Greetings to
you all in the name of our God, Our Creator, Redeemer and Sustainer.
In a space of a week the world said good bye to some
of the greatest talents of our generation. The loss of the legendary musician
David Bowie and the versatile actor, the fame of Snape in Harry Potter Alan
Rickman was felt profoundly across the nation. As the world was still coping
with these bereavements, the ecclesiastical world particularly the Anglican
Communion was on the news this week for several reasons known to you. Where
some sections hailed that ‘the biggest schism was prevented in the communion’
on the other hand it was reported that ‘Primates suspends Episcopal Church of
USA from full participation in the Anglican Communion.’ Is unity achieved at the expense of
exclusion? Or can the split within the Church be fixed temporarily by axing
another Church in the name of discipline and order? How are we as a Church the
universal broken body of Christ, where one particular Church is slaughtered on
the altar of majoritarianism?
When we go into the detail of this week’s meeting we
understand that 38 Anglican Primates from around the world gathered together at
the invitation of the Archbishop of Canterbury for a week long prayer and
discussion on the life and service of God in the world. It was reported that
Archbishop of Uganda walked away from the meeting on the second day for not
taking disciplinary action on a particular Church until they have repented of
their decisions that have torn the fabric of the Anglican Communion. In light
of that, hurriedly, the Primates released their leaked communiqué one day prior
to actual day of release suspending this Church for three years from full participation
in the Anglican Communion. All because, the Episcopal Church has brought in
changes to their doctrine of Marriage.
Coincidentally and by the providence of the Spirit the
text this morning that has been chosen on the common lectionary, where Anglicans
and other Christians are called to preach this Sunday, after a week of hurt and
pain is a text, where Jesus and his disciples attend a wedding, a marriage
party at Cana from John 2: 1-11. Dear friends, allow me this morning to
re-imagine and reread this given text, “Jesus at the Wedding in Cana,” as an
ecumenical partner in the faith of Christ, for this week’s decisions of the
Primates have huge implications to the global ecclesiology and have a deep
relevance to the Christian faith in this our generation.
Taking a clue from last week’s play we watched with
our children from our Church, “Ink Heart”, where the reader is captured into
the text and becomes a reality into that text, so also I would want to imagine
if the Primates, who represent our Christian context are captured into the text
of John 2 and participate in the wedding at Cana with Jesus and his disciples,
where he turns water into wine. I want to present to you this re-imagination where
the Primates, Archbishop of Canterbury, Jesus, his disciples, mother Mary and
the narrator engage in a conversation with one another.
Presenting to you the re-imagination and re-reading of
John 2 in a narration form. A caveat to this rereading, ‘please don’t take any
offences on any of the characters.’
1.On the third
day there was a wedding, a marriage party in Cana of Galilee, and the mother of
Jesus was the first to attend, for she came to help with the logistics at the
marriage party.
Jesus had also been invited
to this marriage party.
Archbishop of Canterbury along with his 38 colleagues
who are called as Primates also self-invited themselves and attended this
marriage function.
The steward at the wedding noticed a bunch of strangers
who were dressed in purple with huge crosses on their bellies lingering at the
wine section of the party and asked them, “Are you ok? Who do you want to
meet?”
The Archbishop of Canterbury came to the front and
replied in his bass tone, “Thank you we are ok, we are disciples of Jesus and
have come along with him.”
The steward gave a long look at these Bishops and
murmured within himself, “Could Jesus not find any better guys than these bunch
of cheeky ones. Where on earth did he found them?”
The Primate from Korea who knew lip reading angrily
said, “Excuse me my friend, what did you say about us?”
The steward with a grin answered, “nothing nothing,
How are you all and warm welcome to this marriage party, let me go and call
Peter to come and take you to Jesus.” He quickly disappears to find Peter.
Peter then comes and says, “Hearty welcome Archbishop
of Canterbury and to all the 38 Primates. So nice of you Archbishop for
bringing them all to this marriage party. Come let us go and meet Jesus. I will
also introduce you my other 11 colleagues as well. Mind you Archbishop, we
aren’t as Biblically strong as you are all and as powerful as you are all with
dioceses and parishes, for we are all very new to this mission with Jesus, in
the of discipleship.”
Archbishop replies, “no worries bro, some of our Bishops
are here to teach you all guys, for we are coming straight from our fasting
prayers during the week.”
Jesus greets the Archbishop and the Primates and
invites them all to join along with his disciples to enjoy at the marriage
party.
2. Jesus and his
disciples had also been invited to the marriage party.
3. When the wine gave out,
the mother of Jesus said to him, “They have no wine.”
4. And Jesus said to her,
“Woman, what concern is that to you and to me? My hour has not yet come.”
5. His mother said to the
stewards at the marriage party, “Do whatever Jesus tells you.”
As the conversation between Jesus and his mother Mary
was going on in meeting to the need of the occasion, which is finding more
wine, some of the Primates enquired who the wedding couple are and realised
that they are a pair from the Episcopal Church of US and the presiding clergy
at their wedding was one of the priests of the same Church.
Filled with fury and frustration, some of the Primates
whose faith was ultra-rightist started to become uncomfortable and grumbled at
each other how disgraceful it is for us to attend this marriage of a couple of
this disgraceful church.
Among them, Archbishop of Uganda became vocal and
called on Archbishop of Canterbury and said, “Your grace, this is highly
unsolicited of us attending a marriage party of a pair from a church that
altered the doctrine of marriage, will you kindly take disciplinary action on
the Church for such acts or would you want a schism in our communion?”
Archbishop of Canterbury was shocked to hear this and
tried to pacify him and said “Your grace, don’t be in a panic, we can address
this matter, we can have a consultative process and resolve it.”
At once Archbishop of Uganda replied, “I have been
hearing this from so many years, will it possible for you to take a
disciplinary action on these Churches or not? Can you restore godly order in
our Communion otherwise I will have to walk out of this marriage party”
Archbishop of Canterbury then said, “Since we are here
in the presence of Jesus, his disciples and his mother, why don’t we ask them
and seek their wisdom and advice on this matter”
Mary, mother of Jesus who was overseeing the marriage
party and trying to get more wine as the wine gave out, was walking by that way
and on seeing her Archbishop of Canterbury took Archbishop of Uganda and ran
towards her.
Mary on seeing them, “Archbishops are you both ok, why
is there so much unpleasantness on your faces, I am sorry the wine ran out, and
we are trying to address it and soon our jars should be filled with wine, and I
am hoping for my son Jesus to fix it for me”
Archbishop of Canterbury replied, “No worries on that
mother Mary, we can wait for a long to get some wine. There is a more pressing
thing than wine on us, which is bothering our communion.”
Mary asked, “What is more pressing for now than not
having sufficient wine?”
Archbishop of Canterbury then shared the conversation
that took place between him and Archbishop of Uganda and placed it before
mother Mary asking her wisdom on to address it.
Mary smiling at the Archbishops said, “I have told the
bartenders at the wedding to do whatever Jesus tells them to do, like wise I
say to you both ‘Do as Jesus tells you’” She further said, “This is as simple
as that, you don’t need to look for matching references in the Scriptures or
don’t need to exclude anyone, but ‘do as Jesus tells you’ for I know my son,
for all that he would tell is just love and celebrate love. Anyways I don’t
have more time for now; all that I have to say is ‘do as Jesus tells you to
do.’”Having said this, Mary ran to find whether new wine was brought forth.
Archbishop of Canterbury said, “ok lets do whatever
Jesus tells us to do, what do you say?”
Archbishop of Uganda on hearing this said, “It is not
convincing for me. How much of Scriptures does Mary know? In accordance with the resolution of our Provincial Assembly,
it was, therefore, necessary for me to withdraw from here. It seemed that I was
being manipulated into participating in a long meeting with the Episcopal
Church USA and the Anglican Church of Canada without the necessary discipline
being upheld.”
Archbishop
of Uganda walks out of this marriage party, leaving Jesus, his disciples,
Archbishop, the other Primates. Most of them thought that he left unpleasantly
because there wasn’t sufficient wine for him to party and merry.
Meanwhile,
Archbishop of Canterbury called for an urgent emergency meeting of the Primates
and said to them, “Before the news goes to Jesus, let us resolve it ourselves,
for we can’t foresee a schism in our Communion. We can slowly convince Jesus of
our decision of excluding a Church for the sake of fragile unity among our
Communion. Since our Church pews are highly filled in global south than in
other contexts, in order to please these people let us unanimously levy
sanctions on this Episcopal Church and suspend them from all our activities.
Even before Archbishop of Uganda reaches his place, we shall quickly send this
communiqué titled “Walking in the service of God to the world” and save our
face and Communion. Mind you, let this news not go to Jesus and his disciples.”
The
two Indian primates who were present there on the one hand went with Archbishop
of Uganda’s perspective of disciplining the church that altered the doctrine of
marriage, and on the other hand praised the Episcopal Church of US for their
support to the Churches in India during Tsunami. However both of them in their
diplomatic style remained neutral and went along with the majority of Primates present
there and agreed to these recommendations and released the communiqué.
"Our
commitment to be an inclusive church is not based on a social theory or
capitulation to the ways of the culture, but on our belief that the
outstretched arms of Jesus on the cross are a sign of the very love of God
reaching out to us all. While I understand that many disagree with us, our
decision regarding marriage is based on the belief that the words of the
Apostle Paul to the Galatians are true for the church today: All who have been
baptised into Christ have put on Christ. There is no longer Jew or Gentile, slave
or free, male or female, for all are one in Christ.” These are the words spoken
by the Primate and Presiding Bishop of the excluded Church, which are uttered
out of pain and disappointment.
‘Do
whatever Jesus tells you’ was reeling in the heads of Archbishop of Canterbury
and the rest of the Primates there, for they knew the decision they made was
not what Jesus would want them to do. By excluding a Church and suspending a
Church for the sake of majoritarianism and populism, is not what Jesus would tell,
yet the Bishops went against the conscious of Jesus.
Meanwhile,
Jesus called on his friends to fill water in the ritual jars of purification
and turned water into wine, addressing the needs of the people and the
communities over there and elsewhere. At that moment, water was turned into
wine, ritual jars were turned into communitarian fountains of froth,
impossibilities were turned into possibilities. All because of doing whatever
Jesus told them to do. The bridegroom was surprised, the stewards were surprised,
the guests were surprised, mother Mary was surprised, disciples were surprised
at this miracle of turning water into wine. By this Jesus’ glory was revealed
and his disciples believed him.
Jesus
wasn’t interested in which doctrine of marriage did this couple at the wedding
at Cana was following; all he did was addressing the needs of the marriage
party, its people and their communities. Later on knowing about the communiqué
from the Primates of the Anglican Communion, where a Church was excluded,
‘Jesus wept.’
In light of the ongoing exclusions, marginalization,
discriminations, and levying sanctions by the powerful against the powerless,
the true message for us is spoken by mother Mary, “Do whatever Jesus tells
you”, which is ‘love God, love one another, judge not and always embrace the
excluded.’
After all of this, the Archbishop of Canterbury
forgets what has happened in the week comes forward proudly to announce, “We
are working for a common date to celebrate Easter and we are working along with
the Vatican, with the Orthodox groups.”
Where the world is not broken into narrow domestic
walls, into that heaven of freedom my father, let our Churches awake.
Do whatever Jesus tells you.
Raj Bharath Patta
(This is the text of the Sermon preached at St. Peter’s
Church & Chaplaincy, Manchester on 17th January 2016)
Cartoon Courtesy: http://www.weblogcartoons.com/cb/primates07/1.gif
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