The Offerorty and the Kiosk

A recent (satirical) post over at Stuff Christian Culture Likes got me thinking about how wrong-headed we are about the Offertory. This post started off as a series of Facebook posts and, eventually, I realized it should be re-edited into something a bit more coherent. I owe a great deal of thanks to my liturgy professor, L. Edward Phillips, my Eucharistic theology professor, Ted Hackett, and to James K.A. Smith and Simon Chan for helping clarify my thoughts in this area over the past year.
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Ok, I get that these things might be practical (just like online giving, I guess). Sure, the clergy does need health insurance and a living wage (and yes, seminary loans are expensive, but don't get me started on the education system...). If it helps, it helps. I question, though, the wisdom (specifically, lack there of) in separating the Offertory from the Holy Eucharist. The money (et al) that we give accompanies the bread and wine, God's own gifts which we return in thanksgiving, as our participation in the Kingdom of God (over and against the earthly city-state). The Offering is an act of participation in the Holy Meal (which is why, historically, Christians sent forth food, not cash), not the divine banking system.

Let me rephrase. It's less the separation of the Offertory from the Blessed Sacrament and more the substitution of the former for the latter. The sustenance, sanctification, and continuing salvation of the Church is in the Body of Christ (especially in as much as it makes us into the Body of Christ), not the image of our various Caesars.

Especially in as much as the Table of our Risen Lord is a place where all are welcome, be they Jew or Gentile, male or female, slave or free, white or blue collar, banker or janitor, wealthy or impoverished. The Offertory isn't about squeezing every available dime through holy ATMs and consecrated iPhone apps. It is about redistributing the gifts of Christ's Church to those in need. Our blessed Church fathers and mothers weren't concerned with building campaigns, worship expenditures, or the bishop's salary. They were looking after the widow, the virgin, and the orphan. The gifts returned in the Offertory were consecrated for the service of those in need.

The Eucharist is, even today, an act of rebellion against an economy of consumption. The ecclesia (assembly) sends forth its gifts (the Offering, including the bread and wine to be consecrated) that they might be given to the Church for the support of all. Communion is, by default, communal. To remove the Offertory from the Feast is to deny its original role in service to those in need. Worse still, to so completely divorce the Offertory from the Eucharist is to marry it to the very consumerist society to which it is inherently subversive.

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For more, see James KA Smith's Cultural Liturgies series (especially Part II of Imagining the Kingdom) and Ed Phillip's forth-coming work on God and Wealth, an examination of the ritualization of monetary offerings in place of the Eucharist.

Grace + Peace

Happy Last Day of October!

Tonight, I will be visited by one of two entities:

1. The Great Pumpkin
2. The ghost of Martin Luther

Either way, I get presents.

In honor of Halloween and Reformation Day, here are a few old posts from years past.

First, for those curious about Halloween, here's my take on the controversial holiday.

But, since today is not just Halloween, but also the anniversary of Martin Luther's 95 Theses.
For those who are completely unfamiliar with the history behind Martin Luther, I wrote a brief post a few years back concerning the event.

The traditions and teachings of Luther, though, are alive and well today, and influence most western Christians. While I am not Lutheran, nor would I ever dare to consider myself a great theologian, I cannot deny the importance of Lutheran thought in my own writings. Below are several posts I have written throughout the past two and a half years that demonstrate Luther's legacy.
Sobald der Gülden im Becken klingt / im huy die Seel im Himmel springt
"I am Yours. Save me."
"...of whom I am the worst."
Sin Boldly (But Believe in Christ More Boldly Still): Thoughts on Evangelism
The Simple Beauty of Salvation

Luther was known for his wicked sense of humor. And just because I can, I proudly present "I Got 95 Theses, but the Pope Aint One"


Rock on.

Hat tip for the video: Locusts and Honey

Pentecost

Today is Pentecost, the day the Holy Ghost came to believers.

Originally a Jewish festival celebrating the first fruits of the harvest, Jews came to view Pentecost as the day Moses received the law (supposedly fifty days after the first Passover). Pentecost was made all the more important by the events recorded in Acts 2, in which the Holy Spirit descended upon men.

And they thought we were drunk...ha.

Rock on.

The Last Supper and Maundy Thursday

Today we celebrate the Lord's Supper. While Jesus was celebrating the first day of Passover with his disciples in Jerusalem, he was also preparing to face his trial, torture, and execution.

The Lord's Supper brings many of the Jewish Passover traditions into Christianity. The most obvious are the unleavened bread, which Christ tells us is his body (very fitting seeing as he was born in Bethlehem, the "house of bread"), and the wine, which Christ tell us is his blood. These elements, he tells us, are poured out for us and for many for the forgiveness of sins. The texts concerning the Lord's Supper also tell us that Jesus and his disciples washed their hands, which while seemingly insignificant, is also part of the Passover tradition. In his Gospel, Mark deliberately mentions the sacrifice of the Passover lamb.

After the feast, Jesus and his disciples go to the Mount of Olives. Here, he prays for himself and his own safety, while still giving himself over to his Father's will. As he prays, Judas betrays Jesus, selling him to the Jewish officials for thirty pieces of silver. Jesus is arrested and questioned, he is disowned by his Rock, and the scene is set for Good Friday.

For more on Maundy Thursday, including the history of the name and Jesus' washing of his disciples' feet, see Mitch Lewis' blog.
For more on the Passover, see Exodus 12 and my post from Tuesday concerning the traditions of the Feast of Unleavened Bread.

Passover

Today marks the beginning of the Jewish holiday of Passover. For those who don't know, the Passover celebrates the Israelites' exodus from Egypt and salvation from the Tenth Plague. The story, in simplified terms, is that the Tenth Plague, death of the firstborn, was to come upon the Egyptians. To save the Israelite slaves, God commanded that they slaughter a lamb and place the blood over their doorways; this was to serve as a sign so that the plague might pass over the house.

The traditional Passover Seder consists of various symbolic foods, include matzo (unleavened bread), bitter herbs, a lamb's bone, and an egg. The feast also includes the drinking of wine and washing of hands.

It is also a tradition to place a seat for the prophet Elijah, who is said to come preparing the way of the Messiah.

For Christians, the Passover story foreshadows the coming of Christ and the events of Holy Week. According to the Gospels, Jesus was in Jerusalem to celebrate the Passover.

Next year in Jerusalem.
Rock on.

Power Behind the Crucifixion

I can't help but wonder if the powerful images of the Crucifixion of Christ are lost on my generation. Even to modern believers, I think that the Passion isn't as well understood as it was in times past, even up to the 1800s (though I would suspect that the power started to trail off after the fall of the Roman Empire).

Keep this in mind: I am not saying that the Crucifixion is not important. I hold to the belief that Christ suffered, died, was buried, and resurrected as payment for the sins of Man. All I claim is that the power behind the images don't have as much of an effect on my generation (for the sake of argument, let's group anyone below the age of thirty in here).

Christ was humiliated, tortured, and hung on a cross to essentially drown in his own bodily fluids. One of the reasons that this doesn't have much impact on us today is that in what we consider the civilized world, that type of thing doesn't happen. In the US and other western nations, punishment, especially capital punishment, are no longer public events. It used to be that the entire town turned out for hangings, but this is seen as barbaric now (and for good reason). People cannot grasp the idea that Christ was mocked on his way to die. The most recent example of this was Saddam Hussein, and most people claim that he deserved it. In the times of public executions, and in places where this travesty still occurs, the humiliation and suffering of Jesus might have a more tramatic impact. But not anymore.

The second reason that people fail to grasp the power behind crucifixions is that it was torture. Western, civilized societies aren't supposed to do this. We get up in arms about water boarding and the abuses at Abu Grahib and Gitmo (again, for good reason). We as a civilization cannot bring ourselves to imagine the pain of being whipped, beaten, nailed to a tree, and left to die. Modern executions, as horrible as they are, are nothing compared to the ways of old. Lethal injection, electrocution. All seem horrible ways to go, but there are worse ways, and chief among them is crucifixion.

Last, but certainly not least, is our tolerance of violence. Even when executions were public, the idea behind it was not entertainment but enforcement. The message sent was, "Be a good citizen and this won't happen to you." Now violence is fun. First-person shooters, slasher movies, and internet videos have made violence something to be enjoyed and laughed at rather than feared. My neighbors spend most of their free time playing games like Counter Strike and Soldier of Fortune and watching videos of police shootings and plane crashes. Few things are outside of the realm of public pleasure.

While a few things still pop up to scar the minds of westerners (the beheadings of Americans in Iraq, murder of missionaries), most things are considered to be too unrelated to us for us to care. Cases of genocide (Cambodia, Iraq, Rwanda, and the Sudan) are ignored because the populace cannot relate to the victims. If that is the case, how are we expected to relate to the torture and murder of a Middle Eastern rabbi nearly two thousand years ago?

Rock on.

Here I Stand, I Can Do No Other

Happy Reformation Day.

On this day in 1517, Martin Luther posted his 95 Theses to the door of Castle Church in Wittenberg, Germany. The world hasn't been the same since.

Luther, a Augustinian monk, spent his life in fear of God's judgement. He saw no hope for salvation in the Church, which had begun focusing on works as a means for salvation, and using Purgatory as a tactic for selling indulgences.

Luther went to Wittenberg to study at the University, earned his doctorate, and most importantly, realized the importance of salvation by grace through faith.

After the posting of the Theses, Luther was excommunicated, but refused to recant, leading to his famous saying at the Diet of Worms:

Hier stehe ich; kann ich keine andere tun; Gott helfe mir.

Which, translated, is "Here I stand, I can do no other. God help me."

As Luther continued to preach, many of the local princes followed him. While it was a long time before true religious freedom was found, it broke the Roman Catholic church's five-hundred year monopoly on western Christianity. The Reformation also served to divide the Holy Roman Empire between the Protestant and Catholic states, a pretty distinct line between north and south.

The Reformation and Counter-Reformation brought the Renaissance into the Church. Luther utilized the movable-type printing press (developed by Johannes Gutenberg a century earlier), the vernacular, and wood-print cartoons to spread his word (Albrecht Duerer was heavily influenced by Luther). The Catholic Church utilized art to combat Luther's teaching.

But perhaps the most important impact of the Reformation was that it brought religious life out of its stagnant state throughout Europe. After Luther posted the Theses, the average citizen started to stand up and take notice of what was going on.

Rock on.

Edited and expanded on 31 October 2008.