Jesus wants you to steal.

I have to confess that I never understood Jesus' parable of the dishonest steward (Luke 16:1-12). It was only recently, while reading Richard Horsley's book "Bandits, Prophets, and Messiahs," that it finally made sense to me. I've read several of Horsley's books but for some reason it finally made sense to me now.

I've heard sermons on the parable and read things on it, but they always spiritualize the text or assume a social context similar to our own, by which I mean an industrial (though perhaps we're post-industrial) economy with a middle class. That's not the case. The steward was not skimming money off the top, and his master was not a legitimate business man, but a wealthy landlord operating with the blessing of Rome who was probably given a vast estate that already belonged to others. What was owed him was part of a vicious cycle of economic exploitation where the poor were robbed of even the little that they had. (Some estimates put total taxation at 2/3 of crops.) Eventually, through Roman taxation, local taxation, and the temple taxes (what we call "tithe"), peasant farmers, surviving on subsistence farming and dependent on good weather, would often lose their land and end up as day laborers working for an absentee landlord for meager wages. Such conditions resulted in increased banditry, among other things. The New Testament shows evidence of this in Jesus' trial. Barabas, who was release instead of Jesus-- was an insurrectionist, one of many. Likewise, the two crucified next to Jesus were bandits, not mere theives. They robbed Roman caravans, and often shared the wealth with local villages, who offerred the bandits protection from local authorities. History is full of such examples, the most famous being Robin Hood.

But Robin Hood stole. Does that mean that what he did was wrong? Not according to Thomas Aquinas. Aquinas argues that since all things belong to God, when a poor person takes what he needs as a matter of survival from a rich person, he is not stealing. I think Jesus would agree.

The "dishonest steward" was not giving up his commission in writing down the debts of farmers (certainly the beneficiaries of his action, rather than merchants). Rather, he was breaking the stranglehold of economic exploitation that follows imperialism. He was giving the farmers a fighting chance. In a society where patronage was the norm, this would have indebted the farmes to him. They would not owe him goods, but hospitality. He was creating space for himself among the villagers as a sort of hero, as some one who dared to take on the system, even if his motives were not entirely charitable. And since the peasants would have viewed the Roman occupation is illegitimate, and collaborators as heretics, then it was a hero's welcome he would have.

So what do Jesus' comments on the story mean? "Use worldly wealth to gain friends for youreself so that when it is gone, you may be welcome into eternal dwellings." A typical interpreation would not be able to make sense of this. But if we read it within the upside down matrix of the kingdom, it makes sense. Jesus wants us to use the mechanisms available to us to do good. (Think Rage Against the Machine guitarist Tom Morello having a Harvard education.) We need to be as shrewd as we can in order to help others secure their well being, specifically the poor, for whom God has a "preferential option." Sometimes what we're called to do may not be legal, but history has shone that was is legal and what is right are not always the same thing. In the kingdom we sometimes defy the world's code of ethics in order to serve a greater good, and when we do this we are faithful.

Note: This is not the same as doing evil to bring about good. That is strictly forbidden. What this means is that we do good, even if such good defied cultural norms, sensitivities, or laws.

An Orthodoxy that Never Was

Like the last several years, I currently find myself a minority. I'm a white middle-class male, but I am a minority nonetheless, and not just in society, but in the church, perhaps especially in the church. I struggle with this. Frankly, I'm tired of it. I'm tired of having to defend myself from people who are clueless, but think they know because they've read the Bible once or prayed about it and have a "feeling." I'm tired of being on the outside. I don't really have a space in the church, at least locally. Conservatives think I'm too liberal and liberals think I'm too Orthodox, and I'm certainly not polite enough to be either and join them in their captivity to various cultural and political forces. My lack of space, and thus supportive community, sometimes makes me a bit cranky in "discussions," which often doesn't help my case.

I do resonate a lot with what's going on in the Emergent Church movement, less so because I'm influenced by them and more because I think we read the same people. I like what's going on there, most of it anyway. It's not totally united, and in some forms it seems to be just a repackaged evangelicalism. Same junk food in a shiny wrapper. No thanks. I don't want a new box. I want to ditch the refined sugars and have something hearty--organic, whole, and healthy spirituality.

Some of the irony of evangelicalism is that it's basically 80 years old, a reaction against the liberalism of the 19th-century. Though captive to modernity, it is awash in illogic. It's doctrines can't be reconciled, as it's critics often point out. My older brother is one such critic. He raises various objections, I explain them away using the skills I've acquired in my theological studies and he accuses me of remaking Christianity in my own image. Interesting. I don't. I have my methodologies. They're sound. But they lead to radically different conclusions than those drawn by evangelicalism. This doesn't make me unorthodox. In fact, I am quite orthodox. I really enjoy patristic and medieval theology, especially the early trinitarian stuff. The problem is that evengelicals don't read anything before the Jesus Movement. They don't know who the Cappadocian fathers are. They know Augustine by name, but that's it. Ironically, though sometimes accussed of not upholding Christian doctrine, I am much more orthodox in my christology and trinitarianism than most evangelicals. They dont' study, they read the Bible and know what it says. (They dont' intrepret because interpretation is the "traditions of man," failing to realize that their reading is itself an interpretation.)

This doesn't mean that I always agree with everything the Church catholic has professed. I'm a universalist ultimately (There is, however, a strong universalist tradition in pre-Constantine Christianity. In fact, it was not decided that eternal damnation was part of Chrsitian Orhtodoxy util 543, and then by a murderous Emperor, not theologians.). Why? Because God is love (I John 4:8), because Love keeps no record of wrongs (I Corinthians 13), and because our unfaithfulness will not nullify God's faithfulness (Romans 3:3). God will be our God and we will be God's people. God will love us without condition because that's what fathers do. My brother's death helped me see this more clearly. Even though he did drugs, drank, slept around and made choices that we weren't happy about, this doesn't mean that we didn't love him. We did, more than he realized. If we loved him, how much more so did God, who sees our pain and dysfunction and knows the roots behind the poor choices we make and the evil we do? God loved him through all his unfaithfulness. And even though my brother said he didnt' care what God thought, now he's with God. His pain is God; his dysfucntion is healed, and his tears are wiped away because that's who God is. God is Love.

Even in this I'm not alone. Origen of Lyons, Karl Barth, and Hans Urs Von Balthasaar are all Orthodox thinkers (though Origen was pre-orthodox) and are all univerasalists, though each may have different reasons. I understand objections. There are evil deeds done in our world. But instead of fighting and hating, what if we viewed the person who did these things as if they were our child or brother? Would we hate them? Not if we seek God. God's justice is reconcilation. As Paul tells us, we are agents of reconciliation so reconciliation is what we do. That doesn't mean that there is no hell, just that hell is "for a time" and will ultimately lead to purification and reconciliation. Such is the will of God.

On Death and Faith

As I was walking to my office this past week I saw an SUV with the birth and death dates of the owners' son. He was 18. That sucks, I thought. How do you explain that God is loving or just to some one who lost their 18-year-old son? I know the traditional arguments. They're not very good, or at least leave me unsatisfied.

I then thought of my brother, Philip, and I felt a sting of pain as I always do when I think of him. I stopped for a second and took a slow deep breath. My brother committed suicide about a year and a half ago and though this hasn't shaken my belief in God, it has made me more anxious about the after life. The idea that I won't see my brother again seems so overhwhelming to me. I understand disbelief, but I don't accept it. Nevertheless, as I walked toward my office I thought, "How can we love God or even believe in God when God allows children to suffer?"

Then I remembered that it isn't just our children or brothers who suffer. God lost Jesus, just as that couple lost their son, just as I lost my brother. God does care. As some one committed to justice and aware of the vast amount of suffering in the world, sometimes I struggle with coming to terms with why God allows it. I don't believe the ridiculousness that is Calvinism, so I don't think God wills the evil that occurs, but we can't ignore the fact that God allows everything to occur that does occur. But we aren't on our own. In Jesus, God experienced everything (more or less) that we do, including suffering and death, not to mention torture and execution. God also experienced the loss of a Son in a real way.

We don't suffer or experiencepain or loss alone. For me, this helps make it a little easier. And just as with Jesus, we can take solace in the promise that death is not the end, that another life awaits where wrongs are made right and pain is no more.

The Importance of Christmas

As I progressed through college, I came to a point where I thought we shouldn't celebrate Christmas, that it was just a consumer holiday and that the real holiday was Easter. I now think that this is only half true. Though traditionally the Church hasn't put as much emphasis on Christmas, and that it became what it is today because of companies like Hallmark, the birth of Christ does represent a quite significant event. This shift in my thinking came through my studies of atonement. As my understanding of atonement moved from the importance of Jesus' death to the importance of Jesus' life, so too did my understanding of this holiday. Of course Jesus was not actually born on December 25 (he wasn't even born the year he was calculated too, but in all likelihood was born in 4 BC, the year Herod died).

Jesus is Emanuel—God with us. This is the importance of the Incarnation. God has come to us, and not to die in some strange exchange where by God can only forgive if Jesus dies, but as a pledge of God's love and commitment to the world. If God's response to sin can be typified in the two events of the flood and the Incarnation, the latter represents the opposite of the former. God did not destroy the world despite itself, but came to it humbly in order that it might come to God. The Incarnation is like a love poem that God uses in order to romance creation in the hope that it might become God's bride. Jesus' death does not warrant God's love, for, as Augustine points out, if it did hat was the motivation? Rather, according to John 3:16, it was because God already loved creation that God sent Jesus. Nd if God loved creation, God was willing to forgive us our sins, which we see in multiple places int the New Testament where Jesus forgives sin independently of his “dying in our place.” If it was necessary for Jesus to provide a substitution in order to forgive, then he couldn't have forgiven the paralytic, nor said that salvation had come to Zachias, nor God John have offered a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sin.

The Incarnation is the great pledge of God, a sign of what already was rather than something new. It is the concrete expression of the reality that God is Love. This is why we celebrate Christmas, and this is why we give gifts—because God first gave to us. So let us continue to give, but let our giving be meaningful and enriching and less about consuming and accumulating. Let all we do be motivated by Love.

I have come to give my life as a ransom for many

Jesus is quoted as saying that “I have come to give mt life as a ransom for many.” Many Christians have often interpreted this literally, which leads them to conjecture about the devil having dominion over humanity and God needing to become human in order to arrange an exchange with the devil, or even God having to do an exchange with God's self, whereby God's anger toward sinners is appeased through Christ's sacrificial death. Neither of these scenarios make any sense at all and have come under critique as long as they've been around.

I propose an alternative. Jesus did not mean that his life is literally a ransom. No one is holding humanity captive and demanding that a certain price be paid (though one could make an argument that "civilization" binds all of us in ways that are inescapable). Rather, Jesus is using metaphorical language (hard to believe, I know) to explain that his purpose is to liberate creation. He isn't paying anyone anything, nor does this liberation focus primarily on this death. Jesus came to "give" his life, not as death, but as life, as in devotion to the cause of God. The purpose of the Incarnation is for Jesus to reveal the Father to the world, and since this is why he came, it makes sense that he devotes his life to this end. And it is this revelation about who God is that liberates us in a multiplicity of ways.