HRH

I have been recommending, indeed advocating, that people take a moment to watch the Queen's (that would be Elizabeth II for those wondering which queen) Christmas message in 2011. The suggestion has been met with polite acquiescence, the "I'll humor him" look, as well as the rolling of eyes. My most recent plea included the thought, "It's seven minutes of your life." Clearly less than we waste hearing about cats and weight loss on facebook daily. It is hard to be a monarchist in a republican country...

My advocacy of the Queen's message this past year in particular has everything to do with its solidly and unapologetically Christian message (appropriate on CHRISTmas, I think.) This, of course is a digression. It is not every day that I am thinking about HRH. But I am today because today is essentially coronation day.

Today is the fortieth day after Easter, the day we remember the Ascension of Jesus to heaven. It is a major feast of the church but often slips by unnoticed because we either don't take notice of the feasts of the church (shame because feast is fun) or because it doesn't fall on our usual worship day.

All of the appointed lessons for Ascension talk about the sovereignty of God and the reign of Christ. "He ascended into heaven and sits on the right hand of God the Father." says the creed. This is an ascension to a throne (sits being the give-away word here). Ascension is the Father's acknowledgement of the reign and rule of Jesus the Christ. It is his coronation day.

As coronation day it comes some time after his battle and victory. The battle was the cross; the victory, the resurrection. And some time after comes the coronation. Forty days in this case. In the Return of the King, the last volume of Tolkien's trilogy, Aragorn who becomes king fights his battles (one outside the his gates and one outside the gates of the enemy) and is victorious. After all this he returns to Minas Tirith and is crowned King. The coronation is the acknowledgement of his reign and rule, which is his both by right of birth and by the merits of his victory.

Aragorn is but a figure of Christ Jesus, whose rule and reign on this day we remember.

The psalm appointed for this morning says:
For God is King of all the earth;
sing praises with all your skill. (Psalm 47:7)

The writer to the Hebrews also reminds us today:
You made him for a little while lower than the angels;
you have crowned him with glory and honor,
putting everything in subjection under his feet.

Now in putting everything in subjection to him, he left nothing outside his control. At present, we do not yet see everything in subjection to him. But we see him who for a little while was made lower than the angels, namely Jesus, crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering of death, to that by the grace of God he might taste death for everyone. (Hebrews 2:7-9)

The writer here underlines one of the common struggles of believing in the reign of Jesus, trusting in the truth of his ascension to the right hand of God - we do not yet see everything in subjection to him. (Yet is the give-away word this time). His reign, though real, is still being worked out in the world, and frankly in me. But that does not make it any less real. Another favorite book comes to mind as I think about the working out of reign. Caspian, king of Narnia, in the Voyage of the Dawn Treader, relates to Edmund and Lucy what has happened since they had left Narnia, just after Caspian's victory. He tells them he still had to deal with some "troublesome giants on the frontier." Rule and reign is worked out over time, but that does not make it any less rule and reign, nor any less complete.

Charles Wesley, in acknowledging this day and his King wrote this:
Hail the day tha sees him rise
To his throne above the skies
Christ, the Lamb for sinners given,
Enters now the highest heaven!

And for those who have seven minutes of their life to invest, here's the link to the Queen's message:
Queen Elizabeth II Christmas Message 2011

The Good

I saw a bumper sticker the other day which said: "Humankind: Be Both."  Pithy.  Provocative.  And somehow unsatisfying.  Kindness, while a positive thing from which we all might benefit, remains only a facet or shadow of the greater thing which is the Good.  Opting always for kindness means that we will sometimes miss the Good.  Making excuses for a substance-addicted family member may be a kind thing, preserving that family member from some short-term discomfort or humiliation, but it is not a good thing.  In psychological parlance, it enables the addiction.  Kind, but not Good.  This may seem like an extreme example.  Here's a less extreme one.  Consistently driving your kid to school because he or she has missed the bus.  Very kind.  If it is an occasional occurrence.  In this case it might even be seen as good.  But where the missing is habitual all we are doing is teaching our teen that if they sleep in, someone will fix it for them.  They will be in for a rude awakening some day.  So in that case, it is neither kind nor good.

But what about the Good - this which is larger than simple kindness?  To be sure we often do that which is good, but when we do not, why?  Why do we fail to do the Good?  I can think of two reasons, there are undoubtedly more.  First, we do not do the good because we reject it for some other thing which is positive but less.  Kindness is one example.  But there are others.  We will often sacrifice the Good for the useful or utilitarian.  We do that which makes the most useful sense, or economic sense, or, to follow Freud, that which makes the most pleasure sense.  Again, usefulness, sound economics and pleasure are all positive things, but they are often morally less than the Good.

The second reason we do not do the Good is because we claim we can't know it.  There are so many shades of grey in life and situations.  How are we to know the Good?  Some thoughts on this from two characters, one fictional and one real.  In The Lord of the Rings, the riders of Rohan ask Aragorn how, in these complicated times, men might know good from ill.  Aragorn responds, "As he has ever judged...good and ill have not changed since yesteryear; nor are they one thing among Elves and Dwarves and another among Men."*  Aragorn puts it baldly in front of us.  The Good is knowable and has always been.  I feel this when I opt for the lesser things, usefulness or pleasure.  The Good is before me and I choose other.  It's not that I don't know.

St. Paul, while he does not mention moral good in this text, says something very similar in the first chapter of Romans:
"For what can be know about God [including his Goodness] is plain to them, because God has shown it to them.  For his invisible attributes, namely his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made." 
(Romans 1:19-20 ESV - comment in brackets mine)

What is at least as interesting as why we don't do the Good, is why we do.  Even here I think there are good reasons and bad.  For all of us, if we learn right from wrong as children, we learn to do the Good to avoid punishment and to gain reward.  This is right and proper for the punishment and the rewards are part of the teaching, the shaping of our souls.   But this, like a scale played during piano practice, or conjugations done when learning a language,  is a drill to shape and form something in us - conscience or understanding of the Good.  If as adults we are continuing to do the Good for fear of punishment, we have missed something.  We have not yet come to love.  St. John says this:
"There is no fear in love, for perfect love casts out all fear.  For fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not been perfected in love."
(I John 4:18 ESV)

More on love in a minute.

The other reason we do the good I take from a nursery rhyme.
Little Jack Horner
Sat in the corner,
Eating a Christmas pie;
He put in his thumb,
And pulled out a plum,
And said 'What a good boy am I!

We sometimes do the Good in order to congratulate ourselves, "What a good boy and I!"  Or possibly so that others will congratulate us.  This ultimately is a variation on the punishment theme, just its opposite side.  We do good things because we want people to think good of us, to approve of us and appreciate us.  The problem with this, and the fear of punishment goodness, is that the Good can easily get warped in pour minds to mean "whatever the other wants."  Here we are easily prey to manipulation, sometimes dong what is not good in order to obtain the approval of, or avoid the wrath of those whose opinion we value.  It's how we get involved in gangs and why we get engaged in cliques in our school, workplace or neighborhood.

But there is another reason for doing the Good and it is what the childhood punishment and reward system is meant to grow in us.  And that is the love of the Good.  There is a big difference between doing what is Good because we are afraid that if we don't God is going to get us, and doing it because we love it.  I remember distinctly the day this realization came to me - that God was not asking me to do the Good but rather to love it.  And the doing then flows much more easily out of the loving.

The Good, together with the True and the Beautiful, are things we are made to love. And in loving them we become more truly human.  And something quite a bit more than kind.

*J.R.R. Tolkien, The Two Towers

Moving On

One of the many things I appreciate about The Lord of the Rings is its ample epilogue.  Generally in books and movies there is little that follows the major climax.  A few minor details may get tied up but it is not substantive in any way.  In Tolkien's opus, there are crownings, weddings, another voyage, a parting of friends (at least twice), a minor conflict and an ensuing battle.  What I appreciate is that we are not forced to immediately move on after Sauron is defeated.

Moving on seems to be a significant imperative for us.  When one thing is completed the next thing is immediately before us.  There is no gracious time to ponder, reflect, appreciate or even learn from the thing completed.  We must move on.  We have miles to go before we sleep, as Robert Frost suggested.  Mustn't dwell on the past.  And we all know that a rolling stone gathers no moss, so let's keep rolling.  In the act of writing this I suddenly wonder what is so bad about moss.

I notice this impetus to move on especially at Christmas.  Coming from a Christian tradition that follows with some care the liturgical calendar, I know that Christmas STARTS on December 25 and then lasts for 12 days (hence the song in which the curious Lords-a-leaping are figured).  But on December 25th we have moved on.  It's over.  On to the next thing which will include post-Christmas sales, New Year's resolutions and all that lies ahead.  Could we not rest in the moment, for just a few days?

This has occurred to me because we have just passed Easter (it was on Sunday) and I had moved on.  We're done with Holy Week, Good Friday and the Feast of the Resurrection.  What's next?  As I was reading the lessons appointed in the lectionary this week, I found myself vaguely annoyed that we were going over the Passover in Exodus, rereading resurrection accounts in the Gospels, and meandering through I Corinthians 15.  Wasn't that last week?  I thought to myself.  Isn't it time to move on?

I come back to Tolkien as I think on this.  His multi-chapter epilogue does us the service of not immediately moving on.  All that follows the climactic victory at the gates of Mordor and in the heart of Mount Doom is a working out of the implications of that victory.  All of the events that follow the climax are results of same climax.  Life, in all of its joys and also struggles, blossoms forth.  The climax and victory allow for all of these other things to happen.  It is moving on, in a way, but a moving on that is deeply rooted in and thankful for the event that permits it.

And thus it is with Easter.  Christmas is 12 days.  Easter is 7 weeks.  On Monday and Tuesday I was annoyed because the lectionary hadn't moved on.  Today I had a change of heart.  I am thankful that these themes and stories are again before me.  The Easter event, Jesus' resurrection from the dead, bears some continued reflection.  I am moving on, but deeply rooted in and thankful for the event that permits me.