Humanizing Christ

 "and they twisted together a crown of thorns and set it on his head. They put a staff in his right hand. Then they knelt in front of him and mocked him." —Matthew 27:29

"Behold the Man"  by Antonio Ciseri

During Lent I’ve noticed how much oppression and evil in the world is tolerated, ignored, and even supported by those who identify as Christians. There seems to be very little correlation between the life of Jesus and the life of his followers. Sadly, what I and many others see are self-identifying Christians becoming more openly cruel and oppressive under the standard of the Cross. What is going on here? 

I believe it is how we understand Christ, our Christology, if you will. Christology is just a fancy theological term for the nature and work of Jesus of Nazareth. The dominant theology in the West is focused almost entirely on the divinity of Jesus. Unfortunately this understanding comes at the expense of his humanity. And ours. It has taken my entire life to realize this.

During my time in the church, I cannot recall hearing a sermon about the humanity of Jesus. Rarely did I hear a teaching about the Beatitudes, the Sermon on the Mount, or Jesus' encounters with outcasts. I heard many sermons and teachings about the fate of "sinners in the hands of an angry god," the evils of the world, the dangers of liberal thought, warnings about sexual taboos, and of course sermons hawking for money. Most of what I heard was fear-inducing and transactional. It was all about "the deal" of accepting Jesus and having my sins washed away. Having read the bible several times and the Gospels in particular, I began to see the human side of Jesus. Seeing the humanity of Jesus made the humanity of others visible to me.

Among his first public acts Jesus touched a leper. In Jesus' day, no one touched a leper. Jesus' touch healed the man. Sometimes we breeze over that passage and fail to see the human connection in that moment. That man may not have felt another human touch in years. When Jesus connected his own humanity with the humanity of the leper, he rehumanized him! The man's healing was social as well as physical. After that encounter and the healing of the centurion's servant, some folks were zealous to follow him. But what Jesus had done was a radically political act. It violated social and religious norms, and as such the action carried considerable risk. Jesus warned his would-be acolytes about the cost, a cost he never failed to fully disclose. He warned them of the consequence of his all-embracing humanity,  "the son of man has no place to lay his head" (Matthew 8:20). Note that in calling himself "the son of man" Jesus underscores his humanity. It's a phrase he uses many times in the gospels.

In acknowledging and illuminating the humanity of others,  Jesus confronted power structures that were built on a hierarchy of castes. The caste systems required a dehumanization of scapegoated people and separating them into strata of society. Jesus challenged the system by recognizing the humanity  of outcasts publicly. This was the light of Jesus. So, if Jesus was fully human, if indeed he was the light and life of men, the question arises, did he have a shadow? 

All those we generally accept as heroes, Lincoln, Gandhi, Bonhoeffer, and MLK to name a few, were flawed human beings. But their deaths made them martyrs. The passage of time and selective positivity of their biographers obscures our knowledge of the full range of their humanity. All these men, these heroes, had their shadows. They didn’t deny their shadows. Indeed in the light of day, their shadows proved they had human substance. Even Jesus had his shadow, the proof of his human substance.

“Could you not stay with me for one hour?”

“My God My God Why have you forsaken me?” 

When we dehumanize our heroes, we deny their human substance and make them inaccessible. I will go so far as to say we have dehumanized Jesus. Our Christology only sees his divinity and denies his humanity, therefore the substance of Jesus' teachings are ignored. His humanity is inaccessible to us. And when we have dehumanized Jesus, what light is left in our Christian religion?

The dehumanization that precedes all the others is the dehumanization of Jesus Christ. The dehumanization of Jesus is a fact of history, but it is also accepted as Christology (the nature of Jesus). We emphasized his deity at the negation of his humanity. Once we dehumanize our prophets, we kill them. Then we are free to build statues, shrines, and construct religions around them. Their very human biographies are lost and replaced with our hagiographies. We ascribe to them what we want to believe.

When Jesus "let his light shine" he illuminated "the least of these." He saw them. And he didn't just see them, he saw himself in them! So much so that he equated any good or evil done them as done to himself. So what can we do? Can we let our little light shine on the holy in the everyday, the mundane? It is possible to see (recognize) the holy and transcendent that is already here in everyday life:

"We have so little of each other, now. So far from tribe and fire. Only these brief moments of exchange. What if they are the true dwelling of the holy, these fleeting temples we make together when we say, "Here, have my seat," "Go ahead — you first," "I like your hat." "  —Danusha Laméris, Small Kindnesses

It's that simple. It only requires us to slow down and look. To place ourselves in the shoes of others. To equate their wellbeing with ours. Then we will recognize the humanity of our fellow human beings. And when we see Christ in others, our kindness becomes a sacrament.

“if you have done it to the least of these, you have done it unto me [Christ].” 

Conscious recognition of holy moments. Recognition of the humanity of others. All others. Including those deemed to be "The Wretched of the Earth." Jesus has shown us the way, the truth, and the life. 

  

The Serpent

"Let us consider the first fifty years of our national history. There was never a moment during this time when the slavery issue was not a sleeping serpent. That issue lay coiled up under the table during the deliberations of the Constitutional Convention in 1787."
-- John Jay Chapman

If we were to examine the complete history of our nation, even to the present day, that snake is still present. Even through all our progress to a more egalitarian society, that snake, like the serpent in the Garden of Eden, lies coiled and ready to strike.  The toxic venom spewed out during the 2016 presidential campaign is proof of the serpent's enduring presence.

We might protest that in this day and age, in the 21st century, there is no slavery or open racism. But the snake takes many forms and has ways of blending in with its surroundings. It starts with the premise that some people are less than fully human. That there are those who are "three-fifths of other persons" (words written in the Constitution). The devaluation of people. This is the serpent's poison. This devaluation does not limit itself to a historically enslaved race. Any person, of any non-white color, immigrants, women, even white women, can feel the weights on the scales of justice tip against them.  Racism, misogyny, antisemitism, and xenophobia are just camouflaged forms of the same serpent.

I realize I am taking quite a leap to speak about injustice towards people of color, other religions, and women when I am none of these. How can I speak of things I have never experienced? I can't. But I can speak from where I have been. And that place is ignorance.

I have been ignorant of the privilege my gender, my race, and my ethnicity afforded me. I have never had to worry when walking alone, even at night, that someone would try to rape me. I have never had to worry when I was pulled over by police that I was being profiled or that I would be shot if I took my hands off the wheel. I have never had my Midwestern accent questioned nor have I been looked down upon as a "foreigner." I have never been persecuted because of my religion. I have never been profiled at the border because of my color or surname.

I was ignorant of the serpent. I would remain so until I went through a "conversion". It was not an instantaneous process. My conversion was a product of  disillusionment, searching, circumstances, experiencing the humanity of others, and my own choices. At lot of it had to do with my faith journey and how it kept bringing me back to words of Jesus. I became disillusioned with faith communities that had no interest in reaching out beyond their property line. Circumstances in my career had an influence as well. As I met more and more people from other parts of the world I discovered their humanity. Then there were the writings of  Bonhoeffer, Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, MLK, Mother Teresa, Victor Hugo, Coates, and Dorothy Day to name a few. Reading their stories and their insight into the heart of God softened my own heart. My work with like-hearted people and young men in a mission endeavor has opened my heart even more.

I have learned that the serpent sees vulnerability in our fears. Our fears are many: security, job, health, crime, and terrorism. The serpent knows these issues provoke our primal instincts. He knows where to strike. The serpent also knows the questions that lead us to doubt: "Did God really say?" But we can also remember these words: "Fear Not!", "perfect love casts out fear", and "love one another". Once I let my heart open up to the words of Christ, compassion towards others followed. Love overcame fear! I became willing to risk for others. I learned that the love of God is the only cure for the venom of the serpent.