Some Leonardo Boff

Found these passages in a collection of writings entitled 'The Way of Mercy' featuring articles by Pope Francis, Dorothy Day, Thomas Merton, Joan Chittister and others.
My favourite thus far is an entry by the Brazilian theologian Leonardo Boff whose words about 'the reign of God' strike not only as profound but timely, oh so timely, given the recent US election of the Donald as its President.

It isn’t preaching that saves but practices. This is the basic key to the ethic of Jesus. Which practices align people with the great dream of the realm of God, those that save? These practices do not sacralize, or extend, or improve existing ones. They start new ones. For new wine, new wineskins; for new music, new ears.

The first thing Jesus does in terms of ethics and behaviour is free the human being. We all live behind the bars of laws, rules, prescriptions, traditions, rewards and punishments. That is how religions and societies work; with such instruments they make people fit in, keep them submissive, create the established order. Jesus stands up to this kind of apparatus, which impedes the exercise of freedom and stifles energy: “You have heard that it was said to the ancients, but I say to you” (Matthew 5:21,22). Since he is apocalyptic, he lives an ethic of urgency. Clock time is running against history. There is no halfway point: “Let your word be yes if it is yes and no if it is no” (Matthew 5:37). What is most important about the law is not observing the traditions and fulfilling religious precept, but “doing justice, mercy and good faith” (Matthew 23:23).
The essential and new thing introduced by Jesus is unconditional love. Love of neighbour and love of God are the same thing, and the meaning of all the biblical tradition is to culminate in this unity (Matthew 22:37-40). The radical proposal resounds: “Love as I have loved you,” which is love to the end (John 13:34). No one is excluded from love, not even enemies, for God loves all, even the “ungrateful and the wicked” (Luke 6:35).

The law of Christ - if indeed this word “law” can be used - or rather the logic of the reign, is encapsulated in love. This love is more than a feeling and a passion. It is a decision for freedom; it is a life purpose in the sense of always opening oneself to others, letting them be, listening to them, welcoming them, and if they fall, reaching out to them. The truth of this love is tested in whether we love the vulnerable, the despised and the invisible. It is especially of our relationship of acceptance of these wretched of the earth that Jesus is thinking when he asks us to love one another or the neighbour. Making this love the standard of moral behaviour entails demanding of the human being something highly difficult and uncomfortable. It is easier to live within laws and prescriptions that anticipate and determine everything. Our lives are boxed in but at ease. Jesus came to break down that inertia and to awaken human beings from this ethical slumber. He invites them, for the sake of love, to create conduct appropriate to each moment; he urges them to be alert and creative. The reign is set up whenever this loving and absolutely open and accepting stance exists. If power means anything, it is to be a potency of service. Power is only ethical if it enhances the power of the other and fosters relationships of love and cooperation among all; otherwise the domination of some over others continues, and we become entangled in the nets of the interests in contention.

This love is expressed radically in the Sermon on the Mount. There Jesus makes a clear option for victims and those who don’t count in the present order. He declares that the blessed, that is, bearers of the divine blessings, are the poor, and the first heirs of his reign are those who weep, the meek, those who hunger and thirst for justice, the compassionate, the pure in heart, the peacemakers, those who are persecuted for the sake of justice, those who bear insults and persecutions for the sake of the reign and put up with lies and every kind of evil (Matthew 5:3-12). Indeed, the ethic of Jesus reaches into people’s innermost and hidden intentions: not only those who kill but even those who offend their brothers and sisters will be liable (Matthew 5:22); even desiring another’s wife suffices for committing adultery in one’s heart (Matthew 5:28). He says emphatically: “Do not resist the evil; if someone slaps your right cheek, offer him your left; if someone disputes with you to take your clothing, offer him your cloak as well” (Matthew 5:39,40). It was such ideals of Jesus that led Thoreau, Tolstoy, Gandhi and Dom Helder Camara to propose the way of active non-violence for confronting the power of the negative.

How is this radicalism to be understood? What matters is knowing that Jesus did not come to bring a harsher law or an improved phariseeism. We will completely lose the perspective of the historic Jesus if we interpret the Sermon on the Mount and his moral indications within the framework of the law. He renders its fulfilment impossible. Or else, human beings are left in despair, as seems to have happened with Luther. What is new with Jesus is that he brings good news: it isn’t the law that saves, but love, which knows no limits. There are limits to law, because its function is to create order and guarantee some harmony among people in society and to curb those who violate it. Jesus didn’t come simply to abolish the “the law and the prophets” (Matthew 5:17). He came to lay out a criterion: what comes from traditions and moral rules, if it passes through the sieve of love, will be accepted. If laws impede and hinder love, he relativizes them, as he did with the Sabbath, or ignores them, as he did with the precept of fasting. It is love that opens up the reign. Where power prevails, the doors and windows of love, communication, solidarity and mercy close. That applies to both society and the churches.

The supreme ideal of the ethic of Jesus is proclaimed in “Be perfect as the Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:48). Jesus always emphasizes two characteristics of the Father’s perfection: a love for all without barriers and an unlimited mercy. Love and mercy guide those who wish to enter the reign. It is not enough to be good and law abiding, like the brother of the prodigal son who stayed home and was faithful in all things. That is not enough.
We have to be loving and merciful. Unless these attitudes are internalized, the reign does not advance, even though it is already set in motion by the practice of Jesus. When the reign is established, we will witness the great revolution in the sense of the spirit of the beatitudes: the poor will feel like citizens of the reign, those who weep will feel consoled, the non-violent will possess and administer the earth, those who hunger and thirst for justice will see their dreams fulfilled, those who have compassion for others will experience mercy, the pure of heart will experience God directly, the peacemakers will be recognized as sons and daughters of God, those persecuted for the sake of justice will feel that they are heirs of the reign and those who are insulted and persecuted for the sake of the dream of Jesus will be especially blessed (Matthew 5:3-11). Never have values been so radically reversed, as here courageously proposed by Jesus.

What is the ultimate meaning of the Sermon on the Mount, the contents of which we have just set forth and which sum up the fundamental ethic of the Jesus of history? It isn’t a new law or a new ethical and moral ideal. It is something quite different. It is about establishing a criterion for measuring how far along we are on the path of the reign, near the reign or within the reign, or how far away we are, out of alignment and outside it. The Sermon on the Mount is an invitation and a challenge to us to do our utmost at this last hour, to approach the ideals that make up the content of the reign. The reign is about to break in. The colliding meteor is about to enter the earth's atmosphere and set the earth on fire. The shortest and surest route to entering the reign of God is to participate in this way in the dream of Jesus and to live unconditional love and unlimited mercy now. That is the infallible passport for entering the reign and participating in the life of the Trinity. There is no reason to fear the devastation wrought by the colliding meteor because it leads to the emergence of a new world and a transfigured humanity.

Is everybody in?

from vox.com

The job of the peacemaker is to stop war, to purify the world, to get it saved from poverty and riches, to heal the sick, to comfort the sad, to wake up those who have not yet found God, to create joy and beauty wherever you go, and to find God in everything and everyone.  Muriel Lester

Poor Starbucks.

Every year as we approach the Holiday Season, Starbucks gets flack for serving their coffee in cups that aren't Christmas looking enough. The cups are green and not red, which is enough for the company to be vilified for taking Christ out of Christmas, as though Christians can only be identified by the colour of the cup we drink our coffee from during the holiday season.

The CEO and Chair of Starbucks, Howard Schultz gave this defence:

"The green cup and the design represent the connections Starbucks has as a community with its partners (employees) and customers. During a divisive time in our country, Starbucks wanted to create a symbol of unity as a reminder of our shared values, and the need to be good to each other."

He has a point. The lead up to the election of the next U.S. President has been divisive. And though he said nothing about Christians, admittedly we have been more inclined to add to that divisiveness rather than bridging the divide.

But can we as Christians be anything but divisive? I mean we do believe in heaven and hell, we do await a Final Judgment and we do draw a line between what is true and what is false, between what is good and what is evil. But we also believe that we are not to judge, and that if vengeance is required, that's God's business and not ours. We are to do good regardless of who's involved, to turn the other cheek regardless of who hits us and how hard, we are to love our enemies without exception as though they are as much God's children as we are.

Which has me asking: Is everybody in God's kingdom? When I die and face God, will I discover that everyone's in regardless?

I simply don't know. The sacred texts seem universal in that all you need is love, that God desires mercy over judgment and even though we are deeply flawed, we are, because of Jesus, blameless in her eyes.

What I do believe is that if anyone is in, it's because of Jesus. He pointed at the void before the worlds began and said 'let me go there, die if I must to affirm that life prevails over death, love over hatred, peace over war, giving over greed, mercy over judgment.'

His bodily resurrection overwhelms the void regardless of where the void is. Even in the places where all you can smell is death.

What I do know is there are people living among us who are already in God's kingdom: poor people, deeply discouraged people, people unjustly treated, and people persecuted for what they believe. In his kingdom already are humble people, downtrodden and vulnerable people, people the world stomps on in the name of prosperity and renown. They are child soldiers dying in a war not their own, they are mothers and infants in famine, they are elderly and dying alone. They are homeless, friendless, vilified, despised. They are the ones we do not honour whom God calls her own.

They're already in. They are the people God calls blessed - not blessed as in will be, but blessed as in now.