Resisting
the Hijacked Gospel
By Mike Rivage-Seul
LASP Fall 2004 Newsletter
With the presidential election approaching in less than a month,
I find it impossible to respond to the invitation to write here,
without addressing the nature of Christian faith in that context.
The issue is urgent, since, frankly, neo-conservatives have
hijacked Jesus’ Gospel message. Especially since 9/11/01,
they have turned the proclamation of the Prince of Peace into
a message of holy war. So, in the name of Christian jihad, Old
Testament references are routinely cited about Yahweh, for example
ordering His people into battle against their hated enemies.
In such contexts, Jesus himself is referenced as though He could
possibly be a champion of imperial occupying forces. In reality
His people were always the victims of imperialist occupation
including Egyptians, Assyrians, Babylonians, Persians, Greeks
and (in Jesus’ own day) the Romans.
In this way, what Fuller Seminary’s Glen Stassen terms,
“Neo-Con” ideology, turns Jesus into the enemy
of the very kind of people He especially loved. It’s
even worse than that. I mean, who is it that Neo-Con politicians,
Rush Limbaugh and others despise – “for Christ’s
sake?” None other than the kind of people Jesus himself
was. Think about it. He was the son of an unwed teenage mother;
a homeless person (in Bethlehem), and an immigrant for a while
(in Egypt). Jesus was a poor street person without visible
means of support, traveling with a band of unemployed men.
He was accused of being irreligious, because He was too liberal
in His biblical interpretations. Jesus was seen as possessed
by a devil, a drunkard and friend of sex workers. He was a
radical critic of the religious establishment, of the rich,
and of empire. Jesus was an object of government surveillance
and investigation; a man who was imprisoned, tortured and
subjected to capital punishment. Ignoring all of this, Neo-Cons
treat Jesus as though He were a rich white Republican working
on Wall Street and driving a Humvee.
As for specific Neo-Con Bible reading . . . It highlights,
for instance the familiar “Eye for an eye and tooth
for a tooth” reference as interpreted by such eminent
theologians and scripture scholars as George W. Bush himself.
Meanwhile the Neo-Cons set aside as somehow “uninformed”
and in need of “interpretation” the plain words
of Jesus himself who said, “You have heard that it was
said, ‘An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.’
But I say to you, Do not resist one who is evil. But if any
one strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other
also . . . (Mt. 5: 38-42). This, in brief, not “holy
war,” is Jesus’ recipe for peacemaking.
Here the point is not simply to proof-text. It is, rather
to note words attributed to Jesus within the context of his
lived example and over-all teaching, which Matthew presents
as the very fulfillment of the Jewish Testament (Mt. 5:17).
In that light, it is difficult to imagine Jesus supporting
modern warfare, much less bearing arms himself.
Because the Neo-Con caricature of Jesus is virtually all
U.S. citizens have recently been exposed to, many will (understandably)
object to the words written here. To hear the “other
side,” dialog among us is needed – especially
within the learning community known as the Latin American
Studies Program.
LASP claims for its own a commitment to more penetrating understandings
of the Christian Gospel. Such understandings must move beyond
the pronouncements of self-interested politicians. Instead,
within LASP, during this time of permanent war, we need informed
dialog transcending the easy “truths,” which turn
out, upon examination, to be entirely questionable. Establishing
that sort of dialog is what I take to be the LASP’s
lasting contribution to its participants. That is why I am
here in Costa Rica this year.
Mike
Rivage-Seul is a professor of General Studies and Religion
at Berea College, in Berea, Kentucky, where he has taught
for 30 years. A laicized priest, he holds his doctoral degree
in theology from the Academia Alfonsiana in Rome. He will
be teaching in the LASP program during the 2004-2005 academic
year. He also taught in the Fall of 1994.
Sink
In
i sink in as the cascotes swarm.
i swat them with my pocket-sized Bible,
and bat not a lash, though faced
with the Sacreligious irony of it all.
the Mickey Mouse mattress cover
the incense burning elephant
the Bri Bri protection mask,
all spit on me as the rain
jackhammers
plastic above me,
my only source -
Natural Light.
but Praise God.
Santo Nombre.
smile and nod.
be culturally sensitive.
grateful.
polite.
helpful.
but Guard your honesty.
Eric Andrew Hoff, F2004
Stories
of Restoration
By Jessica Mueller
In the midst of 43 goodbyes to fellow LASP
students in Miami last spring, our beloved intern Laura Hamilton
made the comment to me that LASP is a meeting place. It is
a place where people of diverse backgrounds come together
to make lasting connections by sharing each other´s
stories. Tenía razon. At no point in the semester is
that more evident than during “Camino Espiritual”
or “Spiritual Journey,” where we take one Saturday
to gather in a circle in the LASP classroom and listen to
a small part of every student and staff member´s story.
Four minutes at a time, the stories unfold--the thanksgiving
of positive Christian upbringing, the pain of parents´
divorce; the struggles to understand poverty and injustice,
the amazement of God´s grace; the sorrow of parents´
deaths, the joy of surviving cancer. And as the stories are
told, we all become strangely connected, recognizing our own
pain in one another´s pain, our own joy in one another´s
joy—even though the context for those joys and sufferings
is very different.
A similar time of sharing occurs after the
host family stays in Nicaragua. Only this time, the stories
we tell are the stories of the Nicaraguans we meet. One group
of students at a time, we hear stories of joy and contentment
despite the poverty, stories of hopelessness and despair because
of it. We hear stories of tender love and care, and stories
of violence and abuse. And as we reflect, the stories of our
Nicaraguan brothers and sisters sound strangely similar to
our own. We suffer, we love, we laugh, we cry, we hurt, we
wonder why and when and how. The connections we have made
are stronger than the language, culture, and geography that
separate us.
As we try to make sense of the connections
we feel, we begin to see and experience all of our stories
as part of the larger story of God’s redemption in a
world that aches for love and life. We sense in all of this
our own call to participate in God’s restoration, deeply
aware that we must experience our own journey through pain
and suffering before we can identify with others who have
also experienced poverty, oppression, pain, and limitations
in their various forms. Henri Nouwen writes, “Jesus’
appearance in our midst has made it undeniably clear that
changing the human heart and changing human society are not
separate tasks, but are as interconnected as two beams of
the cross.” LASP offers that experience to us—to
meet Jesus in our own sufferings and the sufferings of those
we meet, to meet Jesus in reflecting on the love we’ve
experienced in our own lives and in the love our Latin American
brothers and sisters show to us and to one another. LASP has
created meeting places—safe spaces where we can experience
our own conversion and liberation while listening and responding
to the voices in society that also cry for transformation
and liberation. And for those experiences that create bonds
and connections among humans in this process of restoration
we say, Gracias LASP!
Jessica
Mueller is the LASP Intern for the 2004-05 school year. She
graduated from Northwestern College in Orange City, Iowa,
in 2004 with a degree in Sociology and Humanities.
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