One of the features of daily life at Saint Mary’s is the occasional overlap of lectionaries that are used. For instance, right now the Gospel according to Mark is being read at Sunday Mass, at Evening Prayer, and at daily Mass. Because each of these three services follows a different lectionary the Gospel is being read at differing paces, and we are at three different places in the narrative. This Sunday we continue to read from the first chapter of Mark, and we will crawl through the narrative all year. At Evening Prayer this week we are reading the ninth and tenth chapters of Mark, and we will have read the Gospel (minus the concluding events narrated in chapters 13-16) in six weeks. This week at daily Mass we are reading the seventh chapter of the Gospel, and it will take a total of nine weeks to read at daily Mass what was read in six weeks at Evening Prayer.
When it happens, this overlap can be confusing, and to be honest, somewhat annoying. “Didn’t we just read that?” is a common sentiment of those who attend the daily services. A few weeks ago the same Gospel passage was read at Evening Prayer and then read again at the evening Mass. That said, the benefits far outweigh any negatives. Hearing the same passages read by different people in different contexts has often had the effect of revealing new things to me, things that I hadn’t ever noticed. Until recently, I had never noticed how much healing Jesus does in the Gospel of Mark.. Time and again Jesus is surrounded by those seeking healing: at one point we are told that the market in a local town was completely filled with the sick, at another point we read that the crowds of those who were sick were so thick that it was enough simply to try to touch Jesus’ clothes.
Because we are reading slowly through John’s Gospel at Evensong – yet another lectionary cycle – I have felt a sharper contrast in the way John and Mark tell the story of Jesus than I had ever felt before. John focuses so much on the words of Jesus as a means for interpreting what has just happened, whereas Mark rarely takes a break from narrating events and scenery. The image of Jesus completely surrounded by people desperately seeking healing might appear in John’s Gospel (certainly at Bethesda that is true), but it’s not an image I associate with that Gospel. Likewise I believe Jesus’ extended remarks on the Bread from Heaven at the feeding of the 5000 would feel extremely out of place in Mark’s narrative.
For me, hearing these different texts makes it seem obvious that the different writers spoke about Jesus in very different ways. The lectionary doesn’t provide Gospel passages only, we also read great swaths of the Old and New Testament throughout the year. This week at daily Mass the Biblical account of creation was read. The story of creation is told in the first chapter–we are told that “it was good”. The story of creation is told again in chapters two and following. We are told that early on things took a slightly less “good” turn. I think that the account of creation also illustrates that there are different ways of speaking about the same thing: in this case, the centrality of God in every part of our lives, beginning at creation.
I believe that for the most part Christians accept that the Scriptures speak with many voices from history while still speaking with one voice in the Holy Spirit. Christians deal with that seeming contradiction, sometimes picking favorites and identifying least favorites – Martin Luther famously referred to the letter of James as “an Epistle of straw” – but rarely taking the step of actually trying to remove those texts they have difficulty with from the Scriptures. The Scriptures, to my eyes and ears, look a whole lot like the Church. Like the Bible, the Church contains enormous variety that is not always easy to accept; I wonder if that sometimes-begrudging acceptance of certain difficult texts is more often paralleled with acceptance of certain difficult Christians or not.
Prayerful and academic Bible study has led me to a deeper understanding of the Scriptures, and I appreciate more than I used to that different people express their faith in God in radically different ways. Not every passage of the Bible is my favorite, but I have found that when I let the text speak for itself, rather than assuming I already understand and know what it has to say, something new is often revealed to me, and I gain insight and perspective into someone else’s faith. Honestly, not every denomination, nor even every Episcopal church, is my favorite, but I have found that prayerfully listening with patience to those with whom I have difficulty often allows me to gain equally great insight and perspective into how someone else lives out their faith in Jesus Christ.
No comments:
Post a Comment