You
are my beloved one, with you I am well pleased
Baptism
of Jesus - January 10, 2010
Let us pray: O God, we hear your word of affirmation expressing love, hope and promise to Jesus, and we know those words are also meant for us. May we confident in the promise and inspired by the faith of those words. Amen.
It’s probably no surprise to you that I was listening to CBC Radio yesterday morning. I’m sure the fact that I am a fan of our national radio broadcaster has not escaped you. The program to which I want to refer this time is the weekly national political commentary called The House. However, before I delve into the item that particularly interested me yesterday morning, let me just say what a treasure trove of resources for the faithful life can be found among the various programs and in the podcast storehouse that is part of today’s CBC. I’ve decried in the past the fact that much of CBC programming is now being broadcast in more than one time slot - a fact that makes it easier to hear again, or to find for someone else, something that was interesting the first time around, but which also limits the amount of air time devoted to new material. The fact that programmes and stories are placed in more than one time slot seems almost overdone given that much of what comes over the air waves can also be found online in podcast format. I’ve developed a keener interest in podcasting in the past three weeks now that I have an iPod nano in my possession, one of the gifts that I found under our Christmas tree this year. So, now my walk along 50A Avenue, to and from work can be accompanied by bits and pieces of such shows as Tapestry - and if you haven’t listened to it, I really recommend this programme about matters of the heart and soul. It is on CBC Radio One at four o’clock on Sunday afternoon. And if that time doesn’t suit you, you can find all the Tapestry interviews online without too much difficulty. However, enough of this unpaid advertising.
As I mentioned, the particular show that sparked this little infomercial was The House. Kathleen Petty interviewed author Yann Martel, best known for his Booker Prize winning book The Life of Pi. Some time ago, Martel was concerned about what he perceived as a lack of interest in the arts on the part of our Prime Minister, Stephen Harper, so he undertook a little project of sending a work of fiction along with an accompanying letter to the Prime Minister every two weeks. This has been going on for more than two years now. Martel has now written a book about the project called, “What is Stephen Harper reading”, and yes there is also a website or perhaps it is more accurate to call it a weblog. Of course there is a bit of an assumption in the title that Stephen Harper has actually been reading the books that Yann Martel has been sending him, but it is an interesting little exercise nonetheless. It was quite interesting to hear Martel’s ideas around the importance of reading fiction as a way of learning about life, expanding our horizons and leading us to a more well-rounded world view.
In the interview with Ms. Petty, Martel was quite clear that he has been sending works of fiction to the Prime Minister, and he was very eloquent in describing his reasons for doing so, much more eloquent than I could hope to transcribe here, so I refer you to the web version of the interview which I hope is reproduced on the podcast.
I mention this interview for a variety of reasons. First of all, because Martel’s perspective is one that matches mine on this issue, except that he was much more creative than I could ever expect to be. I admire the creativity of sending a book to the Prime Minister as both a public statement and as a kind of personal mission. In my opinion, there is an element of the gospel in this little project. As I recall, neither religion nor spirituality was mentioned at all in the interview, yet I could not help but think that this is precisely the kind of thinking that would appeal to Jesus - a perhaps bit whimsical but also deadly serious action meant to widen horizons, introduce new ideas and ways of thinking, and generally perhaps even gently, although not necessarily - for fiction can have a very forceful and demanding effect - open new understandings of what it means to live as a member of God’s community.
Secondly, the project draws one to consider the importance of books in one’s own life. I wish I could read more books and really there is nothing preventing it in my life except for the fact that other kinds of reading are easier and more compelling for me in my life right now. Research has never been easier, and it is ever so simple to grab a nearby computer and pursue whatever interest might be the topic of the moment. So, it’s not that I don’t read - I probably read as much or more than I ever did in a given day, but a large amount of it is not reading from books. Will the Amazon Kindle, recently introduced to Canada change that for me? First of all I don’t have one and don’t expect to have one for a good long time, if ever and therefore I doubt it. An electronic book in my thinking will be just as hard to pick up as a paper and pages one.
It’s also not as if I don’t read books at all. I was pleased to read down the list of seventy-two books that Yann Martel has sent to the Prime Minister and find that I’ve read a goodly number of them myself, and no this is not the start of my campaign to become Prime Minister!
This is perhaps the longest introduction to any reflection I’ve ever written. I guess that interview on the radio yesterday really grabbed me. What I wanted to talk about was the importance of a particular book on my way of thinking. I had heard about it quite a well before I picked it up, and my most vivid memory of it was reading it on the bus which took me from my home in a Calgary suburb to the office where I worked. It was a bit of a self-conscious journey - for you know how easy it is for others to see what you are reading when it is on the bus. And how often do you find techie - especially 1980's oil industry types - reading books that have “blessing” in the title. But that’s what it was - a seminal book by Matthew Fox - later excommunicated from the Roman Catholic Church in part because of the views he presented in the book. It’s title Original Blessing and the radical heresy that it dared to present is the idea that God loves and loved humanity from the very beginning. Shocking, eh! Well at least the Vatican thought so and summoned Fox to come and present his views which in their view challenged the theological principle of Original Sin. Fox refused, realising that such a thing would not be in his best interest and more importantly in the best interest of presenting differing points of view about what it means to be faithful, and so his ordination as a Dominican priest was removed and he is now a priest in the Episcopal tradition in the United States - the same tradition that we call Anglican.
I was moved to consider this early reading because of our reading from the gospel today - which tells the story of Jesus’ baptism and in particular which ends with the quote from God paraphrased in the title for this reflection - This is my beloved one with whom I am well pleased. Is this not something we should always hear at the baptism of each and every person? Is this not more affirming than the idea that we are in a continual process of trying to dig ourselves out of the mire we know as Original Sin - a concept which seems to lay a burden of guilt and condemnation upon us before we even have a chance to get started in our lives.
No doubt there are things we need to change in our lives, but I prefer to think of them from the perspective of starting out as people loved and blessed by God rather than as hopeless members of humanity who can only find the meaning of life as a result of the unconditional grace and love of God. Surely that unconditional grace and love was there from the very beginning and it is ever more hopeful for us to know the affirmation that God sees us a blessing rather than a lost soul that needs salvation.
And so I think the message that God wants us to hear on this day when we remember the baptism of Jesus and when we celebrate the baptism of Neve and when we are called to remember our own baptism is the same one that was heard by the banks of the Jordan river when Jesus emerged from its refreshing waters - You are my beloved one, with you I am well pleased.
Let me end with one more little commercial. In mid-December, Mary Hynes, the host of Tapestry, interviewed Victor Wooten, sometimes known as one of the greatest bass players in the world today. Many bass players waited with great expectation for the introduction of his book, thinking that it might provide some insight on how he achieves his great skill as a player. Instead they found a book which delves deeply into the spirituality of music. It’s a great interview and even more so, it led me to look up on Youtube a song from Wooten, which in many ways says what I wanted to say today - namely that we are created in the image of God and we are blessed and loved by God. You can look it up. I’ll put a link to it in the online version of this reflection on our church website. It’s called “I Saw God”. I’ll also put a link to Yann Martel’s blog “What is Stephen Harper Reading”. Now I think I will go home and pick up a book from the pile I have of books waiting to be read. Amen.