"From the cross is a prayer and, indeed, the only prayer known to
Christians. All our prayers are prayers only in sharing in the prayer of the
cross, the exchange between Jesus and the Father in which Jesus offered the
whole of his life to the Father and the Father raised him from the dead."Hebert McCabe, Good Friday: the mystery of the cross
Thursday, January 24, 2008
I'm taking Christology this semester
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4 comments:
Mel,
They're having you read McCabe? That's totally awesome. I didn't know Catholics still cared about him. I love the guy--I wish I could have adopted him has another grandfather.
McCabe's christology informs all my sermons. "Jesus dies of being human." That seems exactly right to me. Here's my favorite line from the McCabe sermon you quoted:
"We need and deeply want to be loved and to love, and yet when that happens it seems a threat, because we are asked to give ourselves up, to abandon our selves; and so when we meet love we kill it.... It is when love appears nakedly for what it is that it is most vulnerable; and that is why we crucified Christ. Jesus was the first human being who had no fear of love at all; the first to have no fear of being human."
I posted a bunch of books on my blog that Carter assigned for his Christology class. Now that I think more about it, I would also say Donald MacKinnon is someone worth struggling through--his christology chapters in Borderlands of Theology, among others. I still wrestle with what he says. Oh, and of course, Sebastian Moore's The Crucified Jesus is no Stranger. That's best read as a morning devotional. That books still haunts me.
Of course, none of these books are cool these days. So, I don't know how important they are to read.
Isaac - thanks for the recs from Carter. We are reading mccabe but we're also spending a lot of time of Rahner. On the Rahner/von Balthasar spectrum, Kathleen is very Rahner (she wrote her dissertation on Schillebeckx). We are reading Schussler Fiorernza and a lot of other (post)colonial Christologies. The list is great and will help a lot.
M-This has absolutely nothing to do with your post, but I came across this quote today by MLK and I was moved. I thought you'd be too.
"And every now and then I think about my own death, and I think about my own funeral. And I don't think of it in a morbid sense. Every now and then I ask myself 'What is it I would want said?' And I leave the word to you this morning. If any of you are around when I meet my day, I don't want a long funeral. And if you get somebody to deliver the eulogy, tell them not to talk too long. Every now and then I wonder what I want them to say. tell them not to mention that I have a Noble Peace Prize, that isn't important. Tell them not to mention that I have three or four hundred other awards, that's not important. Tell them not to mention where I went to school.
I'd like somebody to mention that day that Martin Luther King tried to give his life serving others. I'd like for somebody to say that day that Martin Luther King tried to love somebody. I want you to say that day that I tried to be right on the war question. I want you to be able to say that day that I did try to feed the hungry. And I want you to be able to say that I did try, in my life, to clothe those who were naked. I want you to say that on that day I did try to visit those who were in prison. I want you to say that I tried to love and serve humanity. Yes, if you want to say that I was a drum major, say that I was a drum major for justice. Say that I was a drum major for peace; I was a drum major for righteousness. And all the other shallow things will not matter. I won't have any money to leave behind. I won't have any of the fine and luxurious things of life to leave behind. I just want to leave a committed life behind. And that's all I want to say...if I can help somebody as I pass along, if I can cheer somebody with a word or song, if I can show somebody he's traveling wrong, then my living will not be in vain. If I can do my duty as a Christian ought, if I can bring salvation to a world over wrought, if I can spread the message as the Master taught, then my living will not be in vain."
Nice quote, C! It's amazing to think about King's self-awareness of his imminent death. He really knew this as soon as he accepted the call the the civil rights movement. I was always moved by that story. King was in his kitchen, looking down at his new born baby when the Lord told him to fight for his people. And King was afraid and confused. Then he heard the voice of the Lord say "I will be with you til the very end of the ages."
He was never promised safety or praise or even victory. The only promise given was that God would be present to him.
Hallelujah.
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