+Z’ev

Today’s assigned readings:

1 Samuel 10:17-27, Acts 7:44-8:1a, Luke 22:52-62

“Surely this man also was with him; for he is a Galilean.”
Luke 22:59

I like to imagine that Peter gets recognised because of his accent. Although I’m a southerner - “Southron” is the politically correct term among Confederate partisans - I have lived in far too many places to have much of distinct accent any more. Sometimes my sentence structure may betray me - and yesterday at Church I said, “I ain’t thought about it yet.” But generally my accent blends in with that of whichever group I happen to be speaking: I can sound like a New Yorker with New Yorkers. I can sound Irish with Irish (or when drinking heavily). I can sound English with English (or when drinking heavily). I can sound Southron with Southrons - in fact, I can blend in very well with several regional dialects. As a result of this skill, I can also do quite a few other accents: Israeli English (a little), Russian/generic Slavic English (a LOT - especially in Fr Victor’s voice). I can do Valley. I can do camp. I can also manage to sound about as News-Room Neutral as I may want. I can do several more that are escaping my memory just now. Most of these show up at work when I’m reading “shift change” reports to the daily staff meeting. I forgot French! I can do a very bad Maurice Chevalier (nasally haw haw haw).

However, when I speak in my native Southron, the most common content is Jesus Speak - be that making fun of Televangelists and Faith Healers, or just Bible quotations. My Protestant, devout Christian roots seem as tied to my Southron, as my Anglo-Catholic roots are tied to that curiously English-sounding “Altar Voice” and my Orthodoxy can best be discussed in a semi-Dracula voice. (”Ze Paskal vigil… takes place… *sigh*… ad niiiiiiiaaht.”)

Peter was recognised as a Galilean (by his accent, I hope) and so, logically he must be a Christian, right?

We can imagine Peter’s reply to have been, “Yes, I’m a Galilean, but not that kind of Galilean.”

The folks over at the GetReligion blog are fond of pointing out that the news media likes to go to certain, very specific talking heads when covering the religious right - Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, Focus on the Family, etc. Rarely do they go to conservative RCs or Orthodox, or more sensible sounding voices. GetReligion worries about this. But I’ve pointed out over there I’ve never ever heard a morally conservative Christian leader say, “Yes, I’m a Christian, but not that kind of Christian.” Then, one would hope, he would go on to explain why his version of opposition to Gay Rights or Women’s freedoms was different than Robertson’s.

Never heard it.

I have, however, heard a LOT of the “liberal” sorts - including myself at several phases in my life - say, “Yes, I’m a Christian, but not that kind of Christian.”

I’m wondering today if that denial of kinship - especially if left to stand on its own - mightn’t be morally/spiritually/psychically the same as Peter’s denial of knowing Jesus.

They say the world will know we are Christians by our love for one another: not by our doctrines or our theology or our politics. So I think it’s interesting that - conservative or liberal - the first thing we might want to do is define what kind of Christian we are, really: rather than simply love. Even more interesting we do this in negative terms: I’m not this. I’m not that. I’m certainly not that hateful thing over there.

I was even prone to doing this back in 1982, my freshman (and only) year at the “non-denominational” Christian college: I kept feeling a need to say what I was not - neither an evangelical, nor a Roman, nor a fundamentalist. Five years ago I felt a need to draw a line between myself and liberals. Today the situation is reversed again - back to where it was for most of my life - but why do I feel the need to divide at all?

I find a couple of things, recently, to be tied to this. The name “Hebrew” evidently comes from the word “Habiru” which seems to mean “Gypsy” or “Boundary Crosser”. The name “Israel” of course means “who struggles with God”. Paul’s epistles assure us that there are no more boundaries in Christ. Yet we are still the spiritual “Israel”. We still cross borders and fight with God.

But they will know we are Messiah’s followers by our love.

How can we weave all this together?

Since he is speaking to Israel, and I am Israel-in-Christ, are the words of Stephen applicable to me when I say, “Yes, but not that kind of Christian”?

“You stiff-necked people, uncircumcised in heart and ears, you are forever opposing the Holy Spirit, just as your ancestors used to do. Which of the prophets did your ancestors not persecute? They killed those who foretold the coming of the Righteous One, and now you have become his betrayers and murderers. You are the ones that received the law as ordained by angels, and yet you have not kept it.”

One of my former pastors, Rick, used to say that in all the world there are only two religions. My memory is vague as I don’t remember what the two of them are, but I used to feel, often enough, as if when pressed, he might feel he and I were in different camps. This used to annoy me a lot because clearly one was “right” and the other was “wrong”. But in after years I’ve done the same: when I left ECUSA for the Eastern Orthodox faith it was because one was “right” and the other was “wrong”. (It’s only on discovering that both are equally right and wrong that I can modify that stance.) I did the same in former years, by drawing the same lines between conservative and liberals and saying the liberals were right.

How does love get in here? How do we ever let it in so that, to paint a picture, Jack Spong and B16, Phyllis Schafley and Phyllis Tickle can meet over the table of Jesus in Love?

Or do we want that kind of peace and fellowship ever to break out?

Yes, I’m used to blaming the conservatives for the problem, for even when I was one, I knew I would not be turned away from St Gregory’s altar if I showed up there. But that’s not the same thing I’m talking about: the verbal lines are drawn both ways. We can still recognise each other by our accents and, apart from hospitality, we still say “I’m not that kind of Christian” a lot.