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SUNDAY SPECTATOR
March 31, 2002
Christ the Jew
My mind wanders to Jerusalem each year at the approach of Easter -- and of Passover the Jewish feast at which Christ was present for the Last Supper (in the synoptic tradition). It was the night before his Crucifixion. Christ having been of course a Jew. It is the night the paschal lamb is consumed; the night on which according to all the Gospels the Eucharist was instituted which we Christians continue to celebrate down to the present day. "This is my body this is my blood." ... "Do this in remembrance of me." This year as ever the two feasts are close together for one is the echo of the other like a sky in which there are two moons. Indeed the only thing to separate them is two thousand years of history little calendrical deviations. The idea of the sacrifice and with it the idea of redemption begin in the same place and will finally be one and the same. He Christ was betrayed by Judas Iscariot and brought before a human judge. In the words of the Apostles' Creed: "Suffered under Pontius Pilate. Was crucified dead and buried. He descended into hell." And then The third day he rose again from the dead. Today is that third day the most holy in the Christian calendar the day on which the news is proclaimed He is risen! We hang not on the Cross but on Christ's Resurrection. At the centre of all Christian doctrine -- and according to Christians at the centre of everything -- is this one moment. It is not understood as a miracle but as the miracle at the heart explaining all miracles before and after. It was or rather it is the grand intersection between the Eternal and our own transitory world of space and time. Everything in nature and in ourselves was -- is -- transformed by it. It casts backwards through history as well as forwards it gathers together every strand of meaning into one knot into one flame and is of the moment with the Creation. And in prayer and contemplation the Christian apprehends through the fact of the Cross and shining through the Cross the Resurrection. It is the lifting of the burden the weight -- of sin of mortality of fate. Christ according to the Gospels came into the world to abolish death. To abolish the tyranny over us to free us from our greatest fear. In the moment of contemplating Christ's Resurrection we know the truth and the truth has set us free. "That God so loved the world." All lines of scripture also converge at this one extraordinary moment when all prophecies are fulfilled all stories are completed all promises are redeemed. I think of the promise of Jehovah brought by his prophet Isaiah to the people "chosen of God": And to old age I am he; And to hoar hairs will I carry: I have made and I will bear; Even I will carry and will deliver you. This is the moment of our deliverance for which we waited through the centuries for which our Jewish brothers and sisters wait faithfully still. He said that he would bear would carry; he said that he would come for us; and we proclaim that he has come. In the descent of the dove he came. "Came down from heaven." And for our salvation for the salvation of all humankind. And as the Jews wait we wait for the "second coming" of this Messiah for the true "end of history" for the moment to return upon us like our own carnal earthly deaths in a day when we look not for Thee and at an hour when we are not aware . At midnight he awakened King David; at midnight he awakened Paul; at midnight he said the Bridegroom shall come . Every Christian believes this -- irrational is it must sound to many -- not just crazy "born agains". Believes some day the skies will open. Yes we are all so strange. It is what we are about; not just thinking nice thoughts doing a kind turn to a stranger saying prayers before bed or grace before meals. Those are all possible activities depending on the situation and the time of day. Christ didn't tell us to pray at any particular time. Instead he instructed us to pray: "always" (Luke 18:1) without ceasing (I Thessalonians 5:17) at all times (Psalm 34 and Ephesians 6:18). He did not require us to carry watches. I am writing all this in a certain context our first Easter since the events of "9/11" changed our lives and we entered a new era in the violent history of our world. A new era in which everything is changed and yet Christ does not change. * * * * * My mind cannot wander to Jerusalem this year without feeling a deep solidarity with my Jewish brothers and sisters in Israel under daily assault from suicide bombers and in the shadow cast by a horrible war -- the backward shadow of a war that is approaching. I pray for the Muslims too with all who stand at Heaven's Gate who must walk through "the valley of the shadow of death". But for the Jews I pray in solidarity for they are once again under attack not because there is a war but because they are Jews. After the Holocaust we vowed Never again. Have we already forgotten? It is time for all Christendom to remember Never again. That we will not stand by as Jewish people -- as pregnant mothers children teenagers old women and old men -- are selected for extermination. That we are not indifferent in this matter that we are not neutrals as between the victim and the murderer. That as Christians and in the name of Christ we stand by our brother and sister Jews. In many parts of the world Christians are also under attack from the same murderous ideology because they are Christians. In some places it is Shia Muslims or other minorities under attack. And likewise we stand by them our own in Christ's mercy. And by all those believers or not for whose blood the fanatics cry. My Bible keeps falling open at Psalm 46: "God is our refuge and strength a very present help in trouble. Therefore will not we fear." David Warren
© Ottawa Citizen
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