30 Now Jesus had not yet come to the village but was still at the place where Martha had met him. 31 The Jews who were with her in the house consoling her saw Mary get up quickly and go out. They followed her because they thought that she was going to the tomb to weep there. 32 When Mary came where Jesus was and saw him, she knelt at his feet and said to him, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.”33 When Jesus saw her weeping and the Jews who came with her also weeping, he was greatly disturbed in spirit and deeply moved. 34 He said, “Where have you laid him?” They said to him, “Lord, come and see.” 35 Jesus began to weep. 36 So the Jews said, “See how he loved him!” 37 But some of them said, “Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man have kept this man from dying?”

38 Then Jesus, again greatly disturbed, came to the tomb. It was a cave, and a stone was lying against it. 39 Jesus said, “Take away the stone.” Martha, the sister of the dead man, said to him, “Lord, already there is a stench because he has been dead four days.” 40 Jesus said to her, “Did I not tell you that if you believed you would see the glory of God?” 41 So they took away the stone. And Jesus looked upward and said, “Father, I thank you for having heard me. 42 I knew that you always hear me, but I have said this for the sake of the crowd standing here, so that they may believe that you sent me.” 43 When he had said this, he cried with a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!” 44 The dead man came out, his hands and feet bound with strips of cloth and his face wrapped in a cloth. Jesus said to them, “Unbind him, and let him go.”

Meditation

Imagine Martha and Mary preparing Lazarus’  body for burial. The washing, the anointing, the wrapping, the laying in the tomb. The ever-flowing tears, the grief that is beyond comfort but can only be sympathized with. Like all priests, I have dealt with death many times in my ministry: the deaths of the elderly whose time had come and was anticipated, but also the deaths of children, of young people who died in accidents, of people who had been murdered.

Imagine the uncontrollable wailing of mothers, the haggard and grim faces of fathers. In this lesson we have the verse, “Jesus wept” (John 11:35). Often cited as the shortest verse in the Bible, it also summarizes Jesus’ identification with us as mortals. Lazarus “has been in the tomb for four days.” Bodily decay has begun with its revolting, gagging stench. 

Here, arguably, is the greatest of Jesus’ miracles. The raising of the dead is not only a world-changing miracle; it is marked by a compelling command. The command is not given to Death, but to the dead. The command is shouted with undeniable authority: “Lazarus, come forth!” (John 11:43). 

Compare the translations; most have “Lazarus, come out,” as if he is revealing himself at the end of a game of hide and seek, but “Come forth!” is a command to present yourself before the Master, a command to which even death must submit. 

In Zeffirelli’s miniseries, “Jesus of Nazareth,” at this point there is a scudding away of a shadow from the stone field before the tomb as if blown away by the wind, and the land is left bright and sunbathed. The closing verse, “Take off the grave clothes and let him go” (John 11:44) is a summary of the entire meaning of the Gospel: the rescue of the beloved from the supreme grasping clutches of death and the grave.

David Baumann is a published writer of nonfiction, science fiction, and short stories. In his ministry as an Episcopal priest, he served congregations in Illinois and California.

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Daily Devotional Cycle of Prayer
Today we pray for:

The Diocese of Indianapolis – The Episcopal Church
The Episcopal Diocese of Springfield

After George Floyd was killed, white evangelical Christians seemed to lean in and learn from Black Christian leaders like Esau McCaulley and Justin Giboneyin ways that appeared miraculous compared to how many white Christians engaged in conversations about race and faith after Trayvon Martin was killed. Fellow white Christians were offered tools to zoom out from just thinking about personal sin and, instead, think about the immediate and generational impacts of communal sins (both intentional and unintentional). Our eyes were opened to the ways that imbalances established by intentional injustice tend to be maintained (or even widened) over future generations if there is no intentional correction.. White evangelical Christians recognized their responsibility to do something to deconstruct the systems that maintained imbalances and do something to make the victims of generational injustice whole again, somehow.

As someone who coaches pastors and parents about how to minister to sexual minorities, I was curious about how to translate these new found tools and concepts for biblical racial justice into biblical justice for gay people. And as someone who experiences same-sex attraction and stewards that according to historic Christian sexual ethics, I was both curious and wary about what those potent intellectual and theological catalysts might do in my heart and in churches leaning into conversations about race and faith.

I noticed many of my fellow white evangelical Christians posting black squares on social media in support of #blacklivesmatter (and often in the same season, declaring that they were egalitarian). Then there was sexual ethics. During this period, I received dozens of messages from earnest Christians with some version of the following question:

“I’ve become convinced that how Jesus really sees things is more in line with culturally progressive views on racial justice and women in leadership. I’ve always believed in a more traditional Christian sexual ethic, but now it’s bothering me that the version of Jesus in my head leans one way on race and women, but then the other on sexual minorities. That seems inconsistent. I feel like Jesus wants some form of dignity and justice for gay people as well. Does that mean I need to switch my views on that too?”

My first impulse was to send these earnest Christians an Amazon link to William Webb’s Slaves, Women, and Homosexuals. This somewhat dated, unsubtly titled volume concedes that Christians have used the Bible to justify slavery and oppress women, but it encourages modern Christians to instead focus on what the narrative across the Scriptures tells us about God’s ultimate ethic on slavery, women in leadership, and gay sex. Webb argues that when we take a closer look at how the Bible talks about each of those, we see the Scriptures treat those topics differently and compel the Christian to hold perspectives on race, female leadership, and sexuality that point in different directions.

Basing his approach on the notion that God accommodates His self-revelation based on our abilities and limits, Webb points out that across the narrative of Scripture, from Genesis to Revelation, the way God talks about slavery and women changes over time—suggesting a trajectory toward an ultimate good. Women, for example, are among Christ’s disciples, and Paul urges Philemon to see his slave as a beloved brother.

Webb argues that this trajectory, however, is not found in how the Bible discusses same-sex sexual activity. Notwithstanding all the cultural caveats we might make, sexual activity between people of the same sex appears to draw consistent repudiation, even condemnation.

So I sent the Amazon link for Slaves, Women, and Homosexuals to my friends yearning for biblical justice for sexual minorities. They were underwhelmed.

What I failed to recognize was that their core concern wasn’t the seeming inconsistency of Christian responses to race, gender, and sexuality. Instead, their primary concern was a desire for gay Christians to experience genuine wholeness and thriving in our churches, instead of experiencing loss of faith driven by Christian homophobia. The Christians messaging me saw that believers could hold onto biblical ethics while seeking justice for racial minorities and women. Their real question was, “What about gay people?” Unspoken, I heard them also hinting that they were hoping there was a way to satisfy their God-given yearning for justice for sexual minorities without needing to abandon historic Christian sexual ethics.

After many discussions, we slowly started to piece together an answer. As is often the case with problem-solving, we first needed to admit that there is a problem. And we needed to name how Christians have intentionally and unintentionally fostered injustices against gay people.

Particularly in the past century, it seemed like Christians have either perpetrated or been complicit in these behaviors, motivated at some level by homophobia:

1. Christians defended the criminalization of gay sex, supported housing and employment discrimination policies, and stood by as the AIDS crisis was waved away as gay cancer.
2. Pastors taught that merely experiencing same-sex attraction was a sin and propagated ex-gay theology that led millions to lose their life or faith.
3. Denominations barred celibate gay Christians from leadership in their churches and policed what words sexual minorities could use to describe themselves.
4. Parents failed to protect kids from the wounds of the closet by waiting until kids came out to share about God’s love and wisdom for same-sex attracted people, enabling loss of faith and loss of life.
5. Churches neglected to teach about or support the vocational singleness encouraged in Matthew 19 and 1 Corinthians 7, instead cultivating churches in which no one can thrive in lifetime singleness for the sake of the kingdom.
6. Often with the best intentions, churches hid their historic Christian sexual ethics, publicly used messaging that hinted at the opposite, and set gay people up for painful bait-and-switch experiences when they learned the truth after years of fellowship.
7. Christians maintained a double standard of sexual stewardship by calling gay Christians to biblical standards but then turning a blind eye to sins among straight Christians, including casual romance, premarital sex, disregard for Christ’s invitation to consider vocational singleness, refusing to be open to raising children for the kingdom in Christian marriage, and enabling unbiblical divorce/remarriage.

As my friends and I considered the effect of these seven injustices, I noted that most of the gay Christians I’ve known haven’t directly endured the worst of these injustices. Their churches weren’t overtly homophobic, and many of them allow celibate gay Christians to lead. Fellow Christians have often supported basic LGBT civil rights. But too many of the gay Christians I’ve known who’ve tried to follow historic Christian sexual ethics still struggle mightily. They’re haunted by the lingering wounds of the closet, including shame, anxiety, depression, and unhealthy coping mechanisms. A subtle double standard of sexual stewardship in their churches still stings. Their churches still don’t know how to offer lifelong, lived-in family to anyone in long-term singleness, regardless of sexual orientation. It seems there’s a systemic homophobia that was established by communal sins of the past, continues to burden gay Christians today attempting to follow God’s wisdom, and must be pruned from the Church.

Holding unambiguously to biblical wisdom for sexual minorities, believing unequivocally that God loves gay people, and asserting unreservedly that He wants to offer them what’s truly best, my friends and I dreamed about biblical justice for sexual minorities. We remembered one of the key transferrable lessons from biblical racial justice and empowerment of women: God is much more concerned with making those on the margins whole than He is about punishing those who established or maintained injustice.

In contrast to the injustice gay people have experienced, we discerned seven ways the Church can be cleansed of systemic homophobia and sexual minorities can be made whole:

1. Churches can repent for the sins of past Christians against gay people. Nehemiah 9 and Ezra 9, among others, make clear that it is good for the people of God to recognize and confess the collective sins of the Church.
2. Pastors can correctly teach that while same-sex attraction may constitute a temptation, a person has not sinned until the individual has yielded to that temptation in thought, word, or deed. Pastors can teach that the solution to temptation isn’t harmfully ineffective ex-gay practices, but instead a daily dependence on the Holy Spirit to resist temptation.
3. Denominations can recruit leaders who are faithfully stewarding their same-sex attractions, celebrate the spiritual gifts they have to offer the body of Christ, and support them to use whatever words empower them to reach LGBT people with the gospel.
4. Churches can clearly and compassionately share their convictions about God’s love and wisdom for sexual minorities so that straight Christians know how to better support their queer siblings and so that gay Christians know whether it’s safe to share their story.
5. Parents can teach every kid in age-appropriate ways about sexual stewardship for all people, including God’s love and wisdom for same-sex attracted people, before puberty.
6. Churches can raise the bar for everyone’s sexual stewardship, protecting gay Christians from a self-destructive victim mentality and fostering thriving according to God’s wisdom for all.
7. Churches can teach what Jesus and Paul had to say about vocational singleness, guide teens and young adults to discern (regardless of sexual orientation), celebrate the commitments and kingdom work of vocational singles, hire them as church staff, and cultivate intentional Christian community where vocational singles can find lived-in family.

We were inspired by this vision, but something still felt undeniably different about biblical racial justice versus biblical justice for sexual minorities. Then we clearly named it: there’s nothing broken about being Black. The color of our black and brown siblings in Christ is exactly what God intended for them. In contrast, while injustices have been committed against gay people and systemic homophobia lingers, same-sex attractions are ultimately a brokenness that God did not intend. Perhaps this difference is why Webb’s Slaves, Women, and Homosexuals is unavoidably necessary. Biblical justice for racial minorities and for sexual minorities will look different, but not because God is arbitrarily singling out gay people. No, true biblical justice for sexual minorities will be just as good for gay people as it has been (in part) for women and people of color. But it doesn’t look that way yet, right? Why? I submit it is because we haven’t tried it yet.

The Church has never actually tried to embody God’s wisdom for sexual minorities in ways that lead to good and beautiful thriving for gay people. We’ve only seen the tragic fruit of ex-gay theology and revisionist sexual ethics. Perhaps for the first time in history, Christians have everything we need to compassionately embody historic Christian sexual ethics. We could try it and see what happens! We could discover how gloriously good and beautiful a Church filled with gay Christians thriving according to God’s wisdom can be.

We might realize a Church in which kids grow up hearing and seeing the testimonies of Christians publicly navigating same-sex attractions, committed to historic Christian sexual ethics, and experiencing just as much connection and community as their opposite-sex attracted brothers and sisters in Christ. Imagine some gay Christians walking out vocational singleness and others walking out marriage with someone of the opposite sex, but all finding deep belonging as they daily depend on the Holy Spirit to resist lesser loves. We might see a Church in which gay and straight Christians spur one another on toward love and good deeds, and the whole body of Christ flourishes according to God’s wisdom. And we might delight in a Church where kids are sober-minded but not scared if they notice same-sex attractions in themselves, because they’re confident they can share with their parents and find lifelong support from their local church to thrive according to God’s wisdom.

Let’s try.

At the heart of this slender volume is a series of retreat addresses Rowan Williams first presented to the Anglican Benedictines of Holy Cross Convent in Leicestershire, which he later reworked and to which he added a couple of related essays. As it happened, I brought Passions of the Soul with me for a recent retreat, where I experienced through a slow, meditative reading of the text Williams’s unfailing pastoral insight. It is a gem. Like some of Williams’s other short books based on retreat addresses — his two sets of meditations on select icons of Christ and of Mary come to mind — Passions of the Soul merits multiple readings to savor the superb wordcraft and absorb the wisdom of its pages.

The brief foreword and lengthy introduction orient the reader to Williams’s topic: the teaching of early Eastern monastics on the principal interior obstacles to spiritual growth and strategies for overcoming them. He centers his exposition on texts written in 450-750, but also draws on earlier material, especially from Evagrius of Pontus (d. 399), as well as later works in that treasury of Eastern monastic writing, the Philokalia. The introduction frames the rest of the teaching that is to come, and I focus my remarks on this early, informative material. Book I then delves into the eight “passions” as interpreted in the tradition; Williams also juxtaposes each of the eight Matthean Beatitudes as counter-remedies to them. The two essays of Book II survey the goal of Christian spirituality — or the challenge “To Stand Where Christ Stands” — from Paul through patristic writers to Teresa of Avila and John of the Cross. These chapters elucidate foundational questions from various angles, while indicating an essential unity in the spiritual quest across the centuries.

The passions under consideration are symptoms of a fundamental loss of freedom in the human soul. While we might think of passion, positively or negatively, as intense desire, the “fire in the belly” (Williams wryly observes that nowadays no CV is complete without a disclosure of one’s “passion” for the work), these uses of the word are secondary to the monastic authors. Passion is employed in their ascetical grammar in its root sense to indicate something we do not so much choose as undergo, even suffer.

Western Christians might recognize it as the condition stemming from original sin — parsed by Williams as the “spiritual handicaps we haven’t chosen but are stuck with.” Chief among these is the mental skew of “illusion,” which prevents us from seeing things as they are, in their natural simplicity, with clarity of vision. Instead, we tend to approach the world (including others) with the unstated questions, “What’s in it for me? How will this affect me or mine?” A self-centered perspective is seriously off-center, but we can’t seem to help it.

Small wonder early theologians referred to baptism as an “illumination”: the grace of seeing with the lights on; seeing, by small increments, the truth. But maturing into the baptismal life, of healing our disoriented and fractured selves, requires at least a lifetime of consistent ascetical effort. Our deep hope is grounded in the grace of Jesus Christ, who by his incarnation, death, and resurrection took our evil upon himself and transformed it. The Spirit opens a way into freedom, a defining quality of resurrection life. We are further helped by our innate longing for God, given in creation, what Williams calls “a kind of magnetic turning towards the real.”

Meanwhile, we need practical help to see straight, and here is where the early tradition comes to our aid. Williams insists, rightly, that these centuries knew no distinction between “theology” and what we would call “spirituality”; indeed, “Christian doctrine took its distinctive shape only through reflection on the distinctiveness of how Christian women and men actually prayed.” The guidance of the early monastics was shaped by their personal and corporate experience of struggle and prayer, their keen observations of the workings of their hearts, and the interventions of divine grace usually enacted in quite ordinary circumstances.

The passions are those framed by Evagrius of Pontus as the “Eight Thoughts,” which in turn passed into the Western tradition via John Cassian as the Seven Deadly Sins. This was an unfortunate recasting of Evagrius’s insightful diagnosis of our spiritual maladies, for what is at issue are not so much discrete acts of sin (although they can morph into sin) as thoughts, notions. Evagrius calls them logismoi. In his opening chapter, “Mapping the Passions of the Soul,” Williams shrewdly describes them as “corrupt chains of thought”: not mere “strings of mental ramblings but chains that bind us.” These logismoi can make us their prisoner, but it is possible to break these destructive bonds before they take over. Watchfulness over our thoughts from the very start is key here. Once we notice a vicious pattern beginning to lodge itself in our minds, we face it without undue anxiety and hand it over to God, casting ourselves upon divine mercy for help. Finally, we simply turn our attention to whatever task may be at hand and get on with it. No fuss.

Attaining the condition called apatheia is the object of these practices, but we must not confuse it with its entomological English relative, “apathy.” (Indeed, apathy could be traced to indifference or acedia, one of the deadly thoughts — what Williams characterizes as a cynical, perhaps coping, “whatever” attitude.) By contrast, apatheia is an “anticipation of the resurrection” (xiv), a state of inner freedom from enslaving, disordered, compulsive passion. Only apatheia makes authentic love possible, since it is free from our usual set of demands, whether spoken or not. “Apatheia has a daughter named agapé,” wrote Evagrius.

The aim here is to get beyond purely reactive responses to whatever life serves up. Humans have evolved a whole set of instinctive responses to situations that may please or threaten, instincts that have helped us survive and cope, and thus serve up to a point. But they have their limits. As Williams notes,

We have to negotiate our way by means of these instincts, yet they can get in the way of our full humanity if we don’t think through how they work. … For the Eastern Christian writers, “passion” is the whole realm of instinct, reaction, coping mechanisms, and this is the level at which complications arise. We cannot live without these things if we are to be human at all; yet unless we understand and in some degree transfigure them, we are trapped in something less than human. (xxii-xxiii)

As Williams, following the ancient writers, teases apart each of the Eight Thoughts along with its corresponding ameliorative Beatitude, we see the integrative theology of the Church’s first thousand years working to support praxis. The labor of habitual wakefulness does not take place in the echo chamber of one’s private thoughts, however. Its context is the faith and sacramental life of the community, and “it develops as we live a life involved with others, as we respond to situations and cope with a fluid and changing environment. … God has so shaped the world that we grow into our deepest freedom in a world of constraints and challenges.”

The teaching of these ancient guides is fundamentally hopeful. We don’t have to be trapped in self-defeating reactions that shrink our humanity, destroying the exchange of love with God and others for which we were made and for which we are destined in Christ. But we need education in the often subtle ways of the Spirit to get our bearings, sharpen our discernment of what’s really going on, and thus sustain a faithful response. Passions of the Soul offers such a needful mentorship.