ALL SAINTS MARGARET STREET
Sermon preached by Fr. Gerald Beauchamp at High Mass on the Second Sunday of Lent, 28th February 2010
Readings: Genesis 15. 1-12, 17-18; Philippians 3. 17 - 4.1; Luke 13. 31-end
One of the names that tend to get a bit of a reaction out of people when you're talking about modern art is Damian Hirst. A while back he caused a sensation by creating a skull using platinum and encrusting it with diamonds. The materials alone were worth millions of pounds. Before that we had cows and sharks: cows and sharks preserved in formaldehyde. The cows were sliced in two so that you could walk between the tanks and see the innards in all their excruciating detail
Whatever you think of Damian Hirst's art he is exposing us to something that is pretty much lost to us in our culture but obviously had profound meaning to the likes of ancient Abram: the splitting and halving of animals in sacrifice.
This morning's lesson from Genesis takes us back to the mists of patriarchal history. At this point Abram is just that. He hasn't been renamed Abraham as he would be later. Abram has a vision, an encounter with God. All the main elements, the images and archetypes that would lay the foundations for Judaism and Christianity are there: the promises of a son, of descendents, of a land; the response to this promise by way of sacrifice - the shedding of blood; and then the sense of mystery - the deep sleep and the glow of the smoking fire pot and the flaming torch.
These ideas and images resonate through the Old Testament and find fulfilment in the New: the gift of a son; the creation of a community; world-wide mission; the symbol of light rolling back the night and stretchingfar into the day - the paschal candle. Where there was barrenness now there is fecundity; where was death now there is life; where there was sorrow now there is joy .
A psychological reading of ancient sacrifice would be to say that it's a reciprocal act offered to what was believed to be the origin of life. Just as when an animal is born it splits open the mother's womb and the physical connection is severed so the animal sacrificed symbolises the recognition that life is a gift not something manufactured. Animals were split in two. Birds were not. Birds are egg-layers and so don't split the female in the same way. Sacrifice regenerates human culture. It binds people to the land with its seasons: times of sowing and reaping, dying back and recouping; times of fasting and feasting But the shadow side of this culture, when it becomes successful - when the land produces abundance, when there is prosperity, when societies flourish, when institutions are created (kings are crowned and the borders of empires extended) - the shadow side of this is that blessing morphs into superiority. The splitting of the sacrifice becomes a licence for division. There's 'them' and there's 'us'. So the struggle for power and dominance begin. There is subjugation and expulsion. And in this fight there are no ultimate winners.
Jesus, heir of Abram's faith (his experience and vision) is the one who embodies, sums up and fulfils the promises and covenants of God's ancient people. But he models something very different in his sonship and the community that is built on his name. Jesus laments over Jerusalem. It is a failed experiment: Jerusalem, O Jerusalem, killing the prophets and stoning those who are sent to you! And then using a stunning image he says: How often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings. In Luke's Gospel, to gather is a crucial idea. It is often paired with scatter. Whoever does not gather with me scatters, says Jesus in chapter 11 (23b).
At one level the cross reveals the conventional manner of gathering people into community around the victim. Where the corpse is, there the vultures will gather, says Jesus (Luke 17.37b). But the cross also undermines the ghoulish side of human nature: the public execution of the victim, the killing of the one deemed 'other', 'not one of us.' In his account of the Passion Luke tells us: And when all the crowds who had gathered there for this spectacle saw what had taken place, they returned home, beating their breasts (23. 48). The crowd had gathered for the sacrifice to reaffirm their identity but now scattered. Instead of that delicious self-righteousness gained in witnessing the victim getting his just desserts, they returned home wailing.
The fox had done his work. Herod and his ilk, those who maintain power whatever the cost work in a very different way to that of God. Herod scatters. God gathers. God draws people together. He binds them into one. He overshadows. Since the dawn of creation when the spirit of God brooded over the waters he has sought to protect and unite what he has made. Abram is told that the Lord is a shield. Jesus tells us that he is a hen: a hen (that) gathers her brood under her wings. The cross is his wings. We gather not in its shadow but in its shade. Blood sacrifice is brought to an end once and for all. The old wound (the splitting) is finally healed. The blood flowing from the gash on humanity is staunched.
No wonder, then that the Apostle Paul's exhortation to the church at Philippi and to all Christians is so bold: Brethren join in imitating me. In the old dispensation living animals were reduced to joints of meat. In the new what was disjointed has been joined together again. Paul, too had his name changed. As Saul he had shed the blood of Christians. Paul now has all the zeal of the convert. He had been part of the agony of scattering but he had also come to know the Lord Jesus in an experience as profound as that of ancient Abram.
Paul too had had a vision. He too had known the deep sleep of blindness but had come to see the light. He was impatient with those who had missed the point: those whose prosperity had led them into superiority and who cared only for themselves - their god is the belly. Something far more glorious awaits those who allow themselves to be transformed in Christ and gathered, joined to his love.
What Christ offers us in gathering us under the wings of his cross is eternal. This is all a bit different to modern art. Walking through Damian Hirst's divided cow preserved in formaldehyde in a brightly lit gallery lacks the mystery of the deep sleep and the smoking pot. (Although I sometimes wonder about modern art if smoking pot might be part of the story somewhere.) In recent years the original cow has had to be remade because the carcass was deteriorating.
There was an amusing incident a few years ago when it went on tour to Japan. It was during the BSE crisis and Japan had banned imports of British beef. The authorities there had to be persuaded that the cow was art not dinner. But dinner is precisely what Christ is about for us. He feeds us every time we come to mass. He nurtures us every we time we stretch out our hands to him and mirror the way he stretches out his arms over us. He strengthens us every time we turn from our divided and scattered lives and are gathered to him.