Tag Archives: sacrifice of Jesus

A Season for Sacrifice

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crossRedVeil1Lent is the season when we think of making sacrifices, usually small ones, like giving up a pleasure or two. This Lent, we have been called upon to make many large sacrifices because of the COVID-19 virus. The social distancing needed to slow the spread of the disease entails giving up many very good things that we take for granted. I can’t even go out and get a haircut when I need one. The disappointments through canceled events are many. For me, it’s a concert I was looking forward to and, more disappointing, a speaking engagement where I was going to present a paper I had worked on for many hours. I’m sure many others have had greater disappointments than that. It must be hard, for example for children not to be able to play freely with their friends and to be separated from grandparents. One of the greatest renunciations for committed Christians is, ironically, Church. Usually, going to Church is something one increases during Lent, but the social distancing called for right now has worshipers staying home and making do with online services. I would think this would make worship a self-emptying process as the familiar sacred space and the people one is usually with would not be there except on a computer screen.

We do not necessarily choose to give up these things. When concerts are cancelled, for example, one doesn’t have the option of going. Bishops around the country ordered the cancellation of in-person services before most state governors had issued executive orders. The only choice is to be a reasonably good sport about it. Or not. We may grieve the things we lose during this time, but we can take comfort in the assurance that these renunciations are saving lives, maybe even one’s own. Thinking of others in this way lightens the load that comes of focusing on our own losses. Greater than the sacrifices of social distancing are the sacrifices of those who are risking their health and possibly their lives to serve others during this time. Medical workers top the list. True, these people entered these professions expecting to make sacrifices for others, even if not in so intense a fashion. But people stocking shelves in grocery stores or working elsewhere in the food chain are also risking themselves and these are not jobs one normally expects to be so risky. Then there are those who lay down their lives. One example I’ve heard of is a priest in Bergamo. His parishioners had bought a lung ventilator for him, but he gave it to a younger man who was dying. Not even his body was recovered in the midst of the mass burials.

In such times of stress, there are some who opportunistically seek to profit instead. The selling of needed medical equipment for many times their wealth is a tragic example of this. There is also talk about sacrificing human lives to save the economy, a notion that makes The Economy loom like a deity requiring sacrifices. I don’t mean to minimize the economic impact of the COVID-19 virus and the need for careful balancing of economic peril with that of the disease. I am calling for a deep concern for the lives of all people. In all this, there is the fundamental choice of whether we will make sacrifices of ourselves as needed or will prefer to sacrifice other people. This is a fundamental choice we face all the time, but the current crisis adds urgency to it.

The Great Sacrifice of Jesus who died on the cross makes it quite clear that God is in the business of self-sacrifice and is certainly not a deity that requires sacrifices of others. And yet, as our model, self-sacrifice is what is asked of us because of what Jesus did for us and continues to for us all the time. During this season, we are reminded of those who made a sacrifice of Jesus, oblivious of the sacrifice Jesus was making for us and even for them, if they could accept it. The love that motivates Jesus is awesome, beyond our comprehension. If we even begin to tap in to this love, we come to see for ourselves that it is the way, not to glory, but the way of glory.

American war Sacrifice

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crossRedVeil1The escalation of militarized violence has reached bewildering levels in the USA. Kelly Denton-Borhaug gives us an important theological response centered on the theme of sacrifice.

First, Denton-Borhaug surveys the militarization of our society which will be an uncomfortable eye-opener for most of us. Recruitment is taking place in our public schools and has infiltrated our computer games which are being more and more designed to train us for real war that is no game—or shouldn’t be.

One of the most disconcerting elements of our society’s militarization is the large number of Christians who are avidly supporting our wars. Denton-Borhaug zeroes in on the rhetoric of sacrifice which she suggests is the keystone of the presidential speeches since 9/11. The sacrifice being made on our behalf by those serving in the military is noble, sanctified. How dare we oppose those who make these great sacrifices? Well, there is the matter of the countless people “over there” who are being sacrificed without having enlisted with the US military for the job. These deaths are countless because the US military does everything it can to prevent counting their deaths.

Denton-Borhaug analyzes the Christian theologies of sacrifice, especially substitutionary atonement, that makes Jesus’ death a sacrifice required by the Father, or at least the cosmos. What has been happening is that political rhetoric is syphoning off the Christian resonances of sacrifice, corralling the sacrifices required of war as if the god of war were the God of Christ. Much of this works on subliminal levels.

Those of us working with the thought of René Girard and his colleagues see ourselves in a different place regarding sacrifice, but Denton-Borhaug has problems here as well. Girard himself she mentions almost in passing, only to suggest that Girard sees it as human nature to be violent so not much can be done with it. Mark Heim’s fine book Saved from Sacrifice is examined in some depth. Although Denton-Borhaug respects Heim’s attempt to get away from a theology of sacrifice, she thinks he fails. The failure hinges on Heim’s (and Girard’s) notion that only through his sacrificial death could Jesus reveal the truth of sacred violence.

I think Heim and Girard are right about this but Denton-Borhaug has pointed to an important point. If Jesus’ death is considered “necessary” in any way whatever, then it is vulnerable to the military rhetoric that proclaims the sacrifices of war as “necessary.” Girard avoids philosophical and theological terminology and so does not consider the category of contingency. This is where theological analysis is necessary for Girard’s anthropological insights. Granted, the power of mimetic desire analyzed by Girard was highly likely to lead to the violent outcomes of collective violence leading to sacrificial rites. But to retain any sound doctrine of Original Sin, we must insist that this violent outcome at the dawn of humanity was contingent. The same applies to Heim’s analysis of the Atonement. Heim is as clear as it can be that Jesus’ death was not necessary as far as God was concerned. If it was “necessary,” it was “necessary” for humans. Given the weight of history and the situation in Judaea at the time Jesus lived, it seems highly unlikely any other outcome was possible for Jesus’ earthly ministry but we have to insist that the death of Jesus was contingent. That is, the truth of sacred violence could have been (and actually was) revealed through Jesus’ teaching. It was not “necessary” for Jesus to be killed to reveal this truth, but that is what happened. Knowing Mark Heim as I do, I am almost certain this is his position. I have taken the time to go over this section of the book in more detail to show how the challenge from Denton-Borhaug can help those of us who use Girard’s thought to sharpen our thinking in this area.

In a broader sense, Denton-Borhaug has trouble with sacrifice and for good reason, since the militarized rhetoric is such a powerful form of emotional and spiritual blackmail that really has ruined many of the brightest and best of our younger generation. One need only note the traumatized lives, high rate of homelessness and suicides of our veterans to see how thoroughly they have been made sacrificial victims. Denton-Borhaug has trouble understanding the nobility of Christian martyrdom in the early centuries, not realizing the degree to which it was nonviolent resistance to the Empire. In fact, her practical suggestions are along the lines of actively making peace, a “theology of work” she calls it which amount to much sacrifice as well as resistance to violent political structures.

A thought-provoking and important book that helps us grapple with a major ongoing crisis in our time.

For an introduction to René Girard’s thought see Violence and the Kingdom of God

Escape from the Denial of Death

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cemetery1Richard Beck’s new book The Slavery of Death works with the powerful thesis of Ernest Becker which states that fear and denial of death fuels human aggression. I have read both of Becker’s books (Denial of Death and Escape from Evil) and I find Becker’s analysis of this phenomenon compelling. Moreover, much scientific testing has verified Becker’s theory. Beck outlines Becker’s demonstration this existential fear of death and its subsequent denial leads to striving for heroism. For Becker, heroism is a compulsive drive to succeed, to prove that one matters, and to gain recognition for one’s efforts. One might think that there is nothing wrong with any of this but this neurotic striving for “heroism” comes to the expense of other things in life such as family and friends. Moreover, the social settings for such striving tend to magnify aggressive behavior so that not only fearful individuals but the social groups as well persecute others to validate themselves.

Impressive as Becker’s insights are, they are very bleak and they don’t offer humanity any constructive way out the denial of death except, perhaps, a heavy dose of Stoicism. Most humans find this cold comfort at best and an impossible prescription at worst. Might as well join Jean-Paul Sartre in a life of existential despair.

Richard Beck brings Christian theology and spirituality to Becker’s insights which brings us into a whole new ball game. To begin with, he notes the importance the Eastern Orthodox Churches give to Death, rather than Sin being the prime enemy that Jesus must destroy. He adds depth to the slavery to “heroism” by comparing it to the “principalities and powers” of the world denounced by St. Paul. Beck then uses the social and anthropological thought of Walter Wink and William Stringfellow (who deserves to be much more remembered than he seems to be) to help us see the strength of social forces that pull us into a “heroic” mode. Much more important, Beck shows how an eccentric life can pull us out of this death anxiety so as to live a healthy, loving life. Beck is not talking about being somebody’s eccentric uncle; he is talking about living a life centered outside the self. He uses Arthur McGill as a resource for understanding how love and concern for others benefits the one doing the loving by pulling us out of ourselves. Jesus, of course, is the perfect example of eccentric living. Jesus was positioned fully out of himself out of concern for others and also his grounding in his heavenly Father. That is why, although he feared the painful death to come in Gethsemane, he had the courage to endure it. Lest one be overly daunted by the extent of Jesus’ self-sacrifice and that of people like Teresa of Calcutta, Beck also shows how important small sacrifices on a daily basis are for eccentric living. These are within reach of everybody. The “little way” of Thérèse of Lisieux is are stirring and practical example. For Thérèse, eccentric living can be as simple as pushing a wheelchair of an elderly sister who complains bitterly over every bump on the way. It is such eccentric living that leads to Jesus’s resurrected life which we are all invited to share.