Friday 23 February 2007

Yesterday we started looking at Cornel's book "Democracy Matters." The title may not sound like something for a devotion...but hang on...the Church can benefit from spending time with it.

Expanding on the "three crucial traditions" (Socratic commitment to questioning, Jewish prophetic commitment to justice, tragicomic commitment to hope) - all of which I see in Jesus.
In the face of elite manipulations and lies, we must draw on the Socratic. The Socratic commitment to questioning requires a relentless self-examination and critique of institutions of authority, motivated by an endless quest for intellectual integrity and moral consistency. It is manifest in a fearless speech - that unsettles, unnerves, and unhouses people from their uncritical sleepwalking.

Often I speak of the "powers that be" or the "empire." These are not merely political. They can also be religious. In many ways such powers often suffer from a lack of truth-telling in order to keep things just as they are or to turn the world into a position that is more favorable to a few. In the face of such powers, we must prayerfully question the assumptions that begin to run the world even as we are not willing to go in the way they lead us. I find it to be necessary that our questioning involve our own actions, motives, and dreams. Without such a critique, we all know that we are so easily pulled into great rationalizations as to why we do or do not live along the way of Jesus. In fact, this is a good time to submit that without living in a community that questions and being a part of that critical experience, we will justify lives contrary to the grace of our God in Christ, Jesus, and we will enter those lives acting as though we do not smell. Truth is we do and we will smell. The questions help us to unveil that which is able to stick up the life of the individual and the community. We will do well if we are able to maintain a community life that is willing to question the way we are moving...and then to walk together along the way of the cross and into life beyond our ways.

Connection: West notes that in Plato's Apology, Socrates says: "Plain speech is the cause of my unpopularity." And yet, it is into this kind of plain speech we are invited to move today.

Make us fearless when we speak, O Lord, so that we will work together to face the truth of your Reign and also face the many ways we attempt to live on its boundaries or in other lands that we claim to be of our own making. Grant us the peace of your Holy presence Amen.