2021.03.07 | It's the System
“It’s the System”
Rev. Pepper Swanson
John 2:13-22
March 7, 2021
When I travel in England, I am fond of visiting both Churches and Cathedrals. I love their architecture, their grand scale, their history, and their art. Some you can simply open the door and walk inside, freely entering the quiet. Others, particularly the larger and better known Cathedrals, have gift shops right inside the main entrance where you can purchase a ticket, a tour, a special exhibit pass, and browse for books, postcards, and music. Three of my favorite Cathedrals also have cafes where you can buy tea and scones and rest for a while.
Closer to home, you may have noticed that we sometimes sell things at Eden Church, especially during our annual Pledge Campaign. We set up tables in Oliver Hall and sell or accept offerings for hats, t-shirts, mugs, water bottles, and, what is always our bestseller, donuts.
I always think about both the Cathedral gift shops and Eden’s own pop-up marketplace when we read one of the four Biblical passages in which Jesus (to put it mildly) indicates his dissatisfaction with what today’s scripture characterizes as “people selling cattle, sheep, and doves, and the money changers seated at their tables.” While we never sell cattle, sheep, or doves at Eden, I can’t help but wonder what Jesus would think about our occasional forays into donut-mongering.
In the interest of exploring this question, I’d like to offer three simple observations about today’s reading.
First, please note that today’s story is from the second chapter of John, not later as in the 21st chapter of Matthew, 11th chapter of Mark, or the 19th chapter of Luke. In the Gospel of John, this outburst is how Jesus’ ministry begins, with a very public demonstration of his dissatisfaction with Temple practices and a bold statement that points to both his death and resurrection, which will happen on his third Passover visit to Jerusalem, three years hence.
Second, unlike donuts, which most Eden members would agree are not integral to our faith, the cattle, sheep, doves, and money-changing were integral to the Jewish Temple practice. The animals were needed for the burnt offerings that would mitigate sin and could not be driven or carried by travelers from their homes so they were bought in Jerusalem. Offerings and Temple taxes could not be made with Roman coins bearing the image of Caesar, so the faithful exchanged them for Temple coins. While it is possible Jesus objects to the market’s location, his actions — making the whip, driving the sellers out — and his words — his Father’s house — reveal a deeper, more profound problem than market location.
Third, the underlying history of John’s gospel supports the idea that Jesus was offering a much more serious challenge to the Jewish faith and Temple system. As the ancient reader of John would have known, the Temple was destroyed by the Romans in 70 AD, at least 10 and possibly 20 years before the Gospel was circulated.
Jesus, through his Christian followers who compiled the Gospel in 80-90 AD, is critiquing a dominant system while simultaneously offering Jewish survivors a new place to meet God, a place they believed was prophesized and validated long before the Temple’s destruction, that being the crucified and risen son of God.
Understanding that Jesus was making a systemic challenge to his own faith tradition helps us think about the many challenges in recent years to our political, economic, and social systems. For example, you will remember the Occupy Movement of 2011. With their rallying cry of “We are the 99 percent!” the Occupiers set about to object to social and economic inequality, greed, corruption and the undue influence of corporations on government. More recently, serious challenges have been raised to two other systems: the #MeToo movement has challenged systemic sexual abuse and harassment and the Black Lives Matter movement has challenged systemic racism in the US. Other movements are tackling climate change, health care, immigration, refugee safety, among many other social justice issues.
Critiquing and challenging systems of inequality is hard work. Many movements, like Occupy, lose steam because their agenda is vast and the forces against them are enormous. Others experience setbacks because they won’t accept incremental change or find the media has moved on and they are left without the amplification they need to illustrate their points.
One take-away from today’s story of Jesus in the Temple is that it’s important to offer people alternatives to the system in which they find themselves, especially if that system is hurting more than it's helping.
The early Christians weren’t experts, but in their writings we detect many indications that they were on a mission to change both a faith and economic system that they thought was broken. They traveled widely, shared the gospel happily, attempted to talk to their opponents, and when faced with rejection or violence, they moved on to others who were more receptive to their message. As a result, belief in Christ and Christian practices spread rapidly across the Mediterrean, then Europe, and the whole world. It helps to offer a positive alternative to the current system.
I’ll close by offering another insight gleaned from my love of Cathedrals. Most of the Churches and Cathedrals that I have visited in England, even those with bookstores and cafes, are sparsely attended. Entering St. Paul’s Cathedral on the weekend of the Diamond Jubilee of Queen Elizabeth when London shops and markets were thronged with people, I found four worshippers, two of whom were the priests.
I was surprised but not shocked. Over the last 100 years or more, a curious thing has been happening in both England and the US: the market has driven the people out of the church. If Christ returned today, he might find himself in the same unenviable position as we do as progressive Christians: critiquing an economic system that seems to demand all from the people it should serve — all their time, all their money, and all their attention. If we are not fighting for our economic survival, we are actors in a system that demands semi-constant consumption and entertainment, sometimes at high cost of our spiritual and family lives.
COVID-19 has both accelerated and highlighted economic inequality while simultaneously pushing the pause on consumption for those who are able to shelter in place. The old adage, “Be careful what you wish for!” is doubly true when it comes to hoped-for end of COVID-19.
As the body of Christ today, our job is to take up Christ’s challenge to the systems of inequality. We can and will offer the cross and the certainty of God’s love, but ultimately we will be more successful if we offer — and fight for — a systemic alternative to the suffering we see around us. Amen.