Don Friesen
This past week the United Nations (UN) Conference Against Racism met in Durban to review progress towards the goals set by the World Conference against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance, in 2001. One might think that such a noble pursuit would find wide agreement across the nations, but it appears that even altruistic efforts have their detractors. It's common knowledge that these meetings have become platforms for disparaging Israel, but receiving much less airplay is the plight of the world's Dalits, a South Asian group of people of low caste – outcasts, or "untouchables," as they are known. Dalits are subject to violence and rape, suffer routine discrimination – socially, culturally and politically – and have few means to address their grievances through the judicial system.
The word, "Dalits," comes from a Hindi word meaning "held under check". Peter Prove, an Australian human rights lawyer, has worked with the Lutheran World Federation for many years in a struggle to eliminate discrimination against Dalits, who number 260 million, but the Dalits received nary a mention in the declaration of the UN conference with the noble name. It appears untouchables are unmentionable!
Untouchable, Unmentionable – Irredeemable?
I can't think of a more insidiously evil designation than untouchable – someone considered unworthy of basic, human touch. To deny someone the warmth and tenderness that comes from human touch seems cruel. Mahatma Gandhi (1869-1948) said that God never made human beings so that one might consider another human being an untouchable. Imagine what life would be like if you were never allowed to touch another human being, and that other human beings were forbidden to touch you. Imagine never to feel the warmth of another person's hand, a hearty pat on the back, an embrace, or to experience a kiss. Some of us may not be particularly touchy-feely, but there is considerable significance and power in touch.
The Scriptures are not unfamiliar with untouchables. Lepers, for example, were thought to be infected with a disease so contagious and incurable that to the burden of suffering the disease itself were added the burdens of shame and disgrace. Lepers were considered unfit for human companionship, to say nothing of human touch. Yet Jesus, when a leper came to him and knelt before him, "stretched out his hand, (and) touched him...." (Luke 5:13)
Jesus touched an untouchable! This may not surprise us, because we know the gospel story. Jesus was a healer. I can't imagine healing people without touching them! And people wanted to touch him. Crowds would gather to hear him, and Luke tells us, "the people all tried to touch him" (Luke 6:19, NIV) in order to receive healing. This did not sit well with everyone. On one occasion, when Jesus was a guest at the home of a Pharisee, another guest poured perfume on Jesus' feet, then dried his feet with her hair. His host was not pleased and thought to himself, "If this man were a prophet, he would have known who and what kind of woman this is who is touching him – she is a sinner." (Luke 7:39)
One day another woman tried to touch the hem of his garment (Luke 8:44), thinking that would be enough to cure her ailment. People started bringing their babies to him "that he might touch them," and when the disciples tried to stop them, Jesus said, "No, no, let them come, the kingdom of God belongs to such as these." (Luke 18:15, my paraphrase) I can imagine that little ones were clamouring to climb up into his lap in response to his welcoming touch.
The Ghost of Messiahs Past?
For the disciples, of course, these were just memories. Jesus had died, and the disciples were still sorting through the shards of their shattered hopes, hiding out in some backroom in Jerusalem, when suddenly Jesus appeared among them and said, "Peace be with you." They were startled! Terrified! They "thought that they were seeing a ghost." (Luke 24:36-37) The reality of the resurrection had not yet sunk in, and in their fear, abetted by their overheated imagination, they thought they were seeing an apparition! And Jesus said, "What's with all the doubts and worry?" (Luke 24:38, my paraphrase) "‘Look at my hands; look at my feet – it's really me. Touch me. Look me over from head to toe. A ghost doesn't have muscle and bone like this.' As he said this, he showed them his hands and feet. They ...couldn't believe what they were seeing. It was too much; it seemed too good to be true." (Luke 24:39-41, The Message)
While the disciples were trying to sort this out, Jesus said, "Have you anything here to eat?" (Luke 24:41) And whether this was a ghost, the real Jesus, his apparition, or what not, the disciples knew their manners and they "gave him a piece of broiled fish, and he ...ate (it) in their presence." (Luke 24: 42-43) Hmmmm. This is a touchable risen Christ. An embodied risen Christ. A risen Christ who eats!
Some Prefer a Disembodied Christ
Now, there were some that preferred a disembodied Christ. Let his apparitions appear. Let his ghosts linger. No harm in that. A ghost is of considerably less threat to the powers-that-be than the real deal! However, it wasn't only those for whom Jesus' popularity posed a threat, a popularity a political movement could easily exploit, there were others who also preferred a Christ without a body.
The new Christian movement intrigued Gentiles, with the exception of the Word-became-flesh idea. Greek Gentiles, in particular, didn't like the idea. No god in his right mind would take upon himself a human body. In fact, some Greek gods were held in esteem for precisely the reason that they held themselves aloof from earthly affairs. To the Greek the body was evil; it imprisoned the soul; it confined the spirit! Marcus Aurelius, the Roman Emperor and Stoic, advised: "Despise the flesh; it is (but) blood and bones and a network, a contexture of nerves, veins, and arteries." For the Stoics a god was best experienced in abstraction.
This anti-body mind-set lingered, even in Christianity. Early Christians called Docetists believed that Jesus' physical body was an illusion, as was his crucifixion. The name, Docetist, is derived from the Greek verb meaning, "to seem to be". Docetists held that Jesus only seemed to have a physical body and to die a physical death. The very thought of taking the word, "flesh," and applying it to God, was revolting to them. They imagined Jesus as some sort of phantom. His human body was not a real body; he didn't really feel hunger; he just ate the broiled fish for show! Jesus felt no weariness, sorrow, or pain; he was, in fact, a spirit in the form of a human being. The Docetists revered Jesus, but they preferred a ghostly Jesus to a Jesus one could touch.
In centuries to come the Church held several Councils (Nicaea, AD 325; Chalcedon, AD 451) to discourage the anti-body mind-set, but there are attempts to deal with this heresy already in the New Testament. The New Testament suggests that the Word became flesh, that Jesus was a human person, and that the risen Christ was touchable, with appetite intact. The New Testament makes no attempt to soften this fundamental theological assertion, as harsh as it might sound to Gentile ears, and it was Gentiles to whom Luke addressed his Gospel. Flesh is flesh is flesh! Paul begins his letter to the Romans, for example, by introducing "the gospel concerning (God's) Son, who was descended from David according to the flesh...." (Romans1:3) The writer of 1 & 2 John makes of Jesus' fleshliness a test of faith, saying: "By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit which confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is of God...." (1 John 4:2, RSV) And in the following letter he warns his fellow believers of "deceivers, ...those who do not confess that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh...." (2 John 7)
The Word Became an Abstraction?
The Word-became-flesh is at the heart of the gospel. Ernest Renan (1823-1892), one of many biographers of Jesus, wrote: "Humanity seeks the ideal, but it seeks it in a person, ...not in an abstraction." Our God came to us, and identified with us. God, who normally dwells in eternity, out of love and grace subjected Himself to the limits of time and space that are part and parcel of our human existence. We worship a God whose love is an embodied love, full of grace and truth, which we have beheld in the person of Jesus Christ.
Some people prefer the ghost of Messiahs past, and this preference is not unique to the early centuries of the Church. Clarence Jordan, the biblical scholar who founded Koinonia Farms in an effort to address a number of things, including racism, wrote, "Jesus has been so zealously worshipped, his deity so vehemently affirmed, his halo so brightly illumined, and his cross so beautifully polished, that in the minds of many he no longer exists as a man. He has become an exquisite celestial being who momentarily lapsed into a painful involvement in the human scene, and then quite properly returned to his heavenly habitat. By thus glorifying him we more effectively rid ourselves of him than did those who tried to do so by crudely crucifying him." (Introduction, The Cotton Patch Version of Luke (Jesus' Doings) and Acts (the Happenings)) A perfect Christ, unsullied by flesh and earthiness, may be wonderful to admire, but of limited relevance to us.
A disembodied, ephemeral Christ, of course, is more adaptable, more easily shaped to accommodate our will. I imagine this is of comfort to those who want to accommodate themselves to whatever cultural currents blow at the moment, but it's a ghost whose appearances are capricious, who can just as easily disappear, and who has little ethical substance. Imagine children coming to an ephemeral Jesus, wanting to climb on his lap, and he has to tell them, "No!" because they'd fall right through! "Go away! It's not a real lap. And stop trying to touch me!"
Madeleine L'Engle tells of a time when her daughter was young and cried out in the night, and Madeleine went to her and attempted to comfort her: "Don't be afraid, dear, God will be with you." Her daughter, however, didn't derive much satisfaction from an abstract theological concept, and said, "I know that, Mommy, but I want somebody with some skin on."
The Sacrament of Human Touch
Touch is important. Take it away from babies and they fail to thrive. The Menninger Institute once identified a group of crib babies who did not cry. Babies cry because they instinctively know that this is the way to get attention. These babies, however, had been in abusive homes. Their parents had let them cry for hours on end without responding. Eventually the babies stopped crying. So the Menninger Institute began an experiment. They brought in people from retirement homes, and every day these people held the babies and rocked them. The object was to get these babies to start crying again – and it worked! Physical touch made all the difference. Touch is important. Misuse it, or abuse it, and the harm caused is incalculable.
I have read that our skin is so sensitive to touch is because our skin has 50 receptors per every one hundred square millimetres. Within these receptors are tactile points from 7 to 135 per square centimetre, and from all of these tactile points you have about half a million sensory fibres carrying all sorts of messages to your brain – physical messages of heat and cold, pain and pleasure, but also psychological, emotional, and spiritual messages of friendship and love.
Touch meets a deep-seated hunger within us, a hunger for human contact. Being touched in tender, caring ways is healing and therapeutic. I remember a nurse, at one of my cancer check-ups years ago, running her hand over my surgery scar several times. It was such a human, personal, and comforting gesture amidst the cold, sterile, and antiseptic atmosphere of a hospital. On Friday I sat with our brother, Bob F, who is growing weaker and who was in great pain, but as I prayed with him, holding his hand, his grip was strong. There is something powerful in basic human touch. It's the reason I touch children when parents dedicate them to God.
Wendy Wright is a writer who interviewed a number of Christians, asking them, "What were your most powerful experiences of God?" What struck her was that 90 percent of those interviewed spoke of finding God most powerfully within relationships, in other words, with "somebody with some skin on." People found God most powerfully in friendships, or with a spouse, with children and parents, in faith groups, with a co-worker, and so on.
Madeleine L'Engle, whose young daughter said that she "wanted somebody with some skin on," talks about the "sacrament of human touch". She writes: "In the night when I wake up, as I usually do, I always reach out with a foot, a hand, to touch my husbands's body; I go back to sleep with my hand on his warm flesh." (L'Engle, Glimpses of Grace, page 192) She confesses that she does not fully understand the mysteries of the flesh, but she acknowledges its spiritual and emotional significance.
A Cleveland pastor tells of a man among them who was hard to touch. Harvey lived alone, and rarely received a hug, or even a kind-hearted touch. He probably had been mugged more often than hugged. He had been "manhandled," but not embraced. His clothes smelled of some off-putting odour, his breath was laced with gin, his teeth were missing, and his language was rougher than his voice. He rarely had on his hearing aid, and so any encounters were more monologue than conversation. Under his grim exterior, however, was a gentle and lonely man.
Several members of Harvey's church took care of him after he suffered a bad fall. They cleaned his house, under the frightful gaze of seven cats. They set up a system of home health care and daily meals, so that in his final years Harvey received what he had needed for a long time. Harvey told them, "You all saved my life because you reached out and touched me. I thought I was an untouchable." (story told by Timothy C. Ahrens)
Love, on a personal scale, and salvation history, on a larger scale, are not woven of gossamer wispiness. I think that the New Testament emphasis on Jesus' bodily presence is not to prove the resurrection, as some like to stress, but rather an affirmation that matter matters! The resurrection of Jesus' body affirms that the creature formed "from the dust of the ground" (Genesis 2:7) is indeed good and what God intended.
Unlike the ancient Docetists who thought matter evil, and their modern-day cousins, who spiritualise faith, deftly separating body and spirit, the New Testament preaches a holistic gospel. Matter matters! The resurrection – with a risen Christ who invites us to touch him – is "God's affirmation that creation matters, that love and justice matter, that humanity, in all its ambiguity and complexity, is still fearfully and wonderfully God-made." (Cynthia Lano Lindner, The Christian Century, April 21, 2009)
An Embodied Christ Requires an Embodied Church
G.K. Chesterton (1874-1936) was one of the most influential English writers of the twentieth century; his prolific output included journalism, philosophy, poetry, biography, Christian apologetics, and fantasy. His clever and pithy sayings earned him the title, the "prince of paradox," but he also wrote fifty-two detective stories, of whom the hero is Father Brown, a priest as well as a clever detective.
In one story Father Brown and his friends are confronted by a particularly mean and cowardly crime, prompting one of a group of people who know the criminal to say, "I wouldn't touch him with a barge-pole myself."
"There's a limit to human charity," says another.
To which Father Brown responds: "There is; and that is the real difference between human charity and Christian charity. ...it seems to me that you only pardon the sins that you don't really think sinful. ... You forgive because there isn't anything to be forgiven."
"But hang it all," cries one of the men, "surely you don't expect us to be able to pardon a vile thing like this?"
"No," says the priest, "but we have to be able to pardon it. We have to touch such men, not with a barge-pole, but with a benediction. We have to say the word that will save them from hell. We alone are left to deliver them from despair when your human charity deserts them." ("The Chief Mourner of Marne," The Collected Works of G.K. Chesterton, Volume XIII, 2005)
An embodied Christ requires an embodied church, a church whose task is not to determine whom one can touch with a barge-pole or not, but whose task is to touch others with a benediction, as Jesus did. Touch was his primary contact with others. He touched children, widows, beggars, blind people, prostitutes, sick people with every imaginable affliction, lepers, and even the dead. Most often the people he touched were strangers and outcasts. He went out of his way to touch the untouchables of his society.
It is in his honour that we, the Church, share real food and real wine – food we can taste and touch – in remembrance of his body broken for us. It is in his honour that the Apostle Paul waxed eloquent about the Church-as-body. Paul describes the church as Christ's body in order to express the unity of its many members who perform different functions within this single organism. (1 Corinthians 12) And Paul goes on to suggest that, just as in a human body each part is essential, and the health and function of each part is essential to the health and functioning of the whole, so too, in the Body of Christ, all parts of the Body are interrelated and must function for the common good.
I worry, however, that just as it appeals to some of us to worship a ghostly, disembodied Christ, it is convenient for us to think of the Church in the same way. If the Church is a body, then the parts of the body have to show up for bodily events or the event will not occur. If, however, your idea of the Church is as a more ephemeral entity, then participation becomes optional, depending more on one's preference than upon one's commitment. It's my prayer that our lives, including our commitment to the Church, will reflect the grace and truth of the One who became flesh and dwelt among us.
Fred Craddock, a master storyteller, says that thirty-something parents approach him and without a blink of an eye ask, "Let's see now, was it next Sunday that my daughter was going to be baptized?"
And Fred answers, "Yeah, next Sunday."
"Well .... she has dance lessons next Sunday," replies the parent.
And Fred, trying to be accommodating, answers, "Well, the baptism is on Sunday morning."
"Well ... the dance lessons are at 10:30," answers the parent.
"On Sunday morning?"
"Yeah, The dance studio has classes on Sunday morning."
"On Sunday morning?" replies Fred.
"Yeah. Sunday morning."
To which Fred replied, "Then we have a decision to make, don't we?"
(Craddock Stories, 2001, page 51)
Quotations of Scripture are from the New Revised Standard Version, unless otherwise noted.