Seventeenth Sunday after Pentecost (19B), Sept 16, 2018; The Rev. Susan Ackley

Here we are back in the sanctuary.

A change of location for our worship as we move from the long, narrow space in the Lindsey Chapel back to this BIG wide open space.  Banners visible up in the choir loft. The Emmanuel Land window. All this resonant air just waiting to be charged by sounds of the Schutz, Byrd, and Bach.

You and I, we’re bodies, we occupy space physically, and locations matter to us, they affect us, consciously and unconsciously

This week’s Gospel is all about location.

To begin with, the physical text of the Gospel of Mark. The passage for today occurs pretty much right in the middle. Some scholars call it a hinge between the very different two halves of the Gospel.

With this passage, the mood changes, becomes more serious, the ministry of Jesus and his apostles more problematic. A cloud begins to hang over the narrative.

And then there’s where this passage is located, geographically. Jesus and his followers have traveled to Caesarea Philipi in far northern Palestine.

The signs of Roman occupation surround them. Once there here had been a temple dedicated to the wild god Pan, but now a grandiose temple to Caesar Augustus dominates the town. Herod’s son Philip had built it 15 or so years before, built it as an effusive tribute to the Roman emperor.

Philip designed Caesarea Philippi to trumpet imperial power, strength, and luxury. Visitors had only to look around to see who was boss.

It was  here in this location that Jesus chose to ask the question that stands precisely at the center of the Gospel, “Who do you say that I am?”

Peter answers, “You are the Messiah.”

In Jesus’ time there wasn’t just one conception of the Messiah. For some, the Messiah would instituted the reign of God in which goodness and righteousness would prevail; for others it was a military leader who would defeat Caesar and end oppressive Roman rule. Still others didn’t expect a Messiah at all.

Peter seems to fall into the second camp. And he probably feels this is a perfect symbolic location for Jesus to ask his question and for Peter to answer as he did!  As far as Peter is concerned, this was the exchange—Jesus “Who do you say that I am?” Peter “You are the Messiah, the anointed One, chosen by God to end Roman domination !”

But Jesus’ response slices the heart out of Peter’s excitement. He doesn’t repeat Peter’s word “Messiah,” with its possible triumphalist connotations. He refers to himself instead as the “Son of Man” or “Human Being” and predicts not triumph but great suffering and death (and rising too, of course but they’re all too shocked by the suffering and death part to hear it).

Peter doesn’t want any of this. He rebukes Jesus, and Jesus rebukes him—“Get thee behind me, Satan.” This is not affectionate sparring. The Greek word translated “rebuke”  used twice here is only used in Mark’s Gospel for exorcism. They are accusing one another of being possessed by demons. Something very serious is going on here.

Jesus goes on with his requirements for discipleship–

“If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.”

Jesus turns the symbolic structure of Caesarea Philippi upside down, rejecting its ethos of power-over, violence, and corrupt luxury.

In order to follow him, they would have to put down any longings they had for power over others, for pride and wealth and prestige, and instead “take up their cross.”

The cross—that symbol of shame. Carrying the cross meant enduring public humiliation, meant separation from the mainstream of “good,” respectable people, meant, in Paul’s words foolishness.

After the Gospel today, Jesus’ ragtag little band turns their backs on Caesarea Philippi literally and figuratively and follow Jesus on a long journey south to another even more symbolically loaded location, Jerusalem, where the cross was waiting.

But–you don’t have to leave town to resist Caesarea-Philippi.

Last Thursday I was giving directions to Emmanuel to my daughter and I heard  myself saying, “well, if you take the Green Line to Arlington Street,  you’ll get out by the Hermès store. Head up Arlington to the Taj Hotel. Turn left and you’ll pass the window for Tiffany’s…”

Definitely an echo of the conspicuous consumption rampant in Caesarea-Philipi!

But here we are this morning. This is Emmanuel’s location.

Through research by Mary Chitty our church archivist, I found that it has been part of the church’s DNA almost from its beginning to resist its literal Caesarea-Philippi-ish location with a unique intertwining of the values of beauty and inclusion.

The fourth Rector of Emmanuel was the Rev. Elwood Worcester, here from 1904-1929. Worcester initiated the Emmanuel Movement which  invited people suffering from physical and mental illnesses to the church for fellowship and healing.

A contemporary account of one of the gatherings of the Movement mentions how beauty and inclusion combined in the work of healing: “any Wednesday evening from October to May, you will find if you drop in at Emmanuel Church, one of the most beautiful church interiors in the land well filled with worshippers… A restful prelude on the organ allures the soul to worship…” A talk was given “usually of practical significance, like hurry, worry, fear, or grief, and the healing Christ is made real in consequence to many an unhappy heart.”The worshipers were primarily poor people from the tenements of Boston, as well as many others suffering from alcoholism and addiction to cocaine and morphine.

It’s in Emmanuel’s  DNA: some examples I’ve witnessed– Bach cantatas and Boston Warm, homeless artists from Common Art exhibiting in the Newbury Street Fair, a couple of weeks ago, five years ago opening the Lindsey Chapel soon after the Boston Marathon bombing for scared and confused people to color and marker prayer flags and carry them in procession to Copley Square.

Through beauty and welcome, welcome and beauty, set firmly in this location, Emmanuel Church still stands against the dominant values of Caesarea-Philippi.

I want to end by giving us all a chance to reflect on our lives as individuals.  How do you resist imperial values? How do I? How can we resist the demons of a society which worships wealth and economic success, in which structures hurtle us in the direction of more and more inequality, in which might makes right, in which way too much masquerades as just enough?

So in silence, let’s each of us ask ourselves some questions:

Among the lures and allures of this Caesarea Philippi world, what tempts you most? I recently realized that I’m tempted by the demonic thoughts driving me to achieve a degree of financial security significantly beyond what I will ever need and more than most people could ever imagine. What about you?

How do you resist?

What role do the gifts of beauty and hospitality play in the life of your spirit?

(Pause)Doestoevsky once wrote, “in beauty is the salvation of the world.” I’d amend that to say,”In beauty and welcome are the salvation of the world.”

Amen

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