Is it not the case that the Spirit of Jesus requires and invites us to belong more deeply to one another, to overcome divisions through that Spirit? This is surely what the call to conversion, to transformation of life, is all about.
We are all born into complicity, part of an oppressive, dehumanising world order, for which we did not give our permission. This is original sin, our separation from one another and from God. But, by the grace of God, we are forgiven and set free to be responsible; responsible for the complicity that we do have a choice about. We can say: “This is the way things are — but I beg to differ.” Jesus invited his followers to do things differently.
Of course, that is hard, because it is not our default position, and it is always a minority position. But it is no harder than it was for the few people who started the campaign to end slavery, who were also up against powerful vested interest and the love of money.
There are ways for every one of us, even small ways, to be dissenters. We can make a noise, and refuse to say prayers while beneath us people rot in dungeons, as the slave-traders did — and we can tell our political and church leaders so.
When the women went to the grave of the crucified Jesus and could not find his body, the angels said to them: “Why do you look for the living among the dead? He is not here. He is alive.”
It is a paradox of the good news that fullness of life is found in embracing those very realities that we fear most, in confronting our fears, in dying and rising into the glorious freedom of the children of God.
Yet that freedom, and the joy and hope it brings, are not to be found in intellectual assent, or theorising, or in better techniques for prayer. They are found in engagement, in the midst of people, in the midst of all the hurt and shame and vulnerability we share with all human beings everywhere.
One South African living with HIV said this:
We cannot escape our grief, or the losses we have experienced. But we can act to minimise this suffering, to prevent further deaths, to open our hearts, and hold in them those who, now, are afflicted with illness and its isolation.
We cannot allow our bereavement to inflict a further loss upon us: the loss of our own full humanity, our capacity to feel and respond and support. We must incorporate our grief into our everyday living, by turning it into an energy for living, by exerting ourselves as never before. AIDS beckons us to the fullness and power of our own humanity. It is not an invitation that we should avoid or refuse.
The following prayer was written in Xhosa by a member of an HIV/AIDS support group in a church in South Africa. I invite you to listen to Noma-lady’s words, and to walk with her and many others
as a sister or brother. We belong together.
God is love to me, and God is amazing, even though I am not strong physically in terms of my health. Even though things are difficult, I continue to go down on my knees and pray, and from time to time I see God responding to my prayer. . .
There are times when the pain is so heavy: my hand with cramps; my fingers twisting. Had I not been connected with God, I would be accusing people of causing this pain, but, earlier in my life, I chose a close relationship with God, though I am poor. God is with me in the morning when I wake up. God is around during sleep, and is with me as I try to walk around. I just cry knowing that God has heard my prayer. I live with great hope. Amen.
This is an edited extract from Sharing the Blessing: Overcoming poverty and working for justice, by Kathy Galloway.
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