Sermons from Park Hill Congregational UCC Denver, Colorado Rev. Dr. David Bahr [email protected] July 21, 2019 “When Not to Apologize” Luke 10: 38-42 – New Revised Standard Version As they went on their way, Jesus entered a certain village, where a woman named Martha welcomed him into her home. 39 She had a sister named Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet and listened to what he was saying. 40 But Martha was distracted by her many tasks; so she came to him and asked, “Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to do all the work by myself? Tell her then to help me.” 41 But the Lord answered her, “Martha, Martha, you are worried and distracted by many things; 42 there is need of only one thing. Mary has chosen the better part, which will not be taken away from her.” Last August, Zoe Fenson went to “feminist summer camp” for grown women. It was full of nostalgic activities such as making friendship bracelets, campfire songs, and s’mores. And three days of presentations and discussions on how to stop saying “I’m sorry” for everything. Women, she said, are taught to apologize for the slightest hint of trouble. “Bump into someone in line? ‘Oh, I’m sorry.’ Take too long to find your credit card to pay, ‘Oh, I’m sorry.’ We say ‘sorry’ to defuse tension, to express regret, to joke, and even try to ease pain caused by others – apologizing to the store clerk for the rude behavior of the person in front of her. Women, she said, say sorry when we fail and we even say sorry when we succeed. When Naomi Osaka defeated Serena Williams to win the 2018 U.S. Open, she didn’t beam with joy. She apologized for winning. Zoe decided to try an experiment when she got home. Seven days without letting the word “sorry” escape from her lips. The temptations came fast and furious. “I wanted to apologize to my husband for having to take a shower, to my cat for being away so long, to my friends for missing a dinner party the night I got back.” But she did it. She caught the words before they left her mouth and instead simply told her husband, “I’m getting in the shower.” She told her cat, “I missed you.” And to her friends, she explained, “I need to stay home tonight to catch up on some rest.” Over the course of the week she was tested over and over, wanting to say sorry for having a stomachache, for heavy traffic, and “I’m sorry my hips are too wide for that narrow diner booth.” Zoe said, “no one else probably noticed but I felt lighter, less slouched, and more confident.” Instead of saying “I’m sorry I’m late,” I said, “thank you for waiting.” Instead of apologizing for another customer’s bad behavior, I said, “Wow, that person was rude!” But the best thing, she said, was that after a week of “sorry-detoxing,” when real apologies were needed, they meant something. Instead of a ritual “sorry,” now, when I say it, I mean it. “I understand why you are upset, I hurt you, and I’m sorry.” It’s liberating. But overcoming a lifetime of conditioning is hard. “In a culture that teaches women to apologize for everything – whether they have done harm or not – not apologizing is a quietly radical act.”[1] It’s radical because men keep demanding it. As Melissa Blake writes, “Powerful men use it as a tool – a weapon even – to suppress strong, confident women by making them feel humiliated, ashamed, and small.”[2] We saw clearly this week that was the goal of the tweeter in chief. Without the slightest hint of irony, he demanded the “radical left congresswomen must apologize for the foul language they have used, and the terrible things they have said.”[3] The terrible things they have said?!!! Doesn’t this make your head want to explode?! And what are the consequences if they refuse to apologize? Especially women of color. A crowd of red hats will gleefully foam at the mouth and roar the familiar refrain of racists, “Send her back.”[4] What is one way we know that Jesus was human? Sometimes he could act like a jerk. Not presidential level, but nonetheless, sometimes he said things that were not cool. Jesus is a friend of mine, so I mean no disrespect, but sometimes we need our friends to be honest with us. And so I simply have to say: Jesus, how you treated Martha wasn’t ok. You chided her, you scolded a grown woman. “Martha, Martha, you are worried and distracted by many things; there is need of only one thing. Mary has chosen the better part, which will not be taken away from her.” You can affirm Mary without turning sisters against each other – saying one way is better than the other. It’s not a competition. But, once you said those words, what else could Martha have felt but diminished and ashamed, to lower her head, step back, and walk away repeating, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.” And Mary? I doubt she felt any better. Scholars and commentaries offer all kinds of explanations and some excuses. With some of them, I agree. This short text has been rightfully used to argue in favor of women’s theological education. Mary clearly sat at his feet just like a rabbi in training would. This text has been rightfully used to support a balance of the active and contemplative life, to value being as much as doing. This is an exceptionally important text for that. But it’s also true that it probably wasn’t good for Martha to involve her guest in what appears could be an ongoing dispute. One could argue that Martha breached hospitality by doing so. She made him feel uncomfortable. Which means, did Jesus deserve an apology from Martha? Among the explanations and excuses is one that Jesus’ words were meant as an invitation rather than a rebuke.[5] Jesus invited her into a new reality. But if that were the case, wouldn’t he have said, “Come over here, take a seat, and join us in our discussion. I’ll ask the other disciples to prepare the meal.” His brusque words to Martha seem so out of character for Jesus. And yet he treated at least one other woman similarly. He was rude to the Syro Phoenician woman who asked for healing for her daughter. He said that “it’s not right to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs.” Gasp. But she argued right back that “even little dogs eat crumbs from under the table.” And for her bold response, Jesus healed her daughter.[6] The excuse for his behavior was that Jesus was just exhausted by all the demands placed on him, so he didn’t really mean to be rude. “He didn’t really mean it.” Sound familiar? How often does that get thrown around. “He didn’t really mean it. He’s a good guy. I have known him for years.” Racist, sexist, homophobic language and abuse are constantly excused by “he didn’t really mean it.” Our new book club read Austin Channing Brown’s memoir about being a black woman in a world made for whiteness.[7] As have others, she said white people have an uncanny need to excuse away the racist behavior of other white people. The words “he really didn’t mean it that way” have fallen off my own lips. And for that I must say “I was wrong and I’m sorry.” And stop doing it. And yet otherwise, Jesus did repeatedly speak up and act out on behalf of women. He constantly challenged a deeply patriarchal world. Perhaps most notably, when men expected Jesus to denounce the woman who kissed and wiped his feet with her hair, a very sensual act, he not only defended but praised her. Men said, “Make her apologize! Proper women don’t do such things.” He said, “She understands the nature of my ministry more than any of the rest of you.” Judas chided the woman who bought expensive perfume to anoint Jesus. “That could have been sold and the money given to the poor.” This from the man about to sell Jesus down the river for 30 coins. Oh, but she’s the problem. Throughout the gospels, Jesus honored women by revealing or confirming his identity to them. For example, the Samaritan woman at the well with 5 husbands. And Martha. In the Gospel of John, Jesus told Martha, “I am the resurrection and the life.” She responded, the first person ever to do so, “I believe that you are the Christ, the son of God, who was to come into the world.”[8] Martha may be best remembered for being too concerned that her guests will be taken care of and well fed. But, we should never forget she was the first to boldly affirm that Jesus is the Christ. Some communities in southern France remember her exactly that way. They elevate her in a way I had never heard of before. I want to share some stories I learned this week.[9] After the death, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus, Mary, Martha, and Lazarus began to spread the good news, but during a period of persecution in the year 45, they were among a small group put into a boat and left to drift on the Mediterranean without oars or a mast. In some traditions, they landed on Cyprus where they preached and taught until they died and were buried there.[10] But other traditions tell that the boat kept sailing until it reached the South of France. While others split off and went their own way, Mary found retreat near Marseille; a cave in a rock 2,800 feet high, where she spent the next 30 years in prayer and contemplation. Seven times a day, at each canonical hour, she “was raised in the air by angels to pray and afterwards placed gently on the ground where she ate the same heavenly food as the angels. Occasionally she left her place of solitude to ‘pour the honey of the words which flowed from her heart into the souls of the listeners.’” Sounds like Mary! The ever-energetic Martha, on the other hand, kept busy along the banks of the Rhone River and in the towns of Avignon and Arles “cleansing lepers, restoring paralytic persons, raising the dead, giving sight to the blind, hearing to the deaf, a sound walk to the lame, strength to the feeble, and health to the sick.” And probably providing supper for some drop-in guests on occasion. Among the stories about Martha: She ate only once a day and then only roots and the fruits of trees. Bare-footed, her head covered with a white turban made from camel skins, she wore sack-cloth and a hair shirt belted with a knotted horse-hair rope -which tore badly into her skin. Like a Desert Mother, her bed was made from branches and vine-shoots with a stone for her pillow. But the most remarkable story is the one in which she tamed a dragon. A terrible dragon of incredible length and extraordinary size whose mouth exhaled deadly smoke and from whose eyes, flames shot forth. It tore everything it encountered to pieces with its teeth and claws. Terrified, the people challenged Martha to prove the power of the Messiah about whom she preached. So, undaunted, she walked right up to the dragon’s den. She made the sign of the cross and it immediately calmed down. She tied her belt around the neck of the dragon and forbade it to ever harm anyone again with its breath or its bite. Afterward it lay down and followed her around like a massive dog on a leash.[11] These stories were not made up to tell at a feminist summer camp in 2019. These traditions date back to the middle ages. Relics of Martha were found in a church in Tarascon. To this day there are ancient churches and shrines dedicated to Saints Martha and Mary in Provence and elsewhere in southern France that keep these stories alive. But, like any legend or tale or fable, the point isn’t its historicity but its meaning. And so, we should at least remember, Martha is far more notable than to reduce her to a dispute with her sister. But back to the scripture text, if Martha felt rebuked by Jesus for being preoccupied, it didn’t seem to matter. Perhaps she didn’t feel rebuked and simply brushed it off and got back to work. That doesn’t excuse Jesus. But she didn’t feel a need for an apology; No big deal. Afterall, tradition says that Mary, Martha, Lazarus, and Jesus had an especially close relationship. They were like family. And yet, the encounter between Martha and Jesus still makes me feel a certain kind of way. It raised some questions about women and apologies and left me wondering:
[1] https://theweek.com/articles/794664/women-apologize-everything-what-happens-when-stop [2] https://theweek.com/articles/853050/trump-everlasting-problem-men-demanding-apologies-from-women [3] https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2019/07/trump-demands-apology-from-democratic-congresswomen-he-attacked-in-racist-diatribe/ [4] https://www.theroot.com/what-they-mean-when-they-say-send-her-back-1836503461 [5] https://www.workingpreacher.org/preaching.aspx?commentary_id=1723 [6] Matthew 15:21-28 [7] Austin Channing Brown, I’m Still Here: Black Dignity in a World Made for Whiteness, Convergent, 2018 – Highly recommended. One of the best books I’ve read all year. [8] John 11:27 [9] Thank you for the idea to Jane Anne Ferguson and sermon-stories.com [10] https://anunslife.org/blog/nun-talk/of-cooks-pirates-and-dragons-saint-martha [11] https://monasticmatrix.osu.edu/commentaria/legend-mary-and-martha [12] https://theweek.com/articles/853050/trump-everlasting-problem-men-demanding-apologies-from-women
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