麻豆约拍

A spiritual comment and prayer to begin the day with Revd Dr Paul Mathole

Good morning.

Marilynne Robinson wrote the Pulitzer Prize winning novel Gilead. She is also a thoughtful essayist. She suggests modern culture suffers from an increasingly troubling reflex - the need to demonstrate that my 'group' or tribe is in the right.

To illustrate she describes this scene: She saw a woman publicly rebuke an older man for a remark that she interpreted as improperly ethnocentric. The man accepted the rebuke and was saddened and embarrassed. Robinson writes that this 鈥渨as not a scene from some guerilla war against unenlightened thinking鈥�. Rather, the woman 鈥渕ade a demonstration of the fact that her education was more recent, more fashionable, and more extensive than his鈥�, and as if to imply that 鈥渞ight thinking was a property or attainment of hers in a way it never could be of his鈥�. All this done in front of an audience already in agreement with her view.

What troubled Robinson was this was not a genuine attempt to enlist or persuade, but actually an attempt to undermine. I am right and you are wrong. I am inside and you are outside. Correction actually masked for reinforcing superiority.

By contrast, Jesus told his disciples: 鈥淵ou know that those who are regarded as rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them ... Not so with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be slave of all鈥�. The task of explaining the gospel of Christ was not about reinforcing their superiority. Humility came first.

Gracious God, we are humbled by your grace. Help us to see all people, however different, as those you value and care for. May our gratitude to you make us servants of all.

Amen.