Thread by @dianabutlerbass

For the theological record, the “blood of Jesus” is not a magical talisman. Jesus bled because he was a victim, fully human, of political violence. His own blood did not stop his own suffering & death.

https://twitter.com/amaramarasingam/status/1246658639785492480

Christian theology insists that thru his death, Jesus gathered all suffering to himself - in a cosmic act of redemptive love. To stop all pain, not to spread it. The blood represents all of that suffering - violence, injustice, death.

That doesn’t mean it is magic. It means that Jesus - who is also fully God - knows human suffering - even pain has been gathered into the heart of the Divine.

Jesus’ blood makes none invincible. Rather, it marks the world with a startling truth: in the worst of human suffering, God suffers, too.

That is what makes for redemption- God with the world, the sacred presence that does not diminish or trivialize how we humans experience sorrow, pain, isolation, doubt, & death. And by God’s full participation in that thru Jesus, suffering and death are transformed (not avoided).

Thus, even suffering is drawn into the creative event of love. Blood and new birth are interwoven into one another into God's horizons of compassion and grace.

This is part of the deep mystery of Christianity - the "blood" calls forth a kind of vision to see beyond and thru death, toward what is not easily seen.

But "magic" and "mystery" are two different things.

Magical thinking implies that something will break into our lives from the outside and fix our problems.

Mystery insists that what is true is here. That it has always been here. That the problem is we haven't been able to see or understand it.

Thus, Jesus' "blood" isn't magic. It is part of the deep mystery of all that has been, since before the beginning, until the end. It "saves" (ie., "heals," "makes whole") by revealing that which we otherwise would not know.

That God dwells with us, caring, loving, feeling.

And, it is within that context, that life triumphs over death. That resurrection occurs, that suffering is not the final word. The way opens for full union with God and completed love.

That is, in a few tweets, the story of #HolyWeek, which begins today on #PalmSunday.

The story of how Jesus' followers expected a magical king to save them & found themselves at a Cross instead.

It isn't a story of magical escape; it is a tragedy w/the most unexpected ending.

It is a story about political fools whose decisions kill people for power. About thinking that empires will last forever and that peasant rabbis who teach love can be wiped from the face of the earth and forgotten. That the hope of the poor doesn't matter.

That love is nothing against violence, that crushing the weak will silence them.

And, ultimately, Jesus' blood - the poured out life of God with the world - overcomes all that. Not because of magic. But because the human intention of death cannot - will not - overcome God's intention of creative, ever-widening compassion.

Blessed are the poor.
Blessed are those who mourn.
Blessed are the hungry.
Blessed are the insulted, the persecuted.
Blessed are the meek, the merciful, the peacemakers.

That is the mystery at the heart of things.

Thus ends a short Twitter sermon, on this Palm Sunday.

If you are a Christian, may you be drawn more deeply into the mystery this week. God is with us. In the midst of walking the pain. God is with us.

(and I'm sorry the earlier thread broke - I had to go back and fix it)

And the dismissal:

STAY AT HOME

(unless, of course, you are a caregiver, doctor, nurse, emergency worker, or one of the true saints getting food to our tables - pray for all these people)

DO ALL YOU CAN TO SHOW LOVE AND CARE FOR ALL OUR NEIGHBORS