He has shown the strength of his arm,
he has shattered the proud in their conceit.
He has cast down the mighty from their thrones,
and has lifted up the lowly.
He has filled the hungry with good things,
and the rich he has sent away empty.
– The Song of Mary, Magnificat, Luke 1:46-55
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Jonathan Erdman
Writer. In the summers, I live and work in the incredible state of Alaska, in the bush community of McCarthy, as the Executive Director of the Wrangell Mountain Center. When not in McCarthy, you'll typically find me in the Santa Cruz Mountains of California, writing and working with local activists. My primary writing project right now is a novel set in remote bush Alaska, of the magical realism genre wherein an earnest and independent young woman finds a mysterious radio belonging to her grandmother, a device that has paranormal bandwidth and a disturbing ability to mess with one's mental stability.
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I’ve been reluctant to comment on this sentiment, but now that Christmas is over… Really? Seriously? I guess I should have watched the 10 o’clock news last night.
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Ktismatics,
Don’t worry. It’s not too late to “be the first person to Like this post”!
=)
I originally sent this to a friend who was emailing me about politics. He is a Christian, and he made the comment to me that the Bible doesn’t say anything negative about the rich, like so many in the Occupy. So, I sent him this verse, which happened to be one of the lexical readings of the past few weeks. “The rich he has sent away empty.” As long as I had typed it out, I thought I would plug it in as a post and see what happened.
I’m not necessarily for sending away the rich empty, but I am for changing the balance of the scales, as you know. The Bible, on balance, shares this perspective. I say “on balance,” because the Bible doesn’t speak with a unified voice on this issue. There is diversity on most topics, so I’ve found.
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Sorry. The above should read: “in the Occupy Movement,” not “in the Occupy.”
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It’s pretty clear that Jesus’ ministry echoes the Magnificat. I suppose the perennial question for the Christians, as it was for the OT Jews, is “how long, O Lord, before you do it again and kick the 1%’s asses?” After awhile God starts to sound like the washed-up ballplayer reliving his glory days over a few too many beers at the bar with Bruce Springsteen.
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True. But that’s why one doesn’t wait on God.
I was just reading John Caputo, a recent journal article he wrote, who says (and I paraphrase) that deconstructive theology, done in the spirit of Derrida (still one of my favorite philosophers) doesn’t construct theology around the adventures (and misadventures) of God or a Divine Being. Rather, it is deeply materialistic, in the best sense of the term, in the sense that one acts as an catalyst for change, not content to sit around waiting for Jesus, watching tv and buying stuff on ebay.
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