A Brief
Alphabet of Christianity and Politics (8)
Holiness – Hard to imagine two topics farther apart from
each other than holiness and politics, isn’t it? Well, not so fast there, my
friend. It just may be that we’ve gotten holiness more than a little wrong. At
least Chris Green thinks so in his remarkable book Sanctifying
Interpretation. The section on holiness is gold and demonstrates its relevance
for Christianity and politics.
Holiness, for Green, is defined in terms of Christ not any
version of morality or goodness (or political viewpoint we might add. And
Christ’s holiness, his being separated to God and for God, is cashed out not in
keeping distance from humanity but rather in hospitality for and with a hurting
and broken humanity. He writes,
“But if holiness is understood as hospitality, then we
see that ‘holy living is not about my completeness or the completeness of my
love, but rather the completeness of the recipient of my love’. The mark of perfect love is the ineluctable
desire to see to the good of the beloved. Love is perfected not in the one loving
but in the one loved. The truly holy life, therefore, is one lived
sanctifyingly – offered up, eucharistically, for the sake of the neighbor and
the neighbor’s world. This is exactly the love that we see in God’s
gospel-hospitality for us. ‘To be holy
according to the proclamation of Jesus is to be separated to God, and with God
to be separated to the world.’” (109)
And to be with Christ, and with
God, in hospitality with humanity is to share his fate for them.
Luke Bretherton argues that “Jesus does not resolve the
tension between hospitality and holiness present in the Old Testament”, but
radically re-works how the two imperatives relate to each other. For him, “Jesus
relates hospitality and holiness by inverting their relations: hospitality
becomes the means of holiness”. (110)
Frank Macchia reminds us:
“In holiness, Jesus inaugurates the kingdom of God in
power in solidarity with the sinner and the outcast. The righteousness of the
kingdom is lived out in mercy and justice toward those who are broken and cast
down. The spirit of holiness that raised Jesus from the dead also empowered him
on his path toward the cross. The Spirit
that Jesus pours out as the Spirit Baptizer makes us crucified with Christ
living in newness of life in the power of the resurrection. It empowers us to
bear one another’s burdens and so to yearn and strive with all those who suffer
for the liberty of God’s grace.”
Holiness does not so much make us sinless as it impels us to
care for those who have been broken by sin.
Robert Jenson affirms that the triune God is “roomy.” But he
is jealous, as well as roomy. Indeed, jealousy is his name (Exod. 34.14). Now, God
is not jealous of us, resenting our freedom and the ways we abuse it in
betraying him. But he is jealous for us. He desires above all else that we know
the fullness of joy intended for us in Christ. And the truth is, that joy can
be ours only if we are at-one-ed with God in Christ, made partakers of his
nature and partners in his mission. And Jesus’ death and resurrection make it
plain: God is determined not only to draw us into that room prepared for us but
also to make us roomy. 116
Holiness, then, is a life of intercession. Hence, Green writes,
“. . . those who are filled with this Spirit are moved
to come alongside their neighbors in unrelenting compassion and unstinting
care. ‘The saint doesn’t stand at a distance from ordinary human experience but
is more deeply involved in it, since the saint stands closer to the source of
what it means to be a full human being.’ Therefore, holiness, under the
conditions of this world in its fallenness, reveals itself always best in
intercession, in our self-denying participation with others in their sins and
in their repentance, in their joys and in their sorrows, in their life and in
their death. 129
Holiness relates Christianity
to politics via compassion. Wherever and in whatever ways we find compassion in
the political sphere we must support it. Compassion, holiness, is the benchmark
we use to gauge our engagement with our community. Even if that means standing
with the victims of our world outside conventional morality or even the law.
Surprisingly, then, when parsed
biblically, holiness stands cheek by jowl with political involvement in our
world. And that’s a lesson we best learn sooner than later.
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