A Meditation on the Passion of Jesus
in Light of A Course In Miracles
by Tom Baker
Date: March 28, 2010
Several years ago a horror movie came out that graphically portrays the torture and violent, bloody death in excruciating detail of a holy man. Human beings love horror, so movies like this are enormously popular. When people watch this movie, entitled The Passion of the Christ, many of them weep because they think it is about Jesus Christ dying for them by inches. They might think, "He is dying just for me." He dies, they assume, because they are bad. When they see Jesus dying in such vivid detail they can begin to really feel how bad they are. They are the ones that should have been crucified, they are the ones God is really mad at, they think that God would like to make them scream in agony so the bad in them could be justly punished, but Jesus innocent as a lamb and himself the son of God took all of God's punishment on himself; he suffered in our place, he died in our stead. I used to give this sermon: "He died because of you, and he dies again when you are bad. And that's why when you are mean to your brother or sister or say an unkind word to a friend or just forget you're a Catholic and eat a hot dog on Friday during lent, you are driving another nail into Jesus' foot." I had a pastor once who got what he thought was the cool idea of pounding a nail into a block of wood with a hammer off stage when the passion of Jesus was being read. People shuttered, and some wept, and many prayed fearfully to a God whose retribution they dreaded. Of course this is nonsense, vivid, convincing nonsense. Mel Gibson has made a horror movie with a halo, but it is not a movie about Jesus, it is a movie about Mel Gibson, who like most human beings, is passionate about death.
For as long as human beings can remember we have used death to solve the world's problems. The biggest building in the world, the Pentagon, was built to house the offices of death's experts and every year we spend the largest part of our budget on the technological marvels of death. We evidently think that death keeps us safe. We use death to make life feel real, to motivate ourselves. People really get serious about changing things in their lives when it's a matter of life and death. I stopped smoking because my doctor told me that if I didn't I would die of lung cancer before I was sixty. Death even seems to solve problems. I had a parishioner who kept wondering why in the hell didn't Jesus just kill Pontius Pilot, condemn the high priests and any other troublesome non-Christians to eternal damnation and take over the world, right then and there. He was our parish football coach. He fixed me with an angry eye and said, "What if I told my boys to forgive Our Mother of Sorrows? I tell them, kill Our Mother of Sorrows." Our Mother of Sorrows was the name of a neighboring parish, our biggest rival.
I fixed Coach Roach with a skeptical eye: "So you tell the boys to kill Our Mother of Sorrows, and then maybe dismember The Holy Trinity (another parish)."
"Oh, Father, you know what I mean." I was a real diplomat in those days so I dropped it. But I should have said, "Yes, Coach, I do know what you mean, you mean you really don't take Jesus seriously. And I would say to Mr. Gibson and to all of you and myself, we don't really take Jesus seriously." For the passion of Jesus, was not death. Jesus was and is passionate about life, good life, joyful life, feeling good to be alive life. Jesus never killed anybody, never condemned anybody, Jesus never ever encouraged anyone to suffer, in fact, he got people out of suffering as quickly as possible. You weren't suppose to heal on the Sabbath and Jesus said, "To hell with that, you're getting well NOW." Lepers tore off that hated little bell that warned people to avoid them and they went home and hugged their families, felt smooth skin against their smooth skin. Cripples ran home and felt the wind in their hair as they scampered over the hills shouting as they ran, "I can run and leap and skip again!" The no longer blind stared in wonder at faces they had only imagined with their hands, and the no longer deaf and dumb chattered away, delighted finally to be a part of the conversation. Shame fell away like worn out clothes and it was suddenly no longer painful to be a human being. "God," said Jesus, "is not who you thought God was, God is a God of life. Death is your idea, and it is not a good idea." Jesus dismissed our favorite, most serious idea. He raised the dead: "Lazarus, come out!" Sure enough out he came. Edgar Cayce said that it was the raising of Lazarus from the dead that really got the theologians mad, in fact it got everybody's ego mad. Why else would the crowd turn against Jesus, a hero only months before?
Because he went too far, he was on the verge of emptying the cemeteries, he was on the verge of invalidating death. Without death we could have no war, no disease, no drama, no sorrow, and no God to punish us and confirm the pathetic image of ourselves we so treasure. So the inevitable happened; human beings had to teach Jesus that death was real and serious and even theological, not only would Jesus die but his death would save us from the big fella who really who really is, we secretly think, out to get us. And although Jesus went through the ordeal and walked right back to us alive and well and eating a fish sandwich three days later we Christians, who believe in the resurrection and celebrate Easter, insist on remembering him as dead. And ourselves as bad. And God as mad.
What I say next will not shock you or scare you or change you forever, for you do not need shocking, or scaring, YOU do not even need changing, only your mind and only a tiny mad idea in your mind, needs to change. Now, listen. Several years ago a courageous and bright Catholic theologian named Sebastian Moore wrote a book called The Crucified Jesus is No Stranger. The book is not a traditional book about Jesus dying for our sins. Father Moore proves over and over again that the man on the cross is not Jesus, but a portrait of how we see ourselves. The man on the cross is how human beings see themselves. This is a portrait of how Mr. Gibson, Mr. Baker, etc. see themselves: A victim, suffering at the hands of life, poor me. Jesus rises from the dead and says to us, "Look over here, look at me. In me alive and joyful and innocent, see yourself, a vision of a new heaven and a new earth, a new you, the you I have known all along. Alleluia."
© Copyright Tom Baker 2010