Jack Hardaway
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We all love a good story.
The stories we keep coming back to say a great deal about who we are.
The stories we tell each other, reminding each other about. The stories we read over and over again. The stories we find our selves wondering about at random moments.
It says something about who we are.
I love Mark Twain, especially Huckleberry Finn.
The great American Novel, one of the great satires of all time.
It says something about who we are as a nation.
Riding along the big river.
I read a lengthy research article about American divisiveness and polarization.
The conclusion of the meticulous research is that we as Americans are actually agreeing about more and more, more than ever before in our history, but that we dislike each other more than ever before because of political branding, we dislike the other political party and those who associate with them in any way, and we dislike them more than ever before, even though we have more in common than ever before.
It is like we are living in a Mark Twain satire, with the feuding families in Huckleberry Finn, the Grangerfords and the Shepherdsons, who had been fighting for so long that they no longer knew why they hated each other, a heart breaking and ludicrous tragic comedy.
Feuding seems to be a very American version of our human tendency to just want to be in a fight. Like some of the wild-eyed southern boys I grew up with who would as soon cuss and fight as look at you.
Shakespeare wrote of it in his own tragedies.
The stories that stick around say something about us.
The four Gospels are like that. They have stuck around.
And we hear Mark today. He shows us Jesus in a religious feud when things take a surprising turn. Jesus gives us the first commandments above all the others.
Love God totally and singularly with all we are, and love our neighbor like ourselves.
But that is not the surprising turn.
We hear it, and we don’t, because it gets used a lot.
Mark’s telling of the story has something interesting that caught my attention this time.
The sudden turn.
The Scribe and Jesus agree with each other. In the middle of a polarized debate, they suddenly find common ground, the common foundation to build a life on. And the fighting stops. There was no more debate or arguing.
It was like everyone was so surprised that they forgot that they were arguing.
A rare moment in Mark’s Gospel.
Common ground.
And that common ground is God and love.
Rather than another thing to hate each other about, something greater happens.
For a time there is peace, they are not far from the kingdom of God.
For a time.
God is what we hold in common.
Love is what we hold in common.
Whether we all believe the same way or not, the faith is that God is God, God is one, and God connects us.
And where there is love, bidden or not, God is there, Ubi Caritas deus ibi est.
Jesus is God breaking us free from our endless satire of hatred.
A new story.
A better story.
A true story.
The feud is over.
Something so much bigger, something so wonderful and beautiful has interrupted our repetition.
God.
And Love.
Love and God. So simple that it is embarrassing.
The tragic comedy of the cross has brought joy to the whole world.
The stories we come back to.
They tell us something.
God’s favorite story is you.
God comes back to that story over and over.
It says something about God.
Your story.
It says something about God.
Something wonderful.