Lessening Our Complicity

Daily Office Devotional, Tuesday, August 22, 2023

Proper 15, the week of the twelfth Sunday after Pentecost

The Rev. David W. Perkins, Th.D.

Key phrases for reflection from today’s Gospel reading:

7But those tenants said to one another, “This is the heir; come, let us kill him, and the inheritance will be ours.” 8So they seized him, killed him, and threw him out of the vineyard.

The full text of today’s Gospel reading can be found at the end of this reflection.

Daily Office Lectionary readings (BCP, 980)

AM Psalm [120], 121, 122, 123; PM Psalm 124, 125, 126, [127]

2 Samuel 18:9-18; Acts 23:12-24; Mark 11:27-12:12

David’s Reflections

Someone once said, “The opposite of poverty is not wealth but justice.” Today’s Gospel reading reveals a social world in which poverty and exploitation lead to violence, violence even of oppressed against oppressed.

The tenants in Jesus’ story are tending land not their own, land in Galilee that probably belonged to a foreign landlord. Those tenants probably had once been landowners themselves but had lost their lands to landowners like this one and had been forced into peasant status, tending their own former land for another and paying a lease from the fruits of the land.+

When the landowner sent his slaves to collect the agreed-on lease (copies of such rental contracts have been discovered), they not only refused to pay but they treated violently those oppressed ones the owner sent to them. Ultimately, the landowner would resort to violence himself, forcing the tenants off the land and leasing it to more cooperative ones.

The tenants resisted the oppression and injustice they experienced with tactics similar to those of the ones who had dispossessed them and continued to oppress them. Jesus’ central point seems to be that Israel had resisted God’s claims on her for fruit and that such resistance would result in Israel’s forfeiting her role as the people of God on mission in the world.

Jesus’ parable, grounded in the matrix of social and economic relationships of his day, shoots off other branches of content for reflection beyond that main point. This parable sends a warning about the consequences of rendering people powerless through unjust social and economic policies. It also cautions us to look beneath the violent actions of marginalized and oppressed people to the injustices that might be sparking such behaviors. (Not unlike the retrospective look we are taking at the racial violence and rioting in recent killings of unarmed blacks by police and private citizens.)

While not embracing or condoning such violence, we can be moved to strike at its roots by seeking to correct the injustices kindling the flames rather than merely spraying water on the fire itself by seeking to counter the violence. We have seen examples of such violence in American history: for example, John Brown’s revolt to free the slaves; riots in the inner cities during the Civil Rights era; violence spinning off recent protest movements, some of it spawned by opponents of the protestors.

We can find ourselves complicit with exploitation individually and corporately. For example, with so many of our services being outsourced abroad and so many of our products being manufactured in countries lacking democratic values and concern for the well being of the workers, we have no idea whether purchasing a piece of clothing might be underwriting the oppression of garment workers in the country where that garment was made. Jesus’ implicit condemnation of oppression in this parable offers a shocking commentary on these trends and a penetrating critique of our entire way of life.

It can feel like we are caught in a web of injustice and that avoiding complicity keeps challenging us. What can we do? Become more aware, act out our thirst for justice by advocating for the oppressed, continue to repent for our unavoidable complicity, and pray for God’s will to be done on earth as in heaven. Those ongoing actions will get us started and will make a difference. We can take our cue from Jesus, whose awareness and advocacy got expressed, in part, through parables like this one.

I find the words of Luise Schottroff about this parable particularly haunting. “The victims of economic violence become murderers; their actions lack all perspective. They are at the center of the narrative. In particular, they mistreat and murder slaves who are themselves already the victims of economic and physical violence. The parable speaks in a distilled form of multilayered experiences of violence.”

“. . . the parable interprets the present. It is the hour of repentance for the political leadership and for those among the people who react with hatred and violence against their own powerlessness.” *

Perhaps this prayer could play a role in lessening our complicity.

“O Tree of Calvary, send your roots deep into my soul. Gather together my frailties—my soiled heart, my sandy instability and my muddy desires—and entwine them with the strong roots of your arboreal love. Amen.”@

+ For research on these matters see these books, William Herzog, Subversive Speech: Jesus as Pedagogue of the Oppressed [Westminster/John Knox, 1994] and Luise Schottroff, The Parables of Jesus [Fortress, 2006].

* Luise Schottroff, The Parables of Jesus, trans. Linda M. Maloney (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2006), pp. 21, 24.

@Daily Prayer for All Seasons {New York: Church Publishing, 2014), p. 129.

Collect of the Day, Proper 15, the twelfth Sunday after Pentecost

Almighty God, you have given your only Son to be for us a sacrifice for sin, and also an example of godly life: Give us grace to receive thankfully the fruits of this redeeming work, and to follow daily in the blessed steps of his most holy life; through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen. (BCP, 232)

A Collect for Peace

Most holy God, the source of all good desires, all right judgments, and all just works: Give to us, your servants, that peace which the world cannot give, so that our minds may be fixed on the doing of your will, and that we, being delivered from the fear of all enemies, may live in peace and quietness; through the mercies of Christ Jesus our Savior. Amen. (BCP, 123)

For Social Justice

Grant, O God, that your holy and life-giving Spirit may so move every human heart [and especially the hearts of the people of this land], that barriers which divide us may crumble, suspicions disappear, and hatreds cease; that our divisions being healed, we may live in justice and peace; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. (BCP, 823)

In the Order of Worship for Evening

Almighty, everlasting God, let our prayer in your sight be as incense, the lifting up of our hands as the evening sacrifice. Give us grace to behold you, present in your Word and Sacraments, and to recognize you in the lives of those around us. Stir up in us the flame of that love which burned in the heart of your Son as he bore his passion, and let it burn in us to eternal life and to the ages of ages. Amen. (BCP, 113)

A Collect for Mission

Almighty and everlasting God, by whose Spirit the whole body of your faithful people is governed and sanctified: Receive our supplications and prayers which we offer before you for all members of your holy Church, that in their vocation and ministry they may truly and devoutly serve you; through our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen. (BCP, 100)

Daily Office Gospel, Mark 11:27-12:12

27 Again they came to Jerusalem. As he was walking in the temple, the chief priests, the scribes, and the elders came to him 28and said, ‘By what authority are you doing these things? Who gave you this authority to do them?’ 29Jesus said to them, ‘I will ask you one question; answer me, and I will tell you by what authority I do these things. 30Did the baptism of John come from heaven, or was it of human origin? Answer me.’ 31They argued with one another, ‘If we say, “From heaven,” he will say, “Why then did you not believe him?” 32But shall we say, “Of human origin”?’ —they were afraid of the crowd, for all regarded John as truly a prophet. 33So they answered Jesus, ‘We do not know.’ And Jesus said to them, ‘Neither will I tell you by what authority I am doing these things.’

12:1Then he began to speak to them in parables. ‘A man planted a vineyard, put a fence around it, dug a pit for the wine press, and built a watchtower; then he leased it to tenants and went to another country. 2When the season came, he sent a slave to the tenants to collect from them his share of the produce of the vineyard. 3But they seized him, and beat him, and sent him away empty-handed. 4And again he sent another slave to them; this one they beat over the head and insulted. 5Then he sent another, and that one they killed. And so it was with many others; some they beat, and others they killed. 6He had still one other, a beloved son. Finally he sent him to them, saying, “They will respect my son.” 7But those tenants said to one another, “This is the heir; come, let us kill him, and the inheritance will be ours.” 8So they seized him, killed him, and threw him out of the vineyard. 9What then will the owner of the vineyard do? He will come and destroy the tenants and give the vineyard to others. 10Have you not read this scripture:

“The stone that the builders rejected

has become the cornerstone;

11this was the Lord’s doing,

and it is amazing in our eyes”?’

12When they realized that he had told this parable against them, they wanted to arrest him, but they feared the crowd. So they left him and went away.

Daily Prayer Offices in The Book of Common Prayer Morning Prayer, Rite 2, page 75, Book of Common Prayer Noonday Prayer, p. 103, Book of Common Prayer Order of Worship for Evening (Vespers), p. 109, Book of Common Prayer Evening Prayer, Rite 2, page 115, Book of Common Prayer Compline (Night Prayer), Page 127, Book of Common Prayer Daily Devotionals, page 136, Book of Common Prayer