Month: January 2020

Part of our series on abolitionist readings of texts from the Revised Common Lectionary frequently used in mainline churches.

Micah 6:8 is one of the most-commonly-quoted calls to justice in the Bible: “What does the LORD require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?”

While the doing of justice is essential to the abolitionist project, the earlier verses in this passage make it even clearer the liberatory shape of the justice God proposes.

First, God rises up to “contend with Israel” (6:2): “O my people, what I done to you? In what have I wearied you? Answer me!” The root of his contention is Israel’s forgetfulness of their history: “For I brought you up from the land of Egypt, and redeemed you from the house of slavery” (6:3).

As James H. Cone, among others, has written, the call to justice, and particularly to freedom, in Israel is a direct response to God’s act of liberation in the Exodus. The foundational act of freeing captives in the Exodus is determinative of what justice means now, for Israel.

This is the context of Micah’s call to us in 6:8, to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly: doing justice means continuing God’s work of Exodus, of setting captives free. By remembering God’s work and God’s story in Israel, we see the pattern of our own justice turned toward abolition.

Editor’s note: This is part of a series of meditations based on passages in the lectionary used by many mainline churches, intended as a prompt for preachers and an ongoing project of reading unexpected passages with abolitionist eyes.

4:13 He left Nazareth and made his home in Capernaum by the sea, in the territory of Zebulun and Naphtali,

4:14 so that what had been spoken through the prophet Isaiah might be fulfilled:

4:15 “Land of Zebulun, land of Naphtali, on the road by the sea, across the Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles

4:16 the people who sat in darkness have seen a great light, and for those who sat in the region and shadow of death light has dawned.”

4:17 From that time Jesus began to proclaim, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.”

This week’s lectionary readings present the great and familiar promise of Isaiah, “the people who sat in darkness have seen a great light.” While the gospel lesson quotes only a portion of the passage—a promise of hope and redemption to those in the darkness of prisons and jails, to be sure—the Old Testament reading presents the full passage from Isaiah and makes its promise of freedom to prisoners even more explicit:

9:2 The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who lived in a land of deep darkness on them light has shined.

9:3 You have multiplied the nation, you have increased its joy; they rejoice before you as with joy at the harvest, as people exult when dividing plunder.

9:4 For the yoke of their burden, and the bar across their shoulders, the rod of their oppressor, you have broken as on the day of Midian.

The yoke, the bar, the rod—all symbols of captivity and oppression—are broken. In the kingdom of God, prisoners are set free.

Last week’s reading presented to us the question of where Jesus was “staying;” of where he was abiding in our world—leading us to think of his presence with those most marginalized including the incarcerated.

This week’s passage, from the beginning of a different gospel, begins in the same place—here is where Jesus “made his home”—and then makes explicit that his dwelling or staying with those who are oppressed is not only for their comfort but for their freedom, by showing that his “making his home in the territory of Zebulun and Naphthali” is precisely fulfilling Isaiah’s prophecy of their freedom from captivity.

It is from the position of solidarity, dwelling with those who sit in darkness, and towards the liberation of all the captives, that Jesus proclaims the nearness of the kingdom of God, and calls us all to repent of our support for structures of oppression, including those we cling to in the name of false “justice.” Jesus dwells in darkness to set the prisoners free.

The disciples said to him, “Rabbi” (which translated means Teacher), “where are you staying?” He said to them, “Come and see.” They came and saw where he was staying, and they remained with him that day.—John 1:38–39

One challenge for the abolitionist theological project is to develop our imaginations to “see” the language of liberation and abolition for prisoners throughout the whole arc of scripture.

To that end, and as a Christian in a liturgical tradition that uses a lectionary, where set texts are read each Sunday, this is the start of a series to provide meditations on selected lectionary texts, for study (and to help preachers) in advance of the coming Sunday.

(I say selected because I don’t think I can promise to get one up EVERY week – but I will do my best! The goal is to see abolition in as much of the lectionary as we can. And if you, a reader of this blog, have an idea for a meditation for this series, please contact me, at least a week in advance, and I’ll be happy to run it!)

In the Gospel reading from the Revised Common Lectionary for Sunday, January 19, 2020, we are faced with the disciples following Jesus, whom John the Baptist has just identified as the Lamb of God. Their first question to him is “Where are you staying?”

The concept of “staying” or “dwelling” already has great resonance in the first chapter of the Gospel of John, where we have just read that “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us” and that “the Spirit descended upon him and remained on him.” For the disciples to look for where Jesus is staying is not just a practical request but an opening of their eyes to see where God is abiding and illuminating the world.

What the abolitionist perspective brings to this story is an answer to the question “Where are you staying?”—we know that the place where God dwells is in the darkest places in our world, in the darkness with the captives, in our jails and prisons. God is present in and with everyone who is incarcerated, bringing liberating power to “those who sit in darkness” (Isaiah 9:2).

The disciples ask Jesus, “Where are you staying?” and Jesus responds, “Come and see.” Come and see the conditions in our prisons and jails, and be radicalized. Come and see the presence of God even in the midst of this horror, and find hope in God’s ongoing work against prisons. Come and see the place where God dwells in the midst of our prison nation.