The Good News of Mark

Introduction

1. As we listen to the readings, a different world tends to emerge.   It differs from that to which we are accustomed.   The world offered in the Markan texts, runs contrary to our presumed world - at the very time our presumed world seems to function less and less effectively!   We get upset, awed, angry, forlorn, and maybe attracted in turn, by this alternative world and its values!   We experience more than one world.

2. If leaders of the Liturgy of the Word respect us listeners, and give us room to think for ourselves - not at the expense of accommodating or compromising - but by showing us texts that do not fit comfortably with our assumed reality, by revealing dreams that expose vested interests!   If that kind of leader invites us to run beyond ourselves - beyond our "old selves" - then we come to the Christian assembly with a mixture of hope and fear!   We allow ourselves to be addressed to see if there are new resources and new possibilities here!!

The Year of Mark

3. The gospel of Mark, originated in the Roman dominated world of the late 60's of the first century of the Christian era.  In the gospel we readers/hearers are addressed to the task of fulfilling, in our practice, the "good news" of Jesus.  Mark, the author of the account that we read during this year, is our fore-runner!   Through his literary creation he provides an example for us, of "reading" Jesus' practice.   Our modern "reading" of Mark becomes the way a new generation of disciples follow the practice of Jesus.  In the words of the angelic messenger:

    You are looking for Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified;
    he has risen, he is not here.  See, here is the place
    where they laid him.  But you must go and tell his
    disciples and Peter, "He is going ahead of you to Galilee;
    that is where you will see him, just as he told you."
                                                            (Mk.16:6-7)

4. That sums up the whole gospel of Mark.  Jesus' resurrection makes little or no sense except in relation to all the rest of his story.  We test the truth of this with a scene from Mark chapter 12.  In reply to a question from the Sadducees, who did not believe in the resurrection of the body, Jesus said:

    Surely the reason why you are wrong is that you
    understand neither the scriptures nor the power of God.
    For when they rise from the dead, men and women
    do not marry; no, they are like the angels in heaven.
    Now about the dead rising again, have you never read
    in the Book of Moses, in the passage about the bush,
    how God spoke to him and said:
   "I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac
    and the God of Jacob?" He is God, not of the dead,
    but of the living. You are very much mistaken.
                                                            (Mk.12:24-27)

5. To affirm the resurrection of the dead, Jesus re-opened the scriptures enclosed by the priestly class.   He "read" his own story as continuing the movement of Moses, Jacob, Isaac and Abraham.   For Jesus, it was the same power of God at work in each of these people.  For Jesus the Hebrew scriptures had earlier borne witness to this same power of God.

6. To not know how to read this ancient narrative - or to refuse to "read correctly" the story of Jesus, is the same. Blindness tied to positions of culture, gender, ethnicity and class, closed the eyes and ears of Jesus' adversaries. For them, in fact, God was a God of the dead and the promises made to Abraham and the others, had lapsed. The system of clean and unclean led to death. The temple, the centre of the Hebrew symbolic field, was doomed to ruin. After the year 70 of the Christian era, this affirmation of Jesus, was to resound powerfully in the minds and hearts of readers and hearers of Mark's gospel

The God of the Living!

7. Jesus affirmed that the "God of the Living" animated His practice. The same "power-for-life" that raised a descendant of aged Abraham; that raised up a people from slave work through Moses - this same power, would be able to raise up other bodies! Mark's story of Jesus of Nazareth links the totality of the practice of Jesus to resurrection. Mark refers Jesus' practice to the great founding stories of Abraham and Moses, by affirming that Jesus' power was attributed to God, just as theirs was - only more so!

A Sequel to Mark's Gospel

8. The story of the gospel of Mark is not closed. It remains open to additions of stories of the practice of it's modern readers/hearers. New and powerful practices stemming from the "God of the Living" that continue to liberate bodies! That's saying that the problem of God and the problem of resurrection, have no meaning aside from the practise of faith, hope and love. Or to speak positively - it is only at the heart of a practice aiming at the in-surrection of bodies, that the question can be posed validly of their re-surrection!

9. Modern society oriented almost completely towards the anti-life ways of competiton and self-interest, has witnessed a widespread insurrection of indigenous cultures against and from within this dominant anti-life culture. The recovery of indigenous values is one sign of attempts to arrange power and access, in ways that are different from those prevailing in the dominant culture and ideology. In Aotearoa-New Zealand the desire to realize the ideal of partnership in culture, gender, and ethnicity, expresses a world-wide phenomenon of the felt need for alternative values, or the recovery of neglected values that can energize people towards a more life-promoting and convivial culture

Our Task Today

10. The subversive narratives of the Hebrew-Christian tradition were transplanted in fragmented and partial ways during the past one hundred and fifty years of our history as an island in the Southern Pacific. For the most part, the wisdom tradition of the "First People of the Land" was ignored or actively suppressed. Our re-reading of the Hebrew-Christian tradition/s in the light of recent shifts in our cultural awareness, addresses us with fresh tasks to integrate and apply the values recovered from the cultural sources that have formed us as a people. These sources still have the power to move us towards a new social reality. In the terminology of Mark's gospel, this would be called, "realizing the reigning of God" through our practise of the the alternative values revealed by Jesus words and actions in the light of the events in our history.


top