Flash robes

 

Haiku for the self important

Religious leaders,

shaped by pride, just like us all;

no better, no worse.

The erudite Scribes,

learned, apparently wise;

enjoy the honour.

Flash robes, the best seats,

places of esteem; the Scribes

are lapping it up!

They like to look good

but don’t care about justice;

they will be condemned.

The rich can pretend

to be generous; the poor,

giving freely, are.

She gave all she had

to live on; this poor widow.

True munificence!

Generosity:

stamped into the DNA

of God’s creation.

© Ken Rookes 2021

The temple deserving of destruction

"... The woman’s devotion is undoubted. But we have taught her, in part, to increase her poverty in the name of God. “They kill the widow and the stranger...” (Ps 94:6) Families are destroyed by husbands at too many meetings and working bees, or wives working too long in the church office. Except it is not the husband or the wife, it is the church. Young women are destroyed by the structures; it has been happening all my life and I am only finally seeing.

.... In this picture of a more fundamental corruption, those “inadequate people seeking power” (Loader) are often tolerated, and even encouraged,  by other inadequate people seeking an inadequate God. Great is their rage and destructiveness when they see they have idolised God and gotten only a poor minister.

And in the middle of it all those who are true become the “collateral damage” of the church; the ones we deny we have destroyed.

I once saw a man stand firm under fire and give everything he had. What an appalling thing if the widow was doing this, too, with her two coins, and it turned out we had built a temple which turned her love into a lie!

It would deserve its destruction."

Andrew Prior (from https://www.onemansweb.org/theology/a-difficult-day-of-the-lord-mark-13-24-37/the-trickle-down-theory-of-church-mark-12-38-44.html)

The surprising quality of generosity

There is a principle at the centre of creation,
written for all time in the dust
from which the universe was fabricated
and glowing with a lustre born
of hope’s never flagging defiance.
Given the formal name of ‘Grace,’
it is also known as ‘Generosity,’
and sometimes, ‘Kindness.’
The concept of this reckless munificence
frightens many, especially politicians,
eager to capture the votes of the mean-spirited,
and preferring the long-established reliability
of tax-cuts and border security
ahead of the uncertainty of noble compassion.
It would never do if those who are unworthy
were to receive something
to which they are not entitled.
Even those who have been touched
by this grace, given substance
in one who held back nothing,
struggle with generosity;
fearing to let go our truckloads of accrued stuff
in the delusion that it is of lasting importance.
The woman of Zarephath had nothing,
save her precious son, but acceded
to the prophet’s request to share their last meal.
This she did, according to the ancient story,
every day; discovering, in turn,
that the surprising quality of generosity abides,
glowing quietly with defiance.


© Ken Rookes