Capitalism

 

Capitalism:

some folk have more than they need,

most don't have enough.

Ken Rookes 2024

Walking, praising God

Haiku of witness

People came running.

having seen the crippled man

walking, praising God.

Peter points to God.

Such power isn’t from us,

we can’t make him walk!

Abraham, Isaac,

and Jacob; it was their God

who sent us Jesus.

You rejected him,

had him put to death, but God

raised him from the dead.

He was the author

of life, the one in whom all

people find true life.

By faith in Jesus

this man is healed and made strong;

you can all see this.

You and your rulers

were blinded. Prophets told us

the Christ must suffer.

You were ignorant,

now you know. Return to God,

and be forgiven.

© Ken Rookes 2024

We stopped listening

Haiku for the respectable

We stopped listening

to Jesus some years ago.

His words were too hard.

We much prefer wealth

and power and influence.

We vote for Mammon.

We like the idea

of being known as Christians,

just not the method.

He said Love Neighbour

but failed to clearly define

the limits to love.

We believe in love.

We do our bit. The failure

must lie somewhere else.

We like the concept

of justice. We just don’t think

we should bear the cost.

One thing that he said:

The poor are always with you.

We agree with that.

Some people languish

behind gates and barbed wire.

Nought to do with us.

We do not much like

the idea of grace, unless

applied to ourselves.

We are deserving,

unlike the many who aren’t.

Jesus rewards us.

We are disciples,

following our Lord Jesus,

anchored to the ground.

© Ken Rookes 2018

This poem doesn't respond  to a specific lectionary  reading. Perhaps it responds to a number of gospel passages.

won't you fight for me?

I am reminded of the words of the people in the musical JC superstar, in which the crowd welcome Jesus into Jerusalem with the chant ...
Hey sanna Hosanna sanna sanna hey sanna hey sanna hosanna, 
hey Jc Jc, won’t won’t you fight for me, sanna hey sanna ho superstar. 
They expected, as we desire, a leader of power and force to save them from their repression. In our modern age this gospel lesson asks us if we are that much different. When we are feeling in danger from an enemy how many of us welcomed a George Bush of a John Howard who set themselves up as saviour figures and avenging angels of power? The message is no easier for us today to hear than it was for the people of Jerusalem. The power of Jesus and Jesus’ message is not of this world. It is the power of compassion, of healing and of grace. It is not a language that we yet understand but, it is a language we are called to seek to live as Christians even in our modern age. I believe that when Jesus wept over Jerusalem, he was weeping for all the generations and religions to come that would refuse to listen to the language of peace and healing.

Only speak the word and let my servant be healed

They have an efficacious power

written deep within the interstices of their syllables;

these words of Jesus.

We disciples should repeat them often,

even the difficult ones.

We should speak them confidently

with an attitude of blessing, hope

and encouragement

Be whole!

Be at peace! Forgive!

Love your neighbour!

(And your enemies.)

Live generously!

Do for others

as you would have them do for you!

Walk away from your wealth!

(How did that one sneak in?)

Be free! Live fully! Follow!

Sometimes,

laying aside reservations

and overcoming our inhibitions,

we might even voice the words

loudly, in public spaces.

We could spray them rudely on walls,

pass them out with cups of water,

or paint them boldly upon our faces;

shouting with appropriate outrage and defiance,

and causing good people

to gasp.

© Ken Rookes 2016

Idle

He gives power to the faint,

and strengthens the powerless.

Isaiah 8:29

God is idle,

declares the small white badge

purchased from the NGV

after viewing an exhibition of contemporary art.

In spite of the confident declaration

of the ancient prophet,

I find myself forced to agree.

The god who intervenes in human affairs

giving power to the faint and strengthening the powerless,

appears to have gone missing.

Who has less power

than those who cross hazardous seas

in nervous wooden boats;

fearful, fleeing; seeking, pleading

for refuge and compassion?

Their anxieties compound, multiplying

behind iron gates and barbed wire.

They cry out in desperation, but god

and the bastard gaoler politicians

who pretend to serve him,

neither hear nor act.

We can only hope

that there might be another god,

human-shaped, bleeding, weeping;

whose spirit resides in at least a few faithful hearts.

Perhaps this god is listening;

perhaps the servants of this god

have open ears,

and are not idle.

© Ken Rookes 2015

power and glory

Two things, power and glory, stand out from the readings for today. In Acts, Jesus told his followers they would receive power when the Holy Spirit came to them and many times Jesus used versions of the word ‘glory’ in his prayer in the John reading. What do these two words, “power” and “glory” mean to us when we use them in relation to the Church and to God? Do they have similar or different meanings for us from when they were used to describe the British aristocracy? We have added them to the “Lord’s Prayer” when we say, “For thine be the kingdom, the power and the glory, for ever and ever, Amen. They are not there in the Bible [Matthew 6:9-13] and are not said in the Catholic tradition. When and why did we add them? Was it when our position in life was understood to be appointed by God, when the oldest son in the aristocracy inherited the land, the second went into the military and the third son from the manor house automatically went into the church with a guaranteed income and parish for life?

The power and glory of God are vastly different from the power and glory of the world and it is easy for us to lose sight of this when we are surrounded and seduced by the propaganda of materialism and military might. We have been accused of being head people who think too much about religious matters rather than feeling them and becoming wholeheartedly involved in glorifying God. But sometimes we haven’t thought enough. We have accepted what we have been told through the words of hymns and Biblical teaching. If we think about it, we might see the difference.

We have been given power through the Holy Spirit to discern God’s glorious goodness and where we can carry that into the community to help bring the Way of God to fruition. Trust the disturbing thoughts and feelings of this power to lead you in glorifying God.

Rev Julianne Parker

the powers of this world

In the Gospel story of the temptations, Jesus is engaging the powers of this world--the underbelly of human existence, that is embodied for the purpose of telling the story in the figure of the devil. The powers of this world are the great resistant forces, largely uncontrollable, that hold people hostage, captive to the institutions and systems that carry us along, the forces that drive the spirit of the age promising life but leading to death. The powers of this world seek to render us powerless, before the immensity of the world's problems.

• These are the powers that say, "No one really wants war, but the bodies keep piling up."
• That say, "No one really wants homelessness, but we can't seem to do anything about it."
• That say, "No child needs to die of hunger anywhere, but especially in the wealthiest nation on earth, and yet they do."
• These are the powers that say, "I am not really living, but simply being driven along by forces beyond my control."

http://day1.org/2694-choose_life

Massacres of the innocent

In his birth stories, gospel writer Matthew

gives us the terrible tale sometimes called

The massacre of the innocents.

It seemed plausible at the time of writing;

this callously brutal act, ordered

by a despotic monarch

for the sake of preserving his kingship.

In more recent years

historians and scholars

have dared to ask the question:

did it really happen?

They point to a shortage of corroborating evidence

beyond the scriptures;

along with the Moses story,

and the need to solve

the Bethlehem – Nazareth conundrum.

Traditionalists, of which there are a few,

point to the character, or lacking,

of Herod the Great, a ruthless tyrant

who would tolerate no limitations

to his pursuit of power.

Without doubt he was capable

of ordering such a terrible deed,

as have been so many kings and rulers since.

In the last hundred years

there has also been no shortage of tyrant:

dictators who have cruelly

oppressed their own people,

tribal leaders who express their hatred

with guns and machetes,

presidents and Prime Ministers

who declare bloody, high-tech war,

on the slimmest of pretexts.

Few have dared

to directly target children,

but  these little ones have borne

more than their share of suffering.

Historical considerations aside,

it is good that this Christmas text reminds us

how the small, the innocent, the weak

and the vulnerable, have so often

paid the price demanded

by the wealthy and the strong.

And still do.

© Ken Rookes

© 2010  Ken Rookes

.

For some.

The wealthy and powerful ones;

rulers, kings and major shareholders

do a lively trade in information.

They invest some of their ample resources

in finding out stuff, analysing trends and opinion,

and gathering whatever facts can be assembled

from their multiple sources

in order to gain advantage over everyone else.

Knowledge, they say, is power;

who would argue?

In his terrible nativity story, Matthew

presents us with the despotic Herod,

who, sensing a threat to his kingly power

in the unlikely birth of a child,

demands, of his royal advisors,

insight and opinion. It is his hope

that when the appropriate dots

have been successfully joined,

they will indicate a profitable course of action.

And just when,

he confidingly enquires of the wise strangers,

feigning concern for the success

of their crazy adventure;

did the star first appear?

Having sent the gift-laden travellers to Bethlehem,

in accordance with some long-forgotten oracle,

he awaits their return,

along with the specific details,

(parents, street name and number),

that they will supply.

He must have waited some time;

the successful pilgrims, as the story goes,

were recipients of further information,

and went home by another way.

The ever-pragmatic Herod was unconcerned;

it was a minor inconvenience.

Their answer to his earlier question

had been duly noted by his scribes;

it would be sufficient for his mathematicians

to make the necessary determinations

that would allow his troops to do their job.

The baby’s parents also received advice

that enabled them to choose a path to safety.

Not so blessed were other young children

in Bethlehem. Knowledge, they say, is power;

for some.

©Ken Rookes 2012

Revolution

You say you want a revolution, well you know, we all want to change the world.

Revolution #1, John Lennon, 1968.

The revolution failed in 1968.

The students of Prague, Chicago, West Berlin,

Paris, Mexico City, Madrid and other such places,

yearning, as they were, for a more just and true society,

gave it a fair shake,

but they were up against an indescribable behemoth.

In Luke’s gospel, the child-woman Mary

was the unlikely harbinger of a revolution

in which the powerful

were to be brought down from their thrones

and the lowly lifted up: Vive la revolution!
It was left to her son
and his assorted crew of fishermen and stirrers 
to make the running, to protest the injustice

of power, greed and wealth,

among other things, in his own day.

His revolution failed, too,

but it gave rise to a movement that never quite died.

These insurgents achieved the occasional small victory,

but have not yet realised their lofty goals,

even after two millennia.

The demons continue mighty, powerful and fierce;

having added to their toolbox

of cunning and treacherous devices,

these fearsome powers go undetected and unnamed.

Still there remain a defiant few

who have not bent the knee before the gods

of capital, greed and comfort;

a vestigial company, marked by love,

that sees beyond the shining lights

and the glistening lies.

They form a tenacious remnant,

and hold tightly to outrageous dreams,

determined to maintain their revolutionary fervour.

They refuse to surrender to despair;

they will not abandon hope.

© Ken Rookes 2012

subversive political acts

"In its simplest terms, the kingdom of God that Jesus announced and embodied is what life would be like on earth, here and now, if God were king and the rulers of this world were not (Borg, Crossan). Imagine if God ruled the nations, and not Obama, Medvedev, Kim Jong-il, Mugabe, or Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Every aspect of personal and communal life would experience a radical reversal. The political, economic, and social subversions would be almost endless—peace-making instead of war mongering, liberation not exploitation, sacrifice rather than subjugation, mercy not vengeance, care for the vulnerable instead of privileges for the powerful, generosity instead of greed, humility rather than hubris, embrace rather than exclusion, etc. The ancient Hebrews had a marvelous word for this, shalom, or human well-being.

            The Lord's Prayer, then, just might be the most subversive of all political acts: "Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven." People who live and pray this way have a very different agenda than Caesar's, whether Republican or Democrat, whether capitalist, socialist or communist, whether democratic or theocratic, for they have entered a kingdom, pledged their allegiance to a ruler, and submitted to the reign of Christ the King.

"http://www.journeywithjesus.net/Essays/20091116JJ.shtml

So also the tongue

So also the tongue

James 3:5-10

The heart is hungry,

the tongue is its servant.

“More, more,” it cries,

even though it has never missed a meal

and knows that the storehouses overflow.

The heart is greedy;

the tongue insists,

“I know what is best

for your well-being.

Trust me, make me your king;

these others are fools.”

The mines thrust deeper

to ravage red earth,

forests are levelled,

while quarries gobble their way

to the horizon and beyond.

The heart is never satisfied.

“More, more!” the tongue shouts

at gargantuan dozers and digging machines;

“Less, less!” the tongue protests against

the people and their taxes.

They are an inconvenience, undeserving;

annoying obstacles to the heart’s

never-ending lusts.

The heart will never have enough,

even as multiple tongues bring

their restless evil workings

to the task.

© Ken Rookes 2012

The son of the Most High God

The son of the Most High God

sits upon an elusive throne;

his reign resembles more joke than substance.

The house of Jacob appears to have forgotten him;

if they ever recognised his reign

in the first place.

There are any number of seats of power

upon which he might have been installed

by his eager acolytes:

Washington, Rome, Beijing, Brussels,

Canberra; (sorry, I couldn’t help myself!)

– but he seemed uninterested.

It would have proven a futile effort anyway;

he failed to sell himself, didn’t seem

to grasp the basic requirements

of the job. If you expect to rule

then you need the right power-base,

and the best he could do

was point to an incongruous crew,

the members of which didn’t seem

to have made any real advances

with the passing of two millennia.

He spoke in riddles about his ancestor, David,

and a throne that would endure.

When we pressed for some details

he gave an idiot grin

and muttered something about the weak,

forgotten and desperate ones;

those who sail in fragile wooden boats,

who camp sadly behind barbed wire,

who dwell in shabby boarding houses,

or caravan parks, and who occupy

public squares and plazas.

As if these counted for anything

when it comes to the serious matter

of might and thrones and power;

and kingdoms that are said to have no end.

© 2011 Ken Rookes.