What feelings does Jesus’ teaching about divorce bring up for you? Unfortunately, this text has been used as a weapon against people struggling in abusive marriages experiencing the pain of betrayal, or simply feeling stuck in relationships that aren’t life-giving. My hope today is to approach this teaching in a different spirit, with a sense of curiosity, asking how it might instead bring blessing. In our Bible study this week we acknowledged how important it is to take into account the radical cultural differences between our society and that of Jesus’ time, when it comes to marriage, gender and sexuality. And we took heart in the fact that Jesus himself offered us a model of critical thinking and the interrogation of received traditions, as he debated with Israel’s revered prophet Moses. We all loved what Jim Gullikson said, which I am sharing with his permission: “I have gotten to the age where I sometimes disagree with Jesus. And I am comfortable with that.”
Sometimes, indeed, we find that the inspiration of scripture emerges out of our tension with it. With the help of the Spirit, a sacred text can act as a kind of spur, urging us to articulate a contrasting view. And yet, the more closely I study Jesus’ teaching about divorce, the more I am able to appreciate it. First, it’s important to locate this text within the overall arc of Jesus’ teaching in the Gospel of Mark. Jesus consistently articulated a politics, that is a vision for our common life, rooted in concern for the vulnerable; his God-inspired mission was to create a caring and equitable community. He called his followers into a different value system, one that was a complete reversal of the society in which they lived. He centered the needs and the gifts of the littlest and the least. He insisted that greatness was to be found not in exploiting and dominating others, but in a posture of humble and mutual service.
Marriage, in Jesus’ time, was primarily about property, procreation and the inheritance of land. Women and children were essentially possessions of men. The “teaching of Moses” Jesus referenced is in chapter 24 of Deuteronomy. On the way to making its larger points about remarriage, this passage paints a vivid picture of the powerlessness of a woman facing divorce in those times: “Suppose a man enters into marriage with a woman, but she does not please him because he finds something objectionable about her, and so he writes her a certificate of divorce, puts it in her hand, and sends her out of his house.” The debates going on about divorce within the religious community of Jesus’ day did not ask the question of whether or not divorce was permissible, only what the appropriate grounds were for it. I think Jesus’ primary motivation in forbidding divorce on any grounds was to protect women and children. And, in an even more basic sense, he sought to cast a different vision of marriage and, indeed of all forms of human relationship. He critiqued all the ways we human beings treat one another as possessions to be owned. Instead, he wanted his followers to understand that we belong to each other.
To do this, Jesus hearkened back to the two creation stories in Genesis. From the first story, Jesus referenced these poetic words: So God created humankind in God’s image, in the image of God, God created them; male and female God created them. (Genesis 1:27) In other words, God’s own being was incorporated into both of the genders known in the ancient world—male and female—not in a hierarchy, but as an equal and complimentary partnership. If today we believe there are many genders—that gender is not a binary but a spectrum—then I see no reason we can’t read this text through that same lens, expanding our picture of God, and deepening our understanding of how humanity reflects the divine image.
And from the second story, in chapter 2 (which we heard read this morning) Jesus drew the concept that marriage unites two people into “one flesh.” Again, I don’t think this passage needs to support only traditional norms of gender and sexuality. We can find the blessing of “one flesh” in an expansive understanding of marriage and also in relationships that are not marriage. Becoming one flesh need not involve sexual intimacy at all. There are many forms of partnership, many ways to commit ourselves to relationship and community.
The Celtic concept of soul friendship comes to mind, as described by the Irish poet and theologian John O’Donohue. He writes:
One of the deepest longings of the human soul is to be seen. . . . You can never be fully visually present to yourself. The one you love, your anam cara, your soul friend, is the truest mirror to reflect your soul. The honesty and clarity of true friendship also brings out the real contour of your spirit. It is beautiful to have such a presence in your life.
The point of Jesus’ teaching is: when people express love and friendship, commitment and belonging, in all the ways that we do, there is something sacred in it, something we must honor, something that shouldn’t be casually dismissed or made into a commodity.
The second part of today’s text, about blessing children, might at first seem unrelated to the teaching about divorce. The thread that links them, however, is once again Jesus’ care for the vulnerable. In ancient times, children were hurt by divorce along with their mothers—left without income or a home, sent off without protection. And the word translated “child” here is that same word we encountered a few weeks ago, which can also mean “slave.” I wonder if this is really Mark’s version of the Beatitudes found in Matthew and Luke, in which Jesus declared “blessed are” the poor, the grieving, the hungry, the exploited. I imagine that Jesus was taking in his arms both children and slaves, children who were slaves, the littlest of the little ones. It was as if he were saying “these are my people” In the kingdom of God we side with them, we listen to them, we advocate for them, and we allow them to lead us.
Today, as I mentioned, is World Communion Sunday. This observance began in the 1930s in the Presbyterian church and soon extended to many Protestant denominations. Searching for a sense of what this day means for us, I visited the UCC website and found these words,
We recognize that we are part of the whole body of believers. Whether shared in a grand cathedral, a mud hut, outside on a hilltop, in a meetinghouse, or a storefront, Christians celebrate the communion liturgy in as many ways as there are congregations.
World communion Sunday reminds us of our kinship with Christians of many cultures all over the world.
Throughout this political season I’ve felt deep distress about the ways we are talking about and thinking about immigrants. You’ve heard it; I don’t need to repeat it: the ugly language rooted in scarcity and fear, the blaming, the scapegoating, the dehumanization, the threats of violent rejection and dismissal. This political strategy mirrors the way divorce functioned in Jesus’ society—it was about the control of vulnerable people for the sake of gaining power and consolidating wealth in the hands of a few. This strategy goes far beyond partisan politics as usual and it is unacceptable. This is how fascism operates. These are the sorts of things Hitler said and did to seize power in Nazi Germany.
Jesus’ politics, in clear contrast, honor those who quite literally bring the gifts of the entire world to us, to our communion tables, to our coffee hour tables, to all the tables we set to share food and create friendship. Jesus would have us govern our common life through policies that give practical reality to the deepest truths about who we are—people created in the image of God, people who are one flesh with each other and the earth, people who belong to each other. In the days and weeks to come, may we all find ways to embrace and embody these joyful, hopeful, transformational politics of Jesus. Amen.