Dear Jesus: Don’t do that. Don’t go saying “I come not to bring peace, but division.” You’re scaring us. Don’t you know there are children in the room!
Peace is not the product of the politics of fear, of Wall Street fraud or war profiteer.
Listen, Lord, we need you to get back to being a sweet Jesus. Sweet little Jesus boy, born in a manger.
Herod didn’t think of Jesus as sweet.
And a manger wasn’t some first-century Palestinian crib. It’s an animal feeding trough filled with dried sheep slobber.
Peace is not the silence of the sepulcher, drowning sad-soul songs of lament; peace is not repressing, abducting, disappearing all who dissent.
Peace isn’t passive. It’s not always nice or good-natured, cheerful or charming, winsome or quiet or sweet.
Prophecy that provokes no crisis, asserting no claim or offense, is a liturgy deaf to Redemption’s resolve, inflated with pious pretense.
©Ken Sehested @ prayerandpolitiks.org. Inspired by Luke 12:49-53, Jeremiah 6:13-15, and former Salvadoran Archbishop Oscar Romero.