Mark1:1-8
The Second Sunday of Advent / Year B
The 1986
film titled “The Mission” is widely recognized as one of the best religious
films ever made. Set in Argentina in the
1740’s, it tells the story of Spanish Jesuits who set out to Christianize
native tribes, including the remote Guarani people who live deep in the forest
above the Iguazu Falls. The first Jesuit to visit the Guarani is martyred, but
Father Gabriel (played by Jeremy Irons) is able to win over the people with the
simple beauty of his oboe’s music.
While
Father Gabriel is with the Guarani, a slave trader by the name of Rodrigo
Mendoza (played by Robert Di Nero) captures dozens of tribesmen and needlessly
shoots a person trying to get away. It
is clear the two Spaniards have crossed paths before.
When
Mendoza makes it back to the main city he makes a handsome profit for his
work. However, he learns his girlfriend
has fallen in love with his brother and, in a jealous rage, kills him in a
duel. Acquitted of murder, he spirals
into a deep depression and exiles himself in a secluded cell at the Jesuit
Monastery. Six months later, when Father
Gabriel returns to the monastery, he challenges Mendoza to undergo a rigorous
act to penance to find forgiveness and redemption. Mendoza, believing neither is possible for
him, agrees.
His
penance is to accompany a small group of Jesuits back up river to the
Guarani. It is an arduous journey made
even more difficult for Mendoza because his penance is to drag one of his old
slaving nets filled with his armor and swords.
More than once, while attempting to climb a muddy hillside or rock
cliff, Mendoza loses his balance and is dragged backward by the weight of the
huge, clanky, bundle of junk. One of the
Jesuits approaches Father Gabriel and says, “The other brothers and I think he
has done enough” to which Father Gabriel replies, “But he doesn’t think he has
done enough.”
The group
arrives at the near impossible climb up the Iguazu Falls and Mendoza barely
manages, through sheer power of will, to do it while hauling his load. The Guarani warmly greet the Jesuits, but the
mood changes quickly when they see the man who captured and killed members of
their community. Mendoza is on his hands
and knees, physically exhausted and covered in mud. The tribal leader instructs one of the
tribesman to get a knife. The lieutenant
holds it to Mendoza’s throat and there is every reason to believe he will exact
revenge then and there. Father Gabriel
and the leader have a brief exchange in a language we don’t understand. The leader then issues an order, again in his
native tongue. The person bearing the
knife moves it from Mendoza’s throat to the thick rope he uses to pull the
net. The knife cuts the rope and the
tribesman, who lost kin and friends to Mendoza, kicks the bundle over a cliff
into the raging waters below. At this
Mendoza breaks down and weeps - bitterly at first, but then with tears of
joy. Through his penance he finds
forgiveness in the most palatable way imaginable. Well, this is only the first 45 minutes of
the movie, but you can watch it in its entirety on YouTube (I recommend the
version with subtitles).
So here is
my question: How far would go to be forgiven?
As we just
heard, the Gospel of Mark begins by introducing us to John, a religious figure
of some sort who sets up shop along the Jordon River and calls people to
prepare for the Lord’s coming by confessing their sins and being baptized. Perhaps this does not strike you as a
successful church growth strategy, but it works. The text tells us people come to John from
all over the countryside. Not only this,
“everyone” in Jerusalem travels to see John.
Now, this
is surprising for several reasons.
First, you might think the people of Jerusalem have better things to do
with their time than to spend several days trudging through the wilderness to a
backwater location. Next, it is not easy
to get from Jerusalem to the Jordon River.
The path is a remote, desolate, downhill, rocky grade with twists,
turns, rises, and falls. Beyond the
physical challenges, it is not the safest of journeys; being riddled with bandits
and animal predators (remember Jesus set the parable of the Good Samaritan on
the way from Jerusalem to Jericho). And
finally, as difficult as the walk to the Jordon is, the journey back to
Jerusalem is even worse. It is all uphill. When I was in Israel we drove from the Jordon
Valley to Jerusalem and there were several times when our tour bus struggled
with the grade on a major highway. I
remember thinking I was glad to be riding rather than walking.
So why are
people willing to make this journey?
Because they want to confess their sins and be forgiven. And we get it. Each of us knows what is like to live with
the crushing burden of our mistakes and failures. “I know my transgressions,” writes the
Psalmist, “and my sin is ever before me” (51:3). Though filled with different symbols of
regret, each of us knows what it is like to drag Mendoza’s burden. How far would you go to have your burden lifted?
Jesus has
a lot to say about forgiveness, doesn’t he!
In the Lord’s Prayer he connects forgiving others with being
forgiven. He teaches we must forgive
seven times seventy. He challenges us to
forgive our enemies. He gives us the
example of forgiving while dying on the cross.
But nowhere, to the best of my recollection, does he speak about how to
receive forgiveness; how to appropriate it into one’s being in order to let
yourself off the hook.
It is
possible to believe God forgives you but to be unable to forgive yourself. It is especially challenging to forgive
yourself when the consequences of your actions cannot be undone or if a person
you wronged won’t grant release to you.
Mendoza was forgiven by the Guarani and welcomed into their tribe, but
no such redemption is possible with the brother he murdered. He must learn to live with what he did to his
brother until he can learn deeply and authentically how to receive
absolution.
Maybe the
reason so many people go to such lengths to see John in order to confess their
sins and be baptized is because they need to make the effort. For whatever reason, the Temple’s sacrificial
system, with its easy offerings of this, that, or something else, in order to
be forgiven, simply do not break through the penitent’s self-imposed sentence
of condemnation. So the journey to the
river is an important part of the process of believing you are forgiven.
So too is
the water. There is something
restorative about it. I am amazed how I
enter the shower every morning feeling like a zombie and step out moments later
feeling resurrected and ready to take on the day. When I was immersed in the Jordon River at
the traditional spot where John was believed to have baptized, it was a warm
day and I was surprised by how cool the water felt. I imagine the people John baptizes enter the
river hot, dirty, tired, and sinful and come out of it refreshed, renewed, and
believing they are forgiven. How far
would you go to feel forgiven?
I have
only once engaged in the prayer book’s service of a Rite of
Reconciliation. I did something so
seriously wrong that participation in the General Confession was not enough for
me. Confessing my specific sin to a
priest and having absolution pronounced for it helped, but it did not erase the
consequences of my actions. I knew God
forgave me, but I had to live with the knowledge of the hurt and pain I
caused. Years later I was blessed to
reconnect with the person I offended and was released from what I did. Life doesn’t always work out this way, but
when it does it is one of the richest blessings imaginable.
How far
would you go to be forgiven? And why do
you think John connects confession with preparing the way of the Lord? I suppose at one level he associates being
cleansed with being worthy to be in the presence of the Lord. At a deeper level, perhaps he associates it
with being ready to serve. It is a call
to throw off the old in order embrace the new.
But I suspect at the deepest level unburdening oneself makes it possible
to live life as God intends. You can’t
soar if you are weighed down by the things you have done and left undone. Jesus comes that we might have life and have
it abundantly and this is what John invites us to prepare for by confessing our
sins and being forgiven.
