Above: St. Titus
Image in the Public Domain
Difficulty
FEBRUARY 25, 2024
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The Collect:
Blessed Lord, who caused all holy Scriptures to be written for our learning:
Grant us so to hear them, read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest them,
that we may embrace and ever hold fast the blessed hope of life,
which you have given us in our Savior Jesus Christ, who lives and reigns
with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
—The Book of Common Prayer (1979), page 236
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The Assigned Readings:
Genesis 9:18-27
Psalm 39:4-8a
Titus 2:1-10
Matthew 12:38-42
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Some of the readings for this Sunday are difficult. Genesis 9:18-27 gives us the misnamed Curse of Ham (“Cursed be Canaan,” verse 25 says). This curse follows a euphemistic description of either the castration or the incestuous and homosexual rape of Noah by his son Ham. As one acquainted with the shameful history of racism, slavery, and institutionalized racial segregation in the United States knows well, the misuse of this passage to justify these sins is an old story. I know that story well, due to reading in both primary and secondary sources. Primary sources include back issues of The Presbyterian Journal (founded as The Southern Presbyterian Journal), a publication by and for ardent defenders of racism and institutionalized racial segregation in the 1940s forward, some of whom went on to found the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA), schismatic to the Presbyterian Church in the United States, or, informally, the old Southern Presbyterian Church, in 1973. (The events of 1942-1972 are not ancient history!) I have index cards from which I can cite many examples of quoting this and other passages of scripture to criticize efforts to work for the civil rights of African Americans, so nobody should challenge me regarding the facts of this objective matter.
Titus 2:1-10 is likewise troublesome. Insisting upon submissive wives and slaves is indefensible. If one thinks that Jesus might return during one’s lifetime, one might not argue for social reform. God will take care of that, right? Maybe not! Besides, do we not still have the moral obligation to love our neighbors as we love ourselves. The epistle dates to the first century C.E. I am typing this post in 2017, however. The passage of time has proven the inaccuracy of the expectation that Jesus would return in the first century C.E.
David Ackerman summarizes these two readings as focusing
on ways in which God calls Christians to repent of misusing the Bible to the unjust exclusion and oppression of others.
—Beyond the Lectionary (2013), pages 37-38
The lack of faith of certain scribes and Pharisees is evident in Matthew 12, for they request a sign from Jesus. (Faith requires no signs.) Our Lord and Savior replies in such a way as to indicate
rejection experienced in death yet God’s victory over it.
—The New Interpreter’s Study Bible (2003), page 1768
The possibility of death is evident in Psalm 39. A sense of awareness of one’s mortality and vulnerability pervades the text. The author turns to God for deliverance.
Sometimes deliverance from death does not come. Yet, in God, there is victory over death.
May, via God, there also be an end to
unjust exclusion and oppression of others.
KENNETH RANDOLPH TAYLOR
JUNE 6, 2018 COMMON ERA
THE FEAST OF FRANKLIN CLARK FRY, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED LUTHERAN CHURCH IN AMERICA AND THE LUTHERAN CHURCH IN AMERICA
THE FEAST OF SAINT CLAUDE OF BESANCON, ROMAN CATHOLIC PRIEST, MONK, ABBOT, AND BISHOP
THE FEAST OF HENRY JAMES BUCKOLL, AUTHOR AND TRANSLATOR OF HYMNS
THE FEAST OF WILLIAM KETHE, PRESBYTERIAN HYMN WRITER
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https://blogatheologica.wordpress.com/2017/06/06/difficulty/
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LENTEN AND EASTER DEVOTIONS 
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