Repairing The Breach

Theological Reflection In this week’s gospel reading, we observe Jesus’ in the company of his friends. Jesus’ death is looming but for now we read about his dinner party with Lazarus (the one he had raised from the dead), Mary and Martha. In the passage preceding, Jesus wept as he encountered the grief of the death of Lazarus. Jesus raises Lazarus to life, and proclaims, “unbind him and let him go”. These words echo the words Jesus proclaimed in the temple when he stood and read from the scroll of Isaiah, “Is this not the fast that I choose… to let the oppressed go free”. Encountering relational and structural violence and captivity and then challenging it with the proclamation of freedom and friendship is the pattern of Jesus’ ministry. He even transforms the ultimate breach of life, death. The ‘destiny’ of Jesus becomes the focus of this narrative in John’s Gospel. The death of Jesus on the cross enters and the reader is witnessing Jesus being anointed, as if for death and burial. Mary’s prophetic action proclaims Jesus as Lord. “At the feet of Jesus Mary no longer expresses grief and disappointment, as she did in her first meeting with Jesus (11.32), but love and devotion. They are the marks of true faith and discipleship. In Shussler Fiorenza’s words, “she [Mary] articulates the right praxis of discipleship.” 1 As Mary performs this extravagant act, Judas looks on, morally outraged, exclaiming “this perfume could have been sold and given to the poor.” Yet, in terms of ‘right praxis’ it is Mary who is displaying the marks of discipleship. This is in no way because the poor aren’t important to Jesus. We know from our stories of faith, that God has a priority for the poor. This moment, however, is about the deep suffering and death Jesus is about to endure. And, it is in this death that death will be no more… the oppressed will be free. 1. Dorothy Lee, 1994. The Symbolic Narratives of the Fourth Gospel: The Interplay of Form and Meaning. pp. 198; 219. 83