The foolishness of God - enabling dialogue and understanding

Based on a talk given to Otley Churches Together 1st April 2011.

(with reference to the King James Bible)

As it is April Fool’s day let's look at the foolishness God, with reference to texts from the King James Bible. For example:

Then said Saul, I have sinned: return, my son David: for I will no more do thee harm, because my soul was precious in thine eyes this day: behold, I have played the fool, and have erred exceedingly. 1 Samuel 26:21

For wrath killeth the foolish man, and envy slayeth the silly one. Job 5:2

However more significant for us is the foolishness of God illustrated in the New Testament:

18 For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness; but unto us which are saved it is the power of God. 22 For the Jews require a sign, and the Greeks seek after wisdom: … 23 But we preach Christ crucified, unto the Jews a stumbling block, and unto the Greeks foolishness; 24 But unto them which are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God, and the wisdom of God. 25 Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men; and the weakness of God is stronger than men. (1 Corinthians 18, 22-25)

Work for Christian unity and interreligious dialogue requires love for this foolish God. He emptied himself to take on our condition, so as to restore union with God and unity amongst all people. We follow a path laid down for us by Jesus crucified and forsaken on the cross, who took on himself all division, inequality, ugliness, separation and sin.

And at the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani? which is, being interpreted, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? Mark 15:34

Here are some illustrations of the foolishness of faith and its fruits in our lives and in the lives of others.

Trust in God’s love for us enables us to go out of our own circle and meet others who are not of our kind. Although the movement for Christian unity is well developed and unstoppable, there are still too many in the Christian world who consider engagement with other Christians foolishness or a waste of time. Our witness to the real unity we already experience, and the positive progress we can make on our journey towards full unity in diversity, remain essential.

Regarding interreligious dialogue, here too the foolishness of love pushes us to engage and build healthy relationships with our other faith neighbours.

Recently a leading British Muslim, Abdul Hakim, spoke engagingly about the King James Bible. The translators of the Bible, Lancelot Andrewes and others, learned Arabic so as to help with ancient Hebrew translation, which led in turn to the first translations of the Qu’ran. These first translations have the same cadence, tone and language as the Bible. Early English converts to Islam, such as George Sale and Marmaduke Pickthall were themselves steeped in the KJV and this influenced their own translations of the Qu’ran. These great scholars were capable of understanding and enquiry based on the sacred texts of other religions.

One of the translators William Bedwell Rector of St Ethelburga’s in the City of London even produced a dictionary in six languages. It was the first significant dictionary expressing Christianity in Arabic space and he translated part of the New Testament into Arabic. It was not only love of language but love of faith, peoples and cultures that pushed these men to do what they did.

A massive IRA bomb in the city of London in April 1993 partially destroyed St Ethelburga’s church. It was then rebuilt as a centre for dialogue and reconciliation and flourishes as such today.

What about the influence of Christian Scripture on people without a formal faith?

Reading the New Testament was a significant thread in the transformation of Etty Hillesum, a Dutch woman who died in 1942 in Auschwitz. In the space of two years she wrote remarkable diaries that reflected her transformation from a Jewess of a complex, ‘on the edge’, personality and secular liberal lifestyle to a woman in a deep relationship with God and with a huge capacity of care for others, travelling to the death camp in Auschwitz.

Initially she described her inner self as a tight “ball of twine” Later, as her journey goes on she writes: “My inner landscape consists of great wide plains, infinitely wide, with hardly a horizon in sight, one plain merging in to the next.”

She also wrote:
Things come and go in a deeper rhythm and people must be taught to listen. It is the most important thing we have to learn in this life.

I quote this because true listening requires a self-emptying which is a constant challenge and can seem to be a ‘foolish’ letting go of our own way of seeing things.

Etty is an important contemporary figure because her transformation and her relationship with God happened outside any religious institution. So perhaps it is an invitation to us to trust in God’s love for each person, who in ways perhaps unknown to us draws all people to himself. Our love can be a catalyst for their transformation.

Let’s look now at another contemporary figure who was fascinated by the Gospel and was able to say ‘yes’ to the foolishness God asked of her.

Chiara Luce Badano was a young Italian who met the Focolare movement as a child and who died in 1990 at the age of 18.

When she was only 11 after attending a congress for children, she wrote:

“We began our adventure straight away – to do the will of God in the present moment. With the Gospel in our hands we will do great things”.

When she was 12 she wrote: “I have discovered that Jesus [crucified and] Forsaken is the key to unity with God and I want to ... prepare myself for when he comes. I have understood that I can find him in those far from God, in atheists and that I must love them in a very special way, without self interest.”

At fourteen she wrote:
“I have seen the Gospel in a new light. I understood that I was not a real Christian because I did not live it in depth. Now I want to make this marvellous book the one aim of my life. I won’t and cannot remain illiterate about such an extraordinary message. Just as I can learn the alphabet easily, so I must be able to live the Gospel too (…)”

At the age of 17 she was diagnosed with incurable cancer. After a short time of intense inner struggle – because she wanted to live and do good in the world - her life became a constant ‘yes’ to God, saying “If you want it, I want it too”.

Her extraordinary spiritual maturity was recognized and she was beatified by the Catholic Church in September 2010.

May our lives continue to be used by God to build unity and understanding wherever we are.

Celia Blackden
26th April 2011