goodness calls to goodness

March 5, 2023 • Second Sunday in Lent
Scripture Reading: The Gospel of Mary 2:1-3:6
(translation from A New New Testament)
Katie Reimer, guest preacher

[You may find the full worship video recording at: https://youtu.be/5bEfsxuXs60]

Sin.

Sin is a movement away from the deepest voice within.

Sin is something we do. It is not who we are.

Sin is temporary. Goodness is permanent.

Sin is an illusion. Love is reality.

Being human is inherently glorious and expansive.

Love wins not because it’s stronger, but because it is the deepest truth.

Salvation is found by reclaiming what we have always known and sensed to be true.

Salvation is being restored to our roots. And our roots are good. Very good.

Thus says the Gospel of Mary.

The Gospel of Mary was buried for a large part of Christian history. It was rediscovered in a Cairo marketplace in 1896. A papyrus book bound in leather and written in Coptic. And at that moment, the Gospel of Mary was saved from complete erasure.

The writings in the Christian Bible were selected and canonized in the 4th century. Before that, for the first few hundred years following the life of Jesus, various gospels were circulating as different communities tried to make sense of Jesus’s life and teachings. Scholars have dated the Gospel of Mary to be a contemporary of the Gospels of Matthew, Luke or John. And so, the Gospel of Mary offers us a crucial part of the Christian story.

It is shocking for our 21st century Christian ears to hear that not only was there a gospel written in the name of a woman, but that that gospel records Jesus as saying, “There is no sin.” Christianity has a well-known reputation for being obsessed with sin. To imagine Christianity without sin is to feel a seismic shift in our faith tradition. To grapple with the idea that there is no such thing as sin is as fresh and striking as it is shocking and unsettling.

But if we look more closely at this claim in the Gospel of Mary, we can find resonance even in the traditional writings of the Bible.

In the Gospel of Luke, Jesus is asked “when is the kin-dom of God is coming?”, and Jesus answers that the kin-dom is already here. Among us. Within us. The goodness of God is already here. Among us. Within us.

And then there is Proverbs 8, which we heard at the opening of worship today. Sophia, Wisdom, the divine feminine, calls out to the goodness in every single one of us. With great understanding, Sophia reaches out to what we have always known and sensed to be true. That our deepest nature as human beings is good.

At our core, we humans are not sinful and depraved. At the core, we humans are good and glorious, loving and kind.

Now, if you’re like me, you might be thinking - but what about all the terrible things that happen in the world? What about rape? What about murder? What about child abuse? What about exploitation and slavery and emotional abuse? What about patriarchy and white supremacy and ecological degradation? Aren’t all of those things sin?

I don’t think that the Gospel of Mary is naive to the cruelty in the world. I don’t think the Gospel of Mary is naive to the cruelty that we inflict on each other. I don’t think the Gospel of Mary is saying that the trauma of the world is just an illusion.

After Jesus says, “There is no sin,” he continues on to say, “it is you who make sin.” In other words, sin is not who we are. Sin is what we do.

Jesus explains “That is why the Good came into your midst, coming to the good which belongs to every nature, in order to restore it to its root.” In order to restore it to its root that is good.

From the beginning of time, the goodness of God has been calling out to the goodness which is at the root of every single one of us. Every nature, every form, every creature, every single one of us will be resolved again into our own roots. Roots that are good. Roots that are generous and kind. Roots that are expansive and creative and playful and curious.

The goodness of God comes close to us to draw out the goodness that resides at the core of our being.

Perhaps this is why we say of people who act with cruelty that they are inhuman. And maybe this is why we say that when people act with deep generosity, warmth and kindness, we say they are human. We say they act with humanity.

You might say that all of this is just wordsmithing. Saying the same thing with different words.

But I think it matters enormously whether we believe in original sin, or whether we believe in original goodness. It matters whether we believe we are rotten at the core, or loving at the core. It matters whether we believe that our roots are depraved or beautiful.

It matters because what we believe about ourselves affects how we address the cruelty we find within and within those around ourselves.

If we believe in original sin, the only way to salvation is to accept a power outside of ourselves. This way comes with a lot of shame and suppressing of our own voice (that we believe to be rotten). This way paves the path to manipulation and control by some of us over others. And in the end, this way leads to cruelty, because it asks us to grab for power outside of ourselves.

If we believe in original goodness, the way to salvation is to breathe into the goodness and power that resides in our deepest selves. This way comes with a lot of healing and acceptance of our own humanity. This way paves the path to reverence and awe. And this way leads to kindness as we remember the goodness of our own hearts.

Some will point to the story of Adam and Eve as evidence for the doctrine of original sin. But I would point back even further to the creation story at the very beginning of our Bible. In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. And after creating each and every nature and form and creature, the story tells that God saw that each one was good. The deepest truth is that we are good. Very good.

I don’t think that all of this means we can retreat from each other into a “pick yourself up by the bootstraps” individualism. In the Gospel of Mary, before saying there is no sin, Jesus says “All of us exist in one another.”

What this says to me is that as we breathe into the goodness at the core of who we are, we can only reach that goodness if we come to know that we exist in one another. That what happens to me happens to you. That what happens to you happens to me.

When we forget that we are intimately bound together with every other created form, we forget that how we treat each other is how we treat ourselves.

Also, we need each other’s goodness to remind us of our own goodness. Many things can silence our deepest voice and we need each other to point us back to it.

But then I wonder…how do we know when our relationships or communities are life-giving or destructive? How do we know if we should stay in a community or if we should leave a community? How do we know when our communities are of God or against God?

I think that when our communities call us back to ourselves, those are life-giving. But when our communities ask us to suspend what we know deep within to be true, those are destructive.

When our relationships make us feel radiant and kind and strong, those are life-giving. When our relationships us make us feel decentered and devalued, those are destructive.

So I come back to my reading of the Gospel of Mary, and what it tells us as we’re working to reclaim sin in this season.

Sin is when we move away from the deepest voice within. Salvation is when we align ourselves with our deepest integrity.

Sin is something we do. Love is who we are.

Sin will always crumble. Goodness will always grow.

I often wonder - what if the world had never silenced our inner voice? What if the world had never silenced the Gospel of Mary?

What if men had never silenced the voices of women? What if white people had never silenced the voices of people of color?

What if we had never silenced our own gut instincts? What if we had never silenced our own voice of conscience?

But I suppose we could also turn these questions around and ask: What will happen when we stop silencing our own inner voice? What will happen when we stop silencing the Gospel of Mary?

What will happen when we stop silencing the voices of women and people of color and birds and water and trees?

What will the world look like when we stop silencing the voice of love at our very core?

The good news is that although voices can be silenced for a time, they can never be permanently erased.

The good news is that we all belong to each other, and we all belong to God.

The good news is that God has always, and will always call out the good which belongs to every one of us.

The good news is that we are human.

This is the gospel. This is good news. Amen.

Copyright (c) 2023 - Katie Reimer
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