Presentation in the Temple

I spoke this morning at our mission on the Feast of the Presentation of our Lord. It’s the last of the feasts of Christmas, even though most Christmas decorations have disappeared awhile ago.

The Feast is based mainly on Luke’s Infancy narrative which begins in the temple with the announcement to the priest Zacharias of the birth of John the Baptist and ends with the presentation of Jesus in the temple by Mary and Joseph. The two elderly Jews, Simeon and Anna represent the faithful generations that have been waiting for the Messiah.

Previously, Luke tells of the poor shepherds, the outcasts waiting in the dark, who are greeted by the angels. In Matthew, the gentiles are invited in the coming of the magi. Now the long wait of the Jewish people is rewarded as old Simeon takes the child in his arms and utters a prophecy that he will bring light to his people.

We bless candles today to symbolize our acceptance of the light of Christ.

God was present in the Temple of Jerusalem, the Jews believed. They prayed there and offered sacrifices to the Lord. Luke would have us see that God’s Son is one with his Father as he is presented in the temple. He becomes the new temple, God present in our midst in a unique way.  He is our new High Priest who unites us to the Father by the sacrifice of himself.

Jesus later claims that role as he teaches in the temple and prays there.

God is present to us in different ways. One window in Epiphany Cathedral pictures Abraham, whom God told to journey to a new land. God sent him on a journey to a new land and promised to be with him on that journey. God sends us too on our journey of life and is always present with us as we go, mysterious and uncertain as our journey may be. We are going somewhere beyond anything we see or hope for now.

Another window in the cathedral shows Moses holding the commandments as he comes down from Mount Sinai.  The Jews carried those tablets on the way to the promised land. God was present in his commandments as they made their way through the desert. God is present when we keep his commands. “If you love me, keep my commands.”

When David established his capitol in Jerusalem, he built a temple to hold the Ark of the Covenant. God would be present in this building, which Solomon, his son, made more magnificent. By the time of Jesus, the temple was made even greater by Herod the Great, a master builder and there Jesus often prayed and taught. God was present there.

There will  be holy places, like churches and shrines, where God is present. There will be holy signs, holy actions, like sacraments and sacramentals,  where God is present.

During this mission, I spoke about seeing God present to us as he was to Abraham. We are made in the image of God; let’s see him there in ourselves and others. God is present on our life’s journey. Let’s see him there.

God is present in sacraments and holy signs, in prayers and commandments. Let us find him there.

Jesus in the Temple

Where did Jesus teach and pray and live when he was in Jerusalem? That’s hard to figure out today because the city was thoroughly destroyed by the Romans in 70 AD, and since then earthquakes, wars, political and religious forces have hammered away at the old city.

Jerusalem destroyed: 70 AD

Archeologists try their best to reconstruct ancient Jerusalem and they’ve produced a wonderful model of the city from about the time of Jesus, which can be seen today at the city’s Israel Museum.  As the model indicates, the Second Temple built by Herod the Great dominated the city then. Jesus must have taught and prayed in this splendid place–still being built during his lifetime– as he came to celebrate the Jewish feasts.

His activity here triggered his condemnation to death.

Can we say more precisely where he taught and when he began teaching there? Luke’s gospel offers the interesting story that his parents, after missing him on one of their usual visits to the Holy City,  “found him in the temple, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions.” (Luke 2,46) This probably took place in the Court of the Gentiles, the extensive space that surrounded the temple itself, which we can see in the model. We can surmise that, as observant Jews, his family brought him to Jerusalem for the major feasts.

The name, Court of the Gentiles, indicates an area open to all, even though the temple building itself was open only to the Jews. In the Court of the Gentiles,  young Jewish children like Jesus and adults looking for a greater understanding of their faith were able to listen and ask questions of the Jewish teachers. At the same time, even those who did not share the Jewish faith were welcome here,  namely,  non-Jews, gentiles, who could speak to Jewish teachers, inquire about the Jewish faith and even pray to the unknown God.

The Court of the Gentiles was an important part of the temple area; it proclaimed Jewish openness to the world.  The psalms and the prophets spoke of the God of all nations and looked to the day when all peoples would be counted among the children of Abraham:

“In days to come the mountain of the Lord’s house

will be established as the highest mountain

and raised above the hills.

All nations shall stream toward it;

many peoples will come and say:

‘Come, let us climb the Lord’s mountain to the house of the God of Jacob,

that he may instruct us in his ways

and we may walk in his paths.” Isaiah 2,1-5

The Court of the Gentiles was the place where Jesus proclaimed a new age that would fulfill these promises.  As he grew “in wisdom and age and grace” Jesus continued to go to the temple with his family from Galilee to celebrate the Jewish feasts, still “listening to the teachers and asking them questions.”

But after his baptism by John, Jesus’ visits to the temple changed. During the feasts he made extraordinary claims about himself and his mission, as John’s Gospel records.  His claims, along with healings he worked in Jerusalem– his cures of  the man born blind and of the paralyzed man, above all his raising of Lazarus from the dead– alarmed the temple authorities.

The gospels all record the disturbing incident that took place in the temple during the final stages of his ministry. According to Mark’s gospel: “He entered the temple and began to drive out those who sold  and those who bought, and he overturned the tables of the money-changers and the seats of those who sold pigeons; and he would not allow anyone to carry anything through the temple. And he taught and said to them, “Is it not written, “my house shall be called a house of prayer for all the nations?’ But you have made it a den of thieves.” (Mark 11,15-17, Matthew 21,1017; Luke 19, 45-46; John 2,13-17)

Not only was the Court of the Gentiles a place for teaching and prayer, it was also a place for exchanging money, getting advice from priests about where and how to pray and make your offerings,  buying food and animals for sacrifice. In a prophetic gesture, Jesus upset this traditional apparatus and called for renewing the temple so that it could fulfill its destiny as “a house of prayer for all the nations.”

The Gentiles would no longer be excluded from experiencing the Divine Presence;  Jesus signified he came to break down the dividing wall between Jew and Gentile and reconcile both to God through his death. He himself would be the new temple and the sacrifice of reconciliation for all peoples.

No wonder that a major accusation made against him later at his trial before the Jewish leaders was based on what witnesses claimed were his threats to destroy the temple. “We heard him say ‘I will destroy this temple made from human hands and I will build another not made by human hands.” (Mark 14,58)

Some picture Jesus as a hapless Galilean peasant caught in a government net to catch and destroy potential revolutionaries, like Barabbas. Jesus went to his death for more reasons than that. His activity in the temple is an important part of his life and mission, and it led to his death.

Telling the Truth in Dangerous Places

The two places recalled in today’s Mass readings are dangerous places for telling the truth. The three young men in Babylon tell the truth in the hearing of a king who wants all to bow down to him. They remain loyal to their God and they are thrown into a fiery furnace, but God keeps them unharmed.

Jesus speaks the truth in the temple in Jerusalem. His message is inflammatory, according to the temple leaders. They would rather he be silent or go somewhere else, preferably back to some little village in Galilee. But he speaks his truth and tells them they are not children of Abraham, but people looking after their own interests. Their dialogue as recorded in John’s gospel still crackles with controversy.

Jesus will be sent to death, but God will raise him up.

From what we know about the Jewish temple at that time it does seem like a place where you had to watch what you said. Though the Romans kept Judea on a loose leash, they didn’t like rebellions. Their representatives in the area were not the best  administrators then–Pontius Pilate really wasn’t good at managing Herod or his Jewish subjects. Historians say he was incompetent.

In the late 60’s some young Jewish leaders attached to the temple would massacre a detachment of Roman soldiers and bring Titus and his legions into Judea to level the temple and Jerusalem itself.

The temple was a volatile place; the temple area today still is. Martin Goodman’s book, Rome and Jerusalem, tells the story of the sad tale of Jerusalem’s destruction and the events that led up to it.

But we still have to speak the truth at dangerous times and places. Yes, even today. Not everyplace or everybody wants to hear it. Don’t mention things like the need for addressing the inequalities that exist in our world in some places.  How can we make sure people everywhere have enough to eat and drink and a place to live? How can we respect human life, from birth to death? How can we deal with the climate change? How can we live together as a human family in our world?

You can’t speak about issues like this in some places, even some of our churches. But if Jesus offers an example, we should.