ST MATTHEW-IN-THE-CITY
ANGLICAN CHURCH AUCKLAND NEW ZEALAND
Fake News?
April 16, 2017
Helen Jacobi
Easter Day Acts 10:34-43 Matthew 28:1-10
Video available on YouTube, Facebook
Is Truth Dead? The cover of TIME magazine from last week sums up the current political conversation in the United States. [1] I wonder if this could have been the cover of the Jerusalem Times the year Jesus was crucified, if they had had magazines back then. Maybe. Is Truth Dead?
Our understanding of what is true today is based in the desire for provable, scientific facts. Anna Mansfield, writing in the Washington Post says “Our current concept of truth is largely a product of the Enlightenment, when humans codified a way to state a question, pose a hypothesis and collect observations that either supported or changed their understanding of the ‘truth’.” [2]
The rise of the “fact checkers” that seek to verify statements of politicians is borne out of the desire to verify what they are saying and hold them accountable. The fact checkers are working hard these days with the rise of “fake news”, events and opinions simply made up as a figment of someone’s imagination. Alarming stuff.
Mansfield goes on to say that Donald Trump and other leaders like him are operating in a different kind of a world based on emotional truth. You can quote facts all day and people will still “believe” him. “Facts don’t matter if the emotional impact is real.” [3] I think when I was at high school we had history lessons about this – it was called propaganda back then.
So what about our Easter story. What kind of truth is it? Is it fake news? The Matthew version of the gospel story that we read this year has all the political intrigue of present day Washington DC. On Good Friday the story finished with Pilate, who was the Roman governor, commanding that Jesus’ tomb be guarded so the body could not be stolen by his followers. The priests and the Pharisees were worried by what Jesus had said, and were concerned the disciples would make it look like he had been raised from the dead. And so the tomb was sealed. Which makes Matthew’s story perhaps the most dramatic of the four gospels because it then requires an earthquake to break open the sealed tomb. In the other gospels the stone has been rolled away already when the women arrive. Here there is an earthquake, and an angel; and the poor guards faint with fear. They can no longer see what is happening. Matthew places great emphasis on “seeing” – the women go to see the tomb (not to anoint the body as in the other stories); the angel says – come and see the place where he lay; and that they will see Jesus in Galilee; then suddenly Jesus is there and they see and touch him; and he too promises that the disciples will see him in Galilee. It reads a bit like a fact checker – see here – see this – see for yourself.
The story then carries on past what we read this morning – back to the political some of the guard went into the city and told the chief priests everything that had happened. After the priests had assembled with the elders, they devised a plan to give a large sum of money to the soldiers, telling them, ‘You must say, “His disciples came by night and stole him away while we were asleep.” If this comes to the governor’s ears, we will satisfy him and keep you out of trouble.’ So they took the money and did as they were directed. (Mt 28:11-15)
So you can change the story if necessary. Keep it quiet. The trouble is Pilate and the Pharisees and the soldiers are dealing with the physical, visual aspects of the story. Matthew is writing about something else altogether.
He is writing about seeing the world with eyes of faith, seeing the world with God’s eyes if you like. Stanley Hauerwas says “Of course we cannot see the resurrection, because God cannot be seen. But we do see Jesus, who has been resurrected. Accordingly, the resurrection is the condition that now makes it possible for us to see truthfully all that is in God’s creation.” [4]
The guards saw the empty tomb; the chief priests knew about the empty tomb and that did not make them believers. The women saw Jesus but women were not considered reliable witnesses in Jesus’ day so their word could not be relied upon. And yet all four gospels agree it was the women who were the first witnesses to the resurrection. Not a very reliable way to build a case. But the gospel writers were not building a case for 21st century fact checkers, they were communicating a different kind of truth.
Hauerwas again “The truth that is Jesus is a truth that requires discipleship, for it is only by being transformed by what he has taught and by what he has done that we can come to know the way the world is.” [5]
Matthew was giving words and meaning to people’s experiences, uncovering for them a truth they knew as followers, and now needed to be able to pass on to others. Those in the next generation who have never met Jesus would also now be included in the discipleship and follow in the way of the resurrected one. Why?
Because to do so, to follow, made a difference. Made a difference to the way they saw and experienced the world; made a difference to their choices, the way they lived. And – this is where Pilate and the politics meets the story again – to be a follower of Jesus meant to see him as “lord” – not a term we are very comfortable with here at St Matthew’s (it sounds too hierarchical and masculine) – to call Jesus Lord, meant Caesar was not Lord. To call Jesus Lord meant that God’s reign was more powerful than Caesar and his soldiers and Pilate and the corrupt religious leaders. [6] Cate said in her Good Friday sermon that when Pilate washed his hands of Jesus and let him be crucified we see respresented in the story all the times we look away from injustice in our world. To claim to see Jesus and to kneel at his feet and worship him was to see through the unjust politics of the time to another way.
So what kind of truth is this then? Is it just a first century version of fake news? Well that is for you to decide, to discern. What do you see when you look at the world and your own life? Are you able to see hope? Are you able to see love? Are you able to see light in the midst of darkness? Faith does not remove the pain and sorrow from our world, indeed faith helps us to see pain, sorrow, injustice and face them sqaurely. Resurrection is life overcoming death, hope overcoming despair, love overcoming hate. Resurrection does not happen, cannot happen without there first being death. In Jesus’ case a death of torture and suffering by a politically oppressive regime. So resurrection faith does not jump over pain and sorrow to a polyanna world of sweetness and light. Resurrection faith is anchored in the real world of sorrow: war, drought, famine, homelessness, climate change, chemical weapons – whatever is top of your list of the world’s sorrows. Resurrection faith faces these things head on and says love will not be overcome, hope will not be overcome. Jesus says to the women – go to Galilee – go to the place we all lived and worked in – go there to our home – and you will see me again – and you will know then what is your purpose, your work. Today Jesus says to us – go to Aotearoa, go to Auckland, see me there where you are, in your life, in your work; see me there. What will we see?
Something that is real or just fake news? Each one of us is invited to make a choice. When we see the empty tomb do we go for the cover up story and remain silent; or do we say
Christ is risen!
He is risen indeed, Alleluia.
[1] April 3, 2017
[4] Matthew 2006 p247
[5] Matthew 2006 p247
[6] Marcus Borg Speaking Christian 2011 p111