June 8, 2014

Helen Jacobi

Acts 2:1-2     Psalm 104:24-35     1 Corinthians 12:3-13     John 20:19-23

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“What language shall I borrow” was a phrase that kept popping into my head this week as I reflected on the Pentecost story. Not being able to recall where I had heard the phrase I googled and found it comes from the Good Friday hymn – O scared head sore wounded – “What language shall I borrow to thank thee, dearest friend, for this thy dying sorrow, thy pity without end?” And it is a phrase borrowed from that hymn for numerous books and articles about hymn writing, and theological language.What language shall I borrow to express faith, what language, what words can describe what I might want to say about God, about faith?The disciples at Pentecost found they needed to borrow a few languages; their own language, was not enough, they needed more.

In our time in the late 90s living in Canada we learned a lot about the politics of language. The politics of Quebec and the struggle to maintain the Quebec identity in the dominant English culture was a passionate subject. In Ottawa the politics of language ruled supreme – all our friends who were public servants had to be proficient in French to rise above a certain level in the public service. So they would go off on 3 month long courses paid for by the taxpayer to improve their French. In any public events French and English would be spoken and not translated, the expectation was that you would understand. On our first summer holiday we traveled to northern Quebec to the Lac St Jean and didn’t hear a word of English all week.

We went to a nearby town on a rainy day to do some shopping and the very helpful shop assistant turned cold on me when I switched from French and spoke to our girls in English. She simple walked away and stopped serving me! To speak English was to belong to the English oppressor who wouldn’t give Quebec independence.

In the Anglican church of Canada there is not a word of French in their prayer book and no translation of the book into French! To have translated their new prayer book in the 90s would have been interpreted as an act of political support for the independence of Quebec. Instead they use a translation done by the Americans of their Book of Common Prayer.

Language is a core part of our identity. In Aotearoa we have learned just in time that speaking te reo is foundational to our identity as a nation. And in our church we always use te reo to remind us who we are; we were a Maori church before we were a settler – pakeha church, bi-culturalism and being a people of two languages is who we are.

The disciples we are told could communicate with the multi cultural, multi lingual crowds – Parthians, Medes, Elamites, and residents of unpronounceable places like Phrygia and Pamphylia.

Now we don’t really understand this Pentecost event as a literal event. It rather describes the remarkable job the disciples did in the early days of the church sharing the gospel and spreading the faith. So passionate were they about being followers of the Way that they overcame all barriers of communication and culture and enthused others with their faith, their energy. The Pentecost event is also a reversal of the Tower of Babel myth in Genesis chapter 11 where God scatters the people who until then had one common language, and gives them different languages because they try to build a tower “with its top in the heavens” (Gen 11:4).

Peter quotes the prophet Joel to describe what will happen after Pentecost, after the tower of Babel is reversed – young and old, women and men, slaves and free will see visions and dream dreams (Acts 2:17-21). Dream of a better world and a new way of being in relationship with each other. A world where God’s presence is felt and the Spirit appears as wind and fire, a world where God is present with the people and not sitting in the heavens looking down upon them.

What language do we use as bearers of the faith? Do we need to borrow another’s language or is our own sufficient? Much of the language of our church and liturgy is ancient – Pentecost, eucharist, acolyte, baptism – ancient words from another culture and language – yet they have become ours in our time.

We are people of the Bible, of the stories and images; we are people of the prayer book, its language, its structure, its prayers. If I say Christ is risen – you know to say – he is risen indeed – if I say the peace of Christ be with you – you say and also with you. Our liturgical and biblical language forms us as worshippers and believers.

Language is something we are very careful about at St Matthew’s. We make sure we use a variety of names for God, we use language that is inclusive of all people. We avoid hierarchical terms like Lord, we emphasise the gathering of the people around the table to be nourished.

Worship is not only about words but also about our body language and actions. We embody our worship, in standing, sitting, kneeling, processing, bowing, making the sign of the cross, eating, drinking, shaking hands at the peace, being censed with the smoke of incense.

I have been puzzled since my arrival at St Matthew’s that while we are very careful about removing the hierarchy from our language at 10am we still ask the congregation to sit in rows like an audience, the preacher preaches from on high, and we move up to the high altar for communion leaving behind the altar we have gathered at, along with a number of the congregation who cannot manage the stairs. There is a dissonance here that I think we can usefully explore in the coming weeks.

Barbara Brown Taylor says “Worship is how the people of God practice their reliance on the Lord … we practice the patterns of our life together before God, rehearsing them until they become second nature to us … from the opening acclamation to the dismissal, every element of the service has something to teach us about our life with God and one another. Practicing them over and over again, we build up the muscles of our hearts, souls, and minds, exercising our ability to respond to the presence of the holy in our midst.”[1]

We build up the muscles in the words that we say and sing and in the way we gather and move, in our posture for worship. And we train those muscles not for worship on its own but for the rest of our lives in our families and jobs and communities. Here we practice compassion, justice, reflection, listening, receiving, offering, gathering, praying, worshipping, serving, so that on Monday we can be compassionate, work for justice, listen, receive, offer, gather, pray, worship and serve in our workplaces, in our homes and with our neighbours.

The disciples were given new languages not for their own faith formation but for the communicating of faith to others. The purpose of Pentecost was not to build up the core of believers but to share the good news of the gospel with others. Today’s Pentecost is you and me in our workplaces, schools, families and community groups. We don’t have to borrow another’s language or learn a new language – our own faith, our own life with the Holy Spirit is sufficient.

So what language will we borrow on this day of Pentecost, this day of many languages? We do not need to borrow another’s language, we need instead to rediscover our own, to reclaim our own faith and its words and actions. Pentecost is about moving outwards, sharing ourselves with others, offering the peace of Christ in the midst of all we do.

Peace, paix, rangimarie are the words and actions the world needs.  

And it is in order to proclaim that essential Pentecostal truth, to be part of the miracle of communication and understanding, to share the peace which the world cannot give, that the Spirit sends us out today.  

[1] The Preaching Life, p.64.&.68, 1993, Cowley Publications