Rumors, truth, and reconciliation
Clare L. Hickman
St. Luke’s Episcopal Church, Ferndale
April 23, 2023—Easter 3A
Acts 2:14a, 36-41; 1 Peter 1:17-23; Luke 24:13-35
There are rumors, flying around. People are talking, asking for details, wondering what it could all mean. And what you hear, and what you believe, depends on who you’re talking to. Depends, in part, on what you want to believe.
This is the situation at the beginning of our gospel today. Just as it would happen now, as a juicy news story starts making the rounds, there are whispers and suppositions, exaggerations and opinions. And everyone’s reaction is shaped by their own worldview. You can watch it begin, even as Jesus is removed from the cross in Matthew: the soldiers advise Pilate to seal the tomb, to make it harder for the disciples to steal the body and then claim Jesus has been raised from the dead. Even before anything has happened, they are convinced what the real story actually is!
Many of us do the same thing. A politician gets accused of some misdoing, and our response depends in part on whether we share their politics. We condemn or we justify. We seek out more information, or we blithely decide we know all that we need to know.
These two disciples on the road to Emmaus are hungry for news, long for more information. Torn by grief, crushed by disappointment, they are now tempted by hope. What if the rumors are true? What if the redemption of Israel hadn’t worked out at all the way they’d expected it to, but God was now doing a whole new thing?
What does it mean, in other words, that the tomb is empty?
The Roman authorities, we already know, will presume it’s a simple matter of grave-robbing, and a soldier or two might well need to lose their job. As for the Temple leaders, who knows what they will be thinking? Signs like earthquakes and the sun going dark are hard to ignore. Could it be demonic forces at work? Or is there any possibility that they misjudged this Jesus fellow?
People are talking. Rumors are flying. And while many will believe what they want to believe, and dismiss whatever doesn’t fit their previous perspective, there are those who are asking questions. Those leaving themselves open to transformation. Followers of Jesus, brought from bitter disillusionment to a joyful new understanding of the kingdom. And those like the centurion at the foot of the cross, moved to a reluctant wonder in the face of such courageous love and forgiveness.
From our modern perspective, such conversions can seem even more miraculous than the healing of lepers. In a world of political polarization, and information echo chambers, it’s easier to believe in the feeding of the 5000, than that people might actually allow their minds to be opened up, and changed.
Even these two disciples take a while to come to it. Confronted by this stranger, they spill out all the rumors, all that they have heard, and feared, and hoped for. In response, Jesus offers some extensive teaching, going through all the scriptures to reveal everything that they contain about him. And still, these disciples do not see it.
Not until they eat together. Not until he breaks the bread, and they remember what it was to sit at table with Jesus. Not until then, and they hear echoes of the Last Supper, when he promised that he will always be present when they break bread together.
Each and every time. But perhaps especially when there are doubters and fighters and deniers and betrayers around the table. When that kind of crowd sits together and breaks bread: Jesus is truly, miraculously, present.
I believe this to be the spiritual reality that underlies the only effective way people have found to bridge serious ideological divides: you have to eat together. Long discourses and well-researched facts are not going to change anyone’s mind. Even Jesus discovers that, when his scripture lesson fails to open the disciples’ eyes. Best to just set aside all your brilliant arguments (at least for now), and break bread.
Why does it work? Well, it’s all about relationship. When people feel adversarial toward each other, sharing food moves them into a collaborative mode. You sit, you eat, you tell stories. This allows shared values and experiences to arise, which makes it much harder to continue to demonize the “other.” It also engages our emotional responses in a positive way. Which is extremely helpful, since our emotions are the true seat of our convictions (which is why those well-researched facts aren’t that useful). Jonathan Haidt writes about this in an excellent book called The Righteous Mind, and it’s all very compellingly grounded in the study of human social interaction.
But I would go a step further, and stake my conviction that breaking bread together also summons the power and presence of Christ. He is THERE, at the table. And not just the Eucharistic table but every table. Because Jesus is the Bread of Life, the living embodiment of God’s desire for all people to be fed, both spiritually and physically. Which means that Jesus is there, whenever we feed and are fed.
Beyond simple sustenance, however, is the deeper reality of what breaking bread together has meant throughout human history. Bread is a sign of fellowship and hospitality. Bread is a sign of trust, when you eat the food another hand has given you. Bread is a sign of relationship and the promise of a treaty.
And when we break bread together, allowing ourselves to be connected on this fundamental level, we participate in the reconciling power of Christ. When we take the bread, which needs to be broken in order to be shared, we know that he abides in the broken places, abides between us, even when everything else is strained to the point of non-existence.
It is Christ’s very nature to stand in the breach. Spanning the distance between humanity and divinity. Reaching between groups of people who feel fundamentally opposed. Filling the gap that aches between estranged individuals. Christ binds us all together, and when we have the courage to step into that breach, we WILL find him there. Our eyes will be opened and our hearts will be moved and our minds will in some way be changed.
It’ll be a miracle. It hasn’t even happened yet, and I’m already sure. Amen.