They came into the city through separate gates, almost at the same time. The first was a procession that demonstrated power: Pontius Pilate’s power, backed by all the forces of the Roman Empire. The second procession was smaller, feeble by comparison, and it represented a different kind of power, which was embodied in the person of Jesus. It was the power of hope, greeted by hosannas and the waving of palms, which were symbols of liberation. Liberation from Roman oppression.
The second parade was a common occurrence in the first century during Passover, when the city of Jerusalem bulged with pilgrims and would-be messiahs were a denarius a dozen, proclaiming with fanfare and hubris that they were the chosen one to set the Jewish people free; a promise that people greeted with eager expectation.
Pilate’s legions weren’t worried.They had been through this drill many times before. After the annual “anointed one” would boast and bluster, he would be rounded up and shoved out the back gate of the city and told not to return. They expected the same routine with Jesus. He would be roughed up a bit, and sent back up north to Galilee, where he could resume being a big fish in a little pond.
But Jesus didn’t boast and bluster. And he didn’t leave the city. Instead, he went to the temple to teach, and when he saw the temple officials treating the ancient faith as a transactional piece of business, he turned over the tables of the money changers. With that act of defiance, he became a threat to the religious hierarchy, to Pilate and ultimately to Rome; and a blinding disappointment to everyone else, whose hosannas were quickly transformed into shouts of “crucify him!” The crowd had expected that Jesus would come into the city, become king, and assume that if he could feed 5,000 people with a few fish, heal lepers and raise dead people to life, he could certainly defeat and dismiss Rome. When that didn’t happen, they turned on him. Jesus came into the city with a different purpose.
On the surface at least, Jesus’ power was no match for Rome’s overwhelming and ruthless force. Jesus’ power sought to change hearts with kindness, love, mercy and justice. Pilate’s power was immediate, visible — and violent when it needed to be. Pilate’s power put Jesus down by nailing him to a cross and lifting it up for all to see.
There has long been a temptation for a religious community to align itself with elements of Pilate’s power. The Episcopal Church, which has been my spiritual home for my entire life, developed an almost symbiotic relationship with corporate America when it established its headquarters in New York City in 1919, the center of American commerce. Vance Packard wrote a best-selling book in 1959 called The Status Seekers in which he claimed that one of the most effective ways for moving up the corporate ladder was to join the Episcopal Church. That unofficial collaboration served the church until the rise of secularism rendered it unnecessary for people to be a member of a religious community for the purpose of advancing their station in life. In some ways the Episcopal Church became disconnected from Jesus’ purpose.
In the 1980s in America, beginning with Jerry Falwell, a large segment of the evangelical church began a similar symbiotic relationship with the Republican Party. Some forty years later, with the Presidency of Donald Trump, various movements which began with the Moral Majority, and evolved into the Christian Coalition, and more recently into the New Apostolic Reformation, have been intent to steer the Republican Party in order to dominate the rest of society, all under the claim of a biblical injunction. (I would call it an ideology, fueled by a hunger for power and domination). The NAR has a Seven Mountain Mandate which urges Christians to seize control of various sectors of society, including government, business, education and the media. It is becoming more difficult to distinguish between Pilate’s army and the avatars of Christian supremacy. They are coming through the same gate. Their intent is visible, immediate, verbally violent – and physically violent when it needs to be. And contrary to Jesus’ purpose.
There have been anxious and fearful moments in my life when Jesus’ invitation to kindness, love, and mercy just hasn’t cut it. There are moments – for all of us – when we want something more immediate, visible, and while we may not want a response to be violent, we can turn our heads and mutter that violence can’t be helped. We may not exactly align with Pilate’s army, but we have been willing, if not eager, to follow his legions through the gate.
History shows, and as the Episcopal Church’s experience demonstrates, the symbiotic relationship between the Republican Party and elements of the evangelical church won’t last. It ultimately won’t work. That said, in the meantime (and it is indeed a mean time) it can do enormous damage and inflict an inordinate amount of pain.
So I go back to Jesus – not as king but as a holy prophet and protester, who drew on hope, mercy, love and peace. That power of the heart lasts over the long haul – if we trust it, embrace it, and use it. Jesus’ purpose needs to be ours.
