(Painting titled “Christ with Mary and Martha”, done in 1654 by Johannes Vermeer, located in the National Gallery of Scotland in Edinburgh, Great Britain. Used under Creative Commons license.)
Lectionary Scripture - Luke 10:38-42 NRSV
Now as they went on their way, he entered a certain village, where a woman named Martha welcomed him into her home. She had a sister named Mary, who sat at the Lord's feet and listened to what he was saying. But Martha was distracted by her many tasks; so she came to him and asked, "Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to do all the work by myself? Tell her then to help me." But the Lord answered her, "Martha, Martha, you are worried and distracted by many things; there is need of only one thing. Mary has chosen the better part, which will not be taken away from her."
Listen and Learn
Progressives, where would we be without them? And visionaries, where we would be without them too? This week’s lectionary scripture contrasts the ways and behavior of traditionalists with that of progressives while a renowned visionary is among them.
For Martha, the traditionalist in the above scripture story, attending to matters of religion and theology was not her place or lot in life. Millennia of tradition dictated that as a woman, she should focus on being a meticulous host for the men who had come to her home. If she managed to glean meaningful crumbs from the discussion taking place beneath her roof, then it couldn’t be helped. Most certainly it wasn’t intended.
We’re not exactly clear as to the reason for Martha’s complaint about Mary. Was she truly annoyed with her sister? Was she envious of Mary sitting at Jesus’ feet? Or was she simply overwhelmed with the crowd in her home and upset that because of her duties as host she might miss out on crumbs of wisdom that would have been hers to hear once the men had been attended to?
Clearly the situation was something altogether new and different for Martha. The men had just arrived from where a lawyer in a crowd pressed Jesus about who one’s neighbor is. The teaching Jesus offered stunned the crowd who included not only lawyers, but priests, scribes and anyone else who had been listening carefully. Jesus’ words in that situation turned the notion of neighbor on its head. Now the neighbor could be someone from a despised ethnic group. Now the neighbor could be a seemingly dead person lying beside the road. Tradition and laws about defiling oneself no longer meant a thing when an innocent party had been wronged and maliciously injured, even if that led to loss of one’s livelihood, or loss of one’s standing in the community, or expending precious resources to care for one who had been wronged. A good neighbor was nothing less than one who showed and extended the greatest mercy despite the circumstances confronting them.
So in one fleeting story told by a phenomenal young rabbi, the whole world had changed for those following Jesus and with it thousands of years of tradition. The followers would have questions, want further explanation, some might even fear the fallout from the religious establishment and want to prepare and strategize for it. Quite possibly, these things were the purpose for gathering at Mary and Martha’s home. My guess is that Martha didn’t want to miss a moment of the conversation which is why she petitioned Jesus to have Mary help her.
Tradition took over however for Martha. Whatever progressive or curious piece in her had been touched by the news and story of who our neighbor is, it had been tossed out the window by Martha in a mindless sort of way. Jesus’ gentle and loving rebuke was a means of calling Martha out of tradition and out of her habits and typical way of doing things so she could do what she really wanted to, i.e. be at Jesus’ feet listening and learning as was Mary.
Have you ever had a time where you should have been listening and learning but your habits, usual expectations, or typical manner of doing things (i.e. your traditions) got in the way? I remember several years ago being approached by a YWCA youth worker trying to help teens learn skills for living on their own. The worker shared about a teen for whom she had grown quite concerned. The teen would have moments where she seemed quite detached in class and would lay her head on the table while closing her eyes and covering her ears. The worker later discovered that the teen suffered from hearing voices and seeing things that weren’t there and these happened quite frequently. At first I thought the young woman might have a form of childhood schizophrenia or depression with psychosis and suggested that the teen be further evaluated. Problem is that I didn’t feel quite right about what I had surmised.
Eventually, I realized my mistake. I had spent so much time working with persons suffering major mental illnesses such as schizophrenia, psychotic depression, bipolar disorder that it I failed to understand what the teen was actually struggling through. Finally, it came to me, but not until I had been through an opportunity to sit and listen and learn regarding PTSD, i.e. post-traumatic stress disorder. I later had a chance to speak with the youth worker and learned that the teen had been in a very disturbing home environment resulting in the need for foster care. There, she finally escaped her traumatizing upbringing.
In Jesus’ time as well as in ours, numbing and traumatizing circumstances readily occur in the religious establishment. Things had become so mindless and numb at the Temple that Jesus overturned the tables of moneychangers and chased out the merchants with a whip demanding that the Temple return to a place of prayer. On another occasion, he condemned the scribes for swallowing up the property and resources of widows. And in this week’s scripture story, he compassionately but straightforwardly differs with Martha and does so by telling her that listening and learning are at times more important than our usual expectations or ways of doing things. And as most of us know, eventually enough listening and learning occurred that a whole new faith movement came into being and now billions claim to follow Jesus Christ.
In our time, I suspect Jesus would say to some followers that their busyness and typical way of doing things on his behalf is little more than a Martha approach to life. He might compassionately but straightforwardly say that a "Mary way of being" needs to be recaptured as there’s been too much loss of the kind of listening and learning necessary for making Peaceable Kingdom progress. Too much of it has been lost in terms of a greater preference for mindless ritual or proscribed behavioral expectations that support some form of tradition that no longer serves a good purpose.
On that note, I remember a few years ago meeting with some lay ministers regarding their distress that certain denominational rituals and traditions were no longer being upheld. One of those issues involved that an ordained minister should always lead congregational worship services. For me, I never understood the magical thinking accompanying such a thing or why the intermediary of an ordained minister was considered as always necessary for ensuring Spirit filled worship. After all, wasn't it because of Jesus that humanity had listened and learned that relationship and encounter with God was primarily personal? Only until I produced documentation from denominational leaders saying worship services could be led by non-ordained persons was the issue finally moot. Just proves that today, as in Jesus’ time, there will always be the Marthas, the traditionalists, and the legalistic individuals who value more that which limits others rather than frees them.
Meanwhile - and thankfully - there will continue to be those progressives and visionaries who emulate Mary and Jesus and other followers who down through time sought after "the better part", the "listening and learning part", they will do so because they want God's Peaceable Kingdom to be reality for all living souls.
To that end, summon the courage to be a Mary – to be a person who sits at the sage’s feet listening and learning so you can be for others whatever is needed whenever it’s needed.
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