|
Background: John's Gospel obviously displays a much
more developed theology then the three synoptic gospels. However, it was still written
early in the so-called sub-apostolic time. The remarkable fact is not that there is a
strong theological slant to it. Rather it is surprising how relatively early in the
history of the early Church a strong Trinitarian perspective has emerged. The trajectory
towards Nicea and the other early councils has already been set,
though the elaborate explanations have yet to appear. Associated with God even by
the time of St. John are Jesus, and the Father, and the Paraclete, the advocate, the
teacher, the protector, the guarantor of the peace that Jesus has given. Already we have
hints that God is a community of relationships, that there is so much knowledge and love
in God that the knowledge and love explode into distinct personages. This truth is
revealed to test our faith, not to provide theologians with raw material for their
speculations (though there is nothing wrong with that), but to dazzle us with the
brightness of God's glory, the power of God's knowledge and the passion of God's love. The
use of the word "spirit," a translation of the Hebrew word Shekenah hints at a
maternal protection in God because the word is feminine in Hebrew - and was used in Hebrew
folk religion as the name of Yahweh's consort. St. John had no thought of such matters,
yet the gender of the noun might well be part of the meaning "in front of the
text." |
read the padre
read t
he padre
Keep in touch...
Locally, and
Globally!
Check out
Andrew M. Greeley's
Columns for the
Chicago SunTimes'
Daily Southtown.
_ |
 |
Story: Once upon a
time there was a high school with very serious problems. The students (all boys, needless
to say) were out of control and over the top. They smoked, they drank, they did drugs and
all on the school campus. They hassled teachers, they shouted racial epithets at
basketball games, they spread graffiti all over the school walls, the cursed at school
administrators, they fought in the corridors. The religious order which ran the school had
a long history of imposing discipline by physical force. The headmaster was a tough man
who had struck terror into the hearts of the students at other high schools. They laughed
at him. When he hit a student, the student hit him back. The student was expelled of
course, but disrespect for the administration, the faculty and everything about the school
continued
unabated. So the order brought in one of its younger members to be the new head master.
Veterans in both the order and the school ridiculed the appointment. The new man was nice
enough, but he wasn't tough. The school required a hard man instead the new head master
was gentle, kind, even tempered, almost, said some of the worst cynics, womanly. Well, he
wandered kind of aimlessly around the school, talked to the students, stood in the
corridors looking kind of confused, laughed at their jokes and told jokes that they
laughed at (even though they didn't quite understand him literate wit). Before anyone knew
what had happened he had charmed even the wildest of the hoods. The word went out that the
new headmaster was like totally cool. The school settled down to mayhem no worse than that
any all-male high
school. You catch a lot of flies with honey, the new headmaster said.
|
