As some of you may know I am presently involved in preparing a presentation to the Society of Biblical Literature regarding a key text in Paul’s letter to the Romans, Rom 8:18-30, that I believe has serious implications for (1) how we view the environment (as sacred space), (2) how we are to live in the world (as co-participants with all other life and living systems), and (3)how we are supposed to cope today when powerful political, economic, cultural, and even religious institutions are operating with a different value system (one of self-interest). What words could Paul possibly speak at such a dire and crucial moment in human history? Or to us here at Mission Hills as our small band seeks to hold on to, as of highest importance, what Paul and Jesus, themselves, held important enough that they would risk their lives and ultimately die. What words could be said?
Complicating this discussion is the way that Christian interpreters have reduced the context from which Paul spoke. Traditional readers see Paul, the Jew, speaking against a Jewish tradition (faith vs. law) that no Jew of his time would have recognized, proclaiming an apolitical gospel that challenges nothing other than an individual’s private view of morality and God, and proposing that the answer to life’s dilemmas today can be summed up with such bumper sticker phrases as ‘just believe in Jesus,” or “Jesus is coming soon; are you ready?” or “Christ believed, is salvation received.”
The initial question is how can Paul or anything in the Bible be relevant to a modern problem such as human-generated climate change? My response is that we are, indeed, in a climate crisis of unfathomable proportions today, but humans have been busy messing up their environment for a long time, even in Paul’s day, and even long before that. Just two examples or I will never get to our text this morning.
Mosquito-born diseases that are a huge threat to public health are not just on the rise today, but have been problematic for thousands of years mainly do to human-generated environmental changes that have disrupted eco-systems. The city of Rome and the surrounding countryside were situated in a low-altitude, well-watered site ideal for growing grains, grapes, and olives. But in the 1st century, such growth was associated with intensive deforestation, driven by the need to clear agricultural land and to harvest timber for construction projects in Rome and combustion in Roman metal-smelting developments. What resulted was a rise in the water table, and an increase in standing water. Reductions in absorption levels led to erosion with huge deposits of topsoil in flood plains like river beds and deltas. From written records at the time, we know floods were recorded in 54 BCE, 23 BCE and 15 CE as well as frequent lower-level inundations. There was such run off that the main harbor for Rome in Ostia had to be abandoned in the 1st CE.
In addition, disease was also connected to this flooding due to the fact that the sewer and drainage systems were one and the same. Floodwaters were associated with malaria-carrying mosquitoes. Things got so unhealthful that the bishop of Ostia, Rome’s seaside suburb had to relinquish his position several centuries later due to the unhealthful conditions.
Further, the Pontine territory south of Rome was a healthy productive region in the 4th century BCE, but by the first-century ce had been transformed into marshland due to among other things, deforestation and road construction. Recorded accounts tell us this area, which was a major food supplier for Rome’s exploding population, became so insect-infested that farming ceased due to malaria and the population collapsed. The disastrous impact of this human generated environmental catastrophe lasted all the way up until Mussolini’s public works projects in the 20th century were finally able to transform the marshes back into livable, cultivated space. That is one of the reasons Rome had its eye on Egypt and Palestine as a way to feed its urban center that had reached about 1 million people (to put this in perspective, no other urban center would get this size until the 19th century and that urban center was London). So to say that human-generated environmental issues are new factors, only displays our ignorance of history.
One more point needs to be made to contextualize what Paul says regarding the role of imperial rule in the daily lives of the people conquered by Rome, including the Jews. Rome took control of Palestine in 63 BCE and designated Herod ‘the Great’ king of the Jews in 40 BCE. With this change in control came massive requirements for produce and money that came on the backs of already struggling peasants. But Rome was experiencing deep divisions within its borders and troubles just outside them as well. So when Julius Caesar’s nephew, Octavian, took over as emperor and was given authority to put things right, his name was changed to Augustus (meaning majestic) and he was hailed as ‘savior’, ‘son of god’, one who brought ‘good news’, ‘peace’ and ‘prosperity’, and the fulfillment of ‘hope’. Of course this was directed violently toward the conquered peoples and the subjugated peasants. In addition to the Empire’s confiscating the emperor became an object to worship. Cities would compete to out do one another in venerating him and receive tax breaks for it. But again this was the viewpoint from those on the upper side of Roman society. This is important when we think about Paul; how Paul would situate himself in society. Was he a part of the 1% or the 99%? Did he have ‘middle-class’ Roman values? Did he perceive himself as a Roman or as one among the conquered and colonized? If he were around today would he resonate with Black Lives Matter or Blue Lives Matter? Or did he ascribe to “The issue is of No Matter?” Again due to time limitations, I don’t have time to discuss this here, but maybe later with any who are so interested.
So let’s turn to the Romans passage.
The location of the passage is at the culmination of Paul’s argument in chapters 1-8. For context, in chapters 1-4 he basically says that Jesus’ suffering and death on a Roman cross has implications for everyone. In chap. 5-8 basically he discusses how Jesus’ suffering and death fit into God’s plans that God has been implementing since the beginning. In chapter 5 he discusses believers’ suffering, and because it is such a significant and present reality, he returns to it in chapter 8, where he greatly expands the horizon of suffering.
So in v. 18, he says that when we reposition our present suffering in a broader context of the essential role our hardships play in God’s timetable (“not comparable to”), it changes the way we look at it. It doesn’t relieve the suffering, but it allows us a better chance to endure it. Now what is the suffering he is talking about? This is where ‘how Paul saw himself in society’ is crucial, but my point is that he is still one of the colonized and oppressed under the heel of Rome. Life was perceived and experienced quite differently by the colonized than by the colonizers (we have been studying this on Wed nights).
In vs. 19 and 20 Paul’s now expands his purview of suffering to include all of creation that has been taking a beating by humans for so long that she desperately looks for the revelation (revealing) of the children of God. He continues, this subjection to futility was not her desire, but the will of “the one who subjected it.” So who or what did the subjecting? Down through the centuries several options have been developed. Adam, or Sin, or the Devil, or God. Today the most popular option is God but that is problematic for many reasons and maybe this would be an interesting discussion later as well. But I would like to suggest another option. Who would have been perceived as so powerful that even controlling nature was possible? I suggest we look to the head of the most powerful force in the history of the world—Caesar. In Roman society, two institutions had been created to pacify the crowds—grain and games; food and entertainment. For time sake, I focus on one part of the entertainment, the gladiatorial contests (munera). These contests were between different classes of men but also between men and wild animals. Accounts at the time show that Rome spent much money and energy capturing the largest and fiercest wild beasts from all over the world so that thousands of animals could be killed at these events in a display to show Roman superiority and control over wild nature, and Caesar, as the head of the empire symbolically represented that source of control.
So… why the subjection? One traditional view reasons that God subjected creation to futility and suffering even against her will to compel both humans and creation to rely on God for a future redemption. Does this make sense of how the God of Jesus and Paul operates? Or rather could Paul be offering a resistant counterpoint to Rome’s confidence that Caesar had fulfilled the hopes of humankind? Part of the Roman imperial ‘good news’ as ‘hope fulfilled’ was actually diametrically opposed to a prophetic view of hope. A prophetic view of hope eagerly and actively anticipated a redemption and liberation that has not been as of yet fulfilled. In contrast to this prophetic view, Rome proclaimed Caesar as the one who already fulfilled the hope of the world for peace and plenty. So Caesar, attempting to subjugate as much of nature as he possibly could, proclaimed a false view of hope as having already fulfilled the world aspirations—so my suggestion is that Caesar subjected creation against hope (prophetic hope). Paul sees Caesar’s actions as contrary to God’s both in his egotistical assertion that the world’s hopes have been fulfilled and that he has the capacity to fulfill them. The preposition commonly translated in the phrase “in hope” can be translated either as ‘in’ or ‘against’ (and I submit that ‘against’ makes better sense in context).
If this makes sense then Paul offers a reason why Roman ‘hope’ is misdirected when he continues in his discussion in v. 21, because even creation herself still needs to be freed from the bondage of corruption that Rome currently was spearheading, and that liberation will come as with the freedom of the children of God.
In vs. 22, Paul seems to think this is self-evident (He says, “For we all know…”) because all his readers have an experience of suffering, and all have seen the results of Roman misuse and abuse. It is in this context that Paul elaborates the nature of godly hope and its ability to create significant change. It is by and through this hope, Paul says, that salvation comes.
Continuing to follow Paul’s line of thought, in vs. 24-25 he clarifies once again that he is not talking about Roman hopes and accomplishments. He is speaking from the perspective of a Jewish follower of Jesus of Nazareth, one of the colonized and so uses language that is coded for recognition by other Jews and Jesus followers—these would be allusions to his sacred texts found in the Hebrew Scriptures. He can use all the terms that the state affirms, but with different meanings. Hope is not hope already fulfilled for he says, “hope that is seen is not hope.” Hope is not passive or fulfilled by the Roman head of state, but it is “eager yearning.” Hope is active with its eyes on the horizon (“but we eagerly expect with… now here most translations use the term patience, but it is too weak; a better term is fortitude”)—“we eagerly expect with fortitude.
The supporting scaffolding of this fortitude is the confidence that God is faithful and will stand by us, walk beside us, and endure affliction with us to the end (“In everything, God works for good… for God has called, justified, and glorified”).
So Paul’s words to us are to live our lives ‘hopefully’, confident that in whatever we do, whenever we speak out, however we choose to sanctify our world on behalf of those who have had their voices silenced, we need not allow worry and fear or suffering to stop us in our tracks for “we are more than our [Roman] conquerors through him who loved us.” And we can be more than the present authorities as well. We can be more than the prevailing conspiracy theories, more than the multinational corporations, more that the global economic realities. The only thing that can stop us is when we completely and utterly lose hope, because that means we have lost sight of God even though God will never leave our side.
Today I have tried to give you contextual tools that will hopefully help us all to allow space for our sacred texts to become a part of this crucial conversation about how we might respond as people of faith to the greed and self-interest that has become institutionalized in almost all of our public institutions. The environment is not the only voice that has been silenced by the political-economic-ideological systems; just the softest with the most catastrophic consequences. Racial injustice upon communities of color, stigmatization of gender, neglect of the homeless, just to mention a few of the marginalized groups that make it on a somewhat regular basis into our news feeds, all of these share a common positionality of being marginalized and targeted by the dominant discourse.
Is it really possible to walk the fence on these issues? The question for each of us is how will we respond as individuals and as participants in a larger group? As hopeful individuals we help those we can, vote our conscience, and develop a sensitized perspective. We should think about the things we purchase—their carbon footprint. Think our vehicles, about our water usage, think about the kind of food we eat—where it comes from? But in addition, as part of a larger hopeful group we must create conversation space to allow for as much consensus as possible and then, support the collective efforts as much as possible. We have solar panels, a community garden, a rudimentary pantry, and one protest under our belts. These are all great starts, but there is still much work to be done by our group to expand the influence of the gospel we preach. What I don’t think it’s an option is to sit on the fence because our hope is not in a fence-sitting God, but a God, who invites us into a partnership of liberation and redemption and who will stand with us wherever that partnership will lead. He or she who sits on the fence today are actually assisting in the dominant discourse. He or she who sits on the fence today silently supports the status quo, but our world is crying out for redemption. So as Paul urges us in today's text: Love God and hear God's call for us to work together for good.
Amen.
