If you were here in church
last week, you’ll remember that we had a wonderful, packed service of baptism for
little Kate Gallagher, and we have another baptism next week – it seems to be
the season for it. One of the most significant moments in the baptism for any
family is the moment when, just before I scoop up the water, I say to the
parents, “name this child”. Of course the baby has been named legally when the
birth is registered, but this moment matters for many families just as
much. It is a reminder to us that the
child being baptised isn’t just any child, but a unique individual, a
never-to-be-repeated gift to the world, with their own personality, their own
path to tread, and ultimately their own story to tell.
Names matter, and in the
story we heard from Luke’s Gospel just now, we meet a man who discovers that
for himself.
He’s living in the tombs outside
the town of Gerasa – perhaps rock-cut caves like the one Jesus will
eventually be laid in himself – and he is described as possessed by demons. We’d
diagnose him as mentally ill, but the point is the same. He’s in a desperate
state, and has been for a long time. He is chained and shackled, regarded with
fear – fear for him and fear of him. According to Jewish law,
contact with the dead, or the tombs in which they lay, even if it was just
fleeting, made you ritually unclean. This man lives here all the time. How
unclean does that make him?
The whole story reeks of
uncleanness, in fact, because later we find that this is an area where pigs are
kept, another taboo for Jewish people. Yet here they are, and in large numbers
too. Why? Who is keeping them? And who is going to buy and eat them?
The answer to those questions
lies in where this story takes place. Gerasa
is on the eastern side of the Sea of Galilee, and it was one of the ten towns
known collectively as the Decapolis, which just means “ten towns” in Greek. They’d
been founded hundreds of years before by the Greek ruler, Alexander the Great,
and the populations were very mixed as a result. A lot of Gentiles lived there,
so they could be uncomfortable places for an observant Jew at the best of
times. By the time of Jesus, though, this was also an area where the Roman
army, the army of occupation, had many of its strongholds and administrative
bases. For the local population, although there was money to be made in
supplying the army, it also meant that you were very much under their eye and
at their mercy. These pigs may well have been destined to feed the Roman
soldiers stationed locally, and the loss of them may have left the pig-farmer
with a real problem. Hungry soldiers aren’t likely to be too impressed by some
cock and bull story about demons.
To add to that, by the time
the Gospel of Luke was written, probably around the 80’s AD, the violence that
had always been in the air around Gerasa had finally erupted into bloodshed.
The emperor Vespasian had brutally put down a rebellion there in AD 67, sacking
homes, massacring the population and destroying livelihoods. The name of Gerasa
had become notorious. It would have evoked in the minds of Luke’s readers the
same kind of images as Helmand Province might in ours, or Lockerbie, Auschwitz,
Hiroshima, Dunkirk, the Somme, places we associate with conflict , death and
terror.
The sacking of Gerasa
hadn’t yet happened at the time this story was set, but Luke’s readers knew
what was coming, and even at the time of Jesus the danger would have been very
obvious in this place where Roman soldiers, in large and menacing numbers, were
a daily sight.
So when Jesus asks this poor
man what his name is, perhaps it’s no surprise that he answers “Legion”. He
uses this Roman word to point us towards a Roman threat. Legions were the
largest unit of the Roman Army, around 6000 men strong. A Legion was a
terrifying sight, a faceless mass in their identical uniforms, with gleaming
armour, weapons bristling, a force no individual had a hope of withstanding. The
root and the trigger for this man’s distress is the political situation in
which he lives. This isn’t a story about one man’s mental illness – a purely
personal problem that was his alone. This is a story about what it is like to
live in a world gone mad, a world where fear is all around, a world where you
know you can be trodden underfoot with no more thought than a person might
tread on an ant. A society that lives like that for any length of time is bound
to be damaged by the experience. Different people will react in different ways.
Some will collude and compromise to keep the peace – keeping those forbidden
pigs, for example. Some will rebel. But some will be driven to mental illness
by the continual fear.
This man seems to have so
internalised the terror of the Legion around him that he has become all terror,
all Legion himself. Maybe that feels easier; better to have the demons inside
you where you know what they are up to than outside. Maybe, too, for his
community, focusing on managing the threat this one man poses is easier than
acknowledging the dread of living under occupation. Perhaps he is the container for all their
fears, this man who thinks his name is Legion.
As I said earlier, names
matter. In the book of Revelation, amidst all the tumult of that vision of the
end of the world and the second coming, there is a lovely moment when Jesus promises
to all those who suffer that at the end they will be given a white stone, and
on that stone will be written a new name, “a name that no one knows except the
one who receives it”, says the Bible. It seems to me that this is exactly what
is happening in this story. Jesus comes into the mess and dirt of this
graveyard and gives this man his white stone. He restores to him his true
identity, his real name. And what is that name? We don’t know, but it certainly
isn’t the name he calls himself, this name that embodies terror and violence.
He isn’t Legion; he is a child of God, made by God in his image, known by God,
loved by God. By treating him with care and compassion instead of fear, Jesus
reminds him of this truth. Not long after this, Jesus will find himself in
another graveyard, sealed in a tomb of his own because of his commitment to
that message.
It might seem cruel to us
that after his healing Jesus doesn’t let this man travel on with him Instead he
sends him back to his own community. But in doing so he is telling them all
that this situation was never just about one man. This is not some random
affliction that has landed on him out of the blue. His problem was really a
problem they all shared, the problem of trying to hold onto sanity in a mad
world. And Jesus message to them was that while they might not have been able
to overthrow the Romans, they could at least help each other by treating each
other with love and care and justice. It wasn’t just the healing of this one
man that was needed, but the healing of their society, the healing of their
attitudes to one another. In our first reading, Paul reminded another community
living under the threat of Rome of that truth. If the Galatian Christians were
to have the strength to cope it would be because they lived “as one in Christ
Jesus” respecting each other and caring for each other across the boundaries of
race, social class and gender.
Mental
illness is an immensely complicated subject. Sometimes it is caused by purely
physical factors, biochemical problems, hormonal imbalances, in the same way
that physical illnesses are caused. Medical approaches can often help. Drugs
are often very effective, vital tools to help people get through tough times.
But medical models don’t always tell the whole story or provide the whole
answer. I listen to people in distress or difficulty regularly in my ministry. Sometimes
they start off feeling puzzled by the depression or anxiety they are suffering
– why are they feeling like this? But the cause is often quite obvious. They
are depressed and anxious because they are battling with depressing and
worrying situations. Why wouldn’t they feel like that?
Someone living with domestic
abuse and violence is bound to be vulnerable to feelings of worthlessness. They
aren’t worthless, of course, but if you are treated like dirt long enough, you
are likely to start believing you are dirt. The root of the trouble is not the
victim but the abuser. Someone struggling with financial difficulty or
unemployment, especially in a time of recession, is going to be anxious. They
have things to be anxious about. Discrimination, exclusion, scapegoating are
all likely to take their toll if you encounter them often enough. Some studies
suggest gay and transgender people seem to suffer a higher than average
incidence of mental health problems. I’m not surprised. If you keep hearing
people using words like “abomination” when they talk about such a basic part of
your identity –apparently with impunity – there’s bound to be a risk you’ll
feel abominable yourself from time to time. It doesn’t help if your loving
relationships are regarded as some kind of threat to society rather than being
affirmed and supported either, denying you the security and mutual care others
take for granted.
Often when people feel they
are going mad, it is actually the world around them that’s insane. Good mental
health is as much to do with the creation of supportive, just and inclusive
communities as it is about brain chemistry, and we can all do something about
that.
Our post-communion prayer
this week acclaims God as the one who comforts the afflicted and heals the
broken, who can give each of us that white stone with our true name and
identity inscribed on it when we have lost sight of who we really are, his
beloved children, whatever our race, gender, sexuality or lifestory. The prayer
goes on, though, to ask God to teach us “the ways of gentleness and peace”, the
ways of his kingdom. If we could learn those ways, perhaps we wouldn’t be so
likely to afflict and break one another in the first place.
Amen
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