May 26, 2004

Daemons

Maybe spirit works best incarnate with some levers to pull, some pedals to push, and a crowd to stir. That seems to be the scene at Pentecost, although at first it seemed to some a drunken orgy. Well, they don’t call that stuff “spirits” for naught. After all, alcohol, I understand, is an Arabic word meaning something like spirit.

And spirit seems altogether neutral. Just because something’s “spiritual” doesn’t drape it with all those schmarmy, pious hearts and flowers. The daemons in this morning’s gospel (Mt 8.28-34; Mk 5.1-20; Lk 8.26-39) were, of course, often among the first to recognize Jesus for who he was and to quake at the sight. “What have you to do with us, O Son of God? Have you come here to torment us before the time?”

Facing the inevitable, they, needing those levers and pedals, opted for the pigs and off they got sent only to drive the herd over a cliff and into the sea to drown. Understandably, however, the little town of Gentiles, hence, the pork, probably depended on that for more than just legislative padding, asked him, nay, begged him please to leave the neighborhood.

It was this scene that led the sage poet Dorothy Sayers to comment about what little regard Jesus apparently had for other people’s livestock. It is this scene, as well, that might remind us that “spiritual” is not always sweetness and light, and that we’d better hope for Jesus and an alternate route for the daemons when they begin to nag at us.

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