This sermon was given at Stevens Chapel on November 2, 2003 by Rev. Judith Campbell.

Whatever Happened to Jesus?

The most basic facts of Christianity are these. Christianity is a world religion whose over 2 billion adherents follow the teachings and the example of Jesus ben Joseph of Nazareth who was born somewhere around 2000 years ago. The exact date remains in question, but at this time it is generally agreed that he was most likely born in April, rather than December(was he an Aries)He lived approximately 33 years, died a hideously painful death in a public execution for, among other things, refusing to worship the Roman Emperor. As I mentioned in the reading, his last name was not Christ. Christ means transcendent spirit, or Messiah. His followers added it to his myth and mystery, believing that Jesus returned to life from the death of the crucifixion, and was later physically carried into heaven to be with his father God. The doctrine of the trinity, the Tripartite God - Father, Son, and Holy Spirit - was created over the years as the followers of Jesus tried to systematize and codify his message and his teachings and the memories of those who knew him, or knew someone that knew him, into the major canon of Christian Doctrine which is that Jesus is God incarnate. That God created Jesus to bring God's message of love and healing and forgiveness to people on earth who were hopelessly enmeshed in the original sin of Adam and their own sinful ways and who were waiting for a messiah to show them the way out of this mess. The messiah who was predicted by the prophets of the Hebrew Bible

We can say that world Christianity is roughly divided into two major streams: Catholic, with a big "C", Christianity, and Protestant Christianity. And these two, are subdivided into any number of denominations, sects, rites and liturgies.

Most of us don't realize that Catholics with a big "C" have a number of differing liturgical and theological traditions and positions. For most people the word Catholic simply means Roman Catholic;but there are Coptic Christians who claim the oldest practice of Christianity, Eastern Orthodox Catholics of a number of varieties, Greek being the most familiar, as well as Romanian, Russian, and Armenian Orthodox churches. And most recently, there has been a new development within Orthodox Christianity calling itself Antiochian Orthodox, and whose services are in the language of the place, and who claim any number of converts to a religion rich in symbolism, liturgy, and sadly for me anyway, male domination.

What Catholics with a big "C" share is that the worship service, the Mass, is a recreation of the miracle of the sacrifice and resurrection of Jesus, which is the very foundation of Christian thought. The bread and wine that is offered at the mass is a recreation of the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross, and a restatement of the belief that he rose from the dead, and that he died to grant us humans redemption from eternal damnation or original sin;if we believe in his message and follow his teachings. And if you are Roman Catholic, you are expected to adhere to and follow the many tenets of faith and practice that have developed over the centuries in the Roman Catholic tradition as outlined in the Nicene creed, written in the 3rd Century, and is still repeated by everyone at every celebration of every Catholic Mass, everywhere. It is a religion of Mystery;.there are many things (holy mysteries) we humans are simply not expected to know, but must accept and not question as believers and members of the church. So a Roman Catholic Sunday service is focused on the rite and sacrament of Holy communion, where believers through the celebration of the priest, and hearing the words of the ancient liturgy repeat that ritual which gives Catholic Christians comfort, healing and the experience of the sacred. The priests are expected to be the interpreters of the message, and the laity has to be there to receive the message and the miracle. The sermon in a Catholic service is secondary to the Ritual of communion. The sermon is referred to as the homily, and is usually no more than 5 minutes(don't get your hopes up!)

The Great Protestant Reformation happened in the late1500s, and was conveniently coincident with the inventing of the printing press, which allowed an increasingly literate world population to read the Bible for themselves. With more and more lay people reading the bible, more and more people came to think that the words of God as written in the bible should be available to all people, and not just for the priests to interpret for them. Hence,whatever flavor of Protestant Christian Church we will find the greater emphasis of the Sunday morning service is on the Sermon, on the word of God as found in the Bible, and as interpreted by the minister. Most Protestant churches offer regular bible study as part of their Religious education, and theologians throughout history and around the world are involved in an ongoing dialog with the bible and with each other about the interpretation of these often disputed words of God.

AS Biblical Scholars, with the help and research of ancient near east scholars, archeologists and archeoanthropologists, delved more deeply into history and culture of the period they have uncovered some surprising new information. Information that more clearly fixed the Birthday of Jesus. Information that tells us that Jesus had brothers and sisters. And information that tells us that the Jew Jesus was seen as one of the many prophets and faith healers that were wandering the country side during a period in history when Jews and gentiles alike were waiting for a Messiah, a Kristos, a Deliverer. But Jesus ben Joseph of Nazareth, was so charismatic, and his message and his being so compelling, that within four hundred years, the followers of this simple man who preached a message of love and forgiveness were legion, and Christianity, with its many variations and interpretations was indeed a world religion.

Some time in the future, I plan to invite some of my best friends who are confessed Christians, including a UU Christian, to a Sunday service and let them tell us in their own words about how Roman Catholics, Methodists, Quakers, Episcopalians and "others" define their Christianity.

So, when I ask, "Whatever Happened to Jesus"? I am asking what happened to the original message, (as best as we can figure it out) of a man, a real man, who preached love, humility, forgiveness, and acceptance, who sat with prisoners, prostitutes and lepers. Who routinely broke bread with outcasts and whose 33 years changed world history.

If he returned today, I think he would be heartbroken to learn into what convolutions his message has been twisted, and I mean twisted. There is nothing in his message that told us to torture and kill non-Christians. There was nothing in his message that said Roman Catholics, Baptists, Muslims or Jews were the one true path to God. Jesus died a Jew, albeit a Jew who was challenging the orthodoxy, but he died a Jew. His followers called him the Kristos, and themselves Christians, followers of the messiah. And from that day to this, they have been arguing about it. I think poor Jesus would be appalled to hear that his simple and direct message has been the subject of so much anguish and so much anger, caused by the fight to be right.

Our Universalist branch was Christian and loosely Trinitarian. Jesus was the son of God who came not to redeem us from sin, but to teach us about the love of God. And if for some reason, you never got his message, maybe because you were Hindu as long as you lived a good life, you would enjoy eternal bliss (they didn't define that too clearly!). Everyone had an opportunity to have a seat at the heavenly table.

Our Unitarian grandparents left the New England and English Congregationalists over the doctrine of the Trinity and the celebration of communion. Many Unitarians and later Unitarian Universalists have since clearly sorted themselves into any number of theological and humanistic and ethical distinctions and variations. (And if you listen carefully, they argue just as much amongst themselves as the Mainline Christians do, but don't tell anyone I said that!)

Jesus' clear and original message was a message of love. Love your neighbors, love your enemies, love yourself. He was a gentle man who sat with lepers and prostitutes, shunned the rich and the mighty and the self important. He saw the spirit of God, whom he called father, in everyone; and if the true nature of God the father was one of Love, and that spirit was in everyone, then we are all worthy of god's love and the love of our fellow brothers and sisters.

We have much to learn from Christians and Christianity. For a church which recites the covenant that begins with "Love is the doctrine of this Church", and for a church which claims to believe that love can conquer fear and eradicate hate, and for that same church whose members will split any given hair into infinite particles, and argue over an issue until the cows come home over a matter of principle, maybe it's time we looked at the history making message that Jesus gave the world: "Love works when all else fails". (This of course is a paraphrase!)

We Unitarians draw liberally from all religious traditions, but many of us get real quivery when Jesus or Catholic or Christianity is mentioned. I know that is because many of us came hard against and were really hurt or disillusioned by what we perceived to be the hypocrisy, the cruelty and suspension of reason we found in the institution we left. The use of the word "institution" rather than religion or denomination here is very deliberate, because institutions grow up around and over ideologies. And in that development, we can lose the original message in the politics and in committees. Does this sound familiar?

As Unitarian Universalists, we have free access to the greatest religious and intellectual thinking and messages of the world, untainted by the politics of the leaders and the practitioners. But we have to be really careful that in the construction of our own liberal thinking, that we don't ourselves impose too many of our own rules and regulations and constrictions and conditions on religious and spiritual practice. In other words, Buddha is OK, Jesus is suspect. Meditation is OK, Prayer is not. Joys and Concerns are OK, Candles or incense are not. Or, don't use the word God too often; and if you do, for "God's" sake use gender neutral terms. We really need to be careful that we do not impose upon our new found spiritual home the very same kinds of restrictions and blinders we left behind us. Old habits die hard.

Jesus' message was quite simply about Love; and the incredible power of love to work miracles in our lives. Much of what happened to that message was added after the fact in an attempt to build an institution around the simple words and the works and the legend of a wandering Jewish self-proclaimed prophet and faith healer.

But if you think about it, there was nothing simple about it. Let us not, in our liberal religious search for our own truths ignore one of the most beautiful and profound of religious Truths. Love is the message. Love is the medium and there is nothing simple about it.