Читать книгу Blessing the Curse? - Ksenija Magda - Страница 19

From earlier reflections on the curse and the structures of sin, the main obstacle to the earth’s prosperity seems ontological and therefore dependent on the nature of humans. People need to change from within, letting go of their preoccupations with themselves and their own profits. This is not a new question: how can we accomplish, order, legislate, and implement this intrinsic change? Can we legislate people’s being?

This question was already raised by the Apostle Paul in his letter to the Romans. Naturally, he raises it in the context of the usefulness of the Mosaic law for his people. He concludes that any people will be dreadfully misled if they believe that laws can save them. Even at their best, laws sanction a deed that has already been done. They cannot force or motivate people to obedience. In my own region, people seem more motivated to avoid, find holes, and skip over laws or interpret away the critical matter at hand. Laws are there to be broken!

Laws are also abused and used to hurt people who should benefit from them. In our region at least, when a politician swears that “everything has been done by the law,” the public can assume that some grave injustice has been done. The bureaucratic state establishment constantly adjusts laws instead of furthering their implementation for the least. Even the adjustments to the European legislation, which is often perceived as superior to our own, prevent justice by constantly changing the law.

I recall a high-positioned officer who was fighting human trafficking proudly explaining, “We constantly adjust legislation to that of the European Union. We have the best and most up-to-date legislation!” Her enthusiasm was gone when asked about the results of their work. She admitted, finally, that they did not bring many cases to justice. Her pursuit of legislation made her equally blind for options outside her job in legislation. She maintained that churches could not do anything regarding human trafficking, and so they should leave the job to people (like herself) who knew the laws. When stopping demand was mentioned as an area where churches could help immensely, she laughed out loud and said, “Yes, out there, that’s the new buzz word. I can only say that in my experience, boys will always be boys!”

Legislation is not only unhelpful, but it is often blind to justice and how to achieve it. At best, legislation punishes evil after the fact, which hardly helps the victims. Stabbed or shot victims find no satisfaction in the perpetrator’s prison time. Lame laws are often guarded by equally lame bureaucrats – not only in places like Eastern Europe, but also in highly developed democracies. I have listened to testimony in a CSW breakout session by women from Iceland who tried to persuade their chief of police to prosecute those who were buying sex rather than the prostitutes. He laughed in the face of legislation: “I have no intention or manpower to prosecute the ‘Johns.’ It is impossible,” he allegedly told them. But these women organized an event promising exotic dancing and demanded registration. Subsequently, they escorted a whole hall of men to the chief’s offices, showing that it could be done. When the registrations were processed, it became evident that many were already in police records for various crimes.

Legislation does not really change anything. Rather than motivating people towards the good, it lets them find more intricate ways to commit crimes. UN research has shown that between 2015 and 2020, twenty-eight trillion dollars could have been gained for the world economy if women had been given equal opportunities to men in higher leadership positions and equal access to resources. However, the study also claimed that it might take 138 years for the same outcome at the current rate of female involvement. With the turn to the right around the globe, even these 138 years seem to be an optimistic projection. When all laws and logic speak for those who are benefited by systems of sin, the world remains stubborn and set in its ways. The rulers often only see their own immediate profit.

So where does one start the change, if not with the laws? Social media recently carried outcries by individuals who were demanding an intrinsic change of human beings to help sustainability. To me, this is a confirmation of what the Christian faith offers, which has always featured changed hearts and insisted on selflessly sharing with others and putting others first. When we trust that God loves and cares for all his creation and for all who believe in him in particular, we have the strength to do what is illogical from the perspective of the structures of sin and stand up for others. Christians have faith that God cares for them while they work for the benefit of others.

In addition, in its earliest creeds, the church defined herself as “catholic” (from gr. catholicos, or “general”). Thus people of any race, social status, nation, or gender are welcome – and equally so. Christianity is also the oldest universal institution, with branches throughout the world, and hardly any geographical areas where it is not represented. Logically, the 2.2 billion adherents to the Christian faith (as of 2010) should be able to accomplish the change towards just and sustainable living on earth if they truly believed God and worked for the common good. Malcom Gladwell showed that very few people (sometimes even less than 5 percent) could bring about the tipping point of social change.^[13] So why is this holy third of the world unable to bring about change? Sadly, and for many reasons, the church betrays its faith. It adapts itself to living according to the curse. It gives up on the paradigm of salvation in Christ in its everyday living, sometimes for pious reasons, but often because it is easier. Many church doctrines have been shaped by the culture of death that reflects the structures of sin and the curse rather than Jesus’s countercultural life and salvation.

In the following section, we will trace how the paradigm of the fall permeates the life of the church, making it one of the main obstacles to life. Then we will search for theological reasons that may explain the phenomenon and suggest what can be done.