Posted in textures, tagged biblical reflection, Ephesians, textures on October 4, 2007| 1 Comment »
Paul might be accused of possessing a rather egregious blind spot when it comes to matters of what we blithely label ‘social justice’. In this final chapter of his letter to the Ephesians, he counsels submission and a posture that is easily misconstrued as passivity in the face of the regnant social stratifications of Greco-Roman society.
‘Stay where you are’ is—prima facie—about as radical a statement as his social conscious is able to produce. (more…)
Posted in textures, tagged biblical reflection, Ephesians, textures on October 3, 2007| Leave a Comment »
Paul, who with a purist’s zeal plundered the lives and networks of the earliest Christians, remains in his apostolic career deeply aware of how his actions had stripped him of all credentials based in status or achievement. Something akin to guilt with its barb removed presses him to describe himself with self-deprecating clauses like ‘the greatest of sinners’ or—as here in Ephesians 3—’the very least of all the saints’. (more…)
Posted in textures, tagged biblical reflection, Ephesians, textures on October 3, 2007| Leave a Comment »
Pauline phrases reverberate in literal translation through hearts and minds that have been attuned to the apostle’s vocabulary and cadence. Take, for example, the alliterative spotlight that Paul casts upon divine life with a clause that anchors human destiny to the motor that is divine love: ‘out of the great love with which he loved us’. (more…)
Canter Bridge 