Subversiveness

I am convinced of it. He has convinced me. Eugene Peterson has convinced me that pastors, above all else, must be subversive. And the subversive tool? Words.

"Words are the real work of the world-prayer words with God, parable words with men and
women. The behind-the-scenes work of creativity by word and sacrament, by parable and
prayer, subverts the seduced world. The pastor's real work is what Ivan Illich calls 'shadow
work'-the work nobody gets paid for and few notice but what makes a world of salvation:
meaning and value and purpose, a world of love and hope and faith-in short, the kingdom of
God."

In his work, The Contemplative Pastor, Peterson describes how the pastor's faculties must be focused on the act of subversion; how she works through the world against the world and it's seductions.

And we are seduced by the things of this world.

At its heart this subversive journey is neither some Arthurian quest for morality, nor an attempt to conform the world to a dogmatic belief system. It is exactly the opposite. It is that quest which banks on the reality of a different place where systems and moral judgments are replaced with love, hope, forgiveness, and grace, and seeks to act according to those standards.

Oh, to be seduced by those things!

And so we use the tools of the trade, confident that the seduction is already beginning.

See you in church,
VT...