Challenging "Empire"

In “Alien Witness,” an article in the March 6, 2007 issue of Christian Century, Walter Brueggemann writes on the subject of how God’s people challenge empire. (Online version of the article can be found here.) His assessment of Israel of the Old Testament was that

"the wave of the future of God's people . . . were those who kept their critical distance, who regularly reminded the empire of that which it wanted to forget: that human power is penultimate, that there are limits to the power of empire, and that power finally is judged according to its enactments of mercy, compassion and justice” (p. 28).

Lest we forget, this was not only true for Israel, but also holds true for all areas of our life today – for our nation, for our parishes, for The Episcopal Church, and for the Anglican Communion. Thank you, Uncle Walter, for reminding us of such eternal, God-given truths.

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