The world is hungry. We hunger for justice and peace. We are born into a state of hunger, cut off from our mother and turned out to a cruel world as orphaned beggars. We are robbed daily of our peace. Our energy and joy are eaten day and night to fuel the extracting machines of this world: industrialism, capitalism, consumerism. Brutalized, where in this world can we turn for justice? No where. Checks on executive power weaken with each social media proclamation, judicial bias has been bought stock and trade, due process is a false and flimsy veil over systemic corruption. Justice is bartered at the money changers’ tables beneath the ivory towers of our governments and the price is steep!
We are ground into the dirt from which we came until we die and return to the ashes. Until then, we hunger.
From the infancy of human civilization until now, we have hungered for peace and justice. We’ve marched along the tragic path from monarchy to empire and back again, oligarchies rising and falling all about us on the waves of our discontent.
And then, along the way, while fleeing once again from corrupt aristocratic rule, we saw a lovely fig tree: Democracy! Taking root in the Enlightenment, sprouting up from the dirt, stained by the bloody revolutions that overthrew those godless rulers who robbed and murdered and lied to us: how pleasant this tree appeared! And seeing that this tree of Democracy was sprouting many fine leaves, we gaped in awe from the distance at the full beautiful canopy under which we might rest and eat the fruit of the fig. Sure of the abundance of fruit that we would find hanging from this tree, we full tilt proclaimed to our overlords: No more suffering! Liberty! Equality! Freedom! Or death! We will rule ourselves! We declare ourselves democratic! We will bear the fruit of peace and justice for ourselves!
Yet, as we have drawn nearer to this tree, are we not sorely disappointed? Look and see: the tree, though luscious, bears no fruit! Nothing grows on this tree: no justice, no peace–just leaves promising a harvest soon to come. The empty promise drew us in, speaking honey-dipped words to our empty bellies and gall-filled mouths. We were taken in as fools: hungry, desperate, haughty fools!
We didn’t listen to the words of Sócrates who warned us (Republic, Book VIII) about the deceit of Democracy. In establishing Democracy, out of our excessive pursuit of freedom, he warned, we could only give way eventually to tyranny, and find ourselves in a worse state than we had under any monarchy or oligarchy. Just as we were warned, under democracy, we’ve become easily fooled, effortlessly appealed to in simple terms, and nothing more than unsuspecting lambs bearing the simple prejudices of the ordinary masses. Socrates explained how such a democratic man eagerly elects a fearmongering demagogue and silently watches him raise war after war, having become, over time, a member of a citizenry easily swayed to accept war and its resultant poverty, and conditioned to condone any atrocity done unto any other man besides himself–so long as it seems to him that his freedom is at stake otherwise.
Instead of being beguiled by Democracy, drunk on our own freedom, Socrates encouraged us to look for a philosopher king–a benevolent, wise ruler. This should be our hope, in such a man we would find justice and peace. And we were given this philosopher king in Christ. Yet, resisting the teachings of our philosophers and the warnings of our prophets, we have despised him. Trusting no one, we’ve preferred to take our fate into our own hands.
So, here we sit now, alone. Here we languish under the tree of Democracy: lamenting our continuous state of hunger. Pondering, investigating, pontificating the ceaseless causes and ailments of our lack–dissecting and expounding endlessly upon all the excruciating agonies of our emptiness.
Why do we sit continually under this barren tree? Why do we not curse it, as Christ cursed the barren fig tree that gave him no fruit when he hungered?
We do not curse it because we lack faith. We do not curse it because we are filled with doubt in God. Faithless, we sit idly, and hope for a fig to sprout. But, can’t we see? If Democracy were all we claimed it to be–after all these years, there would be no powerlessness to feed ourselves. If the tree was all it promised to be, then when we hunger for justice, the fig should spring immediately forth from the branch, sweet and full and ripe and ready to fill our aching bellies. No such thing has happened. No such things ever happen in our white sepulcher halls of Democracy.
Democracy is a false hope, a false assurance in our abilities to secure with our own hands the freedom we crave. Democracy is a cunning device to keep us ever hoping, ever waiting for the peace and justice that it will never give. Worse, Democracy is a false faith: the faith in humanity to govern itself. It is a faith that humanity, apart from God, is capable of ruling itself. We believe with fervent faith that humanity alone, governed rationally by the masses, can produce goodness of its own volition and produce fruit of its own variety most nourishing and pleasant–if we just wait, hold onto hope, and have faith in ourselves.
So, we’re not really faithless, are we? Definitely not. We have had all sorts of faith–a great magnitude of faith in ourselves for hundreds of years now. We trust with complete confidence and loyalty: rationalistic, secularistic, scientific, evidence-based thinking will be our salvation! Oh, the long-suffering faith we have held in ourselves! And we have waited for our faith to self-actualize while the poor, the hungry, and those unfairly accused and imprisoned die without peace and justice.
But, look and see: our faith in ourselves has been tested all along this long century of devastating war that sprang up first in Europe, spreading bloody revolution after bloody revolution the world over, until alas it seemed that Democracy had finally taken full root and would surely flourish worldwide and finally deliver to us our justice and peace!
Consider the proof of the test of Democracy: Our faith in Democracy, which is to say our doubt in God, has yielded what only doubt can yield: emptiness, hunger, disillusion–more war, more death, ever more sophisticated ways to rob and destroy and kill ourselves daily. We are now plainly in the hands of vain, cruel tyrants. Sitting idly under a barren tree, we behold the image of our own greedy hearts reflected back to us in the gluttonous grotesque girth of these demagogues fattened by the flesh of the orphans, widows, and countryless men created by their wars. And we sit under this barren tree, foolishly wishing still–despite the daily horrific visages of their unholy effigies–to be rich and powerful like them.
Imago Dei! Have we forgotten? We are made in the image of God! We are not able to fashion another image for ourselves: at least, not one that can yield the fruit of true goodness. Apart from the image of the divine, we are a barren tree! But, if we have faith in the ways that the Divine Creator has revealed to us, then, truly we will become the gods which we have imagined we could be. Truly, in His image, we will bear fruit and we will never hunger for peace and justice again.
It is recorded by Matthew in his gospel (Chapter 21) that not only did Christ curse the fig tree that bore no fruit, but he also turned to his disciples who were astonished at how quickly the tree withered and taught them of faith:
Truly, I tell you. If you have faith, and doubt not, you shall not only do this which is done to the fig tree, but also if you shall say unto the mountain: Be removed and cast into the sea!, it shall be done. And all things, whatsoever you ask in prayer, believing, you will receive.
I tell you now a truth that God has revealed: He has remembered his children. He draws himself back to this Earth and He seeks to embrace the creation that has shunned Him. His love for us is everlasting, and never will He take from us our dignity and free will. Though we shunned Him, and told Him to leave us to rule ourselves by our own devices, and though He obliged and gave us over to become the tyrants that we admired more than Him, He has heard the voices crying in the night. And truly I tell you, He has harkened to these voices that have cried out to Him: Do not forget us! Do not leave us here alone to die by our own hand! Remember your people! Remember your loving kindness! Return to us, and dry our tears, enflame our hearts, let us burn for you! Let your light shine again upon our realm, the realm of your creation, so that all may feel your love and all may see your light! And so that all in the heavens and beyond behold your glory shining forth from your children. And all will know the vast loving kindness of your ways, and see how everlasting peace and joy fills the place where you have seated Man, made in your glorious image. Remember your children! Imago Dei!
And the high angels watch in wonder with great curiosity at what He is now doing. Look and see: His hand moves and creates a new rhythm, new artistry leaps forth from our feeble, fearful, teary whispers. He composes a new song: a new brilliant orchestration. Where there was nothing before–where there was once a soundless void–He has created again! Listen. Open your ears and listen. The music plays. And your eyes: open your eyes and see! Yahweh dances. How beautifully He dances to the piping flute in the freshness of spring! He will dance and dance, until our ears are filled with the song, and our eyes feast on His majestic movements. He will dance to the music that He has made from our mournful pleas until we can no longer withhold our hungry spirits from the dance! And he will show us again the life that He has designed for us to inhabit in this place, His creation.
Let us curse this barren tree of Democracy and cause it to wither and die! Let us rise up and leave this dead tree. Let us run and cling to our beloved philosopher king: the Lord Jesu! Jesu! Jesu! Have faith and fill your lungs with the boldness of a breath that can command the reshaping of this Earth! Pray and ask it of Him in faith and the mountains of our oppressors will be cast into the sea, the world will be remade, and on Earth it will be as it is with Him in the Heavens. Then, alas, we will eat the fruit of justice and peace and we will be full–just as quickly as the words spring forth from our mouths, we will be free! Let us take courage! Let us pray! Imago Dei!