Why Does Your Teacher Eat with Tax Collectors and Sinners?

It's been so long, I almost forgot my password! In any event, I have come out of hiding, very Bobby Fischeresque (if only I played chess), to post a book review because this particular book has captured my attention and I have been unable to stop thinking about it.

Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners? This is the poignant question that Richard Beck addresses in his book, Unclean: Meditations on Purity, Hospitality, and Mortality. Beck is an experimental psychologist and professor of psychology at Abilene Christian University in Texas. Unclean explores the relationship between notions of purity, mission, theology, and psychology in light of Matthew 9:9-13, in which Jesus is questioned by some Pharisees for eating with tax collectors and sinners. This book is Beck’s attempt to get to the root of Jesus’ statement to the Pharisees, “Go and learn what this means, “I desire mercy, not sacrifice.”

Unclean is written to and for the church as an admonition to become aware of the psychology of disgust and how it is manifest within our churches. Disgust psychology is that innate part of us that feels revulsion toward anything deemed unclean, such as bodily waste, dirty food, people, actions, etc. Disgust psychology creates within us the desire to separate ourselves from things or people who are deemed unclean or impure. It causes us to build walls in order to maintain our own purity, and serves to protect us from foreign and unclean substances and diseases. This innate reflex has some positive protective aspects. However, it also strongly, and detrimentally, influences us at a moral level causing us to exclude those that we view as the “other”. What does this have to do with theology? Beck purports that there is, “An affective, experiential, and psychological aspect to theological reflection. We are pulled toward certain theological systems and repelled, even repulsed, by others.” (5)

Disgust properties create sociological barriers and motivate acts of exclusion, which is what we see happening in Matthew 9. The Pharisees’ “disgust properties” are shown as Jesus rejects long-held psychological, sociological and theological barriers by eating with those deemed by the Pharisees to be unclean. I found this to be quite compelling because I have always considered the Pharisees’ hatred of Jesus as stemming more from His oppositional theological stances. Beck made me dig a bit deeper into the psychological aspect of that tension. There is more at work here than just religious and social norms, Jesus is also messing with psychological constructs. Beck asserts that disgust psychology is still at work in our churches as it protects the “sacred and holy” from descending into the “vulgar and profane.” Ultimately, Beck argues that this psychology inhibits hospitality and leads to missional failure because it comes in direct conflict with the character and actions of Christ. Jesus rejects this form of “holiness,” pushes for mercy, and at the same time, Jesus purifies the contagion.

The strongest and most thought-provoking part of Beck’s book is his compelling assertions about the universalizing power of the Eucharist. The Lord’s Supper is the central act of worship. It is the place where all are invited, guests with no merit, by our gracious and merciful Host, Christ, to a fellowship of solidarity, unity, and mission. Yet in many places, past and present, the Table is a place of exclusion and hierarchy. This was not the way Jesus treated the Table. Beck states, “The Lord’s Supper universalizes language of family and kinship. People dislocated by race, blood ties, and socioeconomic class are embraced and included through their participation in the Lord’s Supper.” (113) Indeed, Jesus’ ministry of table fellowship challenged notions of superiority by proclaiming radical egalitarianism within the Kingdom of God. Beck purports that the Lord’s Supper speaks into our notions of purity and separation. Communion is deep and powerful psychological intervention. (114)

I found Beck’s thoughts on Communion to be convicting and empowering. I had not considered the profound notion that the Eucharist alters, remakes, and re-configures my psyche, the psyche of my church! Beck states, “The Lord’s Supper, through its metaphors and the missional practices it promotes, is a ritual that is fundamentally altering and remaking the psyche. The Lord’s Supper reconfigures the way we experience otherness. More specifically, the Lord’s Supper is a practice that dismantles the psychic fissures within the heart that create otherness.” (113)

Unclean is a compelling book. It caused me to think about the hospitality of God and my church. It caused me to consider my nature - am I a hospitable being? (I do have a very high gag reflex when it comes to smells. This was quite entertaining when our kids were still in diapers). Unclean also made me think about the places in my life where I have seen the radical and boundary-breaking work of Christ. On Thursday nights in Portland there is a large group of Christ-followers, from all denominations, that meet under the Burnside Bridge to eat with and care for the increasing population of homeless persons in the city. This is a place where I see and experience the dismantling of psychic fissures that create otherness. It is not uncommon to break bread with a drug addict, paint the fingernails of a prostitute, or wash some seriously dirty feet. I hate feet. They gross me out. (Insert gag reflex here). Yet, I have sat under that bridge and washed the dirty, smelly feet of a 19-year-old homeless kid with HIV. I am certain that this is the dismantling work of Christ. I love looking around that bridge and seeing the diverse group of people, “clean” and “unclean” breaking bread together, washing feet, cutting hair, and praying together. Truly, Jesus is cleansing all of us. Beck helped clarify that for me.

I am thankful to Beck for challenging me to think deeply about hospitality and mercy, about psychology, theology, and mission. Beck asserts that, “Hospitality is about selfhood. It is that space where the dignity of every human person is vouchsafed, embraced, and protected deep within the heart of the church.”(140) This, is the kind of space that I long for my church to be, that I long to be. Beck has further opened my eyes to the realization that hospitality and welcome requires self-assessment and intentionality on our part. He has caused me to see the power in Jesus’ words, “mercy, not sacrifice.” I believe that we all need to look at ourselves and our churches critically, particularly in light of the life and teachings of Christ. We must ask, “Why does our teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?” And, we must ask, “Why don’t we?”