We Are All Christ’s Body

In this homily based on 1 Corinthians 12, Father Richard shows how the apostle Paul understood our unity in diversity through the metaphor of the Body of Christ: 

Humanity consistently has to face the problem of unity and diversity. We’re not very good at understanding it. That’s why we continue to struggle in our society with rampant racism, along with sexism, homophobia, classism, nationalism, and more. We habitually choose our smaller groups, because we don’t know how to belong to a larger group. That demands too much letting go.

The apostle Paul writes: “The body is one, although it has many parts; and all the parts of the body, though many, are still one body. And so it is with Christ” (1 Cor. 12:12). Here Paul develops the doctrine known as the Body of Christ. This isn’t easy for Westerners to understand, because we are deeply trained in cultural individualism. So much so, we don’t even recognize our lack. When we try to be holy without one another, it doesn’t work—because only the Whole is Holy. Individually we are too small, too fragile, too broken to fully represent the Mystery of Christ.

Paul continues by emphasizing unity: “For in One Spirit, we were all baptized into One Body, whether Jews or Greeks, slaves or free persons. We were all given of One Spirit to drink” (1 Cor. 12:13). In this verse, Paul tears down notions of nationalism, classes, and castes.

Then he honors diversity: “The Body is not a single part, but many” (1 Cor. 12:14). Each of us reading this meditation is a different and unique person. And yet at the same time, we are not so different and unique. The mystics go to deeper levels to realize that we are more one than we are many. When we can move from “I” to “we,” our conversion begins. Most of us start by thinking “It’s all about me!” Only generous, unconditional love can free us from this self-isolation—but for many this only comes later.

We often ask our isolated selves, “Am I perfect enough? Good enough?” Yes, you are perfect and good enough! Yet as individuals, we are too fragile, too insecure, too small, to bear the weight of glory. And also too little and weak to bear the burden of sin.

We are corporately quite stupid and sinful. I wrote a small book trying to show that Paul actually teaches a most subversive thing: Evil is corporately agreed upon as good before individuals ever dare to do it. [1] We all cooperate in absurd systems. When we humbly and honestly recognize this, we learn much more readily how to join hands with one another. We’re trained to compare and compete; that’s the nature of capitalism. The gospel undercuts that by saying, first of all, that we are one; and secondly, that each of us is a unique individual. Holding our oneness and individuality together reveals the Christian mystery: “You are all Christ’s Body, and individually, you are parts of it” (1 Cor. 12:27).

The Spirit of Ubuntu

CAC friend Rev. Dr. Jacqui Lewis finds inspiration in the African concept of “ubuntu,” which means “I am who I am because we are who we are.” The ubuntu vision of relatedness can provide healing in the midst our many current crises and divisions:

Even before COVID-19 showed up in our global family, we were living in what I call “hot-mess times.” In our current context, race and ethnicity, caste and color, gender and sexuality, socioeconomic status and education, religion and political party have all become reasons to divide and be conquered by fear and rancor. . . . Put simply, we are in a perilous time, and the answer to the question “Who are we to be?” will have implications for generations to come.

We have a choice to make. We can answer this question with diminished imagination, by closing ranks with our tribe and hiding from our human responsibility to heal the world. Or we can answer the question of who we are to be another way: We can answer it in the spirit of ubuntu. The concept comes from the Zulu phrase Umuntu ngumuntu ngabantu, which literally means that a person is a person through other people. Another translation is, “I am who I am because we are who we are.”. . . With this in mind, who I will be is deeply related to who you are. In other words, we are each impacted by the circumstances that impact those around us. What hurts you hurts me. What heals you heals me. What causes you joy causes me to rejoice, and what makes you sad also causes me to weep.

By channeling the ancient wisdom of ubuntu, we can engineer a badly needed love revolution to rise up out of the ashes of our current reality. . . . The empathy that grows from listening to others, from connecting with our neighbors, and from loving our neighbors as we love ourselves can define the courses of action we take. [1]

Father Richard finds a similarly unifying perspective in the spirituality of Julian of Norwich (1343–c. 1416). He writes: 

The divisions, dichotomies, and dualisms of the world can only be overcome by a unitive consciousness at every level: personal, relational, social, political, cultural, in inter-religious dialogue, and spirituality in particular. A transformed people unite all within themselves, so they can then do the same in the world. [2]

My favorite Christian mystic, Julian of Norwich, used the Old English term “oneing” to describe what happens between God and the soul. As Julian put it, “By myself I am nothing at all; but in general I am, I hope, in the oneing of love . . . for it is in this oneing that the life of all people consists.” She also wrote, “The charity of God creates in us such a oneing that when it is truly seen, no person can separate themselves from another” and “In the sight of God, all humans are oned, and one person is all people.” [3]

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