Regardless of all of this, I found much of what Rankin had to say still very pertinent, and so thought I would share it on this day that we honor the Sacred Heart of Jesus.
A fraud
Rankin begins his talk by noting that perhaps, in a sort of secret way, we have always known that Jesus was a sissy. All efforts to align him with soldiers, marching, battles, banners, and wars (as, for example, in hymns like 'Onward Christian Soldiers') are part of a widespread fraud – 'a pious, well-intentioned fraud,' says Rankin, 'but a fraud nonetheless. For Jesus was a sissy.'
Rankin himself was taught from an early age that male success was synonymous with aggressive physical behavior. Indeed, he internalized this message so well that he became a professional fighter – 'Rocky Rankin'! 'Violence was rewarded,' he remembers, and all his teachers were proud of him.
He has since learned that human behavior has been 'arbitrarily categorized as masculine and feminine,' that societies have 'carefully defined sexual stereotypes that lead to victimization,' and that 'according to our own particular stereotypes, Jesus was not a ‘soldier marching to war,’ but an honest-to-goodness sissy.' To insist otherwise is to feed into a 'dangerous and damaging fraud.'...Rankin declares his thesis absolutely inescapable: Jesus was a sissy. After all, Jesus was able to feel and express a wide range of tender emotions. He wept without shame, even raved and screamed and moaned and won no battles. He was an intuitive thinker, often the victim of wild imaginings and flights of fantasy. He responded to beauty, embracing the birds of the air and the lilies of the field. He nurtured little children, relating to them in the manner of a mother. He freely touched other men and kissed them.
'Does Jesus really fit the American ideal of manhood?' Rankin asks. Can we imagine Jesus as a United States Marine? As a linebacker for the Detroit Lions? As the Marlboro Man? 'By almost every standard in our culture,' concludes Rankin, 'Jesus was a real live honest-to-goodness sissy.'" (See full post here).
What of this? Was Jesus a "sissy"? The Sacred Scriptures show otherwise. In the wonderful Catholic classic entitled "My Meditation on the Gospel," published by the Confraternity of the Precious Blood, Rev. James E. Sullivan provides us with the following meditation on Christian Fortitude:
"After a few days' stay at Capharnaum, Jesus and Mary and the first five Apostles made the journey to Jerusalem for the Passover. When they entered the Temple, they heard its usual peace broken by a great uproar. Men were shouting and bargaining, oxen and sheep were bleating. Jesus stiffened, His Father's house made into a market place! A fierce, set look came over His features. His hands seized some cords and tied them into a whip. His eyes never left the scene before Him. He walked forward then, arms outstretched. 'Take these things away!' He cried out. His voice was strong, yet trembling with anger. An uneasy fear came over the crowd, as His eyes burned into theirs. They hurried away their oxen and sheep, those in back urging on those in front. The money-changers alone held their ground. Jesus seized the end of their tables and sent them flying end over end. They became panic-stricken then. They grasped what coins they could and ran. Jesus stood alone in the courtyard. Peace settled again over the Temple.
My Lord, how I admire You in ths scene! We are so liable to think that being a Christian means being a weakling and a 'mouse'! How wonderful to see that distorted notion so firmly dispelled by the example of Your magnificent courage! Your Father's house was being desecrated; there was reason for the fighting - so You fought! You didn't care what they thought or what they would say. His glory was primary! Nor did it matter to You that You were alone against them all. Your courage was so great and Your cause so just that the entire crowd fled before You."
Does the cleansing of the Temple come across as the action of a "sissy"?
Jesus' Apostles were hardy men. They were men used to hard labor and were by no means effeminate in any way. But Jesus rebuked them for being frightened when it appeared their ship would capsize in the story Sea of Galilee:
"He got into a boat and his disciples followed him. Suddenly a violent storm came up on the sea, so that the boat was being swamped by waves; but he was asleep. They came and woke him, saying, 'Lord, save us! We are perishing!' He said to them, 'Why are you terrified, O you of little faith?' Then he got up, rebuked the winds and the sea, and there was great calm. The men were amazed and said, 'What sort of man is this, whom even the winds and the sea obey?'
The Apostles were afraid for their lives. And they cried out to Jesus. Sissy? How many real men would cry out to a sissy for help when their lives are in danger?
Jesus is presented in the Gospels as one who taught with authority. In fact, an evil spirit, so fearful of Him, instantly fled at His command:
"Then they came to Capernaum, and on the sabbath he entered the synagogue and taught. The people were astonished at his teaching, for he taught them as one having authority and not as the scribes. In their synagogue was a man with an unclean spirit; he cried out, 'What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are—the Holy One of God!' Jesus rebuked him and said, 'Quiet! Come out of him!' The unclean spirit convulsed him and with a loud cry came out of him. All were amazed and asked one another, 'What is this? A new teaching with authority. He commands even the unclean spirits and they obey him.' His fame spread everywhere throughout the whole region of Galilee." (Mark 1: 21-28).
Jesus came to die for our sins. And His death involved a level of torture that was almost indescribably horrific. Hardly the actions of a "sissy."
No, Dr. Rankin's idea of Jesus as "sissy" is the one which is a fraud. And on the Dies Irae (the Day of Wrath) those who bought into his asinine idea will learn just how wrong he was. For the King of Kings, the Lion of Judah, is not going to return as the suffering and sacrificial Lamb. He tells us:
"..Behold, I make all things new..I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. To the thirsty I will give a gift from the spring of life-giving water. The victor will inherit these gifts, and I shall be his God, and he will be my son. But as for cowards [read sissies if you will], the unfaithful, the depraved, murderers, the unchaste, sorcerers, idol-worshipers, and deceivers of every sort, their lot is in the burning pool of fire and sulfur, which is the second death." (Revelation 21: 5-8).
Now why would it be a fearful thing if Jesus were a "sissy"?
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