It's about bodies, not bones

Here we go again. Last year DaVinci, the year before that Mel Gibson, this year the "bones" of Jesus. Only not bones, just ossuaries, that supposedly contained bones until, in 1980, they were reburied somewhere unmarked. But still, enough DNA here, they say, to "prove" that these were the bones of Jesus, and his wife Mary Magdalene, and their son Judah, and his mother Mary, and some other guys named Matthew and Joses. And they're going to compare the DNA to what? Oh, I forgot -- the descendants of the Merovingians, of course.
But preachers should be glad, because this is ripe Lenten material, a teachable moment in which to remind Christians that resurrection is not about resuscitation of corpses. The notion of the empty tomb was undoubtedly useful as a graphic way of saying that Jesus is not dead, but risen. It may even have been historically true. But it's not the point. The "resurrection body," as Paul is at pains to point out, is not like "the body of this death." Better, almost, if Jesus' bones did turn up, because mine will certainly be present for some time to come, unless incinerated, and yet I hope to rise with him.
What is seizing me more importantly this Lent is the poetry of Galway Kinnell, in which, as one reviewer wrote, the poet's "ambition all along has been to hold death up to life, as if he had it by the scruff of the neck, and to keep it there until he has extracted a blessing from it." That was thirty-five years ago. In the latest book, "Strong Is Your Hold," his deep tenderness toward the flesh, the earth, and the spirit are all on display. And lately he was "heard" in the pages of Vermont papers pleading that we not plague our peaks with wind turbines for commercial use.
At present I am myself campaigning to have groundwater declared a public trust resource, off limits to commodification. This was meant to be a statewide campaign, but I find that I somehow got ahead of the pack. Here's hoping it passes our Town Meeting so we can be the pioneers for all who will come after us next year.
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