The Church as Peacemaker: Building a "House Without Walls" (Ephesians 2)
by Ched Myers

Jose Marti Marti, a Cuban patriot of the late 19^th century, was a vigorous critic of U.S. imperialism. But he also understood that there was promise here. Marti thrilled at the dedication of the Statue of Liberty on the occasion of the first U.S. centenary in 1976 precisely because it suggested a repudiation of imperial ethnocentrism in favor of those remarkable lines from Emma Lazarus. "Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free," says the statue; "Send those, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me; I lift my lamp beside the golden door." Marti saw this symbol as crucial for what he called the hemispheric struggle for 'nuestra America.' A mongrel nation of OUTCASTS — only here has this vision found any hospitality at all. As long as that statue stands, the "minority tradition" (the double entendre is intentional) it symbolizes will continue to haunt us.

We, the descendants of immigrants, now stand at "the golden door." As our conquests around the globe continue to displace the poor, many of us would bar the door. We whose ancestors experienced hospitality from the native peoples of this Great Turtle Island refuse to extend it to others.

We, the descendants of immigrants, now stand at "the golden door." As our conquests around the globe continue to displace the poor, many of us would bar the door. We whose ancestors experienced hospitality from the native peoples of this Great Turtle Island refuse to extend it to others. We whose ancestors respected no boundaries — neither those of the indigenous people nor those of the land — have set up borders, and militarized them. The disinherited and the marginalized, the poor immigrant and refugee, stand outside, seeking inclusion. The voice of Christ speaks in them: "Listen! I stand at the door, knocking; if you hear my voice and open the door, I will come in to you and we will share communion" (Revelation 3:20).

The image sharpens. This vigil at the door is a kind of reenactment of posadas, that old Mexican liturgy with Catholic and Aztec roots, celebrated throughout Mexican America during the last days before Christmas. In this Advent ritual of remembrance neighborhood people accompany the Holy Family from house to house as it seeks shelter, waiting to be recognized and allowed in so that the Christ-child may be born. The procession, traditionally bearing figurines or statues of the Holy Family, ritually recreates the story of "no room at the inn" until at last (usually at the church) the procession is let in for the final celebration on Christmas Eve.

Is not the history and the future of nuestra America a narrative of posadas? This story surely represents a more redemptive origin myth for us than the triumphal tales of "discoverers" and conquistadors. It reminds us that we who have found shelter must continually resist NATIVISM and embrace NATIVITY. It challenges us to keep the door open, to welcome those we have excluded.

The image sharpens further. The community of Dolores Mission in East Los Angeles is celebrating posadas. Their nighttime procession winds slowly through the tough Aliso housing projects, illuminated by candles and carols. The people petition for entrance at each door; those inside answer back that there is "no room" for Jesus. It is a fitting ritual, for the people of this parish know both sides of the "golden door." First and second generation Latinos, they are themselves poor. Yet led by the women, they have reached out to their own alienated youth, urging them to give up gangbanging, trying to create jobs for them. And they welcome new immigrants and refugees, sheltering and feeding them in their small church. The community of Dolores Mission embodies the kind of inclusive HOUSE envisioned by Jesus, keeping the vigil of hospitality at the Golden Door.

"Look, what magnificent structures!" (Mark 13:1). Jesus’ disciples cower, fascinated, before the Jerusalem Temple edifice. It is indeed a magnificent structure, bigger than life, architectural symbol of their social project. But Mark's Jesus refuses to be impressed, for he understands what they do not. This House must be deconstructed in order to make possible a more human society that will be pleasing to the true "owner of the House" (Mark 13:35).

"If a house is divided against itself, that house cannot stand" (Mark 3:25). The master political metaphor Jesus uses to describe his messianic mission is that of a struggle over a "House divided." He introduces it in his very first parable in Mark, which narrates an act of breaking into and entering a "strong man's house" in order to "loot his goods" (3:25). Later in Mark's story, this "divided House" is revealed to be none other than the Jerusalem Temple itself. Intended as "a home for all peoples" (11:17a), this House has instead become a "den" where criminal authorities practice exploitation (11:17b). Jesus there performs his most dramatic exorcism, symbolically "looting" those who have looted the people (11:15f). Shortly thereafter he predicts the dismantling of this House.

"Do you see these great structures? There will be not one stone left on top of another which will not be overthrown!" (13:2). This remarkable call to overthrow (Greek katalythee) the Temple system will–understandably, from the authorities’ point of view–be used to convict Jesus in court for treason/blasphemy (14:58), and earns the scorn of those who preside at Jesus’ execution (15:29). Yet as Jesus expires on the cross, "the curtain of the Temple was torn in two, from top to bottom" (15:38).

"Christ has made us one, having broken down the dividing wall of hostility" (Ephesians 2:15f). The conviction that socially dividing walls had been torn down by Jesus lay at the heart of the earliest church’s message. Mark's sign of the torn curtain at the apocalyptic moment of the cross was later reiterated by one of the apostle Paul's disciples: "Christ abolished in his flesh the law with its commands and ordinances in order that he might create in himself one new humanity from two, so making peace, reconciling both in one body to God through the cross, thereby killing the enmity" (Ephesians 2:16). Indeed Paul himself, like Jesus, wagered his entire ministry on this double task of DECONSTRUCTING the divided House and RECONSTRUCTING it on a foundation of race, class, and gender equality: "There is no longer Jew or Greek, slave or free, male or female; all of you are one in Christ" (Galatians 3:28).

Essayist Annie Dillard writes:

You hammer against the walls of your house. You tap the walls, lightly, everywhere... you know what to listen for. Some of the walls are bearing walls; they have to stay, or everything will fall down. Other walls can go with impunity; you can hear the difference. Unfortunately, it is often a bearing wall that has to go... Knock it out. Duck. Courage utterly opposes the bold hope that this is such fine stuff that the work needs it, or the world.

…we live in a world constructed upon a social architecture of division that threatens the structural integrity of the "House," whether this metaphor is understood in terms of a local city, an institution (such as our churches!), a nation, or our globalized but increasingly rickety civilization as a whole.

Dillard is referring to the writer's struggle to improve her work. But her metaphor about the difficult business of tearing down the walls of one's own house strikes me as descriptive of the task facing First World Christians today, for we live in a world constructed upon a social architecture of division that threatens the structural integrity of the "House," whether this metaphor is understood in terms of a local city, an institution (such as our churches!), a nation, or our globalized but increasingly rickety civilization as a whole. The question is, do we have the courage to take down walls that divide–even if they are bearing walls–in order to save the house?

A "deconstruction project" may not seem like the normal vocation of the church in America, since it normally is involved in "propping up" the House. But the book of Ephesians speaks directly to this matter. The author of Ephesians, who probably should be regarded as a member of a "Pauline school," takes on the task of summarizing the social character of the apostle's theology. The Epistle is a treatise on the struggle within salvation history to realize God's great plan of reconciliation, focusing upon the conflict between Christ's inauguration of peace and the Powers' perpetuation of enmity. At the heart of this struggle stands the church, which has inherited the messianic vocation of peacemaking.

The "thesis statement" of the epistle is stated in Ephesians 1:9-10:

God has made known to us the mystery of God's will — acccording to God's favor, set forth in Christ for the administration of the fullness of time — to reunify all things in heaven and on earth under Christ.

The fact that this vision is repeatedly stressed as a "mystery" throughout the epistle (see 3:3-6,9, 6:19) testifies to the author's realism. Human history has long parodied the hope for the genuine reconciliation of everything. Yet the fact that it is a mystery revealed invites and challenges us to be part of this new "administration" entrusted to Messiah.

The last part of the benediction introduces a second key theme of Ephesians in the following equation: "we" (v 12) plus "you" (v 13) will constitute an "us" (v 14). The writer is Jewish, which though never stated directly is indicated by phrases such as: "we who first hoped in Messiah" (1:12a) and "the circumcision" (2:11). The audience addressed, on the other hand, are Gentile Christians who have "heard the word of truth...and have believed" (1:13). This is clearly expressed in 2:11f: "Remember that at one time you Gentiles in the flesh, called the uncircumcision... were separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise." It is the plan of God to deliver a joint "inheritance" to both Gentiles and Jews (1:14).

This we/you discourse strongly suggests that the epistle was written at a time (late first century?) when Gentiles had become the majority in the church. Apparently they were beginning to marginalize both Jewish Christians and the Jewish roots of the faith. This prompted the writer to simply reverse Paul's argument in Romans: if before the apostle insisted on the right of Gentiles to be equal partners in the faith, now he would insist that they remain in solidarity with Jews who, after all, remain "first" in the salvation history of God. Because this unity is not just spiritual but concretely social in character, deep cultural and political enmities must be overcome by the church.

Ephesians 2:11-22 is the theological heart of Ephesians, articulating the concrete historical shape of the cosmic reconciliation in Christ promised in the prologue (see 1:10). Stipulated as a precondition for this new social order, however, is the "turning" of a people from a way of life that "follows" the course of the world and the Powers (2:1f). This conversion is described in consummate Pauline fashion: it is likened to resurrection (vv 5f) and is possible only through of the "immeasurable wealth of God's grace" (vv 7f). Paul's careful dialectic is captured in the claim that the gift of salvation is not "because of our works," yet is for the express purpose of practicing good works (vv 8-10). Whenever we have moved from "walking" in debt/sin (v 2) to "walking" in these good works we represent "God's work of art created in Christ Jesus" (v 10).

Throughout this epistle the author addresses a community, not just individuals, always using plural pronouns. The argument stands or falls on the creation of a new "people," but this vision is tested upon the historical fact of human enmity, indeed upon a "worst-case" example. In Hellenistic antiquity the cultural, economic and political conflict between Jew and Gentile was considered to be the prototype of all human hostility. We know from Galatians 1:6-9 that Paul's entire missionary project threatened to founder more than once on this enmity. After reminding the Gentile audience of their alienation from the "commonwealth of Israel (vv 11f), the author begins to attack its ideological foundations.

The argument is an extended midrash on Isaiah 57:19: "Peace, peace to the far and the near, says the Lord; I will heal my people". The author asserts that Isaiah's promise has been realized "in the blood of Christ" (v 13), and then launches a meditation on the cosmic event of the Cross. Christ embodies that peace because he has:

made us both one, broken down the dividing wall of hostility — in his flesh the enmity, the law consisting of commandments in statutes — made peace by creating in himself one new humanity from the two and thus reconciled both, in one body, to God through the cross thereby killing the enmity (vv 15f).

This wall is clearly equated with the enmity that divides Jew and Gentile and that is enforced by the "statutory law." Does its dismantling allude to Ezekial 13:14, where a "whitewashed" wall represents the false hopes of those who proclaim peace when there is no peace? Does it refer to the five-foot wall that separated the Outer Court of the Gentiles from the rest of the Jerusalem Temple? After all, Paul had at least once been accused of bringing a Gentile into the Temple (see Acts 21:28f). The meaning of this demolition metaphor is probably inclusive of these and other connotations, because the scope of Christ's abolition of enmity is cosmic.

The author now returns to the Isaiah allusion (v 17), for the gospel has become the message of peace (6:15; see Isaiah 52:7). The result, stated in almost Trinitarian fashion, is that in Christ both groups now "have access in one Spirit to the Father" (v 18). The doctrine of atonement implied by the order of the assertions here is unambiguous: reconciliation with our social enemies is a precondition to reconciliation with God! In his classic little 1959 book The Broken Wall Markus Barth writes:

If Christ "is peace," then he is by nature a social, even a political event, which marks the overcoming and ending of barriers however deeply founded and highly constructed ...When this peace is deprived of its social national or economic dimensions...then Jesus Christ is being flatly denied.

Christ's cross represents a unilateral declaration of peace by which Christians must abide. Only then are we truly "seated with Christ in the heavenly places" (2:6), an allusion to Christ's sovereignty over the Power that perpetuate division (see 1:20-23).

Those who do abide by this peace represent a "third force" in history — the reconciled community of the church (vv 19-22). This is described in clearly political terms, as the formerly alienated status of Gentiles is reversed:

2:12: you are... excluded from citizenship (Greek politeias) in Israel and strangers (Greek xenoi) to the covenants of promise

2:19: you are no longer strangers (Greek xenoi) and 'outside the house' (Greek paroikos), but are "fellow citizens" (Greek sumpolitai) with the saints and 'members of the household' (Greek oikeioi) of God.

The writer now moves to an elaborate description of this "house." As Barth puts it, "Those who have been received into God's house are no longer described as its inhabitants in what follows; rather they are declared the building materials". The apostles and prophets are the "foundation" and Christ Jesus the "keystone" (the stone at the top of an arch), the "whole construction fitting together" (vv 20f). But only by "building together" can the community become a Temple in which God dwells, a clear reference to the condition of prior reconciliation between the two alienated peoples (v 22).

Ephesians speaks of using those who acknowledge the "peace" forged by Christ as building material for this house (Ephesians 2:19-22). Christians who abide in this "unilateral disarmament of the church" cannot by definition also cooperate with any of the myriad social constructions of enmity — gender, class, race and nation. Does not this gospel call us to renounce whatever aspects of our national and/or cultural identity that perpetuate ideologies of division? And does not this include rethinking fundamental assumptions, as was the case with the "Law and commandments" for Jews?

Today the U.S.-Mexico border — the only place where First and Third World stand adjacent — has been militarized and fortified. Even as the wall symbolizing Cold War hostilities was torn down a new wall is being built along the border, where it symbolizes the fear and loathing of the new war against the poor. According to Ephesians, such a wall mocks the "structural integrity" of the church. The issue for the Paulinist was "access" to social, cultic and political space in a world where it was severely restricted (Ephesians 2:18). The wall has been torn down — what might this mean for us in our world of real division? The sanctuary movement that offered hospitality and solidarity to Central American refugees in the 1980s offers a clue. We can learn from the Civil Rights movement as well, in its refusal to abide by the "Law and its statutes" of Jim Crow. What is the implication of Ephesians for the gender wars now raging in our culture, or for the second-class status of gays and lesbians in most churches? What about the social architecture of our cities that still insulates rich from poor and divides whites and people of color by the "thin blue line" of police discrimination and the "thick red line" of economic apartheid? If we are not involved in defying these walls, we are simply not living "in Christ."

A House constructed upon social and economic division will either collapse because of its internal structural contradictions, or be burned down by those whose disenfranchisement gives them no reason to feel a stake in its maintenance. Or, as the popular slogan of the L.A. rebellion put it: "No justice, no peace."

"A house divided cannot stand." So warned the great American president Abraham Lincoln, appropriating the ancient verdict of Jesus to describe the economic, social and political crisis that led to the War Between the States in the 1860s. The image has haunted the American political unconscious ever since. This historical ultimatum was felt sharply again during the 1992 Los Angeles uprising. A House constructed upon social and economic division will either collapse because of its internal structural contradictions, or be burned down by those whose disenfranchisement gives them no reason to feel a stake in its maintenance. Or, as the popular slogan of the L.A. rebellion put it: "No justice, no peace." This judgment applies equally well to another building collapse recently heard ‘round the world: the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center in New York in September 2001.

Our bible studies have reminded us that there are two kinds of multiculturalism — from ABOVE and from BELOW. In ancient Rome one’s culture and religion were tolerated as long as one acknowledged the sovereignty of Caesar, paid tax and tribute and stayed out of the way of the Roman military machine. In today’s McWorld, transnational corporations, politicians and the tourist industry all love to use Rainbow rhetoric, but it is too often only a thin veneer for the same old dominant culture biases. Multiculturalism from below, however, paints our streets with the richly varied hues of ordinary working people trying to make a living, transforming the social terrain in ways unpredicted by elite planners.

For example, "immigrant economics" have changed the face of this city. Mexicanos who are being pushed north by transnational forces of economic disenfranchisement have brought with them their traditions of grassroots entrepeneurship. One cannot go far in Los Angeles without encountering day laborers on the corners, cafeteria trucks (loncherias) doing brisk business at job sites, push-cart vendors selling tamales or ice cream bars on the sidewalks, or produce trucks winding through barrio allies, hawking the weekly specials by megaphone. Similarly, new Korean small businesses raise capital through family-based pyramid financing; Chinese shopkeepers become more fluent in Spanish than English; Salvadoran busboys work tables in Japanese restaurants and Filipino cooks make pizza; and Cambodians (many of them survivors of Pol Pot's killing fields) have captured a quintessentially American corner of the market — the urban donut-shop. Such examples of immigrant ingenuity and economic diversity abound — despite the opposition of city regulators and the incomprehension of suburban shoppers. Because of its immigrant history, America has always been multicultural from below. It is the DOMINANT culture which has never known how to embody the nation's motto--e pluribus unum, "from many, one."

I hope I have been clear over the last two days that I believe that our metropolitan centers are the most strategic places of engagement for Christian faith to face the real future. Centrifugal struggle does not mean fleeing the city, but deconstructing concentrations of power and privilege, and tearing down walls of division. The city and indeed the entire American house are characterized by this double reality. On one hand they are already a multicultural reality, have in fact always been. On the other hand the foundations of dividing walls are deep. Our task, therefore, is to embrace the diversity while hammering on the walls. The challenge is for the church to be a sort of demilitarized zone where intercultural tensions are WORKED THROUGH, and a mobilized community where issues of structural and community justice are engaged — thus providing a desperately needed example for the wider society on both counts.

The problem is, today things are backwards. The extraordinary cultural diversity that now characterizes American society is NOT reflected proportionally in our churches. We simply can’t do our work if we remain congregationally Balkanized and politically mute.

The problem is, today things are backwards. The extraordinary cultural diversity that now characterizes American society is NOT reflected proportionally in our churches. We simply can’t do our work if we remain congregationally Balkanized and politically mute. Christians can hardly promote publicly what we do not practice ecclesially. Steven Charleston calls the struggle for cultural diversity within the church a "Second Reformation… There will still be splinter groups. But there will be a whole community within the Church, stretching around the globe, that will be much more horizontal in its relationships. There will be more equal understanding of the role of men and women, of laity and clergy, of youth and elders. It will be a more tolerant and accepting community. Its ritual and worship life will be far more integrated with the sight, sounds and smells of its many different members." This is the church of the future: a people of the oikumene, a community of discipleship, a church that has overcome the deep divisions of the past, a "wounded healer." It is the only future, in my opinion, the church has.

As pressure to redistribute social power grows from below, dominant culture reaction will increase from above. The church MUST take sides is the struggle for cultural diversity. It is necessarily a struggle for cultural JUSTICE, since not all groups have equal access to social resources and space. It will require critical analysis of the actual relations of power, and a commitment to building strategic coalitions across traditional group boundaries which are based on partnership and respect. We must learn to preserve the differences among us while searching together for social cohesion, and most importantly, we must teach our children a worldview PREDICATED upon multiculturalism. Tensions, competition and even conflict will be inevitable, to be sure. But cultural diversity is far less a risk than conformity. Multiculturalism is an ASSET to democracy, because it serves as a political guarantee against totalitarian tendencies, which are almost always ethnocentric in character. And above all it entails celebrating the cultural geography in which we live.

Unfortunately, many Christians find diversity-preservation work both troubling and threatening. The reason for this is our theological resistance to the notion of PLURALISM. Pluralism is heretical wherever the church continues to be infected by Constantinian–or shall we say Babel-onian?–assumptions about its privilege and power within society. Historically, once Christendom reinvented itself as a politically defined monoculture, it was less than hospitable to those defined as cultural "outsiders."

They were dealt with DEFENSIVELY (e.g., wars with Moslem competitors) or OFFENSIVELY (evangelizing or conquering "heathens"), but rarely FRATERNALLY. The church's collaboration with State oppression and repression of minorities is a haunting legacy, from the Inquisition to the Holocaust. (To be sure, establishment Christianity has not been alone in this; MOST dominant groups with strong ideologies have had difficulty being tolerant — communists and capitalists no less than Christians.) The problem, then, is not Christianity per se, but it’s identification with the dominant culture. By rejecting RELIGIOUS entitlement, we are declaring our faith that the disestablishment of the church will make it not only more inclusive, but stronger from the point of view of social ecology.

Princeton theologian Mark Taylor calls the challenge facing the church in our post-modern historical context a trilemma. "Postmodernism's three traits each presents a demand that invites attention and development: to acknowledge tradition, to celebrate plurality, and to resist domination — all three together." I find this a useful conceptualization. It is both possible and necessary that the church rediscover its identity in the narrative TRADITION of biblical radicalism; that we also welcome postmodernism's celebration of PLURALITY without endorsing its uncommitted relativism; and that we join with others in the deconstruction of DOMINANT cultural conformism.

Solidarity, which can entail taking sides in social struggles, is not incompatible with pluralism, which entails acceptance of differing points of view. The church must understand that by embracing pluralism it is not giving up its convictions; it is simply refusing to exercise them from a position of domination.

For help in being such a church we can look to older traditions of Christian dissidence, such as Franciscans and Anabaptists, who were ADVOCATES of cultural pluralism and religious tolerance. We can also look to Asian Christians, who have shown that a minority church can still be a force for social justice. These three commitments — to a convictional tradition, to pluralism, and to justice — are not contradictory, though it is challenging to integrate them in practice. Solidarity, which can entail TAKING SIDES in social struggles, is not incompatible with pluralism, which entails ACCEPTANCE of differing points of view. The church must understand that by embracing pluralism it is not giving up its convictions; it is simply refusing to exercise them from a position of domination. A commitment to social inclusion frees Christians to be critics of certain traditions EVEN AS WE defend their right to co-exist with full and equal rights.

Significantly, we find this trialectic in the narrative of biblical radicalism itself. The Exodus God "calls and names" CERTAIN peoples, cares for ALL peoples, and takes the side of the POOR. Contrary to Christendom's rejection of pluralism, the New Testament ASSUMES it. Jesus and his movement was influenced by the multicultural context of ancient Galilee; the early Jerusalem church accepted the distinct cultural needs of "Hellenists" and affirmed a ministry to Gentiles, though not without struggle (Acts 6 and 15); and Paul's notion of the "body of Christ" (I Corinthians 12), and his own apostolic practice among various Mediterranean cultures, reflect a commitment to diversity. Indeed, Mark's declaration that "all foods are clean" was understood as a central argument for cultural diversity by the early church, as reflected in its later reiteration by Luke in Acts 10.

First World Christians have both a prophetic and pastoral obligation to embrace pluralism in the context of a dominant culture which will necessarily resist it at all costs. Having said this, however, there is an important caveat. The church can and should be a place where diversity and inclusion are practiced. But as a community of conviction it cannot pretend to be all things to all people. Discipleship communities, like other convictional groups, can support a greater degree of pluralism in society than they can absorb internally. This is not a contradiction, but a definition of true pluralism. Equal openness to all beliefs, like thoroughgoing synchretism, actually NEGATES pluralism, sacrificing distinctive identity to a cultural and/or convictional melange consisting of the lowest common denominator of each group. "Universal culture" is no more possible — or compelling — than universal language; one need only consider the utter failure of the great liberal idea of "Esperante." Nor does a commitment to tolerance preclude evangelism, as long as vigorous advocacy of one's views is not linked to practices of domination.

As communities of conviction in a world of diversity, we will have to completely rethink our social strategies and assumptions. We must resist the impulse to defensively ghettoize as well as the temptation to offensively impose our worldview. In this First World Christians have a great deal to learn from the African American church, which has not only survived but flourished without the props of dominant culture support.

The "global village" is growing ever smaller — but as the Third and Fourth Worlds impinge, the entitled of the First World grow fearful, whispering about the "new barbarians" and alluding to socio-economic triage. They are demanding a Fortress America where the internal poor are strictly controlled and the external poor kept out by militarized borders. The church can only see this as a cruel parody of its call to be ecumenical. Fortress America is also an affront to the legacy of Emma Lazarus' "golden door." Christians, therefore, by living in fidelity to the biblical narrative and its call to solidarity, can nurture the Promise of nuestra America.