A Meditation on the Church’s Stigmata

“I carry the marks of Jesus branded on my body.”
Galatians 6:17

“We are … always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be visible in our bodies.”
2 Corinthians 4:10

Stigmata are not just raw wounds on hands, feet, foreheads, sides – they are where the suffering of Christ erupts physically, tangibly, visibly. They are not internal, spiritual or symbolic. Rather they are the external evidence of the spiritual reality of our brokenness. In Galatians 6:17, Paul is speaking personally of himself, whether these marks are the scars of the abuse he received in his missionary career (the safer, traditional view) or divinely imposed stigmata is not critical to this meditation. In 2 Corinthians 4:10, Paul seems to be speaking of others who have also been abused in their missionary ventures, but the expansive language suggests the whole community of the Church is involved. Paul would be the last one to diminish in any way Christ’s sacrifice, yet the suffering of the Church in the name of Christ does have a redemptive effect. (Colossians 1:24)

Connecting 2 Corinthians 4:10 with Galatians 6:17 and the stigmata brings me a whole new awareness of the connection of my personal brokenness with the brokenness of the community of the Church. In this reflection I am seeing the wounds of today’s Church as stigmata. This is where I am being drawn in my contemplation of the Psalms of disorientation and the ancient sign of broken bread in 1 Corinthians 11:23-26 (taken, blessed, broken, given). This is not to externalize and distance myself from the brokenness of the Church, rather it draws me even deeper into the Church’s brokenness as my own brokenness. I am not the healer sent to cure the brokenness in the congregations I have served. The Wonder Worker in Susan Howatch’s novel self-destructs even as he heals. Rather, I am broken along with the Church. Throughout my ministry I have been claiming the wounds and brokenness, the stigmata, of the Church as my own, regardless of how the people of any one congregation have responded. For God to draw me in this direction still leaves a mystery.

If the Church as the Body of Christ carries the death of Jesus so that the life of Jesus can also be visible in the Body, then we should expect congregations to be broken, wounded, dysfunctional, pathological – and in the middle of that the life of Jesus appears. This is not just that people in the Church are sinners still in process of sanctification. Rather, it is that in the relationships and operation of the Church the community is wounded. The paradox of grace is that, while the stigmata of the Church are all too evident, people still recognize and embrace the life of Jesus in and through the community of the Church. That Christ redeems people when the wounds of the Church are visible is normal, to be expected, even necessary.