Truly An Alternative Story

Easter season is not over. Hopefully it will continue for all of us throughout the year. At Easter, we are beginning, as Ivan Illich described it, a new story...

Neither revolution nor reformation can ultimately change a society, rather you must tell a new powerful tale, one so persuasive that it sweeps away the old myths and becomes the preferred story, one so inclusive that it gathers all the bits of our past and our present into a coherent whole, one that even shines some light into our future so that we can take the next step…If you want to change a society, then you have to tell an alternative story.

-A HT to Bob Carlton

The power of story has been a topic on this blog a number of times before. But Illich is talking about something deeper than something you or I could write and tell. He is talking about The Story of a people, nation, group, etc. Sometimes there are competing stories in a nation/culture. We can sure see that happen in the United States as we wrestle with patriotism, financial security, unending prosperity and power as our national story.

But the truly competing story for many of us is the story the national story has often tried to co-opt. This story is non-national, non-patriotic, God-based security and an unending identification with the poor and oppressed and powerless. Only through endless permutations of interpretation can we get to the attitude that so permeates our national version of that revolutionary story of Jesus Christ.

Yesterday Christians went to worship and proclaim that other story. A national power was defeated. A national religious story was turned around. The endless story of death being the ultimate of existence was proven false. That is an alternative story. That is an alternate reality from the one we live within so much of our lives.


Every Easter I am struck by our Moravian tradition of ending our dawn service in a cemetery where possible. As the sun comes up on our lives each Easter we leave the warmth of the church and stand in the supposed final resting place of our families, friends, ancestors. When I describe what we do there are many times when people respond with a certain queasiness. "You actually stand in a cemetery?

Yes! Where else can we appreciate resurrection? Where else can we confront the old story with the new reality of God? Where else can we discover the humility needed when coming into the presence of the Holy? On Easter, more than even at Christmas, The Holy has broken through into our world by showing that we need no longer fear death. It has become powerless.

I know that is hard to believe or accept. Yet deep within the Story of our God is that promise. In fact it is at the heart of the Christian story. May it remain the story that keeps me in God's Presence.

(Pictures: Berea Moravian Church, St. Charles, MN, Easter, 2009)