A Skeptic Glances at The March for Jesus

Millions March For Messiah in Sao PaoloDepending on your source, there were a million, 1.5 million, 3 million, or 5 million people participating in the March For Jesus through the streets of Sao Paulo.  A freaking lot of people, anyway.

The event seems to have been partially organized at least by evangelical Protestants, but took place on the Roman Catholic Feast of Corpus Christi, a national holiday in Brazil.

My interest then is partly intellectual, as the great religious drama of the Middle Ages are strongly associated with Corpus Christi processions, and this seems in the general template of that festival.Dozens March for Cthulhu in Boise

  Such processions seem a natural way of structuring one's religious experience: God becomes man.  Big news.  Get out and say so.  Why wouldn't you?  It's political, it's personal, it's religious... it's a triple threat.

 I'm also interested in the reactions of Christians.

Their reviews are a bit mixed, understandably.  Some are triumphalistic and proclaiming the Kingdom, some are snarling that this is all wrong for some reason.

My go-to site for well-balanced evangelical reaction is The Internet Monk, where we read:

More than one million people took part in Brazil’s annual March For Jesus this week. It is held each year on the 60th day after Easter Sunday. And its purpose is…?

From the comments to that post, this sample struck me as worth replying to:

If a million people want to take a walk together and sing songs, that’s fine. I just don’t really see what this has to do with the Gospel. Did Jesus ever organize a parade through Jerusalem? (And, no, his triumphant entry into Jerusalem on his way to his crucifixion was not organized.)

It's worth noting a few things.

I think it's a bit narrow to approach the world as though simple acts like celebration, gathering (more or less spontaneously), political / theological demonstration need some sort of divine template for theScores Turn Out for 5K Fun Run For Kali in Kalamazoom.

Wherever you have religion, as in medieval Europe, you have strong feeling.  And wherever you have strong feeling you have to have some sort of pageantry or theatrical expression for that feeling.  Drama both structures and clarifies feeling, and marches, parades, drama, or whatever seem to be a natural externalizing of inner states.

So I'm not sure why Christians would need a biblical precedent for saying, "Whoa, we're Christians, and that rocks" in large numbers.

Second, the fact that the Triumphal Entry was not organized (which, by the way, we do not know for a fact) does not change the fact that it was intended by the people (and apparently Jesus himself) as an act of political visibility, a declaration of his right to take up the throne of David.

As parades were political then, so are they now: and spontaneity, while granting a certain authenticity, doesn't seem to have ever been a practical requirement for such a demonstration.Lift High The Lotus: Amble for Vishnu 2010 in October. T-Shirts Available for All Who Finish

So the March for Jesus expresses the feelings of the followers of a two thousand year old sage-savior-king.  It expresses their politics and makes them visible.  This seems perfectly biblical to me, though if we take the Triumphal Entry as a template Christians will want to see follow-through.  But it's still an act that's very closely related to the gospel, that of declaring Jesus to be king and in opposition to the kings of this world.

Even if I were a self-described Christian I probably wouldn't do it, personally, but I say, Knock yourselves out, Christians.  You're in the great human tradition.

Just give me fair warning so I can plan an alternate route.  Thanks.