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Danny pointed out an interesting news item from CNN yesterday.  At the end of a year of celebration of the 2,000th anniversary of the year of St. Paul’s birth scientists have conducted carbon-dating tests on the bone fragments contained in a sarcophagus in the Basilica of St. Paul in Rome.  Their conclusion:  that the fragments are from a person who lived in the 1st or 2nd Century A.D.

What is this fascination with identifying Paul the Apostle?  Why the controversy about the possibility that some of the epistles were supposedly written by disciples of Paul?  Is it the same thing that compels the search for the historical Jesus?  What drives us to yearn for a physical connection with God and his prophets?  I know one thing: it isn’t new.  Moses – standing barefoot on holy ground – humbly asked “Who am I?” before demanding to know of God, “Who are you?”  Four thousand years on we tend to the same mixture of awe and audacity when confronting our Lord.

The easy answer to all this would be to say that it’s a result of our fallen human nature, our tendency toward and love of the things of this world.  That’s a mistake that has been made before.  If we completely rejected this world, then we would justify abandoning the plight of this world – and that was not the message nor the mission of our Saviour.  Jesus was not an apparation during his life, nor was he a ghost following his resurrection.  He was incarnate – born of the flesh – and raised from the dead in the flesh made whole again and perfect.  Yes, we should turn away from the worldly in the sense of prioritizing that which is most important.  But we should also realize that we are called to join in the Church’s mission with Christ to heal God’s creation, to participate in works of piety and works of mercy as part of what Wesley conceived of as the “means of grace”.

So, we celebrate the fact that ancient bones support ancient tradition and ancient manuscripts testify to eternal truths.  At the same time, we realize that though the time is coming when time shall cease to exist, this is the day that the Lord has made for work.