Ordination

I am allergic to flowers.

I can bear with them in funerals, weddings, hospital visits.
I can even pay for them on occasions like 18/11/22 when a KoL was released from Pik Uk.
I can compromise a little at baptisms where new beginnings are celebrated.

But when it comes to occasions like one recently put on show: the ordination of an island seminary professor, my sneezes became non-stop.
And that’s not even counting the pomps surrounding it.

Forget about why a seminary professor is ordained as a pastor.
Forget about the validity in the arrogant proclamation “the world is my parish.”
Forget about my prejudice against ordination on biblical and theological basis. (See ‘Called to be a minister?’)
But let’s not digress.

Note what Apostle Paul would say, or rather said:
“We have become a spectacle to the entire world—to people and angels alike.” (1 Cor 4:9, NLT)

Inside Moscow Bolshoi Theatre (Photographed by Theefer, CC BY-SA 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons)

Boy, what a spectacle nowadays ordination has become!

A horde of senior reverends all gather around the kneeling ordained pastor, laying hands on the latter. All of them probably have flower pinned to the lapel.
Then bouquets of flowers would be offered the newly minted Reverend.
There is hardly any indication of suffering and persecution.

My sneezes erupted!

The flowers are meant to signify a new life in Christ as in baptism?
A new life of freedom as outside Pik Uk?
A new life of a couple as in wedding?
Or a new life after death as in funeral?

What spectacle Paul had in mind?
It is this:
“instead, I sometimes think God has put us apostles on display, like prisoners of war at the end of a victor’s parade, condemned to die.” (1 Cor 4:9, NLT)

It is beyond unbelievable that anyone could see a parallel between what Paul describes and the spectacle that’s on show in an ordination.
Unless it is a parody!

Miletus – Ancient Greek Theatre (Bernard Gagnon</a>, <a href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0">CC BY-SA 3.0</a>, via Wikimedia Commons)

But Paul saw what the world of Christendom would evolve into.
In a few words later:
“Our dedication to Christ makes us look like fools, but you claim to be so wise in Christ! We are weak, but you are so powerful! You are honored, but we are ridiculed. Even now we go hungry and thirsty, and we don’t have enough clothes to keep warm. We are often beaten and have no home.” (1 Cor 4:10-11, NLT)

Which one holds the title? Ordained Reverend or Apostle?
Which one has the salary guaranteed and pegged to civil service pay? Ordained Reverend or Apostle?
Which one has bouquets?
There’s no need for answer.
Questions suffice.

How and why Christianity degenerated so farcically?
It’s of course painful to see the ordination show in all major denominations.
It’s even more painful once one realises that all players, the ordaining senior party, the pastor to be ordained, and all those rejoicing at it with bouquets, all gleefully play the part, seemingly ignorant and forgetful of what Paul has said.

How far it is from just 2000 years ago!

Words preached daily now by any of those on stage, or in the applauding audience no longer mean anything, or has any relevance.
For if those words still do, the show on stage might as well be a rite of signing the ordained’s death certificate.

Lucky those words no longer.