I have noted before that there is a good case to be made for saying John’s gospel reflects a far stronger anti-James polemic than anything in Paul. In a fairly interactive sermon today (which in the UK is Mothering Sunday – and was long before the corruption of it into Mothers’ Day) we looked at and discussed these two paintings for different perspectives on Mary as mother, leading onto to a discussion of mothering.
The first is by Orazio Gentileschi, and is the sort of image Christmas has made us very comfortable with.
The second is by Konrad Witz, and (outside certain Catholic devotions such as the Stations of the Cross, or the Sorrowful Mysteries of the Rosary) is the kind of image that we rarely contemplate. Taking both images together leads to some powerful reflections.
The comment that really caught me by surprise (I suppose because I’m so used to reading the symbolism and ambiguity in John that I sometimes miss the surface) was this question: “Why did Jesus hand his mother to the care of beloved disciple (and, one could add, vice versa) instead of to James?”
Is this another hint, I wonder, that John’s earlier polemical showing of James continues. Does he see his community, and not the Jerusalem one, as the true family of Jesus?
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