Lately I have been wondering if perhaps, for the first time in more than twenty-five years of ministry, I might have something to learn from big oil executives. I am informed that the big energy companies are contemplating a problem that is looming because of climate change and the pressure to shift to renewable energy. The big energy execs are considering what will become of the vast infrastructure of coal mines, drilling platforms, oil rigs, and miles and miles of pipeline that represent significant economic investment of their companies. More to the point, those energy companies are also considering what will become of all the as-yet-uncollected coal and oil and gas that those mines, rigs, platforms, and pipelines are meant to extract, if renewable energy advances are made in enough time to prevent significant climate change. If the sun, and the wind, and water, and maybe hydrogen, or even nuclear fusion become reliable and affordable sources of energy (as seems likely), then all those coal mines, oil rigs, drilling platforms, and miles and miles of pipeline, start to look a lot less valuable to the energy companies than they once were. And the stores of coal, gas, and oil that they have laid claim to, but which are still stuck in the earth, start to look a lot less valuable too.
Economists have a term for all this infrastructure and all those raw materials, should they start to become less valuable as the demand for renewable energies increases; economists call the coal mines, oil rigs, drilling platforms, and miles of pipeline “stranded assets.” They call the coal, oil, and gas left in the earth “stranded assets,” too, (as if they belong to the energy companies).
The energy companies made all that investment because they could see, of course, that fossil fuels would make the world go ‘round, as it were. These resources produce the energy that powers our society, and brings power (and wealth) to those who claim them as theirs. They were not expecting that any of their assets would ever be stranded.
According to Lloyds of London, “stranded assets are defined as assets that have suffered from unanticipated or premature write-downs, devaluation or conversion to liabilities.” And if I was an oil company executive, I’d be worrying that all that stuff, and all that oil, that may soon be much less valuable to me than it once was, since the world is finding and using all those other sources of energy. I’d be worried that all that stuff we built and all that oil still in the ground might soon become stranded assets. And, of course, if I was worried about having stranded assets, the question I’d be asking is: Can we un-strand these stranded assets?* Can we take that which has suffered write-down, devaluation and liability, and find renewed value in it?
But I am not an oil company executive. I am a priest of the church. And I do not worry about the infrastructure or reserves of natural resources that are the concern of big energy companies. I do, however, as a person of faith and a leader in the church, find something intriguing about the concept of a stranded asset.
But my chief concern does not lie where you may think it does: with the infrastructure and the resources of the church that may seem less useful to some people than once they seemed to be (like big, old, brownstone buildings, for instance). Oh, there is a time and a place to worry about all that, but Good Friday is not the time, and this is not the place. To be frank, my concern about stranded assets has to do, quite specifically, with Good Friday, as I stand here with you in the shadow of the Cross.
No, it is not this big old brownstone church that I worry may some day be a stranded asset. It’s not the silver altar in the Lady Chapel, or the fancy chalices that we have locked up in vaults, or the stacks of vestments stored in wide, shallow drawers that I worry may some day become stranded assets, if they should happen to suffer from unanticipated or premature write-downs, devaluation, or conversion to liabilities, so to speak.
Nor is it the other great natural resource of the church - the people of God, whom you represent, as you gather here today in this place - that I worry about. God’s people may falter and suffer from many things, we may rebel and relapse time and time again, but unanticipated or premature write-downs, devalued, or conversions to liabilities you never shall be!
The potentially stranded asset that I am worried about has far greater implications for Christian faith and religion than a bunch of old buildings or a silver altar. It has greater implications even than the significance of the people of God. Since we live in a society that is rapidly deciding it has no particular need of the church or its teachings, a society that is quickly forgetting the narrative of salvation that the scriptures convey, a society that is substantially unconvinced of the value that Jesus might bring to their lives or the life of the world; the potential stranded asset looms over us today from the outskirts of Jerusalem, long ago.
On this Good Friday, I am wondering if the Cross is in danger of becoming a stranded asset.
Once, the Cross seemed useful to everyone, or at least the vast majority of everyone that most Christians could see from wherever we happened to live. Once, servants of the Cross of Christ believed the Cross was so useful to everyone that they would stop at nothing to bring it anywhere and everywhere - even carrying out grotesque acts of cultural destruction and death; this was not a good thing. But for many centuries, across many cultures, from northern Africa, all across parts of the Middle East, and all of Europe, and up and down the Americas, the Cross was a symbol of the power that made the world go ‘round, as it were. The Cross was at the center of the spiritual energy that powered vast societies, and the Cross brought power (and sometimes wealth, it has to be said) to those who claimed it as theirs. No one was expecting that the meaning and value and power of the Cross could ever be stranded or declining in value.
But today, behold the wood of the Cross… and ask yourself if it does not seem a little stranded to you, on its green hill, far away: suffering from unanticipated, premature write-downs, a general devaluation, and in some circumstances, a conversion to outright liability. The world is finding and using other sources of power. The world has decided it might be best to look elsewhere for its spiritual energy needs, or to reassess whether we ever had those spiritual needs to begin with.
Of course, for the first century Romans, the Cross was a stranded asset as soon as the body of Jesus was taken down from it. But it was a cheap asset to them, so it hardly mattered. But the Cross’s greatest value was never in its raw materials; it was always in its symbolism. This was true for the Romans, too. A cross was a threat to anyone who thought they could attack or undermine the prevailing power. It was a threat that was meant to instill fear and submission. I can’t say that I know how effective a cross was as a threat in this way, but I can say that it would probably have worked on me. I think I’d have avoided getting anywhere near a cross.
As I’ve said, the Romans had no particular interest in un-stranding the stranded asset of the Cross, so it would remain to be seen if those who followed Jesus saw the value of un-stranding the stranded asset of the Cross. And the answer to this question lay in whether the meaning of the Cross could be transformed; whether the threat of the Cross could be turned into a promise. And the answer to that question lay in whether or not the powers that be had accomplished what they set out to accomplish with the Cross; whether or not, on the arms of the Cross, Jesus was finished.
We now have two thousand years of testimony that the threat of the Cross was a miserable failure, but that its promise has been fairly spectacular.
For the Cross was meant to bring an end to the teaching and ministry of Jesus; the Cross was meant to squelch Jesus’ declarations of forgiveness and replace them with accusations; the Cross was meant to break up the community who had gathered around him; the Cross was meant to rub salt in wounds that Jesus would otherwise have healed; the Cross was meant to erase from their memories the Lord’s only commandment to his disciples that they should love one another; the Cross was meant to cement the power of death to bring to an end the hopes of those have nothing else to hope for anyway; the Cross was meant to take away the breath of those who’d have sung the praise of Jesus’ name; the Cross was meant to usurp the power of the Prince of Peace; the Cross was meant to embarrass the humility of one who would enter Jerusalem on an ass; the Cross was meant to overshadow the light of this world; the Cross was meant to lock the gate of heaven; the Cross was meant to dry up the river of the water of life; the Cross was meant to devour the sheep and their shepherd too; the Cross was meant to close the doorway into the heart of God; the Cross was meant to weaken the covenant of love that God seeks with his people;the Cross was meant to cause Jesus’ followers to lose their Way, doubt the Truth, and give up on the promise of eternal Life. But in every conceivable way, the Cross failed to do what those who had deployed it hoped it would do.
For the Cross became a beacon for the teaching and ministry of Jesus; the Cross proclaims the expansiveness of God’s forgiveness; the Cross became the meeting point for the community who gathers in Christ’s Name; the Cross brings healing to the wounds that need to be healed; the Cross reminds us always of the Lord’s only commandment to love one another; the Cross has ended the power of death for those who have the nerve and the faith to hope in Christ; the Cross is transformed by the breath of God and the power of the Holy Spirit; the Cross became the banner of the Prince of Peace; the Cross teaches humility from the Lord of Lords; the Cross now shines with the light of the world; the Cross unlocked the gate of heaven; the Cross became a source of the waters of the river of the water of life; the Cross marks the pasture of the sheep and serves as a staff for their shepherd; the Cross has opened the doorway into the heart of God; the Cross will stand forever as a sign of the covenant of love that God seeks with his people;the Cross is all that Jesus’ followers need to find our Way, remember the Truth, and lean on the promise of eternal Life!
Well, maybe that was then, but this is now. So, if, today, the Cross is again in danger of becoming a stranded asset yet again, then maybe the issue is precisely the same: can we find again again the promise of the Cross? Can this stranded asset be un-stranded?
And the answer is clear, as long as there is anything good and holy to be crucified by the powers of dark self-interest, then the Cross retains its power as an asset for those who believe in God’s desire to restore beauty, truth, light, and goodness to the world he made. The Prayer Book puts it much more simply, this way: that by the passion of his blessed Son, God made an instrument of shameful death to be for us the means of life.
Yes, I worry from time to time that perhaps the Cross has become a stranded asset - written off, devalued, and mostly a liability. But then I remember that that’s exactly what the Cross seemed to be on that first Good Friday. And I behold the wood of the Cross - meant to be such an awful threat - and all I can see is God’s promise; and I give thanks for the gift of this Cross of Jesus that shall ever be dear to me, and to the world for which Jesus died on the hard wood of the Cross. And I know that Jesus can and does un-strand this stranded asset: his faithful Cross.
Preached by Fr. Sean Mullen
Good Friday, 2023
Saint Mark’s, Locust Street, Philadelphia
* I was introduced to the concept of stranded assets by Peter Coy, writing in the NY Times, and I owe this phrase “un-stranding stranded assets” to him too.
