Father Snort

The Rev. Brad Sullivan Emmanuel Episcopal Church June 6, 2021 Proper 5, B Genesis 3:8-15 Mark 3:20-35 “You Can’t Fight in Here. This Is the War Room.” Strange as it may sound, today’s Gospel reading made me think of a scene from the movie Dr. Strangelove, where The U.S. President, and a Russian Ambassador, and the top U.S. General are all trying to avert nuclear armageddon when the general and the Russian ambassador start fighting, and the President shouts at them, “Gentlemen, you can’t fight in here! This is the war room!” That reminds me of our Gospel story today as I hear the scribes saying to Jesus with similar irony, “Jesus please, you can’t heal people here, we’re doing God’s work!” How could they think healing people was bad? How could they think casting out demons was bad? Well, healing and casting out demons wasn’t necessarily bad in and of itself, of course, but what if Jesus was turning people to tr