The Masala Saints: St. Bartholomew

Welcome to Masala Chai Theology with Father Joash: a space to spice up our spiritual journeys with ancient, Empire-resisting, and precolonial Christian ways of understanding God and neighbour - in ways that risk upsetting our Empire-shaped religious palate. This space builds on Fr. Joash’s bestselling book, The Justice of Jesus, which you can buy here for 30% off plus free shipping (US only) or wherever you get your books / audiobooks globally. Paid Subscribers are Fr. Joash’s inner circle of chai conversation partners who generously support his ministry as a priest and public theologian. If you’d like a Paid Subscription to Masala Chai Theology but are unable to afford one in this season, just reach out and we’re happy to arrange one for you.

Welcome to a brand new (sporadic) Masala Chai Theology series - The Masala Saints!

This series was born of out a realization I had after posting my most recent Substack piece - Why Charlie Kirk *Is* An Evangelical Saint. One of my core arguments is this piece (albeit behind the paywall) is that a core reason for Charlie Kirk being venerated as a saint is because the evangelical tradition generally does not acknowledge the ‘communion of saints’ (to borrow language from the ancient Creeds) of the rest of the Global Church. So of course evangelicalism has a narrow imagination for the attributes of a saint.

Here’s a part of what I shared from behind that paywall:

If you grew up evangelical like I did, this one is going to require some extra wrestling. But I trust you to be spiritually mature enough to wrestle with it so hang in there with me!

Growing up evangelical, I was raised to think that most Christians around the world were evangelical too. But statistically speaking, most Christians around the world are not evangelical; they’re Anglican, Catholic, and Orthodox.

The Catholic, Orthodox, and Anglican churches globally have hundreds of men and women who are recognized as ‘saints’. Saints aren’t perfect people. In fact, like Charlie Kirk (or you and I for that matter), they’re very imperfect people. But saints are people who persevered in selfless ways to pursue justice and wholeness for the world around them - by being deeply rooted in God’s love. Saints are among the cloud of witnesses we see in Hebrews 12 - people who have gone before us cheering us on, as we run the race marked out for us.

And contrary to what my evangelical teachers taught me, saints aren’t being worshiped; they’re held up as historical Christian witnesses who point us to Jesus or intercede with Jesus on our behalf as believers who are alive in Christ - just like the living saints in your life today would if you asked them to pray for you.

Now, the evangelical tradition doesn’t officially recognize the saints that the rest of the Global Church (comprising the vast majority of Creedal Christians) does. But when we don’t recognize the saints of the historical Global Church, we come up with our own saints to fill in the void of “role models”.

And the bar for unofficial sainthood in the evangelical church is quite low. In fact, it’s basically just, “Believe the right stuff about God and tell others about him. - even if you need to temporarily inconvenience their bodies.”

Perhaps, this is why (as Holly Berkley Fletcher brilliantly points out in her award-winning book, The Missionary Kids - a book I had my Jesus, Justice & Empire students at St. Stephen’s University read this semester) missionary families in the evangelical tradition aren’t just treated as heroes; they’re treated as saints - often to the great harm of their own families when abusive missionaries aren’t held accountable.

Because the vast majority of my Masala Chai Theology readership is evangelical / evangelical-adjacent and given this critique I offer, it’s only fair that I help support the reconstruction of your imagination of ‘sainthood’ in the ‘one holy catholic apostolic Church’ (to borrow Creedal Global Church language again).

Here’s what you can expect from every edition of The Masala Saints: Scripture readings, liturgical prayers, and a brief devotional / reflection on that particular saint - in addition to an Audio version (exclusively for Paid Subscribers). And my hope is to make one of these reflections on a saint available each month.

So without further ado, welcome to the inaugural column of Masala Saints - spotlighting perhaps one of the most forgettable and underrated saints - St. Bartholomew.

“St. Bartholomew stands before us to tell us that attachment to Jesus can also be lived and witnessed to without performing sensational deeds.”

— Pope Benedict

Almighty and everlasting God, who gave to your apostle Bartholomew grace truly to believe and to preach your Word: Grant that your Church may love what he believed and preach what he taught; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

A dispute arose among the disciples as to which one of them was to be regarded as the greatest. But Jesus said to them, “The kings of the Gentiles lord it over them; and those in authority over them are called benefactors. But not so with you; rather the greatest among you must become like the youngest, and the leader like one who serves. For who is greater, the one who is at the table or the one who serves? Is it not the one at the table? But I am among you as one who serves.

“You are those who have stood by me in my trials; and I confer on you, just as my Father has conferred on me, a kingdom, so that you may eat and drink at my table in my kingdom, and you will sit on thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel.”

Have you ever felt ordinary? Yesterday was St. Bartholomew’s Feast Day. Or ‘St. Bartholomew the Ordinary’ as I personally prefer to call him.

St. Bartholomew (believed to be Nathaniel, one of Jesus’ twelve disciples) is perhaps the most ordinary apostle.