Burn the Heretic!

Every time I hear the sad story of Michael Servetus, part of me screams out “What in the world was he thinking when he went to Geneva?” Geneva was under the rule of John Calvin. This is the same John Calvin who taught that each of us is predestined since the dawn of creation to go either to hell or to heaven after we die—and that the odds were that we were going to hell. It was Calvin who deeply influenced the American Puritans. In fact, Calvin’s influence on American Protestantism is still pervasive. Among other things, Calvin advocated a strict and literal interpretation of scripture—a view that expresses itself in American fundamentalism.

Several years before Servetus went to Geneva, Calvin had said that if Servetus ever came there that Calvin would try to see to it that Servetus did not get out alive. What could have possessed Servetus to go to Geneva?

Sure enough, Servetus was recognized and arrested shortly after he arrived. He endured a trial that went on and off for months. And, finally, Calvin saw to it that he was condemned to death. Rather than take the relatively humane option of beheading him, the authorities chose the horrible torture of burning him slowly at the stake.

His crime, as we heard in this morning’s grisly reading, was a theological difference with Calvin that most of us today would find trivial. How in the world does a man from a village in northern Spain end up getting executed for heresy in Switzerland?

Miguel Servet was born in 1511 in the obscure town of Villanueva, about a hour’s drive today from the city of Zaragossa in the province of Aragon in northeastern Spain. He came from a reasonably prosperous family who could afford an education. When he was only sixteen, as was then common, he entered university in Toulouse, a southern French city on the other side of the Pyrenees.

This was a time of immense intellectual and religious ferment. The Reformation was spreading through much of Europe. The relatively recent explosion of printing presses across Europe made all kinds of works accessible, including the Bible. Up until then books were copied by hand, typically by monks. It was not unlike the explosion of information we have seen with the internet. In Toulouse Servetus read the Bible for the first time. Already as a young man he was troubled by the doctrine of the Trinity, which he saw as a great obstacle to extending the Christian faith to Jews and Muslims who considered the Trinity a form of polytheism. When he read the Bible as a student he was surprised to find that the Trinity is nowhere mentioned in the scriptures.

Servetus had entered into the service of Juan Quintana, a scholarly monk, at age fourteen. After two years at university, Servetus, now eighteen, was recalled to the service of Quintana, who had just been appointed confessor to Emperor Charles V. Servetus was part of the group who accompanied the emperor to Italy for his coronation by the Pope. (He was already emperor; this was like a religious wedding ceremony after a civil marriage.) That coronation was a spectacular, lavish affair. Records show that carved lions spouted red wine from their mouths while carved eagles spouted white wine. It made a deep impression on the eighteen-year-old Servetus. He felt revulsion at the pomp and majesty. He would later describe his horror at seeing the Pope borne upon a chair carried by princes as people along the streets fell to their knees in adoration.

Servetus left the service of Quintana shortly thereafter. He made his way to Basel in Switzerland and then to Strasbourg. It was there, at the age of nineteen or twenty, that he published, in Latin, his first book, On the Errors of the Trinity. It was published, as the verdict in Geneva stated, in the village of Hagenau near Strasbourg. The book caused quite a stir. Servetus naively thought that simply pointing out the errors of the traditional theology would cause the Protestant reformers to change their position. Instead, his book was widely denounced and often confiscated by authorities.

Servetus then made his way to France. He spent some time in Paris, there studying medicine and mathematics. Later he moved to Lyon in the south of France. Because of all the controversy his book had caused, he changed his name to Michel de Villenueve, essentially French for Miguel of Villanueva, his childhood home. He supported himself by editing books for publishers and later by practicing medicine. As evidence of his wide learning and restless intellect, he is credited as the first person to publish the finding that the heart sends blood to the lungs for aeration. And as evidence that the specialization that we take for granted did not then exist, this scientific finding was published in a work of theology.

He lived in hiding in southern France under his assumed name for more than a decade. However, he never stopped thinking about theology and never gave up his dream of somehow rescuing Christianity from its doctrinal errors. He began working on another book, The Restitution of Christianity.

Calvin had come to power in Geneva. Servetus saw an opportunity to affect the course of Christianity by convincing Calvin of the correctness of his, Servetus’s, views. He began a correspondence with Calvin. He used his new name, but Calvin instantly knew who was writing. Servetus, as is too often the behavior of those who are sure they are right, adopted a condescending tone in his letters to Calvin. Servetus began sending what were manuscript chapters of the Restitution of Christianity. Calvin, a bit miffed, wrote to Servetus that he was too busy to write entire books in response, especially since what Calvin had to say was already contained in his book, The Institutes of the Christian Church. Calvin sent Servetus a copy of the Institutes. Servetus annotated the copy with insulting comments and returned it to Calvin. Altogether Servetus sent thirty long letters of disputation to Calvin. If the truth be known, Servetus could be a pretty prickly character. During this time Calvin wrote to a colleague, “Servetus has just sent me, together with his letters, a long volume of his ravings. If I consent he will come here, but I will not give my word, for should he come, if my authority is of any avail I will not suffer him to get out alive.” Sadly, a number of people did not get out alive from Calvin’s Geneva. In a five year period from 1541 to 1546 a total of 58 people were executed. Geneva was a city of only 15,000 then.

When Servetus’s new book, The Restitution, was published in 1553, Calvin quietly sent word to authorities in southern France that Servetus was living there and practicing medicine in the town of Vienne under his assumed name. This caused the Inquisition to investigate and then to arrest Servetus. He was jailed, but escaped — apparently with a little help from the jailer. He was condemned to death by the Catholic Church and later burned in effigy. The Restitution of Christianity caused such a stir that all copies were ordered burned. Only three copies are known to have survived.

After his escape, for some reason that is still a mystery, Servetus went to Geneva. He was recognized and arrested immediately. His trial went through all kinds of delays and dragged on for months. Finally, as we saw, he was burned at the stake. He was bound with chains, green oak branches and logs were piled up. A wreath of straw was placed on his head. Servetus cried out in agony as the fire started. In half an hour it was over.

Luckily it is easier to be a heretic today than it was in sixteenth century Europe. You and I should be grateful for that, for everyone in here today is a heretic. The root of the word heretic comes from a Greek word meaning “to choose.” In other words, a heretic is someone who chooses to reject an accepted teaching — someone who chooses to think for him or her self. Servetus was a heretic because he read the scriptures and came to a conclusion about the Trinity that was not in accordance with orthodox teaching. Heretics are stubbornly independent. Heretics do not take things on authority. Heretics ask questions. How often have I heard one of our members recall being the kid who would ask tough questions at church. If the earth is young, where did the dinosaurs come from? Where is heaven? Does God really send people to hell who have never heard the gospel? How do we know that what is in the Bible is true?

We are a congregation of heretics! We are part of a movement of heretics. Heck, we honor heresy and advocate it! We come from a long, long tradition of heretics, too many of whom lost their lives.

What does it mean to live as a heretic today? You and I, thank heaven, will probably not be burned at the stake for thinking for ourselves. But that doesn’t mean we won’t get burned in other ways.

At the most basic level, living as a heretic takes a personal toll. As we heard in Joe Stone’s chalice lighting, to disagree with the teachings of a church can lead to estrangement from friends and family. Most of us in here today have paid that price at some level — and are paying it still. Some of us have families who are terrified that we are going to hell. We have to deal with awkward situations at family gatherings. Funerals can be especially difficult. At work or at school we sometimes feel that we have to do our own version of living in France under an assumed name; we know we hold opinions that might get us into trouble or strain relationships. We hide behind a false front. Our children often feel like outsiders among their religiously conservative classmates.

Life as a heretic means needing to make lots of decisions about when to speak up and when to bite our tongues. When do we let things slide and when do we take a stand? How do we decide when to keep silent and when do we feel compelled to speak out? How much are you and I willing to risk for what we believe? There is no easy answer.

We heretics need to be especially careful, for we often share the naivete of Michael Servetus. At some level Servetus always believed that if he could just show people the error of their thinking that they would change their minds. Boy, I wish I had a thousand bucks for every time I have rather innocently raised some issue and have been shocked by the emotional defensiveness which my question or suggestion provoked. I recall once when I was around twenty trying to be helpful by pointing out to the head of a training program that what she was doing wasn’t very effective. I even made several helpful suggestions. I got burned big time. I have been burned more than a few times in my life for being a bit too open about what I thought. I bet it has happened to you, too. We heretics tend to be naive about how easily someone might feel threatened. We do our little mini versions of going to Geneva all the time.

The fact is that heretics are dangerous to those in power and authority. That is why those in power react so strongly. At some level Calvin knew that if he allowed Servetus to spread doubt about Calvin’s doctrines on the Trinity and infant baptism that it would undermine his authority and the authority of the church. Heresy is always anti-authoritarian. That is why the powerful try to stamp it out.

The path of the heretic is a difficult one. No one is going to do our thinking for us. No one is going to give us all the answers. There are plenty of risks.

Yet once you and I begin on the path of heresy, it is almost impossible to turn back. We cannot ever believe orthodox teachings in the same way again, even when we try to.

So you and I are destined to live our lives as heretics. We cannot go back. We must go forward together.

How are we to live as heretics today? We heretics need to stick together. We need to take comfort and strength from being together. We need to learn from one another.

Beyond that, I believe we heretics should celebrate heresy. We should be living witnesses that being open to new ideas is good. We need not accept old teachings uncritically. Let us bear witness that we need not all think alike, but that we can love alike. We can be compassionate together. We can accept one another and even delight in our differences. We can raise children without brainwashing them.

We are a congregations of heretics. I think that’s wonderful. I wouldn’t have it any other way. How about you? Take my hand. Let us be happy heretics together.