All Things
Peace on earth and goodwill to All?
It is the Christmas season. Christians celebrate the birth of Jesus who enjoined all to love their neighbor as they love themselves.
That seems familiar, simple and heartwarming until I read this story: “ Asheville City Councilman Cecil Bothwell believes in ending the death penalty, conserving water and reforming government - but he doesn't believe in God. His political opponents say that's a sin that makes him unworthy of serving in office, and they've got the North Carolina Constitution on their side. “
The good people of Asheville and of North Carolina no doubt are also getting ready to celebrate the birth of their Savior. But they interpret Jesus' message rather narrowly: they believe that Jesus told them to love all those who were like them, but to execrate all those who held different opinions.
Was that Jesus' message? Did he say: love all those who are just like you and whom you would have no problem loving? Or did he say love all those whom you find really hard to love?
Christians call Jesus the Prince of Peace. The people of Asheville, North Carolina remind us to ask ourselves and them: peace with whom? Peace with family and friends, or peace with strangers we distrust—with cheats, rapists and murderers? With people who worship different gods, with people who hate us, with terrorists?
Remember that Jesus spent his time with the people most despised in Jewish society of his day, with prostitutes, with tax collectors (tax collectors worked for the Romans, the enemy occupying force in the Jewish land), with simple folk who work with their hands.
Before we allow the Christmas season to dissolve the message of Jesus into fuzzy sentimentalism, we should listen to the question from Asheville: who are the neighbors Jesus told us to love?
- Jesus Of Nazareth: The Infancy Narratives
Pope Benedict XVIIn his book The Spaniard and the seven deadly sins, Fernando Diaz Plaja criticizes what he considers an example of the sin of pride rather common among Spaniards: criticizing a book without having read it. He offers the following example:Literary...
- Dating The Birth Of Jesus Christ
Copy of Raphael's The Virgin of the Rose, by Manuel Alfonseca SantanaI will not enter here into the nineteenth-century debate on the historical existence of Jesus Christ, for after 1926 historical criticism has unanimously accepted...
-
Facing Islamophobia In the face of the current rising tide of racism, in this case directed at Muslims, it is very difficult...
-
The Pope's visit. Pope Francis is popular because, unlike his predecessors, he is not a hard-nosed reactionary. He remembers the political message of the Gospels that Christians must be just and that justice calls for equality....
- Finding Love Or Selling Yourself.
Finding Love or Selling Yourself I heard an ad on the radio for a personal counselor, who promises to pilot clients through the shoals of the dating scene. She called her website “Are you Market ready?” I was intrigued and puzzled by that and looked...
All Things
Peace On Earth, Good Will to All?
Peace on earth and goodwill to All?
It is the Christmas season. Christians celebrate the birth of Jesus who enjoined all to love their neighbor as they love themselves.
That seems familiar, simple and heartwarming until I read this story: “ Asheville City Councilman Cecil Bothwell believes in ending the death penalty, conserving water and reforming government - but he doesn't believe in God. His political opponents say that's a sin that makes him unworthy of serving in office, and they've got the North Carolina Constitution on their side. “
The good people of Asheville and of North Carolina no doubt are also getting ready to celebrate the birth of their Savior. But they interpret Jesus' message rather narrowly: they believe that Jesus told them to love all those who were like them, but to execrate all those who held different opinions.
Was that Jesus' message? Did he say: love all those who are just like you and whom you would have no problem loving? Or did he say love all those whom you find really hard to love?
Christians call Jesus the Prince of Peace. The people of Asheville, North Carolina remind us to ask ourselves and them: peace with whom? Peace with family and friends, or peace with strangers we distrust—with cheats, rapists and murderers? With people who worship different gods, with people who hate us, with terrorists?
Remember that Jesus spent his time with the people most despised in Jewish society of his day, with prostitutes, with tax collectors (tax collectors worked for the Romans, the enemy occupying force in the Jewish land), with simple folk who work with their hands.
Before we allow the Christmas season to dissolve the message of Jesus into fuzzy sentimentalism, we should listen to the question from Asheville: who are the neighbors Jesus told us to love?
- Jesus Of Nazareth: The Infancy Narratives
Pope Benedict XVIIn his book The Spaniard and the seven deadly sins, Fernando Diaz Plaja criticizes what he considers an example of the sin of pride rather common among Spaniards: criticizing a book without having read it. He offers the following example:Literary...
- Dating The Birth Of Jesus Christ
Copy of Raphael's The Virgin of the Rose, by Manuel Alfonseca SantanaI will not enter here into the nineteenth-century debate on the historical existence of Jesus Christ, for after 1926 historical criticism has unanimously accepted...
-
Facing Islamophobia In the face of the current rising tide of racism, in this case directed at Muslims, it is very difficult...
-
The Pope's visit. Pope Francis is popular because, unlike his predecessors, he is not a hard-nosed reactionary. He remembers the political message of the Gospels that Christians must be just and that justice calls for equality....
- Finding Love Or Selling Yourself.
Finding Love or Selling Yourself I heard an ad on the radio for a personal counselor, who promises to pilot clients through the shoals of the dating scene. She called her website “Are you Market ready?” I was intrigued and puzzled by that and looked...