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The passage from Wisdom does suggest a helplessly benevolent God who wills the salvation of all. The fact is, He is merciful towards all that He has created and He desires to save. And that is heartening to hear. Yet, in the Gospel we clearly have someone who failed the criteria for inclusion. An innocent tax collector Zacchaeus was not. He was a treacherous traitor, a brazen blackmailer and a shameless sinner. To figure out the animosity against him, picture a Jewish Nazi-sympathiser who profits from selling out his own countrymen to the SS-Gestapo. Maybe we can resonate better with an example closer to home: scammers who prey on the vulnerable, relieving the unsuspecting victims of their hard-earned savings.
So, are there people who by virtue of who they are and what they do beyond the pale of salvation? Like Zacchaeus who because he was a tax-collector was unquestionably condemned beyond salvation. Like the hated legions of anonymous scammers who should be banished. Or could it be that we need a category more wretched than we are to feel good about ourselves? Many amongst us struggle with recurring sins and also repeated failures to repent and reform our lives so much so that we have given up hope on ourselves. In other words, the greater our resistance to change, the easier it is to spot the sins of others. Generally, a person with a judgemental attitude often finds it easier to condemn others than to work on his own conversion.
Conversion draws our attention to a feature in God’s salvific will which is succinctly captured by the author of the Wisdom. What we might miss out is compounded by a phenomenon called the “snowflake” syndrome. Firstly, the Book of Wisdom depicts a God who, little by little, corrects and admonishes those who offend or sin. The challenge for snowflakes is that they “bruise” easily. In this part of the world, such a condition is aptly labelled as the “strawberry” generation. Abusive or offensive, notwithstanding, employers can relate how the present batch of employees is easily hurt and demoralised when corrected. Overly emotional and incapable of dealing with opposing opinions will only make the path to conversion a bit more difficult. When one is easily offended, it will be difficult even to accept God’s gentle admonition or correction.
Going by the current standard, Zacchaeus would have been the perfect candidate deaf to the soft promptings of God. Given his stature and status, he should be offended even by a whisper of a criticism. Yet there seemed to be a certain humility with which he responded to the crowd. Though he sounded defensive, he stood his ground to ask for reasonable justification for their condemnation. “I may have been unjust but, pray do tell, how I have been unjust and I will make good of it”.
It may not be purely “hyper-sensitivity” or touchiness alone which makes hearing God next to impossible. In fact, this Gospel narrative is a call to conversion but the scrutiny is naturally focused on Zacchaeus because he is the “evil” one, the condemned tax-collector. What may escape our spotlight is the nameless one in the crowd murmuring against Jesus. He stands as custodian of norms accepted. He is the standard who castigates Jesus or anyone breaching the laws of propriety.
Jesus repeatedly transgressed the taboos set up to “protect” the virtues of the self-righteous. He frequently dined with sinners—adulterers, prostitutes, tax-collectors and the likes. “Who is in or out?” misses the point that God is relentless in searching for souls to save. This means we have to respond and in Zacchaeus, he recognised the need for reparation for the sins he may have committed.
When God searches, we need to reciprocate. So, when the new translation for the Roman Missal came out 2011, there were objections to the phrasing of the Consecratory Prayer over the chalice. “Pro multis” which refers to God’s salvific will was corrected from “for all” to “for many”. You remember the formula “It will be shed for you and for all men”? Compare it “Which will be poured out for you and for many”. Now, it is true that Christ died for all humanity but what the “restricted” translation affirmed is that each individual must also accept and live the grace won by Christ in order to attain eternal life. “For many,” asserts that salvation is not automatic because it cannot be forced upon a person. In the case of Zacchaeus, “Reparation” symbolised his intent on following Christ illustrating that discipleship has a price.
Without conversion, we can become a Church of Pharisees gather to congratulate ourselves. Whether or not we agree with the criteria set by the “crowd” or the single Pharisee, the point of being “in or out” has always been moral, that is, our actions have consequences. Today our dilemma being “in or out” revolves around whether or not we think like the ascendant group or subscribe to a set of approved behaviour. An observable case is how the net of homophobia is cast wider and wider to include anyone who even dares to disagree with the growing acceptance of same sex marriage, never mind whether it is a moral act or not.[1]
The morality of “in or out” in the exclusion of Zacchaeus shows that the criteria of inclusion must be tied to salvation and eternity. To be “in” is to be saved. It comes with a price which Zacchaeus was conscious of when he asked for proofs of his injustice and the assurance of the reparation he would make. It does not matter who we are or where we have been. It matters that we are changed or transformed. The case of Zacchaeus was an early version of identity politics and the failure to appreciate that it is not who we are that saves us. Rather it is the challenge of where we have been and if we are heading in the right direction of eternal life. The question is “Are we ready to pay the price for our salvation?”.
At the heart of this drama involving a midget of man is conversion. For our generation, what complicates this journey towards transformation is the dilemma posed by identity politics. In a sense, identity politics reflects our fascination with definition, statistics or better still, the delineation between “in or out” based on ideology. Identity politics can canonise us into specific behaviour[2] while failing to recognise that at the heart of being “in or out” is conversion. “In or out” can be made clearer by asking what the goal of salvation is. Let us be clear that God wills the salvation of all. The question is “For what?”. Does it mean that Christ saves us so that we can live forever on earth? No, the correct answer is “I came that you may have eternal life to the full”
The present ideology expects forgiveness from a loving God forgetting the corresponding responsibility of cooperating with His grace of conversion. Grace has never been cheaper in an entitled world that demands pleasure without accepting its purpose. There are many obstacles to discerning God’s outreach to us. In fact, Satan is doing all he can to ensure that we may never hear God. This is not blaming “poor” Satan for our failures but highlighting that the blindness of identity politics can prevent us from hearing God. “In or out” used to be a moral question. Today it is a matter of security or strength in numbers. But “quantity” or number is no indicator of rightness of our action or the guarantee of our salvation. Just because everyone bribes the police does not render corruption less immoral. Instead, “in or out” is “qualitative” in the sense that to be “in” qualifies us for heaven and inclusion is always dependent on following Christ and living His moral commands or imperatives, no matter how unpopular they may be. We pray for courage. We ask for humility.
Addendum
Earlier I mentioned about same sex marriage etc. I have never in my so many years preaching said anything about it. Why? It is not easy because you know stories can change. Stories have changed. Stories will change. Our neighbour down south has legalised homosexual acts between consenting adults. With regard to SSM, you need the PM and all the all farts of his generation to die off before the conversation changes.
In the past, when abortion was being pushed, the slogan was “My body, my choice”. Nobody, not even the Church or God can tell me what to do with my body. It is my choice to keep or abort the baby. Then came Covid and the emergence of the Vaccine. Suddenly, “My body, my choice” lost its currency because vaccination was being forced onto people. Ask Novak Djokovic. “His body, his choice” was no longer valid for him. He was banned from the Australian and the US Open. In the Church what happened? “Your body, your choice” became “No Vaccination, No Communion for you”. In short, people paid the price for upholding what was once “sacred” to the abortion industry.
With regard to sexual mores, in the beginning, the conversation of same-sex attraction centred on sexual behaviour. Why? Behaviour has a moral component to it because it deals with relationships. Even between a man and a woman. How should both behave with each other? For example, can a married man have a sexual relationship with a woman other than his wife? You know the answer.
However, “sexual behaviour” gave way to “sexual preference”. We enter the familiar territory of “my body, my choice”. Morality is not much of a consideration because my behaviour is an expression of my preference. There is greater autonomy here. Soon enough, “sexual preference” opened up the space for “sexual orientation” to flourish. Here, there is even less room for morality here because the origin of one’s behaviour is now transferred to nature. Very easily, the language shifted to one’s “sexual identity”. Think of Lady Gaga’s “I was born this way”. That is the narrative now, morality plays no part. If anything, God is to be blamed for making you this way.
I am not interested in judging people. (1) Life is short. (2) Life is tough. I empathised with people who have same sex attraction. I also empathise with a serial adulterer. A man or woman who cannot be faithful to the spouse is struggling in the area of sexual behaviour. In such a situation, what does “I was born this way” mean? If a man were to say, “I was born to have sex with every woman with or without her consent”, what is our take on this? Perhaps we should use another example because sex is a private matter that no government or religion should intrude. Say, “I was born with this murderous rage inside me that I am fulfilled only when I kill”. What is our response?
“I was born this way” becomes moral as soon as it involves another person. Here is the confusion that has taken place between what is possible and what is permissible. They are not the same. It is possible to have sex with every woman but is it permitted? When science which excels in the art of possibility (because we have technical prowess) is divorced from God, then science will confuse what is possible with what is permissible. Is it possible to manufacture a baby? Yes, it is. Buy some ova from a woman who needs money. Fertilised them and pay a woman to surrogate an embryo. Do we need to question the morality of these possibilities? People are afraid to debate simply because cancel culture uses the fear of labels to silence people. “You homophobe, you hater, you racist, you misogynist”.
Now that we exist solely (or are trapped) in the realm of the possible, the challenge for the Church is immense. When the “marker” for salvation is placed within the boundary of possible, then the “teaching” of the Church with regard to the morality of behaviour must change to accommodate what is possible. If identity and not moral behaviour becomes the central “marker” for salvation, then the Church must change her “teaching” if she is not to be labelled a “hater”. When morality is no longer guided by permitted behaviour, then heaven has to be an entitlement. If the Church alters her moral teaching, then we must ask if she is still the Church founded by Christ when He returns or if like Moses coming down the mountain, we are found worshipping the golden calf that we have fashioned ourselves, to validate our behaviour.
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[1]It used to be a moral matter. “Sexual behaviour” touches on morality because it involves relationships. Later the behaviour evolved into “sexual preferences”. To prefer exhibits autonomy as it is linked to one’s choice. However, preference gave was to “sexual orientation” which is even less “moral” because it expresses “who I am” rather than “what I do”. Naturally orientation has morphed into “sexual identity”. Think Lady Gaga, “I was born this way”. If identity and not moral behaviour becomes the central “marker” for salvation, then the Church must change her “teaching” if she is not to be labelled a “hater”.
[2] For instance, the destruction of masterpieces of art in order to stop the use of oil. What sort of behaviour confuses beauty of the past with the viability of the future?
