The Power of the Cross

[JW]

As the forum has been fairly quiet in the past few weeks, I thought I'd post a link to a meditative hymn to reflect on the events of Good Friday: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ms-gxEOtLA&feature=related.

Best wishes to everyone involved in Holy Week liturgies this week, as well as those preparing our churches for Easter.

[alan29]

Can I add my good wishes too. You all do a wonderful job in making the meanings more real to people.

[festivaltrumpet]

"Took the blame and bore the wrath"

That sounds like penal substitution to me. A good example of why Catholics should be very wary of importing such material. It is often contrary to the teaching of the Church.

[docmattc]

Best wishes to everyone involved in Holy Week liturgies this week, as well as those preparing our churches for Easter.

Indeed, I suspect most on the forum are now up to their knees in paper organising things for the end of the week. I shall be returning north to play the organ. I've played once since the epiphany so I suspect I'll be somewhat rusty on Thursday evening.

FT, I think you're right. I once had to veto a suggestion of "In Christ alone" for that very reason.

[HallamPhil]

Didn't appreciate the theology or the song but a fine set of teeth!

[JW]

I suspected the issue of penal substitution might arise - it's a big debate in evangelical protestant circles and possibly subconciously part of the reason I posted. However, the words are also capable of being interpreted under more orthodox Catholic atonement/propitiation theology:

'Christ became sin for us' is a reference to 2 Corinthians 5:21.

'I stand forgiven at the cross' could be interpreted in a similar light to "by his wounds we are healed".

It doesn't do us any harm to think/debate about how our salvation is achieved from time to time - whilst remembering that we have to play our part in conjunction with Christ's suffering.

Having said all that, I'm not a theologian and happily bow to the wisdom of you who are more erudite.

[FrGareth]

I suspected the issue of penal substitution might arise - it's a big debate in evangelical protestant circles and possibly subconsciously part of the reason I posted. However, the words are also capable of being interpreted under more orthodox Catholic atonement/propitiation theology...
Having said all that, I'm not a theologian and happily bow to the wisdom of you who are more erudite.

Thank you JW, your post got me thinking...

I remembered that in seminary we were taught several "models of atonement" and I was left with the impression that there were lots of ways of trying to explain how Jesus' death "works" as a means to save us, and that the Catholic Magisterium hadn't particularly ruled in or out the main ideas. But I realised I wasn't clear about what we definitely can't say as Catholics. A little digging found only one clear limitation:

Jesus did not experience reprobation as if he himself had sinned...

The plainest way of putting it, is that we CANNOT say: "Jesus was punished because of my/our sins."

But we can say: "Jesus offered himself to suffer, and his suffering took the place of my/our punishment."

The image used in a well-known story (I think from the Alpha Course videos) is of a judge who, in justice, has to sentence an old school friend to be fined - and then in mercy, pays the fine from his own money. The judge's payment is a gift, not a fine, because it was freely given and not exacted from the judge by anything but love.

I once had to veto a suggestion of "In Christ alone" for that very reason.

I presume we are here concerned with the words:

'Til on that cross as Jesus died
The wrath of God was satisfied
For every sin on Him was laid

If "wrath" is interpreted simplistically - God was angry, had to lash out at someone, and picked on his only Son - then the message is not one we can accept.

But if God's "wrath" (like God's "love") is a theological concept which summarises our understanding that God's nature, as a perfectly Good being, requires God to ensure justice is served; and our understanding of "justice" is that it's not about punishment but about the objective need that reparations be made by someone, then we avoid heresy!

"Every sin on Him was laid?" If God-the-Father laid the sins on Jesus, we have fallen foul of CCC 603. But Jesus certainly took our sins on Himself:

He was bearing our faults in his own body on the cross...

and I think poetic license allows us to say that "what he bore" was "laid on him" even though it suggests (wrongly) that another person was doing the laying.

"Took the blame and bore the wrath"
That sounds like penal substitution to me. A good example of why Catholics should be very wary of importing such material. It is often contrary to the teaching of the Church.

FT has a point here. While I think we can allow "wrath" for the reasons above (and for similar reasons not consider God's "love" for us to be due to a rush of hormones to God's head!), it is difficult to allow the turn of phrase that Jesus took the blame. This strongly implies that Jesus puts his hand up and says, "Father, all this sin is my fault. I deserve to be punished." Reprobation = punishment = blame is the one thing Catholic doctrine doesn't allow Jesus to take on.

The theology of the atonement is filled with theories, phrases, and terminology. When it comes to "substitutionary atonement" or "penal substitution" we must make a clear distinction:

Jesus substitutes himself for us as the one to be punished for our sins - HERESY.

Jesus substitutes his suffering in place of our punishment - GRACE, and one we celebrate and make present at every Eucharist!

Perhaps the words of "Before the throne of God above" get it right:

For God the Just is satisfied
To look on Him and pardon me

- "satisfaction" is a very safe theological term!

... of course, we could go on... and we would find that our concept of atonement is rooted in justice; and our instinct for justice is rooted in incompatible ideas about what is fair. To wit, two children are arguing over a toy. She takes it from him. He says, "It's not fair, I had it first." She says, "It's not fair for you to keep it - it's my turn first." Then the child who actually owns the toy enters the room and demands it back! So always beware when politicians promises a fairer way of doing things: there at at least 3 incompatible deeply-rooted concepts of "fair" in all of us!

[gwyn]

Diolch Tad G.
(Thanks Father. G.)

That was most enlightening.

Gwyn.

[docmattc]

I once had to veto a suggestion of "In Christ alone" for that very reason.

I presume we are here concerned with the words:

'Til on that cross as Jesus died
The wrath of God was satisfied
For every sin on Him was laid

If "wrath" is interpreted simplistically - God was angry, had to lash out at someone, and picked on his only Son - then the message is not one we can accept.

But if God's "wrath" (like God's "love") is a theological concept which summarises our understanding that God's nature, as a perfectly Good being, requires God to ensure justice is served; and our understanding of "justice" is that it's not about punishment but about the objective need that reparations be made by someone, then we avoid heresy!

"Every sin on Him was laid?" If God-the-Father laid the sins on Jesus, we have fallen foul of CCC 603. But Jesus certainly took our sins on Himself:

He was bearing our faults in his own body on the cross...

and I think poetic license allows us to say that "what he bore" was "laid on him" even though it suggests (wrongly) that another person was doing the laying.

Thanks for this Fr Gareth, they were indeed the lines I found troubling. True, we can find an interpretation of the text that avoids heresy, but if the people don't ever hear the interpretation, or indeed any meaty theology, would assume that Occam's Razor applied?

[JW]

Thanks Fr. Gareth, for a very enlightening commentary.