HOMILETIC & PASTORAL REVIEW
June 1991
FATHER, FORGIVE THEM
by Fr. William G. Most
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Jesus prayed that the grace of forgiveness be offered; that does not mean
to say that all to whom it was then being offered accepted it.
"FATHER, FORGIVE THEM"
By William G. Most
"Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do." These few words
from the Cross contain a great puzzle.
Some modern writers have said the most distinctive feature about Jesus was
that he forgave sins "without asking for any repentance": he welcomed and
ate with prostitutes and publicans and if he asked for a change of heart,
he did that "after" accepting them, not before.1 So these words from the
Cross seem to be precisely a forgiveness without any repentance at all. At
the very moment when his enemies were putting him to a terrible death, he
excused them, asked for forgiveness for them. Further, since he had said
and knew that "I and the Father are one" (John 10:30), his request could
not go unanswered. So it would seem they were forgiven in the very act of
sinning.
Could we explain away the problem by saying that they really "did not know
at all" what they were doing? Hardly. They had seen his wonders, his cures,
his exorcisms. They knew he was a true prophet, at the very least, and a
holy and wonderfully good man. The thing they did not know was that he was
divine--but they must have known more than enough beyond that point to be
guilty, hideously guilty.
So, unless we wish to go along with Luther's famous dictum, "Even though
you sin greatly, believe still more greatly"2 we will instinctively think
something is wrong.
And there is something wrong: even though Jesus shows a heroically kind
disposition, we cannot believe that he was almost giving permission in
advance to sin by not asking for repentance as a condition of forgiveness.
So we must take refuge in some distinctions. It is one thing for Jesus, for
the Father, to be willing to forgive; it is quite another thing for the
sinner to actually take in, to receive the forgiveness. For what is
forgiveness? It is not, as Luther thought, a merely forensic or external
thing, declaring innocent or "acquitting" one who really is still totally
corrupt inside. Rather, forgiveness means the infusion of grace into the
soul, to really make it holy; forgiveness does not mean simply "acquitting"
the guilty, while leaving them totally corrupt.
Therefore, Jesus did ask for the grace of forgiveness. His prayer was
surely heard, for at the very moment he was painfully earning the very
thing he asked for. And of course, since he knew he was/is God, he himself
granted what he himself asked.
In brief, then, he did ask that the grace of forgiveness be "offered." That
does not at all say that all to whom it was then being offered accepted it.
Sadly, as St. Paul laments at length in Romans 9-11, most of them did not
accept.
Why then did he ask for this grace for them? We can easily see two reasons.
First, he wished to show the marvelous mercy of God. It was so great as to
call for pardon for sinners in the very act of the worst conceivable sin.
Second we need to notice that there is a difference between vengeance and a
desire that "all righteousness be fulfilled" (Matt. 3:15), as Jesus said
when John did not want to baptize him.
REPARATION IS A LOST CONCEPT
There is a major lost concept in today's theology. Perhaps we should say
not lost, but rejected so strongly that it is hardly ever mentioned. Paul
VI gave one of the greatest Magisterium texts on it at the very time when
it was being suppressed: "Every sin brings with it a disturbance of the
universal order, which God arranged in His inexpressible wisdom and
infinite love."3 This is the thought of Psalm 11.7: "God is "Sadig"
[morally righteous] and He loves "sedagoth" [morally right things]." So if
what is objectively right is violated, the Holiness of God wants things put
right again.4 Hence Paul VI continued: "So it is necessary for the full
remission and reparation of sins . . . not only that friendship with God be
restored by a sincere conversion of heart, and that the offense against His
wisdom and goodness be expiated, but that all the goods, both individual
and social, "and those that belong to the universal order, lessened or
destroyed by sin, be fully reestablished," either through voluntary
reparation . . . or through the suffering of penalties."
An ancient Rabbi, Simeon ben Eleazar, writing about 170 A.D. and claiming
to quote Rabbi Meir from earlier that century gave us a helpful image to
grasp this picture: "He [anyone] has committed a transgression. Woe on him!
He has 'tipped the scale to the side of debt for himself and for the
world'"5 So the sinner takes from one pan of the scales what he has no
right to take: the scale is out of balance. The "Holiness" of God, loving
all that is good, wants it rebalanced. How? As Pope Paul VI said, it is
done by reparation or by enduring penalties. If a sinner stole property, he
begins to rebalance by giving it back; if he stole a pleasure, he begins to
rebalance by giving up some other satisfaction he could otherwise have
lawfully had. Jesus owed nothing, but to fully rebalance he gave up
infinitely more than all sinners together had taken.6 His Mother, as Pope
John Paul II wrote, shared in that work by the "obedience of faith," by her
taking part in "perhaps the deepest "kenosis" [self-emptying] in human
history."7 Further, " . . . as a sharing in the sacrifice of Christ--the
New Adam--it [her faith/kenosis] becomes in a certain sense 'the
counterpoise to the disobedience and disbelief embodied in the sin of our
first parents.'"8
VENGEANCE WILLS EVIL
But vengeance or revenge is quite different from the desire that the
objective order be rebalanced. Vengeance means willing evil to another so
it may be evil to him. The martyrs under the altar in the beautiful image
of Apocalypse 6:9-11 ask God to rectify the order in respect to their
blood. Being with God, they cannot have any attitude of vengeance, though
some unfortunate translations of the verse do use that word.
It is safe for the martyrs who are with God to desire that rebalance; it
would have been safe for Jesus to express that too. But he wished to teach
us that even though his desire for rebalance is legitimate, in fact, even
excellent, yet it is highly dangerous. For human weakness is apt to have a
hard time refraining from sliding over the line from a legitimate desire
for the rebalance of goodness, to a desire for revenge. Hence Jesus willed
to give us the example: On this side of the great divide, we do well to
refrain from a desire that in itself is legitimate. He gave us the example.
David, at the time when the son of Shimei cursed him, meekly ordered his
men not to strike the offender (2 Sam. 16:5-13). Yet at the end of his life
he instructed his son Solomon not to let the man go unpunished (I Kings 2:8-
9). That was not illegitimate, if meant as a desire for the rebalance of
all goodness. Yet Jesus taught us by his example it is better in this world
to abstain from that sort of desire.
We mentioned in passing that Jesus knew he also was the one who forgave: "I
and the Father are one." Pope John Paul II beautifully described the state
of his consciousness thus: "If Jesus feels abandoned by the Father, He
knows, however, that this is not really so. He Himself said, 'I and the
Father are one.' (Jn 10:30), and speaking of His future Passion He said; 'I
am not alone, for the Father is with me.' (Jn 16:32). Dominant in His mind,
Jesus has the clear vision of God and the certainty of His union with the
Father. But in the sphere bordering on the senses, and therefore more
subject to the impressions, emotions, and influence of the internal and
external experiences of pain, Jesus' human soul is reduced to a wasteland,
and He no longer feels the presence of the Father."9 Within a human being
there are many levels of operations, both in body and in soul. It is quite
possible at times that the "fine point of the soul" as St. Francis de Sales
called it,10 may be in calm and sunshine, while all the lower slopes are
plunged in bitterness and darkness.
It was precisely within this terrible darkness that he asked for--and as
God offered--forgiveness. Sadly, most of those present would not accept
this tremendous
"HE WHO HEARS YOU, HEARS ME"
This pain of his soul was always present, during his whole previous
lifetime. Pius XII in his Encyclical on the Mystical Body, told us that
from the first instant of conception, his human soul saw the vision of
divinity, in which all knowledge is to be had--including that of his future
sufferings. It is not irresponsible of Pius XII to say this--as some have
asserted. He was not writing in the context of an imagined medieval scene,
but in the context of the modern debate on the consciousness of Christ,
sparked in the writings of Galtier in 1939.11 The same Pius XII insisted in
Humani generis" in 1950[12] that if the Popes in their "acta deliberately
take a stand on a matter then debated by theologians, it is removed from
debate, and the teaching comes under the promise, "He who hears you, hears
me." Of course, the promise of Christ cannot fail. Pius XII reiterated his
teaching in "Sempiternus rex,"13 and in "Haurietis aquas."14 The Doctrinal
Congregation under Paul VI lamented that many were still not accepting this
teaching.15 It is obvious that these two Popes, by repeated statements,
meant to make the teaching definitive.16
So it was then, in the context of the culmination of a lifelong nagging
pain (cf. also Luke 12:50; John 12:27) that burst into nightmare that Jesus
prayed, in order to teach us how to live: "Father, forgive them."
ENDNOTES
1. Cf. the review, by Donald Senior, of E.P. Sanders, "Jesus and Judaism"
(Fortress, Phila., 1983) in "Catholic Biblical Quarterly," July 1986, pp.
570-71.
2. Epistle 501, to Melanchthon, Aug. 1, 1521, in "Luther's Correspondence,"
(Lutheran Publication Society, Phila, 1918. 1l, p. 50).
3. Paul VI, "Indulgentiarum Doctrina," Jan 9, 1967. AAS 59.7.
4. The Anselmian theory said God "had" to provide compensation, an error,
and also said it was basically God's justice that was involved. We do not
deny the relation to his justice, but if we center our position on that
some will say: "If I am offended, I do not always demand justice. Why
cannot God be nice about it?" But if we say, correctly, it is his Holiness
that abhors all evil and wills all that is right, we bypass the objection.
5. Tosefta, Kiddushin 1.14.
6. Many theologians today are in despair of explaining the "price" of
redemption, mentioned by St. Paul in I Cor. 6.20 and 7.23. They notice that
Satan was the captor, and refuse to think the blood of Christ was given to
him. On the other hand, the Father was not the captor, and so did not
receive the price. But the words about a price are metaphorical. That does
not mean they have no content, but it does mean we may need to adjust the
meaning in a sort of analogical sense. Here we propose that the "price" was
to rectify the objective order, willed by the Holiness of God .
7. John Paul II, "The Mother of the Redeemer," March 25, 1987, Vatican
Translation 18.
8. "Ibid" par. 19.
9. General Audience, Nov. 30, 1988.
10. St. Francis De Sales, "Treatise on the Love of God" 9.12 and 9.3.
11. DS 3812. Cf. P. Galtier, "L'unite du Christ--Etre, Personne,
Conscience," (Beauchesne, Paris, 1939).
12. DS 3885.
13. DS 3905.
14. DS 3924.
15. AAS 58, 659-60.
16. It is a generally accepted theological principle that if a doctrine is
taught repeatedly on the Ordinary Magisterium level, that teaching is
infallible.