My grandfather sometimes used to get into fights with other boys on the way home from school. When I was young he used to tell me, the fights were always round the issue of him being Salvation Army and them being Catholic. The irony is that as an adult his sister Grace married a Catholic. My mother, whenever she speaks of her Aunty Grace always remembers her husband in those terms. I am sure she has mentioned his name but the stronger memory for me is Aunty Grace and her Catholic husband.
I have a sense that you have only to scratch the surface of any one of us, & there is some kind of prejudice shaping our decisions. It’s natural ! It helps us to give order to the world. Prejudice gives us an efficient way of setting boundaries, of filtering experience – of keeping ourselves and our loved ones safe. Yet the effect of prejudice is that it always keeps the people we are stereotyping at arms’ length – typecasting them into caricatures and cardboard cutouts instead of living, breathing people like you and me – complex and conflicted.
I’ve been reading the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew’s Gospel this past week again, focusing particularly on the Golden Rule. The Golden Rule says, “In everything do to others as you would have them do to you; for this sums up the Law and the Prophets” (Mt7:12). This verse has it’s foundation in the much older book of Leviticus that says, “But the stranger that lives among you shall be like one born among you, and you will love them as you love yourself, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt” (Lev19:34). So the sense of Jesus teaching here is an openness to others, that breaks down prejudice, creating space to encounter all people as image bearers of God himself.
Over the years I have met too many evangelicals who are willing to right off a major part of the Church because Catholics don’t profess to be saved or born again like they are.
During the week I was reading a piece in the paper by a young catholic professional, Rachel Patterson. After all the media hype surrounding the Pope’s visit and World Youth Day, I found it a refreshing read. Let me share some of the highlights…
“At the core of catholic faith is the belief that Christ is God and God is love. As followers of Christ we are called to love God and one another. As such, for Christians, life is not a meaningless experience but a beautiful, sometimes difficult thing to which there is a purpose other than mere self-satisfaction”.
“At the heart of Catholic moral teaching is an understanding of freedom that contrasts sharply with popular notions of choice. For most people, freedom is simply the ability to do what they want. For the Catholic Church, freedom is the is the ability to do good. It is easy to do what we want. It isn’t always easy to do what is right. And when we choose to do right by another, especially when it isn’t our inclination or in our interests to do so, we exercise our capacity for love. In other words, love isn’t just some gooey emotion we feel for our parents, children or significant other… ”.
“Some people… question why the church persists in having so many rules –especially when it comes to sex… [Why] does it ask us to keep sex within marriage [?]… Not because the church is scared of human sexuality. Sex is understood as something created by God and, therefore, a… good and beautiful thing. It can, however be misused and when it is we can hurt people and ourselves. Far from being oppressive, church teaching on sex is meant to be liberating”.
“It can be lonely leading a life that is counter to the prevailing moral norms. For many of the young adult making the trip to Sydney for World Youth Day, it is one of the few times in their lives that they will be surrounded by other young Catholics in a decidedly Christian atmosphere. To them I say, enjoy. Your faith is a gift and you do not need to apologize for it or isolate it from the rest of your life”.
“But the stranger that lives among you shall be like one born among you, and you will love them as you love yourself, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt”.
Allowing the stranger to draw near… This is why the Golden Rule is golden.
