By far the biggest religious story in the news this week has
been the impending resignation on 28 February of Pope Benedict XVI on grounds
of failing physical and mental health. It is a story of the acceptance of
personal responsibility. As John Paul II’s closest adviser, Benedict when still
Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger had seen the previous Pope incapacitated by ill health in his last months and
clearly decided that for this to happen again would be detrimental to the
interests of the Catholic Church.
The news of Benedict XVI’s impending resignation came
against the backdrop of another story, from the world of British domestic
politics, stretching back to the year 2003. It was in that year that a
candidate for election to the leadership of one our political parties persuaded
his then wife to claim that she, and not he, had been driving in excess of the
speed limit and therefore should receive three penalty points on her driving licence
(which, if he had accepted the penalty would have resulted in his receiving a
ban from driving). For ten years, the politician lied about his decision and
only faced up to his responsibilities and resigned his seat in Parliament last
week. The case against his former wife for perverting the course of justice
continues. She claims to have been coerced by her husband into accepting the
penalty points. Neither former husband – the ex-politician – nor former wife, it seems, have
been prepared to accept personal responsibility for their decisions at the time.
The acceptance of personal responsibility by the
Christian is our theme because it is a central concern for Lent. In our
liturgy, we hear in Psalm 51 king David accepting responsibility for his
actions and asking for forgiveness by God. It’s a good place to start, and much
more satisfactory than Genesis 3:12, where Adam seeks to shirk his
responsibility for eating the apple which had been strictly forbidden (cf.
Genesis 2:17) by telling God that ‘the woman whom Thou gavest to be with me’
had passed him the forbidden fruit. ‘It wasn’t my fault, guv’, we can almost hear
in Adam’s words. ‘It was the woman what led me astray.’
It is perfectly possible for the believer to hear the
words of Jesus and to ignore them: Jesus’ parable of the man who builds his
home on rock and the other who does so on sand is interpreted as the one who
hears Jesus’ words and acts upon them,
as against the one who does not (Matthew 7:21-28). Again, the emphasis is upon
the personal responsibility of the believer. ‘Repent,
therefore, and turn to God so that your sins may be wiped out…’ we read in Acts 3:19.
God has set the standards for
which we are responsible and by which we are measured. They are explained in
His law as revealed in Scripture. It tells us what is good and what God
requires of us. ‘He has showed you, O man, what is good’ we read in Micah 6:8. ‘And
what does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk
humbly with your God.’ Some day all of us have to give an account for our sins
of commission and omission. ‘For we must all appear before the judgment seat of
Christ, that each one may receive what is due for the things done while in the
body, whether good or bad’ (2 Cor. 5:10). Chapter 20 of the Book of Revelation
has a graphic image of the book of life: ‘And
I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne, and books were
opened. Then another book was opened, which is the book of life. And the dead
were judged by what was written in the books, according to what they had done’
(Revelation 20:12). Salvation is not only based in faith but in repentance of
sin. Repentance is not just asking for forgiveness, as does the penitent thief
hanging on the cross next to Jesus (Luke 23:42). Repentance is forsaking sin
and trusting in Jesus Christ (metanoia). We are all called to make an active choice to
trust in Jesus Christ.
‘Dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return’ (Genesis 3:19) the priest
pronounces at the imposition of the ashes of Ash Wednesday. It is intended to
provide us with a sober appraisal of the context of our existence. That context
is dust. Indeed, it is in our dust that we are saved.
We know that the Word became flesh like us. ‘“The flesh is the hinge of salvation”
(Tertullian). We believe in God who is creator of the flesh; we believe in the
Word made flesh in order to redeem the flesh; we believe in the resurrection of
the flesh, the fulfilment of both the creation and the redemption of the flesh’
(Catechism of the Catholic Church, para 1015).
The Word also became dust like us. ‘Rightly understood’, Karl Rahner writes,
“you are dust” ‘is a complete expression of life.’ Rahner continues: ‘When on
Ash Wednesday we hear the words “remember you are dust” we are told then
that we are brothers and sisters of the incarnate Lord. We are told
everything that we are: nothingness that has been filled with eternity; death
that teems with life; futility that redeems; dust that is God’s life forever.’
So when we hear the words that we are
dust, these are not a source of despair, but the best words we will ever hear.
It is in our dust that we are saved. But it can only be thus if we accept our
personal responsibilities first. We return to the words of Karl Rahner in his
essay Dust You are: ‘flesh designates
not only the pivot and hinge of the movement into nothingness and death, but
also the pivot and hinge of a movement that passes through death’s nothingness
and forlornness into life, into eternity, into God. Ever since
that moment, the sentence of terrifying judgment, “dust you are” is changed for the person of faith and love. The old sense is
not abolished; the old sense must be endured and experienced in tears, in the
bitterness of nothingness and death, in evil and dying, in the bitterness of
limitations. But the downward motion of the believer, the descent with Christ
into the dust of the earth, has become an upward motion, an ascent above the
highest heavens. Christianity does not set us free from the flesh and dust, nor
does it bypass flesh and dust; it goes right through flesh and dust.’
Thus, death is not the end of our dust.
The cross is our sign. It signifies what Paul proclaimed without ceasing: ‘If
the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised
Christ Jesus from the dead will give life to your mortal bodies also through
His Spirit which dwells in you’ (Romans 8:11).
