Bits of the Gospel

I now remember the witty words of Dietrich Bonhoeffer: "Cheap grace is the mortal enemy of the Church.[...] Cheap grace is preaching forgiveness without repentance; it is baptism without the discipline of community; it is the Lord's supper without confession of sin; it is absolution without personal confession. Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without the living, incarnate Jesus Christ." And without being aware of what we are asking for, we want to obtain what we do not know. Good Friday, for instance, is the event [sic, the experience!] that frees us from thinking about small gains in order to ponder on our own personal fate, about the ultimate meaning of all life. And yet, many abhor the Good Friday, all set to grab the sweet glory of Easter. Easter, in fact, is a big and loud 'No' to cheap grace, if cheap grace were to be understood in terms of separation of the Good Friday experience from the Easter glory!

Easter is a period full of meaning for the believer because besides the many times that we hear the "doubting Thomas" syndrome, we also hear the consoling "they saw and believed". I've been rethinking my choices in these days. Resurrection does not mark the end of suffering. If it does, it also marks the end of suffering for Pilate too! Pilate was not free: conditioned from without and yet from within truth echoing, he suffered. He was troubled. But the Risen Lord gives the Pilates of this world freedom to choose the truth, the voice echoing within. That choice must always involve some suffering. Believe me then, Easter does not mark the end of suffering. Resurrection is the end of the rule of pettiness, the inability to see beyond. The human heart is a courtroom wherein truth can be exposed and embraced or veiled and ignored. The fact is like in every courtroom, if justice is not done, if truth is not embraced, people will fuel hatred. Yes, because justic...