Simon wrote: It strikes me that our destructive side (sin) is exactly that which makes us want to divide and put boundaries around things. This is precisely the scandal – what Richard Rohr calls the ‘humiliation’ – of grace; we have no control over the loving inclusiveness of God. We are loved and included, even when we don’t want to be.

Another friend asked: Simon, would you like to reflect on Matt.25:31-46 in the light of that?

Simon: Sure. But understand these are musings, and not a final, dyed-in-the-wool, unchangeable viewpoint. I don’t really have a mode that works that way.

So what are the options for understanding this story?

1. Let’s try taking it literally. Any traditional ‘justified by grace’ person must be horrified by this story. Works gets you into heaven! You mean all I have to do is feed the hungry, and I’ll have eternal life? How many hungry do I have to feed before I make the grade? How many prison visits is the cutoff before I get in? It quickly degenerates into farce.

2. Let’s take it as an allegory of Christians (sheep) vs. non-Christians (goats). In this case, it’s virtually unintelligible: I know many more non-Christians who do the things on that list than I do Christians. In fact, in my experience, most people who call themselves ‘Christian’ would actually shy away from many of these things.

So maybe it’s saying that those who do these things are the true Christians? Again, this is justification by works, and there are a whole lot of atheists who are actually Christians (which I’m not claiming as impossible by the way, but most people who call themselves Christian would be horrified at the prospect).

3. Let’s try spiritualising it. Jesus is not talking about real hunger or real imprisonment here: he’s talking about spiritual hunger and spiritual imprisonment. Well, number one Jesus would have had no concept of such a separation. Number two, why doesn’t he say spiritually hungry instead of just hungry?

4. (Here’s where I lean) Let’s take it as a story about the way the world works. This is descriptive of what happens, not as an eternal reality but a natural consequence of our actions. The point is: here is what makes for life (sheep side): here is what makes for death (goat side). Embrace life. But know that every person (you, me and Hitler) falls on both sides of the great divide to some extent.

I think Jesus is doing a couple of things here: one, he’s turning the whole traditional sense of righteousness on its head. He uses their own understanding of the way the world works (the typical winners and losers) to flip their values upside down, in a similar way to the beatitudes and the rich young ruler. Being with the poor and the imprisoned or the naked are what makes for true life.

Again, I think Girard’s scapegoating mechanism is instructive here. It’s too easy to use this story as a tool for self-righteousness. For example, how many people on this list honestly place themselves on the goat side, despite rarely if ever doing any of the things on that list, or racking your brains to think of times you’ve fed the hungry, etc to justify yourself? And as I already said, how many times would you have to actually have to do those things to get on the sheep side? Or is feeding the hungry and visiting the imprisoned just a “state of mind”?

This story is used (or abused) in liberal circles much more to look down their noses at those who don’t do “social justice”. And this is deeply unhelpful, because again it’s projecting the evil in oneself onto the other; thus making them a scapegoat and making yourself self righteous.

And while we’re on the existence of evil as a dividing line – if we claim that Jesus already has the victory, that he’s already won, then surely we must claim that evil has been swallowed up in that victory. There is nothing that evil can do to us. Even ultimate evil – Jesus’ murder – was redeemed. Dare we claim it as impossible for the evil we are victims of, let alone the evil we perpetrate? If God can redeem my own evil, God can redeem all evil. Thus, even evil is no longer a dividing line because of God.

This strikes me as incredibly good news. Evil is dead! Jesus Christ is victorious! (Lord help me to live into that…)

I’m not sure I’ve articulated it terribly well, but there it is, for what it’s worth.

Pace, Simon

http://smoyle.blogspot.com.