Lord, Liar, or Lunatic

Calvary by Michael Godard

Where can you get accurate, reliable information these days.

I was looking for a particular quote I’d once heard.

So I typed key words into Google.

It found the quote and led me to Wikipedia.

It’s a quote C S Lewis and others had used.

Jesus is one of three things: the Lord, a Liar or a Lunatic.

Jesus said many times that he is the Lord.

As in today’s Gospel when the crowd asked, If you are the Christ, tell us plainly.

He answered, The Father and I are one.

One might argue that that’s still a little vague.

Maybe he just means they’re in agreement.

But there are also many other instances in the Gospels where Jesus indicates that he is God.

He used God’s name for himself when he said, Before Abraham was, I AM.

He said, If you have seen me you have seen the Father.

He praised Thomas for calling him My Lord and my God.

And he said many other things that only God could legitimately say.

He forgave sins, he said he would sit on the throne of judgment.

He said he had the power to lay down his life and take it up again.

It’s occurred to me before that there could be a fourth possibility to C S Lewis’ three.

It could be that the evangelists wrote those things, but Jesus didn’t actually say them.

Not that they were trying to deceive—just taking some artistic license in conveying their story.

But if we start down that path, we soon have nothing that we can accept as the Gospel truth.

The Wikipedia entry had some pretty surprising statements—it said:

New Testament scholars agree, nearly unanimously, that Jesus never said he was God.

It quoted a book by a Protestant theologian named John Hick to support that claim.

I looked for more information on that book and found that its second edition had a new chapter.

Agreeing with that viewpoint and written by a Jesuit theologian, Fr Roger Haight (H-a-i-g-h-t).

That gave me some pause, but then I thought—well he’s only a Jesuit.

(Actually I love the Jesuits; some of my best friends are Jesuits.)

Then digging a little deeper I found that Fr Roger Haight had been silenced by the Vatican.

That is, ordered by the Vatican to cease writing and teaching.

So, clearly the Catholic Church doesn’t share Hick’s supposedly “near unanimous” view.

All in this supposed great majority don’t necessarily contend that Jesus was not God.

They simply contend that he probably didn’t actually say that he was God.

God may have chosen to hide that fact from Himself in His incarnation as Jesus.

So maybe Jesus didn't know with absolute certainty that he was God, 
Until after the Resurrection.

But his earlier statements indicate that, even before his death,

Through his communication with the Father, he did already believe that he was God.

We know we can’t read everything in Scripture literally.

(Although some people try.)

So where do we draw the line?

And now we see that we can’t even assume that everything in Wikipedia is beyond dispute!

What can we rely on?

We have our Church’s long history of inspiration and scholarship to guide us through Scripture.

We have our gift of faith.

We have the Spirit within us.

We can rely on those as we ponder that key question Jesus once posed for his disciples:

But who do you say that I am?

Tuesday 4th Week of Easter

Jn 10:22-30      Read this Scripture @usccb.org