The letter of the law

I recently joined Twitter (we retired people can make time to do these things!) and even more recently got into a very focused discussion arising from the Synod for the Family about remarried Catholics being able to receive communion.

In that discussion it was brought home to me very forcefully that there are huge divides in the Church. 

People who have got to know me have mostly worked out that I have a simple theology and philosophy of life: God made us in his image, so we are all spiritual beings created to mature spiritually and find our way back to God. 

That means that we were all born blessed and gifted - and so the purpose of families and schools and parishes is to help us grow along that path by growing in God, sharing the blessings, and developing the gifts by using them for others.

My key understanding of our Creator is "God is love". 

To me this is very obvious. It is all supported by scripture, the teaching of the Church, and reinforced by the experiences of my prayer-life. Just this week our Pope, speaking of Jesus healing blind Bartimaeus, reminded us that "even though Jesus has only begun his most important journey ... he still stops to respond to Bartimaeus' cry. Jesus is moved by his request and becomes involved in his situation. He is not content to offer him alms, but rather wants to personally encounter him."

Last week I got into discussion with very committed Catholics, members of my Twitter community, who have a strong black-and-white view that mistakes made early in life cut a person off from full participation in the Church for ever. 

My understanding of the conclusions of the recent Synod is that these Catholics may be right objectively - but people in that situation always have the right to a subjective case-by-case review with their priest, and their conscience (which I see as a person's individual developing relationship with God) also plays a part. I do not know any priests in our country who would treat that discussion with a closed mind.

I would feel uncomfortable in a church that cut off prodigal members with no possibility of return.

However, one of the best things about the Catholic church is that there are about 1.2 billion of us. That is far too many for a real community - but when we break ourselves down into real communities, there seems to be a place for most of us. 

That 1.2 billion is about half of the 2.5 billion Christians in the a world of 7 billion. I include these numbers not as a source of pride, but because all 7 billion were created in the likeness of God, and each has a direct link with our Creator. We are together finding the kingdom within us.

Many of those links are tenuous - but on a subconscious level at least, we are each guided by God. Some choose not to listen. Many do not know how to listen (and this includes nearly all of us at some stages in our lives). Listening to God is a skill that most are given as a seed only - and with a responsibility to water and weed and fertilise as we grow. 

Perhaps some very committed people feel safer relying on clear and objective rules and find security there. 

My Twitter friends may find food for thought in St Paul's comment in his second letter to the Corinthians 3:6 ...

God has made us competent as ministers of a new covenant—not of the letter but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.