“Today
you will be with me in Paradise.” (St. Luke
23.43)
Death and
Dying
The Narrow Gate
and the Broader Road:
What Christ
Really Said about Dying
Many
will hear these words today.
Some have already heard them.
We ourselves
may hear these words today.
What should
give us pause — is that we may die today and NOT
hear these beautiful words spoken to us.
I know that
this is terribly incorrect in contemporary theological circles,
and that it is anathema to suggest such a thing from the ambo.
It is ... somehow scandalous to us, inappropriate, insensitive,
and incorrect.
The Jesus we are taught is
still – some 40 years later – something of a “Flowerchild”
and the Gospels an updated redaction of “Zen and the Art of
Motorcycle Repair” – two phenomena of both fusion and
confusion, a mutilated and unsuccessful attempt at fusing
the East and the West morally, culturally, and spiritually ...
resulting in a confusion of what is authentic to each. Today,
I suppose you would call it a “Remix” — a kind of syncopated
version of the Bible by “Jesus Christ Superstar”.
Nirvana came to Nineveh ...
and somehow it has not yet left
Everyone makes
it there ... at least eventually. Today we have re-christened
it “Heaven” ... once again ... but much of the baggage
that came to Nineveh remains on the steps. “All Dogs Go to Heaven”
— and so do all men. What you do, how you live your life, the
notion of authenticity in your relationship to Christ, and the
various impedimenta to Heaven detailed in Holy Scripture, are
largely beside the point.
You are “saved”
... with your dog.
Heaven is a
given. It is a “right.” It is more than a right, it is an eventuality,
a certainty. After all, didn't Jesus Christ pay the penalty
for your sins and mine? The deal is done. Sit back, enjoy the
“good life” (which, by the way, is not Budweiser and Broadway)
and when the time comes — your time — reap the benefits
of His Passion. There is nothing you must do. Nothing you ought
not do ... at least that will count in the end.
What is more,
you gave a beggar a dollar once, and the Church $5.00
last year!
But I wonder
— and you should wonder — will we hear these blessed
words really spoken to us? Or will death come to us in a thundering
silence ... or worse.
This may surprise
you, and will certainly make you uncomfortable, but the fact
remains that Jesus spoke much of Hell and our need to avoid
it at all costs. It is true. He refers to it many times, in
the clearest terms, and with the sternest warnings. So did
His Apostles.
“Enter
by the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the way
is easy, that leads to destruction, and
those who
enter by it are many. For the gate is narrow and
the way is hard, that leads to life,
and those who
find it are few.”
(St. Matthew 7.13-14)
I won’t belabor
the point. For all your efforts, you cannot reconcile what Jesus
tells you in the verse above, and what your priest or pastor
seems to assure you at the ambo ... concerning the terribly
false certainty of Paradise for virtually all
who pass into death. It is not what Christ said. What He said
makes us nervous, and with good reason. Not everyone goes to
Heaven. In fact, Christ Himself tells us that those who will
find it are few. Not a very satisfactory state of affairs
... is it? It could be worse: you could go on believing that
you can “do your own thing” — and not Christ’s — and still expect
to get to Heaven — until the day you die.
You are being
lulled into a false security .... and you know it. What is worse,
you cease to pray for your dead in your mistaken assurance that
they are already there ... if they make it at all!
In our fear
of confronting Hell, we deny it — no matter what
Jesus says, no matter what He tells us. We will retain
those who will assure us of our salvation, and the salvation
of those we love — and we will flee or effectively fire those
who will not provide that assurance as a given.
Paying Hell to Stay the Hell Away?
“Pass the basket”
as long as your pastor will give you the assurance that Hell
is not a place that you have to worry about ... and if he does
not give you that false assurance, take your money to another
parish where the priest will — as though you could purchase
Heaven itself! ... or pay Hell to stay the hell away ...
For all your
pretenses, in the dark hours of the night and in the lonely
places of the world you are far less assured of hearing these
blessed words than your priest, pastor, or false friend can
convince you. In your heart you have heard stirrings in the
night and whispers you would that you had never heard.
The Good Thief
heard these words on the very cross — and you would hear
them on the comfort of your couch?
God loves
you!
He admonishes you! He ceaselessly encourages you, persuades
you, and implores you! — to that Paradise that He has prepared
for you — and away from that Hell on which
you are bent.
Both are real.
Jesus said so.
It would cost
the thief his life and a tremendous act of faith before he
heard those words.
Do you think
that it will cost less of you?
Geoffrey
K. Mondello
Editor
Boston Catholic Journal
Comments?
Write us:
editor@boston-catholic-journal.com
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