{"id":17748,"date":"2019-02-05T08:21:24","date_gmt":"2019-02-05T13:21:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/?p=17748"},"modified":"2019-02-05T08:28:38","modified_gmt":"2019-02-05T13:28:38","slug":"jesus-and-the-cross-changing-perspectives","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/?p=17748","title":{"rendered":"Jesus and the Cross; Changing Perspectives"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Jesus and the Cross<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/cac.org\/changing-perspectives-2019-02-05\/\"><strong>Changing Perspectives<\/strong><\/a><br>\n<strong>Tuesday, February 5, 2019<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/-4Nx2hEhVRE\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n\n\n<p>When we look at history, it\u2019s clear that Christianity is an evolving faith. It only makes sense that early Christians would look for a logical and meaningful explanation for the \u201cwhy\u201d of the tragic death of their religion\u2019s founder. For the early centuries, appeasing an angry, fanatical Father was not their answer. For the first thousand years, most Christians believed that the sacrificial death of Jesus on the cross\u2014the \u201cprice\u201d or the ransom\u2014was being paid not to God, but to the devil! This made the devil pretty powerful and God pretty weak, but it gave the people someone to blame for Jesus\u2019 death. And at least it was not God.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Then, in the eleventh century, Anselm of Canterbury (c. 1033\u20131109) wrote a paper called <em>Cur Deus Homo? <\/em>(<em>Why Did God Become Human?<\/em>) which might just be the most unfortunately successful piece of theology ever written. Thinking he could solve the problem of sin inside of the medieval code of feudal honor and shame, Anselm said, in effect, \u201cYes, a price did need to be paid to restore God\u2019s honor, and it needed to be paid to God the Father\u2014by one who was equally divine.\u201d I imagine Anselm didn\u2019t consider the disastrous implications of his theory, especially for people who were already afraid or resentful of God.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In authoritarian and patriarchal cultures, most people were fully programmed to think this way\u2014working to appease an authority figure who was angry, punitive, and even violent in \u201chis\u201d reactions. Many still operate this way, especially if they had an angry, demanding, or abusive parent. People respond to this kind of God, as sick as it is, because it fits their own story line.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Unfortunately, for a simple but devastating reason, this understanding also nullifies any in-depth spiritual journey: <em>Why would you love or trust or desire to be with such a God?<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Over the next few centuries, Anselm\u2019s honor- and shame-based way of thinking came to be accepted among Christians, though it met resistance from some, particularly my own Franciscan school under Bonaventure (1221\u20131274) and Duns Scotus (1266\u20131308). Protestants accepted the mainline Catholic position, embracing it with even more fervor. Evangelicals later enshrined it as one of the \u201cfour pillars\u201d of foundational Christian belief, which the earlier period would have thought strange. Most of us were never told of the varied history of this theory, even among Protestants. If you came from a \u201claw and order\u201d culture or a buying and selling culture\u2014which most of us have\u2014it made perfect sense. The revolutionary character of Jesus and the final and full Gospel message has still to dawn upon most of the world. It is just too <em>upending<\/em> for most peoples\u2019 minds until they have personally undergone the radical experience of unearned love. And, even then, it takes a lifetime to sink in.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Jesus and the Cross Changing Perspectives Tuesday, February 5, 2019 When we look at history, it\u2019s clear that Christianity is an evolving faith. It only makes sense that early Christians would look for a logical and meaningful explanation for the \u201cwhy\u201d of the tragic death of their religion\u2019s founder. For the early centuries, appeasing an [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17748"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=17748"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17748\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17750,"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17748\/revisions\/17750"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=17748"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=17748"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=17748"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}