A couple of weeks ago, a beautiful story made its way around the internet. In April, Pope Francis was visiting with the children of a working-class parish in Rome. The children took turns asking the pope questions. One little boy, probably about 7 or 8, however, lost his nerve when he approached the microphone, and he started to cry. So the pope urged the little boy to come up to him and whisper his question. Pope Francis embraced him and they spoke to each other in whispers, and then the little boy returned to his seat. The Pope then said the little boy, named Emanuele, had given his permission for the Pope to share what was troubling him.
The little boy’s father had recently died, and had been a non-believer. However, even though a non-believer, he had had his four children baptized, and had been a good man and a beloved father. The boy’s tears for his father, which the Pope characterizes as “brave,” proved that Emanuele’s father had been a good person.
“Is my father in heaven?” the little boy worried.
“The one who decides who goes to heaven is God,” the Pope explained. “But what is God’s heart like with a dad like that? What? What do you think?” he asked the crowd of schoolchildren. He paused. “A Father’s heart. God has a dad’s heart. And with a dad who was not a believer, but who baptized his children, and gave his children that courage, do you think God would leave him far from himself? Do you think? Speak up, with courage.”
The crowd murmured, “No!”
“Does God abandon his children?” the Pope continued.
“No!” the crowd responded, stronger this time.
“Does God abandon his children when they are good?”
“No!” came the immediate response.
“There, Emanuele, is your answer,” the Pope said, looking at the little boy now in his seat. “God surely was proud of your father because it is easier as a believer to baptize your children than when you are not a believer. Surely this pleased God very much.”
The pope makes an important point here. We humans are the ones who try to limit and create barriers—and we are really good at doing that, even in the Church. In doing this, we diminish God and try to control God’s grace. This tends dangerously toward the original sin of Adam and Eve—of deciding that we know better than God does.This story has captured the hearts of thousands—especially those who have been told they are outside the circle of salvation because of some reason—whatever it is, it’s based on others’ judgment of sinfulness.
The Episcopal Church is certainly not immune to this kind of exclusionary thinking, either, Three years ago, when we last encountered these readings, national news picked up the story of a controversy over baptism that came out of the Diocese of Central Florida. Two men who were parishioners at the diocesan cathedral there in Orlando adopted a little boy, and of course wanted him to be baptized. However, at the last minute the baptism was postponed when some complained about baptizing the child of two gay men. Eventually, the baby WAS baptized—but the irony of this situation coming up at the same time we hear our lectionary readings decry denying baptism to anyone was not lost on many of us.
The question both the eunuch and Peter ask still obviously has relevance for today. For years, now, many denominations been wrestling with a much shorter version of Peter’s question: Who can deny baptism to those who ask (or in this case, whose parents ask)? How do we know that THIS incident isn’t the Holy Spirit moving among us?
The image the pope used in helping the children imagine God was that of a loving parent—a loving father, in this case, especially since that was what young Emanuele was missing most. In our gospel today, Jesus too, speaks of God as a father, one whose love is unfailing. “As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you; abide in my love. If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father's commandments and abide in his love.”
This is a continuation of last week’s discussion about the vine. The fruit of the vine is love. The least mysterious thing about the mystery of the Trinity as we see it in our readings today is that love binds Father, Son, and Holy Spirit is a sacred dance: God loves Jesus, and Jesus loves God enough to come to us, and the Spirit empowers us through love to participate in the life of God Godself. We are drawn into that dance also through being loved and by loving. We are bound up in love with God the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, which allows us to share in God’s will through our obedience to God’s commandments. And, as Jesus reminds us repeatedly through the gospels, the greatest commandment is love.
Thus, Jesus again gives the disciples “his” commandment: That we love each other as Jesus has loved us. Yet this commandment isn’t all that “new:” This wording is very similar to that John 13:34-35, where Jesus says, “I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”
Jesus then explains what this means: that we be willing to lay down our lives for our friends—and that includes Jesus as well as each other. We have been chosen by Jesus, not the other way around, and made the friends of Jesus by his sharing his knowledge of God with us, and then trusting us to use that knowledge to help establish God’s kingdom on earth. Jesus models his love for us in being willing to lay down his life for HIS friends- us. And perhaps “friend” is too mild of a word—in Greek, philos can better be translated as “loved one.” This is awe-inspiring- that each one of us continue to be loved and treasured by our living, risen Savior, who continues to live in each of us and in the Church—especially in our better moments. And when we fail, we are still loved, and strengthened to start again.
Our gospel makes it clear that that God’s victory is not won through might, or force, but through LOVE. And embodying that love that we receive from us is how we bear good fruit as branches of Jesus the True Vine. As Peter and the other disciples experienced in the Book of Acts, God’s Spirit of Love obeys no human limitations. The abundance of this love calls us to a life of courage allow the Spirit of God, the Spirit of Love, to move within our lives and help us break down those barriers to which we cling, barriers that we think will make us feel safe—but often only leave us feeling more alienated and isolated than ever.
The Spirit of Love still moves where she will, urging us to the knowledge that God shows no partiality. Our Risen Savior breathes the Spirit upon us so that we can bear Christ into the world as true disciples. My UCC friends have a slogan: God is still speaking.
God’s revelation to us did not end 2000 years ago on a cross, or even 400 years later when the Bible was assembled. Revelation of who God is and what love God calls us to continues, even today.
One of the problems with the Biblical literalism that often undergirds is based on is that it denies the agency of God through the Holy Spirit in our lives today. And too often that outlook tries to draw bright lines about who is in, and who is out, who is a child of God and who is not, who is worthy of the name of “children of God”—and who is not. It also fossilizes Christ as a figure from the past who lived 2000 years ago but not now. It denies the ongoing power of the Holy Spirit to break through our knowledge to new understanding of who God is and who God calls us to be.
We are an Easter people. We proclaim a living, risen Savior. Either we believe that Jesus lives, and that the Holy Spirit was sent to us to continue to reveal who God is to us, or we deny a whole chunk of the Christian witness, then and certainly now.
Who decides—God, or us? Who are WE to deny baptism to anyone who asks? Who are we to limit God’s action and put fences around grace? Jesus reminds us again in our gospel that our lives are meant to be lived for others and for God, grounded in love. If we spend our lives worrying about whether we ourselves will get to heaven in the next life, we end up with our priorities going the wrong direction. We spend our lives then concerned about ourselves, rather than about others or about God.
Ultimately, it’s not up to us who goes to heaven, as the Pope pointed out. As we have heard repeatedly throughout the witness of scripture, God’s mercy is broader than our mercy. We can’t earn our way into salvation. Rather, salvation is rooted right here, right now. The kingdom of heaven is becoming—right now, right where we are. As disciples, we are called to the joy of working toward that kingdom, toward reconciliation, toward justice and mercy intertwined that leads to true peace. The fruitfulness we produce is a life lived grounded in love, which means directed outward to others. This is the life God has created all of us to live, since we are all children of God—you, me, Emanuele, and Emanuele’s father and even the Pope.
We are known as Christians by our love—by the fruit we produce to build up the kingdom of God, whose foundation in love. As Pope Francis pointed out, the fruit of the father’s life that we had before us in this short episode showed a life grounded in love, especially in love for his children that lives on in his children. That’s why the Pope calls him a good man. His life was fruitful, even if not formally grounded in faith.
Pope Francis reassured Emanuele and all of us that God never gives up on us. The witness of scripture throughout time is that God never gives up on us even though at times we may waver and give up on God. Again and again, we all fall short of doing what we ought to do. We embrace doing things that we shouldn’t that harm our relationship with others-- and with God.
God is not done with us yet, nor is God done revealing who God is in the world. As our psalm reminds us, we are called to sing a NEW song because God IS doing new things, right before our eyes. God is calling us to actually live into the words we profess, especially during Easter, that Christ IS Risen, and that God’s love never fails. Can we open our minds to the possibility that what we say is true, and that God is alive and active in the world? And then can we live that for others, for love’s sake?
As the old song goes, there’s a wideness in God’s mercy, like the wideness of the sea. That mercy manifests itself in God’s repeated pursuit of us, even when—especially when—we stray from obedience to God’s command to love. God chooses us as beloveds of God; as the Pope reminded young Emanuele, and God’s love will not admit defeat. And Alleluia for that!
Amen.
Readings:
Acts 10:44-48
Psalm 98
1 John 5:1-6
John 15:9-17
Links/References:
The story of Pope Francis and Emanuele can be found in many places, including at America Magazine: https://www.americamagazine.org/faith/2018/04/16/my-dad-heaven-little-boy-asks-pope .
Helpful commentary about the theology of the Pope's remarks is found here: https://www.americamagazine.org/faith/2018/04/19/was-pope-francis-right-tell-child-his-atheist-dad-may-be-heaven .
Video of the encounter:
Photos:
(1) Pope Francis comforts Emanuele, from America Magazine.
(2) Jesus blesses the children, Greek icon.
(3) Psalm 139:1-2 illustration.
(4) Banner carried during march in St. Louis, October, 2014, by Leslie Scoopmire.
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