Al Owski’s Reviews > The Universal Christ: How a Forgotten Reality Can Change Everything We See, Hope For and Believe > Status Update

“scapegoating characterizes much personal, political, and public discourse. People on the Left accuse the Right of being merely "pro-birth" while being pro-war and pro-gun… People on the Right accuse the Left of being "pro-abortion"…and thus not "pro-life"… By concentrating on the other group's goat, both sides can avoid being completely consistent. …works quite effectively to keep both of us from being honest.”

“A Christian is invited, not required, to accept and live the cruciform shape of all reality. It is not a duty or even a requirement as much as a free vocation. Some people feel called and agree to not hide from the dark side of things or the rejected group, but in fact draw close to the pain of the world and allow it to radically change their perspective.”

“Christians are meant to be the visible compassion of God on earth more than "those who are going to heaven." They are the leaven who agree to share the fate of God for the life of the world now, and thus keep the whole batch of dough from falling back on itself.”

“Jesus the Christ, in his crucifixion and resurrection, "bring all things together all things in himself…" (Ephesians 1:10). This one verse is the summary of Franciscan Christology. Jesus agreed to carry the mystery of universal suffering. He allowed it to change him ("Resurrection") and it is to be hoped—us, so that we would be freed from the endless cycle of projecting our pain elsewhere. ”

“Hear Jesus's words in John's Gospel: "I did not come to condemn the world, but to save it" (12:47), or in Matthew: "Come to me all you who labor and are overburdened, and I will give you rest.... for I am gentle and humble of heart. Yes, my yoke is easy and my burden is light" (11:28-30).”

“Girard understands Hebrews's frequent "once and for all" language (7:27, 9:12, 26, 10:10) in a quite definitive way as the end of any need for any sacrifices by which to please God. The problem of divine love is settled forever from God's side. In our insecurity, we keep recreating "necessary sacrifices." ”

“It is not God who is violent. We are.
It is not that God demands suffering of humans. We do.
God does not need or want suffering—neither in Jesus nor in us.”

“"Go, learn the meaning of the words, 'what I want is mercy, not sacrifice'!" Jesus said throughout the Gospels (Matthew 9:13, 12:7). He was quoting the prophet Hosea, who further added, "I want knowledge of God, not your holocausts" (6:6). Notions of sacrifice keep us in the retributive—justice framework and outside of the essential Gospel of grace and undeserved love.”

“Far too many evils have been committed in history under the manipulative cry of "sacrifice," usually violent and necessary sacrifice for an always "noble" cause. … But I believe Jesus utterly undoes the very notion of sacrificial requirements for God to love us—first in himself, and then in all of us.”

“The Franciscans, however, led by John Duns Scotus (1266-1308), refused to see the Incarnation, and its final denouement on the cross, as a mere reaction to sin. Instead, they claimed that the cross was a freely chosen revelation of Total Love on God's part. In so doing, they reversed the engines of almost all world religion up to that point, which assumed we had to spill blood to get to a distant and demanding God.”