Note: See how similar is the Franciscan
view of salvation as a nonviolent process to the Orthodox view, and
how radically diferent from the juridical emphasis that dominates
mainline Catholicand almost all Protestant and Evangelical
atonement theories (based on the view of an angry God – as opposed
to a loving one, who had to punish his Son in order to be able to,
again, reluctanty, love his human creatures).
_______________
In the thirteenth century, the Franciscans and the Dominicans
invariably took opposing positions in the great debates in the
universities of Paris, Cologne, Bologna, and Oxford. Both opinions
usually passed the tests of orthodoxy, although one was preferred.
The Franciscans often ended up presenting the minority position.
Like the United States’ Supreme Court, the Church could have both a
majority and a minority opinion, and the minority position was not
kicked out! It was just not taught in most seminaries. However, it
was taught in some Franciscan formation centers, and I was a lucky
recipient of this “alternative orthodoxy” at Duns Scotus College in
Michigan from 1962-1966.
I share this background to illustrate that my understanding of
the atonement theory is not heretical or new, but has quite
traditional and orthodox foundations, beginning with many
theologians in the Patristic period.
Thomas Aquinas and the Dominicans agreed with Anselm’s (by then
mainline) view that a debt had to be paid for human salvation. But
Franciscan John Duns Scotus (c. 1266-1308) said that Jesus wasn’t
solving any problems by coming to earth and dying. God did not need
Jesus to die on the cross to decide to love humanity. God’s love
was infinite from the first moment of creation; the cross was
Love’s dramatic portrayal in space and time. That, in a word, was
the Franciscan nonviolent at-one-ment theory.
Duns Scotus built his argument on the pre-existent Cosmic Christ
described in Colossians and Ephesians. Jesus is “the image of the
invisible God” (Colossians 1:15) who came forward in a moment of
time so we could look upon “the One we had pierced” (John 19:37)
and see God’s unconditional love for us, in spite of our
failings.
The image of the cross was to change humanity, not a necessary
transaction to change God—as if God needed changing! Duns Scotus
concluded that Jesus’ death was not a “penal substitution” but a
divine epiphany for all to see. Jesus was pure gift. The idea of
gift is much more transformative than necessity, payment, or
transaction. It shows that God is not violent, but loving. It
is we who are violent.
Duns Scotus firmly believed that God’s freedom had to be
maintained at all costs. If God “needed” or demanded a blood
sacrifice to love God’s own creation, then God was not
freely loving us. For the Franciscan school, Jesus was
not changing God’s mind about us; he was changing our minds about
God. If God and Jesus are not violent or vindictive, then our
excuse for the same is forever taken away from us. If God is
punitive and torturing, then we have permission to do the same.
Thus grew much of the church’s violent history.
Jesus’ full journey revealed two major things: that salvation
could have a positive and optimistic storyline, neither beginning
nor ending with a cosmic problem; and that God was far different
and far better than religion up to then had demonstrated. Jesus
personally walked through the full human journey of both failure
and rejection—while still forgiving his enemies—and then he said,
“Follow me” and do likewise (see John 12:26; Matthew 10:38). The
cross was not necessary, but a pure gift so that humanity could
witness God’s outflowing Love in dramatic form.
|
|
Filed under: Catholic, Orthodox, Theology Tagged: Anselm, Duns
Scotus, Franciscan, Richard Rohr, substitutionary atonement
