I was raised Roman Catholic. Many things about the church puzzled me, Good Friday perhaps being the most puzzling of Holy Days. On the lighter side, the kids at Catholic school insisted that it always rained on Good Friday, usually in the afternoon while Jesus was dying on the cross. Whenever it did rain this was seen as proof of something important. When it didn’t rain on Good Friday, that lack of rain was merely an exception to the rule.
Throughout my life, I’ve found that Catholics are very skeptical about religious beliefs . . . well, as long as it isn’t their own beliefs that they are questioning. Growing up Catholic, I always heard about those “bizarre” beliefs of other types of religions. “How could anyone ever believe such silly things?” Catholics would often ask. For reasons I still don’t understand, I found myself asking these same skeptical questions about my own church (and everyone else’s church). I started asking these questions even as a young child. Good Friday has always been the focus for many of my questions, for at least three reasons:
I. False Suspense.
The Good Friday church services were always dreary. Tears were shed, incense was burned, and sad songs were sung. Those attending the services went away from them thinking that all bordering on hopelessness, as though this might be the year that Jesus didn’t rise from the dead. This was puzzling to me, given that Easter was already marked on everyone’s calendars. The rising was a done deal. They’d already bought their Easter clothes and they’d already rehearsed the Easter service. Even the people who normally didn’t go to church had marked Easter services on their calendars. Why the remorse on Good Friday? Why the surprise three days later?
II. Contradictory Meat Rule.
Canon Law still prohibits [1] Catholics from eating meat on Fridays. On the other hand, Catholics are encouraged to go to Communion on holy days like Good Friday.
Here’s the wrinkle: The Catholic doctrine of transubstantiation [2] holds that the Eucharistic elements of bread and wine are changed into the body and blood of Jesus during Consecration. Therefore, the host that Catholics commonly eat on Good Friday is meat. It follows, then, that taking Communion on Good Friday violates Canon Law because it is the act of eating meat on Friday.
III. Non-Sequitur.
What if you noticed that someone killed your pet dog and the culprit turned out to be the kid next door? You ask him: “Why did you kill my dog?” He answers: I killed him so that I could I could wear a blue shirt.” You respond: “What?? Wearing a blue shirt has nothing to do with killing my dog. That’s a non sequitur! You could have worn a blue shirt without killing my dog!” You would think that the kid was vicious and immoral.
Then consider this: If you ask a Christian why Jesus had to die on the cross she will also answer with a non-sequitur: Jesus died to save us from our sins.” This time-worn answer is also a non-sequitur. It seems logical to so many people simply because it has been repeated so often.
But allowing His Son to be killed isn’t the only way for an omnipotent God to forgive us our sins. God is allegedly . . . God! He can do anything in any way He chooses. [One exception: philosophers have long agreed that God’s inability to do self-contradictory acts (like making a rock so heavy that He can’t life it) is not really a limit on his power.]
Forgiving us our sins is something that an omnipotent God can do in a thousand ways. He could forgive us our sins by wiggling His Nose, waving his Hand, or singing a little song like “I Absolve Your Sins, You May Live in Peace” (sung, roughly to the tune of Row Row Row Your Boat). Since He’s omnipotent, he could even just decide “I forgive their sins.” With that one mighty Thought, all of the sins of the world (and even the sins of all sentient life forms sprawled across the entire universe) would be instantly and permanently forgiven. It would be that easy for an Omnipotent God and I have yet to meet a praying person who denies that God is Omnipotent.
God’s omnipotence is troubling to me because it makes the death of Jesus gratuitous and violent, i.e., gratuitous violence. Believers often tiptoe around God’s long history of gratuitous violence. The Bible tells us that God has been part of scores of murderous rampages based upon the most minor of transgressions. For example, note the following [3] from Judges 21:8-10 (NIV):
Then they asked, “Which one of the tribes of Israel failed to assemble before the LORD at Mizpah?” They discovered that no one from Jabesh Gilead had come to the camp for the assembly. For when they counted the people, they found that none of the people of Jabesh Gilead were there. So the assembly sent twelve thousand fighting men with instructions to go to Jabesh Gilead and put to the sword those living there, including the women and children.
For a much longer list of God’s destruction of human beings, see http://www.skepticsannotatedbible.com/int/long.html [4] . I realize that God later clarified his position [5] regarding indiscriminate killing.
That someone has a habit of engaging in gratuitous violence does not justify such behavior. That’s what we’d say to any mass murderer, though Believers make this puzzling exception for God. Killing one’s Son is a disturbing act. Decent human beings don’t condone such behavior except when it is the only way to accomplish something extremely important. God’s followers plainly admit that God is omnipotent; therefore He had other ways to get the job done. The Martian anthropologist would say it thusly: Because there are safer and easier ways to save the People, don’t slaughter your son to get the job done.
Further Thoughts.
In case it’s not obvious, I don’t believe that the Christian mysteries are literally true. Nonetheless, I do believe that proclamations of faith can be important for believers even though they are not literally true. Mysteries of Faith are commonly and publicly proclaimed by Believers as displays of loyalty to the church community. Such mysteries are like flags. Flags consist of colors and shapes devoid of any intrinsic meaning. Same thing with oxymoronic declarations of faith. It is impossible to understand assertions that there are three persons in God or that a virgin had a baby. Nonetheless, these articles of faith are important as salient rallying points for groups of people working to maintain a sense of community.
Though largely untrue, the lore of Good Friday is important, then. It is important for the many believers who look to these bizarre and self-contradictory stories as a way to kindle their sense of community with each other.
My difficulties with the mysteries of the church are not meant as an attack on those Believers who are good-hearted, decent and tolerant. There are millions of such people, many of whom are my close friends. I’ve been inspired by their deep generosity, their willingness to help desperate strangers and their willingness to speak out whenever they see injustice and intolerance.
May those Believers find further motivation for continuing to be good-hearted, decent and tolerant on this Good Friday!
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