AboutFace

There is a saying in the preaching world: "A good example is the best sermon."

As Christians, we are taught to be good. The Church is not of this world, but as a system of spiritual machination, the goal is to produce saints, as it says in scripture "Precious in the sight of the LORD is the death of his saints" (Ps 116:15). As we know from history, in the saints She has produced (or, rather, recognized) there was great diversity in their modes of sanctity. The goal of Christian life is not uniformity, but conformity--that is, conforming our hearts, wills, and lives to that of our master Christ. 

It is human nature to want to choose the way we serve God; we have a consumer heart, whether we realize it or not, and even if we give up 98% of our lives to Christ, that precious 2% we often reserve the way Ananias and Sapphira held back some of their offering (Acts 5:1-11). Even St. Peter perhaps had this mind when he was given fair warning by our Lord that "Very truly I tell you, when you were younger you dressed yourself and went where you wanted; but when you are old you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will dress you and lead you where you do not want to go” (Jn 21:18). 

And so, we learn to piece together our spiritual and corporal lives in ways that are largely presentable within the Church: feeding the poor, attending Mass, making Holy Hours, being kind and forgiving one another, honoring our religious superiors and authorities, tithing. These are great stories for the local diocesan newspaper or issues of Catholic Digest because they make us feel good. They are what a good Catholic is supposed to do. Because a good example is the best sermon.

But what happens when a Catholic becomes what seems to be a bad example, when they do things that step out of the uniform "good" line and start to make people feel uncomfortable? Our good Lord set the example which he expected us to follow; he began his public ministry helping an embarrassed party with wedding details, cured sick folks, blessed children, and miraculously fed thousands in one sitting. But somewhere along the way, he started making people (namely, the religious authorities and by extension, the Romans) a little nervous. He did things that were 'illegal,' in violation of law and custom. This itinerant preacher's following was starting to swell, and those charged with maintaining order (both religious and civic) were starting to notice, as we see in scripture,

“What are we accomplishing?” they [the chief priests and Pharisees] asked. “Here is this man performing many signs. If we let him go on like this, everyone will believe in him, and then the Romans will come and take away both our temple and our nation.”

Then one of them, named Caiaphas, who was high priest that year, spoke up, “You know nothing at all! You do not realize that it is better for you that one man die for the people than that the whole nation perish.” (Jn 11:48-50)

Our Lord's precedent was not that we become good Jews or good people to gain eternal life, but that we share in his baptism of death (Rom 6:3) to accomplish that purpose. Whether we experience that death literally (in martyrdom) or spiritually (in various desolations and privations), none of us can become united to the risen Christ without drinking the cup of his passion. God does not call all to the witness of physical martyrdom, but to some, he does. We all have our own cross tailor made for us, and we we sin by omission when we attempt to shirk it as he lays it on our shoulders.

Speaking of the cross, it is such a ubiquitous symbol in our religious faith as Catholics that we can become numb to it, a kind of iconoclastic white noise meant for walls and background or necklace chains. It's slightly unbecoming to have actual blood stains in the sanctuary carpet, after all, and hard to raise one's hands in song and praise when you have nails in them that have shattered your second and third metacarpal.

In our faith, we often complain about the people who don't seem to really believe "all this stuff," meaning the articles of faith that inform how we live our lives. Whether you call them cultural Catholics or cafeteria Catholics or what have you, we convince ourselves that because we do believe and profess everything the Church teaches--as opposed to those who don't--we stand justified. We are like the "good Jews" who don't associate with the uncircumcised or eat unclean foods. We want to bathe Christ's whole body when he gives us his soiled feet to wash instead. We make bold proclamations of dying before denying him, but then when a simple servant girl notices our association with him, we denounce him. These are tough lessons, and if you didn't notice, St. Peter had to learn all those aforementioned the hard way. And so do we.

Back to the cross. Christ, by his death on the cross, rebranded it so we could enjoy it's spiritual fruits. Of course Christ was not the first or last to undergo this method of torture and death. But what was the cross a symbol of prior to his resurrection? Who were the ones who were crucified, and why? 

"Crucifixion was fairly broadly practiced in the ancient world, but the Romans used this particularly brutal form of execution as a means of producing social conformity. It was, the Roman politician Cicero says, the “most cruel and hideous of tortures.” The bodies of the condemned would remain on crosses for days. 

Once dead, some were allowed to rot in public, others were taken down and thrown to wild animals, while others were buried. By maximizing the public display of torture the message to onlookers was quite clear: undermine the empire and the same thing could happen to you." [1]

 

Bart Ehrman takes this a step further on the topic of why Romans crucified people and who crucifixion was reserved for:

"The crucifixion was not invented by the Romans, but they used it a lot.  It was thought of as the most horrible, painful, tortuous, and humiliating form of execution possible.   If Romans wanted simply to kill someone without a fuss, there were plenty of other means available – for example, beheading.

But there were lots of special cases.  Two of the most common were low-life criminals and enemies of the state.   These are two very different matters – they are not the same thing.  Low-life criminals would include, for example, slaves who had escaped from their masters and committed a crime.   If caught, a slave could be crucified.   There were two reasons they were subjected to such a tortuous, slow, and humiliating death.

They were receiving the “ultimate” punishment for their crime.  But possibly more important, they were used as a spectacle to warn any other slave who was thinking about escaping or committing crimes about what could happen to *them*.

Worse than escaping as a slave or stealing a horse –very much worse – was opposing the Roman state itself.  This is something the Romans WOULD NOT tolerate.  Enemies of the state were shown what the power of the state was.  And crucifixion was how it was done.   If you were a resistor to Roman military action – crucified.  If you were caught attacking Roman troops – crucified.  If you plotted to overthrow the local Roman government – crucified.

Crucifixion was a particularly poignant statement when it came to enemies of the state.  Those who were opposed to Rome. I don’t mean those who didn’t much like the Romans running the show, those who wished things were different, or even those who hoped something better would come along. But instead, those who actively sought to oppose the state, or at least were *thought* by the Roman authorities to seek to oppose the state.

They were unceremoniously condemned to be crucified precisely in order to show how absolutely HELPLESS anyone is who thinks they can oppose the power of Rome.

Roman power was very real, very tangible, and very palpable.  And it was played out on the bodies of those who tried to oppose it.  Crucifixion was the perfect mode of execution for anyone engaging in, supporting, or endorsing violent opposition to the Roman state.  Do you think you can oppose US?  Well then, this is what we’ll do to YOU to show you how powerful you really are.

Your hands and feet are nailed securely to wood and you are left to hang in a position where you cannot fend for yourself.   You are not able to move your body, wave off the scavenging birds or kick away the roaming dogs.  Powerless to lift a finger to help yourself.  We can do this for you.  And if you oppose our power, this *is* what we will do to you.

Crucifixion was not merely death by torture.  It was a symbolic statement that WE are Roman power and YOU are nothing.  And if you oppose us, we will prove it, by rendering you absolutely, completely powerless, while we wrack your body with pain and make you scream."

I've been thinking about all this in the context of the pro-life witnesses who were recently sentenced on charges of violation of the FACE (Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances) Act. For those who aren't aware of this law here in the U.S., 

The Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act (FACE or the Access Act, Pub. L. No. 103-259, 108 Stat. 694) (May 26, 1994, 18 U.S.C. § 248) is a United States law that was signed by President Bill Clinton in May 1994, which prohibits the following three things: (1) the use of physical force, threat of physical force, or physical obstruction to intentionally injure, intimidate, interfere with or attempt to injure, intimidate or interfere with any person who is obtaining an abortion, (2) the use of physical force, threat of physical force, or physical obstruction to intentionally injure, intimidate, interfere with or attempt to injure, intimidate or interfere with any person who is exercising or trying to exercise their First Amendment right of religious freedom at a place of religious worship, (3) the intentional damage or destruction of a reproductive health care facility or a place of worship. [2]

When I wrote earlier about the gradients of Catholics--from those who "believe all this stuff" to those who don't to those who take it literally and attempt to live it--that same mindset applies to those in the pro-life movement. There are gradients of activism: from 40 Days for Life and sidewalk counseling to the more seemingly "extreme" like Red Rose Rescue who seek to physically "stand in" for the helpless and oppressed by non-violent direct action. What this entails, however, is literally doing so by blocking access to abortion centers and as a result, violating (whether intentionally or unintentionally) the FACE Act (I should note that I find it strangely ironic that articles 2) and 3) group "reproductive health care facilities" with "places of worship"). 

(Edit: from Monica Miller: (Red Rose Rescuers do not block anything during the rescue. That's why we have never been charged with FACE. Also. The 11 years is because these Rescuers were slapped with the additional charge of conspiracy to interfere with civil rights.)

Rescuers might be the pro-life equivalent of St. Anthony at the age of eighteen hearing the Gospel of Matthew (19:21) being read in church about selling all you have in order to be perfect and then....selling everything he had. Or St. Francis standing buck naked in public after removing all his clothes and giving them back to his father, renouncing his hereditary rights. These are pro-lifers who really do not just believe that abortion is the killing of innocent life (as most of us "good Catholics" do), but who also feel that they cannot stand idly by while those innocents are slaughtered. They're not making memes and doing fundraisers. They are simply exercising the logical and compelling action of such truths. Say anything you want about their methods--they are not hypocrites.  

In doing so, however, they stand not just as a witness to the unborn, but a source of discomfort to those (like many of us) who "believe" but do not act (Ja 2:17-18), who would rather venerate the plastic corpus on the wall so as not stain the sanctuary carpet with our own blood. Getting sentenced to 11 years in prison for such an act is not only painful, but humiliating. Because the Church no longer stands against the State (who defends and upholds the legality of such slaughter of innocent life by abortion and who is in bed with the abortion industry) but abets it, one has become not only a literal criminal in the eyes of the state, but a "bad" (ie, 'radical'; ie, one who believes and acts) Catholic, a proper leper among polite Catholic society. 

And when it comes to FACE and the five defendants, that's exactly the point. To alienate, humiliate, and publicly make an example of anyone who may also be considering such sedition against the State (and, by extension, the abortion industry) in the same way crucifixion made an example of criminals and insurrectionists. 

Roman (read: governmental) power was very real, very tangible, and very palpable.  And it was played out on the bodies of those who tried to oppose it.  Crucifixion was the perfect mode of execution for anyone engaging in, supporting, or endorsing violent opposition to the Roman (read: U.S.) state.  Do you think you can oppose US?  Well then, this is what we’ll do to YOU to show you how powerful you really are.

All that being said, I do maintain that just as not all are called to the same martyrdom (or called to physical martyrdom at all), not all are called to be Rescuers. When Christ asks James and John if they can drink the cup he is going to drink, they answer affirmatively, to which Jesus responds "You will indeed drink from my cup" (Mt 20:23). We all must drink the cup of suffering as Christians and we all must heed our consciences always and without exception as well, but that will look different for each person and will only be in accordance with the will of the Father when it is discerned accurately. God gave to James the Greater the cup of beheading while James the Lesser was thrown from the Temple and stoned. Thomas was speared, Phillip was impaled by iron hooks. They were not all Zealots, but one out of the twelve was (Simon). Yet all died following and professing Christ even when they were not afforded a share in his particular method of torture, which was crucifixion. And so likewise there is a place for Rescuers, even if we are not all Rescuers.

Legal crucifixion is the weapon of choice in our country, and the Five are being hung out as "bad examples"--'domestic terrorists', 'insurrectionists', 'criminals,' 'zealots' for all to see...including those in our own religious ranks. I pray they share in Christ's own strong cup of humiliation and his alienation from his own people, from the "good Jews" of his day, that at their trial when they stand alone before the One True Judge, they receive their just reward.