Gottes Freitag

by John P. Flannery

This is Gottes Freitag — God’s Friday — usually called, go figure, “Good Friday,” when Jesus was scorned, abused, crucified and killed.

I was a BIC (Bronx Irish Catholic) when young but my membership has long since lapsed.

Still, the historic Jesus was a man who preached charity, peace and sacrifice for the good of human kind.

It was the powers that be, the exalted Romans, who washed their hands of the gruesome affair, and the many people in the attendant crowd who wouldn’t pardon him, who approved his death.

Are we doing any better these days?

The government is not.

They are prepared to sacrifice the lives of so many for geld — money, money — unconcerned about the value of a life — to make a business or win an election or just save face.

One critical biblical truth — manifest in this pandemic — is that sooner a camel will pass through the eye of a needle than a rich man will enter the kingdom of God.

I’m more concerned, however, with how we serve each other in the here and now than when some share the beatific vision and others burn in hell for all eternity.

My sense is that we the people seem to know what to do.

It is our leaders who don’t get it — can’t figure out what to do because they can’t wrap their head around the fact that life is more important than, well, anything else, certainly than ambition and “winning.”.

Because, without life, there is nothing else.

JPF