Today was the special session reflecting on the suffering of those who have been hurt by the Church.
I submitted a second intervention as a written contribution. I include it below.
God’s Extravagant Mercy
From any objective measure God’s moral code seems to be unreasonably demanding of us, even cruel. Trying to live up to the full invitation to which God calls us is darn hard, if not impossible.
Who can be expected to live up to these extreme, radical demands?
None of us really. Not me, not you, not even Pope Francis who has publicly declared: “I am a sinner”. From a human perspective, attaining God’s vision for us is impossible.
That’s why he gives us grace to help us, and mercy when we fail. Because we will fail, we ALL do. And when we do, we are not met with condemnation, but with extravagant mercy.
God’s mercy is abundant and eagerly offered to the repentant one. Nothing is unforgivable in the eyes of God. His extravagant mercy makes pursuing his radical invitation possible, even attractive.
Our Church is meant to be a prophetic voice in a world that cannot comprehend either God’s radical invitation, nor His lavish mercy. The world tells us that some sins are not really sins, and that other sins are unforgivable. Both misrepresent God’s nature and his relationship to us; one denies our capacity for greatness and the other denies the power of His redemption.
It is neither compassionate nor loving to deprive others of God’s radical invitation because they find it challenging, or they dislike us for it. To expect less than what God desires for us is to treat them with less dignity, not more.
Equally, it is unacceptable to deny God’s mercy to ourselves or others when they fail, sometimes miserably.
As a Church we must bring clarity, not confusion, to this mystery.
In this Council, let us stand in the uneasy space that embraces God’s radical invitation and extravagant mercy. Let us hold both in dynamic tension recognising that within that mystery is the hope for which every heart longs – that we can always come home to the Father who waits for us.