While Jesus was teaching in the temple, the Scribes and Pharisees brought in a woman who had been caught in the act of committing adultery. They said to Jesus, ‘In the law Moses commanded us to stone such women.     Now what do you say?’ (Jn. 8: 5). 

All human beings are utterly interdependent. It has always been so and is more evidently so in our day, when we can see the effects of a breakdown of some part of the human network. I well remember the strike that affected our hospitals when hospital cleaners decided not to work. It more or less paralysed the entire working of the hospitals. These men and women were the least well paid amid all the echelons of staff, but their work was essential.

This interdependence affects everything we do. We cannot pretend that we are not a part of the injustices of this world. The fact that such a small percentage of human beings has the wealth and comfort that, probably, all who read this blog enjoy, is something to which all of us are a part. When I eat chocolate, for example, I am told that those who produce the chocolate, at source, are often virtual slaves, working for a pittance. Is my eating of the chocolate not a contribution to the misery of others?

My contention would state that, in the realm of morality, we also are interdependent; that it is not possible to ‘opt out’ of our one human family, and pretend that we were not, or are not, also a part of the horrors of moral evil, which appear to be everywhere in our world today.

There is also moral evil in our Church, today, and some is to be found among a small proportion of its clergy. Of course, the scandals caused by this small proportion are huge, and should not be minimised. Unfortunately, interdependence means that lay persons cannot just opt out of this mess. Take a person who might have been judgemental, unfriendly or not caring enough for his, or her, neighbour; this will make him, or her, not as compassionate as they might have been, and this has a ‘knock-on effect’ on the soul or spirit. Multiply this 60 million times for the population of the UK, and we come to something approaching what we today observe – a Britain in which there is a distinct lack of love. Priests and Bishops – and even a Cardinal – may have behaved badly because they did not receive the example of love and mercy that ought to be manifest throughout the human race – the love and mercy  taught to us by Jesus. In other words the lay person may not have been, fully, the disciple of Christ that he or she should have been.

It is true that, in one sense, I was not directly responsible for the famous “Moor Murders”, when in the 60’s, children were killed by evil people and buried on the moors: however, I think there is another sense, in which all human beings are responsible to a degree, because we do not see the beauty that is in each human being, whatever they have done. Therefore, we do not love enough, going out of our way to be loving to even the worst person, continuing to love as Jesus did right to the end, even when he was hated and tortured by others. Jesus is the model of what it is, or should be, to be human. When will more of us begin to understand that, even in the wicked sinfulness of some, we are all called by God to love each and every other?

The Pope Leaves Rome and Flies to Castelgandolfo 

In recent days, with the resignation of Pope Benedict and the many scandals reported by the media that have happened in the Church, a reporter in a national paper wrote like this:

“One of the more unsettling moments of the Pope’s UK visit in 2010, for me, was when he called on “the whole church” to atone for its crimes. But those were not my crimes, Pope Benedict: I am not one of the ordained men who has abused children or helped cover up their abhorrent behaviour, and I resent being treated as one.

In fact, all around me, I increasingly hear these words from my fellow Catholics: not in my name. These crimes that have been committed, this power that has been abused, this trust that has been betrayed: not in our name, Your Holiness, has it happened. Guilt has dogged my church through the centuries, and it’s a guilt that has often been planted most deeply among the lay people.

Somehow to me the above writing in italics does not ring quite true, well written though it is, and in some ways I sympathise with its import: rather, I would side with Pope Benedict, in that the whole Church should atone for its crimes, because all Catholics are in the one Body of the Catholic Church. I would say that nobody, who belongs to the Church, can stand outside it and say “I am completely innocent or uninvolved in the crimes mentioned by the reporter above”. It could be that I have sinned by omission as the “I confess” in the Mass states: “I have greatly sinned….in what I have done and in what I have failed to do”. If I did not ‘do’ something about the sins of our day – including the moral evils – then I, too, am guilty by omission; in other words, if I have failed in my ‘loving’. For instance, do I really love, even my enemies? The mystery of being ‘non-judgemental’ about others, is that I should not judge those with whom I totally disagree, even about their moral judgements. A good example is the debate between those in favour of “Pro-Life”, and those in favour of “Abortion”, or those who favour “Gay Marriage”, and those who oppose it. A Christian involved in these debates, should never judge the opposite person who holds a different view, as that would not be the way Jesus taught us.

It is in this context that I would like to consider this phrase of Jesus ‘Let anyone among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her’ (Jn.8:7), with its commentary by Chiara Lubich, written in 1998. It seems to me to be helpful to us in 2013 as we enter this ‘rocky’ time for the Church.  I say ‘rocky’ with good reason, as we await the election of a new pope, and while we do so we can be sure that there will be more scandals affecting our Church, and more accusations against it, particularly in Britain and Ireland They may well be based on some evil events that have happened.

“WORD OF LIFE – March 2013

(First published in March 1998)

We are in no position to condemn anyone. We too are sinners. We need to treat each person with the tenderness and mercy that Jesus displayed.

‘Let anyone among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her’ (Jn.8:7).

While Jesus was teaching in the temple, the Scribes and Pharisees brought in a woman who had been caught in the act of committing adultery. They said to Jesus, ‘In the law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?’ (Jn. 8:5).

      They wanted to set a trap for him. If Jesus had shown himself to be against the stoning, they could have accused him of going against the law. According to the law, the eye-witnesses had to begin stoning the one who had sinned, to be followed by the rest of the people. If, instead, Jesus had confirmed the death sentence, they would have made him contradict his own teaching about God’s mercy to sinners.

      But Jesus, bending down and writing on the ground with his finger, showed how unruffled he was. He straightened up and said:

‘Let anyone among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.’

     When they heard this, the accusers went away one by one, beginning with the eldest. Jesus then turned to the woman and asked, ‘Where are they? Has no one condemned you?’ She said, ‘No one, sir.’ And Jesus said, ‘Neither do I condemn you. Go your way, and from now on do not sin again’ (see Jn. 8:10-11).

‘Let anyone among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.’

With these words, Jesus certainly doesn’t show himself as permissive in front of evil, such as adultery. His words: ‘Go your way, and from now on do not sin again’ clearly state God’s commandment.

      Jesus wishes to unmask the hypocrisy of those who set themselves up as judges of a sister who has sinned, without recognizing that they too are sinners. Like this his words underline his famous declaration: ‘Do not judge, so that you may not be judged. For with the judgement you make, you will be judged’ (Mt 7:1-2).

      Speaking in this way, Jesus is addressing also those who totally condemn others, with no consideration of the penitence that can well up within the heart of the guilty. And he clearly shows how he treats those who fall: with mercy. When all had gone away from the woman taken in adultery, ‘Two were left,’ as Augustine of Hippo wrote, ‘misery and mercy.’ (Homilies on the Gospel of John 33:5.)

‘Let anyone among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.’

      How can we put this word of life into practice?

Let’s remember, as we come before each brother or sister, that we too are sinners. We have all sinned and, even though it seems to us that we’ve not done anything seriously wrong, we have always to bear in mind that we may not realize the heavy circumstances that caused others fall so low, making them stray from God. How would we have done in their place?

      We too, at times, have broken the bond of love that ought to unite us to God; we’ve not been faithful to him.

      If Jesus, the only man without sin, didn’t throw the first stone at the adulteress, then neither can we at anyone whoever it may be.

      And so, have mercy for all, react against those impulses that drive us to condemn without pity—we have to know how to forgive and forget. No harbouring in our hearts any lingering judgement or resentment, where anger and hatred can breed and alienate us from our brothers and sisters. See everyone as new.

      Having in our hearts, rather than judgement and condemnation, love and mercy for each person, we will help each person begin a new life, we will constantly give courage to start afresh.”

I would suggest that the above reflection on that phrase ‘Let anyone among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her’ (Jn.8:7) may throw light on the painful circumstances in which the Catholic Church finds itself at this time, especially in Britain and help one or two at least to find some light in the darkness that surrounds us.

Jonathan Cotton