In this episode, the Pharisees, together with the Herodians, lay a trap for Jesus by trying to draw him into the political controversies of the day. The Herodians, for their part, were not natural allies of the Pharisees. They were, as their name suggests, supporters of Herod, the Roman puppet king, and thus collaborators with a foreign, occupying power. The Pharisees, by contrast, were no enthusiasts of Roman rule, but they at least did not espouse violence. The same could not be said, however, for a third group, the Zealots, who would, over the course of the next hundred years, lead two disastrous rebellions that would end in the destruction of Jerusalem and the definitive exile of the Jewish people.
And so the Pharisees and the Herodians try to draw Jesus into this trap, to force him to one of two poles: are you a collaborator with Rome (a thing hardly expected of the messiah), or are you a Zealot and hence a rebel deserving of Roman justice? Jesus, for his part, deftly dodges the question. His Kingdom, as he will later say to Pilot, is not of this world, and so he will not be drawn into and defined by the political binary, and so he says: Repay to Caesar what belongs to Caesar and to God what belongs to God.
Again, in saying this, Jesus is more evading a trap than he is giving a political theory. He is not dividing the world into the civil and the sacred, as though these were two spheres with nothing to do with one another.[1] But his statement does contain an essential corollary: do not render under to Caesar that which is due to God alone.
This principle, itself an outworking of the first commandment, would resonate greatly in the witness of the early martyrs, who in their refusal to give sacrifice to the pagan gods, and even at times to arrogant emperors who thought themselves to be gods, would demonstrate the absolute centrality of this principle, showing us by their deaths the uncompromising faithfulness that leads to eternal life.
Now today we may think, and gratefully, that we are not so tempted as were our forefathers. The state, after all, does not go around demanding that we offer sacrifice to Jupiter or Minerva. But to what degree has the ancient temptation merely changed, rather than disappeared? Can we really say, that is, that we render only to Caesar what is his due? Or do we not also, in subtle and not so subtle ways, subordinate our sacred obligations to secular concerns?
In fact, I am unsure that there is a worse or more widespread disease than this within the American Church: the prioritization of partisan politics above the social demands of the gospel, which, as previously intimated, in practice amounts to a repudiation of the first commandment.
Now, for some there is a reluctance to even speak about “the social demands of the gospel.” The disease, in other words, may be so advanced that a person is incapable of hearing this phrase without taking it for some sinister weaponization of the gospel on the part of his partisan opponents. Or else, one can be so captured by a spirit of laïcité that one wrongly thinks the Church to have no place in secular affairs, the limits of the gospel’s reach being defined by the four walls of the church building, or by the narrow confines of one’s personal, and hence private, affects and convictions.
But a true hearing of the gospel shatters any such notions, for the gospel is irreducibly social. There is no such thing as a “me and Jesus Christianity,” no such thing as a Christianity that does not have reference to other people. For on the eve of his passion, did not our Lord say to his disciples I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this, everyone will know that you are my disciples. Did he not, throughout his preaching, affirm that the two great commandments are to love God and neighbor, while at the same time radically challenging our limited notion of who our neighbor is in the parable of the good Samaritan? And does not St. John develop this logic with a piercing and convicting clarity when he writes If anyone says “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen.
And so, clearly, the gospel does make social demands on us, demands rooted in our call to love one another, a call which in turn flows from the very heart of that divinization which Christ works to accomplish in us, as we become conformed to God who is love. To quote the US bishops, “the Gospel – and those who respond to it in the life of the Church – allow the values of the kingdom to touch every aspect of society. The laity especially have the role of serving as this leaven in the various secular occupations that they undertake.”[2] This is true in every aspect of life – it is what the mass sends you out to do. And in a republic, such as ours, it especially encompasses what you do at the ballot box.
Earlier, I lamented the prioritization of partisan politics over the social demands of the gospel, itself a species of rendering to Caesar that which is due to God, and this is what I mean: do we allow our political conscience as Christians to be shaped by the gospel, i.e. by the Church and her shepherds, or do we instead give ourselves over to partisan punditry? Are we more inclined to listen to our bishops, who, lest we forget, occupy the teaching office of the apostles, or do we prefer the voices of our favorite podcast hosts or youtubers?
On the foundational level, it is essential that as Catholics we work to conform our political imaginations to the basic contours of Catholic Social Teaching, above all: recognizing every human person as an image of the Triune God, recognizing the equal dignity of all human beings, and recognizing the supreme value of human rights.[3] From these foundations flow five principles that undergird Catholic Social Teaching: concern for the common good, a recognition for the universal destination of goods, subsidiarity, solidarity, and social justice.[4] There is not time this morning explore these concepts in depth, but it is nevertheless the obligation of every faithful Catholic to form their political conscience in accord with these foundations and principles, and so I direct you especially to those resources which are available on the USCCB website.
But having spoken on the level of principles, it would be a mistake to stop there, to think that the Church obliges our consciences only on a general level and not at the level of particulars. The protection of the unborn is, of course, the preeminent example of such a particular, as we must everywhere and always oppose the scourges of abortion, IVF, and destructive embryonic stem cell research. Another example, which was very dear to Pope Francis, is the duty to care for and protect the natural environment. And a third would be the obligation to oppose the unjust treatment of immigrants.
This last deserves especial mention. Last month, faith leaders from across East Tennessee signed an open letter calling on our community, and especially the Christian community, to resist the implementation of unjust and draconian immigration policies in our city, in our region, and in our state.[5] Over 40 Catholic clergy and lay leaders signed this letter, including Bishop Beckman, and Fr. Doug, myself, and a number of our deacons enthusiastically added our own signatures. This letter, which I implore you to read, echoes the US Bishops’ Special Pastoral Message on Immigration from last year:
“We are disturbed when we see among our people a climate of fear and anxiety around questions of profiling and immigration enforcement. We are saddened by the state of contemporary debate and the vilification of immigrants. We are concerned about the conditions in detention centers and the lack of access to pastoral care. We lament that some immigrants in the United States have arbitrarily lost their legal status. We are troubled by threats against the sanctity of houses of worship and the special nature of hospitals and schools. We are grieved when we meet parents who fear being detained when taking their children to school and when we try to console family members who have already been separated from loved ones.”
I know that there has been grumbling about this letter and about this statement. I know that some of you are grumbling now. But I remind you: the voice of our local bishop, the voice of the Bishops’ Conference, and the voice of Pope Leo are not just additional voices among the cacophony of political commentators. As Canon Law makes very clear:
Canon 753. Whether they teach individually, or in Episcopal Conferences, or gathered together in particular councils, Bishops in communion with the head and the members of the College, while not infallible in their teaching, are the authentic instructors and teachers of the faith for Christ’s faithful entrusted to their care. The faithful are bound to adhere, with a religious submission of mind, to this authentic magisterium of their Bishops.
And so, if you find yourself grumbling at the bishops’ teaching on this subject, I ask you: who are you listening to, and why?
Abortion, as was already said, is the preeminent social issue of our time, and yet it is so often tolerated and even celebrated in certain quarters in no small part because the suffering which it causes falls upon those who have no voice. A similar unseen suffering has accompanied the immigration policies of the present administration – if you do not interact with these communities, you do not see their suffering and fear.
But, of course, we do see their suffering. These are Catholics who are suffering. They are our brothers and sisters who are afraid to go to work, afraid to go to school. It is Catholic families that are being permanently torn apart, Catholic fathers and mothers and children who are being detained, without due process, sometimes for months, who have seen their legal status arbitrarily revoked and who have seen pathways to legal status vanish. And it is beyond scandalous that there are parishioners at our 5:00, 8:00, 10:00, and 11:30 masses celebrating and promoting the very cruelties and injustices by which those at our 7:00 mass live in fear.
Obviously, we are in an election year, and I will not tell you who to vote for. Nevertheless, to take an example, Jerri Green, the democratic candidate for governor, supports abortion, and so it goes without saying that it would be gravely sinful, it would be formal cooperation with evil, for a Catholic to vote for Mrs. Green because she was in favor of abortion. Similarly, I think it would be a grave thing if a Catholic were to vote for Marsha Blackburn because she supported Trump’s inhuman immigration agenda.
I bring all of this up because there has been grumbling, and I know that some are grumbling now, but to these I ask: why do you give more credence to partisan commentators than to the successors of the apostles? Perhaps there are elements of the Church’s social teaching that run counter to your moral and political intuitions, fair enough, but if we don’t allow the incarnate Son of God to challenge our moral and political intuitions, then what are we doing? To reflexively insist on our own political opinions over and against the teaching of the Church is to cut ourselves off from the possibility of conversion, rejecting thereby the very first public words of Jesus: The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent, and believe in the gospel. Given that they both support unsupportable evils, the Catholic who finds him or herself comfortably at home in either major political party cannot have heeded this message.
By way of conclusion, I want to make one last thing very clear: I do not say all of this because of any particular concern about the outcome of these elections. Rather, I say all of this out of a profound concern for what an uncritical, unreflective, and ultimately unchristian engagement with the political process will have on our souls, a process characterized on both sides by fear, misinformation, half-truths and outright lies; you cannot be the light of the world if you give yourself over to that darkness.
And so to make all of this as simple as possible: remember the words of St. John. If anyone says, “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen. Use these words as an examination of conscience. Remain rooted in the spirit of love that is the spirit of the gospel, never giving yourself over to the spirit of the age, never giving to Caesar more than is his due, as you strive in every moment, in every circumstance, and in every public action to love the Lord your God, and your neighbor as yourself.
[1] Consider, for instance, Jesus’ words to Pilot: You would have no power over me unless it had been given you from above. Thus secular power is predicated on, at a minimum, the permissive will of God.
[2]https://www.usccb.org/resources/Outlines%20for%20Clergy%20Formation%20Sessions%20on%20Faithful%20Citizenship.pdf, 8.
[3] Ibid., 10.
[4] Ibid.
[5] https://www.yahoo.com/news/politics/articles/faith-leaders-call-community-resist-090450315.html
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