Jesus condemned sacrificial theology

Giles Fraser:

Last time I was in Wiawso, four men were arrested in a local village, not far from the cathedral, for having taken part in the ritualised murder of a disabled man, a hunchback. He was staked out and dismembered. The men involved went on to sell his body parts for large sums of money to witchdoctors. Pregnant women and children have also been targeted, with Ghanaian newspapers reporting that a human head can be traded locally for a Kia truck.

Thinking about the celebration of Holy Week in my new adopted cathedral brings home to me quite how important it is for Christians to insist upon a non-sacrificial reading of the death of Christ. For too long, Christians have put up with a theory of salvation that has at its core the idea that God requires the sacrifice of his own son so that human sin can be cancelled. "There was no other good enough to pay the price of sin," we will all sing. The fact this is a disgusting idea, and morally degenerate, is obvious to all but those indoctrinated into a very narrow reading of the cross.

No, Jesus is not a blood sacrifice to appease a vicious God. The story is not an endorsement of the idea that sacrifice brings peace with God but an attack on it.

Read it all.

Posted by John B. Chilton on April 14, 2009 10:40 AM | |
Comments (3)

It's helpful you posted this. It illustrates quite well that the core division in the Anglican Communion is indeed profoundly theological.

-Mary Ailes

Posted by BabyBlue [TypeKey Profile Page] | April 14, 2009 11:04 AM

Baby Blue's suggestion that Sacrificial Theology illustrates a core division in the Anglican Communion misses a larger point.

If she is suggesting that some version of this idea, such as 'substitutionary atonement' is the only 'orthodox' explanation; probably 225+ million Eastern Orthodox Christians would strongly disagree.

Sacrificial Theology has long been seen as a Western, (if now largely Calvinist) heresy by the Christian East. Don't take my word for it, do a google search.

john iliff

Posted by Anonymous [TypeKey Profile Page] | April 14, 2009 12:27 PM

Thanks for sharing this! I had an Easter post at my own blog in which I noted the irony that this understanding of the cross flies in the face of a Scripture Jesus is said by Matthew to have quoted: "I desire mercy and not sacrifice".

http://exploringourmatrix.blogspot.com/2009/04/celebrating-easter-with-doubting.html

James McGrath

Posted by ReligionProf [TypeKey Profile Page] | April 14, 2009 12:49 PM

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