Jonathan Pageau: Christians Are Not Called to Be 'Nice'

There is a trope in um the media in society and this trope is something like if you were a Christian you would be nice and that uh Christians in some ways accept everything that Christians uh that Jesus really was a hippie you know it's a good way of thinking of it you know that he was open and that he accepted everything and so there are aspects of the gospel where you see Christ acting in In that way, you know, when he says, "Let the children come to me." You know, when he goes to those that have been dejected, that are impure in the society where he is, when he goes to prostitutes and to tax collectors, all these people that are rejected uh by society either because they are decadent or because they are um you know, let's say people who work for the government for the for the oppressive government. This is something people often forget about Jesus is that when he went to the margins, he uh he when he talked to the tax collectors, it meant that he was talking to uh to people that were um in fact betraying their nation for Rome, you know, and so that is the type of margin that Christ talked to. And so, of course, Christ does manifest these things. But there is also a way in which this way of talking about Christians is a what I call weaponized compassion. It is a way to use Christians vision of compassion and of love in order to manipulate them and to make them do what you want. And I don't think Christians are called to be manipulated in that way at least when they can help it. You know, Christ tells us to be of course uh vigilant and to be wise as foxes and innocent as doves. And so there is a a few places in scripture where in some ways Christ reveals how it is that this works, how it is that Christians are inclusive and to in what way it is that the church and the body or the kingdom of heaven is open and inclusive. [music] This is Jonathan Pjo. Welcome to the symbolic world. [music] [music] Greetings friends, cosmographers, fellow symbolists. This is Joshua from 8th Day Books inviting you to join me in studying a remarkable cosmic coincidence. Why is it that writers, philosophers, [music] and prophets from many times and places have all told us that contemplating the night sky makes our own souls similarly more beautiful [music] and more ordered. Hebrew and Hindu, Greek and Chinese, they've all told us that looking up is the same as looking in and that we are as much citizens of the sky as we are of Earth. In February, we will be looking at Pythagorean folk tales, biblical wisdom, literature, and contemporary novelists to ask [music] these questions. It'll be a challenging course, but not technical. I teach medieval philosophy and Renaissance literature, and I'm condensing a year's worth of information into a few wonderfilled hours. Please join me for some Plato, some poetry, and some practical skygazing. All to help us pursue the art of imitating heaven. See you very soon. And so I want to read of course the uh it is the parable of the great banquet. I want to read that parable for you and we'll look at how it is that you know Christ manifests this. Now there are two versions of this parable. one is in Luke. And what's beautiful about the one in Luke is that the one in Luke is really emphasizing this desire that Christ has to move towards the margins, right? And to move towards those that are usually excluded, those that usually aren't invited and invite them to the great wedding feast, especially as those who um because they're too important don't seem to be able to see the value of the wedding feast, you know. And so, but the version in Matthew goes one step further and then uh adds a little bit that I think is important in the context of what it is that I'm trying to help you understand. It is in Matthew 22 when it says, "And Jesus answered and spoke to them by parables and said, the kingdom of heaven is like a certain king who arranged a marriage for his son and sent out his servants to call those who were invited to the wedding and they were not willing to come. Again he sent out other servants saying, "Tell those who are invited, see, I have prepared my dinner, my oxen and fatted cattle are killed, and all things are ready. Come to the wedding." But they made light of it and went on their ways. One to his own farm, another to his business." And the rest seized his servants, treated them spitefully, and killed them. When the king heard about it, he was furious and he sent out armies, destroyed those murderers, and burnt up their city. But when the king heard about it, he was furious and he sent out his armies, destroyed those murderers, and burned up their city. Then he said to the servants, "The wedding is ready, but those who were invited were not worthy. Therefore, go into the highways, and as many as you find, invite to the wedding." So those servants went out into the highways and gathered together all whom they found, both bad and good, and the wedding hall was filled with guests. But when the king came in to see the guest, he saw a man there who did not have on a wedding garment. And he said to him, "Friend, how did you come in here without a wedding garment?" And he was speechless. Then the king said to the servants, "Bind him hand and foot, take him away, and cast him into outer darkness. There will be weeping and nashing of teeth. For many are called, but you are chosen." Now, this parable is a little different from the ones that uh we usually hear. You know, usually people like the one in Luke because it's all about inclusion. Uh, but this one is a little rougher. It's a little more uh intense. And I chose it because first of all, it shows that the idea that Christ is a is a nice hippie that just accepts everything uh simply not true. Um, but second because it it shows a certain characteristic. Of course, people usually use these parables and this particular parable to talk about how in some ways Christ came uh to Israel, came to Jerusalem, came to the Jews and presented the message of the kingdom of heaven. Uh but for that he was refused and not just him but many of the prophets as they brought the word of God, they were um they were beaten, they were killed um for bringing the word of God to the people and that Christ of course would would be the ultimate version of that. And for that reason then Christ in some ways his message will move out from Israel and into the uh into the the gentile nations uh in order to call them to the wedding feast in order to get them to also participate in the kingdom of heaven. >> [snorts] >> But then Christ adds another detail which is that, you know, the the servants go out into the streets and they, you know, they they uh they send the the they they invite people that are random, the people that are on the side of the streets, but you imagine people that are poor, people that usually don't even get invited to wedding feasts. Uh you know, and but then when they come, when one of them comes, he forgets to wear he doesn't wear a wedding garment. And the best way to understand that is in some ways he doesn't conform to what is expected of him at the wedding feast. And so and then because he doesn't conform to what is expected of him to participate in the wedding feast, then he is thrown out into the outer darkness. And what you notice is that in fact his situation is worse than the one that would have been before. That is if he just stayed on the road and not accepted the invitation to the wedding feast, uh things would have been difficult for him. But now that he has come and now that he has accepted the invitation, but he has not conformed to what was expected of him at the wedding feast, now he is thrown out and is in a worse situation than before. And so this is really a good way of understanding the kingdom of heaven, you know. And so when we talk about the kingdom of heaven, we really are talking about the way that heaven gathers the world together, right, into a in a coherent hole. And so although it of course applies esqueologically, it kind of applies to the entirety of all things, sometimes the best way of understanding it is seeing how it applies at a more local at a or at a smaller level, right? Um and there are cases that can help us understand this parable. I think um particularly now right so a a good example of something especially towards the last part um especially in in terms of the story about immigration you know because there is a entire pyic about immigration and about in some ways how nations Christian nations or nations that at least used to be Christian somehow have to accept everything like they they just have to be open to everything and invite people over and let people come into their country uh and just accept whatever it is that they bring here, whatever culture, whatever thing that they bring. And I think that, you know, this parable is a good example of understanding how that simply isn't possible. Like that that actually not only is it not right, but it's not it's not something that is possible. And I'll explain why, you know, in terms of both the question of immigration and also the question of the wedding feast. And so why is it that the servant has to confirm wear his wedding garment at the wedding feast? And you know why why does it such a big deal? Why don't they just let him hang around at the wedding feast without the without the garment? And the answer is because if you do not conform to the thing you're participating in, and if too many people do not conform to the thing they're participating in, it will cease to be what it is. You know, if you if you if you go to uh if you participate in a meeting, but during the meeting you're doing something else besides the meeting and if too many people do that, at some point it's not the meeting anymore. Some at some point it's become something else. If you you know I've talked about this in terms of the in the symbolic world master class as the knitting group the cosmic knitting group is that if you organize a knitting group and then you invite people to come to the knitting group but the people that come don't want to knit and what they want to do is I don't know they want to play music or they want to write poetry or whatever else there is they want to do then at some point it's not a knitting group anymore is it? It's something else. I don't know what it is but it's definitely not a knitting group you know and so that is why it is important when you enter into a body that you conform to the body right and so in some ways in terms of Christianity what this is suggesting is that yes we are going to move out into the gentile nations we are going to invite all people to come and enter into the the body of Christ but you have to conform to the body of Christ in order to be in the body if you enter into the body of Christ and then you do not conform, then it will be much worse for you in terms of your soul and in terms of of everything than it was even before that you entered into the body. And so how does this apply to the the question or the story of immigration? It's the same thing. [snorts] So, you know, there are actually examples of of this perfect examples right now in Canada. You know, because let's say there are certain aspects of the social fabric in our society that the people that were born here, the people that grew up here often don't want to do, you know, and there a good example is agricultural work. And so one of the things that happened is that the farms they you know they try to hire people that are from here in order to work on the farms and that's become harder and harder to do. They then started to at least try to get students you know during the summers young people that are that are healthy and and strapping and you know and and can handle a hard day's work. And so they invite them to come and work for the farm. But that's becoming harder and harder as well. The students just aren't interested. It's not worth it for them. They find it too difficult. There are all kinds of reasons uh why they don't want to do that. And so for that reason, again, our government has set up a whole system to invite people from South America to be able to come during the summer and during the fall in order to work the farms, right? And so you can see it's very similar to this idea of this participation in the wedding banquet. That is the king sends their invitations to the people that are usually come to the wedding banquets, but those people aren't interested. Of course, in this parable, it's even worse. They they actually treat the envoys of the of the uh king uh roughly and kill them. Um but let's say not particularly in the case of the farmland, let's say. But what happens is that because of that then the invitation moves out into more and more further out from what it usually uh does. Uh but you know if if you invite someone from South America to come here then when they come we expect them to follow our laws. We expect them to not act in ways that would transgress our own social cohesion. And if they do, then it's completely normal that we eject them. Like this is a completely normal thing because in some ways the the in order for them to participate in the body, they have to be part of the body. They have to act in a way that is coherent with what is what is expected of them in the in the body. So this is of course the case in all levels of the the the question of immigration that it should not be weird for countries uh for nations to expect from people that come to their nation to participate in the social fabric to in some ways wear the wedding garment that is wear the clothing wear the the the behavior wear the the social norms you know of the nation that they're joining. You know without that then what is happening then the problem if you don't at some point uh expect that of people that are coming from the outside in order to join your nation then it won't be your nation after a while and at some point just like in the knitting group if people come and decide to paint or decide to do something at some point it will no longer be what it is it will become something else it'll move towards chaos at first and then it that that chaos will be potential for something else will be potential for some other identity that will come and scoop it up and be able to in some ways enforce its kingdom on on the world. So you can see that the parable is really an image of of uh it's really an image of everything, right? It's it's an image of how all things function. And so if you if you're building a car, you know, and certain materials aren't available to the building of the car, then you're going to kind of move out and and see if there other materials which you usually wouldn't use that would be available to make the car. But you those materials have to conform to what a car is supposed to be, right? Like you can't make a card out of Jello-O at some point. There's no way that it can fit. But it's completely normal, of course, to if you're trying to make something or or create a type of coh cohesive hole that if the usual things that you use in order to make that hole aren't available, then you start to look out into potential for things that could possibly be integrated into that hole in order to continue to make it. And in some ways, what you could you could think that this is a kind of opportunity, especially if if it's a good kingdom, it's a wonderful opportunity for things that usually aren't included in the kingdom to participate. Uh but in some ways, they they have to still have to prove their worth. They still have to conform to the body. Okay? And so you know this was just a small meditation to kind of help you understand how you know a body functions and and how it is that Christianity although it does in fact you know reach out to the ends of the earth that it does in fact give the opportunity of all people of any person to participate in the body no matter where you come from and no matter what your situation there is a point that it is expected of view of the person that enters into the body to conform to the body at least to some extent or else it isn't right and so you could see this in all kinds of ways that is if you say you're a Christian but you don't have the creed you know and you don't believe the things that Christians believe then at some point you're going to be ejected you're heterodox you're going to be ejected if you say you're a Christian but you commit all these crimes and you you uh do all of these you commit all these moral immoral acts in theory you should at some point be excommunicated that is you should be excluded from the body until you make up until you at least to some extent are able to conform to what is expected of a Christian in order to be in the body and so you know this idea that Christians are just infinitely nice and this weird idea of this postmodern idea of radical hospitality that in some ways you have to be open to all things and that you should let all things in. That is definitely not a Christian vision. And not only is it not a Christian vision, but it is a road map to chaos. It is a road map to self-destruction u and to death. and and uh that is um you know it's not that in some ways you could say Christians are not sometimes subject to that right to some ways a kind of death but it is even in terms of martyrdom Christians are not supposed to look for their own death they're not supposed to act in ways that will bring about their own destruction even though they know that sometimes they will be persecuted or that that destruction or that violence will come to Um there is a clear uh um there's a there is a clear cannon in the in in the church and there's a clear way of seeing it in the church that you should never look for your own martyrdom. Uh you shouldn't act towards it and that it is that is actually a form of weird it's like a form of weird perverse pride to uh to it's you could call it virtue signaling in the modern sense you know when you do something like that. So hopefully this was useful and helping you uh understand. Don't forget that if you love these videos, you know, go to the symbolicworld.com uh and you know, you can join the symbolic world.com. We have a community that exchanges and uh there also ways that you can support what we're doing financially. This is also where you can buy our books, you can get our courses, you can participate in the uh in the symbolic world community. And just like any other community, if you participate in our community and you don't and you just, you know, you're not talking about symbolism or you're not completely conformed to what it is that's expected of you, uh we do have mechanisms to eject people from that community, although we don't like to do it. And so uh and so thanks everybody for your attention. Hope this was useful and I'll talk to you very soon. for.