Forvent det uventede: Pave Frans overrasker igjen, denne gang gjennom et lengre brev til en italiensk journalist.
Det var i en lederartikkel 7. august at Eugenio Scalfari, grunnleggeren av avisen La Repubblica, stilte tre spørsmål om troen, etter å ha lest pavens encyklika Lumen Fidei: Gjelder Guds nåde også for ikke-troende? Er det en synd å tvile på at det finnes absolutt sannhet? Er troen på Gud kun et produkt av den menneskelige tanke? I lederen beskriver Scalfari seg som en "ikke-troende som i mange år har vært fascinert av forkynnelsen til Jesus av Nasaret".
Pave Frans svarte altså i et fire sider langt brev til Scalfari, som onsdag ble trykket i nettopp La Repubblica.
I brevet beskriver paven sin egen tro, en tro som springer ut av "et personlig møte med Jesus Kristus" gjennom Kirken. Med bakgrunn i denne troen, er jeg "komfortabel med å lytte til dine spørsmål, og sammen med deg søke den vei som vi kanskje kan gå deler av sammen". Dialogen mellom troende og ikke-troende "er positiv, ikke bare for hver enkelt av oss, men for hele samfunnet", skriver paven.
Frans svarer deretter direkte på Scalfaris spørsmål. Om Guds tilgivelse for ikke-troende sier paven at "Guds nåde kjenner ingen grenser dersom vi vender oss mot Ham med et oppriktig og botferdig hjerte".
First of all, you ask me if the God of Christians forgives one who doesn’t believe and doesn’t seek the faith. Premise that – and it’s the fundamental thing – the mercy of God has no limits if one turns to him with a sincere and contrite heart; the question for one who doesn’t believe in God lies in obeying one’s conscience. Sin, also for those who don’t have faith, exists when one goes against one’s conscience. To listen to and to obey it means, in fact, to decide in face of what is perceived as good or evil. And on this decision pivots the goodness or malice of our action.
Sin, also for those who don’t have faith, exists when one goes against one’s conscience. To listen to and to obey it means, in fact, to decide in face of what is perceived as good or evil. And on this decision pivots the goodness or malice of our action.
På spørsmålet om det finnes absolutt sannhet, påpeker paven at i kristen forståelse er sannheten "Guds kjærlighet for oss gjennom Jesus Kristus". Sannheten er derfor "en relasjon!", bemerker han.
To begin with, I will not speak, not even to one who believes, of “absolute” truth, in the sense that absolute is what is inconsistent, what is deprived of any relationship. Now truth, according to the Christian faith, is the love of God for us in Jesus Christ. Therefore, truth is a relationship! So true is it that each one of us also takes up the truth and expresses it from him/herself: from his/her history and culture, from the situation in which he/she lives, etc. This doesn’t mean that truth is variable or subjective, quite the opposite. But it means that it is given to us always and only as a way and a life. Did not Jesus himself say: “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life”? In other words, truth being altogether one with love, requires humility and openness to be sought, received and expressed.
Er så troen på Gud kun et produkt av den menneskelige tanke? spør Scalfari. "Menneskets storhet støtter seg på dets evne til å reflektere over Gud", svarer Frans. Men Gud eksisterer uavhengig om mennesket tror på han eller ikke. "Gud er ikke avhengig av våre tanker", poengterer paven.
And that is in being able to live a conscious and responsible relationship with Him. However, the relationship is between two realities. God – this is my thought and this is my experience, but how many, yesterday and today, share it! – is not an idea, even though very lofty, fruit of man’s thought. God is reality with a capital “R.” Jesus reveals it – and lives the relationship with him – as a Father of goodness and infinite mercy. Hence, God doesn’t depend on our thought. Moreover, even when the life of man on earth should finish – and for the Christian faith, in any case, this world as we know it is destined to fail --, man won’t stop existing and, in a way that we don’t know, also the universe created with him. Scripture speaks of “new heavens and a new earth” and affirms that, in the end, in the where and when that is beyond us, but towards which, in faith, we tend with desire and expectation, God will be “all in all.”