“Do all religions really lead to God?”
This was the question trending on social media recently. It came to my mind when I was preparing to preach on Mark 9:38-48. Providentially, Jesus shows in this passage why the notion that all religions lead to God is deeply wrong and with damnable consequences for those who propose it and those who believe it.
St. John had tried to prevent someone from casting out demons simply because the person was not in their company. Jesus asked him not to prevent the man from doing so because the man was actually doing something to advance His kingdom, “Do not prevent him. There is no one who performs a mighty deed in my name who can at the same time speak ill of me.”
Jesus also used this opportunity to teach us three truths that we must not forget.
Firstly, there are only two camps in this world – the camp of those who truly belong to Jesus and the camp of those who do not belong to Him but reject Him, His love, grace, truth, and way of life. These two camps are forever opposed to each other and there is no area of agreement between them, “For whoever is not against us is for us.” There is no other camp in this world apart from these two camps and all must make a choice between them. We cannot be neutral, and we cannot belong to both camps at the same time, “No one can serve two masters.”(Mt 6:24)
This belonging to Jesus is much more than being baptized, confirmed, ordained a priest or pastor, becoming a missionary, or belonging to the hierarchy of the Church. It means experiencing His merciful love and forgiveness and allowing His grace to control and move our hearts in all things. It means growing in the grace of our baptism through charity. It means searching for His will in all things and seeking to fulfill it always like the Blessed Virgin Mary. We belong to Him through loving obedience to His word by His grace, “For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother, sister and mother.”(Mt 12:50)
Secondly, there are only two missions in this world – to gather souls with Jesus and to scatter souls and drive them away from Him. We are either gathering souls with Jesus or we are driving them away from Him. There is no other option. Not to gather with Him is to scatter, “He who is not with me is against me, and he who does not gather with me scatters.”(Mt 12:30)
It is not enough to belong to Him. We must also labor to bring souls to Him and to bring Him to souls. Just as He gathered souls through His death and resurrection, those who belong to Him also endure suffering and make sacrifices to gather souls with Him. They will do and endure anything to make Him better known and loved by others.
The mission of the camp that rejects Jesus is to scatter the flock by scandalizing them. They scandalize by their teaching and actions, “Whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him if a great millstone were put around his neck, and he were thrown into the sea.” The mission of those in this camp is to spread the lie that there are other ways to communion with the true God – Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. They pretend that there is divine inspiration in every religion, so they are all valid ways of approaching God. They ignore the divinity of Jesus Christ and that He alone brings us into communion with God through His humanity, “For in Him the whole fulness of deity dwells bodily.”(Col 2:9)
While we must acknowledge that there is some truth and goodness in other religions, we must never forget that whatever is true, good, and beautiful in other religions is but a poor reflection of the goodness, truth, and beauty in Jesus Christ. Jesus made this clear to us when He said, “Everyone who is of the truth hears my voice.”(Jn 18:37) The presence of these things in other religions prepares and draws them to seek its fullness in Christ and in His Catholic Church. Our mission as Christians is to proclaim and reveal to them these perfections in Christ and not to falsely assume that all religions lead to God.
Lastly, there are only two ultimate destinies – heaven or hell. We are either making choices that bring us to heaven, or we are making those that lead to hell.
Heaven is for those who belong to Jesus to the end, follow Him faithfully in His mission, allow Him to forgive and heal them, and freely sacrifice whatever prevents them from entering into heaven, “If your eye causes you to sin, pluck it out. Better for you to enter into the kingdom of God with one eye than with two eyes to be thrown into Gehenna, where ‘their worm does not die, and the fire is not quenched.’” These ones come to enjoy the unending joys of heaven.
Hell is for those who rejected Jesus and His saving grace. They refused to belong to Him. They opposed His saving mission by scandalizing souls instead of bringing them to Him. They rejected His merciful love and obstinately indulged in their sinful passions to the very last breath. They had reflections of His truth in their consciences through the Natural Law, but they did not follow them with sincerity. These ones will come to experience the eternal torments of hell with all its pain and regret. All these will happen because they have ignored the potent words of St. Paul, “God has fixed a day on which He will judge the world in righteousness by a man whom He has appointed, and of this, He has given assurance to all men by raising Him from the dead.”(Acts 17:31)
My dear brothers and sisters in Christ, we live in an age of unbridled tolerance and a false sense of egalitarianism, wherein we tolerate everything and declare them all equally good and acceptable, irrespective of how they contradict each other. We must be on guard against whatever diminishes the uniqueness and saving power of what we believe as Christians. Is it not bad enough for us to pretend that the two genders are the same and interchangeable? Must we also extend our distorted egalitarian mentality to religion? We must be cautious because our salvation and the salvation of others are at stake.
One unique thing about Christianity is that we are not the ones who choose our God. On the contrary, God is the one who has stooped down and chosen us in Jesus Christ, the God made man. We can only choose to belong to Jesus because He has lovingly chosen us first, “You did not choose me, but I chose you.”(Jn 15:16) As if that is not enough, He died for us while we were still sinners so that we can belong to Him forever.
There is just no way that all religions can lead us to the true God who lovingly gave His Son on the cross for us so that we can share in His Spirit of adoption!
Jesus Christ renews His choice for us at each Eucharist, making present again His saving sacrifice that makes us His own, gives us grace to gather souls with Him, and prepares us for the joys of heaven.
Let us choose to belong to Him now and always. There is only one other choice, and that other choice is damnable.
Glory to Jesus!!! Honor to Mary!!!
Image credit: Photo by aisvri on Unsplash
Homily for the Twenty-Sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time (B) – Readings: Numbers 11:25-29 | Psalms 19:8, 10, 12-13, 14 | James 5:1-6 | Mark 9:38-43, 45, 47-48.
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About the author:
Fr. Nnamdi Moneme, OMV, is a Roman Catholic priest and religious of the Oblates of the Virgin Mary currently serving in the Philippines. He teaches theology and is a seminary formator for candidates to the priesthood and religious life. Father also gives Ignatian retreats and serves as spiritual director to many of the lay, religious, and clergy in the area.
He earned his first degree in Physics from the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, Nigeria. Ordained in 2009, he studied at St. John’s seminary, in Brighton, Massachusetts. Father has an STL/MA in Moral Theology from the University of Santo Tomas in Manila, Philippines.
Father Moneme blogs at https://toquenchhisthirst.wordpress.com/.
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