Fr. JC Maximilian

[“Christ Standing before Pilate, First Interview” by Tissot]

“Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice.”

In 2008, bestselling Catholic author Dean Koontz published his novel, Your Heart Belongs to Me. The book tells the story of a young multi-millionaire named Ryan. Ryan discovers that he has a serious congenital heart defect. The only chance he has is a heart transplant. However, despite several dramatic encounters that tell him to be patient, Ryan panics. He is afraid that he will not live long enough to get a new heart if he has to wait on the donor recipient list that he signed up on. Being rich he thinks he can make his own rules. Ryan uses his wealth to bypass the normal channels and within a month he has a new heart.

What he does not know, but will learn later, is that his heart was taken illegally in a most gruesome manner. A young, innocent political prisoner is killed just so that her organs can be harvested and sold on the black-market. The rest of the novel recounts the tragic unfolding of the rest of Ryan’s life as the consequences of his sin catches up to him. Koontz, the author, nicely summarizes the moral of the story when he writes, “The roots of all violence are found in the hatred of the truth.” In the novel, Ryan’s selfish refusal to face the moral truth of his actions led to the murder of a healthy, innocent woman and the transformation of his life into a nightmare.

In today’s Gospel reading, Pilate also refuses to recognize the truth as it literal stands before him, and it leads him to condemn an innocent man to death. The consequence of that decision will haunt Pilate for the rest of his life. Ironically, it did not have to turn out that way. Jesus came to Pilate to save his soul. In St. John’s Gospel, the term “Jew” is not used to indicate any racial or ethnic group. Rather, St. John uses the term “Jew” to signify all those who reject the revelation of divine truth in Jesus. When Pilate says “I am not a Jew,” he is ironically indicating that he is open to the truth manifested in Christ the King. So why, if he is open to the truth does Pilate fail to recognize Jesus as King?

First, Pilate set his heart desire on that which can never satisfy, namely the world. Like any Roman politician of his time, Pilate was always looking for ways to climb the social and political power, falsely thinking that the accumulation of power and riches would lead to happiness. Jesus tells Pilate “my kingdom does not belong to this world.” In order to claim Christ as our King we must keep our minds and hearts fixed on what is above; we must desire a share in God’s divine life above all else.

Second, Pilate needed to accept and reverence the reason for the Incarnation. Jesus tells him, “For this I was born and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth.” The truth that Jesus testifies to is the truth of the Father’s merciful love, and our need for salvation. In order to accept Christ as our King, we need to acknowledge our own sinfulness, and turn it over to Jesus our Savior in heartfelt contrition. Failing to own up to our sinfulness causes us to remain subject to sin, and Jesus’ death on the Cross becomes meaningless in our lives.

Lastly, Pilate needed to allow himself to be led by the truth. As Jesus tells him, “Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice.” Of course listening is more than just the physical sensation of hearing Jesus’ voice; it also means following Him. Being led by the truth requires humility. We need to acknowledge that there is an authority higher than ourselves. In other words we need to recognize that we are NOT God. Pilate did not necessarily think that he was a god, but he did think that the natural forces of his time, particularly political and military power, were gods. This is seen by the fact that the top of the political and military structure, the Emperor, did make the claim of being a god.

Have things really changed all that much for us today? Aren’t we still prone to look for happiness and satisfaction in the goods of the world instead of in our relationship with God? We are all prone to sin, yet too often we are not willing to accept the responsibility for our sins. We minimize them, saying that they really don’t hurt anybody. But is that really true? Do we really know the consequences of our sins? We might not think much about not returning the extra change the teller accidentally gives us, but if a teller’s tray is short too much or too often they are likely to be fired. And that is just a consequence that we can see in this world. If we take seriously our believe that we are united through our baptism to form the Mystical Body of Christ, then each of our sins injures everyone else in the Body of Christ. Clearly we are in need of a Savior, but do we acknowledge that fact in our lives or do we think that we can make things right on our own? We might not have an emperor claiming divinity in our lives, but for many of us political power still is seen as the cure for all the problems. Or maybe it is science and technology that we see as saving us from all our problems. Do those other “gods” make too much noise in our lives so that we have a hard time listening to the voice of Jesus calling us to follow Him?

It is not too late. Just as Jesus stood before Pilate wanting to save him, Jesus continues to stand in our midst wanting to save us. We just need to acknowledge Him as Christ our King.