The Gospels contain many startling statements that familiarity may disguise. On one occasion, for example, Jesus declared, “No one can come to the Father except through me” (John 14:6). Can that really be true? By the Father he means God. Was he really saying that no one can come to a relationship with God without first establishing a relationship with him? Did Jesus regard his fellow Jews whom he had not persuaded as a lost cause? Was he dismissing out of hand all followers of other religions, as well the many outstanding people of goodwill down the ages for whom religious faith makes no sense?
One essential lesson to be learnt from this question is the importance of not fastening on to a single sentence as a kind of universal key, for there is other teaching to be borne in mind. Think of the Beatitudes: “Blessed are the poor in spirit, those who mourn, the meek, those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, the merciful, the pure in heart, the peacemakers, those persecuted for righteousness’ sake, and those who are reviled and falsely accused. The reward for these blessed people, we are told, will be great in Heaven” (Matthew 5: 3-12). “And there are those who feed the hungry, give drink to the thirsty, welcome strangers, clothe the naked, and visit those who are sick or in prison. And the conclusion? When they did it to one even of the least of these, they were in fact doing it also for him, for the Lord” (Matthew 25: 34-40). The way people come to the Father through Jesus is not as simplistic as we may at first assume.
All the same, a relationship with Christ is itself not to be dismissed out of hand either. I would suggest that it has a significant role to play. When I ponder this issue, I think about Claire Lawrence. Her photograph is on my desk as I write.
I buried Claire in the spring of 1990. She was just over four years old. She had been born with cerebral palsy that made her prey to meningitis, epilepsy, pneumonia and any other passing virus. She never spoke. She was probably deaf and almost certainly blind. But although she was virtually incapable of any response at all, she received unending love from the doctors and nurses who cared for her, the teachers who worked with her, the family and friends who came to visit her, and most of all from her mother and father.
Now let me be clear. I am not suggesting that Claire’s condition offers an analogy for non-Christian religions or for those who find the very idea of religious faith meaningless, as though they can simply be dismissed as deaf, dumb and blind, and somehow dependent for their salvation on those for whom faith has meaning. That idea would be as false as it is arrogant. Whatever claims Christians may make for the Gospel, we cannot presume to determine how else God may make himself known. I wish simply to use one aspect of her condition, the fact that she could not actually respond. And in our world there is the fact that many wonderful people, whether because committed to other religious traditions or unmoved by religious faith at all, find that the Gospel leaves them cold. They cannot respond to it. Yet as Claire, though unable to respond, was surrounded by love and received love, so those whose faith is different or who find religion meaningless, may nevertheless in some way benefit from the faith of those who believe. And they enhance it.
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For this relationship is not all one-way. When Claire died, many people acknowledged that she had tapped depths in their capacity for loving of which, before knowing her, they had been unaware. In this way she not only received love from them, but returned it as well. Could it not be the same for those who believe when they are aware of those who do not? Without condescension, they discover their own faith deepened when, so to speak, they also hold it in trust for those who cannot believe.
This deepened faith creates for others a link to the Father. There are more ways to him through Jesus than we had perhaps imagined.
Monsignor Roderick Strange is the rector of Mater Ecclesiae College, based at St Mary’s University, Twickenham