There is a very great deal of importuning God, or Jesus, to have mercy on us, or other people - I have done great deal of such importuning myself, such as the Jesus Prayer.
But I've come to believe that this is a bad idea, because it tends to fix a habit of supposing that God and Jesus are Not merciful, but need to be importuned to be merciful...
It's as if God, or Jesus, is the problem!
As if we must Always be reminding them, even begging them to do... what is of their nature to do, and they cannot do otherwise.
Anyway, asking for mercy now seems like a Bad habit, and I am trying to remember that my loving-God does not, Not Ever, need to be asked for mercy.
There is something wrong, a sad and actually offensive misunderstanding, that Christians ever suppose otherwise.
As if we have mixed-up the true nature of our Father, with some other god who is a tyrant that demands repeated, even continual, propitiation.
Well, we are all sinners, and we all make mistakes!
But it's time to apologize to God for this one.
Note: Of course in asking for mercy, people may and often do mean something else - the words may not be intended literally; indeed may have more of a mantra function, perhaps simply directing our attention Godwards or at Jesus... All are possibilities. But I have come to dislike the word, and what I perceive to be its gravitational effect.
13 comments:
A lot of traditional prayer involves asking God to do what he naturally wants to do anyway -- the most obvious instance being "Thy will be done" in the Lord's Prayer. There's obviously no need to persuade him to do his own will; I think it's more a declaration that we are aligning ourselves with that will. Likewise, the tradition of saying to a condemned criminal "May God have mercy on your soul" serves more to remind *us* of the correct attitude to have toward the criminal than to influence the behavior of God.
@Wm I was trying to cover that with my note, but while there is clearly validity - it seems a rather feeble and desperate and over-inclusive defence. Such an argument would only be acceptable when what was asserted was regarded as actually true or a matter of indifference.
I find it increasingly important to remember and affirm God character; and to dissociate from the extremely frequent assumption of a god with the nature, character and behaviour of a power-crazed evil tyrant.
Isn’t the petition due to the fact that justice is also God’s nature? Whether you are given justice or mercy depends on which one you ask for, ergo we must ask.
@Mia. I know that people often place justice as a primary trait of God, especially protestants - following Paul. And Jewish Law. But I don't think it is true. God is our loving Father, and justice is Not an essential trait of ideal parenthood - love transcends justice. Justice is merely a necessary expedient of life among unloving strangers.
@Wm. I would re-emphasize that my point her is not that it is merely redundant to ask God for mercy, but symptomatic of a horrible and wounding misunderstanding, misinterpretation.
Imagine if a child in a loving family felt it necessary ritually, repeatedly, to beg his father or mother for *mercy*!
Such a child is badly and harmfully misunderstanding his situation.
(Like the dwarfs at the end of The Last Battle.)
But in the post below (and you have said similar things often) you say: "Repentance is the acknowledgement that I have sinned; which includes understanding that what I have done is indeed a sin; and the asking of God's forgiveness for my sins with a contrite and sorrowful heart."
https://charltonteaching.blogspot.com/2014/03/the-nature-of-repentance.html
It's hard for me to see a substantive difference between this and asking for mercy. The Christian tradition is surely that punishment isn't something that God does to us, but the natural consequence of our sins unless we seek and accept forgiveness.
@Mal - That was 12 years ago, and I have been continuing to think about things in the meanwhile. I now regard that 2014 statement as significantly mistaken.
Maybe this is key because Judas killed himself, presumably thinking he couldn't be forgiven for what he did
so that the one unforgivable sin is believing something, however bad, is unforgivable.
Seems vital incase we get ourselves in a situation where we feel unforgivable and that we don't mix-up at that point 'the true nature of our Father, with some other god who is a tyrant that demands repeated, even continual, propitiation.'
@Owen. Very good point.
I believe there's a bit of the Western/Eastern divide here, where God is seen more as "Judge" in the West and as "Healer" in the East.
We're in both cases asking God to forgive our sins, but it's not about asking God to not punish us as a Judge, but to heal us.
At the very least, I believe this perspective avoids or attenuates your criticism.
@Ranger. I am talking from a "Western" perspective. But from what I know, the Eastern ( Buddhist, Hindu) concept of God is so different, in so many ways, from the Christian God (and the nature and purpose of the religion), that your distinction isnt really valid, overall.
Sorry for the misunderstanding, I meant "Western Christianity" (i.e, Roman Catholics and Protestants mostly) vs "Eastern Christianity" (Orthodox). I thought it would be clear from the context but obviously it wasn't. I avoided the direct terms because I don't want to make a sectarian dispute about it, just to highlight a difference of perspective.
@Ranger. Ah, I see what you mean. I agree there is a difference of degree, but not a qualitative difference. Certainly, the sheer repetition of Lord Have Mercy in the EO liturgy and prayer tends to change its perceived meaning! But IMO there are fundamental contradictions in EO theology shared with all other major denominations, which make it almost impossible clearly to explain the necessity of Jesus, and tend to encourage the idea that God the Father needed persuading to be loving to us. The intermediary role of Mary and of Saints is sometimes explained this way too.
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