“Pontius Pilate, representing Roman justice and law, shows what these are worth when called upon to do justice to the truth.”
Listening to the attacks on candidates for the Trump Administration Cabinet and Department heads a new low has attained. One journalist surprised me by writing that certain folks on the Senate panel came perilously close to asking “are you now or have you ever been an Orthodox Catholic”. Being that many of the Senators are unorthodox Catholics it is a brazen question. “Orthodox “ means the “correct praise”, or glorifying properly. One Senator stated to a candidate, “your dogma shouts loudly from your opinions”. Translated that means that what you have been taught in the church might actually inform your opinions and your rulings and impact policy. Of course we know they are talking about abortion. It made me go back and reread a little book written years ago by Hendrik Berkhof called “Christ and the Powers”. The theme is that when Paul speaks of “principalities and powers” he is speaking of the good gifts of God that underlie and bolster creation. Government, the Law and laws, social organizations and cultures, and even churches are created by God as good gifts that keep us from totally destroying ourselves. They become corrupt and corrupting and Christ has led them captive when He died on the cross and put them on “public display” see Colossians 2:13-15. The powers that were made good by God want to be God, and so “when the true God appears on earth in Christ it becomes apparent the they are inimical to Him, acting not as His instruments but as His adversaries. The scribes, representatives of Jewish law far from receiving Him who came in the name of the God of the law, crucified Him in the name of the law. The priests, servants of His temple, crucified Him in the name of the temple. The Pharisees personifying piety, crucified Him in the name of piety. Pilate, representing Roman justice and law, shows what these are worth when called upon to do justice to the truth.” Christ defeated the powers by disarming them of their power to create illusions that they are the regents of the world who offer ultimate certainty, ultimate direction, ultimate happiness and ultimate duty for small dependent humanity. In Christ we know that we have higher orders to follow and we stand under a greater protector. Watch these hearings and see what a “public spectacle (display) really means in terms of Collosians2.
