(RNS) — My editors warn me regularly not to look at the comments at the end of my columns, but for my sins I do take a look. A majority of them are critical, not infrequently hostile and ad hominem, and those that aren’t seem to show up only to berate the critics. So be it.
An exception is RobertG, a frequent reader who identifies himself as “a retired priest and college professor, originally from Brooklyn, who tries to see all sides of every issue and to discern what is true and good.” And he’s as good as his word. He usually disagrees with me, sometimes rather intemperately, but always in good faith. He’s someone with whom I’m happy to exchange views.
After my last column — on the judge who asked a Justice Department attorney WWJD when it comes to letting trans people into homeless shelters — I got into a back-and-forth with RobertG about what the historical Jesus’ message really was. His claim, based on the work of some modern biblical scholars, was that in real life Jesus prioritized changing people’s hearts and minds over helping the least among us — in other words, he was more concerned with religious commitment than love of neighbor. Those passages that seem to suggest otherwise, he argued, are not from the Apostle Paul’s letters, the earliest evidence we have of Jesus’ actual preaching, but from later (Gospel) texts more reflective of the views of the early Christian community.
In response, I pointed to Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians: “To be sure, agape [love] outranks pistis [faith] in 1st Corinthians, but that’s a late letter, eh?” RobertG replied as follows.
“Good question. I Corinthians was written in response to specific problems in the churches of Corinth, including sexual immorality, which Paul (and Sosthenes) describe in great detail in chs. 5-6.
“In Ch. 7, they argue that, given the imminent Parousia (the apocalyptic second coming of Christ), it would be best if everyone avoided sex altogether, but allow marriage only grudgingly in order that the Corinthians not yield to temptation and engage the services of prostitutes, male and female. So it seems to me difficult to argue that, in the absence of specific teaching, the authors understood Jesus to have been open to including trans people in the Church, or that Paul would do so in the churches of Corinth.
“To your point about agape — well said, especially if we give more weight to Ch. 13 than to chs. 5-7. Yet, as you correctly note, Paul uses agape rather than the more familiar philia (love for friends, etc.) You may be aware that agape has specific theological meaning, viz., self-giving love: the love of God for humankind that demands self-giving love in response. In Pauline theology, it’s one of the charismata (gifts) of the Holy Spirit, and not what it has become: a verse to be read at weddings, which is, by contrast, a love that often fails. The love that never fails, on the other hand, is God’s love for humankind, enfleshed in the man Jesus, which Paul implores the people of Corinth to mirror in their lives of self-giving.
“So, although I would say let the trans person into the shelter, I don’t see 1 Corinthians as making a case that such formed part of Jesus’ revelation of the Father.
“Good Sabbath, Mark.”
“Thanks, Robert,” I replied. “I appreciate your commentary.”
Returning to the column a couple of days later, I was surprised to find that what he wrote above had been replaced with the following statement from RNS: “This comment violated our policy.” How could that be?
The policy, it turned out, was that a comment would be automatically removed if three people complained about it. In this case, the complainants were Wormwood, Peter and John_A, three familiar names in RNS’ critical commentariat.
Whether they complained independently, coordinated their complaints or are themselves one and the same complainant, I have no idea. I do believe that the triune objection didn’t have to do with RobertG’s scriptural exegesis but with his kind words for the author and, perhaps, with his support for admitting trans people to homeless shelters — as if an erstwhile ally extending a friendly hand to the other side is what’s truly unacceptable.
Be that as it may, what’s unacceptable to me is allowing commenters to cancel other people’s comments not because they contain personal or religious invective or otherwise violate standards of civility, but simply because the commenters don’t want to see them on the page. The upshot: RNS will now establish a higher bar for getting comments removed.
As for RobertG’s comments, they are now uncancellable. May you have a blessed and fruitful Lenten season, Father.