She grew up a Jewish girl in a Catholic neighborhood. She was not a Christian, but she loved Jesus. I mean, who wouldn’t love Jesus? Just listen to the Gospel stories about his amazing loving life and you can’t help but love him. And she did.

She was disappointed when her little girlfriends came of age to be confirmed and she was not allowed to go to confirmation classes with them. She loved hearing the stories. She loved Jesus. But she was Jewish. And Jews don’t usually go to confirmation classes in Christian churches, Catholic or Protestant.

One day around Easter her little Christian friends told her something terrible.

“You killed Jesus,” they said.

She couldn’t believe her ears. She had never even met Jesus! How could she have killed him? And besides, she LOVED Jesus!

Her girlfriends treated her with disdain. She ran home in tears. When she told her mother about what had been said the rabbi was called. Then the rabbi angrily called the priest of that church. There was a big, loud, tear-filled meeting.

Afterward, everyone agreed this little Jewish girl had not killed Jesus after all.

_____

So here we are on another Good Friday, remembering Jesus’ death on the cross. Christians around the world observe the day in countless different ways, all sharing that solemn sadness that falls upon you when remembering a loved one’s death. And along with Good Friday’s mourning often arises the same shameful message hurled that day against the little Jewish girl.

“You killed Jesus.”

Of course we are all well aware that this awful accusation has been hurled at Jewish people since the day Jesus died. It is the thought that was used to fuel the holocaust and the extermination of six million Jews before and during World War II. And it is the attitude that underlies anti-Semitism in our day.

“You Jews killed Jesus.”

And yet, not just Jews are convicted of the murder of Christ and sentenced to serve a lifetime in this cold dark prison of guilt and shame.

We Christians are indicted too. And people of other religions. And people of no religion at all.

We are ALL sinners. Remember?

And – remember what “they” told us about US sinners?

“Christ died for YOUR sins.”

We all killed Jesus. Men, women, children – all of us.

That’s the party line.

Jesus took the death we deserve. He died in our place. We caused Jesus’ death.

We killed Jesus.

_____

A few years ago, gently holding my little granddaughter in my arms, peering into her beautiful blue eyes that reflect nothing but the purest love and goodness, I found myself thinking, “This makes no freaking sense!”

Only a guilt-ridden theologian with too damn much time on his hands could come up with an idea like this that condemns all humanity – including little Jewish girls and my little Christian granddaughter – for the state-sponsored murder of the most beautiful person who ever lived!

So I say to my granddaughter and all who may struggle under the overwhelming weight of religious malpractice:

“No, honey, you did not kill Jesus.” 

Jesus was killed because he stood up for you – your value – your dignity – your worth as a child of God. In fact, whenever people take a stand in the radical Love of God for all people, they often suffer the indignity of rejection by the powers-that-be.

And sometimes they face death.

Sometimes people die because they stand up for the Good.

But of course, I don’t have to tell my granddaughter about all that.  She does not possess anywhere in her little girl’s body, mind or soul even a subatomic particle’s worth of guilt about our Savior’s death.

When she gets older she will no doubt join the rest of us struggling to understand why there is evil in the world and why bad things happen to good people. She may come to that place in life where she wonders if there was any point at all to Jesus’ death on the cross.

That’s when you and I will have to tell her about the miracle of why Good Friday really is Good:

Because even when good people suffer because they fully embrace God’s Loving way – even when the powers of evil and death prevail on the sad Friday’s of human history…

…Easter always comes!

 

(Note: The little Jewish girl described in this post is today a religion professor at Vanderbilt University. An Orthodox Jew, she teaches New Testament studies because, she says, “I still love Jesus!”