Saturday of the Second Week of Lent
If the pollsters have it right, we have a lot of “prodigals” in our midst. According to surveys conducted over the last several years, the fastest growing group in the US with respect to religious identification is the group referred to as “the nones.” Those are individuals who, when asked about their religious commitment or affiliation, typically say something to the effect that they don’t identify with any church institution but that they might have spiritual leanings. Something like that.
Perhaps you can think of a religious “none” or two that you know. I certainly can. Actually, I can think of several “nones” that I know. Some of them are members of my extended family. Many of them, to my surprise at first, can be found in my classes at the University of Dayton, which is of course a Catholic university.
While not limited to young adults in their teens and twenties, the identification as religious “nones” is certainly prominent among them. Why?
When pollsters ask young adults why they don’t identify with the kind of institutionalized religion one finds in a church, the answer is pretty clear. And it’s the same answer I and colleagues I’ve talked to hear from students (many of whom were raised Catholic) at UD. These young adults will tell you that they find the doctrinal commitments, theological positions and, especially, attitudes toward people who are different on the part of many individuals who call themselves Christians not to be, well, very Christian. They’ll tell you that they think Christianity these days is too much about gatekeeping and politics and not enough about Jesus.
And, so, these “nones” are, in a manner of speaking, our prodigals. That being so, how should we respond to them? Can we make a compelling case to them for their return? And, if they do find their way back to us, how should we receive them?
Those are great questions that a lot of earnest Christians are asking these days. And I most certainly don’t have the answers. That said, I think we could do a lot worse than embrace in every way we can imagine the wisdom of the Psalmist today:
He will not always chide,
nor does he keep his wrath forever.
Not according to our sins does he deal with us,
Nor does he requite us according to our crimes.
The Lord is kind and merciful (Ps 103).
What if this God were the model for all Christians? What if Christians everywhere understood themselves to be called to follow this God? Who of our prodigals just might return?
And if/when they do . . . let’s throw a huge party, prepare the finest food, put rings on their fingers, drape robes over their shoulders, and (remembering our own sin), shout: “The Lord is kind and merciful!” Amen and amen!