Hans Urs von Balthasar - The Moment of Christian Witness

THE MOMENT OF
CHRISTIAN WITNESS

Translated by
Richard Beckley

IGNATIUS PRESS SAN FRANCISCO

Title of the German original:
Cordula oder der Ernstfall
1966, 1987 Johannes Verlag, Einsiedeln, Trier
Published with ecclesiastical permission
Translation 1969 by The Missionary Society of
St. Paul the Apostle in the State of New York

Cover design by Roxanne Mei Lum

Published in 1994 by Ignatius Press, San Francisco
ISBN 978-0-89870-516-4
Library of Congress catalogue number 94-75997
Printed in the United States of America

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In the following pages I make a proposal and submit it to Christians for their consideration. A criterion is offered, and indeed a better one. Better than what? This use of the unrelated comparative is well known in the advertising world. Brand X washes whiterwhiter than what? To say more might lead to legal complications with other soap manufacturers. It would, moreover, be a tactical mistake in the art of salesmanship, because the unrelated comparative is more stimulating and evocative in its effect than the related comparative. And on this occasion something a little more evocative is what is required.

A criterion has a stimulating effect, even if one uses it only in a purely experimental way to exercise ones imagination. If you say to Georges Bernanos, Come along with me. Its the Ernstfall the crucial moment in Christian experience, the old grumbler will get up out of his armchair without so much as raising an eyebrow and follow you like a lamb. But if you go to Reinhold Schneider, the author of Winter in Vienna , and say the same thing to him, there is no telling what might happen. Whether you would finally manage to get any response at all from those who have been demythologized and converted to the world, I do not know. They have already explained everything away and are left with a merely symbolic belief in a message that they understand only by analogy. For them, both the belief and the message are worth dying for only by analogy, just as they consider their Christianity worth living for only by analogy to something else.

However, let us take this lantern of Diogenes and see what can be done with its help. Perhaps by its light we shall distinguish between people who otherwise look very much alike from the outside. One of these may be burning with love, and in his eyes every means may seem right that will help him to speak in a new way of love of Christ to someone who is hard to convince in this respect. But another may secretly feel that he has heard enough about the gospel, the Cross and the whole business about dogma and the sacraments, because he senses something new in the air. He may be out to kill two birds with one stone; in an unexpected and unforeseen manner he may find he can get rid of several things that have been thoroughly ruined for him, and at the same time be able to march forward as an enlightened and reformed Christian, in line with the latest learning, toward a better future. One person will de-mythologize in order to arrive at a purer and deeper faith; another will do it in order not to have to believe anything at all any longer.

The present state of Christianity conceals as much ambiguity as ever it did in the past! Therefore, let us take the lantern and perhaps we shall find among the great number of those who profess to be Christians a few who genuinely are! For who knows if, when the show actually begins, there may not be quite a few who will gladly step up onto the stage and take the part of a Genesius or a Cordula?

Since Jesus, the Son of God, manifested his charity by laying down his life for us, no one has greater love than he who lays down his life for Christ and his brothers (cf. 1 Jn 3:6; Jn 15:13). From the earliest times, then, some Christians have been called uponand some will always be called uponto give this supreme testimony of love to all men, but especially to persecutors. The Church therefore considers martyrdom as an exceptional gift and as the highest proof of love.By martyrdom a disciple is transformed into an image of his master who freely accepted death on behalf of the worlds salvation; he perfects that image even to the shedding of blood. Though few are presented with such an opportunity, nevertheless all must be prepared to confess Christ before men, and to follow him along the way of the cross through the persecutions which the Church will never fail to suffer.

Vatican II, Lumen Gentium
Dogmatic Constitution on the Church

1. The Scriptural Basis

Why was it that Jesus Christ prophesied no other fate for his disciples and followers than his own: persecution, failure and suffering to the point of death? It is true that the great speech with which he sends them out into the world at the end of St. Matthews Gospel, and which is splendidly phrased in words inspired by the Holy Spirit, entrusts them with a commission of universal significance for ail times and places and for all civilizations, both present and future, A commission, however, does not of itself constitute a guarantee that it will be carried through to its completion. It often happens that the greatest achievements of humanity are those that fill us with a vision of immense possibilities but break off before these possibilities are realized. It is true, moreover, that a commission of this kind makes such a superhuman demand on our strength that the prospect of our having to undergo suffering, or even to fulfill it partially, is never very far away. This is especially true when one considers that Christians are said to be sent out among wolvesa frightful image, if one takes the trouble to think for a moment what it really signifies: not only the helplessness and defenselessness of the lamb, but also the natural and therefore insatiable and ineradicable bloodthirstiness of the wolf. The great messianic speech in Matthew 10, which contains detailed instructions for putting into practical effect the inspired vision of Matthew 28:19-20, takes advantage of the sheep-wolf imagery as an occasion for a parallel series of statements interwoven one with another. One series is preceded by the warning Beware! and contains the darkest prophecies of coming persecutions in Matthew 10, verses 17-18, 21-22 and 34-36. The other series belongs together with the exhortation So have no fear of them! and contains the most joyful promises of victory in verses 19-20, 26, 28, 31 and 40-42.

The one series seems to be a clear contradiction of the other. For the situation of death is each time either implicit or explicit in the warnings. It is already implicit in the sheep-wolf imagery. If we do not feel it is expressed unambiguously enough in the incidents in which Christ is delivered up to the judgment of ecclesiastical courts and to scourgings, or is led before governors and kings, John makes it clear for us when he writes: Whoever kills you will think he is offering service to God (Jn 16:2), while in Matthew 10:12 paradosis is clearly described as being delivered up to death: Brother will deliver up brother to death, and the father his child, and children will rise against parents and have them put to death. Here the concern is with the death of the body as opposed to the death of the soul, since God alone has the power to consign us to damnation. The sword that divides men (Mt 10:34ff.) does not diminish the danger of death; on the contrary, it reveals the conditions preexistent within the situation, the likelihood of their extent: hate (Mt 10:22; Jn 15:18) and the unendurable pain of acknowledging Christ ( martyrion : Mt 10:18, cf. 32-33). But whereas the series of warnings clearly speaks of the situation of death, the series of promises seems to exclude each of them: But he who endures to the end will be saved (Mt 10:22), Even the sparrows are in the care of the Father; how much more so, therefore, are those who acknowledge his Son (Mt 10:29-31).

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