If Jesus is Not Political, Why was Jesus Not Stoned to Death?

Jason Micheli —  April 10, 2019 — Leave a comment

Palm Sunday, the most political Sunday of the liturgical year is upon us. Of course, I realize such an assertion is anything but obvious to a good number of Christians. Jesus came to die for our sin; Christianity isn’t about politics, surely some of you are thinking. If it’s indeed the case that Christianity is about religion and not politics, that Christ died as a sacrifice for sinners not as a victim of the Power of Sin, then why in the hell does Jesus die on a cross?

If the death of Jesus is a religious death, then why is not stoned to death?

The late Dominican theologian and philosopher, Herbert McCabe, cautions against any understandings of the cross that are exclusively religious or theological. The very fact that Jesus was crucified suggests the familiar cliche that ‘God willed Jesus to die for our sin’ is not nearly complex enough nor this worldly. McCabe writes in God Matters:






Nobody was ever crucified for anything to do with religion.








And the Kingdom is incompatible with coercion.






In raising Jesus from the dead, the Father responded…



Jason Micheli


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