Outside the walls

At the time of Jesus, Israel, the chosen people of God, was extremely exclusive in mentality. Foreigners were not welcome. Lepers were prohibited from entering the city. It was even expected of them to alert people of their presence and to stay at large. With Jesus, God's kingdom extends beyond the confines even of the chosen people. By nature, God's kingdom is and is meant to be inclusive. Salvation is for all. It is the monopoly of no one and the prerogative of all.

This is the message, loud and clear, in today's Gospel from Luke, and likewise in the first reading from the Second Book of Kings. The healing of Naaman the leper at the time of Elisha and the healing of the lepers in the Gospel, with only the foreigner coming back to give praise to God, means that foreigners can be the bearers of the kingdom just as much as those on the inside.

These are clear instances where prophecy comes from outside the confines of the chosen people, even from outside the Church, we would say today. This is also what Paul is saying when he writes to Timothy in the second reading that "the Word of God cannot be chained". We need to hear over and over again this message given that we still at times perpetuate exclusivity whenever we speak of salvation.

Salvation does not depend on juridical observance, on ecclesiastical discipline, or on mere religious practice. It is not far-fetched at all to conclude that 'leprosy' in today's readings stands for all those blockages, real or imaginary, we ourselves create in time through prejudice or presumptuousness. In Luke, the performance of healing is the effective sign of the kingdom. God is powerful enough to bring down the walls we at times build.

There was a time when we claimed, with a tone of dogmatism, that outside the Church there is no salvation. But it all depends on our understanding of 'church'. The Church, even in its institutional aspects, can serve as a vehicle of salvation as much as it can be an obstacle. We can no longer argue aggressively, when speaking of salvation, or with the attitude of proselytism, or without any regard for the impulses of the Spirit. Historically, disregard for the Spirit has always been a grave sin of the Church. Because that makes us think of God as our possession, rather than the other way round.

God has revealed Himself historically and concretely in time and space, through Israel, and then fully and definitively through Jesus of Nazareth. But He continues to speak and to manifest Himself. At times we pretend to decide for God which are the 'right channels' through which He is expected to speak. But God is God and His ways are not our ways. Failing to discern God's ways, even outside the boundaries of the institution of religion, has always been tragic for the Church and for believers.

There was a time when Western Christianity reached out to evangelise the rest of the world. Now is the time when Western Christianity is being evangelised by outsiders. We live in the midst of a myriad of religions and cultures, a strange world of 'foreigners', from our standpoint. But God's standpoint has no foreigners. Outside Jerusalem stood Jesus Christ crucified and with arms wide open to include all and everyone.

At stake in all this is the ability of the Church in the West to both maintain and invigorate its witness. The missional Church recognises that it does not hold a place of honour in its host community and that its missional imperative compels it to move out from itself into that host community as salt and light.