Judas and the High Priest agreed that the price of Jesus was thirty silver coins, enough to buy a small field.
Today in our post Christian world we like to put a price on life, many women have abortions because the feel they can't afford a child, or couples defer having a child because of the cost, gay "marriage", where it has been introduced has been a boon to those in the surrogacy business, in some third world countries there is a growing business in renting wombs and selling babies. The Staffordshire and other hospital scandals, again remind us that human life, caring for it and cherishing it, has a cost. Keeping someone alive on expensive has a cost, and as countries become poorer the cost will become more and more important, and it will become part of the debate as more and more people start to advocate euthanasia.
How much a human life?
Judas sold Jesus for thirty pieces of silver.
The message of Christianity is that God pays for us, "to ransom a slave he gave away his Son", How much has God paid for me? For me, he has given away his only begotten Son. He tells me, sinner, rebel, God-hater that I am, that I am worth the Son of God, I am worth the Creator, that is the value he places on us: everything. And the amazing thing for all of us, the beggar, the old man, the victim, the torturer, the unborn child, the newly conceived child, God says all these, just one of these is worthy of a God as a ransom. When Jesus is denied or pushed out of the public sphere we lose sight of our value and the value of everyone.
This is the message of Good Friday; the unimaginable value God places on us. This is the message we have for the world and for every individual in it: God places an infinite value on you. We show it by trying to love the least of all.
2 comments:
Thank you for sharing these thoughts, Father Ray. We were just talking today about how the devil rejoices when people are treated as if they are not made in the image of God - as "bunches of cells" or mere animals. I will pray for you.
We wouldn't be able to buy a field with the money; 30 pieces of silver are now worth around £1,000 but a small field would cost 20 or 30 times that.
Irrelevant, but it interested me.
(it depends of course on the size of both and the location of the field, but that seems a typical price for a horse paddock and the Royal Mint's silver Britannia).
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