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Blog: November 21, 2021

Fr. Jeff and others share reflections on the Sunday readings.

November 21, 2021

“Pilate said to Jesus,

‘Are you the King of the Jews?’”


What was Pilate thinking? It’s pure speculation, but I wonder. Surely he heard reports about Jesus’s triumphal entry into Jerusalem. Throngs of people cheered a rather odd sight, a man in a simple robe riding a donkey. Jesus didn’t have an army. No doubt, Pilate knew that before Jesus told him that his kingdom was not of this world. Did Pilate consider Jesus a threat to the Roman Empire? Probably not. By some estimates, the Roman army, in total, had more members than the population of Israel. Maybe Jesus was a trouble maker, a leader of a rebellion among the pesky Jews, or an inconvenience to be dealt with. Would this man disrupt the peace and cause him embarrassment with his superiors? Perhaps it was some plot by the Scribes, Pharisees, and chief priests to embroil Pilate in a dispute among factions. He may have been suspicious of their motives and had a sinking feeling that his power was being co-opted by the religious authorities. It was a tense arrangement at best. Perhaps, Pilate was curious about the man. Who was this Jesus? Why was he so popular? Was there something more? Was he authentic or deluded? Did he really think he was the King of the Jews as he was accused of claiming?


“So Pilate said to him, ‘Then you are a king?’

Jesus answered, ‘You say I am a king. 

For this I was born and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth. 

Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice.’”


It is almost as if the modern culture is speaking in Pilate’s next line (not in this week’s reading), “What is truth?” Maybe it’s in your heart or mind, too. Is there such a thing as truth, or is it all relative? Can we define what is true based upon social construction or personal meaning? Is science true or is it influenced by politics and ideologies? What about human beings who lie and falsify data? And what about epistemology? Can we even trust our senses and our apprehension of reality? Can we know anything? Most of us don’t live in this world of spiraling uncertainty, but it influences us. It seeps in through the cracks and destabilizes our foundations. We may feel adrift, doubtful, or anxious. What is truth, indeed? My cousin Nick, who tragically struggled with mental illness and took his own life, passionately pursued the truth. He had completed his Master’s Degree in Philosophy and sought not comfort or meaning, but truth at all costs. His illness cut short his pursuit, but I admired his single-minded desire to know. I do believe that, in God’s mercy, Nick’s desire was fulfilled by meeting the truth in person, Jesus the Christ. For Nick, there had to be something real, something true. 


In my own life, I experienced a sense of wonder and awe at the Buddhist and Shinto religions as a cultural exchange student in Japan while in high school. That deeply influenced my own ideas and beliefs, although an encounter with God’s love in the midst of my senior retreat reopened the question. My first philosophy course at the Air Force Academy focused on the question of truth. After all, it’s hard to potentially give your life, to die for your country and it’s ideals, if everything is relative, if nothing is true. It may be obvious, but, like my cousin, I came to a foundational conviction that truth exists. I was willing to die for my country and, later, I was willing to promise celibacy, obedience, and simplicity of life at my ordination to the priesthood. I believe that Jesus not only testifies to the truth, but is himself the truth in person. We can know the truth, encounter the truth, and love the truth. Now, what are you thinking?