There are no unforgivable sins.

For Christian faith not to be idle in the world, the work of doctors and garbage collectors, business executives and artists, stay-at-home moms or dads and scientists needs to be inserted into God's story with the world. That story needs to provide the most basic rules by which the game in all these spheres is played.

If others neither have goods we want nor can perform services we need, we make sure that they are at a safe distance and close ourselves off from them so that their emaciated and tortured bodies can make no inordinate claims on us.

Sin is here the kind of purity that wants the world cleansed of the other rather than the heart cleansed of the evil that drives people out by calling those who are clean “unclean” and refusing to help make clean those who are unclean. Put.

By embracing the “outcast,” Jesus underscored the “sinfulness” of the persons and systems that cast them out.

The cure against Christian violence is not less of the Christian faith, but, in a carefully qualified sense, more of the Christian faith. I don’t mean, of course, that the cure against violence lies in increased religious zeal; blind religious zeal is part of the problem. Instead, it lies in stronger and more intelligent commitment to the Christian faith as faith.

God’s gifts aim at making us into generous givers, not just fortunate receivers. God gives so that we, in human measure, can be givers too.

To live in sync with who we truly are means to recognize that we are dependent on God for our very breath and are graced with many good things; it means to be grateful to the giver and attentive to the purpose for which the gifts are given.

If it is true that the dual command of love is the common ground of the two faiths, the consequences are momentous. We no longer have to say, “The deeper your faith, the more you will be at odds with others!” To the contrary, we must say, “The deeper your faith, the more you will live in harmony with others!” A deep faith no longer leads to clashes; it fosters peaceful coexistence.

Faith is the way we as receivers relate appropriately to God as the giver. It is empty hands held open for God to fill.