Credited to St. Augustine, the Irish playwright Samuel Beckett had a favorite saying: “Do not despair, one of the thieves was saved. Do not presume one of the thieves was damned.” I love that quote. Christ’s compassion floods our own presumptions doesn’t it?
This Sunday’s Gospel tells the horrific story of our Savior suffering a most inhumane death, and yet at the moment of his death he still has time to offer salvation and mercy. It is a shocking moment and a shocking promise.
Of all the people in the Bible that Jesus encounters, only one is guaranteed heaven. Think about that. Not even the Virgin Mary is guaranteed heaven from the lips of Jesus. Of course, we know by faith that she is our mother and queen, but in the narratives no one is expressively said to be with Jesus in heaven, except one person. The so-called “good thief.” “Today, you will be with me in paradise,” Jesus tells this condemned man. It the central image of God’s mercy and it is given to a man that was condemned. How true our Holy Father Francis’ words when he reminds us “the people most in need of our mercy, are the people who deserve it the least.”
Thinking of Samuel Beckett, Vladimir, the hobo philosopher of Beckett’s seminal Waiting for Godot has a long speech that sums up for me this story of Christ’s overwhelming compassion:
“Let us not waste our time in idle discourse! Let us do something, while we have the chance! It is not every day that we are needed. Not indeed that we personally are needed. Others would meet the case equally well, if not better. To all mankind they were addressed, those cries for help still ringing in our ears! But at this place, at this moment of time, all mankind is us, whether we like it or not. Let us make the most of it, while we still have the chance!”
For a moment, “the good thief” is “all of mankind” and Christ’s love is for all of us. Certainly, we feel like good thieves. We know what it is like to do wrong, to wallow in self-pity, we know what it is like to be socially or economically crucified, we know what it is like to thirst for mercy.
If you’re like me, you probably know some good thieves. I know I do, and maybe we all know them because we’re all good thieves, because we can’t presume anyone is a bad one.
I’ll be seeing you,
Elliot