St. Thomas Aquinas was one of the most prominent theologians in all of Christianity through all the ages. He studied and taught, wrote complex theology and philosophy. He once made the foundational statement that “All truth is God’s truth.”

In his day, all truth was Christianity’s truth…this was sacrosanct. Yet, he understood that the Christians didn’t have the market on truth. Instead, whenever and wherever truth is found, you have found God. Our expression of faith in the Church is a part of our understanding that truth, but in a world where most of it had not yet been discovered, there was the reality that other traditions existed where God was revealed.

Our faith fell into a type of tribalism where we are right, everyone else wrong. Where we are the favorites and everyone else is not. Jesus, the great teacher of grace and extravagant welcome who allowed women of the night, thieves and tax collectors, even ‘sinners’ to dine with him, the church forgot the example of our teacher! We became about good people, people like us, people that were ‘in’ the crowd at the expense of those outside of our crowd.

And the struggle to be the church of Jesus Christ continues today! Every time we exclude, we cease being a people of the way. Each time we judge, we cease being the people of the way. Each time we choose violence, we negate the non-violent Savior of the world. Whenever we dare to remain inflexible, we no longer walk in the way of Christ, but instead in our own understanding of me. Truth is flourishing and God is revealing, will we have eyes to see and ears to hear?