Christmas--The Dialog Killer

Pope Benedict XVI is one of the more scholarly popes we’ve seen in decades. He is also a man of reasonably good will. He began his papacy by seeking to dialog with other religions around the world. The Roman Church has been good at that during several periods of its history, for good or for ill.
About a month ago, the Pontiff (an interesting title that goes back to pagan times in ancient Rome—the Caesars carried it, it means High Priest of Rome; it predates the birth of Christ) made the statement that no meaningful dialog was possible with adherents of non-Christian faiths.
This does not mean we cannot talk to them, make a common cause in limited areas or that we ought to view them with hostility. It should be noted that the first great Christian missionary, the Rabbi Saul of Tarsus, was never guilty of talking down anyone else’s faith—he merely talked up his own.
What the Pope was finally forced to conclude is that, in the end, Christianity—like Islam and Judaism—is a highly exclusive faith. There is no way you can stretch it into a “big tent” with room for people of all faiths and beliefs. There is no way, as Bush and Obama have both said recently, that you can say, “We all pray to the same God.”
The Christmas Season highlights that fact. This may partially be why Americans of other faiths or of no faith at all are so interested in dropping the name Christmas from the season. Christmas, as the account related in the second chapter of Luke says—and as it is defined by the Nicene Creed of AD 325—is the historical moment in which God became man (the incarnation).
It is the moment in which the Second Person of the Trinity is introduced—in human form. A human mother; God himself as father. The reason for this in Christian theology is that Adam’s betrayal left the human race with an infinite debt. Only the blood of God could pay it off. (See the movie “Lion, Witch and Wardrobe”, in which Christ is portrayed as the Lion, Aslan.)
So God had to come in human form, as a Second Adam, to cover the debts of the First. Christmas becomes that momentous occasion in which our savior (debt payer) finally comes to redeem (pay off our debts) us.
This theological point was, as the Rabbi from Tarsus, St. Paul, who basically founded Christianity was quick to admit, “foolishness to the educated and a stone they could not get over to his fellow Jews”. It sounds almost as silly as saying that a solid piece of iron is actually made up of itty-bitty little atoms that actually move around. Who, holding a piece of iron in hand, could actually believe such a thing?
But if you do believe it, the doctrine of the incarnation eliminates all possibility of one big tent where all faiths can meet In harmony. Christmas kills the dialog. If you accept the notion that the baby born in Bethlehem was “very God of very God” (Nicene Creed), then you cannot be praying to him if you pray to some other deity.
Christ said some very interesting things about himself. In the Gospel of John, chapter 8, verse 58, Christ says, ”Before Abraham was, I AM.” Of course his Jewish hearers understood this claim. When Moses asked God what his name was, the answer came, “I am”. (Exodus 3:14) At Christ’s claim to God’s name, the Jews were so enraged at his blasphemy that they tried to kill him on the spot.
(Philosophically, “I AM (THAT I AM) is an interesting name, unique to Judeo-Christianity. With this name, God proclaims himself the only non-contingent being in existence—he needs nothing else, water, oxygen, food, etc. etc. to exist—and he is outside of and unaffected by time.)
In John 10:30, Christ says, “I and the Father (God) are one.” In John 14:9, Christ says, “If you have seen me, you have seen the Father (God). In his mind there was no doubt that he was God.
Then finally, in John 14:6, Christ makes the faith he is proclaiming, Christianity, exclusive and not subject to dialog for all time by asserting, “No one comes unto the Father (God) BUT BY ME.”
So Benedict XVI took a look at the record and, taking the Christ of Christmas at his word, admitted that there was very little spiritual point in trying to dialog with other faiths and religions.
For any Christian to suggest that we are all praying to the same God sounds fatuous at best.