Did Jesus descend into hell or to the dead?---By Heather Hahn (UM News)

Did Jesus descend into hell or to the dead?

By Heather Hahn
April 22, 2011 | UMNS

 "He descended into hell."

That's one possible explanation of what Jesus did between Good Friday and Easter.

For more than a millennium, Christians have uttered some version of that phrase as part of the Apostles' Creed. And for nearly just as long, theologians have wrestled with what the phrase means or whether it should be included in the creed at all.

Early Methodist hymnals omitted the phrase altogether. The 1989 United Methodist Hymnal includes the likely more accurate translation, "He descended to the dead," and mentions "descended into hell" only as a footnote.

But including any mention of descent in the creed says something about how Christians over the ages have come to understand God's saving work, say church scholars.

"It means there is no part of human existence to which Christ did not 'descend,'" said the Rev. J. Warren Smith, associate professor of historical theology at United Methodist-related Duke Divinity School in Durham, N.C.

"It's what it means for Christ to take upon himself ... the punishment of sin, which is death. If Christ really dies, then that means he (journeys) all the way to the place of dead."

Read the rest of the article here.

It was God's blood which was shed upon the cross...

 

Why Good Friday is a warning against far-right Christian nationalism---Rev. Nathan Empsall, Episcopal priest and the executive director of Faithful America

Good Friday is a day when Christians remember Jesus Christ’s death on the cross — his execution upon an instrument of state torture.

It is also a powerful reminder of how dangerous it is for society when authoritarian politicians and corrupt religious leaders conspire for power and dominion.


Good Friday’s warning resonates deeply even now, nearly 2,000 years after Jesus’ death. That’s because the relationship between the religious authorities of Christ’s time and the brutal Roman governor who ordered his execution, Pontius Pilate, is little different from the Christian nationalist bond that exists between today’s Republican Party and conservative American Christianity.

Read more here.

Good Friday, the Firing Squad, and the Gas Chamber

From the Catholic Mobilizing Network...


Good Friday is a time to contemplate capital punishment.

Today we remember that Jesus suffered and died for us in an execution at the hands of the state.

At the same time, we remember that thousands of our brothers and sisters in the U.S. face the same gruesome fate — and that we, as Christians, have a responsibility to advocate against these attacks on human dignity.

On this particular Good Friday, this responsibility looms larger than ever. Two states — South Carolina and Arizona — have recently announced plans to restart executions in the coming weeks.

(This is very important. Please read more here.)

Today, Good Friday, we weep over the execution by a state of a convicted criminal who carried the message of our salvation. That message of salvation tells us to see Christ in others. If we are about that project, can we allow state-sanctioned executions to take others?