Throughout the Gospels we see Jesus extend his hand to people time and again, no matter what. Leprosy. Blindness. ‘Demons’. Sexual sin. Jesus is not repulsed by the true nature of humanity, neither is he blinded to its worst realities. He reaches out and he extends dignity and humanity to all. Women, foreigners, children, even a murderer dying on a cross. No one is beyond his reach, no one.
Take the story known by most as “The Woman Caught in Adultery” in John 8.
What proof do we have that this was the case? Men, with murder on their minds, warping the law in an attempt to trap and humiliate the upstart from Nazareth.
Tale as old as time, sexual morality affixed to the actions of the women. The accusation? Adultery. The punishment clear. Leviticus 20:10 ‘Stone them both’. The double standard, no matter the context, the culture or the currency, the pleasure all his, the blame all hers. She felt their rage, their hate, their anger, but somehow, she felt it wasn’t really all about her. Hands were all over her, grabbing, pulling, dragging, touching, harm heaped on top of hurt
She is thrown into the midst, faced with the brutal glare of public scrutiny and alone she waits.
Waits for the first blow to land. Waits for it all to be over. Her accusation announced loudly for all to hear.
But the glare of public scrutiny suddenly shifts, the focus swings onto the young man in the centre, He bends down.
He bends down and begins to trace in the dust, from here she cannot see what he is writing. It wouldn’t matter anyway. She cannot read.
The silence stifles and the tension mounts, this is excruciating.
The young man they were all focused on suddenly stands and looking directly at her, in a way that makes her feel as though her soul has been laid bare. He speaks, the tone, gentle and caring, belies the death sentence held in his words. She stops breathing, he holds her gaze, time stops; he sees her; he really sees her.
‘The one of you who is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone at her.’
Confused at his words, she steels herself for the impact, eyes tightly closed.
The sounds are strange, shuffling, shifting, stepping, silence…..
Opening her eyes she looks around and the young man is bent over writing in the dust, the markings meaningless to her. He looks up, his gaze both warm and inviting.
‘Where are they?’ The surprise in his tone mirrored by her own.
‘Has no one condemned you?’ She shook her head, ‘No one, sir.’ Waiting, still waiting. His condemnation would hurt more than the stones that she had earlier feared.
That gaze, it burned, yet she basked in it, ‘Neither do I condemn you. Now go, and sin no more.’
The men with murder on their minds could not publicly declare themselves sinless, but he instructed her to ‘sin no more’.
Was that an option?
Was that a possibility?
Did she have that much control over her own life?
He believed so.
This one moment would forever change her sense of self, her worth, her life. She hadn’t understood what was happening when they dragged her into the temple courtyard. But when he spoke she understood it all. Later when they spoke about the young Rabbi from Nazareth who died, she understood that this was not the end of the story. She was not surprised when his followers started to share stories of seeing him afterwards. She quietly believed and was forever changed by one Sabbath morning in the Temple courtyard.
The taint of sexual sin does not cause Jesus to recoil from this woman. Within Christianity we have seldom seen such a reaction, of acceptance, compassion and grace. Instead we see institutions, laundries, reparative therapies, silence, suffering and shame in response to perceived sin or even the expression of sexuality. The accusation of sexual impropriety alone, has been enough to destroy many lives.
The Jesus we read about in the gospels is not afraid of our worst truth. He does not define us by our worst deed. Looking at that woman He knew that his antagonizing of the Scribes and Pharisees would not end well for him. But he never hesitated, her situation demanded action.
Jesus stands before us now, hands extended, scars visible, His body broken, but triumphant. He is not ashamed of his brokenness, he neither condemns nor judges us for ours.
Shame lives in the silence, in the unmentionable and the unnamed. There it feeds, and it grows until we are no longer able to hide it. Until we are no longer able to ignore it. Reach out, name the thing that stops you, that keeps you down, that says you won’t ever succeed. ‘I am come that they might have life, and life abundant.’ Jesus died so that your life might be abundant. Secure in the knowledge that you are loved, you are valued, you are known, step out from under the shame that has sought to hold you back, and begin to live that abundant life.
Teagan Caeoimhghin
Teagan works in Dublin and is a counsellor, pastoral care worker, educator, public speaker and theologian, with a special interest in faith, sexuality, gender, social justice and the intersection between them.