18/03/2026
... on these two hang all the law and the prophets.
WHAT EXACTLY DID JESUS THINK HE WAS DOING?
(A Coffee Lounge Conversation)
NOTE: A gentle word of warning to The Faithful (and the merely curious): this post contains actual theology. Not the decorative kind that sits quietly in the background, but the sort that may require a fresh cup of coffee, a reasonably alert mind, and possibly a biscuit of structural integrity. It is also, we should say, slightly longer than our usual offerings. But as we find ourselves in Lent—edging, as we are, towards the Cross—it felt worth lingering a little, and wondering together what, exactly, we think might be going on there.
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It was mid-morning in the Coffee Lounge, that curious hour when the place had filled with people who all claimed not to be free but had nonetheless found time for coffee.
Fr Fred was already seated with a cup that suggested long experience and low expectations. Audrey Black, Deanery Synod member and expert baker, arrived with a notebook, a handbag of formidable capability, and the composed expression of someone who had already assessed the room and found it wanting.
She sat down. They both looked at the pastries.
There was a pause.
AUDREY: I think… they meant well.
FRED: I think they began with hope.
AUDREY: And then lost their way.
FRED: Somewhere around the stage of adding fruit.
AUDREY: There are two. Possibly three sultanas, if one is being generous.
FRED: I admire your generosity.
AUDREY: I could have done better.
FRED: I have no doubt. Your Victoria sponge has resolved at least two parish disputes and one minor heresy.
AUDREY: Three, actually.
FRED: Of course it has.
(A pause. Audrey takes a sip of coffee, then straightens slightly. This is now Business.)
AUDREY: Father, I wanted to ask you something… slightly theological.
FRED: (sighs gently) I feared we might get there.
AUDREY: I’ve been listening to Tim’s sermons.
FRED: Ah.
AUDREY: He keeps saying there are… multiple ways of understanding the Cross.
FRED: Yes.
AUDREY: And he uses words. Long words. Words that arrive with coats and luggage.
FRED: Theological words tend to travel heavily.
AUDREY: Substitutionary Atonement.
FRED: Ah yes. The one that sounds like it should come with paperwork.
AUDREY: Redemption. Ransom. Moral Example.
FRED: The Big Four. Bingo. You’ve been paying attention.
AUDREY: I try to. But I’d quite like to know what any of them actually mean.
FRED: A dangerous ambition.
AUDREY: I thought you might help.
FRED: I might attempt to.
(A pause. Fred leans back, the way a man does when approaching deep water.)
FRED: Well then. Substitutionary Atonement, in its simplest form, says that Jesus takes the punishment that should fall on us.
AUDREY: (frowns) That sounds… administratively neat.
FRED: It does. Though it raises the slightly awkward question of why God needs to punish anyone in the first place, and why God then needs to punish God in order to forgive.
AUDREY: That does seem… complicated.
FRED: God is sometimes presented as running a rather severe accounts department. It's about his wrath on one side of the ledger, and his mercy on the other.
AUDREY: I’ve met the diocesan finance team. I see the resemblance.
FRED: Yes. Quite.
AUDREY: And Redemption?
FRED: That’s the idea of being “bought back.” As if humanity has somehow been sold into a kind of slavery, and Christ pays the price to free us.
AUDREY: To whom is the payment made?
FRED: Excellent question. Answers have varied. The devil. Death. The system in general. It’s never been entirely clear who’s issuing the invoice.
AUDREY: That feels… untidy.
FRED: Theology often is.
AUDREY: And Ransom?
FRED: Closely related. Jesus himself uses that word once or twice. Suggesting that his life somehow unlocks our captivity. Less a financial transaction, more a jailbreak.
AUDREY: I think I prefer that.
FRED: Most people do. It has better imagery.
AUDREY: And Moral Example?
FRED: That one says that Jesus dies to show us how to live. Or more precisely, how to die to ourselves. To love so completely that even death doesn’t interrupt it.
AUDREY: (quietly) That sounds… beautiful.
FRED: It does. Though some complain it doesn’t quite explain why the Cross had to happen in the first place. Others say his death was inevitable when Divinity meets Humanity—and when God declines to crush the opposition.
AUDREY: Are there any others?
FRED: (laughs) Plenty! But that's probably enough to be going on with. The others more or less line up with The Big Four, to a greater or lesser extent.
AUDREY: So which one is true?
FRED: (smiles) Ah.
(A slight pause. Audrey leans forward.)
AUDREY: Because this is really my question, Father. Did Jesus die for my sins… or not?
FRED: I think the honest answer is… yes. And also… we are still working out what that means.
AUDREY: That is not as tidy as I had hoped.
FRED: No. But it may be more truthful than some might tell you.
AUDREY: Go on.
FRED: It may mean he took upon himself the consequences of human sin. Not as a legal exchange, but as a lived reality. Violence, rejection, cruelty… he absorbed them.
AUDREY: So he suffered what we create?
FRED: Exactly. Which leads to another way of putting it: he died because of our sins, not so much for them.
AUDREY: Because we couldn’t bear what he was saying.
FRED: Precisely. Humanity met perfect love… and nailed it to a cross.
AUDREY: (quietly) That feels uncomfortably plausible.
FRED: It usually does.
AUDREY: And the Moral Example?
FRED: That remains. In choosing not to meet violence with violence, he shows a different way. The only way, perhaps, by which sin is actually defeated.
AUDREY: By refusing to play its game.
FRED: Yes.
(A pause. From the next table comes the unmistakable sound of cutlery meeting a very substantial breakfast.)
DOBBS: (without looking up) Sorry to interrupt.
AUDREY: You’ve been listening.
DOBBS: It’s difficult not to, when salvation is being discussed alongside a Full English.
FRED: Fair.
DOBBS: I’ve just got one question.
FRED: Of course you do.
DOBBS: How do we know which of these is right?
(A pause. Fred looks at him with the mild sympathy of a man who has heard this question many times.)
FRED: I’m not sure we do.
DOBBS: Oh.
FRED: Not in the sense of proving it. Christianity has spent a great deal of time arguing about these things.
DOBBS: I’ve noticed.
FRED: Occasionally to the point of killing each other.
DOBBS: That seems… counterproductive.
FRED: Deeply.
DOBBS: So what are we meant to believe?
FRED: Well, that’s the interesting thing. Jesus himself doesn’t spend much time explaining theories about his death.
AUDREY: He doesn’t?
FRED: Hardly at all. He uses the word “ransom” once or twice. But mostly, he simply lives… and then dies.
DOBBS: That feels like leaving the instructions out of the box.
FRED: Or perhaps trusting that we’ll understand by following rather than analysing.
AUDREY: Following?
FRED: Yes. For Jesus, faith seems to be less about holding correct ideas, and more about trust.
DOBBS: Trust in what?
FRED: In him. In his way of life. Love of God. Love of neighbour. Self-giving. Mercy. Justice.
AUDREY: The Kingdom.
FRED: Exactly. The poor lifted up. The excluded welcomed. The whole world turned gently but firmly the right way up.
DOBBS: So… faith is about doing that?
FRED: About trusting that way enough to live it.
DOBBS: Rather than having all the correct theories about it?
FRED: Even very clever theories.
AUDREY: (closing her notebook slowly) That’s rather a relief.
DOBBS: It is.
AUDREY: I was beginning to feel I needed a glossary before Good Friday.
FRED: A common condition.
(A pause. Audrey looks at her half-eaten pastry, then back at Fred.)
AUDREY: So in the end… it’s about love, isn’t it?
FRED: Yes.
AUDREY: Love is the thing that holds all of this together.
FRED: First, central, and always.
DOBBS: (thoughtfully) Even when the pastries are awful.
FRED: Especially then.
(A small silence settles over the table. Outside, the church stands in the late morning light, looking as though it has seen all of these conversations before, and is content to let them continue.)
AUDREY: (Looking disparagingly at the pastries) I think I might bake my own for next time.
FRED: That would, I feel, be a significant contribution to the life of the Church.
DOBBS: I am prepared to assist with testing.
FRED: A noble vocation.
And for a moment, at least, theology, pastries, and the Kingdom of God sit together quite comfortably at the same table.
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St Faithful’s is fictional. The affection is real.
Books by Canon Tom Kennar (including 3 volumes of 'The Parish Life' about St Faithful’s and our first novel) are available in print and e-book. St Faithful's merchandise is also available online. See https://tinyurl.com/4k9jtpbe for more about both.
AI may assist with these posts. The drafting and publishing responsibility is entirely human.
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