W6 Day 5 Pious Lie, My Foot!

Fuzzy Shapes Of Truth
Sometime in 1532 a friar who accompanied Francisco Pizarro called on Atahulpa, the Inca chief in prison. The friar wanted to win a soul to Christ and the king was sceptical whether the Christian god dealt in stolen goods and retained the service of those who lied their way through in order to get what they wanted. Friar Vincente saw no difficulty with that. He explained, “A soul is the most precious thing before God. So we may tell a lie, a pious lie, so you may win eternal salvation.”
Atahulpa rued the loss of gold and silver and said,” I believed in Pizarro who must be a whoreson to have lied so smoothly. Doesn’t your king punish liars in his kingdom?” The friar defended the conquistador saying he did a service to his master.
“Ah yes, I understand,” said the prisoner gloomily, “ He lied for honor and saving of his own skin.” After a long silence he looked the friar in his eyes to say, “But you told a lie for the sake of God. I do not know which of the two is the bigger rascal.”
We may get confused where the truth ends and a lie takes hold of a whole range of human transactions since we are bound by time and place and have no way of seeing beyond a short range. In other ways we have no absolute standard with which to separate truth from lies. Incas sacrificed humans as much as Christianity is founded on the redemptive sacrifice of Christ. In what way the Inca practise becomes heathen and the other sacred?
Faith is the only criteria we have which is not same as having Truth Absolute.
So shall we leave that office to God and we may concentrate on what is within our power?
Tailpiece:
After Abel was killed God appeared to confront Cain and He said ‘..the voice of thy brother crieth unto me from the ground.’(Gen:4-10) Matter has its shadow, the cries of souls unjustly killed and falsely accused and defrauded. All these must come up against Truth Absolute.