Today I’m reflecting on justice. As an ex-primary school teacher every time this word comes into my mind I hear a myriad of children’s voices calling “Miss, that’s not fair!” I remember making the same complaint myself.
Like most of us I also remember the pain of discovering the reality that life often isn’t fair. Rather than just being a childish dream, this early concern with fairness suggests that we carry in our hearts a deep sense of fairness from when we are very small.
It might get thwarted and bent out of shape, but I believe that somewhere deep within our hearts we recognise and value true justice. However self-centred or self-serving we become we carry the knowledge within us that humans flourish best when everyone is treated with justice.
Justice is not straightforward. We don’t have to look very far before we see our human justice being abused and misused, despite our best efforts. Reflecting on justice reminds us that God is not like us, as Isaiah tells us:
“For my thoughts are not your thoughts and your ways are not my ways, declares the Lord. For the heavens are as high above earth as my ways are above your ways, my thoughts above your thoughts.”
Part of the call of a Jubilee is to bring our understanding of justice closer to God’s. God’s justice is always firstly based on love. It’s the love that invites us into a covenantal relationship, and then offers us countless opportunities to find our way back to that relationship when we have wandered away from it. Our jubilee calls us to reflect on our understanding of justice and to ensure that, like God’s it’s based firstly on love.
How does the faithful love of God affect your understanding of what justice is?