Jesus becomes increasingly the sign of contradiction in the history of human civilization. His utterly paradoxical and burdensome doctrine has been accepted by infinite numbers of men and women and practiced with intense love, even to the supreme sacrifice.  Infinite numbers of others reject it with inflexible pertinacity and hate it with a rabid hatred.

The furious conflict goes on, not without frauds and treachery. Often troops appear waving standards copied from the sign of contradiction and shouting cries tuned to the precepts of Jesus; they proclaim brotherhood and other altruisms unknown to the subjects of the world. But the deception does not last; in the end the imitation betrays itself because its voice and its accent are different.

Certain it is that Jesus is today more alive than ever among us. All have need of him, either to love him or curse him, but they cannot do without him.  Many people in the past have been loved with extreme intensity – Socrates by his disciples, Julius Caesar by his legionaries, Napoleon by his soldiers.  But today they belong irrevocably to the past; not a heart beats at their memory.  There is no one who would give his life or even his possessions for them even though their ideals are still being advocated. And when their ideals are opposed, no one ever thinks of cursing Socrates or Julius Caesar or Napoleon, because their personalities no longer have any influence; they are bygones.  But not Jesus; Jesus is still loved, and he is still cursed. People still renounce their possessions and even their lives both for love of him and out of hatred for him.

No living being is as alive as Jesus.

Giuseppe Ricciotti [t1964] an Italian Scripture scholar