NOTES for Luk 9:51-56
We do not know what spirit we are of. Today the possibility of judgment does not surprise us; we easily judge not only in our own name, but also in the name of Christians, in the name of the whole Church. One often hears, "the holy fathers say..." or "the Pope said," and so on and so forth. In the name of the Church we accuse people of sins, without seeing the beam in our own eye. In every confession there have been periods when people were killed in the name of the Church: the Inquisition, the struggle against the Old Believers, religious wars... In this text we see that even while Jesus was alive, the apostles wanted to destroy in His name those who had not received Him.
This was a manifestation of love for Him, but not true love. Love for God is impossible without love for one's neighbor. We do not know what spirit we are of, but we know for certain that Machiavelli was wrong when he wrote that the end justifies the means. Love for one's Teacher and God cannot be imposed by violence. Nothing can be achieved by violence, especially not love. God and violence are incompatible. God died for every inhabitant of that Samaritan village that did not receive Him; He also died for each of the apostles, He died for Judas, He died for each of us, and apart from Him, no one can judge.