Civil disobedience and compassion
When laws become unjust, we have a duty to stand against them
Homily preached by the Rev. Jonathan A. Mitchican at St. Edith Stein Catholic Church in Katy, TX on Saturday, May 3, 2025 - 3 Easter in Year C
(Acts 5:27-32, 40b-41)
One of my favorite modern pieces of theological writing turned sixty-two years old just a couple weeks ago. I’m talking about Martin Luther King, Jr.’s famous Letter from a Birmingham Jail. People don’t often think of that as a theological document, but it is. King built his case for disobeying the segregation laws of Birmingham on the Bible and the tradition of the Church. “I would be the first to advocate obeying just laws,” writes King. “One has not only a legal but a moral responsibility to obey just laws. Conversely, one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws. I would agree with St. Augustine that ‘an unjust law is no law at all.’”
King sounds very much like Peter and the apostles here. In our reading from Acts, the apostles have been rounded up by the Sanhedrin for publicly preaching the Gospel. When they’re brought before the high priest and asked to explain themselves, their answer is simple and direct: “We must obey God rather than men.” There’s a history of civil disobedience in the Church that goes back to the prophets in the Old Testament, and then to Jesus Himself. His teaching in the temple and His overthrowing of the tables of the money changers was certainly against the law. Yet He did those things anyway, because the law was unjust and needed to be resisted.
But as King said, we’re also called as Christians to respect the law and obey it when it is just. We may not like some laws or think they are stupid, but we must still obey them. The rule of law is crucial for societies to survive. When people stop obeying the law because they don’t think it applies to them or they think they can get away with it, the whole society suffers. So how do we know the difference between just laws and unjust laws? King answers that by appealing to St. Thomas Aquinas who taught that man-made laws are only just when they’re in harmony with the natural and eternal law that comes from God. King says, “Any law that uplifts human personality is just. Any law that degrades human personality is unjust.” Racial segregation laws that denied people the right to vote or to earn a living or to exist free of violence simply because of the color of their skin–those laws failed to meet that test. Therefore, they had to be opposed by Christians, and all people of goodwill. And that’s true whether you’re directly affected by such a law or not. As King puts it, “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”
Civil disobedience is sometimes necessary, but it comes at a cost. Peter and the other apostles had several opportunities to escape after they were arrested. They chose to submit themselves to the authorities, even though the authorities were wicked. When they were beaten by their jailers before being released, they “rejoiced that they had been found worthy to suffer dishonor for the sake of the name” of Jesus. King wrote his letter from jail because he accepted that he would be arrested for his nonviolent protest. And Jesus went willingly to the cross, submitting to a terrible injustice for the sake of a greater good.
The word compassion literally means “to suffer with” someone. Are we compassionate? If so, then who are we willing to suffer with and for? As Christians, we’re called to be peacemakers, to resist the violence of this world, but that isn’t easy. If we’re truly following the example of Our Lord, we’re unlikely to be placed in positions of power and prestige; and on those rare occurrences when someone does try to use power or prestige for Christian purposes, they’re almost always made to suffer for it. Following Jesus means letting go of our ambitions for such things, which can be a hard pill to swallow, but what we gain far exceeds what we lose. We believe in a God who pours out both justice and mercy. Not even death could stop Him from doing so. All the power and prestige this world has to offer won’t mean anything if we hold onto it by ignoring the plight of those around us. In the end, it’s only love that we’re able to take with us beyond the grave.
There are many people hurting in our society and in our world today, people who’ve often been overlooked and sometimes been oppressed: The poor, the needy, the sick, those with disabilities and their families, migrants and refugees, unwanted children in the womb or frozen in labs, victims of human trafficking and gun violence, and those who’ve been unfairly treated because of their race or sex or religious belief. That’s far from an exhaustive list, but it’s a start. As Christians, we’re called to offer ourselves for each of them. One of my seminary professors used to say, “If you’re a Christian, your job is to stand with the least powerful person in any room you happen to be in.” God will not abandon us when we stand in solidarity with those in need, but we’ll never see God if we allow fear or self-deception to keep us from acting. So, who needs you to stand with them in the rooms that you find yourself in? The time to stand is now. “We must obey God rather than men.”