Why the exclusivity of Jesus is so wonderful

Recently Pope Francis was fiercely critiqued for his teaching at an interfaith event in Singapore. Both Protestants and Catholics have charged him with the serious error of ‘indifferentism’.

Indifferentism is the belief that all religions are alike in their ability to bring you to God – it doesn’t matter which path you’re on, they all reach the top of the mountain. Whatever his corrections and clarifications later, his words at the Singapore conference sounded suspiciously like that teaching. ‘Every religion is a way to arrive at God’ he said. At the same time he made fun of the kind of person who says: ‘My God is more important than your God’. ‘Is that true?’ he asks the audience, expecting the answer, ‘No’.

If nothing else, these comments have turned Christians back to their Bibles to seek the truth about this vital issue: are religions different paths to God?

Clearly not. And the answer is clear whether you turn to the various religions themselves or to the Bible. First of all, in considering world religions it seems obvious that each faith is not meandering its way towards a similar destination. Religions can’t agree on whether there is a God, what he/ she/it/they might be like, what future we’re moving towards or how we get there. We can’t even agree on what a religion is. The truth is, different religions are less like different paths up a mountain and more like different mountains. To draw near to one means, necessarily, moving away from another.

Only one can be true

Given that world religions are mutually incompatible, at most one of them can be correct. A religion that claims otherwise is not being truthful. But let’s turn to the Bible and see how it frames the exclusivity of Christ. Here are three key verses.

First, the Bible is clear that Jesus – exclusively! – brings us to the Father: ‘I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me’ (John 14:6). That might sound like a bigoted fundamentalism but, seen in the light of comparative religion, it’s a statement of simple (and wonderful) fact. Islam does not offer you a Father (Allah is emphatically not a Father and Muslims are not children); the karmic religions do not offer you a Father; non-theistic religions and worldviews (obviously) don’t offer you a Father. Jesus alone brings you to the Father.

Second, Jesus – exclusively! – is the one hope for the world. Before the gospel came to the Ephesians, they were ‘without hope and without God in the world’ (Eph. 2:12). Once again this turns out to be true when you look at world religions. Islam offers no hope for this world (only ‘paradise’ for the successful Muslim), neither do the karmic religions or atheism. Only Jesus offers physical hope for our bodies and our world.

Third, Jesus – exclusively! – is the only Saviour of the world. As Peter preaches, ‘Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to mankind by which we must be saved’ (Acts 4:12). Allah doesn’t offer to save Muslims (he rewards the obedient), karma doesn’t save you (it only judges/rewards you), and in traditions focused on wisdom, it’s not about a rescue mission from heaven but about the practices we employ on earth. It turns out that there’s only been one Divine Rescuer to actually appear in history and do the job. If we’re looking for a Saviour, Jesus is it!

When the Pope made his remarks in Singapore, he was speaking against any religious triumphalism. There’s something to be said for that. When talking to adherents of other faiths, we should never communicate a sense of our superiority. We are simply children of the Father, astonished by hope and saved apart from any of our own merits! None of it is about us, it’s all about Christ. But in saying this we recognise that there is a superiority that we need to communicate – the astonishing superiority of Christ. Jesus alone offers the world a loving Father, eternal hope and full salvation. No one else is even pretending to offer what Jesus delivers for free. Let’s not be ashamed of the exclusivity of Christ. There really is nothing and no-one like Him!