A Tax That Is Not Yet Paid

It was a good question they asked him: "Is it lawful to pay taxes to Caesar?" It was certainly a good question in Jesus' time, when the Romans were exploiting the Jews. It is a question that has been asked many times down the centuries and is still a good question for us today. Indeed, the current issue of The London Review of Books has an article entitled: Why do we pay tax?

The Pharisees who asked the question were less interested in a proper answer than in trapping him. And it was good trap! If he said: "No, you should not pay," he would be caught by the Roman authorities. If he said: "Yes, you should pay," he would be caught by his own people as a collaborator. He couldn't win!

They wanted to catch him as they did afterwards, when they shouted from behind his back to the the Roman Governor, Pontius Pilate: "Condemn him, crucify him, he told us not to pay your tax." They did not come for an answer at all. They had not listened to any of his answers up until then. They had once asked him: "What should we do?" And he had told them: "Sell what you have, give to the poor, and be like me" and they had walked away laughing.

That is why he told them: "Hypocrites, you only came to set me a trap". And when he asked them to show him a coin, one of them was stupid enough to produce one. Jesus asked: "whose face is that?" The man answered: "It is the emperor's head." Jesus then returned the coin saying: "give to Caesar what is Caesar's", adding the real and overruling answer: ''and to God what is God's".

I like the story of the American Catholic Anarchist, Ammon Hennacy (1893-1970) who, when asked by the judge why he refused to pay taxes, is reputed to have said: "I thought that Caesar had enough followers and someone had to stand up for God!" However, standing up for God also carries a tax with it. In practice it means having to work for the implementation of the values of his kingdom.

This tax is the price we have to pay for belonging to his Kingdom here on earth with its values of love, peace and justice. So, for as long as there are people who are deprived of the basic necessities of life, refugees and migrants suffering the pestilence of wars and violence, along with the exploitation and destruction of creation, we should not rest. In effect, our tax is not being paid in full, our worship is not complete. We are not rendering to God what he wants us to render to him: a fully developed human life for all.