"I teach grades 5 & 6 religious education at our parish. Yesterday, we discussed Cain and Abel.
"What a difference the Catholic Biblical School has made for me. I had always thought of this story pretty much as a story of fratricide, of things going from bad to worse. Humankind goes from paradise to hell in a hand basket - in four easy chapters. But the class I taught yesterday was so different! Because of my studies, I instead emphasized the themes of sacrifice and mercy.
"Yes, Cain is murderous, deceitful, cowardly, no remorse, not even an admission of guilt. But instead of punishing Cain, God protects him. God even marks Cain so that everyone knows that this is the man whom God is protecting! Weird. Truly God’s ways are not our ways.
"I thank you all. My teaching this year will be quite different from past years."
