In recent years, the “cancel culture” has gained a lot of traction. Celebrities and corporations who are deemed offensive are called out, shamed and shunned. The most common venue for the cancel culture is social media, but its effects are not merely virtual; they are very real.
Many victims of the cancel culture lose their reputations and their jobs. Corporations in the crosshairs of the cancel culture can find themselves bankrupt. Academicians who dare to disagree can lose tenure. Social media giants cancel accounts and publications deemed to be out of step.
More than a few commentators, on both the right and the left, have warned that the cancel culture threatens freedom of expression, including academic freedom. Moreover, the cancel culture shows no mercy. It hurls bitter and even obscene invectives at those whose ideas and values do not conform to secular orthodoxy. Once it takes aim at a person or an institution, the goal is complete obliteration, or else, unconditional surrender.
There is no dialogue, no common ground, and no chance to explain or redeem oneself, no way back to respectability. Nothing good that a person or institution has done in the past has value. Rather, the flaws perceived by the cancel culture nullify any good that may have been done. Clearly, this is a dangerous path for our society. Its anger and harshness has infected relationships across the globe.
Happily, though, there is such a thing as a “good” cancel culture. It does not originate on social media or the airwaves. Rather, the good cancel culture comes from the heart of God. It is the stunning truth that God, in his mercy and love, has cancelled our sins.
St. Paul puts it this way: “And you who were dead in trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive, together with him, having forgiven all our trespasses, having cancelled the bond which stood against us … nailing it to the tree” (Col 2:13-14 RSV). Indeed, we celebrate this “divine cancel culture” with special solemnity and joy throughout Holy Week and Easter.
How does the “divine cancel culture” differ from its secular counterpart? The two could not be more different. First, God loves and respects every person, even those who have rejected his love, whereas the cancel culture reviles those who dare to disagree. God wants “every person to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth” (1 Tim 2:4), whereas the cancel culture seeks to destroy those it deems unworthy.
Although God dwells “in unapproachable light” (1 Tim 6:16), God sent us his only Son (Jn 3:16) to preach the good news, to heal and to rescue us from sin and death, whereas the cancel culture stirs up vituperation, sometimes anonymously, against its targets. God in his mercy invites us to turn from our sins in order to enter into a relationship of love with him, a relationship in which he speaks to our hearts, whereas in the cancel culture there is no such thing as true dialogue and relationships are built on fear, not love.
Most important of all, the “divine cancel culture” seeks only to obliterate, to cancel utterly, our sins so that we might flourish in the eyes of God, whereas the secular cancel culture seeks only to destroy reputations, livelihoods and any chance at happiness.
Yet, the “divine cancel culture” goes still further. While the secular cancel culture urges that so-called “offenders” be subject to recriminations and payback, the divine cancel culture urges us to cancel the debts that others owe to us.
That is why Jesus told the story of the servant whose master forgave him his debts but that servant in turn would not forgive a much smaller debt owed him by a fellow servant (Mt 18:21-35). That is why Jesus taught us to say: “Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us” (Mt 6:12).
In other words, if God has forgiven us our trespasses “according to the riches of his mercy” (1 Jn 1:7), so too we must be ready to cancel, to forgive, the offenses of others against us.
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