St. Nacho of Libre and Substitutionary Atonement

The 2006 film Nacho Libre tells the story of a friar (Nacho) who loves to wrestle. (It’s based on a true story!)

By day, Nacho lives and works at an orphanage, caring for children with no family. At night he puts on a mask and stretchy pants to become a Mexican luchador. Though he and his partner are terrible wrestlers, they discover even the losers get paid. At first, Nacho is intoxicated with the glory of being a Mexican wrestler. Over time, he sees it as an opportunity to give the orphans a better life. All of this culminates in a final match against the champion Ramses where Nacho finds himself on his back, with Ramses’ foot on his neck. When all seems lost, he sees his young orphan friend Chancho and Sister Encarnacion bringing the orphans into the arena, all wearing his signature mask. Inspired by their presence, he summons his “inner eagle spirit” to rise up and defeat Ramses. The film ends with Nacho, Sister Encarnacion, and the orphans, taking their new bus on a field trip to see the world.

I was reminded of Nacho Libre recently when I was informed via email that the local Christian Reformed Classis was not renewing my license to preach. I wasn’t at the meeting, but later discovered it had something to do my views on atonement theory. Which got me thinking — If anyone had bothered to ask, what would I have said?

In his book The Day the Revolution Began: Reconsidering the Meaning of Jesus’s Crucifixion, N.T. Wright claims the reformers understanding of Christ’s death remained stuck in medieval categories. Early Christian views of the atonement were diverse, with most being described as a form of Christus victor — Christ’s death and resurrection is God’s victory over the “tyranny of the devil.” Around the turn of the first millennium, Anselm of Canterbury developed the “satisfaction theory” of the atonement that shifted the problem from the devil to God’s wrath. In this view, sin is when humans take something they owe to God (honor and worship), which leads to the breaking of covenantal relationship. To make satisfaction, humanity must give back to God not only what is originally owed, but also a gift that goes above and beyond. Because there is no way for humanity to offer such a gift (we already owe God everything) God becomes human in Jesus Christ and offers his life as an act of propitiation to satisfy

God’s wrath. In going above and beyond, Christ’s life and death creates a treasury of merits — an overwhelming abundance of good works accessible through acts of charity, the sacramental system, and indulgences.

According to Wright, reformers like Luther and Calvin didn’t challenge the premise of the satisfaction theory regarding human sin and God’s wrath. Their concern was the emphasis on “merits” that created the medieval system of penance and purgatory. So, they changed the metaphor to reflect a judicial declaration that emphasizes the “finished” nature of redemption, undermining the doctrine of purgatory. “Not only had the divine wrath been placated through the Father’s own action in sending the Son; the punishment for sin had already been meted out. The more one emphasized Jesus’s wrath-bearing death in the sinner’s place, the less one could then ask the sinner to bear any subsequent punishment. (The Day the Revolution Began: Reconsidering the Meaning of Jesus’s Crucifixion p. 30)

Wright’s point is that the “penal” view of substitutionary atonement addresses issues related to Medieval Catholicism — the indulgence system, purgatory, and the Mass as sacrifice — by insisting Christ completed the work of salvation on our behalf. The problem, as Wright sees it, is the biblical authors did not address Medieval Roman Catholic issues. Instead they focused on the Old Testament problem of exile and the hope of restoration. Sin, in this context, is the idolatrous shattering of the image of God that leads to a world filled with violence and despair. God’s response to sin is wrath, but wrath is the shadow side of love — God is angry because God loves humanity, God loves creation, and humans have made a terrible mess of things.

When understood in the context of the Old Testament, the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ is the deliverance of God’s people from exile. God enters human exile — “My God…why have your forsaken me?” — to lead a new Exodus. This is the biblical view of substitutionary atonement expressed by Paul in his letter to the Romans that leads to this proclamation: “For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 8:38-39)

Which brings me back to Nacho Libre: It’s a story about familial love and adoption. Nacho gets into the ring with Ramses for the sake of the orphans. He takes their rejection and suffering upon himself, and it is his love for them that brings unexpected victory. While it’s not a perfect metaphor, it’s more biblical than it might seem. Jesus Christ is, biblically speaking, our kinsman redeemer — he comes to find every lost child and graft them back into the family. “In my Father’s house there are many dwelling-places. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you?” (John 14:2) What better picture of God’s saving work in Jesus Christ can we have than a group of orphans becoming one big family!

My local CRC classis leaders who oppose my preaching are hellbent on making the boundary lines of demarcation more rigid. They are not interested in grafting people in, they are obsessed with kicking (and keeping) people out. They place the letter of the law above the biblical message, losing sight of the good news — in Jesus Christ the walls have been torn down (Ephesians) and the promise to Abraham that he will have many children has been fulfilled. If it’s a choice between the penal substitutionary view of the atonement, narrowly defined, and the Gospel, like Luther I’m more interested in remaining faithful to God’s word. Finally, in the words of St. Nacho of Libre: “They don’t think I know a butt load of crap about the gospel, but I do!”