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Daily Scripture

+ 21st Week in Ordinary Time

Every day is a gift and a blessing.

Readings: I Corinthians 1:1-9 Psalm 145:2-7 Matthew 24:42-51

I give thanks to my god always on your account for the grace of God bestowed on you in Christ Jesus, that in him you were enriched in every way, with all discourse and all knowledge, so that you are not lacking in any spiritual gifts as you wait for the revelation of our Lord Jesus Christ.” [I Cor 1:4-5, 7]

My mother used to say that every day is a gift and a blessing—an opportunity for grace indeed, many graces.

I suppose it’s all according to one’s perspective. The greatest challenge in life is to find something to be thankful for every day. This is particularly difficult during stressful times and certainly during illness of one kind or another.

I think I may have shared difference between a hermit and a nightclub performer. The hermit wakes up at dawn and says, “Thank you, God!” The nightclub entertainer wakes up at noon and says, “Good God, morning?”

There is so much going on in the world at large and in our own particular worlds to bring anxiety and stress. It’s hard work to maintain balance. An active spiritual life based on the confidence that nothing can happen today that can defeat us if we are grounded in the belief that God’s presence is abiding but it’s difficult and sometimes terrifying to let go.

I still remember the first time I road my two-wheeler bike without my dad holding on to the seat. We started off—I, confident that he hand was firmly attached to the seat. I had ridden almost a full block before I realized that he had let go and there I was, gliding down the street. It’s that way with God. We just need to remain conscious that God’s ‘hand’ is not a crutch but that God’s grace within us is real.

Some days it seems as if we are starting all over again.

Ninth Sunday in Ordinary Time 'A'

Sunday June 1, 2008

“From Sand to Solid Ground”

“We are living through the greatest shift ever in Christian thought. New images of our universe and our planet, along with knowledge about the long, slow development of life on this planet provide us with a new context in which to understand the divine presence we call God always present and active everywhere. Reflection on the universality of this presence leads to further reflection on and renewed appreciation of Jesus as revealer of this mysterious presence in our everyday living and loving, rather than on Jesus as the mediator between us and a faraway deity. A Church always in need of renewal must engage, at all levels, this shift in images and thought if it is to have integrity and relevance in the twenty-first century.”

This is the opening paragraph of a new book entitled, “From Sand to Solid Ground – Questions of Faith for Modern Catholics” by Michael Morwood. [Crossroad Publishing Company, NY, 2007]. In it he explores the very notion of God within the context of what we might call theological globalization as opposed to economic or political globalization.

The doorway to the reexamination of how we as Catholics view God and the world was probably the Second Vatican Council. One commentator on the Constitution on the Church in the Modern World put it this way:

“Gaudium et Spes (The Church in the Modern World) is truly an international, transglobal, ecumenical document summarizing what we humans believe about ourselves. It might be argued that this is the first time in our history when we humans have reflected together so profoundly on the very nature of our humanness and drawn out of that a statement of our common beliefs.” [Vatican II in Plain English, Volume 2, “The Constitutions,” Bill Huebsch with Paul Thurmes, published by Thomas More, Allen, Texas, 1996]

In other words, we are no longer worlds apart from one another but have become, in the words of Teilhard de Chardin, truly a global village. There is nothing that happens in one corner of the globe that does not impact instantly on the other four ‘corners’ and this extends to the entire universe as we continue to discover new galaxies.

The preface to the actual document reads – and this is a paraphrase:

“The joy and hope, the grief and anxiety of the people of this age, especially of those who are poor or in any way afflicted: this is the joy and hope, the grief and anxiety of the followers of Christ. The Christian community is, after all, a community of women and men truly linked with humankind and its history, bearing a message of salvation intended for all people.” [Ibid]

The Council called for the ‘engagement’ of the Church with the world and in doing so, it redefined the Church as a people in touch with God, “the people of God.” Although some would narrow this definition by claiming a favored position with God with all the entitlements that go with privileges, the authentic meaning cannot be so limited.

If the Church is truly the Body of Christ, then Christ is the norm for the definition of what it means to be Church in the modern world.

In the opening scene of the film “Oscar Romero,” the story about the Bishop of San Salvador in Central America whose association with the poor made him the enemy of the government, government soldiers in the village square in front of his people stripped Bishop Romero naked. No jeweled mitre, no crozier, and no gold ring. No embroidered vestments. He makes the sign of the cross as if to begin the celebration of Eucharist while the poor around him covered him making the sign of the cross with him.

The Council also placed the Eucharist at the center of who we are as Church. When we gather in this assembly, we are the Church in action and it is the action of the Eucharist that sustains us on our return to the world. The word “Mass” is derived from the Latin phrase, “Ite missa est!” Go, the Mass is ended. We are not here to fulfill an obligation but to celebrate who we are as a Godly people searching for ways to transform our world into a ‘divine milieu.’

The Mass is never ended. It continues through our witness and our liturgy of service to the world.

It is against this background that we are invited to reflect on the texts today.

The first reading is what is called a “second reading.” That’s what ‘Deuteronomy’ means. It’s a new look at the Ten Commandments enriched with oral traditions developed over a long period of time and adapted to the conditions of the Jews who had settled in Canaan. It reads much like a legislative code similar to other legislative texts or treaties of the time, but the meaning and application runs deeper than any law or treaty can articulate.

The opening verse was later taken literally and eventually gave rise to the practice of wearying phylacteries or pendants containing the Ten Commandments around the head and as a bracelet. They were mentioned by Jesus in one of his challenges to the Pharisees who love pendants and places of honor but whose conduct belied their professed belief.

In other words, if we are in touch with the God who dwells in our hearts, then we do not have to wear our religion on our sleeve. It will be obvious in all that we say and do. Blessed are those who take God’s word to heart and live each day as a true partner with God in Christ.

Paul’s goes right to the heart of the matter—literally. It is not by any law that we are justified or saved but it is by the grace of God. This doesn’t mean that actions do not matter or that we may live recklessly as lawless citizens in any earthly domain. It means that if we swim freely in the sea of God’s grace, than we will attend to the things of God and will fulfill the greatest law, the law of love.

But we have also moved beyond Paul’s limited understanding of redemption and the notion that somehow God demanded human sacrifice as a condition for salvation. No, Jesus is the full expression of God’s unrelenting love and compassion and our duty is to do what Jesus did and our destiny is to be one with him until we are totally absorbed into the heart of God—an absorption process that began when we were loved into life, continues in the here and now and will not end until the process is complete at our earthly death.

“Our world desperately needs religious imagery, concepts, and language that draw people together. Jesus provided all that.” We need to do away with theological concepts and imagery that are “elitist, exclusive, and divisive. Genuine Church renewal is no longer just for the sake of the Church community. It is now for the sake of the world and the future of humanity. The issue at stake is whether the Church will continue to protect its own unique identity as the ‘way’ to God or whether it will be courageous enough to die to its exclusive claims for the sake of embracing a world in which the divine presence comes to expression in many shapes and forms.” [Morwood, Ibid.]

There are many implications and applications to this message but the bottom line is integrity and authenticity in speech and action.

The Church ought to be the forum in which the questions that perplex humanity can be discussed with the hope of discovering a new truth that unites humanity. We can no longer demonize those with whom we disagree turning them into enemies that we can either shoot or dismiss.

In the words of the conclusion of the Constitution on the Church in the Modern World:

“We fervently wish to have a frank conversation with all people of goodwill, everyone who seeks goodness and truth, excluding no one, even those who hate the Church, so we can build peace with all.”

“There is nothing, in short, for which Christians yearn more than to serve the people of the modern world generously and effectively.”

“We Christians shoulder a gigantic task which is to introduce love into the world, that love which we receive ourselves from Christ.” [Vatican II in Plain English, Ibid.]

And this is the solid ground on which we are called to believe, to live and love. The solid ground on which we are to build our Church as it moves into the future.