Peace be with you and greetings on this, our celebration of the 20th Sunday in Ordinary Time. Well,,, today’s Gospel reading doesn’t come across real bright and cheery does it? What’s with all this talk about division, one against another, even within the same family? It all kind-a reminded me of a story my friend John once told me when he and his wife had gotten into a pretty serious argument. Now mind you, John and Janis have now been married for over 50 years and are still deeply in love but like any long relationship, there were bumps in the road along the way. They had been in the car traveling all day and had spent the last hour or so in complete silence because of a heated argument. They were not saying a word to each other as they passed a farm with a big barnyard full of pigs. At that point John attempted a little sarcastic humor when he should have just kept his mouth shut. He glanced at Janis and then motioned towards the barnyard and asked, “relatives of yours?” Now Janis is not only an intelligent lady, she’s also quite wise. Instead of responding in anger at John’s stupid attempt at humor, she calmly turned towards him and said, “you’re right John,,, I believe they’re some of my in-laws.” OK, sorry folks. I know, that story isn’t very spiritual but I couldn’t help it when I read the in-law against in-law part of today’s Gospel.
Seriously though, what is the spiritual message from today’s Gospel? How can Jesus say, “Do you think I have come to establish peace on earth? No, I tell you, but rather division” or, “I have come to set the earth on fire, and how I wish it were already blazing.” His words seem to be right out of the Old Testament, don’t they? Where is our merciful, gentle, and loving Jesus we’re so used to hearing? My friends, as hard as it is to accept sometimes, God didn’t change somewhere between Malachi and Matthew. Oh, just in case you didn’t know, Malachi is the last book of the OT and Matthew if the 1st book in the NT. The God of the OT is the God of the NT and we must never forget, Jesus Christ is God, the second person of the Blessed Trinity.
Honestly today’s reading challenges me with what I personally consider one of the great mysteries of my own Christian Faith; it’s not the incarnation, the virgin birth, or even the Blessed Trinity. From my humble perspective I have difficulty reconciling a God who is perfectly merciful with a God who is perfectly just. When someone tells me, they don’t like the God of the OT I remind them, no one in the Bible talks more about Hell than Jesus Christ himself.
OK, so how do I reconcile a God who is fierce and judgmental with a God who is loving and merciful? Doesn’t the Bible tell us God is love? Well, yes it does – but unfortunately, our perceptions of God’s love are obscured by the fallen world we live in. Thomas Aquinas wrote volumes about our perception of God viewed through humanities’ lens of sin in a fallen world and I’ve only got about 7 more minutes but let’s try. Aquinas said; “Whatever is received is received according to the mode of the recipient.” OK Thomas. So, what does that mean? Well let’s think of God’s love as the sun. On a bright blue sunny morning like we had today the sun shines into our homes with radiant beauty. Now let’s add window shades to our simple little metaphor for God’s love. When the shades are wide open our home is full of light from the sun but as we start pulling those shades closed the sun’s light is diminished. The same sun is still shinning on the world outside but we’ve chosen to dim its’ light by pulling the shades. Friends, this simple image is sort of what sin does to our perception of God’s love. It becomes distorted.
If you’re living in a relatively good spiritual state, God’s love will be perceived as kind, gentle, and merciful but if you’re spiritual life is off the rails, God’s love will be perceived as fierce, threatening, and judgmental. You can see this story repeated over and over in the Bible. The great news is however, the sun itself hasn’t changed. God’s love is still shinning as brightly as ever but our perception of that love is distorted and, in many cases, we did it ourselves by closing the shades.
Another key variable in Aquinas’ formula for perception of God is his definition of love itself. Thomas says; love is willing the good of the other. Wow, now there’s something I better keep in mind for my own relationships. Love is willing the good of the other. When it comes to the Bible and our perception of God there is a flip side to this “love of God” coin. If love is willing the good of the other then God’s love for us must of necessity generate God’s own opposition to what works evil in us. And hence we have today’s Gospel. When Jesus says; “I have come to set the earth on fire, and how I wish it were already blazing!” He is telling us all He wants to burn away in us all that is opposed to God’s loving desire for us, all that dims God’s love. He wants to burn up those shades we have pulled over the windows of our hearts blocking out the sun and distorting our perception of God’s love! Jesus came to shake things up and that’s why this reading can sound a little scary and can cause confusion. The bottom line really, really is; God is love.
In his Daily Gospel Reflections from June 1st, Bishop Robert Barron kind of summarized why we tend to be divided, sadly sometimes even in our own household of Christianity. He said this; “The entire point of religion is to make us humble before God and to open us to the path of love. Everything else is more or less a footnote. Liturgy, prayer, the precepts of the Church, the commandments, sacraments, sacramentals – all of it – are finally meant to conform us to the way of love. When they instead turn us away from that path, they have been undermined.” Friends, if you believe anything in the Bible says God doesn’t love you, you’re misinterpreting the Bible and if anything in your own faith life is pulling you away from love of others open up those shades to your heart and let the sun shine in.
Comments
Shelba WetheralPosted on 2/02/20
I didn’t make that Mass and hear your Homily, so I was glad to be able to read it online. God is love and your Homily was a great one explaining that Sunday’s reading. Thank you, Deacon Paul.