HE OFFERED HIS LIFE FOR OTHERS

 

HE OFFERED HIS LIFE FOR OTHERS

Our short text from Isaiah today is repeated - and fulfilled – in the last words of the gospel: He offered his life for others.  Fyodor Dostoyevsky, the Russian writer, puts it this way:

At some thoughts one stand perplexed – especially at the sight of men’s sins – and wonders whether one should use force or humble love. Always decide to use humble love. If you resolve on that, once and for all, you may subdue the whole world. Loving humility is marvellously strong, the strongest of all things, and there is nothing else like it.

But it is a hard lesson learn. ‘Loving humility’ sounds so weak, so spineless. Can you imagine Netanyahu approaching his neighbours with loving humility? We glorify the heroes in war ‘who lay down their lives for their friends.’ Their sacrifice is certainly not useless and in the long run God can bring a new world out of the horror of war. The declaration of human rights and decolonisation followed soon after the end of the Second World War.

Yet the gospel calls us to eschew violence. ‘Put your sword away’ (Mt: 26:52). Jesus pointed to a higher way, one that is hard for us to believe in. It is so contrary to what we experience. ‘Offer no resistance to the wicked … set no bounds to your love, just as your heavenly Father sets none for you’ (Mt 5:39ff).

The disciples, at the time, found this too much. They were still caught in the values of ‘the world’. ‘We want to sit on your right and your left in your kingdom.’ The only ones on his right and his left were the bandits crucified with Jesus on Calvary. James and John declared their desire to follow Jesus but at the crucial moment in Gethsemane, they fell asleep.

Every page of the gospels speaks of the loving humility of Jesus. He is always the servant ever attentive to the demands people make on him, always ‘losing his life’ so that others could find ‘life to the full.’ In the end he is ‘handed over’ (betrayed) and is battered, this way and that, until he finally dies on the cross.

It seems like an impossible ideal for us to follow. But we all know countless people who, in small ways and sometimes big, reach for this ideal. It always takes courage, that noble human quality which overcomes our selfishness. Reaching for this ideal of ‘living for others’ is the gateway to the fulfilment of our deep desires.

20 October 2024   Sunday 29 B         Is 53:10-11  Heb 4:14-16    Mk 10:35-45           

 

SELL EVERYTHING

 

SELL EVERYTHING

‘Go and sell everything you own and give the money to the poor … then come and follow me.’ Some people took this literally, like Anthony of Egypt in the third century and Francis of Assisi in the thirteenth, but these words of Jesus are addressed to everyone – though not literally. A clue is given in our first reading from the Book of Wisdom, ‘compared to wisdom, all gold is a pinch of sand.’

The words of Jesus above refer to wisdom, that unexplored word which has been central to every culture. When we study Shona, we are soon introduced to the collection of proverbs which reflect the wisdom literature of the Scriptures. The wisdom Jesus speaks of is a fulfilment of that wisdom – indeed of all wisdom.

Jesus did not simply speak about it. His whole life was an expression of it. ‘He emptied himself and became as we are and was even more humble, accepting death, death on a cross’ (Phil 2:7). He ‘sold’ everything.

It is painfully difficult for us to ‘empty’ ourselves. Yet it is the core of our growing into the fullness of life. If we reflect on our daily life, we know that we cling desperately to our own ways. How we see ourselves in view of others, how we come across to them, what we say, how we iron out the challenges without facing them! Basically, we run away from who we are and hide behind a variety of stances we adopt. A lot of the time we are on show. We put on an act.

We will never come to the truth until we ‘empty’ ourselves of all these false poses. Jesus is knocking on our door and we don’t allow him in because there is too much clutter in our ‘house’ and there is no room for him.

It is easy to say these things. It is more difficult to face them and act. Yet, these words in today’s gospel are words of wisdom; a gentle invitation to face our poverty and pretence and ‘sell’ all our avoidance of the cross. It is an invitation to freedom. We are to come out of the prison we have made for ourselves; a prison which may give us a sense of security but which, in truth, prevents us enjoying the freedom that comes with letting go of our pretended self and emerging into our true self. It is risky, adventurous and life-giving to the full.   

13 Oct 2024          Sunday 28 B         Wis 7:1-11  Heb 4:12-13    Mk 10:17-30

MARRIAGE

 

MARRIAGE

Marriage is the subject of our readings this Sunday and one, who has not married, might be hesitant to speak of it. Still, there are many ‘experts’ in football who only watch from the stands.

The Church celebrates marriage. It is a risky affair with no sure outcome and for this reason mirrors God’s relationship with us. Jesus used scriptural images of the bond between bride and bridegroom but they do not always describe a happy relationship. Still, John chose to begin his account of Jesus’ ministry by describing a wedding feast and commentators have been quick to draw parallels between this event and the marriage banquet in Isaiah, an image of heaven.

Marriage in the Church has always been surrounded by this enlivening imagery and the ideal of marriage is of a perfect society. And the union in marriage – they become one flesh – results in new life coming into the world. All this is very beautiful. But then we have to enter into the world of actual marriages as we know them. There are people close to us, perhaps in our own families, whose marriages have ‘failed’. Let us come back to that word in a moment. Here we just need to note the intense suffering that can result when two people lose the desire, for a variety of reasons, to continue to struggle to hold their marriage together ‘for better or for worse.’

Traditionally our Church has stuck to ‘the rules’ in the literal belief that ‘what God has brought together, no one should divide.’ Many of us will know people in ‘impossible’ situations where a divorced person enters a new and happy relationship but because of their fidelity to the Church, they cease going to the sacraments for years.

Gradually we are discovering that exceptions to the rules do not undermine the ideal. ‘The Sabbath is made for man and not man for the Sabbath.’ Jesus wants his people to strive for the best but he also wants them to be compassionate, not rigid. Western thinking, and the Church is still dominated by western thinking, says something is either right or wrong. As we move forward, particularly as we follow the synodal way, we are discovering how to take each case as it comes. One rule does not fit all. We are moving into a more discerning, compassionate Church. It may be hard going in the short term but in time we will have a much more inclusive welcoming Church.

‘Failure’ in marriage is not necessarily failure in life. For two people to end their marriage may be an act of great courage ushering in a new beginning. And also, to stay in a marriage, when each day is a torture, while admirable in one way, could also be seen as a want of courage.