Manifest our difficulty with change

The texts from the Roman Catholic Lectionary today contain messages that present us with tension between interpretations.

Interpret the scene

In the First Letter to the Corinthians, Paul asserts the truth that the Lord will manifest our motives but it is not clear whether he is referring to now or at the end time.

The Gospel from Luke sets up our struggle with change and the natural tension we experience between the old and the new.

[5:39] The old is good: this saying is meant to be ironic and offers an explanation for the rejection by some of the new wine that Jesus offers: satisfaction with old forms will prevent one from sampling the new.

Steve Scholer asks Was Jesus really telling us that if we let our hearts grow old and hard we will be no longer willing or able as Christians to face new, difficult problems and issues?

This is the challenge we face. If we refuse to allow our hearts to be filled with new ways to love others, be it those who have slighted us or new ways to reach out to those living on the margins of society, our wineskins will surely grow old and hard. Should that happen, then most assuredly the day will come when our hearts harden and we are no longer able to accept the call to love those who don’t love back and to forgive those who won’t forgive us.

Don Schwager writes about the New "wine" of the Holy Spirit, through which, the Lord Jesus gives us wisdom so we can make the best use of both the old and the new.

He doesn't want us to hold rigidly to the past and to be resistant to the new action of his Holy Spirit in our lives. He wants our minds and hearts to be like the new wine skins - open and ready to receive the new wine of the Holy Spirit. Are you eager to grow in the knowledge and understanding of God's word and plan for your life?

"Lord Jesus, fill me with your Holy Spirit, that I may grow in the knowledge of your great love and truth. Help me to seek you earnestly in prayer and fasting that I may turn away from sin and wilfulness and conform my life more fully to your will. May I always find joy in knowing, loving, and serving you.

The Word Among Us Meditation on Luke 5:33-39 notes that the new wine will burst the skins. (Luke 5:37) Jesus told this parable to ask his detractors to try to become more like new wineskins.

Not all of Jesus’ hearers accepted these words, but those who did were stretched—and were blessed for it! For example, they had to expand their concept of the Messiah: he was the crucified and risen Son of God, not a temporal king. They had to accept that the Gentiles were their brothers and sisters, not pagans who would make them unclean. Because the first disciples’ pliability helped them to respond to the “fermentation” of the Holy Spirit, the Church continued to grow dramatically.

Friar Jude Winkler gives background on the judgement of Paul as “fleshy” by his detractors. The Holy Spirit leads our conversion not in human time but in God’s time as we come to know the motives of our heart. Friar Jude explains Jewish preference not to mix and connects the preference of the Romans for ancient religions to Jesus comment that “Old is Good” in Luke’s Gospel.

Fr. Richard Rohr, OFM, writes that the desert Christians were deeply committed to Jesus’ teachings and lived practice. Withdrawal to the wilderness—whether into close-knit communities or solitude—was only for the sake of deeper encounter and presence. Diana Butler Bass describes the natural flow from prayer to active love.

[Jesus’ invitation to] “Come follow me” was intimately bound up with the practice of prayer. For prayer connects us with God and others, “part of this enterprise of learning to love.” Prayer is much more than a technique, and early Christians left us no definitive how-to manual on prayer. Rather, the desert fathers and mothers believed that prayer was a disposition of wholeness, so that “prayer and our life must be all of a piece.” They approached prayer, as early church scholar Roberta Bondi notes, as a practical twofold process: first, of “thinking and reflecting,” or “pondering” what it means to love others; and second, as the “development and practice of loving ways of being.” [1] In other words, these ancients taught that prayer was participation in God’s love, the activity that takes us out of ourselves, . . . and conforms us to the path of Christ.”

The concept that Paul expresses to the Corinthians that the Lord brings to light and manifests the motives of our hearts is active through our relationship with the Holy Spirit in our prayer.

References


(n.d.). 1 Corinthians chapter 4 - United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. Retrieved September 7, 2018, from http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/bible/1Corinthians/4:1
(n.d.). Luke chapter 5 - United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. Retrieved September 7, 2018, from http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/bible/luke/5:33
(n.d.). Creighton U Daily Reflections .... Retrieved September 7, 2018, from http://onlineministries.creighton.edu/CollaborativeMinistry/daily.html
(n.d.). Daily Scripture Readings and Meditations. Retrieved September 7, 2018, from https://dailyscripture.servantsoftheword.org/readings/
(n.d.). 22nd Week in Ordinary Time - Mass Readings and Catholic Daily .... Retrieved September 7, 2018, from https://wau.org/meditations/
(n.d.). Daily Meditations Archives - Center for Action and Contemplation. Retrieved September 7, 2018, from https://cac.org/category/daily-meditations/