The texts from the Roman Catholic Lectionary today offer us the opportunity to meditate on the preparation for bearing much fruit that our relationship with God has instilled in us.
Seeds for life
The reading from the Prophet Jeremiah shares the nature of a New Covenant written on our hearts.
* [31:31–34] The new covenant is an occasional prophetic theme, beginning with Hosea. According to Jeremiah, (a) it lasts forever; (b) its law (torah) is written in human hearts; (c) it gives everyone true knowledge of God, making additional instruction (torah) unnecessary. The Dead Sea Scroll community claimed they were partners in a “new covenant.” The New Testament presents the death and resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth as inaugurating a new covenant open to anyone who professes faith in Jesus the Christ. Cf. Lk 22:20; 1 Cor 11:25; Heb 8:8–12. Know the LORD: cf. note on 22:15–16.1
Psalm 51 is a prayer for cleansing and pardon.
* [Psalm 51] A lament, the most famous of the seven Penitential Psalms, prays for the removal of the personal and social disorders that sin has brought. The poem has two parts of approximately equal length: Ps 51:3–10 and Ps 51:11–19, and a conclusion in Ps 51:20–21. The two parts interlock by repetition of “blot out” in the first verse of each section (Ps 51:3, 11), of “wash (away)” just after the first verse of each section (Ps 51:4) and just before the last verse (Ps 51:9) of the first section, and of “heart,” “God,” and “spirit” in Ps 51:12, 19. The first part (Ps 51:3–10) asks deliverance from sin, not just a past act but its emotional, physical, and social consequences. The second part (Ps 51:11–19) seeks something more profound than wiping the slate clean: nearness to God, living by the spirit of God (Ps 51:12–13), like the relation between God and people described in Jer 31:33–34.2
The Letter to the Hebrews tells how Jesus became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him.
* [5:7] He offered prayers…to the one who was able to save him from death: at Gethsemane (cf. Mk 14:35), though some see a broader reference (see note on Jn 12:27). * [5:8] Son though he was: two different though not incompatible views of Jesus’ sonship coexist in Hebrews, one associating it with his exaltation, the other with his preexistence. The former view is the older one (cf. Rom 1:4).3
In the Gospel of John, Jesus uses a seed to speak about His death.
* [12:23] Jesus’ response suggests that only after the crucifixion could the gospel encompass both Jew and Gentile. * [12:24] This verse implies that through his death Jesus will be accessible to all. It remains just a grain of wheat: this saying is found in the synoptic triple and double traditions (Mk 8:35; Mt 16:25; Lk 9:24; Mt 10:39; Lk 17:33). John adds the phrases (Jn 12:25) in this world and for eternal life.4
Barbara Dilly comments that many people were open to the way Jesus was speaking to them, even if he was speaking to them like no one had even spoken to them before. In fact, that newness of perspective was what most caught their attention. They were hungry for the word of God. It was the people who were most certain they had all the answers who would not listen, because Jesus challenged their authority and their power.
One of the many blessings I enjoyed as a professor at Creighton University was watching our young people draw on their solid Christian values and knowledge of their faith to listen to Jesus speak to them in ways they had never heard before, in the voices of the marginalized. We gave them a safe place to further discern Christ’s active word in their lives from new perspectives. As a result, they entered more fully into companionship with Christ in ways that not only enriched their own faith, but ways that made a difference in the lives of others.5
Don Schwager quotes “Love what is in the image of God”, by Caesarius of Arles (470-543 AD).
"Whatever you love is either the same as yourself, below you or above you. If what you love is beneath you, love it to comfort it, care for it and to use it but not to cling to it. For example, you love gold. Do not become attached to the gold, for how much better are you than gold? Gold, indeed, is a shining piece of earth, while you have been made in the image of God in order that you may be illumined by the Lord. Although gold is a creature of God, still God did not make it according to his own image, but you he did. Therefore, he put the gold beneath you. This kind of love should be despised. Those things are to be acquired for their usefulness, but we should not cling to them with the bond of love as if with glue. Do not make for yourself members over which, when they have begun to be cut away, you will grieve and be afflicted. What then? Rise from that love with which you love things that are lower than you, and begin to love your equals, that is, things that are what you are... The Lord himself has told us in the Gospel and clearly showed us in what order we may have true love and charity. For he spoke in this way, 'You shall love the Lord your God with your whole heart, and with your whole soul and with your whole strength. And your neighbor as yourself'' (Luke 10:27). Therefore, first love God and then yourself. After these, love your neighbor as yourself." (excerpt from SERMONS 173, 4-5.25)6
The Word Among Us Meditation on John 12:20-33 comments that we all face times when we feel troubled. It could be because we are witnessing a loved one suffering, or it could be as we face our own suffering. It’s painful, it’s challenging, but it’s unavoidable. Jesus knows what it’s like to feel so distressed that you want to run away.
Jesus endured the cross because he knew that his death would reveal the depths of God’s love for us—and for you. Let that love surround you and sustain you today. “Lord, teach me to open my heart to your love. Jesus, I need you today.”7
Fr. Richard Rohr, OFM, comments that the prophet exercises his or her imagination from a place of freedom, as his favorite Scripture scholar Walter Brueggemann describes so well.
“Because the totalism [that is, the system] wants to silence, banish, or eliminate every such unwelcome [prophetic] intrusion, the tricky work is to find standing ground outside the totalism from which to think the unthinkable, to imagine the unimaginable, and to utter the unutterable.” [1]. The “tent of meeting” is the initial image and metaphor that eventually became our much later notion of “church.” The greatest prophet of the Jewish tradition, Moses, had the prescience and courage to move the place of hearing God outside and at a distance from the court of common religious and civic opinion—this was the original genius that inspired the entire Jewish prophetic tradition. It is quite different than mere liberal and conservative positions, and often even at odds with them. Prophecy and Gospel are rooted in a contemplative and non-dual way of knowing—a way of being in the world that is utterly free and grounded in the compassion of God.8
The distractions that serve our self interest in life draw us away from being a good seed that brings life as we respond to Jesus' invitation to bring love to all.
References
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