The texts from the Roman Catholic Lectionary today invite us to contemplate moments of awe in our lives and our response to these revelations.
Moments of Awe
The reading from the Prophet Isaiah describes a vision of God in the Temple.
* [6:7] Touched your lips: Isaiah is thus symbolically purified of sin in preparation for his mission as God’s prophet.1
Psalm 138 offers thanksgiving and praise to God.
* [Psalm 138] A thanksgiving to God, who came to the rescue of the psalmist. Divine rescue was not the result of the psalmist’s virtues but of God’s loving fidelity (Ps 138:1–3). The act is not a private transaction but a public act that stirs the surrounding nations to praise God’s greatness and care for the people (Ps 138:4–6). The psalmist, having experienced salvation, trusts that God will always be there in moments of danger (Ps 138:7–8).2
In the reading from the First Letter of Paul to the Corinthians the Gospel teaching about the Resurrection of Christ is proclaimed.
* [15:1–11] Paul recalls the tradition (1 Cor 15:3–7), which he can presuppose as common ground and which provides a starting point for his argument. This is the fundamental content of all Christian preaching and belief (1 Cor 15:1–2, 11).3
In the Gospel of Luke, Jesus calls the First Disciples.
* [5:1–11] This incident has been transposed from his source, Mk 1:16–20, which places it immediately after Jesus makes his appearance in Galilee. By this transposition Luke uses this example of Simon’s acceptance of Jesus to counter the earlier rejection of him by his hometown people, and since several incidents dealing with Jesus’ power and authority have already been narrated, Luke creates a plausible context for the acceptance of Jesus by Simon and his partners. Many commentators have noted the similarity between the wondrous catch of fish reported here (Lk 5:4–9) and the post-resurrectional appearance of Jesus in Jn 21:1–11. There are traces in Luke’s story that the post-resurrectional context is the original one: in Lk 5:8 Simon addresses Jesus as Lord (a post-resurrectional title for Jesus—see Lk 24:34; Acts 2:36—that has been read back into the historical ministry of Jesus) and recognizes himself as a sinner (an appropriate recognition for one who has denied knowing Jesus—Lk 22:54–62). As used by Luke, the incident looks forward to Peter’s leadership in Luke-Acts (Lk 6:14; 9:20; 22:31–32; 24:34; Acts 1:15; 2:14–40; 10:11–18; 15:7–12) and symbolizes the future success of Peter as fisherman (Acts 2:41).4
Larry Gillick, S.J. shares that guilt, about being sinful, can be a comfortable excuse for us to avoid intimacy which Jesus offers.
Peter was in a shallow spot near the shore. Jesus finds him there and invites him to go deeper and there’s the fear and yet the fullness. Firstly, Jesus encounters Peter and thereby Peter encounters Peter more deeply, who then encounters Jesus, who then invites Peter to begin the process of his being transformed from the water to his attracting others, us, to walk with Jesus in His mission of transforming the earth. “Be not afraid of Him nor yourself.”5
Don Schwager quotes “By faith Peter casts the nets of Christ's teaching,” by Maximus of Turin (died between 408-423 AD).
"'That you may understand that the Lord was speaking of spiritual fishing, however, Peter says, 'Master, we toiled all night and took nothing! But at your word I will let down the nets.' It is as if he were saying, 'Through the whole night our fishing has brought us nothing, and we have been laboring in vain. Now I will not fish with fishing gear but with grace, not with diligence acquired by skill but with the perseverance acquired by devotion.' When Peter lets down the nets at the word, therefore, he is in fact letting down the teachings in Christ. When he unfolds the tightly woven and well-ordered nets at the command of the Master, he is really laying out words in the name of the Savior in a fitting and clear fashion. By these words he is able to save not creatures but souls. 'We toiled all night,' he says, 'and took nothing.' Peter, who beforehand was unable to see in order to make a catch, enduring darkness without Christ, had indeed toiled through the whole night. But when the Savior's light shone upon him the darkness scattered, and by faith he began to discern in the deep what he could not see with his eyes." (excerpt from SERMON 110.2.1)6
The Word Among Us Meditation on Luke 5:1-11 comments that we may not have dramatic experiences like these every day, and it can be easy to lose sight of God’s holy presence in the busyness of the day. God’s holiness can and should fill us with reverence and awe. He can break through our fog anytime: when we are praying, like Isaiah, or during our work, like Peter. He can even reveal himself when we are intent on doing evil, like Paul! How will we respond when he does? With gratitude for his mercy? Or will we reject the grace he is offering us?
Every Sunday we pray, “Lord, I am not worthy.” Today, as we stand before our all-holy God who loves us, let’s speak those words with humble hearts. Let’s turn away from our sins and receive his forgiveness. Don’t let your unworthiness keep you from Jesus. Don’t let it stop you from doing his will. “Thank you, Lord, for your mercy!”7
Friar Jude Winkler explains the Hebrew superlative expression of holiness in the passage from Isaiah. Our response with awe to the experience of the Divine may be to draw near or to pull away. The Corinthians saw Jesus' Resurrection as contradictory to their understanding of the material as inferior to the spiritual. Friar Jude reminds us how God transforms our talents to allow Him to work through us to build the Church.
Fr. Richard Rohr, OFM, shows how the apostle Paul understood our unity in diversity through the metaphor of the Body of Christ (1 Corinthians 12).
We often ask our isolated selves, “Am I perfect enough? Good enough?” Yes, you are perfect and good enough! Yet as individuals, we are too fragile, too insecure, too small, to bear the weight of glory. And also too little and weak to bear the burden of sin. We are corporately quite stupid and sinful. I wrote a small book trying to show that Paul actually teaches a most subversive thing: Evil is corporately agreed upon as good before individuals ever dare to do it. [1] We all cooperate in absurd systems. When we humbly and honestly recognize this, we learn much more readily how to join hands with one another. We’re trained to compare and compete; that’s the nature of capitalism. The gospel undercuts that by saying, first of all, that we are one; and secondly, that each of us is a unique individual. Holding our oneness and individuality together reveals the Christian mystery: “You are all Christ’s Body, and individually, you are parts of it” (1 Corinthians 12:27).8
The image of God we experience in moments of awe as an individual grace calls us to serve as fishers of people gathering together in the Body of Christ.
References
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