The texts from the Roman Catholic Lectionary today invite us to ponder the paradox of evil response to good action.
Reconciliation kairos
The reading from the Book of Wisdom presents the error of the wicked.
* [2:12–5:23] From 2:12 to 5:23 the author draws heavily on Is 52–62, setting forth his teaching in a series of characters or types taken from Isaiah and embellished with additional details from other texts. The description of the “righteous one” in 2:12–20 seems to undergird the New Testament passion narrative.1
Psalm 34 is praise for deliverance from trouble.
* [Psalm 34] A thanksgiving in acrostic form, each line beginning with a successive letter of the Hebrew alphabet. In this Psalm one letter is missing and two are in reverse order. The psalmist, fresh from the experience of being rescued (Ps 34:5, 7), can teach the “poor,” those who are defenseless, to trust in God alone (Ps 34:4, 12). God will make them powerful (Ps 34:5–11) and give them protection (Ps 34:12–22).2
In the Gospel of John, Jesus, at the Festival of Booths, invokes the question “ Is This the Christ?”
* [7:26] The authorities: the members of the Sanhedrin (same term as Jn 3:1).3
Larry Gillick, S.J. (in 2010) comments that Lent is not a time for self-improvement. Our actions will always flow from who we accept ourselves as being. His life, His death, His resurrection are all affirming, picturing and insisting on who He tells us, shows us, and leads us to the acceptance of who we are deeply and not betterly.
I listen to a large number of spiritual and prayerful persons who just want to be “better”. Everything that is important to them about themselves, their prayer, their relationships, their ministries, “better.” I do not recall Jesus using this exact word or anything like it. We can spend all of Lent, make our entire life a Lenten exercise of self-improvement and never seem to be, or act or feel better, but probably worse. This is in no way healthy, spiritual nor religious. When I have tried to live this way I have discovered behind it all a very excited and active ego pumping as fast as it could. “Better” seems to be religious, but the closer we allow Jesus to get to us, the lesser it seems important to judge my personal progress. “Deeper” seems to be His invitation and we’ll never be able to measure that either.4
Don Schwager quotes “Christ our physician,” by Augustine of Hippo, 354-430 A.D.
"As Christians, our task is to make daily progress toward God. Our pilgrimage on earth is a school in which God is the only teacher, and it demands good students, not ones who play truant. In this school we learn something every day. We learn something from commandments, something from examples, and something from sacraments. These things are remedies for our wounds and materials for study." (excerpt from Sermon 218c,1)5
The Word Among Us Meditation on John 7:1-2, 10, 25-30 comments that this episode shows how Jesus was always trying to stay in step with his Father’s will. As he told people numerous times, he was careful to do “only what he sees his father doing” (John 5:19; see also 12:49; 17:4). And he told us to be just as careful in following him. This call to obedience can be very challenging! But the secret is to start simply.
Jesus never veered outside of his Father’s plan or took matters into his own hands, and he asks us to be just as committed to him. Just as Jesus could trust his Father with his very life, we can entrust ourselves to him. Even when we can’t see our way forward, even when the road is difficult, he will help us find our way. All he asks is that we try to remain open and follow him wherever he leads us. “Jesus, help me to be steadfast in following you and your will for my life!”6
Friar Jude Winkler comments on the desire of the wicked to do away with the just. Chronos is time as it unfolds and kairos is the appointed time at which Providence acts. Friar Jude reminds us that we try and wait for all things to turn out well.
The Jesuit, with the name Francis, Pope Francis, has heard the chronology of persecution of First Nations and Metis in and today is the kairos for his sincere apology and promise to visit Canada.
Fr. Richard Rohr, OFM, teaches that a practice of contemplation carries us into the “Big River” of God’s love and enables us to release our fears.
I believe that faith might be precisely that ability to trust the Big River of God’s providential love, which is to trust its visible embodiment (the Christ), the flow (the Holy Spirit), and the source itself (the Creator). This is a divine process that we don’t have to change, coerce, or improve. We just need to allow it and enjoy it. That takes immense confidence in God, especially when we’re hurting. Often, we feel ourselves get panicky and quickly want to make things right. We lose our ability to be present and go up into our heads and start obsessing. At that point we’re not really feeling or experiencing things in our hearts and bodies. We’re oriented toward making things happen, trying to push or even create our own river. Yet the Big River is already flowing through us and each of us is only one small part of it.7
Our reflection on the challenges faced by people seeking truth, beauty, and justice opens our heart to movement by the Spirit to compassion and reconciliation.
References
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