SundayGospelReflection.org

Gospel Reflection 20070722

The spiritual life is not something different from your regular life.
Some people think prayer has to be something highly emotional and dramatic. It's more important that it be sincere, honest and coming from your real life. Whatever you pray, God can handle it.

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Welcome Your Distractions
July 22, 2007



Sixteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time


Gospel
Lk 10:38-42

Jesus entered a village
where a woman whose name was Martha welcomed him.
She had a sister named Mary
who sat beside the Lord at his feet listening to him speak.
Martha, burdened with much serving, came to him and said,
“Lord, do you not care
that my sister has left me by myself to do the serving?
Tell her to help me.”
The Lord said to her in reply,
“Martha, Martha, you are anxious and worried about many things.
There is need of only one thing.
Mary has chosen the better part
and it will not be taken from her.”


So, Martha asks a great question. After all, someone has to take care of all the logistics. So, does Jesus care that Mary is neglecting all the "work" associated with hosting a large group in their home? NO, he doesn't. He doesn't say it in so many words, but he is not about to recommend to Mary that she help serve the drinks.
Jesus doesn't care about what Martha wants Mary to do. Jesus cares about MARTHA. "Martha, Martha ... just relax a minute here ... I cannot make Mary help you because you think that's what Mary should be doing; what I can do, though, is love you right here, right now. I am with you here. You have no control over what Mary chooses to do. All you can do is love her and love me."
This Gospel is not just about prayer and work. Prayer is ultimately more important than work; both must be valued in our lives. But this Gospel is also about our inclination to judge others, about our asking God to take sides. Haven't we prayed like Martha ... "Dear Lord, help my neighbor to be just like me so I won't be bothered so much." The bottom line is: God does not care at all about our judgments of others. God cares about us.
What if Martha also chose the better part? What if they both sat at Jesus feet? What about the other guests? Are they not also important?
And if we are to be like God, to live in God's image, then perhaps we can care less about WHAT we think others should do and care more about others. Let's love one another into freedom instead of judging one another into fear.

Like Martha, I’m not a good “rester.” Never have been. Rest does not come naturally. I’ve come to realize how crazy I can become trying to “do something productive” with every spare moment of my time.
I have come to recognize that a mad dash to fill life with motion and light doesn’t necessarily fill it with meaning. In fact, God doesn’t want us to fill all the vacant moments of our days with activity and to fill every pause of silence with noise. God calls us to rest. He wants us to rest secure in his grace. He wants us to rest physically from our labor. He wants us to rest from our worries, pressures, and busy-ness. In fact, God calls us to be productive in our rest. How? By really resting—not worrying about things to do or places to be.
Jesus knew what it meant to rest as worship. Jesus’ teaching was built upon the principles of Sabbath rest---one day a week given to rest for our families, our animals, our associates, and us. It wasn’t intended as a gift of burden, but a gift of grace.
God doesn’t want our life to be a frantic dash through mayhem. Meaning isn’t found in cramming every square inch of our life with activity. So often our frantic lives steal from us the very things God made us to enjoy. After all, we were made to enjoy relationship with God, with each other, and with his creation.
Today’s story of Martha and Mary raises the question of what’s really valuable in life. Clearly, hospitality is important— But Martha’s “fault” is getting hung up on all the details of hospitality.
Years ago, an admiring fan asked pianist-composer Arthur Schnabel how he was able to handle the musical notes so beautifully.
The pianist answered, “The notes I handle no better than many pianists. But the pauses between the notes—ah! That is where the art resides!”
And that is where the art of living resides also.
That brings us back to today’s Gospel. If Jesus could speak to many of us living in today’s hectic world, he would say to us what he said to Martha:
"Martha, Martha! You are worried and troubled over so many things…Mary has chosen the right thing.”
Jesus would remind us that we can get so involved in doing things that we can forget why we are doing them.
We can get so involved in making a living that we forget about making a life.
We can get so involved in acquiring the things money can buy that we forget about the important things money can’t buy.
It’s this kind of mistake that Martha made in today’s Gospel. She got so involved in cooking a meal for Jesus that she forgot why Jesus came and what he really wanted.
He didn’t come for a free meal; he wanted to be with friends. He came to pause and relax in the midst of a hectic schedule of teaching and healing.
There’s a bit of Martha in all of us. We get so involved in activity that we forget to pause now and then and smell the roses, or rest.
We get so involved in activity that we forget that we need “moments of silence and contemplation.”
We get so involved in activity that we forget the art of living is often best served by observing the “pauses” than in our handling of the notes themselves.
We can get so involved in activity that we forget to pause to “sit quietly and unhurriedly in God’s presence,” making sure that where we seem to be going is where we want to go.
We forget we are both body and soul, and need to keep them both in balance.

A QUICK STORY: “What went wrong?” he asked himself. How did his flourishing mission collapse overnight. “What did I do wrong?” he asked his former church members. The truth hit home one day when a woman said to him, “Father, you did a lot for us. You gave our children clothes and built up our village. But there was one thing you did not do. You did not bring us to know Jesus as our personal Lord and Saviour.” Doing the work of the Lord is great. But knowing the Lord of the work comes first.
Today’s gospel is the story of two sisters, Martha who is busy with the work of the Lord, and Mary who is more interested in knowing the Lord of the work. For Martha service comes first, for Mary relationship comes first. Like the missionary in our story, Martha must have been shocked to hear the Lord himself saying that it is relationship with him that comes first, for without it our service is meaningless.
There are people who see Martha in this story as the material girl and Mary as the spiritual one. But this way of thinking in terms of separation between spirit and matter does not belong to the gospel of Luke. Rather Luke presents Martha and Mary as two sisters who are both interested in the Lord, two women who both want to please the Lord. The difference between them is the manner in which they go about trying to please the Lord. Martha takes the way of service or working for the Lord. Mary takes the way of relationship or being with the Lord.
Mark tells us that when Jesus called the apostles to follow him, he called them for a dual purpose: “to be with him, and to be sent out to proclaim the message” (Mark 3:14). The need, on the one hand, to be with the Lord, to know him, to fellowship with him and be nourished by his word and, on the other hand, to do the Lord’s work, to serve the Lord in others, to proclaim his message of love in word and deed, brings us to a conflict. Which one comes first? How much of my time should I devote to being with the Lord, to prayer and listening to God’s word, and how much time to doing the work of the Lord? In spite of the urgent need to throw ourselves into the work of the Lord, it is only logical to say that my relationship with the Lord of the work comes before my involvement with the work of the Lord.
The point of the story of Jesus with May and Martha is not to invite us to choose between being a Martha or a Mary. The true disciple needs to be both Martha and Mary. The point of the story is to challenge our priorities so that we come to see that fellowship with the Lord, being with the Lord and hearing his word should always precede the work we do for the Lord. Do we have a program of daily fellowship with the Lord? Whatever way we fulfill this need, today’s gospel invites all Christians first to be a Mary who sits with devotion at the Lord’s feet listening his word, and then also to be a Martha who throws herself with energy into the business of serving the Lord.

The story of Mary and Martha helps to answer the question, “What is prayer?” To answer that question we need to recall what kind of prayer Mary was engaged in. She was listening to Jesus. The principal part of prayer after all is listening, not talking. Martha could have been listening to Jesus too while she was serving her guests. The point of the story is that Martha was distracted by her service. She was busying her mind with the injustice that Mary was doing her in not helping.

St. Vincent de Paul told his followers that if they were at prayer and a beggar showed up at the door, they should get up and take care of the beggar’s needs. He did not see this as leaving prayer in order to serve someone else. Rather he saw that the service of a needy neighbor is a continuation of prayer. God speaks to us and expects our response, not only in the silence of the church, but in needs of our neighbors as well. We can be distracted from silent prayer by a thousand and one thoughts of what we should be or could be doing. We can also be distracted from hearing the voice of God in the plight of those around us by thoughts of how badly others are treating us.

Mary listened to Jesus’ teaching in words. Martha observed the needs of those around her. We should imitate both but without concern for the real or imagined injustices we experience from others.

I'd like to share with you an experience I had with God during one of my prayer times. I had begun to realize that I was becoming judgmental in my attitudes towards a certain political party, especially because of their views on abortion. I asked God to help me see these people as he sees them. The answer I received was that I was to see everyone-everyone-as a soul beloved by God. And, that's what I now try to do-see everyone as God sees them, even if their political and social views differ from mine. Where, before, I only saw people, I now see souls worthy of respect--souls worthy of Christian love, even if I know that they are wrong on certain issues--a soul who is my brother or sister, regardless of what they've done in the past.
For everyone here today, I encourage you to pray that prayer-to see all people as God sees them. I guarantee you, this prayer, if taken to heart, will change your life. Once you begin to see people as God sees them, you will no longer see other people as "us vs. them". There will only be brothers and sisters. Brothers and sisters loved equally by God, our Father.
Just think about what our world would be like. No wars. No drugs. No gangs. No third-world countries. Safety on our streets. Peace and prosperity. It could happen. It can happen. But, it has to begin with us. And it has to begin today-right here and right now.

1. “You Are Anxious About Many Things.” It seems that things are moving faster all the time. There is so much going on. The culture makes huge demands on my time. What is more, it seems at times like no one understands my dilemma. I am trying to do what is right, I am trying to be responsible, and it seems like no one else is.
2. “There Is Need of Only One Thing.” Love Christ. Live for Him. Lord, you are all I need. What else will matter when I finish my life? Who else can fill my soul with satisfaction and peace? Who else brings meaning to my life but you? Remind me of this, because many times it is so easy for me to lose my focus and direction in the world. It seems so easy for me to put other things first.
3. “Choose the Better Part.” Lord, your words to Martha strike a chord in my heart. I can let the noise and distractions around me nick at my heart and misdirect me, but all that will do is bring about more confusion and uneasiness. However, if I choose you, what great confidence it brings for me to know that you will not be taken from me. Everyone wants to be happy. Everyone wants to be fulfilled. Why should I fool myself looking for happiness in the things of this world when you supply it, Lord?

IMAGINE THIS: During your prayer time, you picture the face of someone who badly offended you. You feel resentment and anger; your heart beats faster; your facial muscles tighten; you sigh and fidget. Plus, you feel frustrated by the fact that you’ve been distracted from prayer; you feel bad because you have lost that consoling focus on Christ. So you conclude: I can’t pray because I just get distracted; you may also conclude that Christ’s reaction to you must be either one of disappointment or of bare tolerance.
It’s reality… sometimes during prayer we’re distracted, anxious and worried about many other things. We understand more easily the annoyance of Martha; we would love to experience the apparent carelessness of Mary. The “Martha-Mary tension” is the tension between prayer and action in the Christian life; it is the difficult challenge of keeping the vertical and the horizontal together in a balance. Like every tension, though, if handled properly, it can bring much life and fruitfulness.
When you come to prayer, God’s heart is stirred. He holds all creation in His hands, yet in prayer He is “all ears” just for you. But the you who goes to pray, and the you to whom God is listening, is the whole you, not just the part you consider more respectable, not just your “good face”. When you present yourself before Jesus, you are presenting to him all that you are, all that you carry in your heart, mind and memory, your experience in all the dimensions of your life, past and present. You present your body in its concrete reality, sick or healthy, in all its energies, from your sexuality to the blinking of your eyes. There is no other you! Just that one! That real you is the one whose ID the Lord recognizes, loves, forgives and enriches with His graces. He is real; you are real. The you to whom He listens is the same one whose “C.V.”, whose curriculum vitae (commonly known as a resume), is written into the very fiber of your consciousness and sub-consciousness. Prayer is not an escape from reality, but a profound and personal immersion in it. Indeed, it is a call to be more real than you realize.
In prayer, then, there is the encounter of two real persons, one human and, if it is Jesus to whom you pray, one divine. In such an encounter two things at least are inevitable. The first is that you come gradually to be truly present to one another. Real presence from our side takes time; you can’t be fully present to someone in a flash. Many people think they are really present to each other just because they are in the same room together, and even talking together. Presence is not exhausted in the physical nor guaranteed by talking. The second thing is that you both want to learn more and more about one another. Friends share things; friends in love share all things, freely and without reservation. That sharing comes through communicating, through telling one’s story. The Gospel is Jesus’ story, and we need to know and cherish the Gospel with great dedication and zeal. “Ignorance of the Gospel is ignorance of Christ.” How can I really relate to a friend if I do not want to know his story intimately and thoroughly? But the question then arises as to your story. In prayer, it is surely good that we ask for what we need according to the will of the Lord. It is also true that our heavenly Father knows what we need before we ask Him, but He still wants us actually to ask Him, to show we trust Him as a dear and generous Father. He certainly seeks us to worship Him in spirit and in truth through Jesus, His well-beloved Son, and in the power of the Spirit who helps us in our weakness. But … God also wants to hear our story from our own lips. In telling Him our story we come to understand ourselves in His sight. He leads us to know ourselves and so to love ourselves as does He.
Still, He knows that we are reluctant to tell Him our story. We are very conscious of our right to privacy, even before God. Our reluctance is, however, usually about the down side of ourselves. Think how much of a good face we put on our relationships even with the nearest and dearest to us. Yet there is likely not one of us who does not say to themselves, “if only they knew the whole truth about me!” There can be at least three reasons for our reluctance to tell our story to Christ. One is that we are ashamed of some things we have done or are still doing; we fear rejection by Him, and shame has that diabolically lying skill of convincing us that God will indeed reject us if we speak our sorry truth. Another reason is that, while ashamed of what we have done or are doing, we want to keep on doing it because we like it; telling it as it is to Christ would mean telling Him to His face that we do certain things and we see no reason, we have no intention, He has no right, to stop them. In the words of St. John: “The light has come into the world, but men have shown that they prefer darkness to light, because their deeds are evil.” I suppose there could be a third reason for some: they cannot tell Jesus their story simply because they do not even know it themselves. They have repressed it out of pain, they have chosen or been forced to forget it, and they live literally only on the edge of who they are. That is a great tragedy, one that the Lord alone will know how to heal and redeem.
Whatever the reason for not telling one’s full story to Christ in the course of a life of prayer, one thing seems very likely, even if surprising. The distractions that come to us in prayer, if not sent by the Lord Himself, can always be made the object of prayer.
Why would the Lord send us distractions when we are doing such a good and holy thing by having deeper insights into Him?! It follows from what was said above that the Lord can do this because He wants us to tell Him our story, all our story - not give Him classes in theology. He loves us when we come to praise Him, but He also knows that sometimes we indulge in “high spiritual escapades” as a clever way of avoiding and confronting real problems in our lives. It is natural to want to avoid and run away from difficult problems and feelings. But the more we do so, the less will we be able to deal with them, integrate them into our relationship with the Lord and, ultimately, have the courage and strength to see them through. As in the example I mentioned earlier, the distraction of someone’s face may bring back strong and unpleasant feelings of conflict and pain. Well, in prayer, Jesus wants to hear all about those feelings and that pain; He wants to hear all about that person, what happened, why it happened and how can it be brought to resolution in truth and charity. If there is a face I do not want to see, I am actually hiding my own true face from Jesus. Jesus wants me to see that face until I can once again accept that person. For, whether I like it or not, that person, too, is loved by “my Jesus” and will stand by His side and, hopefully, by mine in the Kingdom of God. Heaven is not exclusive, except for those who would make it so. Jesus brings us back from our spiritual fantasies to our concrete reality, in order to heal us and bring us peace. When love is real, fantasies are no more.
I am not suggesting that, in prayer, there will be a miraculous solution to your problems. I am very much suggesting, however, that there will be absolutely no solution to them if you do not yield them to Christ in prayer. In this sense, your distractions can become your salvation. There is no distraction, of any kind whatsoever, that cannot be exposed to Christ. To paraphrase St. Paul: “I take every thought and feeling and make it captive for Christ Jesus.” Faith, trust and perseverance in welcoming distractions and surrendering them to Him will eventually make your own story, however painful, a very unique and powerful version of the Gospel itself. Do not drop your jaw in disbelief at this: this is the meaning of our baptism, of being Church, of being redeemed. There are no dusty corners in heaven for those who “just made it”: there we are all first-born sons and daughters!
“The one thing necessary” of which Jesus speaks is, I believe, the effective willingness to focus all of one’s life, good and bad, on the person of Jesus Christ. That does not mean that we move out of active life, as if the horizontal dimension of life were not of God. Jesus did not ask Martha to stop serving, but to motivate it by, and to focus it on, Himself! This means that we are to understand, evaluate and judge the horizontal in virtue of the vertical, i.e. our relationship with Jesus, which we render explicit in intimate prayer and fraternal worship. There is no problem in the history of humanity, of each human person, that will not ultimately be judged by Jesus Christ. It only makes sense, then, that we seek to draw, by word and example, by prayer and action, ourselves, our activities and our relationships to Jesus. That is what Jesus wants of us and for us; that is the “better part” of our self-awareness before Christ and of our awareness of Him.
“Martha and Mary”: might we say “distraction and attraction”? Later in their lives, both of these holy women professed their faith in the divinity of Jesus as He raised Lazarus, their brother, from the dead. If we will trust in the Providence of God, our distractions, even in prayer, can be the doorway to greater attraction of all we are to the Son of God. Welcome your distractions, then, and in so doing you might well discover that you have left your tomb and been welcomed by Christ into His heavenly home.

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St. Apollinaris


(1st century)



According to tradition, St. Peter sent Apollinaris to Ravenna, Italy, as its first bishop. His preaching of the Good News was so successful that the pagans there beat him and drove him from the city. He returned, however, and was exiled a second time. After preaching in the area surrounding Ravenna, he entered the city again. After being cruelly tortured, he was put on a ship heading to Greece. Pagans there caused him to be expelled to Italy, where he went to Ravenna for a fourth time. He died from wounds received during a savage beating at Classis, a suburb of Ravenna. A beautiful basilica honoring him was built there in the sixth century.

Comment:
Following Jesus involves risks—sometimes the supreme risk of life itself. Martyrs are people who would rather accept the risk of death than deny the cornerstone of their whole life: faith in Jesus Christ. Everyone will die eventually—the persecutors and those persecuted. The question is what kind of a conscience people will bring before the Lord for judgment. Remembering the witness of past and present martyrs can help us make the often-small sacrifices that following Jesus today may require.

Quote:
During his remarks prior to the Regina Caeli on May 7, 2000, Pope John Paul II noted that later that day at Rome's Colosseum he would participate in an ecumenical service honoring 20th-century martyrs. He said, "It is the same paschal light that shines in them. Indeed, it is from Christ's resurrection that the disciples receive the strength to follow the Master in their hour of trial." What the pope said of those martyrs is true of all martyrs for Christ, including today's saint.

posted by Mike Young @ 4:54 PM