SundayGospelReflection.org

Gospel Reflection 20080113

Catch Jesus' vision.
Vision isn't just physical sight. Vision sees beyond today, beyond appearances, beyond the obvious. It gives a sense of direction and compels us forward. Without vision, the people perish. Jesus cured the blind, but his real concern was to impart God's vision. Jesus presents a Kingdom where compassion, justice and mercy reign, where life, not death, gets the last word.

----------

Baptism – An Act of Faith or A Social Custom (since science and human philosophy are the new dogma & exaltation of material possessions and satisfaction of the senses are the new morality)?
January 13, 2008

The Baptism of the Lord


Gospel
Mt 3:13-17

Jesus came from Galilee to John at the Jordan
to be baptized by him.
John tried to prevent him, saying,
“I need to be baptized by you,
and yet you are coming to me?”
Jesus said to him in reply,
“Allow it now, for thus it is fitting for us
to fulfill all righteousness.”
Then he allowed him.
After Jesus was baptized,
he came up from the water and behold,
the heavens were opened for him,
and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove
and coming upon him.
And a voice came from the heavens, saying,
“This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.”



John was preaching a baptism of repentance, and large numbers of people were coming to John to repent of their sins. They wanted to change the direction of their lives and be reconciled with God. Jesus came along with the crowd. Even though he is the sinless one, he numbered himself among the others and proceeded to the Jordan as if he too was a sinner like them. To save people from sin, Jesus would identify himself so closely with fallen man that his death on the cross would work the expiation of their sin. In our own baptism, we were united to Christ. Just as we were buried with him in death to sin, so shall we arise to new life in him. His resurrection is the guarantee of the new life we have in him.
We read that soon after Jesus' baptism, John was arrested and the Kingdom of God movement needed a new leadership. When Jesus heard it he went up and took on the task, in this way implementing the commitment he made at his baptism to promote the kingdom of God. We can see that for Jesus baptism was not just a question of what he could receive but also very much a question of what he could contribute to the cause of the kingdom of God on earth. John F. Kennedy's saying, "Ask not what your country can do for you, rather ask what you can do for your country" can also be applied to our relationship with God and the Church.
What are we doing, each one of us, to promote the kingdom of God? Are we ready to consecrate and dedicate ourselves wholly to the service of the kingdom of God just as Jesus did? Let us today with Jesus renew our baptismal commitment to bear witness to the Good News of the kingdom of God in word and in deed.
Alas, much of this means nothing to many Christians today because they fail to think in terms of faith. What has caused this failure and why? I offer one inadequate response. Today more than ever at least two forms of idolatry weaken and even destroy a heartfelt and faith-felt appreciation for Christ’s way of dealing with us. The first is rationalism, the second is materialism. Rationalism means that only those things which human reason understands or invents can be true or real. Materialism means that reality is seen only in terms of those things we can see, touch, taste, smell or hear. Rationalism idolizes the mind; materialism, the senses. Rationalism was born around the time of the Reformation and was an angry reaction against any truth being given from on high: it abhors all that would suggest that the human mind is not infallible in and of itself. Materialism was born later and, strangely, is in part a reaction against the rationalists and in part an expression of rationalism. The materialist aims lower than the rationalist by stating that the senses and the needs of the senses are all that matters. He is like the rationalist in exalting the absolute independence of the human being from any superior being.
The practical result of these two forms of idolatry is the exaltation of science and human philosophy as the new dogma, or the exaltation of material possessions and satisfaction of the senses as the new morality. These two ways of thinking and living have replaced the dogma of God’s truth in Christ and the morality of obeying God’s commandments: modern man claims that he can know everything and have everything, and therefore needs nothing and no-one, certainly not God or Church. As is obvious, these attitudes repress the deepest truth and spiritual longings of the human heart. They are self-sufficient and narrow and create an atmosphere of intellectual arrogance as well as an obsessive greed for more and more material possessions or experiences. They alienate the human being, not just from God, but from fellow and self.
To such people, talk of religion, God, prayer and spiritual virtue is all nonsense. Indeed, it is more than nonsense: it is dangerous because it would suggest that science and the human mind must be controlled by higher values, and it would seek to deprive people from indulging every and any sensual impulse. Religion is seen by them as contrary to freedom as they understand it. The sad thing is that the people who are affected, if not infected, by rationalism and materialism are not all atheists or non-Christians. Because they live and work in a world whose law and social intercourse are permeated by these idolatries, Christians too bring them to bear within their own homes and also within the Church, in small ways and big ways. For example, while there can often be good reasons for it, many people come to Church late and leave early. It is difficult not to wonder if perhaps this is a sign of how much they begrudge giving time to God – “let’s get it over with quickly!” “I shouldn’t be here listening to all this, but at home sitting at my computer or TV, or out at a sports game: this Church business has become an annoying interruption of my week!” Baptism and marriage are often no more than social customs, become more important for the clothes bought and the parties celebrated than for the supernatural grace and commitment they entail. In homes, crucifixes are less and less seen, perhaps because they are an embarrassment to “sophisticated” guests or, even worse, because no one even remembers any more what they are or signify. Prayer is no longer taught or practiced at the fireside; God is not only far from the heart, but even from the lips; lips have become frozen because hearts have first. Parents are embarrassed to pray with their children – perhaps because they never pray with each other, or even at all?
What can be done to counter these losses of deep and convinced faith among ourselves? Whatever it is, it must begin at the beginning and it must begin with “me”: it must lead to a rediscovery of the meaning of baptism, my baptism. In a crisis, go back to first principles, to basics. It means somehow taking a pause, setting up a red stop light, and keeping in check the mad rush of modern life. Imagine –and I know it may not be possible, but it illustrates my point- imagine you and your family just blocked off a week from the calendar and said, “This week we are going to stay home, turn off the phones and the TV and computers. We are going to take a long hard look at what our goals are as family and individuals; we are going to ask ourselves honestly if they are worthy of God; we will try and understand what it is that is exhausting us, making us edgy, bad-tempered, heedless of God and of one another’s true and beautiful selves. We will begin again with new resolve to live out our baptism and marriage; we can try to be more vigilant about bad influences on us and keep them in check, develop a culture of forgiveness in our home by regular confession, and live with more time and loving words for each other.” Imagine every family in this Church did this once a year! We would need to build a new church and have 10 Pastors on the staff! There would be fewer problems of the wrong kinds, and other people would begin to say, “show us, too, how to be free of the slavery of life’s relentless rush and its pagan idolatry of the human mind and senses.” We would have become witnesses! Is that really so hard to imagine? Maybe, rather than a week, a weekend would be enough, maybe one day. Call it a Jesus Day, a Jesus-with-us Day. Maybe you could get together and work out how to develop a model which would help other struggling marriages and families.
At any rate, the change will not happen unless each of us makes it happen. No Pastor has the magic staff of Moses to part the Red Sea for you. So each one, each marriage, each family, holds the key. God can do the impossible with you if, like Mary, you say individually and together, “let me, let us do what you say, Lord.” Summon with courage the ongoing grace of your baptism and of your matrimony to seek the will of the Holy Spirit in your lives.
The Baptism of the Lord, then, can be the basis, not just of a New Year resolution, but of almighty grace and strength to free us all from inadequate understandings of life which steal our hearts from God and which alienate society from him. Should we not all want to hear the voice of the Father over us, “You are my beloved son, daughter, couple, family. In you, I am well pleased”?
The longest journey begins with the smallest of steps. Listen, please listen, to the Holy Spirit and make your way back, humbly, patiently and perseveringly to the baptismal font.

----------

St. Anthony of Egypt

(251-356)


The life of Anthony will remind many people of St. Francis of Assisi. At 20, Anthony was so moved by the Gospel message, "Go, sell what you have, and give to [the] poor" (Mark 10:21b), that he actually did just that with his large inheritance. He is different from Francis in that most of Anthony's life was spent in solitude. He saw the world completely covered with snares, and gave the Church and the world the witness of solitary asceticism, great personal mortification and prayer. But no saint is antisocial, and Anthony drew many people to himself for spiritual healing and guidance.
At 54, he responded to many requests and founded a sort of monastery of scattered cells. Again like Francis, he had great fear of "stately buildings and well-laden tables."

At 60, he hoped to be a martyr in the renewed Roman persecution of 311, fearlessly exposing himself to danger while giving moral and material support to those in prison. At 88, he was fighting the Arian heresy, that massive trauma from which it took the Church centuries to recover. "The mule kicking over the altar" denied the divinity of Christ.

Anthony is associated in art with a T-shaped cross, a pig and a book. The pig and the cross are symbols of his valiant warfare with the devil—the cross his constant means of power over evil spirits, the pig a symbol of the devil himself. The book recalls his preference for "the book of nature" over the printed word. Anthony died in solitude at 105.

Comment:

In an age that smiles at the notion of devils and angels, a person known for having power over evil spirits must at least make us pause. And in a day when people speak of life as a "rat race," one who devotes a whole life to solitude and prayer points to an essential of the Christian life in all ages. Anthony's hermit life reminds us of the absoluteness of our break with sin and the totality of our commitment to Christ. Even in God's good world, there is another world whose false values constantly tempt us.

posted by Mike Young @ 7:57 AM