*****
“Remember that you received what was good during your lifetime…”
The parable in today’s Gospel does not require a great deal of explanation. Not to put too fine a point on it, but it is a warning - a stern warning. Acts have consequences; choices have ramifications; decisions have results. What goes around comes around and in a very big way.
However, take note of one detail in the story: the rich man who “dressed in purple and fine linen and dined sumptuously each day” is not condemned because of his good fortune – he is condemned because of his failure to share his good fortune with someone less fortunate.
Lent is not only a good time for us to reflect upon all the good – all the blessings – that God continues to shower upon us, but Lent is also a good time to consider how good we are – or aren’t – at sharing our goods with others.
*****
“When his brothers saw that their father loved him best…they hated him…”
This is a famous story from the Book of Genesis. It is a story of family feud. It is a story of internecine jealousy. It is a story of unspeakable betrayal.
And in the end, it is a story of God’s unpredictable providence!
Joseph is his father’s favorite; his older brothers hate him for it. Blinded by their resentment and envy, they plot to murder Joseph. At the last moment, however, Reuben has second thoughts. He proposes that they essentially leave their brother to die in the desert (hoping that he might subsequently rescue his brother). At first blush, it seemed that Reuben’s plan might have worked until a caravan of foreigners appeared. Then, plan changed again: the brothers – even Rueben, by all accounts – decided to sell Joseph into slavery. This provided the brothers with an out: they didn’t actually take Joseph’s life, but they could get Joseph out of their lives nonetheless.
Twenty years later Israel finds itself in the grip of a devastating famine. At the end of their respective ropes, Joseph’s brothers travel to Egypt with the hope of finding food and shelter. Imagine their surprise – and their shame - when they find themselves face-to-face with the brother whom they had sold into slavery, presumably unto death.
There is a great mystery here to be considered. Absent his brothers’ treachery, Joseph’s kin – and presumably, Joseph himself – might have all been consumed by the famine that swept through Israel twenty years after selling their brother into slavery. How could anyone have anticipated that an act of betrayal could turn into a tale of salvation, forgiveness and reconciliation?
What’s the moral to the story? Sometimes in life good things happen for all the wrong reasons. Sometimes in life even the most loathsome of intentions can produce an inspired turn-of-events. Simply put, God can make miracles out of the worst of circumstances.
Today reflect on this question: are there any examples of inspired turnoff-events in your own life in which something that you experienced as bad eventually helped to bring about something good?
*****
"This man welcomes sinners and eats with them..."
This statement is the resentment leveled against Jesus in today’s selection from the Gospel of Luke. In response, Jesus proceeds to tell the Pharisees and scribes a parable: the parable of the prodigal son.
The word “prodigal” is defined as “rashly or wastefully extravagant.” Well, that certainly describes the younger son to a tee. After all, he demands an inheritance (to which, as the younger son, he was not entitled) and promptly blows his entire fortune on irresponsible living.
The word “prodigal” is also defined as “lavish in giving”. Well, that certainly describes the father. After all, not only does he not rub the failure in his younger son’s face – or treat him like a slave - but he welcomes him back, forgives him, and restores his place and position in the family.
The word “prodigal” is also defined as “lavish in yielding”. Well, that certainly relates to the older son, or more to the point, to the older son’s struggle. The story ends with the father begging the older brother to let go of his resentment – to set aside his anger – toward his younger brother’s return as well as toward his father’s lavish celebration of the younger brother’s return.
Is there anything in that story to which you can really relate at this point in your life? Is there anyone in the parable with whom you can most closely empathize?
What is your answer? Why?
*****
"Is the Lord in our midst or not?"
From generation to generation, this is a timely (even a perennial) question, more often than not raised in moments of crisis and confusion or in the experience of suffering, tragedy, injustice or loss. Angry, frustrated and disillusioned, the Israelites - our spiritual ancestors - posed the question to Moses in the midst of the seemingly aimless desert trek on which they had been led. Like them, we ask the same question in our own ways every day, whether due to global events like terrorism, war, famine and disease or our own personal struggles, including unemployment, illness, death and relational issues.
Moreover, it is the perfect question to reflect upon as we progress in our Lenten journey.
At least intellectually, we do believe that God is truly in our midst. Francis de Sales certainly did, but for him, this was no mere intellectual assent - this was a core belief:
“There is no place or thing in this world in which God is not truly present. Just as wherever birds fly they always encounter the air, so also wherever we go or wherever we are God is truly present.” (Introduction to the Devout Life, Part II, Chapter 2.)
However, in our eagerness for God to spring water from the rock in times of doubt or adversity, we often forget the fact that God has been with us all along the way. In moments of crisis, those who encourage us with a kind word, a good turn, or attentive an ear can reflect to us the immediacy of God's faithful, ongoing presence - a presence likewise experienced in Scripture heard, Eucharist shared and prayer raised up.
Still, despite our best intentions and attention, we sometimes panic and miss the obvious in our frantic search for the Lord, especially in times of great need. God is, as it were, “hidden in plain sight”. We forget that God is as near to us as the very air we breathe, a mistake that the Samaritan woman almost makes in her own encounter with Jesus at the well. The Lord is in her midst – in fact, he is right in front of her – but this spontaneous request for a drink from a Jewish male is so astonishing that she almost fails to recognize who is speaking with her. Happily, she realizes that it could “possibly be the Christ” and gratitude stirs her to abandon her water jar, run to town and announce to the people the Good News of her encounter with Jesus.
Whether in the desert or at the well, signs of God's presence are always in our midst and, like the woman in the Gospel, these signs are something for which we should be grateful. The gratitude we feel and express for these signs produces trust: trust in God and trust in those who are signs of God's love for us. “Just trust in the Lord,” St. Francis de Sales writes, “and He will continue to lead you safely through all things. Where you cannot walk, God will carry you in His arms.”
In gratitude for those times when we have been carried in the Lord's arms, today may we be signs of God's presence for others.
*****
“If the prophet had told you to do something extraordinary, would you not have done it?”
Naaman – a great general and a foreigner – travels to far-off Samaria in the hope of being cured of his leprosy. This powerful man – a force with whom to be reckoned - is prepared to do whatever it takes, regardless of how superhuman or heroic, in order to curry favor with the God of Israel. When he finally reaches the home of Elisha, Naaman is told to simply wash seven times in the River Jordan. Period!
Naaman is furious! Such a remedy seems useless at best, insulting at worst. But then, someone in his retinue challenges his presumption that God can only work through extraordinary events and actions or that God is only interested in extraordinary events and actions. In effect, a servant says to Naaman, “You know, if the prophet had asked you to do something absolutely impossible, you would have done it in a heartbeat. When he asked you to do something incredibly ordinary instead, you can’t believe it. Get over yourself and wash! Other than your pride, what do you have to lose?”
And the rest – as they say – is history.
There’s something of Naaman the Syrian inside each and every one of us. After all, don’t most of us – if not all of us – believe that if you really want something big – if you love somebody big-time – that you need to do something big in order to achieve something big – and that you have do something big in order to express your big-time love? Francis de Sales reminds us:
“Great opportunities to serve God rarely present themselves, but little ones are frequent.” (IDL, Part III, Chapter 35, p. 215)
Are you looking to do something good for God today? Rather than waste your time waiting around for an opportunity to do something bigger than life, how about turning your attention to everyday life?
With big – that is, great – love!
*****
“Patrick was born in Britain of a Romanized family. At age 16 he was torn by Irish raiders from the villa of his father, Calpurnius, a deacon and minor local official, and carried into slavery in Ireland, where, during six bleak years spent as a herdsman, he turned with fervor to his faith. Hearing at last in a dream that the ship in which he was to escape was ready, he fled his master and found passage to Britain. There he came near to starvation and suffered a second brief captivity before he was reunited with his family. Thereafter, he may have paid a short visit to the Continent.”
“The best known passage in the Confessio, his spiritual autobiography, tells of a dream, after his return to Britain, in which one Victoricus delivered him a letter headed, “The Voice of the Irish.” As he read it, he seemed to hear a certain company of Irish beseeching him to walk once more among them. “Deeply moved,” he says, “I could read no more.” Nevertheless, because of the shortcomings of his education, he was reluctant for a long time to respond to the call. Even on the eve of embarkation for Ireland he was beset by doubts of his fitness for the task. Once in the field, however, his hesitations vanished. Utterly confident in the Lord, he journeyed far and wide, baptizing and confirming with untiring zeal. In diplomatic fashion he brought gifts to a kinglet here and a lawgiver there but accepted none from any. On at least one occasion, he was cast into chains. On another, he addressed with lyrical pathos a last farewell to his converts who had been slain or kidnapped by the soldiers of Coroticus.”
“The phenomenal success of Patrick's mission is not, however, the full measure of his personality. Since his writings have come to be better understood, it is increasingly recognized that, despite their occasional incoherence, they mirror a truth and simplicity of the rarest quality. Not since St. Augustine of Hippo had any religious diarist bared his inmost soul as Patrick did in his writings. As D.A. Binchy, the most austerely critical of Patrician (i.e., of Patrick) scholars, has put it, “The moral and spiritual greatness of the man shines through every stumbling sentence of his rustic Latin.” (http://www.biography.com/people/st-patrick-9434729?page=1)
We stand in awe of the level of Patrick’s generosity in answering God’s call for him to evangelize the people of a land in which he himself was once imprisoned! The measure with which Patrick measured was clearly measured back to him thirty, sixty and a hundredfold if you consider the impact that his missionary efforts had on both the people of the Ireland in his day and throughout all of continental Europe long after his death.
Isn’t it amazing the difference that one person can make by measuring generously to others? How might we imitate Patrick’s generosity through our willingness to be generous to all those we meet today? How can our lives make a positive impact in the lives of others today?
*****
“Observe them carefully…”
What is it that we should be observing carefully? As we hear in the words on the lips of Moses from the Book of Deuteronomy today, it is God’s statutes and decrees that we are to observe carefully.
When we fail to observe God’s laws carefully – regardless of how large or how little God’s laws may be, as Jesus points out in today’s Gospel from Matthew – often times it is not because we are intentionally choosing to break them as much as – once again – we have managed to forget them, and in forgetting them we manage to lose sight of them altogether.
In his Introduction to the Devout Life, Francis de Sales wrote:
“Blind men do not see a prince who is present among them, and therefore do not show him the respect they do after being told or reminded of his presence. However, because they do not actually see him, they easily forget his presence and having forgotten it, they still more easily lose the respect and reverence owed to him.” (IDL, Part II, Chapter 2, p. 84) And in the effort to underscore the importance of doing carefully any worthwhile endeavor, recall Francis de Sales’ very definition of devotion, that is, holiness:
“Genuine, living devotion presupposes love of God, and hence it is simply true love of God. Yet it is not always love as such. Inasmuch as divine love adorns the soul, it is called grace, which makes us pleasing to God. Inasmuch as it strengthens us to do good, it is called charity. When it has reached a degree of perfection at which it not only makes us do good but also to do good carefully, frequently and promptly, it is called devotion.” (Ibid, Part I, Chapter 1)
Today, do you want to make progress in observing carefully God’s statutes and decrees? You can start - as the Book of Deuteronomy reminds us – by not allowing them to slip from your memory! As the saying goes, “Out of sight, out of mind.”
