FOURTH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME
29 JANUARY 2017
The
prophet Zephaniah addresses his people in exile in Babylon. He encourages them to continue to observe the
Lord’s law, to seek justice and humility, and to trust that the Lord has not
abandoned them. In fact, he assures them
that their detachment from Jerusalem will have a positive result, when the
faithful remnant will return to their homeland.
At one
level, we cannot begin to imagine what it is like for refugees all over the
world, exiled from their homeland because of violence. But we are in exile, because we no longer
have a church building. The Lord speaks
to us through Zephaniah and gives us the same message.
The Lord is preparing us for a new reality in our new church
in this detachment. First, we are
already detached from our seating. Most
of us have camped out in the same places every week. People are not sitting in their usual places
anymore. That will help us to adapt to a
new configuration at the end of March.
Second, most of us go to the same Mass each week. None of those Masses will remain the same,
and we will have to choose a new time.
This time of exile will prepare us for a new physical reality.
In the Sermon
on the Mount, the Lord is preparing us for much more than a beautiful new
physical reality. He is preparing us for
membership in the Kingdom of Heaven. He
is teaching us how to be truly happy, because that is what “blessed” means. Four of the Beatitudes are positive. At the heart of true happiness lies God’s
mercy. God loves us in his mercy, no
matter how many bad choices we make. If
we truly live God’s mercy, then we can give it away to others. Merciful people realize that only God can
satisfy their ultimate hungers and thirsts.
When we hunger and thirst for righteousness, we want to live in right
relationship with God. Merciful people know
how to be clean of heart, because putting God first will purify other desires
for those things that do not satisfy.
Merciful people are happy when they reject all kinds of violence and
strive to solve problems with peaceful means.
The other
four beatitudes teach us the value of detachment. Saint Thomas Aquinas pointed out that there
are four desires which can easily replace our desire for God: money, pleasure, power, and honor. Jesus says that we must learn to detach
ourselves from these desires if we are to be truly happy. Truly happy people are poor in spirit,
because they have learned that bigger cars or homes or bank accounts do not
make them happy in the end. If the poor
in spirit are blessed with wealth, they know how to use it wisely. Truly happy people allow themselves to mourn
in times of difficulty and sadness. They
have learned that chasing after pleasure all the time cannot satisfy. Truly happy people are meek, not in the sense
that they lie down and allow everyone to walk over them. They are meek, in the sense that they know
that always striving for power and control will not fulfill them. They have learned to trust that God is in
charge. Truly happy people are sometimes
persecuted or talked about behind their backs, because they have learned that
their wellbeing does not depend on what other people think about them. They follow their consciences with a peace
that the world cannot give.
We only
have two months to allow the Lord to teach us how to detach ourselves from the
physical realities that we have known and prepare ourselves to adapt to the
realities of a new physical space. But
the Lord has given us the rest of our lives to learn how to embrace those four
beatitudes which bring us happiness, and how to detach ourselves from the traps
of money, pleasure, power, and honor. He
wants us to know those things are not bad in themselves, and that using them in
correctly can guide us as we walk together in this pilgrimage of faith to the
new and eternal Jerusalem.
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