Fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time
If you came to Mass today looking for a pick-me-up reading, our first reading from the Book of Job was probably not helpful. We’ve probably all had days like Job, though, thinking that our life is just dragging on and is full of misery. Remember that at this point, Job has lost almost of all of his material wealth, his children have been killed, and he himself is afflicted with sores. His wife’s advice in all of this: curse God and die! Not the loving support you want to hear from your spouse! Instead, I think in hard times we all would rather that we had someone to sympathize with us; not just someone who feels bad for us, but someone who has gone through the same or similar circumstances.
That is the great news about the Incarnation! God sees us in our misery, a misery which far surpasses that of Job, but He doesn’t just empathize with us, that is, suffer in us without any idea of what it really means. Our God takes flesh in the second Person of the Blessed Trinity, and comes down to know our pain. When God takes on our human flesh, not just living in it but truly making it His own, uniting our human nature to His divine nature forever, He takes on our misery, without giving up any of His glory.
But while He could have avoided the nastiness of our fallen condition, He doesn’t. In fact, our Gospel reminds us that He went down right into the middle of it all. He spends time and touches people who are sick “with various diseases.” He drives out demons. He even enters into the delicate relationship between a son and his mother-in-law when He goes to the house of Simon Peter. And, as our Gospel also states, He goes out to preach and to heal and to expel demons in other villages, not just His own. He takes upon Himself all that it means to be human, but without sinning. But, though He never sins, He even takes sin upon Himself as He suffers the pain and the penalty of sin. When we sin, we (hopefully) feel bad enough because we have injured (venial sins) or severed (mortal sins) our relationship with God. But imagine how much more horrible that must have felt for Jesus Christ, Himself God, to take upon Himself separation from God. When we think about it, Jesus’ words on the cross, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” become even more powerful. Jesus even shares in our death, the ultimate penalty of sin, as He breathes His last and His body loses the breath of God.
That doesn’t sound like it, but it’s good news. It sounds horrible that God would have to go through that, and it’s for that reason that people weep when they think about the Passion of Jesus Christ, but it’s really good news. Our God does not simply empathize with us, but sympathizes with us(which means He suffers with us). He embraces us as we suffer, and reminds us that He knows the pain that we go through, not as a distant onlooker, but as a participant in our pain.
And that is the good news that St. Paul preaches. That is the Gospel (which means good news) that St. Paul is obliged to preach, because he wants others to know that they do not suffer alone, and that, after all Jesus’ suffering, new life was won. That is why St. Paul made himself a slave to all; why he became weak to the weak and all things to all. St. Paul wants others to know that while life can sometimes seem as miserable as Job, Jesus has passed through pain and death and has transformed it into joy and life.
Today the Church celebrates World Marriage Day, and next weekend we’ll have a blessing for Married Couples which will coincide with our St. Valentine’s Day Dinner Dance (and the Sunday after). The call of Catholic married couples is to be a sacrament, a sign instituted by Christ which brings grace. Too many married couples feel like Job, with life as a drag. Catholic married couples are meant to show them, through their own living out of the vocation of marriage, that marriage may not be easy, and that sometimes couples might feel like Job, but that Christ has transformed marriage into a way to become holy. They show it to others by their love for each other. They show it to a new generation as they conceive and raise children in the faith. They preach the Gospel by letting Christ sanctify and transform their love for each other so that when others look at them, they see the love of Jesus for His Bride, the Church.
And we, the Bride, the Church, are not always easy to love, as many married couples sometimes experience. We, God’s People, are not always faithful to Him; we do not always love Him; we do not always show that love for Him by prayer, spending time with Him, making Him the priority in our life. And yet, Jesus continues to love us and pour Himself out for us as He sits at the right hand of the Father, interceding for us. Married couples: I challenge you to say 1 Our Father with each other each day. If you do, I promise not that marriage will be easy, but that you will have the strength from heaven to persevere even in the hard times. High schoolers, college students, and young adults: I challenge you to say 1 Hail Mary each day, asking our Blessed Mother to help show you if you are called to marriage, and if you are called to that beautiful vocation, to show you whom to marry. For the rest of us, let us pray 1 Glory Be each day for the sanctification of married couples and those discerning a vocation to marriage so that our church, our city, our nation, and our world can be filled with examples of Christ’s love.
