Fourth Sunday in Ordinary Time
While the Star Wars purists here might lose some respect for me, I’m actually a fan of Episodes II and III, which deal with Anakin Skywalker, and his transition to Darth Vader. Every time I watch the movies I am drawn in by how good Anakin was, how he was driven by good motives, but then those motives get twisted when he sees a vision of his wife, Padmé, dying in childbirth (which, ironically, he helps cause to happen). I particularly enjoy Episode III and a final battle between Anakin and his mentor, Obi-Wan
The people of Israel, and we, the members of the Church, can sometimes be like Anakin Skywalker: we have such great potential to do good and bring light, but so often we turn to the dark. Rather than continuing as Anakin Skywalker, a great Jedi who can accomplish so much good, our desires and our hearts are twisted and perverted to become Darth Vader, a Sith who sews darkness.
The prophets are like Obi-Wan Kenobi. They are meant to train us in goodness and holiness, and remind us of the will of God. Jeremiah, in our first reading, spoke to the people of Judah, the southern kingdom of Israel, to tell them that they had wandered away from God. They no longer walked in the light, but caused darkness by their oppression of the poor, widows, and orphans, their worship of foreign gods, and their trust in the building of the temple, rather than trusting in the One who made the temple holy: God. For this, Jeremiah eventually is arrested and thrown into a cistern, until what Jeremiah prophesied comes to pass, and the temple is destroyed and the people are exiled to Babylon.
Jesus, too, is a prophet, but not just a prophet, but the Prophet, and the source of all prophecy. He speaks for God, which is the role of every prophet, and while some are drawn to that proclamation, others are enraged by it. The members of his hometown wonder how He could claim to speak with such authority, as He had just proclaimed that the passage from Isaiah was fulfilled in their hearing, which we heard last week. So Jesus calls them out, and for this they drive Him out of town, and try to push Him off the brow of the hill, but He passes through them without any harm.
Last week I mentioned how our mission is the same as Jesus’ mission. We are called to be prophets. But as we proclaim God’s Word (and we should make sure that we’re spreading God’s word, not our own), we should not fool ourselves and think that everyone will warmly accept our message. As we challenge people to live according to God’s plan, people may start yelling at us, “I hate you!”
Part of proclaiming that message is doing so with love. So often we operate out the philosophy that what is loving is what people will readily embrace. But St. Paul reminds us that love is not a feeling, but is actions. In fact, in the English we say “Love is patient,” and basically use descriptors for love. But in the original Greek, when St. Paul describes love, the word that we consider describing love is actually a verb. Instead of saying, “Love is patient,” we might say, “Love patients.” Importantly, too, love “does not rejoice over wrongdoing but rejoices in the truth.” Anything that God has revealed is wrong, or anything that God has revealed as false is not loving.
This is where most people get upset, because there are many things in today’s culture that people think are loving, but because they are contrary to what God has revealed in Sacred Scripture or through the Church, they are not truly loving. Like Anakin, there is the desire to do good, but it easily gets twisted and changes to evil because a person’s emotions or desires get the better of him or her.
What is obvious in the Scriptures is that people, even well-intentioned people, prefer doing evil to good, because evil often feels so much better and gives quicker gratification. Doing good sometimes doesn’t feel good, and sometimes you don’t feel gratified immediately. Or sometimes we convince ourselves, contrary to the ancient maxim, that we can do this evil thing because it will achieve a good result. Evil never leads to good; it only perpetuates evil.
We are all called to be prophets through our baptism, which means that we are all called to proclaim God’s message by word and by deed. As prophets, though, we should prepare ourselves that not everyone will always be open to God’s message, no matter how we package it, and that it may, like Jeremiah and Jesus, lead to real struggles. But, if we speak the message in the love of God, we know that we, grounded in love, can bear all things, hope all things, and endure all things.
