24th Sunday Ordinary Time B (Sept. 13, 2009)
“You are the Christ!”
Homily
Scripture: Is. 50: 4c – 9a; Ps 116 (1-6; 8-9); James 2: 14 – 18; Mk 8: 27 – 35
Introduction: The First Reading presents a specific kind of blessing: “The Lord God is my help, therefore I am not disgraced; I have set my face like flint, knowing that I shall not be put to shame.” The Psalm affirms: “The LORD protects the simple; I was helpless, but God saved me.” In the second Reading we hear “words of blessing: “Go in peace, keep warm, and eat well.” The Gospel informs us that Jesus is “the Christ,” the Anointed One, who comes in the Name of God Most High, Blessed forever. ‘Brk’ (blessing) has multiple-meanings.
Question: What is a blessing for me? Answer: in three points: 1) Wisdom from Isaiah; 2) Wisdom from James; 3) God saves.
1) Wisdom from Isaiah (“Blessed is the one who endures trial”)
The Lord makes us strong in the face of persecutions. The strength of the faithful comes from his or her faithfulness to God. God Himself is the Primal Model of faithfulness. In that sense, God cannot, not be God. Therefore, there is no limit to God’s bounty in self-giving. Human wickedness is the surest sign of delusion; but woe to the one who engages in the same delusion by considering wickedness as powerful, or by joining the “band of scoffers” because of the potential of their malice to destroy. Life is transformed under the influence of hostility and opposition. “All is grace,” but some graces come to us under very strange forms. When we become able to boast like St Paul in our weaknesses, then we understand more fully that we are “boasting in the Lord.” Psalm 115 indeed says, “Not to us God, not to us, but to your Name give the glory, for your faithful love and constancy,” or “merciful and upright is God, and I am filled with love.” It is, in a way, just counter-intuitive to trust that nothing escapes God’s attention and nothing lies outside of the scope of God’s Love and our own deepest capacity to love in return. The prophet is challenging us with an ideal level of faith: a faith that blesses the day and the seasons, a faith that blesses those who curse us, and prays for those who do us evil. Our Lord Jesus-Christ did it and said that we can do it. Are we willing to, at least, consider thinking about it? The blessing here is to know Him and to be inwardly strong in God.
2) Wisdom from James (Blessed is the one who acts justly)
Action makes me strong, works of justice make my light shine, contrary to the results of mere words of a dream and godly intentions: (“the way to hell is paved with good intentions,” – it is well known). Doing the simple things of everyday life by being attentive to others’ needs is practical wisdom. Wisdom is in action, not in feeling, thoughts or words. The stress is not on showing what we are up to; but our call is to let the light of our heart shine like the sun at noon. Our task is to unveil or remove all obstacles covering the radiance of the values that we carry, to bring them out. To this effect, the law outwardly helps people do what is right; in our positive languages, there still is greater and lesser good, even when we believe that “all is grace,” by the very facts of life. The blessing here consists of being active and accurate in what we do, even if our lowest motives come from others’ expectations, or from the fear of exclusion and harm. To survive is part of the final victory, humanly speaking. James’ letter, often red through the simple concept of “works,” in fact, goes much deeper.
Between those two interconnected dimensions of our lives, the internal and the external, Psalm 116 makes a coherent unity by using the language of love, given and reciprocated, from God to us. It describes our action poetically and liturgically as “raising the cup of salvation and invoking God’s own Name,” just as Peter does in the Gospel by uttering, “You are the Christ!”
3) God saves: Jesus (Blessed be God & silent Adoration)
Neither security or strength, nor right action “saves” anyone spiritually. “Somebody” saves, and this somebody is God. Salvation, though a promise, is in its form, more of a surprise-gift than a result of right calculations. Human beings indeed think in terms of mathematical calculations, just like Peter rebuking Jesus on the thought of suffering and death. We mostly feel our need of certainty and of sure grounds. Faith, when embraced with such mindset, produces evil. Any value system on this Earth has potential to generate evil, when sought with that spirit. God saves. God also saves through us. How do we then figure out our role in God’s saving plan? Let us use our imagination:
*You are Moses; you come down from the mountaintop to find your people worshipping a golden calf, a forged or forced, but false value; what will you do? Will you validate this “lesser good?” Alternatively, will you take your people out of the lesser to the greater? How would you do that? How do you help others? Again, you are Moses, and only Caleb and Joshua (two Valliant men) are ready to fight for the Promised Land – the greater good – will you use the democratic model or rule-of-minority-versus-majority, and return to Egypt or will you be paralyzed and say, “We cannot decide?”
*In a second hypothetical situation, you are a Platonic philosopher (wisdom-lover); you know that your people are in the “cave,” seeing only shadows; but none of them is ready to come to the light and see things as they really are, in the light or with discerning eyes and hearts. [For us, this light is God’s Love as seen in Christ Jesus.] Will you stay around your folks, with-them in the darkness? Will you again obey the “democratic” voice? ‘Since they want it, let them have it!’ What else can you do?
*Lastly, you are Jesus, and your friends object to your dangerous lifestyle for security purposes, just like Peter in our today’s gospel. What do you decide?
Christ decides to follow the voice of his Heart, that is God his Father whose most powerful secret is that He is less a “force” than an incredible Love that never fades; a love that may operate through some secondary forces, yet never confused with them. Pope Benedict has consistently been teaching about God’s loving identity and operations towards us. Jesus and his friends are people who act in accordance with a rule that comes from deep and eternal values, regardless of what “the people” see about them. These persons combine right action with right intention supported by the bottomless Origin and the limitless Destination, that is God’s Love, and they live unhindered by all other forces that they may experience along the way.
Conclusion: The life of Jesus is the way God saves. By lifting the Eucharistic cup of salvation, and by recognizing Christ as Lord and Savior, we are true disciples, in the footsteps of Peter. Our task however is to watch, not to make new obstacles, however with the good intention to protect the gift, the new insight, the treasure of our life as though God were exhausted, had grown indifferent, unconcerned or limited in his creativity. Our faithfulness consists of allowing the Gospel to develop its own life within us, and never for us to turn into its masters or experts. Let our renunciation to all forms of arrogance be our cross, as we proclaim Jesus Christ as our Lord and our God and as we receive his body and blood to be one with him, our blessing.
