Twenty-Fifth Sunday in Ordinary
Saint Boniface Parish
September 23, 2018
I have spoken about my dog once before, but for those who don't recall, or weren't here, her name is Lady. Her full name is Our Lady of the Rectory, but we just call her Lady for short. Some people ask what kind of dog she is, and I say ‘well, she's energetic, that's for sure.’ She has toys, as most dogs will, and one of those toys is as a squirrel, and it can sit on its own, and then she has these two plastic squeakers that sort of look like people, they have really big heads and little feet, and that's all that there is to them really – but, like the squirrel, they can stand up on their own. So, I will take the squirrel and these little people, and I'll line them up close to her and every single time she'll come along, and she'll take her nose and just push them over. She won't really do much else with them, at that moment at least. She might come back and play with them later, but first and foremost she pushes them over. Apparently, she doesn't really like them standing there, looking at her for some reason. I don't quite understand why, but it has caused me to wonder how much like human behavior that can be. When we see something standing on its own, something that perhaps causes us a bit of insecurity, of consternation, of challenge - we want to push it over. We don't like that feeling of being uncomfortable. We don't like having someone or something cause us to recognize our own deficiencies. So instead we attack it, we put it down. In many ways this human knee-jerk reaction to rebel against something that points out our weakness is what we are hearing about in our first reading, the reading from the Book of Wisdom. In this narrative a righteous man is under attacked, is insulted and put in a corner by the wicked ones who are close to this righteous one. The wicked see the righteous, and are seen by the righteous in their wickedness, and this disparity between the righteous and the wicked causes the wicked to recognize who they are, that they are wicked, or more precisely, that they have acted wickedly. This, Scripture tells us, is obnoxious to the wicked. Their response is not to stop and reflect on how the righteous, by their righteous deeds , may be calling them, the wicked, to a more righteous way of life. Instead their response is simple, easy, “let us bring down the righteous, let us condemn him to a shameful death!”
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| 'The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse' Peter von Cornelius, 1926 |
Perhaps another image to demonstrate this human difficulty with another standing against us. I don't know if you've seen, or heard, any commercials for the gym Planet Fitness. Now, they have their reasons, and I'm not here to tell them what to do, but they have a term, a way of classifying a certain group of people, and this term is lunk. You may be wondering, what is a lunk? Well, a lunk, according to Planet Fitness, are those guys who are just really fit, they can lift a lot of weight, they might overly show off a bit, but in general they are simply in good physical condition. They are bodybuilders, essentially, and these lunks are not welcome at Planet Fitness. In fact, I have heard, if you lift too much weight at Planet Fitness, if it seems like you are too strong compare to their average clientele, then they will ask you to leave, to go and find another gym. You aren’t, they'll say, a part of their clientele. The reason for this discrimination is simple - when you lift a lot of weight, when you are in good physical condition, you may cause other people to recognize the reality that they aren't in that great of a physical condition. This is especially problematic for someone starting out at a gym and they can clearly see ‘I'm here, and this other person is over here, and there's a great distance between us, and so maybe I'll just quit.’ Instead of trying to commit to a change they may avoid the possibility of seeing in the other an opportunity to grow. They look at the distance and say, ‘that's too far, I can't get there from here, I'm just going to walk away.’
I can understand why Planet Fitness might have this policy; it is after all good for business not to scare away potential clientele. In the end, however, it pulls us apart doesn't it. I can see the reason why we want to have a place of comfort, a place where people can come, and not be overly challenged, after all there are plenty of beginners, and to be a beginner is difficult, especially when you see how far others have come. It is natural to want to feel safe and not feel judged. The more we go in this direction, the more we pull apart, the more we spend time around those who simply comfort, and do not challenge us, and move away from those who are better than we are in some sort of way. The more we live this way the more we will find ourselves living alone. The other, opposite end of the spectrum is to just throw everyone in together in a free for all. It's basically a war zone in which everyone is fighting everyone else. An amalgamation wherein no one ever feels confident in where they are, or in who they are, because we’re always made uneasy by the others around us. Always challenged, never safe. Nevertheless, somewhere in the middle is true community, a true community where humility exists, and we live through that humility. This is a humility that says, ‘I am who I am, and I am good, but I can be better.’ I am good as I am, I am loved as I am, but I always know that I can be better. There would be safety in this humble community since everyone else would also realize their own goodness, and their own need to grow. Others around us, especially people with virtue, people who are good people, they would, by their very being, call us to greater virtue. In the end we can either look at the virtuous and righteous as my dog looks at her toys, and simply try and push them aside; or we can see with them as an example of what we might become.
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| Jesus walking with his disciples - Lumo Project |
The disciples in our Gospel today, they are walking along with Jesus and they miss the opportunity to grow in understanding about what it was that he had told them, about his death and resurrection. If you recall, they were scared to ask – they refused to get out of their comfort zone and didn't want to ask that question. Instead they pass the time discussing, arguing over, which of them was the greatest disciple. Who among us is the greatest? This means their secondary argument had to do with who is second best, who is third best, who is the least? As they are having this conversation they missed the mark completely. None of them are the greatest! They are in the presence of Jesus Christ, himself, greatness itself! They walk in the presence of God-made-man. If anyone was the greatest it was certainly him, and they are walking with him seemingly oblivious to the greatness in their midst. When they get to their destination Christ knows, because he's God, he knows what they were talking about. To give them an example he calls a child into their midst and says that we must be like this child. Now a child is rather humble, typically. A child knows there are things that they simply can't do. They are not strong enough to do all the things an adult can do, they’re not tall enough, they lack understanding. One day, however, one day; not today – but one day. Isn’t this what it is like to be a child, consistently looking forward to the next achievement, the next milestone, the next grade level? School, by its very nature, is looking forward to learning something new. You know you have something ahead of you. You do not doubt that you are good, especially in a loving family, and you know you have plenty to look forward to. You can, and will, be better. What a way to be once more? To be that open to growth, to be that available to potential! The image that we are given is to humble ourselves, which means to truly recognize our goodness, but also to recognize that we can grow in goodness as well.
This all-encompassing humility does not fit the society around us. Oftentimes if a person makes you uncomfortable you knock them over, or you just don't deal with them, you back away, you cut them off, you remove them from your worldview. You leave them be. We as Christians, as Catholics, we are to see what truly is good in the people around us. Not necessarily what the world says is good, but what truly is virtuous residing within one another. To see in the other patience, gentleness, goodness and mercy. To see within the other, perhaps someone sitting next to you, something that you can grow in. You are not a complete saint yet, I guess neither am I. We can all grow and become more like Christ. So perhaps, maybe, we can spend less time knocking each other over and instead build true community. Build a humble community in which we are all, each one of us, recognized as Beloved Children of God.
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