Luminous
A Catholic Woman and Her Thoughts on Life, the Universe, and Everything
Tuesday, February 21, 2006
Thoughts on the Small
A Reading from the Gospel of St. Mark
Mk 9:30-37
http://www.drbo.org/chapter/48009.htm
30 And he taught his disciple, and said to them: The Son of man shall be betrayed into the hands of men, and they shall kill him; and after that he is killed, he shall rise again the third day. 31 But they understood not the word, and they were afraid to ask him.
32 And they came to Capharnaum. And when they were in the house, he asked them: What did you treat of in the way? 33 But they held their peace, for in the way they had disputed among themselves, which of them should be the greatest.
34 And sitting down, he called the twelve, and saith to them: If any man desire to be first, he shall be the last of all, and the minister of all.
35 And taking a child, he set him in the midst of them. Whom when he had embraced, he saith to them: 36 Whosoever shall receive one such child as this in my name, receiveth me. And whosoever shall receive me, receiveth not me, but him that sent me.
=============================
Why would the apostles be afraid to ask Jesus what he meant? Were they frightened of his anger? Were they afraid to disappoint him? That very day they'd seen the Lord cast out demons from a child who'd been afflicted since birth. Were they awed by the power of the miracles they had witnessed? Whatever it was that they felt, it passed fairly quickly. Within a little while they were caught up in their own ideas of what the future was going to bring. Despite Christ's words to them, they still imagined that Jesus was going to take power as some sort of earthly ruler, and that as his followers they would also be great in the world. To make this as clear as possible, Jesus gives them what must have been a dramatic example. In that time, a child had no legal rights. He was not protected by law in anyway, and was literally considered to be "property" of his parents. Yet, Jesus takes a child, and embraces him, showing the apostles that they should cherish him, and then told them that when they honored even as weak and small and powerless a person as a child, they honored not only Christ himself, but the Father as well.
In our culture of death, millions of children have died through abortion. They are not even given the dignity of "personhood" under law, any more than a child in the 1st century was. They have no "civil rights". More children die every day through abuse and neglect, and our society wrings it's hands, but does very little. Our elderly are no longer respected for their fount of life's wisdom, but shut away in facilities to die. Our sick are sentenced to death, and depriving them of basic, normal care is considered "mercy", because their quality of life is judged by materialistic concerns, not by God's standards. Our mentally ill are treated as broken, "disturbed" and potentially dangerous people, rather than loved and cherished. We offer drugs and treatments, to them, when their hearts cry out for so much more. The lost, the lonely, and the poor sit in the shadows and watch us stride quickly by as we go about our important business of the day. We are so caught up in the here and now, that we "don't have time" to reach out to each other any more, and as a result we depend on agencies and charities to do what we used to do for each other - reach out. But as useful as fuel assistance or a welfare check might be - it's not what a person needs to survive. As St. Paul wrote to the Corinthians:
.... So faith, hope, love remain, these three; but the greatest of these is love.
Mk 9:30-37
http://www.drbo.org/chapter/48009.htm
30 And he taught his disciple, and said to them: The Son of man shall be betrayed into the hands of men, and they shall kill him; and after that he is killed, he shall rise again the third day. 31 But they understood not the word, and they were afraid to ask him.
32 And they came to Capharnaum. And when they were in the house, he asked them: What did you treat of in the way? 33 But they held their peace, for in the way they had disputed among themselves, which of them should be the greatest.
34 And sitting down, he called the twelve, and saith to them: If any man desire to be first, he shall be the last of all, and the minister of all.
35 And taking a child, he set him in the midst of them. Whom when he had embraced, he saith to them: 36 Whosoever shall receive one such child as this in my name, receiveth me. And whosoever shall receive me, receiveth not me, but him that sent me.
=============================
Why would the apostles be afraid to ask Jesus what he meant? Were they frightened of his anger? Were they afraid to disappoint him? That very day they'd seen the Lord cast out demons from a child who'd been afflicted since birth. Were they awed by the power of the miracles they had witnessed? Whatever it was that they felt, it passed fairly quickly. Within a little while they were caught up in their own ideas of what the future was going to bring. Despite Christ's words to them, they still imagined that Jesus was going to take power as some sort of earthly ruler, and that as his followers they would also be great in the world. To make this as clear as possible, Jesus gives them what must have been a dramatic example. In that time, a child had no legal rights. He was not protected by law in anyway, and was literally considered to be "property" of his parents. Yet, Jesus takes a child, and embraces him, showing the apostles that they should cherish him, and then told them that when they honored even as weak and small and powerless a person as a child, they honored not only Christ himself, but the Father as well.
In our culture of death, millions of children have died through abortion. They are not even given the dignity of "personhood" under law, any more than a child in the 1st century was. They have no "civil rights". More children die every day through abuse and neglect, and our society wrings it's hands, but does very little. Our elderly are no longer respected for their fount of life's wisdom, but shut away in facilities to die. Our sick are sentenced to death, and depriving them of basic, normal care is considered "mercy", because their quality of life is judged by materialistic concerns, not by God's standards. Our mentally ill are treated as broken, "disturbed" and potentially dangerous people, rather than loved and cherished. We offer drugs and treatments, to them, when their hearts cry out for so much more. The lost, the lonely, and the poor sit in the shadows and watch us stride quickly by as we go about our important business of the day. We are so caught up in the here and now, that we "don't have time" to reach out to each other any more, and as a result we depend on agencies and charities to do what we used to do for each other - reach out. But as useful as fuel assistance or a welfare check might be - it's not what a person needs to survive. As St. Paul wrote to the Corinthians:
.... So faith, hope, love remain, these three; but the greatest of these is love.
Christ didn't scourge the apostles with cords, as he did the merchants in the Temple. He knew they were blind, seeing only the things of the world, that they hadn't yet experienced crucible of the Cross, the joy of the Resurrection, the awakening of Pentecost. He was gentle with them, and he didn't just teach them with words, he showed them by his actions.
We are the Body of Christ to the world. We need to show the world the face of Christ, so that they may know him. We do this not only by what we say, but by what we do. Mailing a check in the comfort of our homes once in a while, when the Spirit moves us, or putting an envelope in the basket each week is good. But every day, in everything we do, we need to show the world who we are. Like the words of that old song - maybe it's corny, but it's so true - "They will know we are Christians by our love..." It's not rhetoric. It's the way God wants us to live. To obtain the glory of Heaven, we need to be small. Be a servant, and minister to the least of us. We need to do more than just say we are followers of Christ. We need to do more than just go through the motions. We need to do what he tells us to do. His will, not ours.1 Comments:
Archive
January 2006February 2006
March 2006
April 2006
May 2006
July 2006
August 2006
October 2006
November 2006
December 2006
February 2007
March 2007
April 2007
May 2007
July 2007
September 2007
November 2007
December 2007
January 2008
February 2008
April 2008
May 2008
June 2008
September 2008
October 2008
November 2008
February 2009
March 2009
April 2009
May 2009
July 2009
August 2009
September 2009
October 2009
November 2009
January 2010
February 2010
April 2010
August 2010
September 2010
November 2010
December 2010
January 2011
June 2012
February 2015
Previous Posts
* Reconciliation and the Beauty of God, Part 3
* The Cost of "Choice": Women Evaluate the Impact of...
* Purgatory over Iced Vanilla Latte: A curious conve...
* Brown Has DaVinci Rolling in his Grave
* Reconciliation and the Beauty of God, Part 2
* The Mentally Ill Patient: A Faithful Image of God
* Reconciliation and the Beauty of God, Part 1
* 200 gather to see Mr. Heterosexual
Links
- by Thomas à Kempis
Blogs
-----------------------------------
You are so right. We can be doing very good things, doing tons of things at church and look like we are so holy. But unless we are doing what Jesus tells us to do, we will not accomplish what he wants. Sometimes he wants us to do less and spend time with him.