29th.
Sunday, Year (C)
(Exodus 17:8-13; 2 Timothy 3:14 – 4:2; Luke 18:1-8)
As Moses was guiding Israel to the Promised Land, we heard
that:
Amalek
came and attacked Israel at Rephidim.)
Now, it is important that we notice what followed, for
Moses said to Joshua:
Pick men for us and march out
tomorrow to fight against Amalek; and I shall stand on the hilltop with the
staff of God in my hand.
Moses was not a bloodthirsty man, in fact, Scripture tells
us (Numbers 12:3-4) that:
Moses was very humble, more
so than any man on the face of the earth;
and yet, as you heard, he went --
as leader, with the staff of God in his hand -- to intercede for the
army of Israel fighting in battle at his behest.
Whenever Moses raised his
hands Israel had the advantage, and when he lowered his hands, the advantage
passed to Amalek.
Ultimately, it was thanks to
Moses' intercession that:
Joshua
defeated Amalek and put its people to the sword.
And so, despite being the humblest
of men, Moses led his people into war believing it to be in accordance with the
will of the Lord.
Moses was also the holiest
of men, for again, Scripture (Exodus 33:11) tells us that:
The Lord used to speak with
Moses, face to face, as one man speaks to another.
The full significance of this is
explained to us in the following words of the Lord:
If he were a prophet and
nothing more, I would make Myself known to him in a vision, I would speak with
him in a dream. But My servant Moses is
not such a prophet; of all My house he alone is faithful. With him I speak face to face, openly and not
in riddles. He sees the very form of the
Lord. (Numbers 12:6-8)
Because Moses was totally dedicated to God in his
holiness and his humility, he could not be directly involved in the bloody
struggle against Amalek taking place in the valley below him; nevertheless, for
the sake of God's People, he would share in the battle, in the manner best
suited to his particular calling and personal character, that is, by his
prayers. From this we can see that war
is not, of itself, evil; but it can only become an acceptable weapon for the
People of God, when used for a purpose, and exercised in a manner, acceptable
to God.
Timothy was a man totally
dedicated to God in his life, but, as with Moses, that did not mean that he
could not, should not, fight. His
ministry was indeed to be a fight, and the words of St. Paul in the second
reading were preparing and encouraging him to be a fighter in the best
Christian sense, for God’s glory and for men's salvation:
All Scripture is given by
inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for
correction, for instruction in righteousness.
Preach the word! Be ready in season and out of season. Convince, rebuke,
exhort, with all longsuffering and teaching.
That is not at all like much
modern use of Scripture to console, ‘cuddle and comfort’, souls!!
Worldly weapons of destruction are,
almost inevitably, backed by worldly passions; and too often they result in
hatred, violence, and ruthlessness being directed against our fellow men. St. Paul, on the other hand, explains that
the Christian fight is against the devil:
We do not wrestle against
flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers
of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the
heavenly places. (Ephesians 6:12)
Moreover, the Christian must learn
to fight not only against evil in principalities and powers but also against
the evil and malice, lust and luxuriousness, weakness and ignorance, ensconced within many of society’s
preferences, and in his very own heart and mind; and for such a campaign -- one
that has to be faced-up to and fought throughout life -- only faith and prayer
can enable him to endure and ultimately win the promised crown:
Take up the armour of
God. Stand fast; fasten on the belt of
truth, for a breastplate put on integrity; let the shoes on your feet be the
gospel of peace, to give you firm footing.
And with all these, take up the great shield of faith with which you
will be able to quench all the burning arrows of the evil one. Accept the sword which the Spirit gives you, the word
of God. Constantly ask God’s help,
praying always in power of the Spirit. (Ephesians 6:13-18)
In armed conflicts emotions
naturally arise in the combatants; and being instinctive, they can easily develop, becoming so powerful and imperious
as to be indeed, passions:
forces we do not simply use, but which rather use us, and from which we suffer
greatly: impulses blinding us to such an
extent that they overwhelm our judgment and override our conscience. From such indulged passions there can directly
arise not only human tragedies and great suffering, but also retaliatory crimes
of passion, spreading human misery over an ever-longer time and wider field.
The virtue of faith, on the other
hand, can never become an overwhelming passion since it is a supernatural gift of
God which only develops through our deliberate and persevering faithfulness and
humility before God; moreover, faith exercises its power against all that
provokes and promotes passions and their excesses, that is, against the
multitude of irritations and antagonisms, injuries and vanities, lusts and
longings -- not to mention anxieties and fears -- that can so easily fill the lives
and vex the hearts and minds of men and women today.
Therefore, our Gospel passage ended
on a very sombre note:
When the Son of Man comes, will He
find faith on the earth?
Many Christian men and women still
lead lives basically dedicated to God; but being involved in the world and
living partly for worldly ends, their Christian faith can, at times, be
weakened by the difficulties and trials they inevitably encounter, for there is
no doubt that our Western civilization is that of a post-Christian era, indeed
a post-religion era; and although
there still remain remnants of Christian teachings, examples of Christian attitudes
and values, these are only very rarely able to tug at public
heart-strings. Moreover, since many of
our contemporaries have thrown off all direct contact with the living Church, morals
have not only deteriorated but, indeed, are no longer recognized in our society
where individual freedom and personal preference triumph over all save criminal
law. In other words, sins are no longer
admitted, only crimes punished. Even ‘glorious’
reason and rationality itself, which might seem, as judged from our
technological advances, to have been so wonderfully encouraged and empowered,
has, in fact, been dreadfully distorted.
Originally given as a unique blessing to enable mankind to recognize and
appreciate something of the glory of God in the wonder of creation, and find,
in a rightly ordered human society, the way to true human fulfilment and
happiness, the human intellect has increasingly been used by men to glorify
themselves whilst seeking to deny any divine power over creation or divine
influence in human affairs.
And yet, because humankind is made
for God, many continue to feel a need to be justified, to be at one with the ‘other’,
who, if it not the transcendent God, must then be society itself. And today, the solution of individual
problems and general moral issues is so often sought exclusively at the bar of
public opinion and common practice: whatever is popular must be right and
acceptable, so that we regularly hear such phrases as: “I’m only doing what
lots of others are doing”. And there are
yet others for whom it is sufficient to feel at one with their presumed
personal fate, and these will frequently explain and excuse themselves by such
words as, ‘There was no other option open to us; we could not have done
otherwise.’.
When the
Son of Man comes, will He find faith on the earth?
To that end that Jesus told the
parable in today’s Gospel to encourage us to pray continually and never lose
heart. Why, even a most unjust judge
could be overcome by the very weakest of opponents – an elderly widow -- by her
persistence:
While it is true that I
neither fear God nor respect any human being, because this widow keeps bothering me, I shall deliver a just decision
for her.
Will Jesus, when He comes again, find
some persistent few still willing to seek a silence, a peace, within
and without themselves, that they might listen for His voice, hear and willingly
answer His call? And if so, will He find
among those chosen ones any prepared -- in accordance with His word -- to
sacrifice themselves with Him, for His purposes, and for the glory of the God
Who created us and the Father Who loves us?
So, let us once more imbibe
confidence from St. Paul’s personal experience of the truth and trustworthiness
of Jesus’ words (Romans 8:38 – 9:1):
I am
persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor
powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, not any
other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is
in Christ Jesus our Lord.
And let us always remember that
God alone is merciful, essentially merciful and true. Therefore, Divine Mercy
cannot be separated from His commands: for His commands – infallibly
known to us through Mother Church’s traditional teaching – are, as Jesus
Himself said, eternal life, always deliberately willed as
supreme expressions of God’s mercy towards weak and sinful human beings
aspiring to walk, perseveringly, in the ways of His Son, as His own children.
