I Learned the Truth at Seventeen

How many of us were raised to think that the Beatitudes were an outline of character traits that we as Christians were called to embody? In some ways this is true; however, here again we see Jesus turning everything in this world upside down. Blessed are the poor in spirit; blessed are they who mourn; blessed are the meek. Really? Doesn’t this contradict those traits that usually characterize success, in that Jesus is saying that those who have no reason in this world for hope or joy are the ones for whom God’s Kingdom has been prepared?

Yesterday we had the opportunity to celebrate my grandson’s 17th birthday. It was hard for me to believe as it seemed like only yesterday when he was born, and could his father, my son, really be old enough to have a 17 year old? And what about me? You can see where I’m going with this. As we listened to the reflections from others, turning seventeen was a time of betwixt and between; it was the best of times and worst of times. It was a carefree time of adolescence in which the child in us had its way, but it also was a time of approaching “adulthood” with the world knocking and wanting answers that we were not always prepared to give. Can’t we just stay here a little while longer some will ask? Others can’t wait to forge ahead. In both instances there is a learning curve and the carefree days of youth like the lesson in the Beatitudes are turned upside down. This is a time to get serious about life.

So the effect that my grandson’s turning seventeen prompted me to think about our Gospel (Matthew 5: 1-12) and the Beatitudes.The Beatitudes run counter-intuitive to what humans have been taught as society’s rules for successful living. I am reminded of lines from Janis Ian’s song from years past, At Seventeen. She like Jesus summed it up in one line, It isn't all it seems at seventeen. But as most who recalled that time, the lyrics ring true:

To those of us who knew the pain, Blessed are they who mourn,
Of valentines that never came, Blessed are they who hunger and thirst,
And those whose names were never called, Blessed are the poor in spirit,
When choosing sides for basketball, Blessed are the meek
It was long ago and far away
the world was younger than today
when dreams were all they gave for free, Blessed are you when they insult and persecute
to ugly duckling kids like me...

To me this is related to the upside down world of God’s Kingdom vs our world and what Jesus repeatedly taught throughout his ministry. The laws of man and of the world have little to do with God’s. Over the past weeks we have read in Mark’s gospels that man’s expectations related to power, wealth, success, fame and happiness are not God’s. Jesus challenges our conventional wisdom that suggests that success, however we define it, or wealth or power equals happiness. He teaches that the concern for losing those fleeting, superficial abstractions of what we value, relate to a life of fear and competition that leads us to think we can only be happy by winning, and by beating someone else at the game. At seventeen we leave our childhood behind and prepare to enter the “grown up” world. At seventeen I learned the truth... It isn’t all it seems, at seventeen.

One of the reasons why this upside down approach to living remains so elusive to us is that it requires that we accept the fact that we are vulnerable because we are human. We have to accept our basic vulnerability as humans in order to let go and embrace life as it is. Most of us find this quite difficult, if not downright impossible. It requires that we acknowledge our vulnerability—which is something most of us spend a lot of energy and effort trying to avoid. Our egos rule our self- image and take us to places that require us to want the props that support a façade that will eventually break.

There is something about letting go of our obsession with getting what we want, and accepting what life brings us that opens up our ability to enjoy the goodness around us. This Jesus way enables us to relate to others with love and compassion. We begin looking at the world with the eyes of Jesus and live in God’s Kingdom in the here and now on earth as it is in heaven. At seventeen I learned the truth. Really?

 

We are free...free to risk, to love, to dream to struggle...to fail

 

What would you do if failure didn't matter? What would you endeavor, dare, or try? What mission would you attempt, what venture would you risk; what great deed would you undertake?

Last week we read in (Mark 10: 35-45) a response from Jesus to James and John that was identical to his response to Bartimaeus: "What do you wish me to do for you?" However, the contrast in attitudes between Bartimaeus and the “Zebedee brothers” is striking. Bartimeus being made aware of Jesus presence cries out two times from the depth of his faith and humility, "Son of David, have pity on me," "Son of David, have pity on me.” While James and John, came to Jesus and said to him, “Teacher, we want you to do for us whatever we ask of you…grant that in your glory we may sit one at your right and the other at your left." 

So, how do we react when we hear these two appeals? How are they different; how are they very similar?

Would you, like Bartimaeus in our Gospel (Mark 10: 46-52), have the courage to shout out for healing even though the people around you try to shush you into silence? I wonder, could it be that Bartimaeus was so used to failure and disappointment that he saw no reason not to try one more time? He, as opposed to James and John, were not part of Jesus’ inner circle… but was he? 

Would we be able to silence the hushes of our false self and surrender to God as Bartimaeus did? What about James and John? They may have missed the point in that they felt that they were privileged to be part of Jesus’ inner circle. But how was their faith different from the blind man?

So often we hesitate to ask God’s help because whether great or small, our needs seem so hopelessly impossible or so ridiculously insignificant that we just don't even try. Yet the promise of the Gospel is that we are free... free to risk, to dare, to love, to live, to work, to dream, and yes… free to fail, because we have God's promise that there is no small gesture and there is no impossible deed, and that the God who raised Jesus from the dead will also bring all things – even our failed efforts – to a good end. And yes, we are all part of God’s inner circle.

So, if we’re going to risk anything that matters, not failing is not an option. Risk entails failure. Change entails failure. Creativity and innovation and experimentation all entail failure. And if we forget that, we will either never try anything that matters or end up sorely disappointed.

There's no such thing as a dumb question???

Throughout our lives, most of us have been told by our teachers that there is no such thing as a stupid question. Well, in Mark 10: 35-45 James and John blow the lid off that myth. They really did ask a really dumb question at an even more inopportune time. Jesus just finished telling the twelve for the third time, that his fate was all about suffering, death, and resurrection. Yet, immediately following they ask if they can sit on his right and left side "in your glory."

Talk about not getting it! What do you suppose the Zebedee brothers had in mind? They want a piece of the “messianic action,” on either side of Jesus’ throne. James and John think they know what it mean to follow Jesus but they still don’t get it.

Jesus is, as he tells James and John after their bold request, a servant messiah, and to follow a servant messiah one must become a servant: "whoever wishes to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you must be slave of all. For the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many" (Mark 10:44-45).

In fairness to James and John, answering the call to "servant-hood" does not come easy. We are so much like them in many ways, aren't we? We would much prefer to be known as a great "anything" but servant. Yet, when by His grace, we are called to give of ourselves to serve the least of our brethren, we know that we are in God's presence. (RRR October 2012)

If I were a Rich Man

For Christians, personal union with Christ is how we come to divine union with God. When we are free from those attachments that divert our attention from God, we are able to turn our lives over to him, and he comes alive to us through Christ. In essence, we get out of the way and let God’s love take us through the rest of our journey.
We can accept what Jesus says at face value in that wealth can be hazardous to our spiritual health; however, Jesus is not suggesting that it’s impossible for a rich man to “enter” the kingdom of God. In our reading this week Mark 10: 17-31, Jesus reinforces the metaphor of wealth as a spiritual liability to our gaining entry into God’s kingdom. But is he only talking about money and riches here? All too often we relate one’s being poor as an automatic “ticket to admission” to the kingdom. Yet, if we “purposely” remain in poverty because we refuse to take responsibility for our own lives and well-being because we passively accept our fate as a “gift” in and of itself, we are missing the point. There are no merit badges for being poor and co-dependent. Not taking responsibility for one’s own welfare…if one is able, is as much a distraction and a liability to entering God’s kingdom as being diverted from our union with God by coveting excess and abundance for abundance sake.

An important message in this reading is Jesus’ call for us to give up our “false selves,” as Thomas Keating calls it. Whether rich or poor, he asks us to set aside all the attachments, devices, security blankets and even spiritual practices that we devise as “props” so that we can stay in our comfort zones. As such, we hide behind an egotistical illusion of the false self. Simply stated, anything that gets in the way of our becoming closer to and being united with God is a stumbling block. Jesus makes it clear that people, places and things can be millstones, or "stumbling blocks" that can block us from our relationship with God.

Christian practice aims at our dismissing the false self by developing an awareness of God’s presence in our lives. Then as we can see our deep-rooted attachments and with God’s help, let them go as he takes them away and replaces them with Himself. (Keating, Open Mind Open Heart, p 72.)

I have always enjoyed Eugene Peterson’s citations in The Message on the false self or ego: Then Jesus went to work on his disciples. "Anyone who intends to come with me has to let me lead. You're not in the driver's seat; I am. Don't run from suffering; embrace it. Follow me and I'll show you how. Self-help is no help at all. Self-sacrifice is the way, my way, to finding yourself, your true self. What kind of deal is it to get everything you want but lose yourself? What could you ever trade your soul for? "Don't be in such a hurry to go into business for yourself.

Is it Caesar's or God's?

 

  
 Once again in Mark 10:2-16, the Pharisees ask Jesus about divorce "to test" him and once again they misunderstand or misuse the scripture to justify their agenda. They hope their question will expose Jesus as dangerous to families, in light of his scandalous comments in prior encounters. 

In typical fashion Jesus turns the table on the Pharisees away from their legal foundation for divorce to God's design for marriage. Because of the hardness of your hearts, he [Moses] wrote you this commandment. But from the beginning of creation, God made them [husband and wife] male and female. For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother, and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh. So they are no longer two but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together no human being must separate.

God is love. We are products of God’s love and handiwork, a small but unique part of God’s great ongoing work of art. Love cannot be governed by temporal laws of man any more than God can. We speak of marriage, a construct of civil law that we attempt to apply to God’s law, as a contract. But is it?

I can remember studying what goes into the essential parts of a valid contract in a Business Law course a long time ago. For a contract to be valid there must be a valid offer and a valid acceptance of that offer; there must be an agreed upon exchange, or a quid pro quo, that is “something for something,” and the contract must detail specified “consideration,” a term used to affix a value exchange, usually money or equitable services rendered.

“God established a creation, a covenant bond, with humanity, with A-dam. Adam’s name is not only the name of an individual, the founding father of the human race, but it’s also the Hebrew word for humanity…The difference between covenant and contract, in the Old Testament and throughout scripture, is profound. Contractual relations usually exchange property, exchange goods and services, whereas covenants exchange persons. So when people enter into a covenant, they say, ‘I am yours and you are mine.’ So God uses the covenant to enter into a relationship with those whom he created in his own image: humanity and all human persons.” (Scott Hahn, Contract vs. Covenant, Outlook, February, 2002.)

So how do we apply a transactional agreement to love? We can’t. Love cannot be governed by man. No human can break the love between two people; it’s not theirs to break. Once again in our reading, Jesus refuses to be trapped by either the Pharisees or his disciples as he challenges the rules of men with the law of God. Each of the synoptic gospels cite some variation on Jesus’ take on separation of Church and state with the famous quote Render to Caesar that which is Caesar’s and to God that which is God’s. This phrase has profound resonance throughout scripture and God’s law based on his love and covenant with man. It has become widely quoted as a summary statement of the relationship between Christianity and secular authority that goes far beyond whether it was lawful for Jews to pay taxes to Caesar. 

"We renew our faith in the word of the Lord which invites faithful families to this openness. It invites all those who want to share the prophecy of the covenant of man and woman, which generates life and reveals God!”(Pope Francis, Openness, 9-27-15, Philadelphia)

"I leave you with this question, for each one of you to respond to. In my home, do we yell, or do we speak with love and tenderness? This is a good way to recognize our love.
(Pope Francis, Patience, 9-26-15, NYC)

All are Welcome

There are many themes in Mark 9:38-50 that are ripe for discussion: Jesus' tolerance for an unknown exorcist and his apparent criticism of his disciples' desire for exclusivism; the danger of being a “stumbling block” to others, and the concern for loss of identity.

Clearly, the disciples view their relationship with Jesus as exclusively theirs. Jesus instructs them that anyone who offers another a cup of water in his name is doing it in the name of the One who sent him. As it was then and is now, the followers of Jesus do not belong to an exclusive club; the love of God has no boundaries and cannot be confined to the four walls of any church or denomination

At the time of Mark’s writing, “Christianity” had yet to be named as such and although the relatively small number of Jesus’ followers were in the midst of persecution, they were struggling for an identity of their own. At that time they were considered as “non-Jews” or Gentiles. Today, we still reference people who are not part of our group as non-Christian or non-Catholic, etc. Richard Rohr speaks about those who need to be identified in some exclusive way so as to be recognized as a member of a group. He refers to people’s use of religious “sign posts” so that they can be recognized as members of an organization or specific denomination. However, all too often institutional “church-club” membership exists as an end in itself and not as the basis for following Jesus. Group membership is commendable as a means to self-identify and as a means to express communal pride and fraternity, but it’s not when it is used to exclude or suggest a sense of elitism or superiority.

Commentators tell us that the Greek word, skandalon, is defined as an obstacle that people trip over and gets in the way. It has been colloquially translated as a “stumbling block.” Today the word scandal denotes a decidedly moralistic tone. In the context of this gospel, Jesus’ reference to stumbling block has nothing to do with scandal as we know it. Rather, he was quite clear that his warning was directed to anyone who would lead his followers astray: Whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin it would be better for him if a great millstone were put around his neck and he were thrown into the sea. In other words anyone or anything that got in the way of a follower’s relationship with God was a stumbling block.

By extension, Jesus refers to the awesome responsibility that those closest to him have as leaders. It’s interesting that in these verses Jesus lays bare the minefield of the church and the real dangers within the Christian community then and now. Those most vulnerable “little ones” within the Body of Christ may be impressionable and susceptible to irreparable damage as a result of stumbling blocks caused by careless discipleship.

In this gospel, stumbling blocks can come disguised as precious body parts that can be so “dangerous” that they must be severed. The violence in Jesus' use of hyperbole here is inescapable. He purposely uses this over-the-top language to get the disciples', and our, attention. We are likely to think there's nothing worse than losing a hand, a foot, or an eye. But Jesus says there is…the consequences of causing another to stumble are far worse than self-maiming.

Jesus asks us to examine not only those stumbling blocks that get in the way of our faith, but those that we place, wittingly or not, in the way of others. Here he includes the Church community and individuals within. Jesus does not confine his attention to Church leaders, its hierarchy and priests, but is speaking to each to one of us who are in a position to influence the “little ones,” young and old.

 

 

Satan...really??? What did I say that was so wrong?

 

Suppose this was the first time you were reading Mark’s words in his Mark 8:27-38. You might wonder if these people really knew each other or if they had an identity crisis. On the one hand Jesus asks "Who do people say that I am?" On the other, his close “friends” who are all over the lot, respond "John the Baptist,” and others, “Elijah,” and still others, “one of the prophets." Now, this is after they have seen him feed thousands; cure the sick; raise the dead, and cast out demons. This is also after he’s provided enough clues as to who he really is. 

Then, after Peter, comes up with the right answer, so we think, and proclaims “You are the Messiah.” Jesus turns to his disciples and rebukes Peter…and calls him, “Satan” and tells him that he is setting is mind on human things, not divine things.    

Now here’s a loaded question, which of the two is confused? I did say it was a loaded question but, in fairness to Peter why did he get it wrong or does even get partial credit? (Tuesday, September 11, 2012 rrr)