Tuesday, January 21, 2014

Memorial of St. Agnes, virgin and martyr

(I Samuel 16:1-13; Mark 2:23-28)

St. Agnes was such a beautiful girl that many young men wanted to marry her, but she was determined to consecrate her virginity to God.  In the midst of the Diocletian persecution at the beginning of the fourth century she was denounced to the authorities and beheaded.  There can be little doubt that she considered herself wedded to Christ – the only one worthy of such sacrifice.

In the struggle against hardness of heart Jesus demonstrates his worthiness as today’s gospel shows.  The Pharisees want to criticize Jesus’ disciples for picking grain to eat on the Sabbath.  Evidently the latter were hungry with no ready food available.  If they were to celebrate the Sabbath at all, they had to find something to eat.  Jesus amply defends them by saying that the Sabbath was made for people to enjoy. 

Today people go to the opposite extreme.  They often turn the Sabbath into a day of total recreation.  Although rest and renewal are certainly integral to the celebration, we must not forget that it is the Lord’s Day.  Like St. Agnes we remember him foremost by attending mass if at all possible.  Then we can recreate with family and friends.

Monday, January 20, 2014

Monday of the Second Week in Ordinary Time

(I Samuel 15:16-23; Mark 2:18-22)

Fifty years ago Martin Luther King Jr. published Why We Can’t Wait.  People were asking at the time, “Do Negros have to take to the streets and cause civil unrest?”  Other wondered, “Why can’t they just wait for the nation to see the justice of their cause?”  Echoing Abraham Lincoln, Dr. King replied that no man or woman can exist half slave and half free.  Such a condition thwarts the mind and kills the soul.  King’s position resembles Jesus’ defense of his disciples in today’s gospel.

The people question Jesus about his followers’ never refraining from food and drink.  They point to other teachers of the time whose disciples vigorously did so.  But, as in so many other ways, Jesus differs from other teachers in his consideration of fasting.  He recognizes that his time with the people is limited and that he must celebrate with them God’s mercy.  His short life may even be considered an extended Sabbath during which people should no more fast than they should be silent at a social.  He urgently wants all to know and appreciate his gracious Father like his disciples are doing.

Today the United States remembers the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., with a national holiday.  It may seem somewhat exaggerated given that he is the only person to be so celebrated annually besides Jesus on Christmas.  However, the injustice against which King effectively contended was so outrageous that it is fitting that the nation takes a timeout to consider.  While we are at it, we might also contemplate that more than anyone else, Jesus was King’s source of inspiration and eternal hope.

Friday, January 17, 2014

Memorial of Saint Anthony of the Desert, abbot

(I Samuel 8:4-7.10-22a; Mark 2:1-12)

Monks are often thought of as men in retreat.  But they do not see themselves in that way.  Rather they recognize their solitary life as enabling them to battle with the evil spirits of pride and concupiscence.  If they win the upper hand, they will have peace with God, nature, the self, and – when in community –others.  Today the Church celebrates the man credited with founding Christian monasticism – Anthony of the Desert. 

As a young man Anthony received his calling to be a monk as he heard the gospel account of the rich, young man who asked Jesus what he might do to inherit eternal life.  Jesus answered that he would have to sell all that he had, give the money to the poor, and then follow him.  The man did not find the wherewithal to fulfill Jesus’ prescription, but Anthony did.  At Jesus’ suggestion he sold his inherited property, provided for his sister then gave the rest of the money away, and proceeded to the desert.  There he witnessed Christ by holiness, charity and wisdom.  If Anthony’s life was difficult, it was also long.  He lived to be one hundred and four years old.

It is not necessary, of course, to enter a monastery to do battle with pride and concupiscence.  We must engage these nemeses every day of our lives.  The struggle cannot be won without asceticism; that is self-denial.  We should let go of caring what others may think about us and what are desires tell us we need.  In their place we need to allow the gospel fill us with hope.

Thursday, January 16, 2014

Thursday of the First Week in Ordinary Time

(I Samuel 4:1-11; Mark 1:40-45)

After every human tragedy – earthquake, hurricane, tsunami – humans ask themselves why it happened.  They wonder whether God is capricious, whether they did not respond properly to God’s initiatives, or whether He exists at all.  Such questions echo the elders of Israel in today’s first reading.

 “’Why has the Lord permitted us to be defeated today by the Philistines?’” the men ask themselves. Apparently assuming that the problem lies with God’s lack of attention, they summon the Ark of the Covenant to be brought to the battlefront.  “Surely the Lord will wake up,” the elders seem to say, “when He sees His people’s need.”  Of course, the tactic fails.  God knows quite well what their situation, yet chooses not to support the Israelites. 

God has His reasons which will always, to some degree at least, remain obscure to humankind.  We might speculate in the case under consideration that God is changing the center of human authority from judges to a king as well as the center of cultic worship from Shiloh to Jerusalem.  But God’s reasons are, in the end, unfathomable.  If we could figure them out, we would sit on an equal level with God.  This is not to say that God caresses and despises humans at whim.  No, He has definitively shown favor toward all of us in Jesus Christ.  What Jesus suffered to liberate humans from sin manifests majestically the Father’s love.  We must respond by embracing whole-heartedly the mystery of God -- both when it seems to favor us and when it seems to reject us.  

Wednesday, January 15, 2014

Wednesday of the First Week in Ordinary Time

(I Samuel 3:1-10.19-20; Mark 1:29-39)

The reference in today’s gospel that Peter had a mother-in-law is the only indication that he was married.  Ironically, the Roman Catholic tradition, which looks to Peter as a key figure in its theology, has insisted on celibacy for a clerical norm whereas Protestant communities of faith find in Paul, the attested bachelor, its theological hero.  Of course, Jesus too was a committed celibate and defended that state of life as summoned by God on behalf of His kingdom.  One theologian thinks it necessary that celibacy be maintained as a discipline to preserve this insight of Jesus.

Still the argument for relaxing the discipline within the Catholic Church is cogent.  In both countries with a long Christian heritage and those where the Church is still getting started there is a shortage of priests.  Few doubt that ordaining married men would not result in a spike of vocations to the priesthood.  Counterarguments have weight also.  There are the traditional problems of patrimony to the offspring of the priest.  More forceful is celibacy’s concrete testimony of the priority of God in a world that is obsessed with issues of sexuality.

As Catholics we need be wary of simplistic ideas on either side of the argument for a married clergy.  Certainly many married men can perform the duties of a priest.  On the other hand, most married men will not want to live in extremely deprived areas where the gospel needs to be preached.  What is paramount is that we continue to “ask the Lord of the harvest to send out workers into His harvest field.”