During the Eucharistic Celebration of this Sunday, may you be enriched with unflinching faith in the death and resurrection of Christ, which would yield in your life the fruit of a new and transformed life.
Happy Sunday +John I. Okoye
DOCTRINE AND FAITH(Jeremiah 17, 5-8; 1 Co 6th Sunday of Year C, 2019)
The first reading is a prophetic oracle that contains both a curse and a blessing, the kind of statement generally associated with the Wisdom tradition. Two individuals are contrasted, each representing a distinct attitude toward life. The first one trusts in human beings and finds strength there. The second trusts in and lives by the power of God. The contrast drawn between these two is striking. All the imagery used to characterize the one who turns away from the Lord depicts barrenness and desolation. He settles in a land too salty to sustain life. Unfortunately, this desolation is not a temporary situation that eventually will be remedied. There is no change of season here, no change of heart. On the other hand, the one who trusts in the Lord is firmly planted near water, the source of life. This one is not spared the hardship of heat, but because the source of life is so near and because its roots have forged their way underground to that source, the drought that often accompanies heat is not a serious threat. The one who trusts in the Lord is described as secure and productive. As a description of these two contrasting life situations, the passage functions as an exhortation to the hearers to choose the way that guarantees security and productivity. As a prophetic proclamation it explains the reason for the fate of each so each can decide upon which path of life to take in the future.
In the second reading for last Sunday, Paul proclaimed and interpreted the good news of Christ's resurrection. In today's second reading he defends belief in the resurrection against those who do not believe in the resurrection of the body. Paul’s position can be seen as follows: If Christ did not rise, then he is still dead; if he is dead, then he has not conquered sin and death; if he has not conquered sin, then believers are unforgiven and still in their sins; if he has not conquered death, then those who have died in Christ have really perished. Paul ends this instruction with a declaration of faith, using an image from harvesting. As certain as the first fruits are a promise of the quality of the coming harvest, so surely does the resurrection of Christ guarantee the resurrection of believers. As their resurrection is dependent on his, so their resurrection demonstrates the fruitfulness of his.
In the Sermon on the Plain delivered to his disciples in the presence of some crowd, Jesus addresses his disciples with both macarisms (blessings) and woes. The teaching is based on a practice associated with the Wisdom tradition. Certain behavior results in blessedness; misfortune is brought on by its opposite. There is a perfect balance in the message of Jesus' sermon. He first singles out four situations in life that, he claims, make people blessed. He then identifies their opposites and declares them as being woeful. What is startling about Jesus' teaching is the reversal he proclaims. The blessed are those who are poor, who are hungry, who weep, who are persecuted, while the woeful ones are the rich, the satisfied, the joyful, the respected. Jesus has overturned the standards of this age and established new standards, those of the reign of God. While there is definitely a religious meaning to these beatitudes and woes, they should not be merely spiritualized. We must appreciate their literal meaning as well as their religious implications. The poor (ptochoi)were the economically impoverished and marginalized. They were frequently reduced to begging and were almost totally dependent upon the generosity of others for sustenance. While anyone can suffer an economic setback, the existence of a social class of poor is evidence that the community as a whole had not taken seriously its covenant responsibility to care for the needy. When this happened, God sided with the poor and acted as their protector. This first beatitude announces that, unfairly deprived now, these poor will enjoy the reign of God. Conversely, the rich who did not address the needs of the poor will not enjoy the consolation of the reign of God. They have had their solace already. Those who are hungry now will be satisfied, and those who are satisfied now will be hungry. Those who weep now will laugh; those who laugh now will weep. The reign of God will turn standards upside down. Perhaps the heart of this teaching is found in the last beatitude and the last woe. It is not just poverty or hunger or mourning that determines one's reward but the commitment to the Son of Man that may have caused the misfortune in the first place or that survived despite it. The followers of Jesus will be hated and marginalized and scorned because they are his followers. When this happens, they will be like the prophets, who, because of their call for repentance and renewal, were rejected by the ancestors. Conversely, the disciples of Jesus should be wary when they are accepted and esteemed in this world. This could mean that, like the false prophets of old, they enjoy approval because they deliver a message that unfaithful or disengaged people want to hear, a message that contains no call to conversion. The reign of God has turned the standards of the world upside down.
In the second reading for last Sunday, Paul proclaimed and interpreted the good news of Christ's resurrection. In today's second reading he defends belief in the resurrection against those who do not believe in the resurrection of the body. Paul’s position can be seen as follows: If Christ did not rise, then he is still dead; if he is dead, then he has not conquered sin and death; if he has not conquered sin, then believers are unforgiven and still in their sins; if he has not conquered death, then those who have died in Christ have really perished. Paul ends this instruction with a declaration of faith, using an image from harvesting. As certain as the first fruits are a promise of the quality of the coming harvest, so surely does the resurrection of Christ guarantee the resurrection of believers. As their resurrection is dependent on his, so their resurrection demonstrates the fruitfulness of his.
In the Sermon on the Plain delivered to his disciples in the presence of some crowd, Jesus addresses his disciples with both macarisms (blessings) and woes. The teaching is based on a practice associated with the Wisdom tradition. Certain behavior results in blessedness; misfortune is brought on by its opposite. There is a perfect balance in the message of Jesus' sermon. He first singles out four situations in life that, he claims, make people blessed. He then identifies their opposites and declares them as being woeful. What is startling about Jesus' teaching is the reversal he proclaims. The blessed are those who are poor, who are hungry, who weep, who are persecuted, while the woeful ones are the rich, the satisfied, the joyful, the respected. Jesus has overturned the standards of this age and established new standards, those of the reign of God. While there is definitely a religious meaning to these beatitudes and woes, they should not be merely spiritualized. We must appreciate their literal meaning as well as their religious implications. The poor (ptochoi)were the economically impoverished and marginalized. They were frequently reduced to begging and were almost totally dependent upon the generosity of others for sustenance. While anyone can suffer an economic setback, the existence of a social class of poor is evidence that the community as a whole had not taken seriously its covenant responsibility to care for the needy. When this happened, God sided with the poor and acted as their protector. This first beatitude announces that, unfairly deprived now, these poor will enjoy the reign of God. Conversely, the rich who did not address the needs of the poor will not enjoy the consolation of the reign of God. They have had their solace already. Those who are hungry now will be satisfied, and those who are satisfied now will be hungry. Those who weep now will laugh; those who laugh now will weep. The reign of God will turn standards upside down. Perhaps the heart of this teaching is found in the last beatitude and the last woe. It is not just poverty or hunger or mourning that determines one's reward but the commitment to the Son of Man that may have caused the misfortune in the first place or that survived despite it. The followers of Jesus will be hated and marginalized and scorned because they are his followers. When this happens, they will be like the prophets, who, because of their call for repentance and renewal, were rejected by the ancestors. Conversely, the disciples of Jesus should be wary when they are accepted and esteemed in this world. This could mean that, like the false prophets of old, they enjoy approval because they deliver a message that unfaithful or disengaged people want to hear, a message that contains no call to conversion. The reign of God has turned the standards of the world upside down.
We who were called last week to witness to the death and resurrection of Jesus are instructed this week as to the meaning of that death and resurrection and the implications of this mystery in our lives. The death of Christ, which at first seemed like a curse, has been conquered in the resurrection of Christ. The curse has become the blessing. Paul teaches us that united to Christ through faith and in baptism, we are united in his death and resurrection. With Christ we die to sin; with him we rise to a new life. Once again the ambiguities of human life may cloud our understanding of this mystery. We may be inclined to live our lives as if nothing transformative has occurred. It would be tragic if this were to happen. Our lives would be empty, our faith would be vain, and we would be people to be pitied. On the other hand, there is a way in which we can live ourselves into a new way of understanding. This can happen when actions performed in deep faith change the way we perceive the workings of God in our lives. If we live those lives as if we have really died to sin and have been raised to a new and transformed life, we may not only begin to believe we actually have died and been raised, but our lives will manifest the fact of this mystery. We cannot wait to see proof of our transformation before we change our actions. The proof is in the lives we live in faith. To deny that we have died and been raised is to deny the resurrection of Christ. Paul insists that they cannot be separated. The challenge is to live in and out of this faith. Both Jeremiah and Jesus introduce us to such a way of living. It is a way of paradox, a way that moves us beyond the self-centered standards of the world. In the everyday give-and-take of living, the implications of faith work themselves out in blessing if we are faithful, in curse if we are not. The Wisdom form, which both men use, suggests that their teaching springs from the way life itself has been fashioned. In other words, the consequences of our behavior are not arbitrary; they flow directly from the behavior itself. However, dying with Christ and rising with him transport us into a new mode of being with consequences that are paradoxical. We are called to trust in God and the ways of God, which we cannot always see or understand, rather than in what is human, which we can grasp. Dying and rising turns the standards of living upside down. In the world sketched in these readings the poor, the hungry, those who weep, and those who are persecuted are really the ones who are blessed. The victims of our social and economic and political systems, those who have been ravaged by war or have been made vulnerable by life itself are the ones who, if they place their trust in God, will be blessed in the end. They may appear to be the outcasts of this world, but if they are filled with faith, they will inherit heaven. The wealth of this world and its pleasures are not the blessings we might think they are. They can blind us to the real values of life and prevent us from dying to the world and living resurrected lives in Christ. It is neither poverty nor wealth that promises blessing or curse but commitment to Christ despite the poverty or wealth. Therein lies the paradox. The life of the tree is subject to the water that nourishes it; the life of the Christian feeds on faith in the death and resurrection of Christ. May Christ in today’s Eucharistic Celebration endow us with profound and committed faith in his death and resurrection, Amen! Happy Sunday! +John I. Okoye
(graphics by charles OC)
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