Less than two months after a killer earthquake snuffed out more than 250,000 lives in Haiti and left an already impoverished country in ruin, yesterday we receive news of yet another even larger quake shattering buildings and claiming lives in Chile. The death toll is sure to rise as a tsunami threatens low-lying regions around the Pacific.
Earthquakes and tsunamis do more than shake the earth; they can also shake our faith. Who will be next? When will the destruction end? Why does God allow these things to happen, in Catholic countries no less?
When I lived in Masan in the early 1980s, we had a mild earthquake, just strong enough to rattle the dishes and shake the bookcase. It was a little frightening and also a faith-filled experience. After all, when the ground beneath your feet starts moving, where do you run? Where can you hide? It’s times like these that either break or strengthen your faith.
Scripture continually calls us to trust in the Lord, but how do you know if you are really trusting in God and not just in your own abilities to survive? You will never know if you really believe in God until your faith is tested. True faith assures you no matter how dark the night becomes or how deadly the way, God will see you safely through every danger and difficulty.
Why? Because we are the reason Jesus came to earth. We are the reason Jesus died on the cross. We are the reason he rose again from the dead. Having paid so great a price for us, God will not easily allow us to be lost, abandoned or forgotten.
Our first reading reminds us, in very gruesome detail, of the covenant between God and Abram through which God made the Jewish people his own. A covenant is a holy contract sealed in blood. In this reading it is the blood of cows and sheep and pigeons. Throughout their history the Jews never forgot that, despite terrible persecutions, they were chosen by God. You could deprive them of liberty, exile them, steal their property, even take their lives, but one thing you could never take from them: their identity. They always know who they are. And they act accordingly.
How many of us have that same conviction? How many of us know who we really are?
We are the new People of God, also sealed in a sacred covenant, this time not in the blood of animals, but in the blood of the only begotten Son of God. We too are the spiritual descendants of Abraham and Sarah, more numerous than the stars of the skies and the sands of the sea.
This knowledge of who we are and of the price paid for our salvation should influence how we behave and what we say and the way we live in the world. We should be influencing society and not the other way around.
St. Paul reminds us that no matter where we live on earth we are citizens of heaven. We should act accordingly.
We have entered into the holy season of Lent to remind ourselves we have on earth no lasting city and to remind us who we are. These forty days give us time to examine just how much society controls or influences our behavior. If you have not yet given up anything for Lent, or have already broken your Lenten sacrifices, so what? Start again today. It’s never to late to renew your citizenship.
Today the people of Chile are being tested. Tomorrow someone else will be. But eventually it will be our turn. That’s life. Now is the time to prepare.
And so on this second Sunday of Lent we read of the Transfiguration of Jesus. Last Sunday’s gospel emphasized Jesus’ humanity. Today we get a glimpse of his divinity. A spark of that glory will remain to get the disciples through the terrible days that lie ahead, when the Son of God, Jesus the Messiah, will be betrayed, arrested, tortured and nailed to a cross to die, executed like a common criminal.
And this glimpse of Christ’s glory also gives us hope in our hour of darkness. It is as if we are all part of a great cosmic story. We each have our personal role to play and our own lines to speak. The story of the Transfiguration at the beginning of Lent allows us for a moment to skip to the end of the story and to take a peek. It reassures us no matter what difficulties or dangers we face today, if we remain faithful, in the end, we win.
No comments:
Post a Comment