The God of Silence (19th Sunday Ordinary A)

God was not in the stormy wind rending the mountains and crushing the rocks, nor in the earthquake, nor in the fire.  Elijah encountered God in the “sound of silence”—in the tiny whispering sound (1 Kgs 19: 9-13).

God’s presence in the ordinary day-to-day events. Almost always greatness is demonstrated by grandiosity—like the astounding display of a multi-million-peso worth of fireworks, the construction of a huge and dominating elaborate edifice, the preparation of an unparalleled hero’s welcome, etc.  Going by this line of thinking, we easily expect God to work in mind-boggling, nature-defying miracles or to reveal God’s self in awesome, jaw-dropping theophanies.  All because God is God; and God is great!

God can do this of course.  But God does communicate with us, more often than we ever notice, in a commonplace fashion, in a non-obtrusive way, in a tiny whispering sound as in the case of Elijah.  The problem is, most of us do not have the slightest suspicion that God in is the ordinary and everyday routine of our lives.  Furthermore, when God is silent, we easily take it to mean that God does not care at all.

God’s presence in the storms of life. In today’s gospel (Mt. 14:22-33), Peter and the other disciples encountered Jesus as a reassuring and calm presence amid the waves that tossed about their boat. “It is I; do not be afraid,” was the assurance of Jesus to his terrified disciples.

Today’s readings assure us of the abiding presence of God whether in our most trying moments or in the humdrum of our daily responsibilities. God is always with us.  God is maybe silent but not absent for sure.

Do I have faith in the God of silence?

Where is God when my only son committed suicide? Where is God when our livelihood and properties were all washed away by flood?  Where is God in my moments of unbearable pain wrought by this vicious cancer?  Where is God when my daughter, our only hope to rise from this miserable life, had an unwanted pregnancy? These can go on and on as an endless litany of other excruciating cries that betray our lack of trust in God whose silence we don’t understand.

Where is God during the storms of our lives?

We see the storm quite clearly as we tremble in fear; but we fail to notice the hand of God reaching out to us.  Just like Peter, when he got out of the boat and started walking on the water toward Jesus, he was distracted by the strong wind.  He allowed his fears to creep in and lost his focus on Jesus.  There and then, he started to sink (vv.  30).

This is true with our lives.  We focus on the storms too much.  God is left unnoticed.   We walk through life with so much burden and pain, insecurities and fears while all along God silently accompanies us, always reaching out his saving hand.  And we don’t notice it, perhaps, until we sink into the pit of despair and start to panic for dear life.

Our invitation is to see the saving hand of God in any storm of life. Like Peter, we need to fix our eyes on God and ask for God’s saving hand. What storm has been buffeting my life?  Do I have faith in the silent but reassuring presence of God seeing me through these difficult times?

May the readings today, make known to us the God of silence—the God whose presence is as unobtrusive as a faint sound of a whisper.  It is God’s silence that tests the sensitivity of faith on our part when we face the turmoil of our storms in life. God is with us either in the ordinary daily grind or in the most trying events of our lives. May this truth build our confidence in facing any storm in life. The Lord is just right there in the middle of the storm reaching out his hand to save us. “It is I. Do not be afraid.”

Jesus' Compassion (18th Sunday Ordinary A)

How do we muster the strength to continue being concerned with the needs and suffering of others when we ourselves are in pain and in sorrow?  Don’t we conveniently make our own suffering an excuse to be insensitive to others?  

I used to bring Holy Communion to an old lady way back my seminary formation days.  She had a son, her only child, who took care of her.  For about two years, I visited her at home every Sunday after mass.  She would gladly receive the Holy Communion.  She was very sweet to me.  One Christmas break, I missed to visit her for two Sundays as I was in vacation. During my absence, her only son died in an accident! So when I resumed my visit, I witnessed her grief and anger.  Her characteristic sweetness was gone. She would wail and raise hell as I entered her house and she would blame God—the merciless God—for the tragedy.  She refused to receive communion for several Sundays. She recovered later though.

When we are in pain we can be too self-absorbed to see the suffering of other people.  Oftentimes, we call attention to ourselves and demand sympathy. Worse, sometimes, we are rendered paralyzed unable to move on with life. Some would just give up on life and others would persist in cynicism.

Drawing strength from our suffering. Jesus is in pain in today’s Gospel (Mt. 14: 13-21). When He heard of John’s death, “He withdrew in a boat to a deserted place by himself” (v. 13). Well, the passage is a plain and simple report of a seemingly negligible gesture of Jesus.  It does not describe, for instance, how terrible Jesus feels.

While it does not explicitly say that Jesus is in grief due to a loss of a significant person in his life, the account, perhaps, leaves it to the reader who knows the relationship of John the Baptist to Jesus the Messiah to figure out how Jesus feels.  His forerunner is dead. Beheaded! The person who paved the way for his mission is murdered brutally.  Jesus must be in terrible sorrow.  This may indeed explain his withdrawal to a deserted place.

In this Gospel episode, we learn from Jesus that we need to wrestle with our grief and to feel our pain and sorrow.  However, we need not stay there.  We should not allow our suffering to suck the life out of us.  We’ve got to move on.  Instead of sulking and blaming others and God for our suffering, we better come to grips with the situation and turn our suffering into our very strength to understand the pain of others.

 

Compassion is "suffering with" others. I believe here lies the secret of the compassion of Jesus—He knows by experience how it is to suffer... to be in pain... to lose someone dear...  to feel the terrible anguish over some events that test our faith... to grapple with questions that shake our convictions.  I would like to believe that Jesus, while in solitude, makes it a point to be in touch with his own pains, anguish, and disturbing questions.  So that, when he disembarks from his isolation, he emerges as a person with a sensitive heart, one that easily sees the real suffering of the vast crowd, a heart that is easily moved with pity (v. 14). “Compassion” after all literally means “to suffer with.”

What are the significant forms of our own pain and suffering in life? What sort of persons have we become because of them? Have we turned into bitter persons or better ones?  Have we become cynical, grouchy, and unproductive persons? Or Hopeful, tender, and compassionate?

Compassion calls for self-giving. Moreover, the rest of the gospel episode reveals that Jesus’ compassion spurs him on beyond plain emotional and sentimental identification with the suffering of people.  He acts on what he sees and feels.  He cures the sick and feeds the hungry, accordingly about five thousand men not counting the women and children (v. 14-20).  

The event of the feeding of such a great number of hungry people tempts us to look at it easily through a miracle-worker understanding of Jesus.  Jesus manages to feed all of them because of his capacity for miracles.  Problem solved.  However, another way of approaching the episode is to consider it as a sacramental catechesis (favored by more commentators).  The feeding event points to the Eucharistic celebration as evidenced by the Eucharistic language--blessing... breaking... giving... (v. 19).  Jesus offers himself in the symbol of the bread.  He is the bread blessed, broken, and given for the sake of his people.

Jesus’ compassion is truly an act of “suffering with” his people.  It is not some magical solutions that he offers to ease the people’s suffering.  He does not believe in shortcuts.  Shortcuts are the devil’s strategy that calls attention to oneself by a display of power.  What Jesus offers is himself.  His compassion urges him towards total self-giving.  If the people are suffering, Jesus is right there with them suffering too as he empowers and gives hope by his sacrificial bestowal of self.

When we are in pain, we may do well to ask for the grace to draw from it the very strength we need to continue to be concerned about the suffering of people around us. And may we share in the compassion of Jesus, thus, helping us to muster the courage to be truly involved in giving hope to one another.

God is Good (16th Sunday Ordinary A)

In the 2014 American fantasy film Maleficent, is the character of Maleficent evil or good?

Some film critics have warned parents of the offensive moral message of the movie. They see in it a subtle drive to present evil, personified by the character Maleficent, as loveable after all. Hence confusing the minds of the young about the nature of evil and influencing them to accept or at least tolerate whatever is evil in life.

I do not share the same view. On the contrary, I see in the movie and, in particular, in the character of Maleficent, the celebration of faith in the fundamental goodness of every being. We all experience the ambiguity that characterizes our earthly existence; there’s good and evil around us and within us. I think the film has shown that we can all be surprised by the capacity of our hearts to overcome what’s evil in us and around us by listening to our deepest invitation to love which is but the natural inclination of our hearts. True love and, hence, goodness is the fundamental calling of every being amid painful experiences of betrayal and the aching hunger for revenge. Goodness triumphs as we make a choice to be true to our calling.

The parable of the Weeds and the Wheat in today’s gospel reading (Mt. 13: 24-43) is of similar theme: The reality of the existence of both good and evil in the world and within us. Allow me to highlight three invitations presented to us by the parable for our reflection this Sunday.

Do not judge others.  In Jesus’ time, the Pharisees (which means “the separated ones”) dreamed of Israel as a society of “pure” believers. So they tended to separate themselves from the sinners; hence, creating an exclusive circle of righteous and respectable men. They excluded those whom they judged as sinners many of whom are the poor. The parable of the Weed and the Wheat is presumably addressed to them to caution them against their judgmental attitude. In the parable, the Sower, who represents the Son of Man, refuses to uproot the weeds as doing so may also result in uprooting the wheat. He suggests allowing them to grow together until harvest. Then it will be clearer which are the weeds and the wheat for judgment.

The parable invites us too to refrain from judging others.  Of course, externally we can morally evaluate an act as either good or bad but we can in no way ascertain the spiritual and moral state of a person who is acting. We cannot label a person as sinner and exclude him in our Christian community. After all who among us has not sinned? 

Pope Francis invites the Church to be like a “mother with an open heart.” The church should be the house of the Father with the door always wide open. The Church is the community of both saints and sinners. God searches the sinners and brings to his house the outcasts. He draws them to his goodness and invites them to be good. Let God be the judge, not us.

Choose always the good.  In our earthly journey towards the fulfillment of the Kingdom of God we experience in a very real way the ambiguity that characterizes our existence. Just as the weeds grow together with the wheat in the field, we experience both the presence of evil and good, sin and grace, curse and blessing in our world and in our hearts.

When it comes to our conscience, we are always led towards the good. We are fundamentally inclined towards the good as we are created good. We struggle with our evil inclination because of the presence of sin that has distorted our nature. Hence, it has not become always easy to decide for what is good.  But we are wired to choose what is good. When we allow the grace of God to work in us, we become more empowered to turn our back to what is evil and embrace what is good. Even Maleficent is surprised that she possesses the power of true love.

There will always be ambiguity in our hearts as we journey in this earthly life, but we have been enabled by the grace of Christ to embrace goodness as our fundamental option. We may falter from time to time in this journey because we remain sinful, but our hearts beat for God.  Let us allow our hearts to seek the Lord and to choose what is good amid the ambiguities of our human existence. Our daily decisions and choices chart our fundamental orientation. Let it be towards the good, towards God.

Trust in the Goodness of God. God is good. The parable reveals that the sower planted only the good seed, the wheat.  He is not responsible for the weeds. The enemy sowed them. We experience in life the suffering wrought by sin. There are many forms of this suffering. Sometimes they befall us and we get confused. We begin to question the goodness of God. Does God care?

Yes. He does care. He loves us. God is good. He did not spare even his Son in order to save us from the suffering and death wrought by sin. We need to trust in the goodness of God.

I was once in a conference in Manila when I received a text message from a certain mother back in Zamboanga requesting me to visit her child who was confined in a hospital and who was in danger of death because of dengue.  I would have easily referred her to another priest since I could not attend to her request; but something deep inside me prodded me to ask the name of the child. The mother texted me her name and I assured her of my prayers for her child and comforted her. Then in the corner of the vast conference hall where I was seated, I prayed ardently for the healing power of the Holy Spirit to strengthen the child. After entrusting to the Lord the concern of the family, I continued with my active participation in the activities of the conference throughout the day.

The following morning, I was seated again for the conference. I received a text message from the mother of the child saying: “Thank you for your prayers, Father. God is good. My daughter is well now!” I felt a sudden surge of gladness in my heart because of the good news. Teary-eyed I texted her back: “Let us praise God for He is good!”

Again, weeds and wheat grow together. In our earthly journey, let us not judge one another; judgment is God’s task not ours. But let us help one another to embrace what is good and to make goodness our fundamental orientation. This we can certainly do for we have a God who is good. Let us trust in his goodness.