Tuesday of the Sixteenth Week in Ordinary Time C-2

Entrance Antiphon Ps 54 (53): 6, 8 See, I have God for my help. The Lord sustains my soul. I will sacrifice to you with willing heart, and praise your name, O Lord, for it is good.

Collect Show favour O Lord, to your servants and mercifully increase the gifts of your grace, that, made fervent in hope, faith and charity, they may be ever watchful in keeping your commands. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God for ever and ever.

Scripture today: Micah 7:14-15.18-20; Psalm 84; Matthew 12:46-50

While Jesus was still talking to the crowd, his mother and brothers stood outside, wanting to speak to him. Someone told him, Your mother and brothers are standing outside, wanting to speak to you. He replied to him, Who is my mother, and who are my brothers? Pointing to his disciples, he said, Here are my mother and my brothers. For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother. (Matthew 12:46-50)

God So Near A striking thing about religious belief is that, typically, the divine is remote. Aristotle saw actuality and potentiality as present in all things. The exception is the supreme unmoved Mover and Cause, in which there is no imperfection — which is to say, no potentiality. God is pure actuality (Actus Purus). He simply is. His life is self-contemplative thought, and he never leaves his eternal repose. Aristotle’s deductions are brilliant and have been used by great Christian thinkers, but, to say the least, the abstract God whom he posits is very remote from man. If we turn to the polytheism of Greek religion, the gods were very concrete but to one with a philosophical cast of mind, simply unbelievable. A serious and profound thinker could not take them seriously as an explanation of the world. Zeus was the king of the gods and father of men, and may be looked on as something of a prototype of the high gods of the natural religions of mankind. Characteristically, the high god is remote, having receded after establishing the world. Man deals with heavenly underlings, which is to say the second-rate deities that busy themselves with arbitrary interventions in the course of affairs. Apart from the revealed religion of the Jews (and, of course, the Christians), the great contender for religious dominance was Islam, whirling furiously out of Arabia with Koran and Sword, only stopped in its tracks at Tours by Charles Martel the Hammer in 732 AD. But what was Islam’s view of the supreme One? We might say it was that he is Master and utterly supreme. He is transcendent, beyond, ineffable. There is no god but Allah. He is great in a way no other is. While he is the Merciful and Compassionate one, what distinguishes him especially is that he towers above all else. Islamic teaching insists that Allah is the Yahweh of the Jews, but there are serious differences. The Islamic Allah seems to be viewed as more powerful than Yahweh and he is certainly not the Bridegroom of a chosen people. Allah is exciting, but he is above and beyond.

I mention this as a backdrop to our Gospel today, which itself must be set against the backdrop of revealed religion generally. The God of the Jews intervened to woo a people, which is to say, to be their Bridegroom. He entered into a covenant with them and asked them to be a faithful spouse. If they were faithful to his commands, he would be with them in undying fidelity. The prophets spoke of him as the Husband of his people, who were given a mission for the benefit of all the peoples. All the nations of the earth would be blessed through them, if they were faithful to the covenant. God remained with them and defended them. Their conviction was that he had chosen them, was with them, and helped them. He was all-holy and punished sin, but he was rich in mercy. There was only one God and he was not remote but very near. But now, he had become man, and in Jesus Christ he stands in our Gospel today in the midst of the people speaking to them. This is the great God, dwelling among men as one of them. The Incarnation is the mystery of mysteries, and the source of unending and prayerful wonder. It cannot be mentioned too much. Not least among the marvels of this adorable Fact — the Fact of Jesus Christ — is that God has become man’s Brother. What is to be said of this when set against the religions of the world, excepting that of Israel? It is in stark contrast with them. God is my Brother, because he is Jesus Christ. He is my Lord and my God — as Thomas the Apostle addressed him — but he is my Brother too. He is my Creator and my Judge, but he is my Friend as well. When our Lord rose from the dead he asked Mary Magdalene to “go to my brothers and tell them that I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.” This is the point in our Lord’s words of today’s Gospel: “Who is my mother, and who are my brothers? Pointing to his disciples, he said, Here are my mother and my brothers. For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother” (Matthew 12:46-50). God the Son become man is our Brother, if we act as children of him who has made himself our “Abba,” dear Father.

One of the reasons why polytheism has been the characteristic religion of mankind is that it has always been so difficult to imagine how one God could create, sustain and rule all things. How immense he must be, if he does this! It is the most natural thing in the world to imagine the one God as remote from puny and vulnerable man. But he is not remote! He is our Father, our Brother and our Counsellor-Advocate, Father, Son and Spirit. We share in his very life. How beautiful has life become because of this! Nothing can now separate us from the love of God made visible in Christ Jesus. Let us then smile through life, carrying the cross after the one ahead of us.

(E.J.Tyler)

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A Second Reflection: (Micah 7:14-15.18-20)

Sin and the Mercy of God Before the emergence of Rome well over 2000 years ago, the Etruscans developed a civilization that dominated the Italian peninsular. By comparison with surrounding peoples their life was enjoyable. One feature of their religious belief was that they expected the Afterlife also to be very enjoyable. They do not seem to have had any fear of a judgment to come and of punishment for sin and crimes during life. This could indicate that they had little sense of sin and of the need for mercy. By contrast, and perhaps at the same time, the prophet Micah was preaching in far-away Palestine — we have an example of his preaching in Micah 7:14-20. In this passage he extols the mercy of God. God is a God of mercy, and the prophet appeals to him to "have pity on us, tread down our faults, to the bottom of the sea throw all our sins." It indicates a profound sense of sin. In revealed religion we are ever reminded of our sins, and we are constantly reminded that God is rich in mercy if we but repent of them. If there is no repentance, God will be angry.

Our Lord came to take on himself the burden of our sins, to expiate for them, and thus to show the mercy of God. Let us pray for a deep sense of sin and for a sense of the richness of God's mercy.

(E.J.Tyler)

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