HOMILY for 32nd ORDINARY SUNDAY : 6th November 2022
Can I suggest that a good title for this week’s Bible Readings might be “How to avoid conflict becoming adversity,” not least because the Church provides a Collect (Opening Prayer) on this very subject – “Graciously keep us from all adversity.” You can hear and see me give this Homily on https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zx0pDXKEGnk&t=30s
Let’s look at how we can do this. Our 1st Reading (2 Maccabees 7:1-14) gives us a very dramatic and frightening example of violent conflict, as we hear these young men defying those who are torturing and killing them, by proclaiming their faith in no uncertain terms. This surely reminds us of all the great Martyrs of the Church who down the ages have had similar experiences; and many are examples to us of love in the midst of suffering. All I can do is hope I never have to face such a situation, because simply thinking about it makes me shudder. Perhaps you, like me, have an awful feeling that faced with that kind of suffering you would cave in? The only comfort I can give us is that many of these great Martyrs didn’t choose this way of being faithful, but when faced with it, God gave them a courage that they did not know they possessed. That’s certainly what Jesus suggests when he says “When they arrest you, do not worry about what to say or how to say it. At that time you will be given what to say, for it will not be you speaking, but the Spirit of your Father speaking through you.” (Matt 10:19-20)
Luckily most of us will not face that kind of conflict ; so breathing a sigh of relief as we praise God for his Martyr Saints, we can move on to something that almost all of are likely to encounter in one way or another. This is simply the conflict we face in our daily life when people disagree, often quite violently, with beliefs that we hold dear. These people may be non-Christians, dismissing us as stupid, or even dangerous, or fellow Christians who think our view of Christianity is wrong or misguided. In either case, the way Jesus handles the Sadducees in the Gospel (Luke 20:27-38) gives us an example that we could well try to copy.
You see Jesus knows that they are criticising him, indeed mocking him, because they think he has a belief in life after death – what is called here the “Resurrection”- which is totally different from what he knows is the truth. They think that he believes that life after death is just like life now, but in a different place; and so they ask that stupid question about which man will that woman be married to. Our response would probably be to say, “Don’t be stupid, what a silly question, of course it isn’t like that.” The response Jesus gives is a much wiser one. He realises that attacking them would only antagonise them. No, what he must do, is explain politely but firmly why they are wrong; and so that is what he does. “Those who are judged worthy of a place… in the resurrection from the dead do not marry because they can no longer die, for they are the same as the angels.”
We can see here how difficult it is to explain our Christian view, not just of life after death but of the nature of God, to those who think of such things in literalist terms, as if God was some kind of super human being, and heaven just another world a bit like this one only happier. I remember vividly one devout old man in a parish where I served who endlessly raised with me his worry that he couldn’t see how all those who died could fit into heaven. My answer was to suggest to him that we will be more like thoughts than bodies, for thoughts do not really take up any space at all, indeed to talk of thoughts being in a space is to misunderstand what they are. The problem of course is for him, and for many others, that St Paul teaches us to think of ourselves in death as having transformed bodies, and that use of the word “Body” sadly misleads many people. Of course this is an English problem, as in Greek body does not mean fleshly.
That man was a Christian who misunderstood things, but many of those we come into conflict with nowadays may well be people who dismiss our belief in God. Once again however, so many of them do so because they totally misunderstand what we mean by God. This always saddens me because they can often be very kind and good people in whom, in my mind, God is already at work. They might call the power they believe makes them good people, “The power of love”, or as in Star Wars “The Force” (Yes I have just re-watched a couple of Star Wars Films!) and some might suggest that their inspiration is “Humanity” and thus call themselves Humanists. Humanists however are more like us believers than they realise, because the “Humanity” they invoke, is not the ordinary everyday humanity that we see causing war and famine and climate change, but a transformed, or idealised humanity; and proving that “Humanity” exists, is just as difficult as proving that God exists.
Whatever the disagreement, what Jesus shows us is that it is better to try to understand those we disagree with than simply to confront them. I suppose some people resort to confrontational language because they think it is the only way to avoid being influenced by such people, who can often be as clever, or more clever, than we are. I would suggest that as Christians we have to take the risk. Jesus does not avoid the mockery of those who think his death on the cross puts the final nail into the coffin of his beliefs. He takes the risk. In Matthew 27 we read (vv41-42) “So also the chief priests, with the scribes and elders, mocked him, saying, “He saved others; he cannot save himself. He is the King of Israel; let him come down now from the cross, and we will believe in him.”
This way is a very difficult one for us, but I think we can get some help from the suggestions St Paul makes in our 2nd Reading (2 Thessalonians 2:16-3:5) He tackles the question of how we can cope with people like this. Yes, he describes them as “bigoted”, but then he suggests that we turn to God for help and so he reminds us that “The Lord is faithful, and he will give you strength and guard you,” and that “We, in the Lord, have every confidence that you are doing and will go on doing all that we tell you.” Then St Paul prays for them saying, “May the Lord turn your hearts towards the love of God and the fortitude of Christ.” Here he names two two things we need if we are to avoid conflict becoming adversity. First “The love of God” – Jesus said, “Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.”(Matt 5:44) And second “The fortitude of Christ” – Jesus said, “Father forgive them for they know not what they do.” (Luke 23:34)
Комментарии