(The following is a homily written for the 18th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Aug. 3, 2014)
One of the things I’ve always struggled with is trust.
One of the things I’ve always struggled with is trust.
I can be a bit of a control freak, and like to be in charge
of things I know need to get done.
I need to be able to KNOW
all that’s happening, so I can fix any situation that may arise.
It is usually not until after my pride has been sufficiently
bruised that I can come to admit that I should have relied more on the help of
others; that I’m not equipped to do it alone.
The readings for today speak to the necessity of Trust,
though not in ourselves, nor in others who may drop the ball, but in God’s
power and Love.
Our first reading, taken from book of the prophet Isaiah (Is. 55:1-3), sets the stage for
us.
“All you who are thirsty, come to the water! You who have no
money, come, receive grain and eat;… Heed me, and you shall eat well, … listen,
that you may have life.”
This section of Isaiah was written most likely around the end of the Babylonian captivity, when
the Israelites were returning to their land after a generation of being
separated from it.
This meant that they were returning to an identity that they
had lost; that they were going to have to rebuild and reclaim their faith in a
monumental way.
In these passages, Isaiah is speaking words of encouragement
to a people who have, through the sins of their fathers, been adrift
spiritually as well as physically.
Isaiah stresses the importance of understanding that the One
and only God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob created all for the good of those who
love and heed Him; that this same God was at work in bringing about a second
Exodus, only this time, it meant not only a freedom from the dreaded foes of
the body, but the nourishment of the soul.
All of his words speak to the need to trust in God; to lay
down our pride and admit that we are thirsty so that we may drink from
everlasting springs; admit that we are poor so that we may be enriched by God’s
grace; admit that we are deaf to God’s Word so that He may heal us in
order to heed His voice.
The words of Isaiah echo the trust found in our Responsorial
Psalm (Ps. 145:8-9,15-16, 17-18),
which tells us today that “the hand of the LORD feeds us; He answers all our
needs…[because He] is near to all who call upon Him… in Truth.”
The words of the psalmist make it clear that our help is in
the LORD IF we can trust Him; if we can open our hands, clinched by false
senses of self-sufficiency, independence, and pride, so that we may receive the
kindness and compassion that gives us a glimpse of God’s Love for us.
St. Paul, in his letter to the Romans (8:35-39) tells us that this love, personified in the
God-Man, Jesus, can never be taken from us;
that our victory over the powers of evil is rooted in the
faith we profess as Christians, not because we deserve it, not because we have
guilted our Lord to have pity, but because He loves us, pure and simple.
It is because of this
truth alone that “neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor
present things, nor future thing, nor powers, nor height, nor depth nor any
other creature will [EVER] be able to separate us” from His love.
No, the only one who can do that is ourselves. We do that when we fail to rely on God’s
help, which is ultimately the only means of salvation we have.
Avery
Cardinal Dulles, a theologian who I have referenced before,
came up with a nifty term that I think captures the importance of placing our
trust in God. It is the term
“hermeneutic of trust” – hermeneutic meaning interpretation.
It is the act of presupposing that the faith we profess is
worthy of our trust.[1]
This interpretation of trust comes into conflict with most of us today, because of our need to know
everything.
We are so wrapped up in this culture’s ideology that each
individual has the right to “command all the evidence” of faith, that we fail to realize the social dimension
of faith, which relies on the cooperation of us all to promote and further
grasp the truth presented by Christ.[2]
Our Gospel today speaks to this failure in the hearts of
Christ’s disciples (Mt. 14:13-21).
After Jesus is followed by a large crowd, and “cures their
sick,” his disciples approached him, telling him to dismiss the people so that
they can return home and eat.
The disciples saw a situation before them, and knew only one reaction to the
situation: to send the people away.
The sadness of this passage is that while they knew of the physical needs of the
people, they were blind to the power of Christ before them.
Their pride deafened the ears of their hearts that told them
that truly, the Man Jesus was the Son of God, in whose name the foundations of
the Earth were established; the celestial bodies took form; and the beating
hearts of each person was given life.
Jesus, in feeding the 5000, not only miraculously nourished
the physical needs of those people,
He pointed to the power of his Love; He pointed to the
humility that is necessary in order to understand; He pointed to the trust that
must be placed in Him, in order that our spiritual hunger might be
satisfied.
We all have trust issues, there is no doubt.
I would hope, though, that as Christians we have learned to
trust the Person of Christ, not because of the hypocrisy we witness in His
Church, but because of the actions of love we have experienced through His
Church.
This is why St. Francis of Assisi reminds us that we are to
“preach the Gospel at all times, and when necessary, use words.”
Our actions speak to the world of Who Christ is in spite of
our failings.
They proclaim Christ’s Love for the World through our brokenness
and sinfulness.
And so, the question presented before us today is this:
Can we trust our Lord so that He can use us in a way that
will fulfill us?
Can we have faith to let go of our anguish and
distress?
Can we relinquish of our pride in order that we may receive
the grain of Christ’s harvest of redemption?
Pray God we can, so that our hearts may be healed, and that
we may, in faith and trust, receive
the miraculous feast set before us today.
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