7th Sunday God desires us to be truly human.

My niece and her husband are first time parents.  And like many first time parents, they post and send a lot of photos, though they are not as “exuberant” as some.
So little William is around 8 weeks old, probably one of the cutest baby ever along with his 3 year old cousin but I may be slightly biased.  He is developing right along, hitting all his milestones.
The big excitement will be when the walking starts.
Over past 3 weeks and this week, we have been within the great teaching of Jesus, the Sermon on the Mount.  
The first part of this teaching was the beatitudes; those beautiful, tweetable, incredibly powerful statements that talk of a God the Father who is there for us; so that we will give our Trust to the Father.
Then we heard about being the salt of the earth, the light of the world, another teaching about the heights of humanity we can achieve with God.
Then the last week and this week we got into the law; and although it sounds a bit harsh to the ear, it isn’t.  It is about the work, the effort on our part, to use God’s grace given to us, so that we can truly be human, truly be free.  It is about not settling for the minimum, but to exceed expectations.
I go back to the image of a child learning to walk.  A baby is clearly not born with the capacity to walk.  A baby must first develop those muscles, coordination et al.,
I think more importantly the child must first trust the parents.  The baby must feel secure, to know that he or she is safe with mom and dad.
Because ultimately, a good parent will place the child down on the floor, and step away or let go of the baby, to let the baby begin to do his work:  to walk.
A good parent will be there when the child falls, not to punish, but to lift up, to encourage, to call the baby forward in trust, to take those steps again.
And the joy on the child’s face when she or he begins to walk.
This is the Good News!  God is here, God is helping us to walk as people, free people:  people capable of so much love, of giving it and receiving it.  
The Good News is that God loves us, and desires that we live out this love.
We are created for this because we are created in God’s own image and this is God, the God of love.
God is not a helicoptering parent who carries us everywhere so that we don’t even have to try, no.   God has given us the mind and heart to discern and make choices that are truly great.  The Father wants us to exceed, not just do the minimum.  He wants us to walk, to run, to exult in the joy of being human!
The Son came so that we can know of the Father’s great will for us, the Father’s great love for us.
Jesus calls us to this life of love.  He lived it.  He exceeded normal human expectations.  He wass not a superhuman, but truly human.
He gave love.
He showed us that when humanity fell to such depths as to execute, murder the Son of God, the Father was still there to lift us up, to get us on our feet again, so that we can walk freely.
The Spirit comes, that very love of God, so that we can be who we are created to be.
Eucharist then becomes food for this journey, but it is also the sacrament of what we are called to be.  Humanity is about self giving to others, and letting others give for us.
And in these days in which there seems so much negativity, so much reckless disregard for the dignity of humanity; whether it be the infant, the sick, the elderly, the immigrant, the criminal, to woman, the homeless…
God is calling to us to get up and walk!  God urges us to step forward and not do better, but BE better.
It is difficult, I know.  I stumble, we all stumble, right onto our you-know-what.  Okay, Jesus stumbled three times, got up.  He trusted in the Father’s love.
We will stumble in our anger, we will stumble because of our fear, we will stumble because of those pesky egos…
We can rise up in mercy, in compassion, in forgiveness, in humility, in trust.

We can walk and Be better, because God is our Father; we are Children of God.

Comments

  1. rosalFebruary 20, 2017 at 12:15 PM

    It would've been great to hear your beautiful homily. I am glad you printed it. Thank you. Also I think it's just lovely your comment on what Chris is. I agree, so many times people tend to think of Him as an harsh father who is keeping tabs on us. Just listening to the Psalm of Sunday gives us an idea who He really is. I wanted to cry just listening to those comforting and loving words. Thank You!


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