In the second
reading for today, from Paul shortest letter, a note to a wealthy Christian
named Philemon, Paul sends Philemon’s escaped slave back to his master. The
slave, who is named Onesimus, had become a Christian in Rome while Paul was
being held under a sort of house arrest. He revealed to Paul that he had escaped
from Philemon’s service. He may even have stolen something from his master, we
can’t be sure of this. Paul asks Philemon to take Onesimus back, but not just
as an escaped slave but as a fellow Christian. Being a Christian was and is
infinitely more important than social status, even if that status is slavery. It
is not that St. Paul is endorsing slavery. He is simply noting that something
is more important than whether one is a slave or not. And that something, or better someone, is
Jesus Christ[1].
We are all
slaves in the world, but we are free in Christ. There are many things that
enslave us. Some are sinful, some are temptations, and all are nuisances. We
are all enslaved by our own selfishness and pride. We want to put ourselves
first. Our very society drills us to “take care of number one.” But Christ
frees us from that. He tells us to love God first, and then others as
ourselves.
We all suffer
from our own pride. We are concerned that we get the proper respect from our
classmates, our family, our workmates, and people in the world. We find
confession difficult because it makes us face up to our own failings. Christ
frees us from pride by teaching us that we need to trust in God, not in our own
abilities. He has the answers. He is the Answer. Who can know God’s counsel or conceive what God intends? The first
reading from the Book of Wisdom asks. We cannot provide ourselves with the
Wisdom of God. He gives us His Wisdom.
We are enslaved by our sinfulness. We often give into temptation, and then
behave in a way we don’t want to behave. St. Paul wrote in the seventh chapter of
the Letter to the Romans: I know that
good does not dwell in me, that is, in my flesh. The desire to do good is
there, but the doing of good is not. I do not do the good I want to do but the
evil that I do not want to do. Who
can deliver me from this mortal body, he cries. And then he provides God’s Answer: we are delivered through Jesus Christ our
Lord.
Let’s make this
concrete: perhaps, we have a quick temper. It doesn’t take much to push our
buttons and Vesuvius erupts. And then we feel terrible because we do not want
to be like that. The more we focus on
Christ, though, the more effort we put into treating others as Christ would
treat them. When this happens it is harder for others to push our buttons. It
is Christ who is conquering our anger because we are determined to follow
Him. Perhaps we are inclined to give
into some of the immoral aspects of our society. We always think that we are
stronger than we are. But we fail over and over again. There are some
temptations that we cannot conquer alone. But we are not alone! His is with us.
When we have Christ in our lives, the pleasures of the world are meaningless
next to the all surpassing joy of living in the Lord. And so we ask ourselves:
“Was I happier when I was doing this or that, or am I happier when I am one
with the Lord?” We know the answer. He is the Answer.
May He make of us an eternal offering to you, we pray in the
Third Eucharistic Prayer. Living the life of the Lord demands that we let His
Presence prevail over all the negatives of the world, all the immoral desires
of our lives, and all the temptations we have to be selfish, to be proud. His
cross doesn’t just save mankind in general. He saves each of us as individuals
who need Him in our lives.
For us
Christians, all that matters is Jesus Christ. Nothing can stand in the way of
living His Life. In the gospel Jesus goes to the extreme: He speaks about
hating mother and father, wife and children, brothers and sisters, and even our
own lives. He really is not calling us to hate our loved ones. Nor is he telling us to hate our lives to the
point of being suicidal. What He is saying is that we cannot allow anyone or
anything to stand in the way of His call to follow Him. If a relationship with
another leads us away from Him, then we need to recognize that this
relationship is not love, but a tool of the devil to destroy us.
In one way
though, we are all martyrs. We are witnesses to Jesus Christ. The word martyr
means witness. We embrace the witness of our lives to Jesus Christ because we
value the freedom we have in Christ. We also have experienced the Presence of
the Lord in our lives. In comparison to
living in the Presence of the Lord, all else in life is garbage.
Certainly the beginning
of the Gospel reading today is difficult, but it contains a wonderful message:
we had been slaves of the garbage but now we have been set free. In fewer –and
more beautiful- words: My chains are
gone. I’ve been set free. My God, my Savior has ransomed me. And like a flood,
His mercy reigns, Unending Love, Amazing Grace…[2]
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