Times have changed,
Father. I’m only doing what is perfectly acceptable by our society.” And with
these words, the elderly lady explained away her present living condition. And with the same words, the young man
justified his “wild” lifestyle, and with the same words the substance abuser
justified his actions. And on and on and on. Add in whatever immoral behavior
you can think of, and someone will say, “I’m only doing what is perfectly
acceptable by society.”[1]
But what society
is that? To what society is this acceptable? It is acceptable by the society that finds nothing wrong with hedonism,
putting one’s pleasure before every other good in life, including respect for
others, respect for country, and respect for life. What is the society that so
many claim for themselves? It is the society that is at best amoral, but which
is mostly immoral. It is the society that is at best pagan, but mostly
atheistic. When a person hides his or her immoral behavior behind the
“acceptable by our society,” argument, that person is invoking the society that
St. Paul calls “this age,” or, according to some translations, “the pattern of
the world.” This is the world that Jesus Christ came to save. It is the world
of selfishness, a world of pride, a world where God is neither wanted nor
present. It is a world of darkness. It is a world to which we Christians cannot
belong.
We were joined
to a new world when we were baptized.
Each of us is a key part of the new world, the Kingdom of God. There are
hundreds, perhaps thousands of people in each of our lives who look to us to
illuminate their darkness with the Light of Christ. The problem is that we are enticed by all that
is around us to reject all that is within us. And so we often straddle major
issues in life.
Even though we
recognize our dignity as sons and daughters of God, we often let ourselves get
involved in actions that are far less than holy. We think that we are OK,
because we are firmly planted on the Lord’s dock, but the forces the other foot
has stepped into draws us away from the dock, and we end up in the drink. We
ask ourselves, “How did I get involved in something like that?” Then,
responding to God’s grace, we not only seek forgiveness, but we give up the
actions that we thought would not be all that dangerous for our spiritual
lives. We Christians are called upon to offer our bodies as living sacrifices
to God. That means that we sacrifice the
pagan aspects of life in order to live for the Lord.
You duped me Lord, and I allowed myself to be duped. Jeremiah
responds in the first reading. Commitment to the Lord carries the cost of
rejecting the world where He is not present. So, like Jeremiah, we want God in
our lives, but we don’t appreciate the cost of Christianity until that cost
becomes personal. Yet, like Jeremiah, we live for the fire burning within our
bones, the fire of God’s love. We allow ourselves to be duped. We want God. Having
God in our lives destroys all other possibilities in life. The decision we have to make is whose life do
we want, our lives or His Life. If we want His Life, then He will destroy those
parts of our lives where He is not present.
“The problem
with you is that you are thinking like the world does, not like God does,”
Jesus tells the disciple he had just called his rock. Peter wanted to prevent
Jesus from dying. Jesus said that the devil would want to prevent God’s plan
from taking place. He actually called Peter a devil. Jesus was more upset with
Peter for this comment, and then he was when Peter denied him three times. Why?
Well, what did Peter do that was so wrong?
He allowed himself to be drawn from the Kingdom of God. He was
conforming to the world.
We cannot allow
this to happen. A world that is in darkness needs us to be its light. People
are looking for hope. People are searching for a reason for living. We can give
them that hope. We can give them that reason for life. We can be the Light of
Christ for others. We do not have to conform
to a world of darkness. We can be transformed by God. Then we will experience
all that is good and pleasing and perfect[2] ■
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