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Friday of the Second Week in Lent
I tell you, then, that the kingdom of God will be taken from you and given to a people who will produce its fruit. Matt. 21:43
Even though it may be realistic to admit that there is hardly any news in the Sermon on the Mount for most people, the core message of the Gospel nonetheless contains a truth that no one has yet fully made true. And real listening means nothing less than the constant willingness to confess that we have not yet realized what we profess to believe. Who likes to hear, for example, that the last will be first, if we happen to be first? And who wants to hear that those who are poor, who mourn, who are hungry, thirsty, and persecuted are called happy, when we are wealthy, self-content, well-fed, praised for our good wines, and admired by all our friends? Who wants to hear that we have to love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us when we call our boss an S.O.B., our own son a good-for-nothing tramp. . . .
The message might be the same all through life and might be repeated over and over again in different words and styles, but those of us who let it really come through allow ourselves, at the same time, the possibility of coming to an insight that might well have consequences for our style of life, which we are not eager to accept. The truth, after all, is radical: it goes to the roots of a person’s life in such a way that few are those who want it and the freedom it brings with it. There is, in fact, such an outfight fear to face the truth in all its directness and simplicity that irritation and anger seem to be a more common human response than a humble confession that we also belong to the group Jesus criticized.
For Christians are Christian only when we unceasingly ask critical questions of the society in which we live and continuously stress the necessity for conversion, not only for the individual but also of the world. Christians are Christians only when we refuse to allow ourselves or anyone else to settle into a comfortable rest. We remain dissatisfied with the status quo. And we believe that we have an essential role to play in the realization of the new world to come — even if we cannot say how that world will come about. Christians are Christians only when we keep saying to everyone we meet that the good news of the Kingdom has to be proclaimed to the whole world and witnessed to all nations (Matt. 24:13). As long as Christians live we keep searching for a new order without divisions between people, for a new structure that allows every person to shake hands with every other person and a new life in which there will be lasting unity and peace. We will not allow our neighbors to stop moving, to lose courage, or to escape into small everyday pleasures to which they can cling. We are irritated by satisfaction and self-content in ourselves as well as in others since we know, with an unshakable certainty, that something great is coming of which we have already see the first rays of light. We believe that this world not only passes but has to pass in order to let the new world be born. We believe that there will never be a moment in our lives in which we can rest in the supposition that there is nothing left to do. But we will not despair when we do not see the result we wanted to see. For in the midst of all our work we keep hearing the words of the One sitting on the throne: “I am making the whole of creation new” (Rev. 21:5).
Our Prayer
God, you wish to reveal to us
how rich is the glory of your mystery
among the gentiles;
it is Christ among us, our hope of glory!
This is the Christ
we are proclaiming, admonishing, and instructing
everyone in all wisdom,
to make everyone perfect in Christ.
— After Col. 1:7-28
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