Human beings are social animals, says Aristotle. Since we often experience our need for relationships with one another, we don’t need Aristotle or any other philosophers to convince us of the importance of being in a relationship. Relationships matter, not just any kind of relationships but the ones in which we feel loved and loving. When we love someone, we discover something so special and unique in that person. This discovery of something so authentic and real in that person also creates something new in ourselves. We discover something that we haven't been aware of ourselves before. As our relationship with that person deepens, we are formed and shaped by that relationship.
This relationship where we feel loved and loving is not limited to a romantic one. This can happen between friends, colleagues, parents and children, pets and their owners, teachers and students, and most importantly God and humanity. Love is at the core of this relationship. Love disarms our defense mechanisms and opens us to change, grow, mature, and create. God who is love invites all humanity into this relationship in which we feel loved and loving. And Jesus of Nazareth is the very human language of this divine love in which God speaks to humanity. In Jesus, we are invited into this relationship of God’s unconditional love. In today’s gospel, Jesus invites Simon and his brother Andrew, and James and his brother John into this relationship of God’s unconditional love. Although Jesus says nothing about love, Jesus calls Simon, Andrew, James, and John to join him on this divine project of proclaiming the reign of God’s compassion on earth. At this point, they have no idea what kind of trouble they’re getting into as they are building a relationship with Jesus. They don’t know what kind of death Jesus would face and that they would eventually betray him and abandon this relationship. In today’s gospel story, we only see the beginning of their relationship. But we do know what kind of ending this relationship would have. There’s a betrayal. And there’s a reconciliation. Jesus invites them into this messy reality of disappointment, forgiveness, grace, suffering, death, and resurrection. And Jesus invites all of us into this. It’s like we’re somewhat expected to betray him, and we’re also expected to be forgiven. In the first lesson from the Book of Jonah, we see this messiness that the relationship God first initiates with people. The focus of this particular calling story is not on the prophet, Jonah. It’s the relationship between God and the people of Nineveh. At first, it sounds like God is so angry at the people of Nineveh. But it turns out this is not true. God changes his mind. The repentant act of the people of Nineveh changes the mind of God. I imagine God desiring to be changed by them. It’s the love that changes the heart of the people of Nineveh. It’s the love that changes God’s mind. Only in this loving relationship with God, can we talk about vocation. There’s no vocation if there’s no relationship between God and us. In this intimate relationship with God, we discover something in God, that we desire to love God more and more. We get to know more about God. There’s one absolute rule to keep if we want to continue any kind of relationship afresh. That is, we never assume that we know everything about that person. Knowing everything about the person we care about might sound like we know all the needs and wants of that person, but there’s no mystery left about that person. We might be closing ourselves to that person’s growth, development, and wonderful change that he or she will continue to show. For example, if I believe that I know everything about my wife, this relationship can become very boring. Open to the newness that person will create. Never get tired of being curious about that person. This openness equally applies to our relationship with God. My understanding of God since my Sunday school should expand and mature. Be curious about God and what God is up to in your life. Discover what makes you love God deeper. Vocation is discovered and renewed in this loving relationship with God. Our vocations to which we are called to be and do are different and unique as we are different and unique. Nevertheless, there’s the deepest vocation that all of us share together. We are made to love God and others. As our love for God becomes deeper and greater, our love for others become deeper and greater. In this loving relationship with God, we can truly discover our vocations. We discover who we are called to love and serve. Calling or vocation is then nothing but our way of loving God as it is our response to God’s love to us. And this is expressed in our act of loving others. This discovery of something in us, this discovery of vocation in our relationship with God always brings us back to the reality of our lives. We don’t find this loving God somewhere far from our lives. We find God right here in our neighborhood where our bodies are, not over there that we don’t even know exactly where. Jesus himself discovers his vocation in response to the situation when John the Baptizer is arrested. He proclaims the exact same message as John, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news.” He repeats that same message, endangering himself. (Matthew 3:2) He didn’t go somewhere particularly special to start his ministry. What about Simon, Andrew, James, and John? Jesus finds and invites Simon, Andrew, James, and John not at some Zagat rated restaurant or holy site but along the Sea of Galilee. It’s the place where they go everyday to make a living. It’s not a special place but it becomes special after their encounter with Jesus. This applies to us too. Jesus invites us at our workplaces, at home, and mundane everyday places. Yet, those places become sacred as we discover Jesus the Lover of our souls inviting us to a deeper and more intimate relationship with him. Jesuit priest, Father Dean Brackley once said, “The crucified people are a privileged place for hearing the call to service. They provoke the crucial question: What will we do to take them down from their crosses?” (Dean Brackley, The Call to Discernment in Troubled Times: New Perspectives on the Transformative Wisdom of Ignatius of Loyola, p. 59) The crucified people are whom we are called to love. And it is our response to God’s love. Who are these crucified people in our neighborhood? They’re crucial for us because loving them is for us loving God. I would like to conclude my homily with this story of Japanese Novelist Murakami Haruki. This is the speech he gave when he was awarded Israel's prestigious literary award, the Jerusalem Prize for the Freedom of the Individual in Society in 2009. A pro-Palestinian group asked him not to accept the prize because of the conflict between Israel and Palestine. They were concerned about political impacts that his reception of the prize would bring. Facing criticisms and threats, he decided to go to Jerusalem. Here’s the speech: “When I was asked to accept this award I was warned from coming here because of the fighting in Gaza. I asked myself: Is visiting Israel the proper thing to do? Will I be supporting one side? I gave it some thought. And I decided to come. Like most novelists, I like to do exactly the opposite of what I'm told. It's in my nature as a novelist. Novelists can't trust anything they haven't seen with their own eyes or touched with their own hands. So I chose to see for myself. I chose to speak here rather than say nothing. So please do allow me to give this one very personal message. It is something I always keep in my mind while I write a fiction. It is carved into the wall of my mind. It’s something like this. If there is a hard, high wall and an egg that breaks against it, no matter how right the wall or how wrong the egg, I will stand on the side of the egg. Why? Because each of us is an egg, a unique soul enclosed in a fragile egg. Each of us is confronting a high wall. The high wall is the system which forces us to do the things we would not ordinarily see fit to do as individuals. We are all human beings, individuals, fragile eggs. We have no hope against the wall: it's too high, too dark, too cold. To fight the wall, we must join our souls together for warmth, strength.” As Christians, where do we discover the crucified people? Where is the egg that we would like to stand on? That place where people are crucified and eggs are broken is where we meet Jesus who invites us into a deeper relationship with him. That is the way of the cross and resurrection. This is the vocation to which God calls us, right now, right here. In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. |
Paul"...life up your love to that cloud [of unknowing]...let God draw your love up to that cloud...through the help of his grace, to forget every other thing." Archives
January 2025
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