Holy Cross Monastery, West Park, NY
Br. Bernard Delcourt, OHC
Proper 28 C - November 13, 2022
Our salvation lies in good hands, in God’s hands.
Imposters will come. War and conflict will rage on (31 countries currently at war in some form or another). Natural disasters will be prevalent. But God’s desire will prevail.
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To love God is not just talk. And loving God is not always like walking through a rose garden at dusk.
All three texts today encourage us to keep at our work as Christians, no matter what. In case you need reminding, our work as Christians is summarized in the Great Commission and the Golden Commandment.
The commission is …that repentance and forgiveness of sins is to be proclaimed in Jesus’ name to all nations… (Luke 24:47) and the commandment is that …we shall love the Lord our God with all our heart, and with all our soul, and with all our strength, and with all our mind; and our neighbor as ourself… (Luke 10:27)
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Apocalyptic literature was a well-known narrative format to the Jewish nation. It kept making a comeback in the Jewish nation’s collective mind whenever they were on the receiving end of international violence in the form of invasion and forced exile. And it made a comeback when it seemed convenient to part with their Jewish identity in order to assuage the difficulties at hand.
Apocalyptic literature is meant to reveal the deeper nature of reality; it tears open the veil that seems to hide God at work in the world; it shows catastrophes and hardships as episodes that we need to endure to enable unity with God.
At the time Luke wrote the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Jewish community (of which the Jesus movement still considered itself an integral part) was reeling from what felt like a world-changing catastrophe.
The Temple at Jerusalem, the most meaningful center of religious worship, had been destroyed, the city’s population had been massacred after a horrid siege, and the remnant of population had been dispersed in the rest of the Roman Empire.
So it is in keeping with his times that Luke, at the end of the first century of our era, would use the apocalyptic style to emphasize Jesus’ authority.
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With today’s gospel passage Luke conveys two important messages to his community.
First important message: Jesus was truly a great prophet. He spoke great truths and some of them came to be realized by the time Luke writes to his people. Two things that Jesus prophesied have by now happened in their living memory or in their present time:
- The Temple has been utterly destroyed,
- The Jesus movement has been, and continues to be, the object of persecutions.
Luke’s gospel a little further than today’s passage assures us that eventually Jesus will return in glory, just as he prophesied.
So Luke wants us to know that if Jesus was right about the destruction of the Temple and the persecution of his followers, he is also right about his second coming. That is Luke’s first important message to his community. Jesus will come back in glory. You can count on it.
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Luke’s second message to his community is to continue its living witness to the message of Jesus Christ, in the meantime.
If earthly powers are doing unjust and unrighteous things, we are not to put the gospel under the bushel. On the contrary, we are to show endurance and fortitude in declaring the gospel.
We are to persevere in standing for what is right in both word and action. That is how we maintain the integrity of our souls. That is how we live the resurrected life to the fullest.
Should persecutions ensue; so be it. Persecution may actually give us some highly visible opportunities to testify to the gospel.
Suffering as an opportunity for testimony. What kind of testimony does one give in the face of great suffering and great hatred? But Jesus says we need not worry how we will make our case to those who might want to silence us.
Jesus is with us to the end of times and the Spirit itself will speak through us.
Luke is encouraging his community to not be idle while waiting for the Lord’s return. Jesus himself told parables on this theme. Continue to witness with your lives about Jesus, the Way.
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The prophet Malachi gives me hope that God will make things good “on the day when God acts”, as he says.
Regardless of how far humanity will have progressed by then and regardless of what calamities will have been endured - On that day, moral ambiguity will disappear and reconciliation will prevail.
Unrighteous success and profit will be unveiled and come to nothing. Then once more you shall see the difference between the righteous and the wicked, between one who serves God and one who does not serve him.
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In the meantime, we’ve got work to do. And the author of the second letter to the Thessalonians (probably a disciple of Paul, not Paul himself) gives us further guidance in how to be faithful to God.
Loving God is a work of community and everyone should actively be involved. This work of community gets harder the more people are coasting and running commentary from the sidelines.
As our writer to the Thessalonians says; “do not be weary in doing what is right” (2 Thess. 3;13).
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So what it is that makes these readings relevant today. What makes today’s world an apocalyptic place? What is it that we need to speak out the gospel about?
Is it the overburdening of our planetary weather system? Is it the overconsumption of resources to the profit of the wealthiest and most powerful and at the expense of the rest?
Is it the use of the justice system to punish rather than to repair, restore and reconcile? Is it the use of industrial and military power to impose worldviews and national agendas on other peoples?
Is it the pursuit of yet another meaningless pleasure at the expense of deeper connection with our fellow human beings?
For now, the Kingdom of God comes quietly, hidden, unseen. Our very lives are what God gets to use to make God’s Kingdom of Love urgently break into the hardness of the world.
We are bodies that enable the body of Christ to act in the world. We are part and parcel of the Revelation of God’s Love for creation. God’s Kingdom is also within and among us. It is being revealed also in our contemporary situation.
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“Apocalypse now” is not only a Francis Ford Coppola movie masterpiece; it is one of the themes of the nearing season of Advent. You get a break with the Feast of Christ the King next week, but apocalyptic literature will be back. Let’s get to God’s work of love now.
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