Last week, in the Gospel parables of the mustard seed and the sower, the theme
that stuck out to me most was God’s grace, of how we are called to have a
disposition that allows God’s grace to enter into our lives and to transform
us, a grace that demands a cost to us. Today, the Gospel story of Jesus and the disciples caught in a terrible storm
addresses the subject of faith. We might think that we know a lot about faith, but let’s try to reflect about
faith in the context of today’s Gospel.
The first thing that sticks out to me in today’s Gospel story is this question
that Jesus asks of the disciples: Why are you terrified? I want to relate a story to you from my missionary experiences from Ecuador,
and reflecting upon that experience, unfortunately, I have a seemingly
inexhaustible source of stories of things that terrified me. One afternoon, I had just arrived in a canoe at the docks at the village of our
mission site. It was a very busy day,
with a lot of people walking down the streets of the village and going to the
markets to do their shopping. I was
carrying a large box of plants and seedlings for my garden, so I had my hands
full and had a hard time seeing what was in front of me. All of a sudden, I saw this little scraggly,
mangy gray dog, barking and snarling, headed right toward me, and this group of
5 other dogs with him. Before I knew it,
this group of dogs had surrounded me, barking non-stop at me. Boy, was I scared. Before I knew it, I felt a stabbing pain on
my thigh, and then felt the wetness of blood all over my leg. One of dogs, a German shepherd, had bitten my
leg pretty badly. I knew that I needed medical
help immediately, so I rushed down to the medical clinic a couple of blocks
away to get the wound cleaned and stitched up. But, unfortunately, this is not the end of my
story. Since that day, I was petrified
of the dogs that wandered around our village all day long. Attacks from these dogs, like my experience
that day, were not uncommon, but they seemed to be accepted by the villagers as
a part of life. I avoided that busy
corner in the marketplace where I had been attacked, even when it meant having
to walk twice the distance in order to get to the school that I
administered. Finally, after about 3 or
4 weeks, I realized that this was ridiculous, that I needed to confront my
fears. So, I decided one day I would
take that route through that corner of the marketplace. Wouldn’t you know, as soon as I approached
that place, I heard barking, and I saw that mean little mangy gray dog headed
toward me. I felt like he singled me out
in the crowd, that I could sense my presence there. Well, let me tell you, I was terrified and I
panicked. I started screaming like a
crazy person. I threw my backpack at the
little gray dog and got out of there as fast as I could. When I arrived at the school, I told my
students the story of what happened, and one of them went back to retrieve my
backpack. Luckily it was still
there. To this day, barking dogs in the
street still terrify me. I think a lot of us have things that terrify us, and perhaps in particular, we
have things that we fear in life that can be stumbling blocks in our journey of
faith. Perhaps we are in fear of failure, in fear of taking a risk in our journey of
faith, or afraid of committing to our faith.
We recall the story of when Jesus goes back to Nazareth and taught in the
synagogue. Many people there questioned
his authority and would not accept his message.
That passage ends by saying that Jesus did not do many deeds in that
village because of their lack of faith. (Matthew 13:54-58). Many other times, Jesus specifically says that it is the faith of the person
that saves them. In the Gospel of the
woman afflicted with hemorrhages that we will hear next week, Jesus says to
her: “Daughter, your faith has saved you. Go
in peace and be cured of your affliction.” Doesn’t it seem like the efficacy of what God can do in our lives is directly
connected to our faith? Even though the dictionary says that faith is a noun, in the context of living
out our Catholic faith, faith is an action word, faith is a verb. Faith is not something that can be passive.
We just don’t wait around for God to show up. We are called to be actively searching for
God. We have to actively find ways to
live out our faith and to grow in our faith.
We would be naïve to think that we are not going to hit a rough patch in our
journey of faith. In fact, I remember clearly from seminary, our rector telling us that we
seminarians had to develop a strong prayer life and have a strong system in
place for when we would encounter a rough patch on our journey as priests,
because we certainly would. I think the one thing I have learned time and time again, is that in a way,
each person has his own journey of faith. Some of us have difficulty with staying committed to our faith when things are
going well, since we might not feel like we need God in those moments, that we
are so engaged in our work or making money or having fun. Some of us encounter difficulty in our faith in moments of crisis or grief or
suffering or loss, feeling that God has abandoned us in those moments. Some of us go through long periods of doubt and questioning and searching for
something in life that we feel is missing. But I always tell people that God meets us in our reality, whatever that
reality is. God reaches out to us in
whatever that reality is, but we have to reach back.
Faith is a the heart of a 14-day period that our Bishops declare this time each
year called the Fortnight for Freedom. Starting with the Vigil mass of Sunday, June
21 on the feast of St John Fisher and St Thomas More, two men who were martyred
by King Henry VIII for standing up for their Catholic faith, and ending with
the 4th of July, our nation’s Independence Day, the importance of us
having the freedom to witness to the truth of the Gospel will be commemorated. In addition to St John Fisher and St Thomas More, the Fortnight commemorates
the feast days of other important witnesses for our faith, those who remained
faithful in the face of persecution and political power, including St John the
Baptist, St Peter and St Paul, and the First Martyrs of the Church of Rome. I will be talking more about the Fortnight for Freedom in our daily and Sunday
homilies during these upcoming days.
Sometimes, like the disciples on that boat, we may fear that we are going down
in the stormy waters around us. But, in our fears and in our weaknesses, we are called to be courageous, we are
called to walk by faith. May we hear Jesus calling out to us: “Fear
not! Do not be afraid!”
No comments:
Post a Comment