Today’s Gospel from Matthew comes right after Jesus reproaches the powerful towns of Chorazin and Bethsaida, who witness his miracles and mighty deeds, but who still do not believe in him. Today, Jesus is telling us the reason for their unbelief and what is most important for us in our faith.
After a prayer of thanksgiving to God, Jesus praises God for what he has revealed to the little ones, but what is not known to the wise and the learned. Think of how often in the Gospels the scribes and Pharisees lord their knowledge and their wisdom over others, but they fail to learn from Jesus, while the tax collectors and sinners and his group of faithful disciples are able to open their hearts to his message and his proclamation of God’s kingdom.
In Jesus stating that God’s mysteries are hidden from the wise and learned, he is not telling us that he is against education. In fact, we are encouraged to learn more about our faith and to study Scripture as disciples of Christ. This refers to the spiritual pride we can have when we think that we rely entirely on our own strength and our own capabilities. This creates the burdens that are to much to bear. Jesus tell us to take his yoke upon us and to learn from him. In the ancient world, a yoke was a wooden beam that was placed over the necks to two animals to allow them to pull a heavy plow or wagon. When Jesus invites us to place ourselves in his yoke, he invites us to be yoked together with him, not to be pulling ourselves through life by ourselves. Jesus is with us every step away, telling us that we will not have to go through our trials and our struggles alone.
From the youngest and the oldest in our families and in our community of faith, we can all learn from each other. Parents have a leadership role and a responsibility in the faith lives of their children, but they can also learn from their children. Just as our faith community has to create time and space for encounters with God, the family has to do so as well.
I mentioned how important it is to constantly be learning more about our faith and to be curious about our faith in a healthy way, rooted in humility and a thirst for God’s truth, not rooted in arrogance or intellectual pride. As disciples of Christ, we are to strive for spiritual growth, a deepening of our prayer life, and an appreciation of God’s creation. St Anselm of Canterbury from the 11th century called theology faith seeking reason, showing that the two are compatible and complement each other on our journey of faith. We are called to have a holy desire to apply our intellect to study and learn more about our faith. The more we learn and discover about God, the more our love for him will grow, which should be the ultimate purpose of our lives.
I have stressed the importance of always learning about our Catholic faith and always wanting to know about God and theology of our Church. There is always so much to learn.
I want to show you a real life example of how I try to learn more about the faith. When it was announced that we are going to have the national consecration of the Sacred Heart, I wanted to know more about the Sacred Heart, even though I had already read extensively about this devotion. I started reading some documents written by the Popes, starting with the encyclical Pope Francis wrote last year, and then documents written by the Pope Pius XII, Pope Pius XI, Leo XIII, and all the way back to Pius VI in 1794. This gave me a really good historical overview of the importance of this devotion in the history of our faith. The good thing is, all these Vatican documents are available free of charge from the Vatican website with an easy Google search. I then found two books recommended by the US Bishops to read. Jesuit priest John Croiset was the spiritual advisor to St Mary Margaret when she had these visions of Jesus’ Sacred Heart in the 17th century. He wrote a book about this devotion, which is considered a spiritual classic. He wrote about his first hand knowledge about St Margaret Mary’s visions and his own observations. Then, the US Bishops recommended a recent book written by Jesuit priest James Kubicki about the Sacred Heart, which was a wonderful book. That led me to other books that he has written, including this wonderful volume of daily reflections that I am using for preparation for writing homilies. I am always looking for those types of resources. In my research on the Sacred Heart, I found a wonderful article published by Bishop Robert Barron’s publishing house Word on Fire about the connection between the Sacred Heart and the Eucharist. A mom of one of our youth said that I should be always promoting education on the Eucharist and its important in our Catholic faith. The is something I have always tried to do in my service as a priest.
I cannot mention this enough, about the importance of each of us personally delving deeper into our Catholic faith. In his visit to the US, Pope Benedict XVI spoke about how educating ourselves in the faith and the Church providing a means of this education is an essential part of the Church’s mission of proclaiming the Good News. Pope Benedict spoke about the importance of encounter. I can truly say that I encounter Jesus in my studies and my readings and the way I search for his truth in my life. Pope Benedict stated that there is a crisis of truth and a crisis of faith in the world today, where many have abandoned their search for God. So, yes, all of us, our children and youth, and first and foremost our adults need to be involved in education in faith on different levels, especially since our adults are passing on this faith to our children and youth.
So, yes, it should feel it is a joy and a privilege to be in God’s presence as we study and learn about about him and about our faith. The words “Catholic identity” should not be this phrase that we toss around and we don’t even know what it means. Catholic identity should be something we explore every day on our journey of faith.
