10/25/22 - This is a Hard Reading

From the first reading for Tuesday of the Thirtieth Week, Year II:

As the Church is subordinate to Christ, so wives should be subordinate to their husbands in everything. Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ loved the Church and handed himself over for her to sanctify her…

What do we do with a difficult reading? Do we toss it away blithely, with a glib aside, or deride it ruefully, or simply pretend it doesn’t exist? Do we judge the reading based on contemporary attitudes, making the standards of the age the criteria for interpreting the Word of God? Are we the judge of the Word? Or do we let the Word judge us and our contemporary age? Do we let it transform us into a new creation? Do we wrestle with it and have it strike us in our hip joint so we walk away limping?

The Word should stop us in our tracks, make us reassess our selves and our assumptions. It should leave us doubting that we are as wise, clever and enlightened as we know we must be.

From 10/18/22

Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness; and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps upon the earth.” So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.

Genesis 1:26-27 | RSVCA

“You have heard that it was said to the men of old, ‘You shall not kill; and whoever kills shall be liable to judgment.’ But I say to you that every one who is angry with his brother shall be liable to judgment; whoever insults his brother shall be liable to the council, and whoever says, ‘You fool!’ shall be liable to the hell of fire. 

Matthew 5:21-22 | RSVCE

What does it mean to be created in the image and likeness of God? The theologians tell us it has to do with our immortal, rational soul. St. John Paul would add that we also image God in our physical bodies, since it is in the body that we love. 

Love implies another. To love only one's self is an infinite loop of narcissism. God is Three in One. His love isn't self gratification. It is shared between Father and Son, and through the Spirit extends through all creation. Not because He has to. Love is not compulsion. Love is a free gift.

Unlike God, we can reject love. We can get caught in an endless loop of narcissism. We can forget that our sister and brother is created in the same image of God. We can also forget that we are imperfect. All of us are broken images. 

It doesn't mean we don't correct a brother who strays, or tolerate abuse. It means that we understand that hatred is as deadly as lust. We can remain perfectly chaste and temperate, yet lack charity. What good is our chastity and abstemiousness when we are cruel and arrogant? What good is our activism for those on the other side of the world when he are indifferent, at best, to the people around me?

We are created in the image of God. God is love. Love open my eyes to see you in others. 

Love calls us to sacrifice for others, as the Son sacrificed Himself for us. Love break the bonds of narcissism in my life.

Love calls us to chastity and temperance so we may live in true freedom. Love free me so I may truly love you in my sisters and brothers.