Weekly Reflection 070603AD

Sunday July 6, 2009AD

13^th Sunday in Greentime

A Tough Call and Calling

Whitney Houston’s statement, “Learning to love yourself is the greatest love of all,” would not fly in Jesus’ world. (It shouldn’t fly in our world either if you listen carefully to what she might be saying in that song.)

We all should have a sense of honest self-respect that we should maintain. Yet, in our individualized culture, self-respect is one thing. Egotism is another.

In Jesus’ culture, with its dominant group mentality, self-respect had to be in the group context of family, village and religion. You got respect from your dutiful fulfillment of your role within your relationships.

Therefore, according to St Mark’s Gospel, Jesus’ self-image had to be challenged by his family’s coming to take him home in Mark 3 because they thought that He was off the deep end. Today, the village of Nazareth (with its 150+ residents) rejects the power and wisdom of Jesus because they know His roots in their own midst. Later, Jesus’ self-image will be challenged by both temple and state, when conventional religious leaders and realpolitik occupation leaders conspired that He had to go. (Neither could Jesus’ Self-respect have been augmented by the triple misunderstanding of the 12 when warned that He is a Suffering Messiah.)

The emphasis in our weekend readings is Jesus as the rejected prophet. Recall that a prophet in the biblical (and theological) sense is seen as a nabi , one through whom God speaks about today. A nabi was a person on a hill who has a different view of reality than those below.

Sometimes, (usually, as a matter of fact,) not all are thrilled with what the nabi says or does. Conventional wisdom, common sense, the collective consciousness know better. (Does that sound familiar these days?) The answer is to write off the outsider through rejection or vilification or violence.

However, there are always a few people listening. They may not get it correctly, as the dull and cowardly 12 did not get it. Our Prophet shares His Spirit to clarify it, hoping that we exercise our baptismal share in His prophetic ministry.

In contemporary America, on this Independence Day weekend, Jesus, our Prophet, asks us to proclaim that Jesus is Lord (no one or nothing else). No joke, for real!! He is the Center of our lives. He asks us to be prophetic in non-violent words and actions in proclaiming and building a Culture of Life, based on the Gospel in a culture of death. When the Hulk and the Matrix call the shots, we need to read more into Jesus (than Harry Potter).

Let us be consistently pro-life in a downwardly spiraling violent world. Let us be non-violent in a world that sees violence as a quick fix. (How many are dead today in the Middle East?) Let us rate people as sisters and brothers, not as the Jones’ whom we have to emulate.

Prophets in individualized or communal cultures still have a tough time. Ask Jesus. 070603 AD jfq