"The people who sit in darkness have seen a great light"

JMJ+OBT
"Land of Zebulun and land of Naphtali,
the way to the sea, beyond the Jordan,
Galilee of the Gentiles,
the people who sit in darkness have seen a great light,
on those dwelling in a land overshadowed by death
light has arisen." Mt4:15-16

This verse has appeared several times in the two Theology courses that I'm talking this semester: Christology and Mariology (a pretty epic combination if I do say so myself). Every once in a while in these course taught by two different awesome, old, wise, and holy Hungarian Cistercians Fr. Roch, and Abbot Denis, I feel like I get a brief glimpse into mysterious unity of just everything. It's like for a split second I see how certain aspects of our faith, of reality all tie together into a complete whole. They never last long and they're never much more than a feeling; I can never fully reconstruct the comprehensive understanding of that moment but still its like for a brief second I'm given the blessing of perceiving a little bit of truth. If it is as the Church says and ultimately Truth finds it concrete reality in the person of Jesus Christ, the Way, the Truth, and the Life, then those little flashes are in a way an encounter with God, all be it, one severely limited by our human finiteness and lack of faith. But they are a glimpse of God nonetheless even if as the apostle to the Gentiles says, "At present we see indistinctly, as in a mirror, but then face to face. At present I know partially; then I shall know fully" 1 Cor 13:12

Back to the first verse though, this quotation of Isaiah by Jesus has been at the center of a few of these "aha!" moments the last couple weeks. The start of Christ's public ministry in Capernum on the Sea of Galilee and His childhood in Nazareth were a scandal to the Jews. Even one of the future apostles, Nathaniel remarked, "Can anything good come from Nazareth?" when Phillip came and told him he had found the Messiah: Jesus, son of Joseph, of Nazareth. Nathaniel's consternation was understandable though for Nazareth a part of Galilee, as the verse from Isaiah says, was the land of the Gentiles, half pagan territory. That God chose to raise up the shoot of Jesse there among the impure was almost inconceivable to the Jewish mind of the time, a true "sign of contradiction." Through his Providence though, God's only son was raised in Nazareth, at least in part, to show from the very beginning that God's plan of salvation was for all people, not only the Jews. There is something so powerful to me in this verse from Matthew: "the people who sit in darkness have seen a great light, on those dwelling in a land overshadowed by death light has arisen."

Just as beautiful is the full prophecy from Isaiah chapter 8 that Jesus is quoting:

First [the Lord] degraded the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali; but in the end he has glorified the seaward road, the land west of the Jordan, the District of the Gentiles. Anguish has taken wing, dispelled is darkness;/ for there is no gloom where but now there was distress./ The people who walked in darkness/ have seen a great light;/ upon those who dwelt in the land of gloom/ a light has shone./ You have brought them abundant joy/ and great rejoicing,/ as they rejoice before you as at the harvest,/ as men make merry when dividing spoils./ For the yoke that burdened them,/ the pole on their shoulder,/ and the rod of their taskmaster/ you have smashed, as on the day of Midian.

Embracing the Catholic both/and approach I see at least two distinct meanings in these verses. The first is that we are the people who "sit in darkness". I especially like how the verb is in the present tense. It reminds me of Isaiah 65:1, "I was found [by] those who were not seeking me; I revealed myself to those who were not asking for me." In our stupor in the squalor of sin the great light of Christ has shown upon us and his message(the very next thing He says in Matthew after quoting Isaiah), "Repent for the kingdom of Heaven is at hand" has resounded through the night. As the Apostle says, "While we were still sinners Christ died for us." Rm 5:8. We did nothing to seek this light or the message of our salvation. We are powerless to save ourselves.

However this freely given gift of Christ, of Life itself, requires a response and therein lies the second meaning. "You are the light of the world," as Christ tells His disciples in the next chapter of Matthew. We are called to be reflections, images of our God and savior and so not only are we those who walked in darkness (notice the past tense of the verse in Isaiah) but we are now also the light which has arisen in the land overshadowed by death. As part of the Body of Christ, the Church, we are called to make present to whole world the saving message of Christ. As Isaiah says, the the yoke that burdened us, the pole on our shoulder, and the rod of our taskmaster, sin, has been smashed by Christ's sacrifice on the cross. What else could our response be but "abundant joy, and great rejoicing" before our Lord. We are called to imitate Christ's humility for He became like us in all things except sin, being born in a pagan, backwater region, so that He could make known his perfect Love to all peoples. Like our Master, Christ, we too have been put, through God's Providence, into a specific place in the world to bring the great light to those who sit in the shadow of death. We are called to be in the world but not of it. We are not seraphims descending from on high, we are of the same people, culture, and nationality as those that in sit in the darkness and we are called to rise up from where we sit to make the Love of Christ known to those around us.

How is God calling you to make the land overshadowed by death a little more illumined by the love of Christ? God bless you dear brothers and sisters, you are in my prayers always, and until next we meet, see you in the Eucharist!

The Good Samaritan

Ok so I know it has been very much too long since I last posted and it'll be a little bit longer yet but I did want to share this reflection from Fr. Mark because it really touched me. And I promise there will be a post from me soon, there be some ideas swirling, finally. lol. God bless y'all, see you in the Eucharist.


The Mystery of the Good Samaritan

Today's Gospel, the parable of the Good Samaritan, is familiar to us. It is, perhaps, too familiar. That may be the problem. We assume that we have grasped its message when, in fact, its message may not yet have grasped our hearts. The Fathers of the Church discerned a mystery -- that is to say, something hidden -- in the story of the Good Samaritan: the mystery of the healing mercy of God revealed in Christ.

God Suffers at the Sight of Our Suffering

The Good Samaritan is none other than Christ Himself. In the days of His flesh, as He journeyed in this world, Christ came to where we were (cf. Lk 10:33). And when He saw all of us, sinners, stripped, and beaten, and left for dead in a ditch, He had compassion (cf. Lk 10:33). The human Heart of God was moved. God, looking upon us through the eyes of His Christ, suffered at the sight of our suffering.

Ethical Religion Alone Is Not Enough

It would be altogether too facile to reduce the message of today's gospel to its ethical demands alone, to hear it exclusively in terms of a social imperative. Be good. Be sensitive. Be caring. Show mercy. It is, of course, all of that.

In Chapter IV of the Holy Rule Saint Benedict counts the corporal and spiritual works of mercy among the Instruments of Good Works.

Saint Vincent de Paul writes that "we must try to be stirred by our neighbors' worries and distress. We must beg God to pour into our hearts sentiments of pity and compassion and to fill them again and again with these dispositions."

Our Lord said to Saint Faustina: "I demand of you deeds of mercy, which are to arise out of love for me. You are to show mercy to your neighbours always and everywhere. You must not shrink from this or try to excuse or absolve yourself from it."

Wanting to Be Splendid

All of that being said, there is more to the parable of the Good Samaritan.
Most of us prefer to cast ourselves in the role of the Samaritan rather than to see ourselves in the one robbed, stripped, forsaken, and half-dead. The Samaritan is the hero. The Samaritan keeps the upper hand in the story. The Samaritan is splendid. Who among us does not, at least sometimes, want to be splendid?

Salvation in the Gutter

Churches are full of splendid people and of people who want to be splendid. We needed the teaching of a twenty-four year old Doctor of the Church to see that holiness is not about being splendid at all. Saint Thérèse tells that it is, rather, about accepting that we have landed in the gutter, that we are in fact without resources, stripped, wounded, half-dead, and utterly incapable of changing any of that by ourselves. The God who bends over our souls with a face of indescribable tenderness, the God who touches our wounds with the strong and gentle hands of mercy, meets us not in the high places, not in Jerusalem, nor in Jericho, nor on the road of a splendid progress, but in the gutter of our absolute need of Him.

Discerning the Face, the Heart, the Hands of Christ

In the Samaritan of today's gospel, the Fathers of the Church discern the face, the heart, the hands of Christ. Christ is near us in our poverty, near us in our nakedness, nearer to us when we are broken and brought very low than we when we are splendid and marching on. "A Samaritan, as he journeyed, came to where he was; and when he saw him, he had compassion" (Lk 10:33).

Christ Stops for Each of Us

Christ comes to where we are and, seeing us, has compassion. Christ stops for each of us; He binds up our wounds, pouring oil and wine upon them, cleansing and disinfecting them, healing them with the medicine of His Spirit and of His Blood. Christ lifts us from where He finds us. He brings us to the inn of His Father's healing hospitality where He cares for us, and pays all our expenses.

The Human Face of God

When the poor man opened his eyes to see who it was who was caring for him with such tenderness he beheld a human face. Christ is the human Face of God, the Face we behold when we open our eyes to see who it is who is caring for us. In the end, it is the experience of this Face that changes us. It is in the closeness of this Face to ours, with, as Blessed Elizabeth of the Trinity said, "His eyes in our eyes," and with the warmth of His breath upon us, that we are resurrected to newness of life and sent back to the road whence we came to "go and do likewise" (Lk 10:37).