Daily Retreat 08/30/06
2006 Aug 30 Wed: Ordinary Weekday
2 Thes 3: 6-10. 16-18/ Ps 127(128): 1-2. 4-5/ Mt 23: 27-32
From today’s readings: “May the Lord of peace Himself give you peace at all times and in every way.... Blessed are those who fear the Lord.... On the outside you appear righteous, but inside you are filled with hypocrisy and evildoing....”
If I had lived then....
There’s a tendency to look at dark moments of widespread iniquity in the distant past or faraway foreign places and imagine that we would have had the courage to stand uprightly against the mob mentality that left a shameful scar on the fabric of human history.
Perhaps we can give ourselves the benefit of the doubt, and at least hope that we would have unflinchingly protested the brutalities of the godless religious persecutions, or African slave trade, or French Revolution, or Nazi Germany.
But no matter what, what we would have done if we lived in different circumstances will never be more than mere matters of speculation. What does matter, however, is our way of life in our present and actual situation. What resistance do we show to the systemic and ubiquitous evils of our own day? Consider, for example: what will future generations think of our legal tolerance of abortion, and the disintegration of the family, and the indifference to true religion?
By self-righteously looking down on the past, the hypocritical scribes and Pharisees were too eager to give themselves the benefit of the doubt , claiming that they would have had no part in shedding the blood of the prophets. And yet, Christ’s woe-filled warnings to them in Jerusalem came just a few days before His Passion, and let’s at least admit that the Lord’s words are just as apt for our own generation....
2 Thes 3: 6-10. 16-18/ Ps 127(128): 1-2. 4-5/ Mt 23: 27-32
From today’s readings: “May the Lord of peace Himself give you peace at all times and in every way.... Blessed are those who fear the Lord.... On the outside you appear righteous, but inside you are filled with hypocrisy and evildoing....”
If I had lived then....
There’s a tendency to look at dark moments of widespread iniquity in the distant past or faraway foreign places and imagine that we would have had the courage to stand uprightly against the mob mentality that left a shameful scar on the fabric of human history.
Perhaps we can give ourselves the benefit of the doubt, and at least hope that we would have unflinchingly protested the brutalities of the godless religious persecutions, or African slave trade, or French Revolution, or Nazi Germany.
But no matter what, what we would have done if we lived in different circumstances will never be more than mere matters of speculation. What does matter, however, is our way of life in our present and actual situation. What resistance do we show to the systemic and ubiquitous evils of our own day? Consider, for example: what will future generations think of our legal tolerance of abortion, and the disintegration of the family, and the indifference to true religion?
By self-righteously looking down on the past, the hypocritical scribes and Pharisees were too eager to give themselves the benefit of the doubt , claiming that they would have had no part in shedding the blood of the prophets. And yet, Christ’s woe-filled warnings to them in Jerusalem came just a few days before His Passion, and let’s at least admit that the Lord’s words are just as apt for our own generation....
posted by FrPitstick | 8/29/2006
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