Wednesday of Week 34 in Ordinary Time (Year II)
Apocalypse 15:1-4 | Psalm 97(98):1-3,7-9 | Luke 21:12-19
Keep this carefully in mind: you are not to prepare your defence, because I myself shall give you an eloquence and a wisdom that none of your opponents will be able to resist or contradict. (Luke 21:14-15)
Brothers and sisters, when your faith is challenged by those who would seek to discredit you, how do you react?
Does your brain immediately kick into high gear, mentally grinding through all those long-forgotten catechism lessons from childhood or later? Does your body start pumping adrenaline to “power up” your body for spiritual battle?
Or do you relax and let something beyond your logical mind give you the words and deeds to address your detractors?
✞ ✞ ✞ ✞ ✞
I’ve written before about my oldest friend who’s quite the atheist, and how I’m grateful to God for bringing him into my life to poke some life into my faith. Now, though, I noticed that he doesn’t poke me much any more, and I think I know why.
He’s known that I’m a cradle Catholic for almost as long as he’s known me. Honestly, I wasn’t much of a Catholic back then, and even less so when our paths converged again during my college days.
In hindsight, he usually pokes me more often during the days when I struggled to live a proper Catholic life, as if he sensed my vulnerability.
But on the days when, as St. Patrick eloquently put it, I feel Christ before/behind/above/below/all around me, something in the way I carry myself, or the kindness and consideration I show to everyone around me, causes him to desist.
Lately, he’s been awfully quiet, which I suppose is a good thing.
✞ ✞ ✞ ✞ ✞
I think the same can be said for anyone facing criticism for believing in God, or anyone on the receiving end of a bully for that matter. Odds are good that whoever’s attacking us has sensed our vulnerability in matters of faith, and is naturally moving in for the kill. After all, only a fool would attack the shield of a strong opponent.
Perhaps he’s noticed us treating the hawker center cleaners with disdain (“Hallo, uncle, why you clean that table when I’m waiting over here?!”),
or studiously avoiding eye contact with the elderly tissue seller in the MRT station,
or something similar that points to a disparity between the love we profess and the mercy we don’t show,
all while a shiny crucifix dangles impotently around our neck.
Perhaps we focus too much on the trappings of our faith, on making a big production of going to Sunday mass (“wah, God, I’m making a HUGE sacrifice here you know, moving all my appointments around to accomodate You!”),
and too little time actually practising our faith, performing frequent works of mercy like giving up our seats on crowded transports, or being polite and cheerful to those who serve us each day,
to the point that they become second-nature to us, and therefore become our natural state, in blessed harmony with the Lord of Love.
✞ ✞ ✞ ✞ ✞
In today’s Gospel, Christ Himself promised to provide us with the necessary eloquence and wisdom to counter our opponents. I can think of no more eloquent or wise way to silence our critics, than to embody His mercy in our daily lives, to don the mantle of God’s grace in thought, word and deed.
So let us not be self-conscious about our belief in the God that the world has always rejected. Instead, let us overflow with unconscious love in our hearts, and channel it through our hands into merciful deeds, so that our tongues may be naturally loosened with the joy of proclaiming the all-consuming grace that is the I AM.
Amen.