Friday of the 2nd Week of Eastertide
Acts 5:34-42 | Psalm 26(27):1,4,13-14 | John 6:1-15
What I suggest, therefore, is that you leave these men alone and let them go. If this enterprise, this movement of theirs, is of human origin it will break up of its own accord; but if it does in fact come from God you will not only be unable to destroy them, but you might find yourselves fighting against God. (Acts 5:38-39)
2,000 years later, I think Gamaliel has his answer. The “enterprise” that is the Roman Catholic Church has yet to be destroyed, though not for the modern world’s lack of trying.
The sexual peccadilloes of a few clergy have now become a widespread movement to both discredit the Church in its entirety…and possibly profit from priests’ mistakes.
The Theology of the Body runs up against a dark twist of the Lord’s own words: “This is my body, and I’ll do whatever the hell I want with it!”
The old refrain “six days in the world, and the seventh for God” has transformed into “I’m kinda busy, Lord, can I get back to you…sometime?”
The seven deadly sins keep a-calling, and they won’t ever let up.
But neither should we.
✞ ✞ ✞ ✞ ✞
I celebrated Fr. Paul Staes’ 80th birthday with many other folks last evening, and while he reminded everyone present about things that I’d heard him recount many times, he ended his little speech with something I’d completely forgotten, something that he himself wrote in a diary to keep in mind:
Always give to God and others what is right, not what is left.
It’s a timely reminder that even “honoring the sabbath” is too little. There’s something dreadfully amiss, if God-time has to scrounged from our lives’ leftovers.
Rather, it must be the reverse: the bulk of our lives should be consciously offered to the Father. Our rushed “good morning, God” prayer, a quick rosary on the way to work, quietly humming that touching hymn at Sunday mass while on a toilet break, all given to God with “thank You, Lord, for this opportunity to remember You, and celebrate Your presence in my life”.
ABC (Always Be Contemplating) holiness, both in the words of daily scripture and the people we encounter in our daily lives.
And then we let the world intrude, not as an all-consuming monster that takes over our every waking moment, but as a necessarily brief distraction from the center of our lives that is the Creator Himself. As Archbishop William Goh enlightened us all last night, Fr. Paul was famous for orchestrating the most efficient priestly senate meetings he’d ever attended, with strict limits on “talk time”.
Get worldly business sorted tout de suite, then get back to the Lord.
If we can all adopt that philosophy, this “enterprise” of ours will last forever.
Amen.