A Lectio Divina Approach to the Sunday Liturgy
BREAKING THE BREAD OF THE WORD (Series 5, n. 38)
20th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year C – August 19, 2007
“Sign of Contradiction”
BIBLE READINGS
Jer 38:4-6, 8-10 // Heb 12:1-4 // Lk 12:49-53
N.B. Series 5 of BREAKING THE BREAD OF THE WORD: A LECTIO DIVINA APPROACH TO THE SUNDAY LITURGY includes a prayerful study of the Sunday liturgy of Year C from the perspective of the First Reading. For another set of reflections on the Sunday liturgy of Year C, please go to the PDDM Web Archives: WWW.PDDM.US and open Series 2.
I. BIBLICO-LITURGICAL REFLECTIONS
I was in my third year of high school when I came across Leo Tolstoy’s voluminous novel, “War and Peace”. I found it so interesting and irresistible that I did not go to school for three days in order to read it from cover to cover. Since then, I was filled with fascination for this Russian “prophet”. I really appreciated his profound commitment to Christ’s teaching on love, compassion and non-violence. Last week I was enthralled when I found Peter White’s article, “The World of Tolstoy” in the June 1986 edition of the National Geographic (cf. p. 758-791). It contains some wonderful information on Leo Tolstoy, which I am sharing here.
Count Tolstoy was deeply inspired by Christ’s Sermon on the Mount, especially his moral exhortation, “Resist not evil” (cf. Mt 5:39), but instead, “Return good for evil”. This would be at the heart of Tolstoy’s doctrine on universal love, moral self-improvement and non-violence as eventually expressed in his work, “The Kingdom of God Is Within You”. India’s Mahatma Gandhi was greatly influenced by Leo Tolstoy. He avowed that when he read Tolstoy’s work, “The Kingdom of God Is Within You” he was overwhelmed. Having exchanged correspondence with Tolstoy, Gandhi was cured of his skepticism and became a firm believer in ahimsa, nonviolence. Through Gandhi’s program of nonviolent struggle, India would later be free from British rule.
Leo Tolstoy, however, was a “sign of contradiction”. His radical view on non-violence was greatly opposed. While praising Tolstoy as a genius who drew incomparable pictures of Russian life and castigated social falsehood and hypocrisy, the communist leader Lenin considered his advocacy of nonresistance to evil as “crackpot preaching” and deplored his inability to understand the class struggle – that a better life could be achieved through the violent overthrow of capitalism by the proletariat.
In his novel, “Resurrection” Tolstoy indicted the tsarist courts and prison system. The Russian Orthodox Church was angered by his comments in this book against the state religion. The Holy Synod declared Count Tolstoy a false prophet accusing him of undermining the faith. He was excommunicated, but there was an outpouring of sympathy from other segments of the Russian society.
Conscience-stricken and upset by the plight of the poor, Count Tolstoy opted for a simplified life and dedicated more greatly his literary pursuits to socio-religious themes. His wife Sonya did not share his zeal for reform and for his new lifestyle that was simple and austere – for example, making himself a brew of barley and acorns because coffee was a luxury! She was chagrined that he chose to work on pugnacious tracts that put people off, when he could be producing wonderful novels that would bring in lots of money. Tolstoy did not care about money, but she had to, otherwise what would become of their children? Unable to bear no longer the divisive and oppressive situation at home and detesting the luxury found in his estate, Yasnaya Polyana, the 82-year old Tolstoy left home on November 10, 1910, accompanied only by his doctor. He fell ill on a southbound train and died at a stationmaster’s house on November 20, 1910. Indeed, Leo Tolstoy is a fascinating figure – a modern day example of a prophet of contradiction.
This Sunday’s Old Testament reading (Jer 38:4-6, 8-10) depicts the story of Jeremiah – a prophet of contradiction in biblical history – a man of strife and contention to all the land. Today’s reading recounts an episode in his life when Jerusalem was under siege by Nebuchadnezzar (beginning of 588 B.C. to July 587 B.C.). As the armies of Babylon were preparing for an assault on Jerusalem, the prophet Jeremiah continued to speak the truth about the inner rot of his nation. Prophesying to the people of Judah, particularly its wealthy and ruling elite, he riled against their corruption, injustice to the poor, and other myriad sins that were offensive to God and would result in self-inflicted woes and disasters. Jeremiah addressed King Zedekiah and his people that unless they repent and return to God, they would be destroyed. Instead of responding positively and humbly to his appeal to conversion, the officials rebuffed and rejected Jeremiah. They falsely accused him of disloyalty and treason. Prevailing upon the feckless King Zedekiah, the princes threw Jeremiah into a cistern where he sank into the mud, almost dying from starvation and the harsh environment.
The biblical scholar, Eugene Maly comments: “Jeremiah really never had a chance to be popular if he was to tell the truth, for the truth was that Judah was doomed. The Babylonians were infinitely more powerful. Judah’s only hope for some kind of survival was surrender. That is what Jeremiah told the people over and over again. But to talk surrender was to be disloyal. So thought the royal princes who no doubt represented the popular opinion. And the king let them have their way with the prophet. Their way was confining him in a cistern. That would keep him from spreading his treachery and maybe teach him to be their kind of prophet, not God’s kind. Jeremiah was no masochist. He did not enjoy being treated harshly, as his confessions abundantly prove (cf. 15:10-18). Nor did he want to prophesy doom for his country. God was allowing this to happen to them because of the people’s faithlessness. This was his word to Jeremiah and that Word was like a fire burning within him that he could not restrain (cf. 20:7-9).”
The dry well into which Jeremiah was thrown was an image of a broken covenant. The cistern without life-giving water indicated the deplorable situation of the people of Judah who had embraced other gods, turning away from Yahweh, the wellspring of life. The inevitable consequence of their alienation and turning away from God was death and destruction. In the summer of 587 B.C. the Babylonians overran Jerusalem and Jeremiah’s prophecy of doom came true. The destruction of the nation was complete. The prophet’s word was vindicated.
Indeed, it is God who vindicates his prophet. Despised as a “sign of contradiction”, the uncompromising prophet turns to the Lord God for help and vindication. Barbara Bozak explains: “A prophet is always in one way or another a sign of contradiction to the people. Fidelity to the Word and his mission expose him to misunderstanding of his neighbors, often to mistreatment, sometimes even to death. The confessions of Jeremiah testify to this: he truly experienced the fact that God is dangerous … The prophet willingly runs the risk of exposing himself to the dangerous God and his Word. This is what makes him a witness, a martyr. If thus it falls to him, he remains unshaken, secure in his faith with utmost confidence in the help of God who will never fail him, knowing that he will emerge victoriously for the trial.”
Against the backdrop of the Old Testament prophet, Jeremiah who was “a man of strife and contention to all the land”, the figure of Jesus acquires greater depth and meaning. By his uncompromising obedience to his Father’s saving will and through his paschal sacrifice on the cross, Jesus became the ultimate sign of contradiction, surpassing Jeremiah and other faithful prophets. In the first part of this Sunday’s Gospel, we hear Jesus speaking about the deep anguish of his soul: “I have come to set the earth on fire, and how I wish it were already blazing! There is a baptism with which I must be baptized, and how great is my anguish until it is accomplished!” (Lk 12:49-50). The “fire” that Jesus greatly desired to enkindle was the Pentecostal fire of the Spirit of God, his Easter gift to the Church. But in order for this fire to be set ablaze, Jesus needed to undergo the “baptism” and bloodbath of his paschal sacrifice. It was necessary for him to be immersed into the painful experience of passion and death that would lead to his resurrection, glorification and the sending forth of the life-giving and transforming Holy Spirit. With anguished desire, the ultimate “prophet of contradiction” Jesus Christ plunged into his saving mission and endeavored to attain its goal: to engulf the earth and entire creation with the fire of the vivifying Spirit after being submerged in the bloodbath of his passion and death.
The second part of this Sunday’s Gospel concerns the divisions that Jesus’ mission creates, even in families. The way of Jesus – the “sign destined to be opposed” - catalyzes separations and provokes conflicts among those who had made a radical choice for him and those who had not. Aelred Rosser remarks: “The division Jesus speaks of with such force (listing several familial relationships for emphasis) is an inevitable consequence of well-lived faith. Into every life there comes a time when the choice to be truly Christian comes into conflict with another choice – perhaps a good choice. When that moment comes, we recognize the division Jesus brought into the world. The peace that comes from making the right choice is also something Jesus brought, but it is his peace, not the kind of peace the world gives.”
Jesus’ gift of peace, which comes from God and is a result of his immersion into the bloodbath of his paschal sacrifice, is not a facile kind of peace. The authors of the Days of the Lord, vol. 6, explicate: “To welcome the peace of the kingdom which Jesus gives and which is only attained through the cross, places believers in a situation where they are sometimes set in conflict with others. For this peace rests on faith, the choice for Christ and the kingdom, which necessarily involves detachment from, if not rejection of, all that is opposed to Christ and the Gospel or that is incompatible with the choice one makes for it … Every human life is confronted, at some point or another, with choices that in some instances demand real heroism. The situation becomes particularly distressing when one finds oneself torn between faithfulness to God, faith, and the gospel, and on the other hand, to family, friends, and country … Such was the drama of Jeremiah and so many others who, out of fidelity to the Word, preferred to hand themselves over rather than save their lives. In this they prefigure Jesus, the sign of contradiction, who had only one urgent desire: to see the fire of the Spirit come upon the earth after he had received the baptism of his passion.”
II. POINTS FOR THE EXAMINATION OF THE HEART
A. What are our various experiences of contradiction, alienation and opposition? How do we relate these painful and upsetting experiences with those of Jeremiah? Like Jeremiah, are we willing to be a “sign of contradiction” in order to uphold and proclaim the Word of God? Are we willing to trust in God and undergo painful sacrifices and opposition for the sake of the living Word and the divine saving plan?
B. What is the “fire” that Jesus desired to set ablaze upon earth? What was the baptism that he was yearning to undergo? Do we desire to be plunged with Jesus in his paschal “baptism”? Do we desire to be inflamed by the “fire” that Jesus enkindles in our heart? Do we contemplate the beauty of Jesus’ self-giving sacrifice and his gift of the Holy Spirit?
C. Why does the peace that Jesus bring lead to divisions? Do we welcome the peace of Christ and its commitment to Christ and the kingdom? Are we willing to embrace the detachment, renunciation and opposition that the peace of Christ may entail? Are we willing to be fully united with Christ and become, in him, a “sign of contradiction” in today’s world?
III. PRAYING WITH THE WORD
Leader: Lord Jesus Christ, you said to your apostles: I leave you peace, my peace I give you. Look not on our sins, but on the faith of your Church, and grant us the peace and unity of your kingdom.
Assembly: Lamb of God, you take away the sins of the world: have mercy on us. Lamb of God, you take away the sins of the world: have mercy on us. Lamb of God, you take away the sins of the world: grant us peace.
IV. INTERIORIZATION OF THE WORD
The following is the bread of the living Word that will nourish us throughout the week. Please memorize it.
“Do you think that I have come to establish peace on the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division.” (Lk 12:51)
V. TOWARDS LIFE TRANSFORMATION
A. ACTION PLAN: Pray that the “prophets of contradiction” of today may give a limpid and courageous witness to truth. Pray for the modern means of social communication that they may be rightly used to proclaim the truth, and not to distort the truth. While avoiding facile compromises and easy tradeoffs, endeavor to bring the peace of Christ to a distressing situation that needs healing and reconciliation. Be courageous to be a “sign of contradiction” when the situation calls for it.
B. ACTION PLAN: To help us become more faithful witnesses of Christ in today’s world, even to the point of becoming a “sign of contradiction”, make an effort to spend an hour in Eucharistic Adoration. Visit the PDDM WEB site (www.pddm.us) for the EUCHARISTIC ADORATION THROUGH THE LITURGICAL YEAR (Vol. 3, n. 38): A Weekly Pastoral Tool.
Prepared by Sr. Mary Margaret Tapang PDDM
PIAE DISCIPULAE DIVINI MAGISTRI
SISTER DISCIPLES OF THE DIVINE MASTER
60 Sunset Ave., Staten Island, NY 10314
Tel. (718) 494-8597 // (718) 761-2323
Website: WWW.PDDM.US