Today all Catholics throughout the
world will have a grumble in their stomach. That means more than 1
billion people world-wide and around 75 million here in the US,
except for those who are too young or too old , who will feel
light-headed or weak. Today, Catholics fast, a traditional sign of
grieving.
Why do we fast? I think for two
reasons: both because when people are distraught, they don't even
think about food, and because it kind of hurts.
We are distraught. We are in a harsh,
sad, scary situation because our lives are riddled with sinfulness.
We realize that something is really not right in our lives without
God.
Secondly, we fast because it hurts. In
a world that constantly runs away from pain, we spiritualize it and
take it upon ourselves. We give pain a deeper meaning so that it is
no longer oppressive, but somehow liberating. Today our pain doesn't
conquer us, we conquer it. Why? How?
Because of the Cross and the
Resurrection.
Today's readings tell us there is a bad
way to fast, and a good way. There's a bad way to celebrate Lent,
and there's a good way.
Today we get that in just a few words
from the prophet Joel: Rend your hearts, not your garments, and
return (Hebrew shoov,
“repent”) to the
Lord your God. “Get everyone
together and ask for God's mercy.” Yes, but there is more to it
than that. Jesus explains further: “Don't do all this for show;
don't do it to look good. If you do it for that, then that's all you
will get. God won't reward show-offs. He rewards what is done in
secret.” The prophet Isaiah in Ch. 58:1-12, gives a more
detailed explanation: Don't sit around with ashes,
See,
on your fast day you carry out your own pursuits, and drive all your
laborers.b
4See,
you fast only to quarrel and fight and to strike with a wicked fist!
Is this the manner of fasting I would choose, a day to afflict
oneself?...Is this what you call a fast? ...Is this not, rather, the
fast that I choose: releasing those bound unjustly, untying the
thongs of the yoke; Setting free the oppressed, breaking off every
yoke?7Is
it not sharing your bread with the hungry, bringing the afflicted and
the homeless into your house; Clothing the naked when you see them,
and not turning your back on your own flesh?
Abraham Joshua Heschel was a devout
Jewish scholar who recently died. When we studied him in Prophets
class I was really amazed at the way he expressed what Isaiah and
Joel are talking about here: all those sacrifices you do, all that
ritual, is just a pathetic empty show in the face of God if you just
go out and do exactly the opposite of what He really wants. Heschel
says: “Deeds of injustice vitiate both sacrifice and prayer. Men
may not drown the cries of the oppressed with the noise of hymns, nor
buy off the Lord with increased offerings. The prophets disparaged
the cult when it became a substitute for
righteousness...Righteousness is not just a value; it is God's part
of human life, God's stake in human history. Perhaps
it is because the suffering of man is a blot upon God's conscience;
because it is in relations between man and man that God is at stake.
Or is it simply because the infamy of a wicked act is infinitely
greater than we are able to imagine? People act as they please,
doing what is vile, abusing the weak, not realizing that they are
fighting God, affronting the divine, or that the oppression of man is
a humiliation of God.”
So, let's start Lent off right: with a
fasting pleasing to God. Let's spend today not on our own pursuits,
but upon God's. In class, in our homework, in whatever else we do
today, we don't do it for ourselves, for show. We do it for God.
And during our free time, we look for what good we can do, for how we
can “free the oppressed” so that our sacrifice is not a mockery
of God to His face.
As we begin this season, we get two
homilies in one Mass. The first you just heard. The second is the
liturgy's: ashes and a command. I am kind of jealous, but not
really, because I know these ashes are going to do much more for you
than my homily; for while the latter might go in one ear and out the
other, these ashes will remain with you all day. You will feel them
again and again, and you will recall the words spoken to you.
There are two options for what you are
told: Repent and believe in the Gospel. And:
Remember, man, that you are dust and to dust you shall
return.
God calls you to reflect on this
command he gives you: Repent and believe! Remember! This is your
second homily today.
Let us live this Lent so as to be
worthy of Easter.
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