10 November 2015
Memorial of Saint Leo the Great
What a consolation it is to reflect on today’s 1st reading. Why? Because we’ve been hearing so much about the interpretation of what the synod on the family said and didn’t say, about “the hermeneutic of continuity” and of “the hermeneutic of rupture”. It becomes wearisome.
The reading invites me to look for Wisdom, that is God, amidst all the confusion. He’s there in all that comes my way, in all the past events of history and in scripture. His presence in his absence reminds me of the old country western, “Every time the telephone don’t ring, you know it’s me.” He’s there, probably laughing at my incredulity and anxiety, “the hermeneutic of hope and humor.”
Then there’s the Gospel. To want to be the servant means to be the servant right up to the end. Jesus came “to serve; not to be served.” That ultimately led him to be the suffering servant.
He will never ask me to go that far, but I can take consolation in reflecting on how patient he was in training his apostles to serve. He has left me his word, the formula that gives me the know-how to progress in the same way. The more I serve with him the more I shall become like him. It is “the hermeneutic of confidence.”