3 October 2018
Wednesday of the Twenty-sixth Week in Ordinary Time
As his friends tried to comfort him, Job asked, in exasperation, “But how can a man be justified before God” (Job 9:2)? The Christian answer to Job’s question is that the only way for a man or a woman to be justified before God is for there to be a miracle of divine grace. Furthermore, just such a miracle occurred in history, on a cross on a hill outside Jerusalem, long, long ago. The purpose of Ignatian Spirituality is to help the Christian to experience, at a deep level, that redemption which Christ won for us, hence the exercises of the “first week.” If you do not know what the “first week” exercises are, the best way to find out is to actually make the Spiritual Exercises. Do yourself a favor and don’t just look them up. Alternatively, you could try praying with Job 9:2, asking for the grace to be, like Job, perplexed, amazed and exasperated about the possibility of being justified before God. In such a way, you will better appreciate just how miraculous our salvation truly is.
Meanwhile, you might have to place on hold important theological questions that might distract you, such as: “What kind of a God would worry about whether people are justified before him?” “Aren’t we all innocent until proven guilty?” “Aren’t we all made in God’s image and likeness?” “Don’t we all have fundamental human dignity?”
These questions have important truths in them, so they deserve serious consideration. If you answer them in such a way as to underestimate or even to deny the redemption then you have gone astray. Remember what Jesus said: “I did not come to call the righteous but sinners” (Mark 2:17).