30 September 2020
Memorial of Saint Jerome, Priest and Doctor of the Church
In Job 9, Job reverently extols God’s greatness as the creator and sustainer of all that is. And yet, just man though Job is, at this point in the narrative, God’s greatness appears so crushing to Job that it seems to Job that there is no point even dialoguing with God: “Even though I were right, I could not answer him, but should rather beg for what was due me. If I appealed to him and he answered my call, I could not believe that he would hearken to my words” (Job 9:15-16). Many of us resist entering into the deeper relationship with God that Jesus offers precisely because we share the reticence that Job has at this point in the narrative. But the story does not end here. Later in the text, the righteous Job does boldly engage God, and not only does God not crush him, but God blesses him for it.
There is an improper way to challenge God, and we see this especially in the example of the fallen angels. But engaging God honestly, even railing at God, can be an expression of our acceptance of the genuine relationship that God offers each one of us. Jacob does not receive the name and the vocation of “Israel” until he has first wrestled with God through the angel that God sends (cf. https://www.magisspirituality.org/ignatian_reflection/19-08-07/). God invites each one of us into that same trusting and confident relationship with him, grounded in the messiness of the lives that God offers us.
If we enter into this relationship, perhaps our relationship with God will not seem as “virtuous” or as “perfect” to the outside observer as if we had refused to engage in a sort of false deference. But real saints have real passions and struggles that they place before God, and which God is able to elevate and transform. Today’s saint, Jerome, is an example of a saint whose passions and personality could make him seem like a bit of a jerk to the people who knew him. No doubt, some of those characteristics were real defects. But he placed all this into his very real and gritty relationship with the Lord whose Word captivated him, and that Word made Jerome a great instrument through which the Word of God has come to be known throughout the world in the language of the most common (and beloved) of peoples. May he intercede for us, that we, too, might have a true relationship with the Word in all that we live and are.