Twenty-fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time
Smoking and swearing. We know that both are bad for us. The one, while offering temporary ease of stress, often leads to damage of the lungs and any number of other important bodily organs and functions. The other, while allowing some expression of anger or frustration, often leads to decreased ability to understand and handle those emotions. Yet, what about the stress and the anger that are still there? The struggle to manage them without allowing them to push us into bad habits, may allow us to hear why St. James describes the spiritual struggle of the Christians to whom he writes as “passions that make war within your members?” (Jas 4:1)
The disciples, so recently taught by the Lord Jesus about the humility of the upcoming Passion, afraid because they do not understand what Jesus is saying, turn to the false comfort of arguing about who among them was better than all the others. (Mk 9:34) Of the various drives that we may sense within us, that urge to place myself ahead of others is the most dangerous. The book of Wisdom describes the wicked who have so given into this false comfort of pride that the simple meeting of the righteous one fills them with violent anger. (Wis 2:12, 19) Jesus knows the struggle of the disciples, and He knows the effects on their hearts and lives if they give up the struggle with out His help. So what does our Lord do for the disciples? What aid in our struggle does Jesus give to us? What is the opening He presents for grace to enter into our hearts and point us to true victory in spiritual combat?
“He said to them, ‘If anyone wishes to be first, he shall be the last of all and the servant of all.’ Taking a child, he placed it in their midst, and putting his arms around it, he said to them, ‘Whoever receives one child such as this in my name, receives me…’” (Mk 9:35-37) Our Lord who knows us gives the pride focused disciples the opposing virtue of humility and of littleness. To give the disciples an initial step in understanding the lesson of the Passion which He predicts, with His own embrace Jesus teaches them to receive a child who, with such great needs, the competition based world would ignore as only a drain on one’s time and resources which could be spent getting ahead of others. This week, as we present our hearts and our spiritual struggles to the Lord, let us ask for the grace to see where in our lives He is offering us concrete ways to love Him and our neighbor and so gain true and lasting victory.