Kent Beausoleil, S.J.

Homily: Seventh Sunday in Ordinary Time

Readings: Isaiah 43:18-19, 21-22, 24b-25; 2 Corinthians 1:18-22; 2 Corinthians 1:18-22

I had dated throughout highschool and college but those connections never resulted in the 'whip, zang, powie' that one usually associates with 'being in love'. It wasn't until I was a seminarian (yes a seminarian) in the year 1994 that I finally met someone that, through our getting to know another, resulted in those feelings of stomach churning, hope-filled, palm-sweating, can't imagine my life without this person feeling. The sad thing is that, since I was a seminarian, plus since at that time I was facing personal hardship at home with a dying father and fighting family, confounded with the fact that the person I was in love with was also in a religious order – the prognosis for things did not look good.

In fact, in the space of two-months, when the inevitable crap hit the fan, when dad did die, when the relationship did end, when I could no longer concentrate on studies and let go of my vocation, I faced my own dark night of the soul. For at that moment I lost it all, I thought everything was gone, I felt my life was nothing, that I was nothing, and I could not get off my own matt of depression. Yet over time, and with a lot of prayer, my own and others, a new love entered my heart and slowly the depression lifted enough to see that out of this suffering there was grace. For I was able to see, to reflect on the fact that through it all, God was deeply with me, that with God's care, with Christ's love, and the Spirit's strength in my life that I did not experience all this loss in vain. Through that one moment of extreme loss, my heart was broken, yes, but it was also with that broken-heart then that I lost finally the walls of my defenses so that I, in losing that life, could find it, could move to a deeper care of self, love of others, and praise of God. I could be graced with God, with the capacity to love myself, others, and God selflessly rather than selfishly, that my life was not worth nothing. With God's grace and healing I was able to pick up my matt and go.

So relationship, we all desire to be in relationship, we desire to have others love us, to know that we are loved by God, and to grow in healthy self-esteem. Yet there is so much in our lives, poor self image, addictive behavior, hatred in heart, violence and injustice in community, that keep us from being centered on God's loving plan for creation, that keeps us from fulfilling the best part of our selves and bringing the best out of one another. Scripture this day seeks to challenge us then to find the truth of what brings out the best in our relationships, with God, with others, with our very selves. Relationships are well, relational. They are circular things as they go out to the other and come back, finding hopefully in the interchange, a depth of being and a sense of shared love and care. So there is this connection then in our faith, in our spirituality, a sense of relational reciprocity between God and ourselves, between our physical body relating with our spiritual, psychological and emotional being, and between that self relating with our sisters and brothers in community and they with us. This relational reciprocity, or relational connection is called in scriptural terms covenant. Here, in covenant, there is a certain sense of obligation to being actively present to those we our bound too, an obligation to fulfill the agreement to bring our best to the relationship, whatever it may be, and whomever it may be with, God, self, or others, so that the relationship can thrive and flourish.

God's covenantal relationship is founded on what Hebrew biblical scholars call hesed. Hesed is a quality of loving-kindness, of mercy, of compassion. Whenever we hear of God's righteousness we must think then that the righteousness that flows from God is the fullness of God's capacity in giving hesed. And since hesed is what grounds God's relationship with us, it is what should ground all of our relationships with God, with self, and with others as well. Whenever loving-kindness, compassion, and mercy are not offered then all relationships are strained. And when hesed is withheld in the extreme through hurtful and sinful behavior then those relationships may snap, may break off, may end. We end up finding ourselves not receiving what we truly need or desire.

The power of word and sacrament carries us through, gives us hope this last Sunday before Lent, this day where we celebrate the Baptism of three beautiful children of God, as we look at what is elemental to faith – 'love and relationship'. First, Isaiah speaks of the relationship of God with us, a relationship of love that is founded on covenant, an agreement that God's promise of love, of a love that will never die. We know from faith that this undying love has been given and revealed to us in our resurrected Christ. Our God every day, in a relationship of love, indeed does something new for us. Truly, God's covenant remains always with us, for out of true love, God, in Christ revealed, and with the presence of the Holy Spirit, wipes out our sins, remembers our goodness, and remains with us. Second, Paul gives us the truth of Christ's love for us alive in community as we love one another. The word of love is never a yes and then no. Love is always a yes and is founded in our togetherness, in our hesed for one another. God's love has put Jesus' spirit of love in each one of us and it is this shared love that unifies us. We live Christ's love when we love others as God has loved us.

Finally, in Mark we learn that Jesus speaks God's healing word to us, the word that is love. The man in our story, a slave to his matt, found love in Christ's healing, yes, but found love also in community as those who carried him throughout life loved him enough to bring him to true healing. So healed and no longer a slave to his infirmity, to his matt, he was able to find new life, and a new capacity to love. We are called to respond to the power of loving-kindness in our lives through action. We too are not called to lie there. We are to pick up our lives and go from those places where we have been healed, get off the matts that we have been resting on, realize the healing we have received, and share that healing and rest with others. God's covenant of healing loving kindness and mercy should move us to act. Loved we must love. Our Sunday praise becomes meaningless then if we don't love in kind.

My grandfather on my mom's side died when I was two. He left me a diary in which he gave me a charge for life. That charge was in the form of a prayer. He writes, "my prayers to you, Kent Alan as you grow in wisdom and stature that you will always try to be a somebody and not just anybody, that you live a full life of honor and respect that you be a credit to those who love you'. As 'grandpappa' left me a charge, I believe God leaves us all our charge, our own personal life story, that becomes a testament to our capacity to love and forgive. We move into this lenten time so that we may shed that which needs to be shed in order to live our call to live life in relationship to the full.

We look into the pools of our own baptismal waters and see Christ urging us to get over any 'woe is me' attitude so that we own our goodness, so that we find the gift of our loving-kindness and mercy, so that we can relate to our sisters and brothers with compassionate mercy, and so that we can find our deepest joys as we praise God. We look inward and see Christ staring back at us charging us to transformation, asking each one of us, where, and in what parts of our life, do we need to die so that we might find life? God's covenantal hesed wishes us life in abundance, fullness in all our relationships, graces us with love. Why then, God laments, are we still stuck on our matts?

--
Kent Beausoleil, S.J.
(513) 745-3005 (Office)