Wake Up; Call upon God

In today's first reading, Jonah 1: 1-2: 2, 11, the Lord said to Jonah:  "Set out for the great city of Nineveh, and preach against it; their wickedness has come up before me."   The wickedness in today's world also comes up before God.  Is it possible, as in the case of Jonah who fled to Tarshish "away from the Lord,"  that many people today are also fleeing from God, doing whatever possible to escape following God's will to address the corruption, the deception, the wickedness of sin-laden humankind?  Is it possible that the turbulence in any part of the world--natural or man-made "storms" --are the result of our having abandoned God?   Do we need someone, as did Jonah, to confront us with the question: "What are you doing asleep? Rise up, call upon your God. Perhaps God will be mindful of us so that we may not perish"  in our wickedness!

With the psalmist, in today's responsorial psalm, we pray:

Out of [our] distress [we call] to the Lord, 
and he [answers us]; 
From the midst of the nether world [of corruption, deception, and violation of law and of people's rights  [we cry] out for help,
and you [hear our voices].for you cast [us] into the deep [of sin-infested behaviors], into the heart of the sea [of an abundance of lies and abuses of power],
and the flood [envelops us];
All your breakers and your billows
[pass over us].
Then I said, 'I am banished from your sight!
...When my soul fainted within me,
I remembered the Lord; 
[Our] prayer reached you...'"

Lord, God, have mercy upon us who have strayed from the path of righteousness, truth and justice in the search for wealth or an abundance of material things and pleasures of all kinds, especially pleasure at the expense of the innocent.  Forgive us, Lord, for wanting things our way instead of Your way and the way Jesus modeled for us!

The Lord, Your God Wills Your Holiness/Wholeness

In  today's first reading, Leviticus 19: 1-2, 11-18, the Lord says to Moses and to us:   "Be holy, for I, the Lord, your God, am holy." How, we ask, are we to be holy as the Lord, our God, is holy? Is that not impossible? For us, on our own, yes. For us, with God, no!  God can do all things and that includes putting us on the path to holiness when we stray!

I was getting caught in a pattern of thinking that is detrimental to grace.  As I recognized the pattern, I began to pray the mantra:  "Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me, a sinner."  As soon as my mind drifted back to negative thinking, I returned to the mantra.  I woke up refreshed, consulted a friend, who set me right and reminded me of what my mission is and how I allowed myself to get pulled into issues that are not my responsibility to resolve and over which I was obsessing. How free I felt and grateful for God's grace at work in me as soon as I turned to the Lord for help and realized how right my friend was in her counsel of me! And, yes, God had put me back on the path of holiness and wholeness!

What do you do when you recognize that you are on a dangerous path, one that will lead you away from what God wants of you?  What helps you experience the freedom and the peace that only God can give? What puts you back on the path to holiness, that is, to wholeness and becoming the person God intends you to become?

Seeking God's Protection

In today's first reading, 2 Kings 19: 9b-11, 14-21, 31-35a, 36,  the king of Judah is taunted by the king of Assyria. Assyria has destroyed many countries and next on their list is Judah!  A threatening letter is sent to the king of Judah, who takes refuge in the Lord. He goes into the Temple and reads the letter to the Lord and then prays: "O Lord, God of Israel, enthroned upon the cherubim! You alone are God over all the kingdoms of the earth. You have made the heavens and the earth. Incline your ear, O Lord, and listen! Open your eyes, O Lord, and see! Hear [the threats of the king of Assyria, taunting] the living God. Truly, O Lord, the kings of Assyria have laid waste the nations and their lands, and cast their gods into the fire; they destroyed them because they were not gods, but the work  of human hands, wood and stone. Therefore, O Lord, our God, save us from the power of this man, that all the kingdoms of the earth may know that you alone, O Lord, are God."  The Assyrians did not succeed in their plans to destroy Judah!

It seems as though the Assyrians in warring with other nations and destroying them and then threatening Judah may have been attempting to become THE nation, superior to all others. Is that what is happening in the world of today by dictatorial regimes? The King of Judah sought help from the Lord God!  What do you and I do when leaders of world powers threaten one another? Do we go into the Temple of the Lord and share our concerns with God as did the king of Judah?  And just as importantly, what do we do when evil from within and without threaten our security in the Lord?

Seeking God's Help

In today's first reading, 2 Kins 17: 5-8, 13-15a, 18, we read about the consequences of the people of Israel having "venerated other gods,"  having "followed the rites of the nations whom the Lord had cleared out of the way of the children of Israel and the kings of Israel..."  The people of Israel and of Judah were warned to give up their "evil ways and keep [God's] commandments and statues, in accordance with the entire law..."  The people "did not listen, but were stiff-necked as their fathers, who had not believed in the Lord their God. They rejected...the warning which he had given them, till, in his great anger against Israel, the Lord put them away out of his sight. Only the tribe of Judah was left."

What, do you think, God is saying to us here in the 21st century?  Are leaders of various nations throughout  the world, are you, am I, venerating other gods"?  Are we following precepts that are contrary to what God is asking of us? Are we involved in "evil ways,"  not listening, not heeding, any of the warnings that God is sending to us to alert us of being on a path that will lead, ultimately, to our downfall, to a disastrous end that could be avoided if we followed God's ways?

As in today's responsorial psalm, we pray:  "Help us with your right hand, O Lord, and answer us,...for worthless is the help of men." Help us, Lord, right the wrongs in which we are involved as a nation, as a society, as a church, as a family, as individuals.  I ask this in Jesus' name. Amen!

God's Providence

Today's first reading, Ex 2: 1-15a, tells the story of Moses' birth, his being placed in "a papyrus basket, daubed...with bitumen and pitch," and hidden in some reeds on the river bank. The baby was found at age three months by an Egyptian woman who recognized the boy as very special and belonging to an Israelite woman. He is rescued and eventually adopted by Pharaoh's daughter as her own son and given the name "Moses," meaning "I drew him out of the waters." When Moses grew up and saw an Egyptian fighting with one of his own kinsmen, he killed him. Fearing that Pharaoh found out about the murder, Moses fled to Midian.

The first stanza of today's Responsorial Psalm, Ps. 69, describes Moses' plight: "I am sunk in the abysmal swamp where there is no foothold; I have reached the watery depths; the flood overwhelms me."

You and I--in our sinfulness, in the weaknesses to which we give in when we lord it over others, when we  need to have things work out our way and we refuse to compromise, when we are obnoxious and prideful, when we do not follow the Spirit's lead--can also sink  into "the abysmal swamp where there is no foothold; [we can then reach] the watery depths; the flood [then can overwhelm us]."

With today's psalmist, I "pray to you, O Lord, for the time of your favor...In your great kindness answer me with your constant help....I will praise the name of God in song, and I will glorify him with thanksgiving...."

As we prayed yesterday at the liturgy,  "our help is in the name of the Lord" (Psalm 124).  With God at our sides, we will not sink into the "abysmal swamp where there is no foothold."

Facing Evil in our Lives

In today’s first reading, Esther C: 12, 14-16, 23-25, we learn of Esther’s desperate prayer for God’s help. “…[S]eized with mortal anguish, [Esther] had recourse to the Lord. She lay prostrate upon the ground, together with her handmaids, from morning until evening, and said: ‘God of Abraham, God of Isaac, and God of Jacob, blessed are you. Help me, who am alone and have no help but you, for I am taking my life in my hand.’” She was determined to approach the King of Persia. To enter his presence without an invitation could mean death.  She says to the Lord: “Put in my mouth persuasive words in the presence of the lion and turn his heart to hatred for our enemy [the enemy of the Jewish people], so that he and those who are in league with him may parish. Save us from the hand of our enemies; turn our mourning into gladness and our sorrows into wholeness.” 

How apropos are those words for today.  We, too, face an enemy, a hatred, we alone are not able to overcome. We need divine intervention, as did the Israelites as we face Isis, Al-Quaeda, those bent on destroying Christians and Jews and others whose beliefs differ from their own.  We also need God’s help in facing the enemies of truth and justice, right doing and right being, all of which are being attacked by immoral practices, unjust judgments, and misguided actions by those who promote human trafficking, drug trafficking, abortion on demand, sex trafficking, slave labor and consumeristic, materialistic, and narcissistic pursuits at the risk of destroying the poor, the vulnerable, the helpless and immigrant populations in our midst.

With Esther, let us have recourse to God day and night. Let us ask for persuasive words in the presence of “the lions” of hatred and evil that we may courageously stand up to those forces in our society that will destroy our children and grandchildren and bring all of us to ruin spiritually.  And with Jesus on the cross, let us thirst for good in this world to triumph over evil. 

Turning to the Lord in our Need

“Turn to the Lord in your need, and you will live” (Ps. 69).  In today’s first reading, Ex 2: 1-15a, we learn of the beginnings of Moses’ life, how he was saved, adopted by Pharaoh’s daughter and raised by her. As an adult Moses sees one of his kinsmen being abused by an Egyptian. Moses intervenes and kills the attacker, thinking no one will see him. The next day he discovers that what he did is, in fact, no secret and he flees for his life.

We may not be fleeing for such serious offenses but we flee nevertheless for less serious ways of bringing distress, hurt and pain into another person’s life. None of us is exempt from doing or saying things that could put us at enmity with another. Sometimes we find ourselves in such a situation because of how an innocent situation is interpreted as “wrong” by the other. As the psalmist says in today’s responsorial psalm, Psalm 69: 3, 14, 30-31, 33-34:

“I am sunk in the abysmal swamp

Where there is no foothold;
I have reached the watery depths;
The flood overwhelms me”

The swamp may be the other person’s anger or one’s own guilt, anger or powerlessness to change what has been done or to elicit understanding from the offended person.  As with the psalmist, we are invited  to recognize our need for God’s help, less we sink into the swamp of our own anger, drown in “the watery depth” of self-pity or be flooded by a desire to retaliate in some way.

“…I pray to you, O Lord,

For the time of your favor, O God!
In your great kindness answer me
with your constant help….
[L]et your saving help, O God, protect me
[from my own sinfulness and selfishness,
my own desire to be right and in control].”

And the psalmist says to me in the same psalm:

“See, you lowly ones [I am one of those lowly ones] and be glad;

You who seek God, may your hearts revive!
For the Lord hears the poor,
And his own who are in bonds he spurns not.”

May you discover this fact today and always as you deal with the conflicts of life.