Thursday after Epiphany

Lectionary: 215

The Holy Family
in Mexican art

Beloved, we love God because
he first loved us.
If anyone says, “I love God,”
but hates his brother, he is a liar;
for whoever does not love a brother whom he has seen
cannot love God whom he has not seen.
This is the commandment we have from him:
Whoever loves God must also love his brother.

Christmas invites us to reflection and contemplation of the memory that resides in our genetic code: before we loved God, God loved us. That message was woven into the double helix of our genes at Baptism. Before we realized that we had set ourselves on the road to perdition, the Lord was anxious for us. Before we had any appreciation of the enormity of our sins, God’s son died to atone for our sins.

For many Christians and Catholics of my generation, our first experience of God was of a Benevolent Tyranny. We have to obey God, love God, keep God’s commandments, and avoid getting in trouble with God -- or else! We learned that experience of God from the disciplinarians of our early life: parents, teachers, ministers and – in some cases – the police. They meant well, and God bless them for it; but we did not find the affection of God in those relationships. God did not seem approachable or pleasant. He – and God was always a capitalized He – seemed always in a foul mood. He scrutinized our every thought, word and deed; kept a meticulous record of our sins; and never forgot any of them – especially if they remained un-confessed. The American playwright, Tennessee Williams, described that God as a “senile delinquent.”

It’s easy to argue with such a misconception; it’s not so easy to be delivered and healed of it. No matter how often we whiten that sepulcher, the corruption remains within, below one’s conscious control; and eager to eruct its putrefaction when we’re disappointed, hurt or angry.

And we’re especially disappointed when we encounter conflict with a Christian brother or sister. The semblance of fellowship suddenly vanishes in a display of internecine hatred. That is the moment in which Saint John’s teaching must slam into us. Our unwillingness to love our fellow Christians, to work out our differences and rediscover our mutual affection expose our lack of faith. Despite all our religious formation, we have not yet discovered the God who first loved us.

And so we return to Penance. Hopefully, religion has helped us to be favorably disposed toward healing and forgiveness. The practice of penance reveals our helplessness in the face of sin, and the overwhelming mercy of God. When we have dug a hole of meanness as deep as possible in the sand of our hearts, the Grace of God washes like an oceanic tide over it; filling, healing and erasing it entirely. Often we cannot even remember why we were so upset.

In that moment we realize the truth of Saint John’s teaching: “Beloved, we love God because he first loved us.”