Tuesday of the First Week of Ordinary Time

Lectionary: 306

Mt St Francis Lake in early spring

What is this?
A new teaching with authority.

The life of the mind is rightly celebrated in our western culture. By the power of the mind we have moved beyond the stone, bronze and iron ages into the atomic, computer and internet ages -- and beyond.

But sometimes we get intoxicated with our mental abilities. We think ideas are real; that they have substance. We sometimes fail to notice that our good ideas don’t really make any difference.

I am thinking of the alcoholic who knows the stuff is killing him but goes on drinking. He can recite the Big Book backward and forward; he talks about his Higher Power; he’s been through treatment many times; and yet he will not surrender in obedience to this simple program.  

Or the doctor who smokes; the priest who preaches joy without smiling. the parent who tells his child, “Do what I say and not what I do!”; the soldier who says, “We’ll bomb them back to the stone age and then they’ll get the message!”

Theirs is a serious disconnect between ideas and reality. They argue to win arguments. They use facts as weapons to overcome friends and enemies, but they do not love Truth.

Jesus saw the pathetic condition of human beings all around him. He saw their diseases and disabilities; their fears, resentments and suspicions. He saw their paralysis when faced with the opportunity to act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with our God.

Those who listened to him were healed, reconciled and set free. They were delighted by his authority, not by his ideas. They honored him as worthy of love, trust and worship.

Even today, those who listen to him make a difference. They bring us a new teaching with authority.