Monday of the Twenty-seventh Week in Ordinary Time

Lectionary: 461

This is the word of the LORD that came to Jonah, son of Amittai:

"Set out for the great city of Nineveh, and preach against it;

their wickedness has come up before me."

To Jonah's great disappointment, and the amazement of countless generations, the people of Nineveh welcomed the Good News of God's wrath that was about to fall on them. Apparently their wickedness had become unbearable not only in God's sight, but in their own. Whatever they were doing, (we're spared the details) it was awful. But we can suppose they were doing what every major city does: neglecting the poor, widows, and orphans; rewarding a few and punishing the vast majority; cheating migrants; neglecting their religious obligations; abandoning their children to the streets and their elderly to public welfare; littering, dumping toxic wastes; and so forth. 

Nineveh was like every major city, proud of its extravagant ostentation and caring only for its pampered nobility. Its doom might serve as a warning to Jerusalem, the Holy City of God; but perhaps its reform, inspired by Jonah's preaching, might arouse Jerusalem to recognize its own sins. They too must repent before God visited his own city with painful justice. It was worth a try!

Jonah, like all Israelites, hated Nineveh, the capital city of Assyria. That powerful nation distrusted all of its neighbors, treated them with contempt, and periodically invaded and ravaged their lands and cities to remind them that Assyria would not abide disrespect. 

God asked Jonah only to warn them of the coming wrath. He did not have to teach them about justice or mercy; nor was he to teach them better farming, marketing, or governing techniques. Jonah should only warn them that God the Creator and Ruler of the Universe was angry at them for their manifestly wicked ways. If some people objected to his higher moral standards and tried to rationalize their compromises, he should give them no careful instruction or explanation of why God's ways were better. It was too late for all that. As Saint Paul said to the Romans, 

...the demands of the law are written in their hearts, while their conscience also bears witness and their conflicting thoughts accuse them. Romans 2:15

American Catholics have a grave responsibility to warn our fellow citizens of God's abiding presence, sovereign authority, and severe justice. If they take that message seriously they might be ready to hear of the promise of Mercy. But ignorance of the Law is never an excuse for violating it. Abortion; adultery; polygamy (including serial polygamy); hostility to immigrants; neglect of the poor, widows, and orphans; these things are always evil and will be punished. 

Jonah, despite his reluctance, did not fail to warn the Ninevites. American Catholics, remembering Ezekiel's parable of the watchman, must not fail our patriotic duty.