October 30, Saturday

Thirtieth Week In Ordinary Time

KNOW YOUR PLACE

If a trusted friend proves disloyal, we feel badly hurt and find it almost impossible to remain faithful. Not so with God. He remains faithful to Israel, of which all but a small rest abandoned him. Yet, the Jews keep a role in God’s plans by facilitating, beyond the possible exclusiveness of one people, the entrance of pagan nations.

Our Lord invites us to his table. He knows that we are people with faults, people who have hurt him and others, by the wrong we done and the good we have failed to do. Knowing who we are, he still loves us and invites us as his friends to join him at his table. Let us humbly take part in his meal and ask the Lord to make us more open to the humble, to people who have erred, and to the poor.

 

First reading: Romans 11:1-2a, 11-12, 25, 29

Does this mean, then, that God is so fed up with Israel that he’ll have nothing more to do with them? Hardly. Remember that I, the one writing these things, am an Israelite, a descendant of Abraham out of the tribe of Benjamin. You can’t get much more Semitic than that! So we’re not talking about repudiation. God has been too long involved with Israel, has too much invested, to simply wash his hands of them.

Do you remember that time Elijah was agonizing over this same Israel and cried out in prayer?

God, they murdered your prophets,
They trashed your altars;
I’m the only one left and now they’re after me!

And do you remember God’s answer?

I still have seven thousand who haven’t quit,
Seven thousand who are loyal to the finish.

It’s the same today. There’s a fiercely loyal minority still—not many, perhaps, but probably more than you think. They’re holding on, not because of what they think they’re going to get out of it, but because they’re convinced of God’s grace and purpose in choosing them. If they were only thinking of their own immediate self-interest, they would have left long ago.

 

The next question is, “Are they down for the count? Are they out of this for good?” And the answer is a clear-cut No. Ironically when they walked out, they left the door open and the outsiders walked in. But the next thing you know, the Jews were starting to wonder if perhaps they had walked out on a good thing. Now, if their leaving triggered this worldwide coming of non-Jewish outsiders to God’s kingdom, just imagine the effect of their coming back! What a homecoming!

I want to lay all this out on the table as clearly as I can, friends. This is complicated. It would be easy to misinterpret what’s going on and arrogantly assume that you’re royalty and they’re just rabble, out on their ears for good. But that’s not it at all. This hardness on the part of insider Israel toward God is temporary. Its effect is to open things up to all the outsiders so that we end up with a full house. Before it’s all over, there will be a complete Israel. As it is written,

A champion will stride down from the mountain of Zion;
    he’ll clean house in Jacob.
And this is my commitment to my people:
    removal of their sins.

From your point of view as you hear and embrace the good news of the Message, it looks like the Jews are God’s enemies. But looked at from the long-range perspective of God’s overall purpose, they remain God’s oldest friends. God’s gifts and God’s call are under full warranty—never cancelled, never rescinded.

 

Gospel: Lk 14:1, 7-11

One time when Jesus went for a Sabbath meal with one of the top leaders of the Pharisees, all the guests had their eyes on him, watching his every move. Right before him there was a man hugely swollen in his joints. So Jesus asked the religion scholars and Pharisees present, “Is it permitted to heal on the Sabbath? Yes or no?”

 

He went on to tell a story to the guests around the table. Noticing how each had tried to elbow into the place of honor, he said, “When someone invites you to dinner, don’t take the place of honor. Somebody more important than you might have been invited by the host. Then he’ll come and call out in front of everybody, ‘You’re in the wrong place. The place of honor belongs to this man.’ Red-faced, you’ll have to make your way to the very last table, the only place left.

 “When you’re invited to dinner, go and sit at the last place. Then when the host comes he may very well say, ‘Friend, come up to the front.’ That will give the dinner guests something to talk about! What I’m saying is, If you walk around with your nose in the air, you’re going to end up flat on your face. But if you’re content to be simply yourself, you will become more than yourself.”

 

Prayer

Our Father, who lift up the lowly,
your Son Jesus came into our world
as the servant of all and he cherished the helpless.
With him, make us respect and appreciate
the weak, the defenseless and the humble,
and accept to be numbered among them.
Dispose us to help them and to seek their help,
for you have poured out your mercy on us too,
through Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen.

 

Reflection:

Respect is to be earned, not demanded

In Israel lunch on a Sabbath used to be an occasion for relatives and friends to meet and have a time of socialisation. After the time of liturgy in the synagogue, family and friends would move to a house and have their time of chat and meal together.

Today’s passage is to be placed in this context of the sabbath lunch. At the end of the liturgy in the synagogue, a leader of the Pharisee invited Jesus for the meal. Jews followed a rigid etiquette at the table. Seats were allocated very carefully: people of honour always get the prominent seating. Seeing the inequality and discrimination even within a family setting, Jesus teaches not crave for places of honour. Respect is not something that can be demanded, rather it is to be earned.

When we read this passage, do not misunderstand that Jesus is giving his listeners a lesson on how to achieve honour and respect. Jesus has never cared for public honour and admiration. And he would not teach his listeners a crafty method to achieve glory. Imagine, if you go to a public function and occupy the last seat with the hope of someone leading you to a better position, your behaviour is hypocrisy. This is not the meaning of the Gospel.

Take a closer look at the passage and we realise, Jesus is talking to his listeners as if he is the host, and not as guest. In fact, Luke has used this setting of the Sabbath meal to put on the mouth of the Lord a lesson for the Christians of his community. Luke was facing dissensions and disagreements among the leaders of his community. The heads of the various ministries had the desire to occupy the “first places.” It is the eternal problem of the Church: everyone should serve, but, in practice, there is always someone who carries the attitude of the pharisee and aspires for honorary titles, wants to excel, swells with pride and even uses celebration of the Eucharist as an occasion for self-celebration. This is the cancer that destroys our communities!

It is not Jesus who is seated at a meal who is giving this lesson today, but the Risen Lord who turns to the Pharisee present in the communities of Luke. This lesson is for the disciples who act as Pharisees, who discriminate. And what does he say? He says that “When you give a feast invite instead the poor, the crippled, the lame and the blind” (v. 13).

The poor, the blind, the crippled, the lame, represent those who walk without the light of the Gospel and stumble, fall, hurt themselves and, others, switching from one error to another. Jesus reminds his disciples that the feast was organized just for them. Woe to exclude them.

 

Video available on Youtube: Respect is to be earned, not demanded