Washing one's hands of the conflict between the powerful and the powerless
means to side with the powerful, not to be neutral
Paulo Freire
We cannot remain silent as our nation engages in one of history's most cruel and senseless wars.
During these days of human travail we must encourage creative dissenters.
We need them because the thunder of their fearless voices will be the only sound stronger
than the blasts of bombs and the clamor of war hysteria.
Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.
The great need today is for Christians who are active and critical, who don’t accept situations without analysing them inwardly and deeply. We no longer want masses of people like those who have been trifled with for so long. We want persons like fruitful fig trees who can say yes to justice and no to injustice and can make use of the precious gift of life, regardless of the circumstances.
Archbishop Oscar Romero
In our own contemporary context of the rat race of anxiety, the celebration of Sabbath is an act of both resistance and alternative. It is resistance because it is a visible insistence that our lives are not defined by the production and consumption of commodity goods.
Walter Brueggemann, from Sabbath as Resistance)
In recent months, we have seen many Gospel readings without a clear ending. We see today that there is no clear ending in the fig tree story as the gardener implores the owner to allow him to continue to tend to an unproductive fig tree, to allow for the possibility of being fruit. The vineyard owner wants to give up on the fig tree, whereas the gardener wants to nurture it. It is like an ecology of mercy emerging where God’s way is to tend and nourish things for growth without judgement. We are being directed to be gracious and merciful towards those experiencing hardship. We are not told whether the owner gave in to the gardener’s request. The story remains open ended.
Much of the Gospel presents Jesus trying to shake people out of inadequate ideas about God. As people came to Jesus with questions relating to God's justice and how to make sense of the two recent tragedies, Jesus tries to shift people from their narrow ideas about God and the causal connection between suffering and sin where it was assumed that one who suffers must have sinned and deserves what happens. We have had experiences where we or others have seen suffering in others and assumed it is God’s punishment and that God is trying to teach them a lesson. But when it comes down to our own suffering, we see it bad luck or unavailable. It is a skewed and imbalanced perspective. Such ideas only miniaturise God. As we reflect on these tragedies, we cannot ignore the volumes of blood being spilled around the world today – the people killed in recent hurricanes, the Congolese Christians, like the Galileans at the Temple, recently abducted by a terrorist group and beheaded in a church, the blood of thousands of women, men, and children in Kharkiv and Kyiv, in Gaza, in the West Bank, Syria, and Rohingya villages of Myanmar. In all cases their blood cries out from the ground to heaven. Jesus’ question confronts: ‘Do you think that because these people suffered in this way that they were worse sinners and offenders than all other living people?’ Given the repetition of violence upon violence, it appears that today’s reply to this old question is a resigned affirmative as we in Gaza, the Congo and Ukraine.
Today’s Psalm sets the tone for Jesus’ response: ‘God is kind and merciful.’ It reminds me of the character in George Bernanos’ The Diary of a Country Priest who sums up his life by saying ‘All is grace.’ Jesus repeats the message of God’s nearness that can open the way for a more humane world for all. In the first reading, we hear that God is not immune to suffering and misery. Mercy is the core message and is expressed in Moses’ call to liberate the people of Israel which includes all who are enslaved, subjugated, and abused. The gospel calls us to find a spark of humanity within ourselves and others - especially wherever there is despair and pain. God sees their pain and hears the wailing of children and is behind people who are not immune to injustice, suffering and misery and rush to respond with care and with outrage.
Many world leaders – religious and political - have made themselves immune to suffering and misery of others. They have not taken up Moses’ prophetic mantle to speak out more forcefully against the atrocities in favour of peace and justice. We heard seen the results when security with more destructive weapons is prioritised over dialogue, development, justice, and human connection. But God will not cease to witness to the people’s pain and call for prophets to speak up and act on God’s behalf. Jesus was always trying to move people from their narrow ideas about God. God is a compassionate healing presence who keeps alive all that has been created in love so that goodness is manifest in the universe. So, to believe that sinners are punished with disaster assumes that God’s care is linked to merit and perfection where blessing equates righteousness and suffering with wickedness. And so, as people question Jesus about God’s justice in the gospel, they conclude these incidents were punishments. As we watch, we may question the guilt of victims but not that of the perpetrator. Is God punishing many thousands of starving children, women and men in Sudan when USAID was terminated whilst warehouses full of food not able to be shipped? Is God behind Christians who collaborate in these disastrous and inhuman sanctions? We can rush to explanations and judgments rather than being present with hearts that crack open with tears. The blame game continues in some cultures, our churches and society. From positions of privilege, poverty and illness can be judged as being due to poor choices. Dorothee Soelle (in Suffering) calls this ‘theological sadism’ which isolates God from those who suffer and justifies us to do the same. The gospel of mercy calls us to understand and be present with others in their suffering.
As said earlier, Jesus upends any belief that equates blessing with righteousness and suffering with wickedness. If we are to repent, we must repent for believing that God sends violence, tragedy, and death upon sinners; for making God into a monster who punishes sin with violence. Jesus calls us to turn from violence and exploitation and judgmentalism which often directed towards vulnerable people. This God weeps with and for suffering people. Unlike the vineyard owner who only values competency and success, God, like the gardener, only sees possibility. Repentance is not about things moralistic but social change. It is a call to return to God’s mercy. This requires a change of mindset so that our eyes can perceive God's love present and active among us.
In last week’s gospel depicting the Jesus’s transfiguration, we were invited to see ourselves and the world more deeply so as to make new ways of acting possible. Jesus, the bearer of peace, calls us to give up contributing to a destructive culture of violence, retribution, judgementalism and scapegoating. As we still try to make sense of what happens in so many other parts of the world, may our pain and grief and good will for the victims also extend to our sisters and brothers that we daily rub shoulders with.
God took on flesh because we are loved, not because we are good, and where there is suffering, sinfulness and messiness. The real gifts of God are mercy, compassion, hospitality, and time (remember the fig tree) to continue to grow and so remove any obstacles between ourselves and God. May our eucharistic tables be filled with strangers becoming brothers and sisters, enemies becoming friends, diversity revealing the deep unity of our shared human experience and desire for the one God.
The choice we are offered at each moment is to become and receive mercy. It is the daily mercy that makes the ground holy as God is revealed in our lives – whether in prayer and liturgy, in our service to the poor, and care for the earth. The call to repent is a call to come to God’s mercy. For God, our value does not depend on whether we measure up to others’ expectations. This is the God who gets down with us, in the dirt, in smelly and places of our lives. This God cares enough to get dirty as would any gardener!
Like the story of the fig tree, our story is not over. This story does not have a clear ending because we have the choice to write another chapter of God’s story of loving kindness or mercy. Jesus assures us that God is near if when things are dull and slow or when we feel that we are not bearing much fruit. Those times are never the end. Like the gardener, God nourishes us with mercy and waits patiently for us. Like the story of the fig tree, our stories are not over. They can always be rewritten whenever we renew our ‘yes’ to God loving kindness. This parable offers us a vision of justice that is not rooted in punishment and efficiency but in our turning toward one another for the upbuilding of all, even those lives deemed disposable. If we heed the prophetic calls of Antonio Guterres and Pope Francis, a way is opened up without the spilling of more blood but where reconciliation forms the basis for a renewed and restored life together. Let us consider the concrete reality that many around us are experiencing. It cannot be left to personal piety that leaves people our system is harming still hurting. Let is strive to shape a society that becomes a safe, compassionate, just home for everyone.
God of Grace and Mercy,
in a world that blames and judges those who suffer,
we long for a different way.
Help us turn toward you,
that we might find ways to embody for ourselves and others
your spirit of compassion and grace.
In every circumstance of our lives,
we thirst for your peace that passes understanding.
Draw near to us now and fill our longing.
Amen.
Out in Scripture