22nd Sunday after Pentecost 21.10.18 Relevance of
religion
Give to God what is God's. And that turns out to be
everything.
Is our religion something that is just on the edge of our
lives, only for Sundays, with fish on Fridays… no, but even that has gone. As
has the restful sabbath, now much like any other day, maybe even busier; and not
used for its primary intention: to give glory and thanks to the Creator and
Saviour.
In fact God claims all seven days, and every minute of them;
as He claims also all the other places besides churches. He claims the shops
the squares, the ovals, the workplaces - everywhere.
Of course He gives a large amount of autonomy to our
activities. He does not normally intervene in every detail. He lets us decide
what we are going to do and will normally let things follow their logical
course (which is why we are in so much trouble!)
For example: Therefore God
gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonouring of
their bodies among themselves, because they exchanged
the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than
the Creator, who is blessed for ever! Amen. (Rm 1,24-25)
He has the last say. He expects us to understand that it is
all from Him. We have to refer back constantly, in thanksgiving, in sorrow, in
petition, always orientating ourselves to His abiding and overall will.
He is not an oppressive ruler by any means, being ready to
give us more than we dare to ask (Ep 3,20).
If we keep our religion in a separate compartment we will
find ourselves living exactly like non-religious people – making money, seeking
a good time, with no thought for an eternal tomorrow.
This is why Our Lord came to save us – to save us from our
own folly; to reinforce for us the relevance of our faith; of true religion.
We can help get the message out by being faithful and
persevering in all weathers; keeping the lights on so that people can see there
are still some believers about.
We keep the spiritual perspective foremost. We still do all
the necessary mundane things, but never to the point of forgetting the spiritual.
Part of our prayer needs to be atonement for the fact that
God is so widely ignored and denied.
Father, forgive them, they know not what they do (Lk 23,34).
They are a stiff-necked people. (Ex 32,9)
As regards worldly attitudes we are often sold out by our
own side, that is, Catholics who are so keen to embrace the world they
surrender their own beliefs. They uncritically adopt popular causes, and then
expect the Church to fit in with them.
It is a fight to the death between light and dark; a battle
for relevance. Our opponents want us to be irrelevant, and they will use any
sort of attack against us, honest or not.
We have the same message as Isaiah and Jeremiah, as Elijah
and Ezekiel: Behold your God! Come to terms with Him, or reap the
consequences. In short, Repent.
The people either laughed at the prophets, or tried to kill
them. It is much the same today.
It becomes a bit draughty for the faithful disciples. We can
spend a lot of time standing apart from the majority. This has to be done until
better times come. We stand with a crucified Saviour.
Today the Church prays for Propagation of the Faith. Through
teaching, convincing, persuading, we seek to bring people to see the absolute
blinding importance of God, of His relevance, His centrality, His uniqueness.
One God, one Saviour, one Hope.
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