An Influenced Mixture (Sirach
3:2-6, 12-14; Psalm 128:1-2, 3, 4-5; Colossians
3:12-21; Luke 2:41-52)
During the week, I
prayed over a paragraph from the Catechism. The paragraph, “The whole life of Jesus Christ
showed how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power.”
God can give you insights before you know they are insights. They came with this weeks readings.
“The whole life of
Jesus Christ….” His life included every breath he took. Life experienced with
every inhale and exhale like traveling to the temple, studying
scripture, the traditions of the feast and festivals, and even living in the extended
family community in Nazareth.
A whole life that included every good time and ever bad time, “Why were you looking for me? Did you not know that I must be
in my Father’s house?”
A life lived in the Holy Family.
Family was important. Jesus knew the
commandments and the writing of Sirach on family honor. Honor your parents and parents point your children to God. These were part of Jesus' life that
showed how God anointed Jesus.
An anointed life in which Jesus lived the virtues
that Paul writes about. The virtues of God we are to "put on." Jesus showed us how to live these and put on the love of Christ.
These were a part of the whole life of Jesus. What about ours?
There are so many different
faces in the world. Faces show family. Some of our faces have the features
of our mother or father. Some features will bring memories of a grandparent,
the same eye color, the same hair color, or maybe it’s the way of a smile. The
way we act, live our lives, and even for some of us the way we make our living,
comes to us through our family. Our whole life, who we are, and what we look
like is an influenced mixture of all those who came before us.
We are constantly challenged
by our world on our relationship and belief in God. Our faith should find
strength in being challenged. Our faith is strongest when supported by a Holy Family
like the family made up in that influenced mixture that came before us. Yet
looking around, it is easy to see that less of us going to our Father’s house.
The reasons given are that mass is inconvenient, hard to schedule, or not important to
my spirituality. But, Jesus went.
In the Sang-pour-sang and Bayou Cypre Apalachee communities in the hills west of the Cane
River, life was hard. It was a life that included intimidation, harassment, and
even death. Families had their homes burned. People were hunted down with dogs
until they were killed, left the area, or disappeared into the woods. Others
denied their race and if lucky blended into the white community.
In the early 20th
century, missionary Dominican Priests came to the remnants of these people.
They found a people often uneducated. There were no schools. Children were not
allowed school because of who they were.
But the priest found one other thing,
a people of strong faith. The people who could not read or write still had a community
school that taught their faith and the catechism. All this knowledge of faith had
been passed down by word of mouth over the generations.
Poor, persecuted, and
isolated, these people were always in their Father’s house. They lived as a
Holy Family doing the Father’s work, they “put on” Godly virtues and the love
of Christ.
They lived this: “Let the
peace of Christ control your hearts, the peace into which you were also called
in one body. And be thankful. Let the word
of Christ dwell in you richly, as in all wisdom you teach and admonish one
another, singing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs with gratitude in your
hearts to God.”
We too need to live in these as we strive
to live the life of Christ. “The whole life of Jesus Christ….” and it includes
every breath we take; what we inhale and what we exhale. We are children of God
and part of a Holy Family. We are the influenced mixture of our family that
came before us. As a Holy Family we should always point the members of our
family to God and to our Father’s House.
“The whole life of
Jesus Christ showed how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and
with power.”
Amen.
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