6th Sunday OT
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP
OLR, NOLA
Why
does God love us? One answer to this question goes like this: God
love us b/c He is Love; it is His nature to love – Love is who He
is and what He does. According to His nature, God cannot not
love. If we take the question to mean – what
is the ultimate purpose of God's loving us?
– we get a slightly different answer. The purpose behind God's
loving us is to change us for the better. And to change us for the
better, God's love requires our cooperation. God will not force us to
love Him. He will not force us to change. He loves us without
condition or pretense b/c it is His nature to love. So, you need
never worry about whether or not God loves you. He does. Always. And
in all circumstances. If you must worry, worry about whether or not
you love God.
Notice the leper. Despite his disease, despite the fact that he is
required by Mosaic Law to avoid healthy people, and declare himself
Unclean, he approaches Jesus, kneels, and begs, “If you wish, you
can make me clean.” Jesus touches the Leper and says, “I do will
it. Be made clean.” Christ loves without condition or pretense, but
he will only cleanse you of sin if you ask to be made clean.
In
recent years, the Church has been roiled by internal debates about
the nature of mercy and sin; the morality of “second marriages”
and taking communion; whether or not the individual conscience trumps
the Church's moral teaching; whether or not a pastor can bless
same-sex “marriages.” The different sides of these debates line
up like you might expect: those who say every case is different so we
cannot impose universal rules and
those who say that there are rock-bottom truths that always apply to
all cases. We hear that God loves us unconditionally, therefore, all
are welcome! We hear that God hates sin, therefore, sinners must not
be welcomed as sinners. Bishop Bob says we must embrace the sinner.
While Bishop Jim says the sinner must be admonished. Pastors and lay
folks get in on the action – documents are quoted; popes are cited;
councils invoked; and theologians and Celebrity Catholics rant in the
media about the respective rigidity or moral laxity of the other
side. Either the Church must always keep up with the times, or the
Church must never change. Notice the leper. His faith in Christ
pushes him to ask for healing. He asks. And Christ heals him. God
loves us in order to change us. To make us holy.
Some
would have us believe that God's unconditional love affirms the
OK-ness of our sin; that is, they say, since God always loves us
(true), despite our sin (true), then our sin must be OK. False. My
sin is a sign, is evidence that I do not love God. He still loves me,
true, but I do not love Him. If I am to be healed, I must ask to be
healed. If my sins are to be forgiven, I must ask to be forgiven. And
in order to ask to be forgiven I must first actually believe that my
sins are indeed sins! But
if God loves me despite my sins, why bother with asking for
forgiveness? Because
my sins tell God that I do not love Him, and He will not force His
love upon me. Without my cooperation, God's love cannot help me to
grow in holiness; without my cooperation, God's graces go unused. And
when my time for judgment comes, God will honor my choice not to love
Him and allow me to live apart from Him for all eternity. The love
that God has for of us does not – in any way – diminish or negate
the damage we do to ourselves when we sin, when we refuse to repent
of that sin and ask for His mercy. Notice the leper, begging, “If
you wish, you can make me clean.” And Christ responding, “I do
will it. Be made clean.” Ask, receive. No asking, no receiving.
So,
the bottom-line is this: if all you want out of your life as a
follower of Christ is to be loved by God. . .well, you got it. You're
done. In fact, you were done the moment you were conceived. God loved
you in your mother's womb; He loves you now, and He will always love
you. He will even love you as you choose to spend eternity separated
from Him. If, however, you want your life as a follower of Christ to
be a love affair between
you and God, a mutual, life-giving, grace-filled affair, then you
will name your sin what it is and ask to be healed. And God will heal
you b/c He loves you. What you – we – cannot do is ask God to
love our sin, to pretend that our disobedience is not disobedience.
Doing that would make God – who always loves us – an accomplice
in our damnation. That He cannot/will not do. Lent is
fast-approaching. We'll be charged with spending some time and energy
examining our relationship with God in Christ Jesus. Take some of
that time and energy to explore the depth and breadth of your love
for God. Ask yourself: do I just presume that my sins are forgiven
b/c God loves me? Or, have I actually asked Him to heal me? The
difference it makes is eternal.
Follow HancAquam or Subscribe ----->
