Legal ain't moral

St. Anthony of Padua

Fr. Philip Neri Powell OP

St. Albert the Great, Irving

Slavery was legal in the US for decades. Abortion is still legal in many states. Same-sex “marriage” is legal. So is divorce/remarriage, fornication, and child abandonment. That a moral act is legal does not make it righteous. And perfectly legal acts cannot guarantee righteousness simply b/c they are legal. This implies that there is something greater than the law to follow if righteousness is our goal. Jesus says that our righteousness must surpass the righteousness of the Pharisees and scribes. NB. he doesn't say that the scribes and the Pharisees are unrighteous. They are. According to their own reckoning of the Law. They follow the Law he came to fulfill. What they are missing – potentially – is the internal dispositions that give the Law its eternal effect. That is, the Law serves as an exterior sign that they are committed to God w/o touching who they actually are internally. We might defend this view of the Law by saying something like “well, better to follow the Law hypocritically than not at all!” But this approach can lead to self-righteousness and judgmentalism – the enduring sin of the scribes and Pharisees. Or maybe we could approach the problem by saying “fake it 'til you make it.” Follow the Law externally until you can follow it internally. Obey the 10 Commandments and eventually you'll come love God and neighbor. After all, virtues take time and practice to thrive. That's better but still not good enough b/c death stalks us all and our time to practice may end sooner than we think. Jesus tells his disciples to love first and obedience results. Love first and forgiveness and mercy and everything else we need to grow in righteousness results. The details of the Law “shake out” as we perfect the virtue of willing the Good of the Other. Love of God is perfected by loving His creatures. The more we love God and neighbor, the more we resemble those we love. And the less likely we are to treat Him and his creatures as inconvenient obstacles to getting our way. If pride is the original sin of believing and behaving as if we can become God w/o God, then charity is the original virtue of believing and behaving as if we can only become God with God. Loving God comes first. Then obedience and righteousness. Until obedience and righteousness are no longer necessary. 

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Are we crazy?

10^th Sunday OT

Fr. Philip Neri Powell OP

St. Albert the Great, Irving

When I told my parents that I was changing my major from business to philosophy, my Mom said, “You're out of your mind.” She said the same thing when my application to join a religious order was rejected and I said I was determined to find one that would take me. I can't repeat here what she said when I told her I was going to China to teach English for a year. But it roughly translates as “you're out of your mind.” It's the business of children to make parents question their sanity. I aced that part of being a kid. More than once or twice. Now, Jesus' family is confronted by abundant evidence that he is nuts. He running around the country doing things that only a prophet can do: healing people, casting out demons, forgiving sins. He argues with respectable religious folks, claiming to have the authority to re-interpret scripture. He's got this gang of twelve hanging around with him, men who once had decent jobs and families. And occasionally he runs off into the desert to be alone with God. Add all these to the fact that everywhere he goes a mob follows along, clamoring for his attention. We're part of that mob. So, how crazy do you have to be to follow a crazy man? What promises does he make to induce our obedience?

Let's review: He promises us persecution at the hands of our family and friends. He promises trial and imprisonment by governors and princes. He promises ridicule, opposition, and outright violence for his name's sake. He tells us that his Way is straight but exceedingly narrow, difficult to navigate at times but clearly plotted and mapped out. Along the Way, he promises us battle after battle in a war he has already won. We have before us a long, hard struggle against an Enemy who cheats, steals, lies and has no moral qualms about using whatever he needs to ensnare us. Finally, he tells us that to follow him with our whole hearts and minds and bodies, we must follow him all the way to the Cross and the Tomb. That's a promise too. Given all these promises, we would have to be out of our minds to even think of crowding around this guy and begging him for his help. And yet, here we are, celebrating his death and resurrection, participating in his divine life.

Why do we follow around a man whose own family thought he was out of his mind? All those promises of pain, loss, tribulation were not made to warn us off, to keep us away. They aren't predictions or punishments. Jesus' promises to us are the consequences of living in the world while not being of the world. IF you follow me, THEN you will be persecuted. It must happen b/c the world cannot abide its own imperfection and those seeking perfection in Christ are irritating reminders that there are more and better ways of being human, more and better means of being perfect. The world accuses: how dare you point out my diseases and disabilities by seeking a way to have yours healed? There's nothing wrong with me, do not tempt me to believe otherwise by pointing out your own faults and how you've come to have them mended! For all the suffering we are promised as a consequence of following Christ, there is one promise that balances the scales: we will be made perfect in the Father's love. In fact, even as we seek that perfection now, we abide in His love. We may be out of our minds for following a crazy man, but we follow him into an audience with the Father to see him face-to-face. Where the Head goes, the Body follows. And b/c we believe, we speak. Or better: we preach! We reveal, we disclose what he has done and is doing for us. That makes us preachers.

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