04/02/2007 - FIFTH SUNDAY in O. T.
- Year C
First Reading Isaiah 6: 1-2; 3-8 Psalm 137
Second Reading 1Corinnthians 15:1-11 Vangelo Luke 5: 1-11
As we move up the stairs to holiness, we realize that our fragility is real.
We are tempted by evil, daily, and daily the devil manages to grasp us and make
us guilty. Laziness, bad thoughts, incorrect behaviour, superficial gestures,
envious and sexual feelings, infidelity and lies surface in our mind and, if
we are indecisive, we capitulate. The container of holiness cracks and breaks,
or is overturned! How great is Our Lord! Jesus has already foreseen an effective
remedy, which, if welcomed in love, not only does it remedies, but, actually,
strengthens our stability. It is the sacrament of Penance, or Confession. Jesus
saw the will of the Father to let mankind come to know His mercy. In meeting
mankind, Jesus saw where God's mercy needed to be poured out; therefore, He
did not refrain from meeting grave sinners. He saw their need and their desire,
and He forgave them. He His Church (and to whom could He have given it?) the
task and the opportunity to continue meeting the sinners, the broken vessels,
so that they could be healed and restored in God's friendship and in harmony
with other! Have you gone to Confession, yet? Is it not a special grace which
heals, reconciles and allows you to enjoy your holiness? What excuses can you
find to avoid this sacrament? They are not excuses: they are new sins of distrust,
of selfishness, of hatred for yourself. It is the evil one who does not wish
to see you kneeled before a minister of God, does not wish to see you proceed
to your conversion, and does not support your encounter with Jesus!
"I give thanks to Your name for your steadfast love and your faithfulness"!
We pray this Psalm between the Readings. In fact, all of today's Readings help
us to see the mercy of the Lord.
Isaiah, is frightened by having seen the glory of God: He's afraid if dieing,
in fact, because he knows that he is a sinner among a people of sinners. He
knows that the purity and the sanctity of God cannot get along with the sin
of man. His own sin prevents him from quickly offering himself generously to
carry out the missions to which God calls him. In this act of contrition and
humility, God will allow him to experience purification. An angel burns his
lips which, with faithless words, have given sin the opportunity to be revealed.
This way, the prophet realizes that we cannot purify ourselves, but that we
need God's intervention. And God gives it! He is not jealous of His sanctity;
in fact, He makes us participants. Purified by His fire, we can be at His disposal
to proclaim His Word, so necessary to men and to the peoples of the world.
Simon's experience is similar. He does not think of his own sin but, when he
realizes that the presence of Jesus beside him is the presence of God, Himself,
Lord of earth and sea, he then re-awakens, recognizes his own detachment from
Him, which is his own sin. How can Peter have come to this understanding? It
happened thanks to an act of obedience. "If you say so, I will pay out
the nets". Peter had worked hard fishing all night and caught nothing,
then he loaned the boat to Jesus, not to fish, but so that all could come to
listen to His teachings and, at the end, had faith in Him. I imagine that it
was very difficult for Peter to through out the nets, again, especially because
it was at a time in which fisherman would have worked in vain, and, yet, following
the direction from someone from Nazareth who had never seen a lake. "If
you say so". This is the News. The Word of Jesus is not a word of man.
The Word of Jesus is true foundation, it is real truth which does require verification,
it certainty. What is the fruit of obedience to the Word of Jesus? Is it a net
full of fish, which fills a boat, better yet, two boats, to the point of sinking?
No. The fruit of obedience to the Word is the fact the Simon through himself
at the feet of Jesus and admits that he is a sinful man. This is the miracle:
man acknowledges Jesus, who was sent by God, humbles himself before Him, admits
that he is a sinner, kneels at the feet of Jesus and awaits His Word. This is
the miracle in which we participate in this Gospel; this is the miracle which,
the Word fulfills in our heart and our community today, as well.
This miracle is the one that was fulfilled in the heart of Paul, which, despite
the struggles he endured to preach the Gospel, he acknowledges that he is the
least of the Apostles, the first of the sinners. But he makes me realize that
acknowledging that I am a sinner is not a disgrace; instead, it is a place from
which to begin so that I may experience and enjoy the mercy of the Father. He
persecuted the Church: each of my sins means persecuting the Church! When faithless
words come out of my mouth, when my steps move away from God, when my thoughts
are filled with futility, when my time passes without significance to anyone's
salvation, when I don't offer my actions to the Father, or when I consciously
do that which He cannot approve, I persecute the Church. Before the love of
Jesus, I recognize that I am a sinner, and I ask the Church to give me the pardon
which He put it is her heart and in her hands.