November 8^th 2015.  Thirty Second Sunday in Ordinary Time

GOSPEL: Mark 12:38-44

­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­Translated from a homily by Don Fabio Rosini, broadcast on Vatican Radio

Don Fabio’s reflection follows the Gospel reading ...

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GOSPEL: Mark 12:38-44

In his teaching Jesus said, ‘Beware of the scribes who like to walk about in long robes, to be greeted obsequiously in the market squares, to take the front seats in the synagogues and the places of honour at banquets; these are the men who swallow the property of widows, while making a show of lengthy prayers. The more severe will be the sentence they receive.’

Jesus sat down opposite the treasury and watched the people putting money into the treasury, and many of the rich put in a great deal. A poor widow came and put in two small coins, the equivalent of a penny. Then he called his disciples and said to them, ‘I tell you solemnly, this poor widow has put more in than all who have contributed to the treasury; for they have all put in money they had over, but she from the little she had has put in everything she possessed, all she had to live on.’

The Gospel of the Lord: Praise to you Lord Jesus Christ

Kieran’s summary . . . . The Gospel presents us with two very different kinds of character. The Scribe uses religion to promote his own public image. He loves to be admired in the streets and to have the best places in the Synagogue and at banquets. The widow, by contrast, has no public image to protect. She gives what little she has to the Lord. What is Christianity for me? What is the meaning of life for me? Am I a puppet who is pulled this way and that by the fear of not looking good in the eyes of others? Often, the more self-dependent we are, the more our lives are dominated by superfluous things. But when we have almost nothing left, when we are at our wit’s end, then we are challenged to place those meagre resources into the hands of the Lord. Desperate situations are an opportunity to entrust ourselves to God’s providence and to enter into a real relationship with him. Let us look at all those areas of our lives where we feel a sense of desperation and let us abandon ourselves into his hands! When we live in this way then we will show society what real Christianity is like. Often society is critical of Christianity because it sees only the Scribe, the religious character who is preoccupied by the outward show, the hypocrite who not abandoned his existence into the hands of God.

Do you want a real relationship with God? Then do not relate to him only on the level of superfluous things. Place your very existence concretely into his hands.

The first reading recounts the story of the poor widow with the child who is left with almost nothing. She takes the last bit of bread and oil and utters the terrible phrase, “Let us eat and then die”. She is at the end of her resources, a fistful of flour, a few drops of oil. How often we are in the same situation! We find ourselves in circumstances where we do not know what to do. At this point, Elijah erupts into the scene and asks the widow to share her food with him. How can he make such a request! Through the person of Elijah, God himself becomes present in the life of this family. It seems utterly absurd that the messenger of the Lord should take what little is left to this woman! But it is precisely in these extreme situations that the most significant events take place, at moments when we make our final resources available to God. The theme of the Gospel is the uselessness of only giving to God what is superfluous. When our connection with God is by means of things that are superfluous, then we fail to enter into a real relationship with him. But when it is life itself that is at stake in our relationship with God, then we really begin to witness his power.

The more desperate our situation, the less we have to give, then the more critical it is to give that little to God.

When we find ourselves in extreme situations, we often say, “If God were really good, he would not put me in such a situation”. But the opposite is the real truth. It is these extreme situations that teach me the goodness of God. When the widow gives what she has to the prophet, the bread and the oil are never exhausted. Through the word of the Lord, personified in Elijah, the woman receives in abundance. What is little become plenty because she has left a space for God to operate in her life. Many people nowadays are in difficult economic and personal situations. Desperation become damaging when people fail to remember the Providence of God. We are led to crazy “solutions” for our situations and begin to think of things that really lead to death, not life. The widow herself was taking this route when she declared that they would eat whatever they had and then die. Our problems are often grave, but sometimes our solutions are even worse. It is in these desperate moments that we must really learn to entrust ourselves to God, to abandon ourselves completely to his Providence.

Where do our hearts lie? In the way we are esteemed by others? Or in our abandonment to God’s Providence?

In the Gospel we are confronted with various characters. The Scribes are experts on Scripture, but they love to parade themselves in the squares and take the best places in the synagogues and banquets. They are slaves to their own public image and their position in the pecking order of society. The Gospel then presents us with a very different kind of character. A widow, despite being in an extreme state of economic need, places what she has at the disposal of the Lord. How many of us live in this world like puppets whose strings are pulled this way and that by the fear of not being esteemed by others! The Gospel tells us that the Scribes “loved” to engage in their ostentatious behaviour. What a strong word! Their hearts were completely taken by this superficial mode of life. The widow, by contrast, is someone whose very existence is put at stake by her generous behaviour towards the Lord.

Do we use the external acts of religion as a way to promote our image in the eyes of others?

These Scribes were experts in religion and their errant form of behaviour was a sin of a religious sort. There is a strong temptation to use the things of God in this way. Sacred Scripture and theology, as it were, become the ostentatious garment and the privileged place in society. Other things of God are also used for motives of a purely egotistical kind. If someone comes along who has a more ostentatious garment, or who is more eloquent than we are, then our privileged position evaporates. What a futile, empty preoccupation! In the end, what matters more? To create a positive public image of ourselves, without regard for the question of whether that image is false or true? Or to encounter God? To take our impoverished existence and to use it as a place of meeting with God? To place what little we have, like Abraham and his sack on Mount Tabor, into the hands of God? It is in God alone and in his Providence that we must place our trust. He is the only one that we can count on.

Society is often angry at the Church because they think that that the outward trapping of Christianity is Christianity itself. When society experiences radical Christianity, people who have utterly placed themselves in the hands of the Lord, then it cannot fail to be impressed.

In the culture in which we live, we can say without any doubt that there is often a negative attitude towards Christianity, if not downright antagonism. Maybe that is because the Christianity that people have experienced is that of the “Scribe”, the superficial attitudes, the characters who are preoccupied by the outer garments of Christianity and positions of privilege. Maybe our society has principally experienced these roles and outwards manifestations, and nothing else. They have not come face to face with the new life that Christianity promises. I am utterly convinced that people are not angry with us because we are Christians; they are angry because we are not real Christians. People have negative attitudes towards the Church because, often, we do not manifest an authentic face. When the Church really is as it ought to be; when Christians really place their complete resources into the hands of the Lord, then we tend to be appreciated for what we are. When the world witnesses radical Christianity, then they cannot but esteem it.