The one thing necessary

Today’s gospel (John 11: 19-27) relates the scenes that occur just before Jesus’ raising of Lazarus, His last great public miracle in the week of the events of the Passion. Jesus arrives at the house of Mary and Martha where they are receiving mourners who have come to offer their condolences upon the death of their dear brother Lazarus. We do not hear of the miracle in this snippet of the gospel. Instead, today’s feast of Sts Mary, Martha and Lazarus, hones in on the faith of Martha who professes her belief not only in Jesus’ power to raise her brother, but also in His identity as the Christ, the fulfilment of God’s promise sent into this world. As mentioned in the last blog, such faith not just a matter of sheer conviction, but conviction about one of the key mysteries of the revelation that Jesus came to share with the world. Intelligence and love meet, and Martha’s heart professes the eternal truth, and confesses the depth of her belief in it.

What is striking here is that while Jesus had travelled to Bethany, it was Martha who had been on a journey since her first appearance in the synoptic gospels in Luke (10: 38-42). When we first met her, she was fraught with busyness, with a houseful of guests and no chance to listen to the Rabbi Jesus, unlike her sister Mary. Martha’s faults in that moment were perhaps twofold. First, she fell into comparisons: what am I doing and what is she doing? We can assume that, to those present, Martha’s treatment of Mary as a feckless sluggard was manifestly unjust. After the event, however, how the words of Jesus must have burned in her mind: Martha, you are worried about many things but only one thing is necessary. It is not that there is nothing else to do; but only one thing is necessary.

Jesus’ reference to worry is Martha’s second problem. There is a kind of busyness that is a sweet immersion in fruitfulness -a saying 'yes' to the Lord every minute of our lives; the busyness of the Virgin Mother no doubt. But there is another kind of busyness that is a tale of stress and friction where things that have to be done chafe upon on our hearts and minds. Our activity then might look like commitment, but it is filled with a spirit of flight, of a subtle desire of not wanting to be in the moment but somewhere, anywhere else. Martha, you are worried about many things but only one thing is necessary. Jesus tells her - as He tells us - to stop her flight and to focus on the one thing necessary: surrender to God.

The Martha we meet in Bethany in the week before Jesus’ death had reflected on this lesson and learned it. Watch her in this scene. She has not lost who she is; it is she, the active sister, who comes out of the house to greet Jesus, while Mary, the gospel says, remained sitting in the house – whether through the collapse of grief or the stillness of her assured faith in the coming Lord, the gospel does not tell us. Yet if Martha comes out of the house to meet the Lord, it is only that He had sought her first, giving her that compass point of the one thing necessary. His words then make her actions now possible.

Then, there comes a dialogue in which she professes her belief in the resurrection, unlike the Sadducees some of whom were surely among the mourners gathered at the house. And Jesus rewards her with a declaration which confirms His divinity: I am the resurrection and the life. It is not that He will be resurrected or that He has life; He is life and, therefore, He is resurrection, i.e. the undoing of death, its utter defeat. Martha now steps forward in faith, and - surely to the surprise of her grieving heart - Jesus sweeps her up in some of the sweetest words ever uttered to mortal ear.

Do you believe this? He concludes, as if He did not know the answer, just as He questions Peter before His ascension: Peter, do you love me? He asks the question not so He can be reassured, but so Martha might profess before the mourners the faith that connects her to God. Jesus works no public miracle, as it were, to buy this faith; it is enough that He has chastised Martha previously, that she has thought upon her failings, and that now she has endured her fiat in sorrow with her brother's death. Martha has ceased her restless flight, and chosen to be still, like the one she loves. She has stopped comparing herself, and instead, she looks in hope to the one who has come into this world. She steps forward in faith and hope, not because Jesus has bought her belief but because she has heard His invitation to embrace the one thing necessary. 

Thus it is that in the conclusion of these scenes which we do not read today, Martha perhaps hears an echo of the words captured by Francis Thompson in The Hound of Heaven, and much beloved of this blog:

"All which I took from thee I did but take,

        Not for thy harms,

But just that thou might'st seek it in My arms.

        All which thy child's mistake

Fancies as lost, I have stored for thee at home:

        Rise, clasp My hand, and come!" 

A seedy business

Today’s gospel (Matthew 13: 18-23) tells us how Jesus understands His own parable of the sower who went to sow his seed. Yet even this explanation does not exhaust the layers of meaning within it. The parable may apply in different ways to those who, it could be argued, have welcomed the seed and in whom the seed has yielded a harvest. Who among us has fully integrated the seed into our lives?

How do we hear the word of God without understanding? We do so by separating understanding of the faith from our devotions or our spiritual journey. This is arguably an even greater danger for those who have heard God’s call to intimacy and try to respond to it with more or less vigour. St Teresa of Avila preferred a learned spiritual director to a holy one; just think about that for a second. It means she was aware that mystical experience could be misleading without the compass points of the creed in all its depth and richness. In the inner life, while intimate knowledge of God comes through the gifts of the Holy Spirit, our normal progress is a life lived through faith in the mysteries and of the mysteries. Doxa (praise) and doctrine are not opposite poles, but oxen yolked together. Faith is not just conviction but conviction about something. To think of faith only as a conviction of the heart or an engagement of the will is to hear the word of God without understanding. Here, we must become literally disciples: i.e. those who learn.

The second class of people in the sower’s parable can also show themselves among the devout. They receive the seed with joy but fall away when adversity comes. If the first class of the devout suffer from lack of knowledge of the mysteries, might we say that the second class of the devout suffer from lack of self-knowledge? That and perhaps also radicality: self-knowledge because perhaps they thought quite wrongly that their initial joy in the word was proof of the depth of their discipleship; and radicality, because that discipleship requires precisely something much deeper, a greater depth of self-surrender than their current levels of maturity and self-awareness allow for. Did we think we were grown up because people address us as mister and misses?

Even the third class of people in the sower’s parable might be found among the devout in whom the worries of this world and the lure of riches choke the word. For the worries of the world are not just tangible, material goods from which it might be easier in some ways to hold oneself aloof. The worries of the world can be the simple but subtle attachments that we have, for example, to how we are perceived or valued; or our belief that we deserve perhaps some grander task than the one we have ended up with. Yet this kind of fretting is also a blind spot obscuring the fact that our value and dignity in God’s eyes do not come about from what we achieve. Be who God meant you to be and you will set the world on fire, says St Catherine of Sienna. If the world is not ablaze then, it is not because we have materially failed, and certainly not because people have failed to recognise how wonderful we disciples of Christ really are. It is because somehow, somewhere, in some subtle way we have damned up the graces that would flow out of us were we to be faithful.

But, we say, we have not gone in for the lure of riches! Look at our sacrifices! Well, that depends. Perhaps if we collect devotions and spiritual milk-bottle tops like the young now collect tattoos, we do choke ourselves with the lure of riches – riches that do not become a part of our life but lie on the surface and clutter our souls, like our unused kitchen gadgets or, heaven help us, our unread books.

Happily, our lives are a journey, not a fine art. In knowledge of God and knowledge of self, coupled with detachment, the seed of His word might produce more fruit in us yet. 

Hearing Him speak our name

Today’s gospel (John 20:1-2, 11-18) marks the feast of St Mary Magdalene and comes to us right out of the heart of the Easter liturgy.  Mary is perplexed by the events of Easter morning, sees angels in the tomb, and speaks to Jesus without even realising who He is. Finally, she takes off to see His disciples, becoming – as the preface of today’s Mass explains – one whose apostolic duty was honoured by the apostles. Her name will ever be associated with penitence and personal devotion to Christ; according to St Luke she stood among the holy women before the cross, with the Mother and the Beloved Disciple. 

The Mary in this scene of today’s gospel is more like Martha (Luke 10:38-42) who works herself into a domestic frenzy while her sister (another Mary) sits at the feet of Jesus, choosing ‘the better part’. She has come in the early morning to the tomb while it was still dark; she has already run back once to the disciples to seek their help; next she weeps in the garden before going again to the tomb where she sees the angels. She does not even recognise Jesus when she sees Him, no more than the disciples on the road to Emmaus. It is a common theme in the post-resurrection scenes of the gospel.

And yet, is there something - some obstacle – she has placed in His way by being in such a frenzy? None of her searching produces any results. Her first trip to the tomb is a failure; her second trip brings little help from the disciples; her third trip at least leads her to a vision of angels, but not to Jesus.

If Martha’s error was to be mindful of the many things, whereas only one thing was necessary, Mary’s error seems to be something similar. Yet, she is on a journey and passes through her own stages of grief: bewilderment at the empty tomb; a desperate search for help; a collapse into grief again; bargaining with Someone she thinks is the gardener. She thought she knew how to cope with the loss of her beloved Master but she powerless to do so... Only when Jesus speaks her name do the scales fall from her eyes. 

And thus it must always be. What must we do to hear the Lord speak our name? It might be easier to say what we should not do: we should not imitate Mary in the garden, except in her final action which is to obey her Risen Lord and go to preach good news of His return.

Unlike Mary, we must not fall into instant judgements about supposed calamities and disasters; we must not lose ourselves in grief – did she wonder in these moments if all this anguish was punishment for her own sins? And perhaps above all, we must not bargain: ‘all I ask, Lord’, ‘if you can only, Lord’, 'but tell me this, Lord', and ‘just grant me this, Lord’. All these things - the humanly necessary ones - will be added unto us when we seek the kingdom of God as He has invited us to do - the one thing truly necessary.

Lord, speak our names to us, for without your voice we are as lost as Mary.

Law and spirituality

Today’s gospel (Matthew 12:1-8) may be read by some as a warning against rigidity in the law. The Pharisees criticised the disciples for picking ears of corn and Jesus seems – some would suppose - to tell these hypocrites to knock off being so petty minded. It’s only a few ears of corn after all! Mustn’t get obsessed about the rules now, must we? But this is only to read the episode in a way that suits our let-it-all-hang-out, permissive culture.

Jesus of course teases the Pharisees with exceptions to their rule – for example, they cannot deny that David ate the loaves of the Temple, and that the Temple priests ‘break’ the sabbath too – but look how He bookends this teasing: Now here, I tell you, is something greater than the Temple. By the end of this passage likewise, He stakes another claim on His position in the order of salvation: For the Son of Man is master of the sabbath. Master of the sabbath? But the sabbath belongs to God in Jewish law: indeed, it is the object of the third commandment. Here, as elsewhere, Jesus is claiming to be God.

Jesus’ talk of law may seem far from spirituality, but both spirituality and law seek the good of man in different but complementary ways. In human law, the law giver keeps the law, but the law is also meant to keep the lawgiver. This is why it is possible in some extreme circumstances to envisage overthrowing a lawgiver or at least to resist their requirements. The famous Nuremberg defence – I was only following orders from my superior – is no defence in human courts, nor perhaps before God. Neither the obligations of love nor those of obedience dispense us from responsibility. We must of course understand those responsibilities properly; Christianity is not anarchy.

The difference with Jesus, however, is that He does not simply give the law; He is the law, the way the truth and the law of life. The Pharisees wanted to acknowledge the Temple but here they were in the presence of Someone higher.

And that is the reason why Jesus allows the disciples to act as they do. In the gospel, the lower law of the Torah is about to be set aside in favour of the higher law of freedom in Christ. For in every command of the law, there is meant to be a dynamic towards God, for God is the end of all good things.

So that when Jesus requires mercy not sacrifice, He is not, like some hippy, saying, “Let it all hang out, man”; He is saying not to make an idol out of the lower laws. Or rather, obey the higher laws first.

And that is good spirituality. It is the spirituality of St Thomas More who resisted his king and found a martyr’s crown. It is the spirituality of St Athanasius who got himself excommunicated for standing up to the Arian heretics while Pope Liberius – the first pope not to be given the title of saint when he died in 366 AD – dithered and crumbled before their persecution. At least he later went into exile fearlessly.

Jesus will have mercy and not the sacrificial pyres that we build to honour our idols. The question for us then is whether we prefer the warmth of His mercy or the bonfire of self-interested human vanity. 

Bigger and bolder still

On Monday, we considered faith big and bold – big enough to ask the moon from God, bold enough to defy the scorn of unbelief that often surrounds us. Today’s gospel (Matthew 10: 16-23) drives home the second of these messages, as Jesus bids his disciples to wake up and smell the persecution.

The most striking of His words here are: beware of men. It is not a message we hear very much these days; in fact, we tend to hear the opposite. Ordered to be afraid of being too inward looking, we risk losing our identity through excessive attempts at bridge building. We should build bridges of course, but we should not cast pearls before swine – Jesus said that too! While Jesus’ words are not a counsel of hostility, they are especially an encouragement not to succumb to idealism and naivety. Fellowship with others is important, but not if it unsights us. Cordiality is a sign of our charity but if we dream that serpents are harmless, we will show ourselves only to be as cunning as a dove…

Yet another theme in this dark passage, however, is that we cannot endure persecution or carry our appointed crosses without going on a journey towards self-detachment. If we are betrayed by our brothers, if our children rise against us, if we are hated by all men on account of Christ, how will we bear it otherwise? We talk about detachment, but we might see this matter also in terms of treasures. For where our heart is, there will be our treasure also. And where is our treasure? Where are we invested?

If we are invested in God, then these persecutions may indeed be endured – by His grace and power. Yet insofar as we have secret, unconscious, or even natural investments in all our other relations, then a time may come when we will have to struggle against the forces they exert upon our God-aspiring hearts. It is not that God does not want us to enjoy such relations; but it is that God will have no strange gods before Himself. And sometimes, it is only in a moment of persecution and trial that we find out what our real priorities are. Where do our horizons truly lie – on the edge of eternity or firmly in this world? We do not truly love others unless we are loving them in God and in the way God intends. 

For the wisdom we need to navigate our way among men, for the courage we need to endure the struggles of the age, we must rely only on Him who delivers us out of all our troubles. But the man who stands firm to the end will be saved.

Faith big and bold

Today’s gospel (Matthew 9: 18-26) relates two miracles both of which require faith but in different ways. Summoned to raise the deceased child of one of the officials, Jesus is touched by a woman in the crowd as He passes. Your faith has cured you, Jesus tells her. In the second miracle, Jesus raises a young child to life. This too requires faith on the part of her parents – the faith that brought the official to Jesus in the first place but also the faith to endure the scorn of the assembled mourners who are too familiar with death to think Jesus can do anything about it.

This gospel suggests to us that faith can be bold in two ways. First, faith can be bold in what it asks of God. Think big, ask more, even resurrection! Discernment is needed no doubt, but while God is not a slot machine or a sugar daddy, He is ruler of the universe. All the saints dream big in their petitions. All the great works of the saints grow strong through their reliance on God, expressed in that prayer of dependence that asks for its daily bread from the hands of a Father who does not want to give us a serpent. Think big, ask more!

And then there is the faith that endures in the face of adversity. We move in a cloud of unbelief, blown upon us by the assumptions of those around us. We are social creatures but when our sociability is too material, too animal, we find our faith faltering because it is not affirmed. What we need here is the boldness of the parents of the dead child – the boldness that defies the scorn of the multitude and opens the door to a Saviour’s visit.

And in the latter case, such a bold faith opens the mind likewise to the new society of the communion of the saints. Our sociability is saved also because Jesus calls us into the life of faith through His Mystical Body. Let the mourners – who cannot turn their minds from death – mourn; let the dead bury their dead. We live on through faith with our brothers and sisters as members of the Body of Him who created and redeemed us.

The quick and the dead

 Today’s gospel (Matthew 8: 18-22) is one of those passages where Jesus seems unrelenting. The Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head, He tells one scribe. Let the dead bury their dead but come follow me, He says to another apparently willing follower who had just suffered a bereavement. Nice one, Jesus …

It strikes me that, in such moments, the gospel writers give us the headlines but not always the context that was probably better understood by bystanders or those who knew Jesus’ interlocutors. Was there something in the scribe that was making a show of wanting to follow Jesus, but actually anticipated some kind of personal glory in being a chosen disciple? Did the man offer to follow Jesus while in fact seeking something else, perhaps himself? Jesus knew.

Likewise, Jesus’ response to the man who simply wanted to go and bury his father seems a priori harsh, but Jesus is the reader of hearts. While we do know the circumstances, we can be sure there was an agenda behind the man’s request, other than merely paying honour to his deceased parent.  And Jesus skewers it mercilessly. Let your yes be yes and your no be no.

There is another layer of meaning, however, in those words: Let the dead bury their dead but come follow me. The meaning of the second ‘dead’ – their dead - might seem obvious on the surface. It is a reference to the deceased, isn’t it? But who does Jesus call ‘the dead’ in the first place? In the latter case, the dead are perhaps those who are not alive to God, or at least those who are not trying to live in His will. They are ‘dead’ in the sense of being like a ‘dead weight’. They are inert and motionless. The dead are those who refuse to be what they are: wayfarers, like the rest of us. Let the dead bury their dead, therefore, is as much as to say: do not act like the dead. Be alive! Get on the road. Be alive to God and God’s call in this moment. Do not project into the future some moment of serving Him eventually. Serve Him now. Live!

What or who, then, are the dead that those who do not live are burying? The dead in the second sense is perhaps the world as it is laid hold of by those who are not alive to God. The world is always good, for it is God’s creation, but the way that we lay hold of it, especially if we are not alive to God, turns it into something dead. Here it is also a ‘dead weight’ but now in the sense of being a burden, something that weighs us down. And how much more will it weigh us down if we are not alive to God? The dead burdens of the world rob us of freedom. In the case of the man whose father has died, his attachments hold him back from doing what perhaps Jesus has given him to understand he must do now: be alive! Note also that this is not just about attachment to things. Our burdens can also be our habits and ways of doing things, our comfort zones, the price of our agreeableness, our intangible tethers that are deep down only the egotist's declaration of 'my way or the highway'. But our highways and roads lead nowhere. Only God's way, the way of the cross, leads to life.  

Let the dead bury their dead, says Jesus, challenging his listeners - challenging us - to live to God the Father, using this world and doing our thing only insofar as they do not hold us back in our flight towards Him.

Live and be free. This is Jesus’ challenge to us.