This is a reflection on the Mass readings of the day.
The first reading from St. Paul takes a moment’s reflection to unpack. What is this comparison he is making with the two mothers of Abraham’s sons, Sarah and Hagar? Sarah was Abraham’s legitimate wife, but she was barren until very late in life; Hagar was the slave woman, by whom Abraham bore a son who was ultimately exiled with his mother due to Hagar’s inferior position as a slave.
Hint: Paul speaks of Hagar and Sarah as images of other realities, one coming from Mount Sinai, the other, from the new Jerusalem. The first is a reality of slavery, and the second of freedom.
Paul is comparing Hagar to the Mosaic Law that came from Mt. Sinai, and Sarah, to the redemption that comes from Jesus Christ.
Just as Hagar produced a son for Abraham earlier, while Sarah was still barren, so the Law gave to God a people, when the redemption of Christ still was not fulfilled. But just as the son of Hagar was born into slavery, so children born into the Mosaic Law were born into slavery–not slavery to the Law itself, but slavery to sin, which the Law had no power to abolish.
But, just as Isaac was the legitimate and free child of God’s promise to Abraham of an heir who would bear him descendants as numerous as the stars, so those who enjoy Christ’s unmerited gift of grace are truly freed from the shackles of sin.
And, importantly, each of us living in that grace enjoys the power to become parents of numerous spiritual children, just as Abraham’s descendants were to number as the stars. For as we offer our little imperfect lives to the Father together with Christ’s sacrifice, we trigger the activation of showers of further grace from that infinite source. Grace of conversion for many, even many whom we will never know. Grace of sanctification.
We often think of Jesus as the power source of all this immense potential for freedom, and so He is. But He is also the living sign of this turning point in history between slavery and freedom. He is like a living signpost. Everything He did in His life points to the shift between the slavery to sin and the gift of freedom to which St. Paul alludes.
It would have been terrible to live in the time of Christ. Terrible, that is, if, like those described in today’s Gospel passage, we had somehow missed the reality of His Divinity and His role. Everything He did throughout His earthly life was like a finger pointing to the reality of coming redemption. He Himself is the new sign of Jonah; as Jonah emerged from the belly of the whale, so Christ rose from the dead on the third day (cf. Mt. 12:40). Today Jesus warns those of His generation that it will not go well for them on the last day for rejecting the signs He has given them.
As accessible as the signs were in Jesus’ day, even more accessible are the signs He has given to us: The Seven Sacraments. And just as Jesus in the flesh was both sign and source of the power of redemption, so the Sacraments for us are both the direct source of His redemptive grace, and the signpost pointing to that grace. They are the source and sign of the liberation from sin of which Paul speaks in the first reading.
Ideas for conversation with the Lord: Contemplate the memory of your last confession, and your last communion. Will the Ninevites rise to condemn you, because you treat Jesus in these mysteries like His contemporaries treated Him in the flesh: Casually, with little faith? Or are you taking full advantage of the liberation that St. Paul so deeply appreciated? Talk to Jesus, thank Him for the Sacraments, and ask Him to help you live them profoundly, so that their grace will not wash over you without penetrating your heart.
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