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Pretention

Peacock

This is a reflection on the Mass readings of the day.


There is a strikingly ordinary pair of lines at the close of today’s gospel, which could apply to any Christian child in grace: “The child grew and became strong, filled with wisdom; and the favor of God was upon him.”

The child grew and became strong. A pleasant line, but an incredibly ordinary one–in stark contrast to the portentous utterances of Simeon and joyful acclaim of Anna the prophetess. There are no words, not one, about the child Jesus doing anything wondrous, anything that any other blessed child might not do.

This ordinary summation of the entire childhood of Jesus seems to reflect and fulfill St. John’s admonition in the first reading to avoid love for the world, for “…enticement for the eyes, and a pretentious life, is not from the Father but is from the world.”

Immediately we hear John’s words and consider the life of Jesus, and we think, “I am not worldly. I am not pretentious. I am ordinary. I am on Jesus’ side in this equation.”

And surely, we are. But perhaps there is a bit of room for further self-examination here. For, there are surely very few in the world who would call themselves pretentious. And yet, we know well that there are many in the world who are, in fact, pretentious.

Have we ever dreamt of having our full worth recognized by the world, in some way? Of our talents receiving full recognition? Has this not in fact at times congealed into an actual objective, a hidden motive that has driven real exertion and effort on our part?

At first glance, the quest for due recognition may not feel like pretention. But consider this: The infinite value that you perceive in yourself, while in the light of God’s love is legitimate and objectively real, is a characteristic of every one of the billions of human beings walking the planet. If each were to receive his/her “due recognition,” the planet’s productivity would grind to a halt. There would be no time to do anything but recognize each other.

It is for this reason that any longing for due recognition may truly fall under the heading of pretention. And when you think about it, it is this longing that typically leads others to acts that we acknowledge as pretentious.

Just as true accommodation of the need for due recognition would grind the world to a halt, we must recognize in our own lives that, if we were truly to obsess on love of neighbor, we would discover that there is not nearly enough time in life to accomplish all that we want to accomplish in that realm.

And certainly, as in the childhood of Jesus, there would be not time for pretentious acts seeking vain recognition.

Ideas for conversation with the Lord: Ask Jesus to purify the inertia and impetus of your heart so that it is filled with a desire for the happiness of others. Ask Him to send the Holy Spirit to fill your heart with the same obsessive passion for the happiness–especially eternal happiness–of other persons that He displayed throughout His life.

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Here Comes the Sun

Sun

This is a reflection on the Mass readings of the day.


When considering the deeper reality of things, It helps to back over and over again the reality explained to us in Genesis of the impact of human sin on our collective lot.

“Cursed is the ground because of you! In toil you shall eat its yield all the days of your life.” (Gn. 3:17)

If God loves us so much, why is it so hard to eke out a living? Why does much of what we do fail? It’s right there in black and white. When we start wringing our hands because it’s so unfair, it is well to remember that we have made our own bed through our rejection of God–individually, but also collectively, cosmically.

Which is the reason that today’s first reading rings as true now as it did when it was written thousands of years ago. Mind you, we have something that the Scripture author didn’t have in his time: Technology and know-how that tangibly advances from generation to generation. It is a sign of God’s mercy that He allows us actually to make progress–clambering, as it were, a few feet up the side of the deep pit that we have dug for ourselves through sin.

But in the end, there really is “nothing new under the sun.” The sun, source of so much of what we need to sustain life, keeps rising and setting; the winds keep blowing; man, like a poor player, “struts and frets his hour upon the stage. And then is heard no more” (Shakespeare–Macbeth, Act V, Scene V). All our progress has not removed our stress, our fretting, our worry, our fear, or the insecurity of our sin-weakened existence.

“But, soft! what light through yonder window breaks?” (Shakespeare–Romeo and Juliet, Act II, Scene II) Nothing new under the sun–until the year zero, until God takes on flesh to send a ladder down the pit; until, in our individual lives, we discover Jesus Christ.

The sun goes on rising, but now the Sun of Justice rises behind it, with healing in its wings (cf. Ml. 3:20). It is as though, upon our two-dimensional, cyclical, never-really-changing world, a third dimension has broken in.

Even Herod, in our Gospel passage today, perceives the novelty, and his characteristic casual curiosity is piqued. He has beheaded John, perpetuating the cycle of barbarity in our darkened world. So who is this new guy? What do you mean it’s Elijah, or John returned–did I not snuff that out?

Herod is ever in search of entertaining novelty (later he would ask Jesus to perform a trick for him–cf. Lk. 23). But he has no idea just how revolutionary the novelty of the crucified Jesus would prove to be.

The world has heard the name of Jesus for centuries; you and I have heard it and think we know what it means. But if we long for novelty, that is where we are to find it–rather than in the next Apple release. Because, despite what we think we know, of Jesus’ novelty we have scarcely scratched the surface.

Ideas for conversation with the Lord: Summarize the life, death, Resurrection, and Ascension of Jesus in your heart. Run through the history of the Church in a rapid review. Tell Jesus how you interpret all this. Then, ask Him if there is something new from Him, something unexpected for your life; ask Him if you have exhausted all His novelty. Ask Him to inundate your soul with awe at the unexpected newness, depth, inexhaustibility of His presence in your life.

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