Did you get a little lost in those readings? I did. They kind of bounced
from one thing to another with little or no apparent logic. We had
shaking sieves; we had pottery, and furnaces, corruptibility and
incorruptibility, splinters and wooden beams, figs and thorn bushes,
grapes and brambles, good trees and bad trees, good fruit and rotten
fruit.
To be honest. I found myself wondering how I
was ever going to get a homily out of all that! It’s not that there
wasn’t enough there – there was almost too much: too many images –
strong but disconnected images – along with wise sayings that seemed to
come out of nowhere with very little coherence or unity. Don’t get me
wrong: I know it’s all the inspired Word of God but are ‘inspired’ and
‘inspiring’ the same thing? Maybe not. So, if you are less than
inspired by what I have to say this morning, I’m hoping you will cut me
some slack!
I did glean one gem from the reading from the
Book of Sirach (one of the wisdom books from the Jewish scriptures).
It’s this: people who speak for a living and whose lives depend to some
degree on the words they speak (priests and politicians come to mind,
among others), ought to watch what they say. Sirach makes a strong case
for measured, forthright, honest speech. Falsehoods, or howlers, or
downright lies and misrepresentations will not escape notice, Sirach
says; they will stick out like husks of grain do when a baker shakes
flour in a sieve. To quote the passage, “When a sieve is shaken, the
husks appear; so do one’s faults when one speaks. One’s speech discloses
the bent of one’s mind. Praise no one before he speaks, for it is in
speaking that people are tested.”
That got me to thinking about how much our
speech, our discourse, is getting debased these days. Sadly, we don’t
have very high expectations of getting the truth any more, do we? Nor do
we expect to be edified by what we hear. But we should. We should not
only expect it, we should demand it - from priests, from politicians,
from pundits, from everyone, including ourselves. So there’s one
takeaway from those seemingly random readings. Speech is sacred. It
should be considered and measured, honest and respectful. Above
all, it should be true.
There was more wisdom in the passage from
Luke’s gospel. Jesus says that a blind person cannot – or should not –
try to lead another blind person. They’re unlikely to get where they’re
going. That’s pretty obvious. What’s not so obvious is why Jesus said
it. I think he was pointing to religious leaders – blind religious
leaders with whom he was often in conflict. And I think he was also
pointing to them when he spoke about eyes with wooden beams in them and
eyes with tiny splinters. People with major blind spots ought to clear
those up before pointing out the minor blind spots of others. Good
advice for religious leaders of any time, including ours, wouldn’t you
agree!
My friends, I’m going to be content this
morning that, from a blur of images and a slew of seemingly disconnected
sayings, there was some wisdom to be gleaned: like face your own truth
before presuming to tell others how to face theirs; watch what you say,
care about what you say. Words are sacred, and so are the people to whom
we speak them. And words should always be in the service of truth: words
should build up, not tear down, bring light, not darkness. None of this
may be at the pinnacle of Christian morality but it could surely take us
a step beyond the present, sorry state of human discourse.
Maybe that’s enough for now. Lent is fast upon
us. There will be plenty of time for going deeper. And longer. Stay
tuned!
Father Michael G. Ryan
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