Daily word, 18 Aug 18

Nineteenth Saturday of the Year (18 Aug 2018) 

Ez 18. 1-10, 13b, 30-32; Ps 51; Mt 19. 13-15

Homily of Fr. Paul Panaretos, S.J. on 8-day Directed Retreat

Savouring

In  dramas on stage, in film, in novels: a message as it unfolds speaks more powerfully than the set, costumes, time. As they unfold scriptures communicate God’s essential message. Circumstances historical, cultural and social are helpful; so great is their distance from us they cannot help us as we would like; surely not as much as the unfolding of God’s message in specific writings.

Our gospel selection began to unfold on Tuesday. Jesus welcoming children to his disciples’ chagrin follows two recent moments: Jesus more than encouraged disciples to be childlike—unless you change—conduct yourselves with childlike openness and wonder—you will never enter the realm of God;¹ then immediately after Jesus spoke of forgive-ness and marriage—Thursday and Friday’s gospel selections—people brought…children…to Jesus that he might lay his hands on them and pray.

Bernie noted on Tuesday that chapters 18 & 19 in the First Gospel the voice of Jesus addressed Matthew’s church community and each one since. The leading image—childlike openness—shapes how we are to be, to keep disposing ourselves. As we grow up we grow out of childlike openness; we may even feel outgrowing it is our destiny. Jesus says our destiny rests in recovering our openness and wonder so we may receive creation as gift.

To cultivate childlike openness requires help. I do offer my willingness and my desire, but alone I cannot cultivate it; I need to be blessed. Blessing shares in the life of our triune God. Parents in the gospel seemed to act on their instinct to help their children: they brought Jesus their children for him to bless. Worship deepened their instinct.

Every Yom Kippur parents bless their children² by “placing both their hands on [each] child’s head.” Many parents did this every Sabbath.³ The oral tradition preserved recalled that people asked blessings of righteous ones—often elders: a righteous person would “pray for [children] to merit Torah and good deeds. …and to teach that they were pleasant and their deeds hand-some and white to heaven.”⁴ Parents recognized Jesus lived the covenant of God with God’s people and practiced good deeds; sure reasons to ask him to pray their children would be like him.

We might savour today how we found ourselves in Messiah Jesus’ presence these days. That may be sufficient. Some may be moved to consider how to cultivate at home what being in risen Jesus’ presence on retreat has opened or unfolded for us. Nothing may be said at all; one may bring oneself to Jesus and simply be with the embodiment of God, be with the one who is ever ready to bless us and bless our lives and “to teach that [we are] pleasant” to Jesus and feel more alive with his Spirit.

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1. Matthew 18.3.
2. Erev Yom Kippur blessing. The Day was instituted at Leviticus 16.29-30. 
3. Shloma Majeski, Chapter Seven: The Blessings and Prayers Of a Rebbe. The Sabbath Prayer from “Fiddler on the Roof” is a window on parents praying for their daughters.
4. Tractate Soferim 18.5. A period during the 1^st and into 2^nd Centuries.

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Wiki-image Let the children come to me PD-US