THE SECOND SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME – B
1 Corinthians 6:13c-15a, 17-20
With the celebration of the Second Sunday, we enter Ordinary Time having concluded the Christmas Season last Sunday with the celebration of the Baptism of the Lord. There is a risk if we make this journey and complete the cycle of readings for the year. The danger is that we might not be at all the same at the conclusion as we were in the beginning. Perhaps that is stating the obvious because the fact of the matter is conversion is the risk we run each time we gather to celebrate Eucharist. It always amazes me how casually and nonchalantly people come together for Liturgy. What if the action works this time? What if the Spirit rushes through the assembly this time and accomplishes the same transformation of them that happens with the bread and the wine? The faithful are very ready to venerate the Body and Blood of Christ present in the Eucharist. Are they ready to be the Body of Christ? Then shouldn’t they have the same reverence for the Christ present in the Assembly? If it works, the Liturgy, that is, then Christ is present in those who have gathered, who have eaten and drunk, and who are then sent. Maybe the realization takes time. But how long? If it works, about the same length of time it takes to transform the Bread and the Wine.
The human experience is one of gradually unfolding and growing awareness. The potential plant is contained in the seed. Watch that seed sprout and the plant grow and the blossom burst forth and you know that your understanding and appreciation has grown as well through each stage of the plant’s development. That’s what happens when we journey in faith and yield to the Spirit. Our understanding grows with each step we take, with each celebration of Eucharist, even as we are transformed. Better put, if we respond.
Hear the first reading and marvel. It is an account of growing awareness on the part of the boy Samuel and his teacher, the priest and leader Eli. Samuel is sleeping in the temple where the ark of God was. The ark is a concentrated presence of God, if you will. God’s presence is universal but especially so where the ark is. Samuel, young and having been given to God’s service from infancy by his mother, Hannah, is awakened by the sound of his name on the night air. Samuel. Samuel. Was it a whisper? Was it a shout? That doesn’t matter. The response matters. Here I am. Twice the boy will wake Eli because he thought it was the teacher calling. The third time he is awakened by the boy, Eli understands who it is who calls, that it is the Lord. One wonders if Eli suffered pangs of jealousy for an experience he had never had as he told Samuel that the next time he heard the voice say: Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening. For Samuel, it will be a call from the Lord to prophecy and the beginning of a relationship with the Lord that will bring him to anoint the first two kings of Israel, Saul and David. But Eli will hear the first prophecy from Samuel, the promise of the coming destruction of Eli and his family for their lack of fidelity to the Lord. The word of God is a two-edged sword.
When Samuel said speak that third time, how much did he understand? Certainly not nearly as much as he did at the twilight of his life and after the years of service and openness to the Lord. At the beginning of each person’s faith walk, s/he is called by God by name as the seed of faith is planted in the human heart. It is the role of the more experienced, the veterans in the faith, to help the neophyte understand who it is that is calling and to exemplify what it means to respond. The Rite of Christian Initiation (RCIA) process is meant to provide the atmosphere and means for those awakening to faith to understand the call to Baptism and along the way, through the experience of faith in the witness and action of the catechists and the parish assembly to come to understand what believers do and how they worship. It is a process that entails journeying with Jesus through the full cycle of readings in a Liturgical Year. Sometimes it takes even longer. And that is how they come to understand who it is that is calling, what it means to follow, and find to courage and the faith to say: Speak, Lord, your servant is listening. They will understand something as they stand at the Font’s edge and take their first step into the waters. As they emerge on the other side, reborn in Christ, they will continue to grow, to be transformed, until, in the fullness of time, Christ comes to full stature in them.
The understanding of Christ is a growing one. No one knows and understands at once. Even Paul, after his blazing encounter on the road to Damascus, had to be led by the hand back into the city where he would learn how much he would have to suffer for the Name. The two in the gospel this week are seekers. They thought that John the Baptist was the one they sought. But John, like Eli, like the RCIA catechist, points them in another direction: Behold the Lamb of God, as Jesus walks by. Notice the question Jesus asks the two of them in their first encounter: What are you looking for? And notice that they do not know the answer to the question because they know so little. But they know that something is here. And they hope that they will know better after some time and exposure to him and so they address Jesus as rabbi and ask him where he lives. Jesus’ response is: Come and you will see. Do you remember that later bitter confrontation between Jesus and Peter when Peter tried to dissuade Jesus from going to Jerusalem to suffer and to die? Remember what Jesus said then? Get behind me, you tempter, and learn from me. What he commanded Peter to do was to walk in Jesus’ footsteps and observe what he does so that he can do the same and come to understand. That is the same thing, in gentler words, that Jesus says to the two seekers. And they stayed with him that day. That is the only way to know Jesus, being with him and then doing what he does.
The next thing we hear is that Andrew, one of the two, goes to his brother Simon and tells him: We have found the Messiah – which translated means Christ. Meeting Christ, believing in Christ, means bringing others to Christ. Bring others to Christ and let Christ do the rest. See how Simon is changed. Jesus gives him a new name that in turn gives him a new significance. You are Simon, the son of John; you will be called Cephas – which translated is Peter. And Peter is translated Rock.
So the journey of this year of faith begins. Maybe the Lord asks you at the outset: What are you looking for? There may be many things you think you seek. Ultimately, though, it is Christ you seek and your ongoing transformation in Christ. So he says to you, Come and see. Listen as you stand at the Table of the Word. Observe as you fully, actively and consciously participate at the Table of the Eucharist. Be transformed as you take and eat. And if it works, you will be transformed and newly convinced that you are sent to be the continuation of Christ’s presence in the world until all have eaten and have come to know.
Sincerely,
Didymus
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