This weekend our country is celebrating its independence. We love America but the path our country is on is troubling, to say the least. Many who have followed the Supreme Court, for example, have accepted its decision on abortion, arguing that it is a right to be defended, thus allowing the Supreme Court to decide whether a human being exists within a mother’s womb or not. Many people seem to think that the Supreme Court is superior to the law of God, ignoring the reality that what is legal isn’t always moral.
It is as though the Supreme Court is correct if the majority of its justices agree on something. People forget that four years before the Civil War the Supreme Court defined slaves as pieces of property rather than human beings. That was the Dred Scott Decision.
We should be concerned not just for the institutions of our country, but for those who accept as true and good whatever path our nation chooses. There appears to be no limit to the absurdity promoted by those in power at times. We need to pray for the leaders of our country, and at the same time, we need to pray for the courage to stand firm for God, to fight for morality, to fight for Jesus Christ and for His Way. Doing so is no easy task.
Jesus concluded the Beatitudes in the Gospel of Matthew with: “Blessed are you when people revile you and persecute you, and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.” Matthew 5:11-12.
We live this beatitude every day when we stand up for what is right and moral. We stand up for all life from conception to natural death, speaking out against sins such as racial prejudice, capital punishment, and euthanasia along with abortion. We are reviled and insulted by those who don’t consider God’s presence in the world. We stand up for charity to the poor and are mocked by those who claim that the Bible supports their perverse laws and tactics.
This is nothing new. 2,500 years ago, God told Ezekiel to proclaim the truth to a rebellious people, even though they would reject him. That was this Sunday’s first reading. 2,000 years ago, people refused to accept the Messiah of God when He stood before them in his hometown synagogue because Jesus did not fit their pre-conceived notion of what the Messiah should be like. “He shouldn’t be one of us,” they argued, taking offense at what he said.
If the prophets were ignored and if Jesus was disregarded, then how can we expect people to listen to us when we proclaim God’s way? We are certainly no better than Paul who tells us about his weakness in our second reading. We are also weak. And we do dumb things. We sin and yet we ask people to listen to us, turn away from sin and put Christ into the center of their lives. Do we really have a right to even attempt to do this? Yes. In fact, we have more than a right. By virtue of our baptism, we are expected to lead others to God. We need to call others to Christ knowing that if they hear our call and follow Christ it will because Jesus worked though us, despite our weakness.
We need to keep putting up the fight to follow Jesus and know that He will work through us, sometimes, despite our shortcomings. “My grace is sufficient for you,” the Lord told St. Paul. “My power is made perfect in your weakness.” (2 Cor 12:9). He is saying that to us as well.
People with the will and power to protect their privileges will reject and silence their prophets. Just look at Ezekiel, Paul, Jesus, Martin Luther King and a host of others, including Archbishops Oscar Romero and Raymond Hunthausen. They all allowed the Spirit to work through them.
The work of God is accomplished not because of you or me with all our faults and shortcomings. The work of God is accomplished because we allow God to use us to bring His blueprint for living to the world.
If we want our country to survive, we must not allow anything to limit our battle for Christ. That includes what others think about us and what we think about ourselves. It does not matter if others think less of us because we reject the immorality of many elements of our society. The society that matters to us is the Kingdom of God. It does not matter if we appear to be a minority either. Jesus never promised us that ours would be the majority opinion. He just promised us that He would be with us until the end of time.
Today’s readings sum up what God expects of us. We are Americans but we are also Catholics, following Jesus Christ.
We love our country and we pray for our country. But what matters more in the long run is that we love and seek to build the Kingdom of God, our pathway to eternal life. It is our responsibility as committed Catholics and as patriotic Americans to lead the United States to be one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.