Two friends were walking down a crowded city sidewalk in the midst of a typical noisy rush hour. People bustling, horns honking, engines roaring, vehicles of all sizes rumbling, sirens blaring all about them, when suddenly amid the noise, one friend suddenly turned to the other and said, “Listen, a cricket!”
“Come on!” the second friend shot back. “How can you possibly hear a cricket in the midst of all this noise? Are there even crickets here in the city?”
“But I did hear a cricket.” She stopped to listen again, then, with her cynical friend in tow, crossed the busy street to a big cement planter. Gently pushing aside the petunias, she revealed a little brown cricket. “That is amazing!” her friend said. “How could you have possibly heard it?”
“There is no secret,” she explained. “Watch.” Reaching into her purse, she pulled out some loose change and dropped a quarter on the sidewalk. Despite the deafening noise around them, everyone within fifteen feet turned their head to see where the sound of the money was coming from. The woman turned to her doubting friend and said, “”See, it is all a matter of what you are listening for.”
Being hearing impaired all my life, I have at times envied the ability of some people to hear certain sounds like the purr of a cat. With the help of good hearing aids, I hear the noise, but I often struggle to discern what is being said in noisy places or when I can’t see the face of the person speaking to me. If I manage to catch the message the first time around, that would prompt my mother to accuse me of selective hearing.
For anyone with normal hearing, this gospel passage may seem irrelevant, but there is a lesson here for all of us, regardless of how well we hear. In the midst of all the noise in our lives, we can easily become “deaf” to the presence of God and even those around us.
Our days are crammed full with too many words and too much talk. We live in the midst of 24/7 cable television news, twitter, facebooks, bluetooths, or texting one another on blackberries. We keep in touch with one another on our cell phones while shopping, waiting for the ferry, or commuting. Without a doubt, we are much more into communication than we were three decades ago but are we listening to what really matters?
Sadly, many people have grown deaf to the words of Jesus, the thoughts of the Bible and the message of the Church because the loudness and clutter of this world’s noise has made them spiritually deaf.
Jesus said to the deaf man, “Be opened!” Those are words we all need to hear. This encounter between Jesus and the deaf man captures the relationship between God and us. Face it; we are not always open to hearing the word of God, much less listening to what God has to say. The noise of our surroundings, of Madison Avenue, sports and worldly values often muffle and silence the Word that God speak to us through scripture, the teachings and the preaching of our Church.
Think of how many conversations fall short of being just that because one person refuses to listen to what the other person is saying. Instead of listening, that person has any number of rebuttals lined up for dismissing what is being said. The misunderstandings that ensue sometimes are resolved when the message is finally heard, then understood.
How open are we to hearing what Jesus has to say to us through scripture, the teachings of our church and the preaching of its ministers? Sometimes we miss the forest for the trees because we become upset or hung up by something a homilist has said or by a certain teaching or regulation of the Church, failing to be open to the messenger and the message being delivered.
More than once, someone has expressed to me the opinion that politics should not be preached at Mass. I would agree, but when the issue at hand infringes on the moral teachings of the Church, thus the Word of God, then we need to be open to the bigger picture and listen to what God is ultimately saying. A church that is witness to the Word of God must be partial to those bowed down and give voice to the voiceless like the unborn, the inmate on death row, the poor on skid row, and the mentally ill.
Contrary to what some may think, the Church cannot stay out of politics when politics endangers the lives of the innocent or the rights of others to follow their conscience. The Church has the responsibility to speak up when the law of the land runs contrary to God’s law, for the former is not our means to salvation.
Recall the words of our opening prayer. “Lord our God, in you justice and mercy meet. With unparalleled love you have saved us from death and drawn us into the circle of your love.” From the very beginning, God has endeavored to save us and will always do so, but if God is to succeed, than we must open our ears in this noisy world of ours to what is being said that truly matters in making salvation real.
The words Jesus said to the deaf man are meant for us as well. We must open our hearts to experience God’s compassion in the love of family and friends, to realize God’s presence at all times and places. What we listen for will make a difference in our relationships with one another and with God. Be open and you will experience God in a whole new light.