Pink slips and “Dear John” letters have one thing in common: they send a message of rejection. Countless authors have received pink slips for their manuscripts. So have many young men and women from the flames of their hearts. Perhaps I would not be standing here if I hadn’t received such a letter 42 years ago from a young woman named Luz Maria. In the gospel scene, Jesus is the one who is being rejected, just as he expected to be. No prophet, he observes, is accepted in his native place. So long as Jesus announced glad tidings, he was welcomed but the moment his tune shifted, his listeners were filled with fury.
Their reaction seems so outrageous. Why did they shift from a warm welcome to the “urge to kill” so quickly? To understand their reaction, consider this ancient Greek tale about the farmer who had a “perfect” wheat field. Everyone admired it because every stalk was exactly the same height. When asked how he achieved it, he explained, “If a grain sticks its head above the others, I cut it off!”
The folks in Nazareth acted much the same way. For thirty years they had known Jesus as the “son of Joseph.” All that time, he had blended in with the neighborhood. Now as a wandering preacher, he stood out like that overgrown shaft of wheat. What he had to say wasn’t what they expected or wanted to hear.
Identifying himself as the anointed one of God didn’t ruffle their feathers. What irked them was learning that God’s mercy and concern would now be extended to all peoples, not just the Israelites. By mentioning the widow in the land of Sidon and Naaman the Syrian, Jesus in effect was pointing out that all peoples are dear to God and are to benefit from his ministry.
Before we pass judgment on the people in the synagogue for overreacting, consider your reaction to God’s truth. Are we just as blind and narrow-minded to what God has to say at times? Jesus speaks hard sayings. There’s no denying that. Like the people in Nazareth, not all of us always want to hear, much less accept what Jesus has to say through the teachings of our Catholic faith. We act like the patient whose doctor felt he had to be told the truth about his condition. “You are a very sick man. You probably won’t live more than a couple of weeks at most. You should settle your affairs. Is there anyone you want me to call?” “Yes,” replied the patient, “another doctor!”
When we don’t like what we’re told, we are quick to get another opinion. As Paul notes, “When I was a child, I used to talk like a child, think as a child, reason as a child.” How often did we ask one parent for what we wanted if the other parent didn’t give us the answer we wanted to hear?
When given a truth they don’t like, some people will look for another “prophet” who will tell them what they want to hear. Many leave the church to find another one that tells them what they want to hear instead of what they need to hear.
Three traits in our culture impede people from accepting the divine truth. The most apparent is secularism, which doesn’t actually deny the existence of God. It conveys the message that God is irrelevant. Think of those you know who no longer practice their faith. How important is God to them?
Then there is relativism, the flawed notion that you have your truth and I have mine. This amounts to saying one opinion is just as good as another. In the name of tolerance, absolute truth is ignored or overlooked. Many opinions, especially judicial opinions, are regarded as being morally right when in fact they are not. The latest trend has been judgments rendered by some courts defining same sex unions as marriages.
Some argue that our society is mired in confusion because many choose to listen to politicians instead of prophets. A politician’s success often depends, not on what he or she truly believes but on saying what they perceive people want to hear. A prophet’s success, on the other hand, is measured by saying what people need to hear. Consequently, prophets often rub people the wrong way, just as Jesus did in his first homily.
As Catholics, we claim to be followers of Jesus Christ, but are we willing to listen to and accept the truth that he offers us? That means realizing that truth isn’t to be found in opinion polls but in the teachings of our faith which are rooted in the word of God. That could also means experiencing the discomfort that comes from literally standing alone at times on a certain principle. How often, for example, have you found yourself in the midst of a conversation that has become coarse or uncharitable? Did you have the courage to walk away or confront the speaker?
We are not all expected to professionally evangelize the good news, standing on street corners thumping on the Bible, but we ought to be committed to living our Catholic faith and that could make us prophets. Clearly, Jesus did not flow with the current of his times nor does he today. He spoke the divine truth, knowing that he would rarely be politically correct. He had no choice for promoting the truth is the prophet’s mission in this world. By virtue of our baptism, that is our mission as well.
This Lent, there will be ads on TV inviting anyone who has left the faith to come home. Perhaps, they may ask you questions. If so, simply answer their questions as best you can and if you don’t know the answer, invite them to see me or a member of our evangelization team listed on the flyer in last week’s bulletin. What you say and do could be what it takes to bring someone home to the Church, allowing Jesus to cheer as he tears up one of the many rejection letters in his collection.