Friday of the Thirtieth Week in Ordinary Time
Life is bounded by a lot of rules, and for the most part, we’re glad people follow those rules. I appreciate, for example, that pretty much everyone respects driving on the right hand side of the road. It makes life a lot easier.
As humans, we also admit that our rules don’t always fit a given situation. If an ambulance is speeding to the hospital with a patient in cardiac arrest, we tend to agree that it is okay – even GOOD – for the ambulance to be on the left side of the road if necessary. I’m reminded, as well, of a hospital janitor, who was told that every day at 10 am he was to vacuum the floors in the visitor’s lounge. One day, a family who had been up all night with a loved one in the intensive care unit was sleeping in the visitor’s lounge. So he had a choice: break his supervisor’s rule (and perhaps risk getting fired) or vacuum later, after the family had woken up a bit more. I’m glad he chose the second option.
Today’s scriptures are about reflections on when it is okay to “break” the rules. The gospel (Luke 14:1-6) features Jesus once more in arguments with the Pharisees about this topic. The Pharisees tried to follow the laws of the Old Testament as closely as possible, so Jesus is a bit of a trouble maker by disrespecting their laws as a guest in their home, and healing a man on the Sabbath. This is why Jesus tries to give an extreme example of a child or an ox when he addresses their questions. As usual, no one can give Jesus an answer to his difficult question, because the fact is that sometimes there are good reasons to break a rule.
Paul knows this as well, but Paul’s example also lets us know that even if we believe we are breaking rules in good cause, the authorities will not necessarily agree. Deciding to break the rules also means agreeing to the consequences. In his letter (Phillippians 1:1-11), we note that he is in prison in part because he has offended the authorities. Paul witnesses to the fact that we should not see his imprisonment as the tragedy we tend to think it is. Instead, he asks Christians to reflect for themselves about the cost of discipleship, to focus on “what is of value” and to let love “increase ever more and more in knowledge and every kind of perception.” Paul wants us to see that what is of value is not always what the world holds valuable, even if that means that we might be thrown in jail or otherwise suffer the consequences of taking up the cross as Jesus commands us to do.
Catholic teaching recognizes the value of knowing when to break the rules, in its virtue of prudence. A virtue is a good habit that we take on, and the virtue of prudence asks us to consider what is the right thing to do in a particular time and place. Many of those who have been named saints are named so because they did something Christians perceive as the right thing to do, but which the authorities see is the wrong thing. Sometimes, the virtuous action might be not to vacuum while a tired family sleeps.
Today, let be attentive to doing the prudent, right thing, especially if the rule is leading us to do the wrong thing.
- Jana M. Bennett