Wednesday of the Thirteenth Week in Ordinary Time
Scripture Readings
On August 28, 1963, Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr gave his famous “I Have a Dream” speech. In that proclamation, King referenced Amos 5:24, the verse that closes out today’s first reading. Dr King declared, No, no, we are not satisfied, and we will not be satisfied until “justice rolls down like waters, and righteousness like a mighty stream.” Here we are 57 years later, living in a world torn apart by many forms of injustice, some obvious and some insidious. Dr King cried out on behalf of people of color across our land; that same cry for justice rings through our streets today. Sadly, the issue of systemic racism has been reduced to one more element in our polarized political environment. People tend to line up on this issue based on their political bent or party affiliation. As Catholic Christians, the only “side” for us is God’s side and God’s side is with the poor and the oppressed. God’s side is the side of justice. As Catholic Christians, we must take our stand with God and seek God’s righteousness in every aspect of life. The lament taken up by Amos in chapter 5 speaks prophetically and profoundly to us today. Systemic racism is only one of many, many forms of injustice plaguing our world. Actually, any broken relationship is a form of injustice. Today, I invite us to humble ourselves and look deep within. Let us ask God to shine the light of truth into our own darkness and expose any root of evil or hate that may have taken hold in us. Let us seek good and not evil; let us choose life and not death.
If you have time, please read all of Amos chapter 5. You can access it here. As you read prayerfully, allow this lament to become your own. Let us weep together today for ourselves and for the human family, our brothers and sisters throughout our nation and around our world. Amos says, Seek good and not evil, that you may live; Then truly will the Lord, the God of hosts, be with you as you claim! Hate evil and love good, and let justice prevail at the gate . . . We, as God’s people, often betray God, choosing hate and death over love and life. Deuteronomy 30 makes God’s will crystal clear. Moreover, the Lord your God will circumcise your heart and the heart of your descendants, so that you will love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul, in order that you may live . . . See, I have set before you today life and prosperity, death and adversity . . . Choose life so that you and your descendants may live . . . Choose life. Choose life. Choose life!
To choose life, we choose love. 1 John 4 paints a beautiful and clear picture of who we are as God’s children. Verse 16 says, God is love, and those who live in love live in God. If we find ourselves participating in any kind of injustice, we are not living in love. We can be complicit by our actions and by our silence. I pray that today we might experience a radical reorientation to God and truly live our lives from that position in God. The Holy Trinity is love. Let us abide unwaveringly in the divine flow of Love that is God. Let our guiding question for life become, what is the loving response? to every situation, to every decision, to every person.
Whenever I judge another person or view him as “less than,” I’m outside the bounds of love. When I refuse to forgive, I have chosen hate; when I fail to offer mercy, I have chosen death; if I refuse to practice reconciliation, I am complicit with evil. In all areas of brokenness in my relationships, I side with injustice. This is not God’s will. What about you? Justice rolls down like waters, and righteousness like a mighty stream each time we reach out in love across a dividing line or dividing wall. Justice and righteousness are present when we recognize every human being as beloved of God and our sister or brother. Being people of justice begins with our 1:1 relationships, extends throughout our families to our neighborhoods, workplaces or schools, reaches out through our parish, and flows out into our world. We must not be deceived. Any time we choose hate over love, evil over goodness, or death over life, we participate in perpetuating injustice in our world. If we are not loving, we are not living. To be unloving, unmerciful, uncompassionate is to die. Today, let us live as radical disciples of radical love, taking whatever steps we need to bring goodness, love, life, and the flow of justice to our relationships and to our world. Amen!