27th Sunday Reflection: Bitter Faith And Empty Vessels
Franciscan Reflections From The Hermitage – Bitter Faith And Empty Vessels – 27th Sunday in Ordinary Time – (Luke 17:5-10)
Jesus’ instructions to his followers on stumbling blocks, pride, forgiveness, repentance, faith, and service… “So you too, when you do all the things commanded of you, say: ‘We are worthless slaves, we have done what we ought to do.’” Seeking glory through one’s faith empties that faith of its benefits and renders unprofitable the servants of the Lord (Chrysostom).
The true nemesis of faith is not doubt, but pride. As Roger Lambert argues with Dale Kohler “If we could prove God’s existence, we could defeat the devil”. Roger asks Dale who he thinks the devil is. “The Devil, ” Dale replies, “is doubt”. Roger responds: “Funny… l would have said, looking at history and, for that matter, at some of our present-day Supreme leaders, Ayatollahs and Fuehrers, the opposite is true. The Devil is the absence of doubt. He’s what pushes people into suicide bombing, into setting up extermination camps. Doubt may give your dinner a funny taste, but it’s faith that goes out and kills.”
Doubt and faith, mix either with pride and the concoction becomes toxic. Those proud in their faith, those proud in their doubts, both are terrors. As Dietrich Bonhoeffer stood before the machinery of evil that sought to destroy ‘good’, he noted that this ‘terror of evil’ mimicked ‘good’ perfectly. This was an evil that appeared good, the zenith and pride of human endeavour in art, culture, and technological advancement. This sold a cheap grace that mimics the ultimate gift of God; an evil that mimics the good; a Christianity of pride and entitlement packaged as the gateway to the good life.
Angela of Foligno was a great beauty of the 13th century who loved the good life. But things change; a violent earthquake, a hurricane, endless war, and its harsh consequences. Little by little became aware of the emptiness of her life. She called upon St Francis, who appeared to her in a vision and asked his advice on making a good general Confession.
Angela felt she should give something to God in reparation for her sins, but slowly came to realise that she had nothing to give God, indeed, that she ‘was nothing’ without God. She understood that it would not be her will to give her God’s love, for her will, could give only her own “nothingness”, her “non-love”. Three years later, on her path of conversion, she reached another turning point as, in the space of a few months, her mother’s death was followed by the death of her husband and those of all her children. She sold her possessions and enrolled in the Third Order of St Francis where she followed a life of love, peace, and joy in the service of the poor. It was in touching the wounds of the poor, that Angela encountered Christ.
Today’s Gospel puts things plainly; God owes you and me absolutely nothing. God is not obligated or in any way relegated to give us anything. ‘God Is’ and God Gives. God is the centre of all things and we are not.
The Good News is that even though God owes us nothing, it is the nature of Love, the nature of God, to pour out those gifts upon us.
The problem with entitlement is that it creates an attitude that puts a selfish demand on God’s abundant generosity and creates conditions in the relationship that are not only unhealthy but deadly and unprofitable. If we believe that God owes us something then the measure of our thankfulness is now based on God’s performance and the entitlements we expect from God.
This blasphemy is the nature of pride; when we sense we have a right to something we distance ourselves from grace and ultimately from God. To the extent that we fall into this entitlement trap, we become deserving in our own eyes, and God’s grace grows less and less amazing in our estimation. Before we know it, gratitude and thanksgiving are slowly replaced with bitterness, pride, and envy.
It is in this deadly sin of pride that we become ungrateful and cease to give honour to God, our thinking becomes futile and our hearts grow dark. The illusion that I am in control is in direct opposition to faith so when the illusion fails as it must, I am left without faith and ultimately without hope.
Consider, O human being, in what great excellence the Lord God has placed you, for He created and formed you to the image of His beloved Son according to the body and to His likeness according to the Spirit. And all creatures under heaven serve, know, and obey their Creator, each according to its own nature, better than you. And even the demons did not crucify Him, but you, together with them, have crucified Him and are still crucifying Him by delighting in vices and sins. In what, then, can you boast? Even if you were so skillful and wise that you possessed all knowledge, knew how to interpret every kind of language, and to scrutinize heavenly matters with skill: you could not boast in these things. For, even though someone may have received from the Lord a special knowledge of the highest wisdom, one demon knew about heavenly matters and now knows more about those of earth than all human beings. In the same way, even if you were more handsome and richer than everyone else, and even if you worked miracles so that you put demons to flight: all these things are contrary to you; nothing belongs to you; you can boast in none of these things. But we can boast in our weaknesses and in carrying each day the holy cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. (Admonition V)
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