HOMILY WEEK 21 03 – Year II
Attitudes of Genuine Faith and Sincere Love
(2 Th 3:6-10, 16-18; Ps 128; Mt 23:27-32)
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“The last act is the greatest treason. To do the right deed for the wrong reason.”
That statement, by T.S. Eliot, in his play Murder in the Cathedral, relates to the readings today, inviting us to have a correct attitude towards life and work, one of genuine faith and sincere love.
Our make-up as human beings involve the art of thinking, dealing with our emotions, and being aware of our attitudes underlying these An attitude to my mind is our habitual way of thinking, feeling and acting in our lives and in this world.
The scribes and Pharisees in the gospel have an attitude problem. They are doing many right things, like keeping all kinds of ritual regulations, but for the wrong reasons. Their main concern seems to have been “looking good” as opposed to truly “being good.” For that reason, Jesus had some harsh words for them, calling them out as hypocrites. The hypocrisy becomes most apparent as they were the ones who prided themselves on keeping the laws perfectly, yet Jesus accuses them of actually being “lawless” as they overlooked the greatest law of all – that of believing in him and selflessly loving others.
As our Israeli guide put it during a tour of the Holy City, her fellow citizens were not that concerned about loving others – their main question was what they needed to do to be a good Jew. That borders on the heresy of Pelagianism, the belief that one can earn heaven or save one’s self by one’s own efforts.
Along that line, Bishop Robert Barron offers this reflection on today’s gospel: One of the greatest dangers in the spiritual life is to fall into the trap of auto-salvation, the conviction that one can save oneself through heroic moral effort. The principal problem with such a strategy is that it results in the strengthening of the very egotism that one hopes to overcome.
What Jesus so vehemently critiqued in the Pharisees was just this kind of egotism: “You are like whitewashed tombs, which appear beautiful on the outside, but inside are full of dead men’s bones.” Sin is not a weakness that we can overcome but a condition from which we have to be saved.
This insight should allow us, at an elemental psychological and spiritual level, to relax and to surrender. What happens often in the hearts of sinners is a kind of tightening of the spirit as the mind and will strive to break out of the prison of fear. All of this stretching and straining serves only to throw the ego back on itself in a misery of failure and self-reproach.
St. Paul, in the first reading, is also dealing with an attitude problem among the people he evangelized – a negative attitude towards work. It seems that in the light of the Parousia coming soon, some of the early Christians were slacking off and doing just the opposite – making little or no effort to even earn their own keep.
That might also be a modern problem today, with many people seemingly having an “the world owes me a living” mentality, that somehow I should not have to work, that someone will take care of me. That attitude can put a burden on our system of employment and taxation, leaving hard-working employers, farmers, business people feeling used and abused. St. Paul minced no words in his day – “Anyone not willing to work should not eat.”
My brother Roger at harvest
I must admit that growing up on the farm certainly taught us a work ethic as young people – we all had chores to do from the moment we were able to do them – the boys on the farm mostly, and the girls in the house for the most part. My brothers and I were driving trucks and tractors by the age of twelve, and certainly had a sense of being valued and relied upon to contribute to the family’s well-being. I suspect young people today, especially in cities, are growing up somewhat deprived of that quality of life.
To be fair, I think that statement of St. Paul’s needs to be tempered by the reality of inter-generational effects of trauma that has affected many family systems, especially within Indigenous circles in the light of colonization and the effects of the residential school systems.
There are also two attitudes that need to be avoided – that of care-taking and enabling. Caretaking tends to help others with the often-hidden aim of gaining something from the activity, of looking good to others, as opposed to care-giving, which is truly altruistic and selfless. Enabling also looks good on the outside, but does not really help the other in the long run and at a deeper level may even be resented.
Here is a saying about attitudes I adapted slightly that may be attributed to Eleanor Roosevelt:
Watch your thoughts; they become words.
Watch your words; they become actions.
Watch your actions; they become attitudes.
Watch your attitudes; they become habits.
Watch your habits; they become character.
Watch your character; it becomes your destiny.
The Eucharist makes present the truly selfless love of God in Jesus Christ, given to us to reveal to us the depths of the Father’s love for us. May our celebration inspire us to check our attitudes, to do the right things for the right reasons, and to lead lives of genuine faith and sincere love.
