– Third Sunday in Ordinary Time
Dawn M. Nothwehr, OSF, Ph.D.
Readings:
Nehemiah 8:2-4a, 5-6, 8-10
Psalm 19:8, 9, 10, 15
1 Corinthians 12:12-30
Luke 1:1-4; 4:14-21
January 2025 marks several significant anniversaries for Christians across the globe. First, is the 17-hundreth Anniversary of the Nicene Creed – the one creed common to all Christians that explicitly names God as “the Creator of the Heavens and the Earth.” The second, is the 10th Anniversary of the promulgation of Pope Francis’ encyclical, Laudato Si – On the Care for Our Common Home. And third, is the 2nd Anniversary of Pope Francis’ Apostolic Exhortation, Laudate Deum – a reminder that our spiritual, mental, and physical well-being requires careful treatment of one another and all creation. Indeed, everything is connected!
We need not look far to see the many ways that the New Year brought with it, numerous divisions and challenges to all areas of life. These all require our attention. Especially threatening are recent unprecedented “Natural Disasters” – fires such as those recently experienced in California, floods, droughts, heat waves – and predictions that extreme events will increase in frequency in coming years. Along with these – there has been a major uptick in “Climate Anxiety” – especially among youth across the globe.
One month ago, on Christmas Eve, Pope Francis announced the “Jubilee of the Year 2025.” This celebration has deep roots in the life of the Hebrew people, our ancestors in faith (Leviticus 25: 8-31). Jubilee was a time for them to make a “fresh start” – a reordering of the community that enabled every person and the land to regain what was needed to thrive: property was returned to families; land was not cultivated; property sold between Jubilee years was considered leased; The land was shared equally by all members of the people of God; Land monopolies were denounced; and, The poor were not to be shut out.
In today’s First Reading, the Hebrew people have recently returned from exile in Babyalon, where they were not able to freely practice their faith. They have rebuilt Jerusalem, and they now hear the Torah read, learning anew the holistic, community-oriented life that God desires, including communal Sabbath (Gen 2:2); Sabbatical (Ex 20:8-11); Jubilee (Lev 25:8-31). With this renewed faith and freedom, they now can celebrate renewed community life, as God intended.
In a similar vein, Paul reminds the Christian community about the importance of the holistic, interconnected, communal life that Jesus founded: “As a body is one though it has many parts, and all the parts of the body, though many, are one body, so also Christ. For in one Spirit, we were all baptized into one body, … and we were all given to drink of one Spirit. … God placed the parts, each one of them/us, in the body as he intended.” (1 Cor 12).
The Bible teaches that every man and woman is created out of love and made in God’s image and likeness (cf. Gen 1:26). This shows us the immense dignity of each person, “who is not just something, but someone. … capable of self-knowledge, of self-possession and of freely giving himself and entering into communion with other persons.” (Catechism of the Catholic Church, #1700) … How wonderful is the certainty that each human life is not adrift in the midst of hopeless chaos, in a world ruled by pure chance or endlessly recurring cycles! (LS #65)
The experience of the Babylonian captivity provoked a spiritual crisis which led to deeper faith in God. Now divine creative omnipotence was given pride of place in order to exhort the people to regain their hope in the midst of their wretched predicament. (LS #74)
In the Christian understanding of the world, the destiny of all creation is bound up with the mystery of Christ, present from the beginning: “All things have been created though him and for him” [Col 1:16]. (LS #90)
“It cannot be emphasized enough how everything is interconnected. Time and space are not independent of one another, and not even atoms or subatomic particles can be considered in isolation.” (#138) “If we feel intimately united with all that exists, then sobriety and care will well up spontaneously” (LS #11).
In this New Year of Jubilee, let us strive to follow Jesus, and join in bringing renewal to our spirits, good news to poor people, and the whole creation (Lk 4:18-19)!
Dawn M. Nothwehr, OSF, Ph.D.
The Erica and Harry John Family Professor Emerita of Catholic Theological Ethics
Catholic Theological Union – Chicago, IL
No comments:
Post a Comment