NOW IS THE TIME TO SHOW OUR BELIEF IN GOD

“Christ Jesus, though he was in the form of God,
emptied himself,
coming in human likeness;
becoming obedient to the point of death,
even death on a cross.
Because of this, God greatly exalted him
and bestowed on him the name
which is above every name, Christ Jesus.” Philippians 2: 6-10

Once again, the World News reports are about violence. This time the violence is against Asians, before that it was violence against blacks, violence against people we think of as “different” (LGBTQ, immigrants, different political views) and subsequent violence against the “perpetrator” who struck out at someone he saw as his enemy. No sooner does one story fade than another one surfaces.

WHY IS THIS SO PREVALENT NOW?

The answer may lie in a pastoral letter written after the March 16, 2021, mass shootings that took place in Georgia. It was a letter to the parishioners of the Salt Lake City, Utah Diocese written by their Bishop, the Most Rev. Oscar A. Solis. Please note these two sentences from the fifth paragraph of the letter:

“Violence and discrimination have no place in America, in our society and in our world. We must instead uphold and fight for the ideals of this great nation, strengthen our fraternal bonds as brothers and sisters, and recognize that each of us is created in the image of God with equal human dignity and rights.”

Those phrases, and the order in which Bishop Solis placed them, provide us the only path that will lead to our remedying the recent increase in crimes of violence and discrimination.   Bishop Sotis writes:

“We must uphold and fight for the ideals of this great nation.”
“We must strengthen our fraternal bonds as brothers and sisters.”

And he reminds us that the only way we are to achieve this is by strengthening our belief that God created all of us in God’s image. Is the problem getting worse because we, Americans, we, Christians, we, Catholics, etc. are giving up that belief in God’s creation of humanity and our moving toward thinking that we can strengthen the fraternal bonds among us at the same time that we decline to gather to show each other that we have these beliefs in God and in each other?

THE IMPACT OF THE BELIEF AND PRACTICE OF RELIGION ON SOCIETY

Many of us have seen or heard about the Pew reports which show that more and more, the younger generation does not want to believe attendence at church services is needed.  They say that in staying away, they don’t “miss” anything. We also see from news reports, especially in ones about incidents of violence, that they (and we) support the strengthening of fraternal bonds, that they (and we) want people to be treated with equal human dignity and rights.

So why all of these incidents of violence?  Maybe because of the lack of something that we need in order to bind us together or that demonstrates that we are bound together.  Might this missing ingredient be the inner and outwardly evident belief in God and the tenets of our faiths?  Note the four references to God in the Declaration of Independence:

The “laws of nature and of nature’s God” entitle the United States to independence.
Men are “endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights.”
Congress appeals “to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions.”
The signers, “with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence,” pledge to each other their lives, fortunes, and sacred honor.

Perhaps we need to develop a balance between our freedom to choose publically to express or not express our believe in God and society’s need to see that we all remember that we are a community that believes in God and are striving to live Godly lives and create a Godly world.

PERPETRATORS OF VIOLENCE ARE CREATED IN GOD’S IMAGE

It seems that some of the acts of violence are perpetrated by people who have a sense that they are lost, forgotten or forsaken. Could some of this personal sadness be the result of too much attention being paid to things other than our vigilant care and concern for each other?  Think of all of the recent gadgets that are taking our attention away from our attentiveness to the people around us.  Is God asking us, as He asked Cain: “Where is your brother?”  Are we caring for our brothers and sisters or responding like Cain, “Am I my brother’s keeper?”

HOLY WEEK

Let us use this Holy Week to think about whether it would be more helpful for our country, our world and each other if, instead of attending marches and protests, we spend time reflecting on how we can better proclaim that our loyalty is to God and our belief is in all of us being “made in God’s image.” Let us think and talk to others about how demonstrating this is a tried and true foundation for a country of peace and prosperity, of brotherhood and sisterhood.  Let us spread the Good News that we believe that we are centered in God and, because of that, striving to be of one mind and heart. Let us come together and proclaim this with and before each other.

OUR GOD IS THE GOD OF ALL OF US, EVEN THOSE WHO ARE LOST

And let us spend some time thinking about the perpetrators, too.  Christ let humanity “kill” Him. What that shows is the extent to which God is willing to go for us, and it shows the extent to which God wants us to be brothers and sisters to the perpetrators.  What seems like foolishness creates peace – peace in America and peace in the world for all of us, not for just many or a few – for ALL.

Sister Loretta