One of the things I enjoy with driving is getting lost, asking for directions, and making a lot of U-turns. And as I age, the more I realize as I have told in July that life is about direction than of destination. As we go on with life, we need to always go back and make many U-turns. Maybe this explains why as we get older, we go back to being like children with less hair, less teeth, and less control of many things that eventually, we have to be cared for by others. It is this imagery of going back in life that our gospeI today is presenting us with Jesus making a U-turn from Caesarea Philippi to head down south to Jerusalem with His disciples. It is a beautiful imagery of ageing gracefully, of how Jesus would direct our sights back to God the Father symbolized by Jerusalem by directing our attention to a child.
They came to Capernaum and, once inside the house, he began to ask to ask them, “What were you arguing about on the way?” But they remained silent. They had been discussing among themselves on the way who was the greatest. Then he sat down, called the Twelve, and said to them, “If anyone wishes to be first, he shall be the last of all and the servant of all.” Taking a child he placed it in their midst, and putting his arms around it said to them, “Whoever receives one child such as this in my name, receives me; and whoever receives me, receives not me but the One who sent me.” (Mk.9:33-37)
By identifying Himself with a child, Jesus is not only asking us to be childlike but most of all to examine how we treat children – and women – because that mirrors how we relate with God! See how sad and tragic in this age when children (and women) are abused, maltreated and molested by adults, by the very people supposed to love and care for them that include some priests! These shameful sins and crimes against children and women show how far we have deviated from God, including those religious men supposed to lead us closer to God. We in the clergy are so pained and deeply hurt within why some of our fellow workers in the Lord have committed those grievous sins, destroying lives and siding with the devil in the way of the world. They have turned away from God, miserably and tragically failing to see God among the children and women. It is plain and simple: anyone who abuses and molests children and women are not of God. They may know but do not believe in God just like the devil.
See how Jesus lovingly embraced that child in the midst of the Apostles. Like the Greeks and the Romans of that time, the Jews considered children of no value at all because they were not complete humans. Childhood was largely seen then as a stage on the way to fullness of humanity. That is why in the feeding of 5000 in the wilderness, children like women were not counted. It was the reason why the apostles drove away the children coming to Jesus one day for which they were reprimanded, telling them that “unless you become like little children you will never enter the Kingdom of heaven.”(Mt.18:3) By lovingly embracing that child in the midst of the Twelve, Jesus is reminding us to go back to the most pristine image of holiness, of God Himself. Childhood is a value in itself! Children are the most loving, the most trusting, and the kindest of anyone. They always tell the truth, they never lie and make stories. All they see is beauty and goodness that they always have that sense of awe and wonder. And that is God, is He not?
“Whoever receives one child such as this in my name, receives me; and whoever receives me, receives not me but the One who sent me.” (Mk.9:37) Last week, Jesus asked us “who do you say I am?” Maybe until now we are still grappling for our answers, still wondering or searching, trying to figure out who is really Jesus for us. Today while He lovingly embraced a child in our midst, Jesus is inviting us to look into their eyes to find Him, to discover anew the giftedness and preciousness of life as well as its fragility and mortality. Everybody is so excited that we are now just 100 before Christmas but has anyone reflected on God’s wonderful gift of His own Son becoming human, born as an infant, a helpless, little baby entrusting Himself to our care? What have we done with the children? Are we still with God?
“Ephphata!” Let us be opened to God again, to see Him and welcome Him in Himself as He is, just like the way we take children that is not according to our own ideas. When we go back in the gospels and see the teachings of Jesus Christ, we always find His constant reference to children and to childhood, warning us not to lead them into sin because their angels are always guarding them (Mt.18:1-10). This shows us that everything in Christ is all about our return to God, of entering the Kingdom of heaven by “becoming like a little child.” (Mt.18:3) Jesus was the first to become a child, being born unto us and now identifying Himself with a child to reveal to us Himself as one who is the “last and the servant of all” like a child among us, serving us! How ironic! Most of the time, we always brag about our being “adults”, of being the “captain of my ship, master of my fate.” That may be good to a certain extent but it is not really what life is all about which is going back to a child, going back to God, being lowly and humble to bend down and serve. It is something that runs contrary to the way of the world like what we have heard in the first reading. St. James reminds us too to go back to God, to go back relating with a child, becoming like a child who is pure and simple for us to attain peace within. Along with Jesus and the Twelve from Caesarea Philippi, let us make that U-turn and follow the way of the Lord, not the way of the world by seeing God among children and women. AMEN. Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, Parokya ni San Juan Apostol at Ebanghelista, Gov. F. Halili Ave., Bagbaguin, Sta. Maria, Bulacan 3022.
*Photo by Mr. Raffy Tima of GMA News in Batanes a day before Typhoon Ompong hit the country last week. Used with permission.
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