2024-09-22 Homily 25th Sunday Ordinary time B Wis 2,12-20 Jas 3,16-4,3 Mk 9,30-37
P. Sebastian Maly SJ
Dear sisters and brothers,
This Sunday’s readings, especially the Epistle of James and the Gospel, revolve around the question of the trials and temptations faced by those who want to walk their path with God, as righteous people, as disciples of Jesus. Even in the Psalms, we repeatedly hear that a righteous woman or a righteous man takes refuge in God in prayer because they are defencelessly at the mercy of their fellow human beings and the course of history. Their righteousness, their virtues, their endeavours for the good cannot save them. Being a good person does not protect you from your fellow human beings. In Psalm 34 we can read: ‘Many are the troubles of the righteous, but the LORD delivers him from them all.’ God is the refuge of the righteous. It is out of this trust that Jesus speaks to his disciples in the Gospel about what lies ahead for him. What Jesus says and what he does turns the powerful of his time in religion and politics against him. As good as his words and as salutary as his deeds may be, Jesus cannot do anything against worldly power and the violence it brings with it. On the contrary: as we heard in the reading from the Book of Wisdom, powerful people like to play with the lives of their subjects. They want to test whether someone will stand by their words even if they are oppressed, persecuted, humiliated or tortured. This is still the case all over the world today. In his Son, God himself surrendered himself to these games of the powerful. There is no stronger sign against the abuse of power!
That is why Jesus speaks openly with his disciples about the topic of power in today’s Gospel. Because it is one of the greatest temptations and temptations for man, especially for men, but also for women. When Jesus was tempted in the desert, the devil showed him all the kingdoms of the earth. Jesus would receive them if only he would fall on his knees before him, the devil, and worship him. Jesus drives the tempter away by quoting from the Bible that man should only worship God and nothing else and no one else. Jesus focusses on God and accepts powerlessness and vulnerability. Only in this way can he, Jesus, truly be one of us. As powerless and vulnerable.
The author of the Epistle of James reflects on the question of where the conflicts and wars and all the abuse of power among people come from. And he answers the question rhetorically: ‘Is it not from your passions that make war within your members?’ What leads us into temptation, what takes us away from the paths of peace and wisdom from above – it all lies within us, in our powers, thoughts and feelings. Even in the tradition of the first male and female monks in the deserts of Egypt and Syria, attempts were made to describe, understand and combat these inner movements. At that time they were simply called ‘logismoi’, ‘thoughts’. Later, they were also referred to as passions. And they were given specific names: Gluttony, Lust, Greed, Sloth, Despair, Wrath, Vainglory and Pride. Pope Gregory the Great turned them into the seven deadly sins or capital sins. Why do passions become capital sins? Gregory the Great recognised that these inner movements in people can gain such power over them that those thoughts have a profound influence on their thoughts and actions. It is no longer about individual actions. It is about the character of a person who is no longer focused on God or his neighbour, but only on himself. As the author of the epistle of James writes: ‘You ask but do not receive, because you ask wrongly, to spend it on your passions.’ If we allow ourselves to be controlled by these inner movements, then our prayers go astray because we are controlled by our passions.
In the Gospel, Jesus offers a concrete strategy for one of these passions and how we can oppose it. Jesus has realised that his disciples have been talking about which of them is the greatest. This raises the question of power, achievement and prestige. The underlying passion or deadly sin is pride. You probably all know the fairy tale ‘Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs’ and the words of Snow White’s stepmother, which she says in her mirror: ‘Mirror mirror on the wall, who is the fairest one of all?’ Pride tempts individuals to see themselves as the centre of the world, the one who has all the beauty, power, knowledge, prestige or whatever and wants to be recognised as such. And this is also what happens to the disciples at this moment. They were probably wondering what would happen to them and the community of disciples when Jesus actually died. It would be plausible for the greatest among them to take over the leadership. And I am quite sure that some of them were self-confident enough that they imagined themselves as the new leader.
Jesus takes up the idea of what qualities might be required to be the first. But he reverses the perspective. He sets a completely different attitude against pride as a passion, vice or capital sin: humility. Those who want to be great in God’s eyes should take the last place and become servants of all. Jesus emphasises this with a very specific action. He takes a child in his arms and says that those who receive a child like this in Jesus’ name receive Jesus. He chooses a child as an example, but he could also have taken any other person who has little standing in society, who is vulnerable, who is not necessarily needed. Today, Jesus would perhaps place a refugee in the centre. Or an unborn child. Or an old, lonely person who no one visits anymore. Or he would point out the sides of ourselves, our weaknesses or faults that we despise in ourselves.
Humility is an ambiguous word. Until today, it is often used in a moralising fashion in order to silence somebody, to make someone look small. But as the American author Rick Warren has written: Humility is not thinking less of yourself. It is thinking of yourself less. Or in the words of C. S. Lewis: “Do not imagine that if you meet a really humble man he will be what most people call ‘humble’ nowadays: he will not be a sort of greasy, smarmy person, who is always telling you that, of course, he is nobody. Probably all you will think about him is that he seemed a cheerful, intelligent chap who took a real interest in what you said to him. If you do dislike him it will be because you feel a little envious of anyone who seems to enjoy life so easily. He will not be thinking about humility: he will not be thinking about himself at all.”
This is exactly what Jesus wants his disciples to do and to act out. Instead of thinking too much about the future and their place in the leadership of the church, Jesus’ disciples should forget about themselves a little bit and focus on the reality that surrounds them. Therefore can humility include turning to a person who is in need and won’t satisfy my need to be the greatest; humility can include that I allow myself to be taken into service in a situation where I have nothing to gain from it at first. I know enough moments from my everyday life where I am challenged in this way. Do I act on the impulse to avoid an encounter or not do something because I think I am better? Or can I distance myself from this impulse, recognise it as a temptation and get involved in an encounter or something that is actually unpleasant for me? And this also applies when I look at myself, my reality and my weaknesses: Can I accept what is vulnerable, small and weak in me? Or do I arrogantly look down on what I don’t like about myself?
Humility is a big word, but it starts small. C.S. Lewis wrote: “If anyone would like to acquire humility, I can, I think, tell him the first step. The first step is to realise that one is proud.” If we realise this and don’t put our egos at the centre, but make room for other people, for our true self, for the fullness of reality, then we also allow God to take up more space in our little hearts. And we allow him to transform us and thus become more and more like Jesus. We cannot want more than that in this life. Amen.