FIDELITY TO ONE’S UNIQUENESS AS GOD’S CHILDREN THE WAY TO HAPPINESS

20160619 FIDELITY TO ONE’S UNIQUENESS AS GOD’S CHILDREN THE WAY TO HAPPINESS

Readings at Mass

Liturgical Colour: Green.

First reading

Zechariah 12:10-11,13:1 ©

It is the Lord who speaks: ‘Over the House of David and the citizens of Jerusalem I will pour out a spirit of kindness and prayer. They will look on the one whom they have pierced; they will mourn for him as for an only son, and weep for him as people weep for a first-born child. When that day comes, there will be great mourning in Judah, like the mourning of Hadad-rimmon in the plain of Megiddo. When that day comes, a fountain will be opened for the House of David and the citizens of Jerusalem, for sin and impurity.’

Responsorial Psalm

Psalm 62:2-6,8-9 ©

For you my soul is thirsting, O Lord my God.

O God, you are my God, for you I long;

  for you my soul is thirsting.

My body pines for you

  like a dry, weary land without water.

For you my soul is thirsting, O Lord my God.

So I gaze on you in the sanctuary

  to see your strength and your glory.

For your love is better than life,

  my lips will speak your praise.

For you my soul is thirsting, O Lord my God.

So I will bless you all my life,

  in your name I will lift up my hands.

My soul shall be filled as with a banquet,

  my mouth shall praise you with joy.

For you my soul is thirsting, O Lord my God.

For you have been my help;

  in the shadow of your wings I rejoice.

My soul clings to you;

  your right hand holds me fast.

For you my soul is thirsting, O Lord my God.

Second reading

Galatians 3:26-29 ©

You are, all of you, sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus. All baptised in Christ, you have all clothed yourselves in Christ, and there are no more distinctions between Jew and Greek, slave and free, male and female, but all of you are one in Christ Jesus. Merely by belonging to Christ you are the posterity of Abraham, the heirs he was promised.

Gospel Acclamation

Jn8:12

Alleluia, alleluia!

I am the light of the world, says the Lord;

anyone who follows me will have the light of life.

Alleluia!

Or

Jn10:27

Alleluia, alleluia!

The sheep that belong to me listen to my voice,

says the Lord,

I know them and they follow me.

Alleluia!

Gospel

Luke 9:18-24 ©

One day when Jesus was praying alone in the presence of his disciples he put this question to them, ‘Who do the crowds say I am?’ And they answered, ‘John the Baptist; others Elijah; and others say one of the ancient prophets come back to life.’ ‘But you,’ he said ‘who do you say I am?’ It was Peter who spoke up. ‘The Christ of God’ he said. But he gave them strict orders not to tell anyone anything about this.

  ‘The Son of Man’ he said ‘is destined to suffer grievously, to be rejected by the elders and chief priests and scribes and to be put to death, and to be raised up on the third day.’

  Then to all he said, ‘If anyone wants to be a follower of mine, let him renounce himself and take up his cross every day and follow me. For anyone who wants to save his life will lose it; but anyone who loses his life for my sake, that man will save it.’

FIDELITY TO ONE’S UNIQUENESS AS GOD’S CHILDREN THE WAY TO HAPPINESS

SCRIPTURE READINGS: [ ZECH 12:10-11; 13:1; GAL 3:26-29; LK 9:18-24 ]

“What will people say?”  “What will they think of us?”   Indeed, most of us are always worried about our public image.  Constantly, we are collecting an opinion poll of ourselves, always anxious about the rating of our popularity, not much different from film stars and politicians.  Just like them, we are always so worried that we will lose our fans and we might no longer be the hero or heroine in their lives.  Consequently, we try to project ourselves as rich, successful, intelligent and talented.

But if people are concerned about their self-image, it is nothing else but their desperate need to be loved and accepted.  The one thing that they fear most is rejection or loss in popularity.  They want to be admired and loved even if they are loved for their wealth or external talents and beauty and not in themselves.  Indeed, there are many people who are always trying to live up to the image others expect of them.  They become pleasers and good doers; not because they are really good and enjoy doing good but only so that people will think well of them.

But more importantly, what is the price of such endeavours?  Well, as Jesus tells us in the gospel: “Anyone who wants to save his life will lose it.”  In trying to live up to people’s expectations our lives become miserable.  We lose our self-identity and our self-integration since we are not faithful to ourselves.   A split personality is what we become in the end.  We cannot be what we are.  We become what people want us to be.  We find within ourselves, two persons living within.  As a result, such people are always restless, ambitious, hyperactive, tense and frustrated in life.

Yes, we cannot please everyone in life.  In trying to please everyone, we please no one and we are not doing ourselves a favour anyway.  This, then, is the price we pay for trying to be someone that we are not. That is what is happening to many Singaporeans. We are confused about our identity because we do not know what is truly important and vital in our lives.  We are not simply reaching out for the stars, more rightly, we are chasing after the wind.

Jesus in the gospel refused to live up to what others wanted Him to be. He remained faithful to Himself and to His identity.  He did not try to fit into the image people had of Him.  He was not John the Baptist nor Elijah.  While He was happy that Peter had the correct answer, He did not approve of the image that he had of Him.  Peter’s idea of Jesus as the Christ of God was still too worldly.  Like the other Jews of his time, he thought that the Christ of God would be a political messiah, a triumphant victor and probably a powerful one that would liberate them from the reins of the Roman Emperor.  However, Jesus would not buy such an imposed image on Him.  That is why, when Peter gave the right answer, Jesus imposed a strict order on them not to tell anyone about this since this would mislead the people even further.

Instead He immediately warned His disciples that He would suffer grievously.  His messiahship was not of a secular nature.  He was the suffering messiah, the lowly servant of God.  He conquered the world not by force or by strength but by the power of love and humble service.   Jesus did not allow the popular notion of what a messiah should be to influence His own identity as the suffering messiah.  He could have given in to the current popular notions of what was expected of the messiah at that time but He did not.

And because He did not, He was rejected in the last days of His life in Jerusalem – rejected not so much by the Romans but by His own people and even His disciples, simply because He did not live up to their expectations.   That was the price Jesus paid for remaining faithful to Himself.  Hence, He tells us that “if anyone wants to be a follower” of His, he must renounce himself.  Like Jesus, if ever we try to be true to ourselves, the world will hate us; even our loved ones will hate us.

Somehow, most of us are conditioned by the demands of what society wants of us.  We try to secure a job or a house or a car or all those 5 Cs that society considers as essential assets or important.  We have no real personal stand of our own, of what a good and successful life is.  Our idea of success and happiness has all been dictated by others.  And the tragedy is that many of us even in our material and worldly success know that deep within us, life is rather empty and even meaningless, yet we do not have the guts to debunk the myth of society’s values and follow the inner calling of our hearts.  Instead of living up to our convictions, we succumb to the world.

However, for those of us who remain faithful to ourselves, time will prove us right.  Jesus, precisely because He stood firm in His beliefs, was raised from the dead to a new life.  He was vindicated by the Father because He was faithful to the Father’s will that His sonship was to be exercised in a lowly human way, which contradicted what the world had wanted of Him,  which was to exercise His ministry in splendour and glory.  In the same way too, many great people, because of their fidelity to their beliefs, had often proved the world wrong.  Take the case of Galileo who taught that the world was round.  He was condemned and persecuted by many people including the Church at that time.  But he stood his ground and was vindicated at the end.

The question is:  How can we stand firm in the face of opposition?  How can we be true to ourselves, to our vocation and to our convictions in life?  The key to our fidelity lies in this.  Firstly, we must realize who we are.  We must know ourselves.  Once we have self-knowledge, we will not worry too much about what people think about us.  Because we know that their judgment is always partial and not complete.  It would indeed be stupid of us to think that others can know us better than we know ourselves.  Instead of worrying what others think of us, we should be more concerned about whether we are exploring our potentials to the fullest.  Furthermore, in knowing ourselves, we also learn to accept ourselves, our strengths and our weaknesses.  Therefore, a deep self-knowledge is essential for a true love of self.  Jesus certainly knew Himself and that is why He had a true love for Himself.

Unfortunately, many people do not really know themselves.  Some see only their weak points and forget about their talents and achievements in life. Who are we then, really?  Nothing less than this, we are the sons and daughters of God.  This is what Paul is saying to us in his letter to the Galatians, that all of us are “sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus.”  Once we know that we are the sons and daughters of God, then we will begin to love ourselves even before we have achieved anything in life.  We will begin to see ourselves as unique individuals.  Again, as Paul tells us, we will no longer compare and make distinctions “between Jew and Greek, slave and free, male and female.”

In other words, when we love ourselves and our uniqueness, we will recognize that all of us are special before God and special to each other.  If that were the case, we would not make any more comparisons but can thank God for all that we are and for all that others are.   And because we are God’s sons and daughters, we also are called to share in His posterity and promises.  We know that just as we share in Christ’s sufferings, we also share in His glory.  Hence, we can be confident like Jesus that if we carry the cross and follow after Him, we too will find new life.  By renouncing what the world wants us to be, we die to self and are formed into Christ’s image.  Indeed, we are sons of God.  But for many this is just mere words.  Many do not truly believe that this is the reality of their being because they do not experience it as such.

So what can be done to come to this realization?  We are told that Jesus prayed before He had the courage to ask His disciples the identity-question.  This implies that before He could ask His disciples who they thought He was, He Himself had to know for certain His own identity.  And He found His identity precisely in His prayer life, in His intimacy with His Father and not from the world. Yes, if Jesus was able to be faithful to His Father and Himself, it was because of His intimacy with the Father which made Him realize that He was uniquely the Son of the Father.  It was His Abba-experience that enabled Him to remain strong and faithful in His ministry; and to reject the worldly messiahship that others tried to impose on Him instead of a suffering messiah.   In the same way too, we need to pray as the Prophet Zechariah exhorts us.  We need to pray for that same Spirit of Jesus so that we too might recognize our sonship in Him.   We need to be intimate with the Father like Jesus.  Prayer is the only way to recover our lost identity.  Prayer is the way to self-integration of a confused identity.  But discovery of self can only be found in prayer and intimacy with Christ.  Self-discovery through prayer therefore is essential if we were to truly know ourselves.

This is our challenge today.  We are called to be faithful to God by being faithful to ourselves, to our calling and especially to our identity as God’s sons and daughters.  Until and unless we live our lives in accordance with our spiritual calling and identity, we can never find happiness in life because we are not ourselves.  But if we are persevering and persistent, then we will find life as Jesus promised us, “he who loses his life for my sake, that man will save it.”

Written by The Most Rev William Goh Roman Catholic Archbishop of Singapore © All Rights Reserved