20170217 FINDING FOCUS AND INTEGRATION IN LIFE
Readings at Mass
Liturgical
Colour: Green.
|
First reading
|
Genesis 11:1-9 ©
|
Throughout the earth
men spoke the same language, with the same vocabulary. Now as they moved
eastwards they found a plain in the land of Shinar where they settled. They
said to one another, ‘Come, let us make bricks and bake them in the fire.’ (For
stone they used bricks, and for mortar they used bitumen). ‘Come,’ they said
‘let us build ourselves a town and a tower with its top reaching heaven. Let us
make a name for ourselves, so that we may not be scattered about the whole
earth.’
Now the
Lord came down to see the town and the tower that the sons of man had built.
‘So they are all a single people with a single language!’ said the Lord. ‘This
is but the start of their undertakings! There will be nothing too hard for them
to do. Come, let us go down and confuse their language on the spot so that they
can no longer understand one another.’ The Lord scattered them thence over the
whole face of the earth, and they stopped building the town. It was named Babel
therefore, because there the Lord confused the language of the whole earth. It
was from there that the Lord scattered them over the whole face of the earth.
|
Responsorial
Psalm
|
|
Psalm
32(33):10-15 ©
|
Happy the people
the Lord has chosen as his own.
He frustrates the
designs of the nations,
he
defeats the plans of the peoples.
His own designs shall
stand for ever,
the plans
of his heart from age to age.
Happy the people
the Lord has chosen as his own.
They are happy, whose
God is the Lord,
the
people he has chosen as his own.
From the heavens the
Lord looks forth,
he sees
all the children of men.
Happy the people
the Lord has chosen as his own.
From the place where
he dwells he gazes
on all
the dwellers on the earth;
he who shapes the
hearts of them all;
and
considers all their deeds.
Happy the people
the Lord has chosen as his own.
|
Gospel
Acclamation
|
1Jn2:5
|
Alleluia, alleluia!
Whenever anyone obeys
what Christ has said,
God’s love comes to
perfection in him.
Alleluia!
|
Or
|
Jn15:15
|
Alleluia, alleluia!
I call you friends,
says the Lord,
because I have made
known to you
everything I have
learnt from my Father.
Alleluia!
|
Gospel
|
Mark 8:34-9:1 ©
|
Jesus
called the people and his disciples to him and said, ‘If anyone wants to be a
follower of mine, let him renounce himself and take up his cross and follow me.
For anyone who wants to save his life will lose it; but anyone who loses his
life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it. What gain, then,
is it for a man to win the whole world and ruin his life? And indeed what can a
man offer in exchange for his life? For if anyone in this adulterous and sinful
generation is ashamed of me and of my words, the Son of Man will also be
ashamed of him when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels.’
And he said to them, ‘I tell you solemnly, there are some standing here who
will not taste death before they see the kingdom of God come with power.’
FINDING
FOCUS AND INTEGRATION IN LIFE
SCRIPTURE
READINGS: [ GEN 11:1-9; PS 33; MK 8:34–9:1
]
It is
generally accepted that everyone must have an ambition in life. The question is
whether having an ambition is really the way to life and therefore a good
thing. Today, the liturgy tells us that ambition is a way to death rather
than to life. Why is that so? The story of the Tower of Babel tells
us that the people wanted to build a town and a tower so that they could make a
name for themselves. They were ambitious. They wanted to be better
than others.
The stark truth is that
ambition makes a person competitive, unscrupulous and hostile towards
others. We can be very sure that the real cause of division of the people
was not because God confused their language. Rather, because of their
ambition, they could no longer speak the common language of love and
unity. For anyone who wants to climb to the top must necessarily step on
others. When we are ambitious, we want to compete with others because we
want to be the winner, often at the expense of others. When we are
ambitious, we are more concerned about achieving our objective than about the
feelings and well-being of others. So ambition is the cause of division
and disunity among human beings because ambition is basically inward-looking
and seeking for self-fulfillment without others.
Secondly,
not only does ambition destroy love and unity, it also takes away life.
Indeed, Jesus asks us, “What gain, then, is it for a man to win the whole world
and ruin his life? And indeed what can man offer in exchange for his
life?” The question we need to examine honestly is, whether ambition and
the achievement of our intended goal can truly bring us real happiness and give
us that fullness of life. Clearly, the answer is negative.
Ambition pretends to offer
true happiness in life because it presupposes the attainment of a goal.
Thus, a person would have to spend years of his life working towards this
goal. And even then, only for some momentary happiness and
satisfaction! After that, he will have to seek anther goal. So his
life is but a series of endless ambitions and momentary fulfillment.
Consequently we live fragmented lives. There are simply too many
demands placed on us. We are torn apart as individuals, as a nation and
in the world.
That is
why people are always in pursuit of happiness in life. They are seeking
for something outside of themselves. They spend their whole life making a
living but never begin to live. They live in hope that one day when they
retire they can find happiness. They live in delayed gratification.
But when the time arrives, it is too late to enjoy, either because they are too
sick or they are too old.
Being ambitious is to be
engaged in activism. We are restless the moment something is
accomplished. Hence, the need to look for another project to do!
What is frustrating is that we cannot find happiness until the goal is reached
and even when realized, the happiness does not last very long.
From
the outset, we must say that it is not wrong to take part in these mundane
pursuits. We are called to be co-operators of God’s creation. The
crux of the problem is that we must not lose our soul in the process of
involving ourselves in the world. This is what Jesus is warning us, “What
gain, then, is it for a man to win the whole world and ruin his life?”
What does it mean to lose our soul? To lose our soul is to lose our
perspective of life. It means that we have failed to distinguish between
the means and the end. What is the finality or purpose of life?
There
is always the danger of repeating the same mistake of Babel. We get so
caught up with success and achievements that we lose our purpose in life,
like those people at Babel. They were arrogant. They wanted to transcend
themselves without God. They wanted to reach God without God. We
have many people who are so caught up with success and achievements that they
would sacrifice family and friends and loved ones for their ambition.
Hence, we must distinguish between the essentials and non-essentials.
What is it we are looking for if not life? As the Chinese saying
goes, it is a question of whether one wants money or life. At times we
cannot have both.
Today’s readings remind us
of how easy it is to respond to the urgent but not the important. The
psalm highlights that the Lord will disregard the plans of nations and designs
of peoples. The Lord’s plan alone stands forever. Following the Lord’s
plan is a response to what is truly important although not urgent. Following
our own plans without regard to the Lord’s plan will result in failure.
The Lord will foil those plans.
Jesus
reminds us that it doesn’t do much good to gain the whole world and forfeit
one’s life. To do so would be to follow the urgent at the expense of the
important matters. Jesus isn’t telling us to avoid wealth, power, nice
things, comfort and the other gifts of modern life. He is telling us to
keep them in perspective – God’s perspective. He is telling us not to
make them an end and to give up our attachment to them. Jesus is telling
us that if we respond to the cares and attractions of this world we are
responding to the urgent. He calls us to respond to what is truly
important. And so we must keep our focus, to discern the important from
the urgent, and to have the wisdom and courage to choose the important.
Jesus poses some probing
questions to challenge our assumptions about what is most profitable and
worthwhile. In every decision that we take in life, we are making ourselves into
a certain kind of person. The kind of person we are, our character,
determines to a large extent the kind of future we will face and live. It
is possible that some can gain all the things they set their heart on, only to
wake up suddenly to discover that they missed out on the most important things.
Of what value are material things if they don’t help you gain what truly lasts
in eternity? Neither money nor possessions can buy heaven, mend a broken heart,
or cheer a lonely person.
So what
are the essentials of life? Jesus challenges us to reflect, “what can man
offer in exchange for his life?”
If
ambition is not the key to happiness, then what can bring us real happiness and
real life? The answer is vocation. The word “vocation” comes from
the Latin word, “voce”, that is, a voice that comes from without and heard from
within. In other words, if we want to find life, we cannot serve
ourselves and be concerned only about our own needs. Rather, true
happiness in life is when we choose to serve God and serve our fellowmen.
Only a life of self-denial in humble service to God and to our fellow human
beings can give us life.
Vocation therefore is the
call to serve God and others; not ourselves. What is tragic today is that many
people not only do not have any ambition but they have no sense of vocation
either. Without ambition, there is no sense of direction, focus or
motivation. Without a focus, we cannot motivate ourselves. Only a
vocation can add colour to life, give us zeal, enthusiasm and life. In living
out our vocation, which is to build the people of God, the living out itself is
already a participation in the life of God. In this sense, we do not need
to fulfill any objective or goal in life, for our whole life is our goal.
Jesus said, “For anyone who wants to save his life will lose it; but anyone who
loses his life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save
it.” Only the man who is able to give himself to others, can find life.
Written
by The Most Rev William Goh Roman Catholic Archbishop of Singapore © All Rights
Reserved
No comments:
Post a Comment