LOSING OUR COOL IN LEADERSHIP

20210805 LOSING OUR COOL IN LEADERSHIP

 

 

05 August, 2021, Thursday, 18th Week, Ordinary Time

First reading

Numbers 20:1-13 ©

Moses makes water flow from the rock at Meribah

The sons of Israel, the whole community, arrived in the first month at the desert of Zin. The people settled at Kadesh. It was there that Miriam died and was buried.

  There was no water for the community, and they were all united against Moses and Aaron. The people challenged Moses: ‘We would rather have died,’ they said ‘as our brothers died before the Lord! Why did you bring the assembly of the Lord into this wilderness, only to let us die here, ourselves and our cattle? Why did you lead us out of Egypt, only to bring us to this wretched place? It is a place unfit for sowing, it has no figs, no vines, no pomegranates, and there is not even water to drink!’

  Leaving the assembly, Moses and Aaron went to the door of the Tent of Meeting. They threw themselves face downward on the ground, and the glory of the Lord appeared to them. The Lord spoke to Moses and said, ‘Take the branch and call the community together, you and your brother Aaron. Then, in full view of them, order this rock to give water. You will make water flow for them out of the rock, and provide drink for the community and their cattle.’

  Moses took up the branch from before the Lord, as he had directed him. Then Moses and Aaron called the assembly together in front of the rock and addressed them, ‘Listen now, you rebels. Shall we make water gush from this rock for you?’ And Moses raised his hand and struck the rock twice with the branch; water gushed in abundance, and the community drank and their cattle too.

  Then the Lord said to Moses and Aaron, ‘Because you did not believe that I could proclaim my holiness in the eyes of the sons of Israel, you shall not lead this assembly into the land I am giving them.’

  These are the waters of Meribah, where the sons of Israel challenged the Lord and he proclaimed his holiness.

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Responsorial Psalm

Psalm 94(95):1-2,6-9 ©

O that today you would listen to his voice! ‘Harden not your hearts.’

Come, ring out our joy to the Lord;

  hail the rock who saves us.

Let us come before him, giving thanks,

  with songs let us hail the Lord.

O that today you would listen to his voice! ‘Harden not your hearts.’

Come in; let us bow and bend low;

  let us kneel before the God who made us:

for he is our God and we

  the people who belong to his pasture,

  the flock that is led by his hand.

O that today you would listen to his voice! ‘Harden not your hearts.’

O that today you would listen to his voice!

  ‘Harden not your hearts as at Meribah,

  as on that day at Massah in the desert

when your fathers put me to the test;

  when they tried me, though they saw my work.’

O that today you would listen to his voice! ‘Harden not your hearts.’

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Gospel Acclamation

Ps144:13

Alleluia, alleluia!

The Lord is faithful in all his words

and loving in all his deeds.

Alleluia!

Or:

Mt16:18

Alleluia, alleluia!

You are Peter, 

and on this rock I will build my Church.

And the gates of the underworld can never hold out against it.

Alleluia!

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Gospel

Matthew 16:13-23 ©

You are Peter and on this rock I will build my Church

When Jesus came to the region of Caesarea Philippi he put this question to his disciples, ‘Who do people say the Son of Man is?’ And they said, ‘Some say he is John the Baptist, some Elijah, and others Jeremiah or one of the prophets.’ ‘But you,’ he said ‘who do you say I am?’ Then Simon Peter spoke up, ‘You are the Christ,’ he said, ‘the Son of the living God.’ Jesus replied, ‘Simon son of Jonah, you are a happy man! Because it was not flesh and blood that revealed this to you but my Father in heaven. So I now say to you: You are Peter and on this rock I will build my Church. And the gates of the underworld can never hold out against it. I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven: whatever you bind on earth shall be considered bound in heaven; whatever you loose on earth shall be considered loosed in heaven.’ Then he gave the disciples strict orders not to tell anyone that he was the Christ.

  From that time Jesus began to make it clear to his disciples that he was destined to go to Jerusalem and suffer grievously at the hands of the elders and chief priests and scribes, to be put to death and to be raised up on the third day. Then, taking him aside, Peter started to remonstrate with him. ‘Heaven preserve you, Lord;’ he said ‘this must not happen to you.’ But he turned and said to Peter, ‘Get behind me, Satan! You are an obstacle in my path, because the way you think is not God’s way but man’s.’

 

LOSING OUR COOL IN LEADERSHIP

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SCRIPTURE READINGS: [ Num 20:1-13; Ps 95:1-2, 6-9; Mt 16:13-23]

Leaders often have to work under extreme stress, trying to meet the demands of those under their charge and often under time, logistic and manpower constraints.  As a consequence, many lose their cool and hit out at those who are deemed to be slow on the uptake and to cooperate, when they make mistakes, and when they seem to be unreasonable in their demands.  This was certainly the case with Moses in today’s first reading.  He lost his temper when the people cried out to him that there was no water for the community.   They blamed Moses and Aaron for their woes.  They challenged Moses, “We would rather have died as our brothers died before the Lord! Why did you bring the assembly of the Lord into this wilderness, only to let us die here, ourselves and our cattle?  Why did you lead us out of Egypt, only to bring us to this wretched place? It is a place unfit for sowing, it has no figs, no vines, no pomegranates, and there is not even water to drink!”

Moses was exasperated.  He could not tolerate the unreasonable expectations of his people.  They were ingrates.  He had sacrificed his peace at Midian to lead them out of slavery from the Egyptians.  He worked hard for the demanding people who often exaggerated their situation, comparing it with their time in Egypt.  They seemed to have forgotten so easily how they were oppressed by the Egyptians, nor did they remember how God delivered them with His mighty hand through signs and wonders He worked, through the plagues, making the ground dry for the Israelites to pass through the Red Sea, accompanying them with the pillar of fire by night and the pillar of cloud by day, and fed them with water, meat and manna in the desert.  And what was most disappointing was that they never learnt.  After almost forty years in the desert, they were repeating exacting what their forefathers did when they arrived at Marah and complained that there was no water (Ex 15:22-25), or at the Desert of Sin, where they lamented there was no meat and bread.  (Ex 16)

Of course, the complaints of the people were further accentuated by the death of Miriam, the sister of Moses.   He was still in bereavement.  In spite of the fact that she had challenged his leadership, he still did not forget how she had contributed to the work of liberating the sons of Israel. She was the one who looked after him when he was born and protected him from being killed by the Egyptians.  Moses was certainly sad that his own sibling had departed from him.  Indeed, quite often as leaders, we do not only have to manage the affairs of the organization or the community we are leading, but we have our personal and domestic issues to contend with.  And yet in public, we have to put on a brave front, act normally and not impose our pain or sadness on others but quietly carry the burden in our hearts.  Indeed, in public life, we need to appear confident, positive and proactive, even when our personal life is taking a toll on us, whether due to our health, our family squabbles or relationships.

But it is important that as leaders we do not take our frustrations out on those who are not responsible for our pains.  This would be selfish and unreasonable.  The target of anger and the source of anger must be the same, otherwise, we would be guilty of abuse.  This was what Moses failed to distinguish, although we can understand and appreciate his limitations.  To lose one of his generals makes it more burdensome to carry the aspirations of his people.  He was left with Aaron, and soon his brother too would be taken away by the Lord. (Num 20:22-28) As a consequence, Moses lost control of his temper and displayed unprofessional leadership by lashing out on the people even though they had done wrong by complaining against him and Aaron as if they were the ones responsible for their plight.

One must also distinguish between righteous anger and unholy anger.  In the gospel, Jesus was also angry with the religious leaders who were stubborn.  He even drove the merchants out of the Temple.  God too was angry when the people turned away from Him and worshipped the Golden Calf.  How many times, God wanted to destroy the people!  But all these are anthropomorphic demonstrations that God’s holiness and sins are totally incompatible.  God’s justice also demands reparation and punishment, otherwise, sins would not be taken seriously.  But God’s anger was not directed at His people because He was frustrated or could not control His temper.  Rather, it was deliberate, so as to awaken the conscience of the people so that they would repent.  The moment, they repented, God would withdraw His punishment.

In the case of Moses, when he came down from Mount Sinai and saw the people worshipping the golden calf, he was incensed because of their betrayal of God, not of himself.  It was not a personal anger on his part but more outrage at the people’s infidelity to God.  And so his breaking of the tablets was intended to sensitize the conscience of the people and to move them to repentance.  (Ex 32:19f) But in today’s case, God wanted him to show the people compassion and mercy.  God did not ask Moses to reprimand the people but to provide them with water.  Instead, he was angry at them and summoned the people before him, calling them “rebels”.   He was judgmental.  He made himself a judge over them.  

In truth, Moses was the rebel.  God simply commanded him, “Take the branch and call the community together, you and your brother Aaron.  Then, in full view of them, order this rock to give water.  You will make water flow for them out of the rock, and provide drink for the community and their cattle.”  But Moses disobeyed God.  He “took up the branch from before the Lord, as he had directed him.  Then Moses and Aaron called the assembly together in front of the rock and addressed them, ‘Listen now, you rebels.  Shall we make water gush from this rock for you?’  And Moses raised his hand and struck the rock twice with the branch; water gushed in abundance, and the community drank and their cattle too.”  Instead of speaking to the rock, he struck the rock in anger and made it seem as if he was the one that caused the water to be made available to them.

Instead of giving glory to God and letting the people know that it was God who provided the water, he did not display the holiness of God as a leader should.  As a consequence, he and Aaron were punished.   The Lord said to them, “Because you did not believe that I could proclaim my holiness in the eyes of the sons of Israel, you shall not lead this assembly into the land I am giving them.”  Just like all those before him who were disobedient and therefore forfeited their privilege to enter the Promised Land, so too were Moses and Aaron because both rebelled against the Lord’s command and took matters into their own hands. 

In the gospel, Jesus showed us how a leader should exercise patience.  He had been preparing His apostles for the passion ahead of Him.  But before He could undertake the last journey, He needed to find where they stood with regard to His identity.  He gently led them to answer for themselves who He really was and not just what others thought of Him, as none of the great prophets before Him could fit into the identity and mission of our Lord.  When Peter managed to give the right answer to His identity, Jesus made it clear that it was by the grace of God and not his own efforts.  Coming to understand Jesus’ identity and faith in Him itself is a grace of God and not our human effort.  That is why we must be patient when those under us are behaving childishly, are unreasonable, ignorant or slow to understand and cooperate.  

Even Peter who had the right answer, did not have the right understanding.  He too needed time to come to understand the real meaning of his confession of our Lord.  Jesus had to correct his notion of a triumphant and political Messiah.  Rather, the way to the kingdom is always through the cross and the passion.  The way of power is the way of the Evil One.  Hence, Jesus ordered Peter to get behind Him and follow His way instead of the devil’s.

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

TEST OF FAITH

20210804 TEST OF FAITH

 

 

04 August, 2021, Wednesday, 18th Week, Ordinary Time

First reading

Numbers 13:1-2,25-14:1,26-29,34-35 ©

The spies return from Canaan

The Lord spoke to Moses in the wilderness of Paran and said, ‘Send out men, one from each tribe, to make a reconnaissance of this land of Canaan which I am giving to the sons of Israel. Send the leader of each tribe.’

  At the end of forty days, they came back from their reconnaissance of the land. They sought out Moses, Aaron and the whole community of Israel, in the wilderness of Paran, at Kadesh. They made their report to them, and to the whole community, and showed them the produce of the country.

  They told them this story, ‘We went into the land to which you sent us. It does indeed flow with milk and honey; this is its produce. At the same time, its inhabitants are a powerful people; the towns are fortified and very big; yes, and we saw the descendants of Anak there. The Amalekite holds the Negeb area, the Hittite, Amorite and Jebusite the highlands, and the Canaanite the sea coast and the banks of the Jordan.’

  Caleb harangued the people gathered about Moses: ‘We must march in,’ he said ‘and conquer this land: we are well able to do it.’ But the men who had gone up with him answered, ‘We are not able to march against this people; they are stronger than we are.’ And they began to disparage the country they had reconnoitred to the sons of Israel, ‘The country we went to reconnoitre is a country that devours its inhabitants. Every man we saw there was of enormous size. Yes, and we saw giants there (the sons of Anak, descendants of the Giants). We felt like grasshoppers, and so we seemed to them.’

  At this, the whole community raised their voices and cried aloud, and the people wailed all that night.

  The Lord spoke to Moses and Aaron. He said:

  ‘I have heard the complaints which the sons of Israel make against me. Say to them, “As I live – it is the Lord who speaks – I will deal with you according to the very words you have used in my hearing. In this wilderness your dead bodies will fall, all you men of the census, all you who were numbered from the age of twenty years and over, you who have complained against me. For forty days you reconnoitred the land. Each day shall count for a year: for forty years you shall bear the burden of your sins, and you shall learn what it means to reject me.” I, the Lord, have spoken: this is how I will deal with this perverse community that has conspired against me. Here in this wilderness, to the last man, they shall die.’

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Responsorial Psalm

Psalm 105(106):6-7,13-14,21-23 ©

O Lord, remember me out of the love you have for your people.

or

Alleluia!

Our sin is the sin of our fathers;

  we have done wrong, our deeds have been evil.

Our fathers when they were in Egypt

  paid no heed to your wonderful deeds.

O Lord, remember me out of the love you have for your people.

or

Alleluia!

They soon forgot his deeds

  and would not wait upon his will.

They yielded to their cravings in the desert

  and put God to the test in the wilderness.

O Lord, remember me out of the love you have for your people.

or

Alleluia!

They forgot the God who was their saviour,

  who had done such great things in Egypt,

such portents in the land of Ham,

  such marvels at the Red Sea.

O Lord, remember me out of the love you have for your people.

or

Alleluia!

For this he said he would destroy them,

  but Moses, the man he had chosen,

stood in the breach before him,

  to turn back his anger from destruction.

O Lord, remember me out of the love you have for your people.

or

Alleluia!

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Gospel Acclamation

James1:18

Alleluia, alleluia!

By his own choice the Father made us his children

by the message of the truth,

so that we should be a sort of first-fruits

of all that he created.

Alleluia!

Or:

Lk7:16

Alleluia, alleluia!

A great prophet has appeared among us;

God has visited his people.

Alleluia!

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Gospel

Matthew 15:21-28 ©

The Canaanite woman debates with Jesus and saves her daughter

Jesus left Gennesaret and withdrew to the region of Tyre and Sidon. Then out came a Canaanite woman from that district and started shouting, ‘Sir, Son of David, take pity on me. My daughter is tormented by a devil.’ But he answered her not a word. And his disciples went and pleaded with him. ‘Give her what she wants,’ they said ‘because she is shouting after us.’ He said in reply, ‘I was sent only to the lost sheep of the House of Israel.’ But the woman had come up and was kneeling at his feet. ‘Lord,’ she said ‘help me.’ He replied, ‘It is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the house-dogs.’ She retorted, ‘Ah yes, sir; but even house-dogs can eat the scraps that fall from their master’s table.’ Then Jesus answered her, ‘Woman, you have great faith. Let your wish be granted.’ And from that moment her daughter was well again.

 

 

TEST OF FAITH

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SCRIPTURE READINGS: [NUM 13:1-2,25-14:1,26-29,34-35; Ps 106:6-7,13-14,21-23; Mt 15:21-28]

Today’s recounting of the fears of the sons of Israel helps us to appreciate better why they had to spend forty years wandering in the desert before they could take control of the land of Canaan which God had promised to their forefathers.  It was not on the part of God to delay in fulfilling His promise but because of the sin of man, fundamentally, the lack of faith in His divine providence and power.  God instructed Moses to “send out men, one from each tribe, to make a reconnaissance of this land of Canaan which I am giving to the sons of Israel.  Send the leader of each tribe.”  God wanted to deliver Canaan to them when they reached the wilderness of Paran.  But they lacked the confidence to occupy the land.

Indeed, the lack of faith is the reason they rebelled against God’s command to occupy the land.   When the spies returned from recceing the land, instead of feeling great and excited over the produce they found in the country, nice grapes, pomegranates and figs, they were focused on the size of their enemies, their strength and the number of inhabitants. Compared to them, they felt like grasshoppers.  It was an over exaggeration of their enemy’s strength.   They were focused on their fears rather than the hope and future in front of them.  They still remained slaves in their hearts even though they had been physically liberated from their Egyptian masters.  It was fear that controlled them.  

The truth is that their fears were unfounded, more so as they had seen the power of God at work in their lives, how God with His mighty hand set the sons of Israel free through His awesome works and wonders.  They were just a motley crowd of slaves, untrained, compared to the Egyptian army and their armoury.  But God showed that He was their Lord when they were drowned in the sea.  Then the Lord protected them with the pillar of cloud by day and the pillar of fire by night.  In the desert, God fed them with water, manna and quail.  They had seen all the wonders of God and yet they doubted whether they could overcome the inhabitants in Canaan.

Instead of being assured of God’s promise being realized, they did not see that the fruits they brought back were signs to confirm that God intended the Promised Land for them.  It was meant to be a pledge of what is to come. It demonstrated the reliability of the Word of God; that they would live in a land of plenty, flowing with milk and honey as promised.  God told Moses, “I have come down to deliver them from the Egyptians, and to bring them up out of that land to a good and broad land, a land flowing with milk and honey.”  (Ex 3:8) And now at the threshold of entering the Promised Land, they lost faith in God. They forgot all that God had done for them.  If only they remembered the many evidences of God’s care and divine providence for them, they would have trusted in God to enter into the Promised Land.  This is an important lesson for us to learn as well because many of us are blind to what the Lord had done for us in the past and what He is doing for us in the present, and thus we do not surrender our future into His hands, and walk by faith, not by sight.  If this God has met our needs in the past and our needs today, why do we doubt that He will provide for us tomorrow?  This is why in the Lord’s Prayer, we are asked to pray for our daily bread, that is the bread for today because tomorrow, He will also provide just as He did for the sons of Israel when God told them to gather the manna enough for just the day, no more and no less.  (Ex 16:4)

By so doing, they were rejecting the promises of God.   They did not trust in God’s words even though God explicitly told Moses that He was ready to give them the land of Canaan.  The men were sent out, not so much to plan for a military operation but to give them encouragement that God’s promise was real and He was going to fulfil them.   God had given them a people and so now God was ready to give them the land.  Hence, they were made to go through the same way as Abraham did via the Negeb to arrive at Hebron where Abraham and Sarah were buried.  (Num 12:17,22) They were to retrace the steps and journey he took in faith when he left his country for Canaan.  Unfortunately, they took the same journey without faith in God, unlike Abraham.

Today, we are called to learn from Caleb who was determined to listen to the Lord. He was not cynical and never doubted that God would not abandon them. “Caleb harangued the people gathered about Moses: ‘We must march in,’ he said ‘and conquer this land: we are well able to do it.'”  Caleb was full of confidence, unlike the rest of the Israelites who “raised their voices and cried aloud, and the people wailed all that night.”  Indeed, in matters of conscience, one must listen to God.  This is why sometimes democracy is not applicable to all situations.  The Church is never democratic, otherwise, truths will be decided by popular consensus.  When churches are fully democratic, this is the reason for so much division and fragmentation because when truth is decided by popular vote, then it becomes a question of influence, publicity and swaying the opinions of people through the media.

What is needed therefore is a firm faith in God.  When there is faith in the Lord, we can overcome all odds.  When we lack faith, we are depending only on our own strength and human calculation. As the angel said to Mary, “For with God nothing will be impossible.” (Lk 1:37) Unfortunately, because the Israelites lacked faith, God had to train them in faith for another forty years before they could enter the Promised Land.  “For forty days you reconnoitred the land. Each day shall count for a year: for forty years you shall bear the burden of your sins, and you shall learn what it means to reject me. Here in this wilderness, to the last man, they shall die.”  God waited for the generation to die so that He could raise a new generation with faith in Him to enter into the Promised Land.  By the time of Joshua, they were ready to enter the Promised Land and conquer their enemies.  Joshua, which means “Yahweh saves” believed that God would win the victory for them.  Jericho was won not through arms but through prayers and trumpets.  God brought down the walls of Jericho and the inhabitants ran away in fear.  (Jos 6:16-21) It was this same faith that saw David defeated Goliath.  

This was the same faith demonstrated by the Syro-Phoenician woman.  She refused to be deterred by the apparent rejection of our Lord to her request to heal her daughter.  Her faith grew because of her contact with the Lord.  She confessed in Jesus as the Son of David, a political title acknowledging the place of Israel in salvation history.  She was humble to admit that Israel was God’s chosen people and the Messiah would come from the dynasty of David. Her humility was also expressed in her light-heartedness in taking the taunts of Jesus without feeling offended.  She would not be dismissed so easily.  She was persistent in her request and never gave up.

But her perseverance in faith was strengthened by her love for her daughter.  For the sake of her daughter, she continued to have faith even when she was rebuffed by the Lord.  Her love made her persevere in faith and hope.  It was her love that kept her humble and touched the heart of our Lord’s compassion for her and her daughter.  Indeed, so long as we have love, it means that we have faith.   Faith, hope and charity always go together.  One cannot stand by itself but always with the other two.  When we are driven by love, we never give up hope and faith in the person.  Love strengthens faith and faith is the basis of love.

Finally, we are told that faith happens when we start praying.  The woman knelt down in worship and cried out to the Lord.  She believed in the power of prayer and intercession.  Earnest in her prayers, she was not disappointed by the Lord.  We, too, can strengthen our faith and love for Jesus through prayers and intimacy with the Lord.  Jesus was so moved by her faith and love that He said to her, “‘Woman, you have great faith.  Let your wish be granted.’ And from that moment her daughter was well again.  She passed the test of faith.

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

 

SIBLING AND LEADERSHIP RIVALRY

20210803 SIBLING AND LEADERSHIP RIVALRY

 

 

03 August, 2021, Tuesday, 18th Week, Ordinary Time

First reading

Numbers 12:1-13 ©

'How have you dared to speak against my servant Moses?'

Miriam, and Aaron too, spoke against Moses in connexion with the Cushite woman he had taken. (For he had married a Cushite woman.) They said, ‘Has the Lord spoken to Moses only? Has he not spoken to us too?’

  The Lord heard this. Now Moses was the most humble of men, the humblest man on earth. Suddenly, the Lord said to Moses and Aaron and Miriam, ‘Come, all three of you, to the Tent of Meeting.’ They went, all three of them, and the Lord came down in a pillar of cloud and stood at the entrance of the Tent. He called Aaron and Miriam and they both came forward. The Lord said, ‘Listen now to my words: If any man among you is a prophet I make myself known to him in a vision, I speak to him in a dream. Not so with my servant Moses: he is at home in my house; I speak with him face to face, plainly and not in riddles, and he sees the form of the Lord. How then have you dared to speak against my servant Moses?’

  The anger of the Lord blazed out against them. He departed, and as soon as the cloud withdrew from the Tent, there was Miriam a leper, white as snow! Aaron turned to look at her; she had become a leper.

  Aaron said to Moses: ‘Help me, my lord! Do not punish us for a sin committed in folly of which we are guilty. I entreat you, do not let her be like a monster, coming from its mother’s womb with flesh half corrupted.’

  Moses cried to the Lord, ‘O God,’ he said ‘please heal her, I beg you!’

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Responsorial Psalm

Psalm 50(51):3-7,12-13 ©

Have mercy on us, Lord, for we have sinned.

Have mercy on me, God, in your kindness.

  In your compassion blot out my offence.

O wash me more and more from my guilt

  and cleanse me from my sin.

Have mercy on us, Lord, for we have sinned.

My offences truly I know them;

  my sin is always before me

Against you, you alone, have I sinned;

  what is evil in your sight I have done.

Have mercy on us, Lord, for we have sinned.

That you may be justified when you give sentence

  and be without reproach when you judge,

O see, in guilt I was born,

  a sinner was I conceived.

Have mercy on us, Lord, for we have sinned.

A pure heart create for me, O God,

  put a steadfast spirit within me.

Do not cast me away from your presence,

  nor deprive me of your holy spirit.

Have mercy on us, Lord, for we have sinned.

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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:

Jn1:49

Alleluia, alleluia!

Rabbi, you are the Son of God,

you are the King of Israel.

Alleluia!

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Gospel

Matthew 14:22-36 ©

Jesus walks on the water

Jesus made the disciples get into the boat and go on ahead to the other side while he would send the crowds away. After sending the crowds away he went up into the hills by himself to pray. When evening came, he was there alone, while the boat, by now far out on the lake, was battling with a heavy sea, for there was a head-wind. In the fourth watch of the night he went towards them, walking on the lake, and when the disciples saw him walking on the lake they were terrified. ‘It is a ghost’ they said, and cried out in fear. But at once Jesus called out to them, saying, ‘Courage! It is I! Do not be afraid.’ It was Peter who answered. ‘Lord,’ he said ‘if it is you, tell me to come to you across the water.’ ‘Come’ said Jesus. Then Peter got out of the boat and started walking towards Jesus across the water, but as soon as he felt the force of the wind, he took fright and began to sink. ‘Lord! Save me!’ he cried. Jesus put out his hand at once and held him. ‘Man of little faith,’ he said ‘why did you doubt?’ And as they got into the boat the wind dropped. The men in the boat bowed down before him and said, ‘Truly, you are the Son of God.’

  Having made the crossing, they came to land at Gennesaret. When the local people recognised him they spread the news through the whole neighbourhood and took all that were sick to him, begging him just to let them touch the fringe of his cloak. And all those who touched it were completely cured.

 

 

SIBLING AND LEADERSHIP RIVALRY

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SCRIPTURE READINGS: [Num 12:1-13; Ps 51:3-7,12-13; Mt 14:22-36 ]

Rivalry among siblings is very common.  People are always insecure and they seek power and influence.  This is why siblings in the same family often vie for attention and recognition from their parents.  Every child wants the parents to love him or her the most, and to be proud of them.   So, they would compare and compete among themselves so that they could earn the parents’ love and recognition.   As they get older, they also seek to protect their interests, especially when it comes to property and inheritance.  There will always be the temptation to seek more of the inheritance than others.

So too is rivalry among leaders.  Everyone leader seeks to be the most powerful among his peers.  Sometimes, we wonder whether when one seeks leadership it is really for the good of the people or for themselves.  How often do we hear the loser of an election say, “I will be back”, when he or she should be saying, “I respect the decision of the voters and will do my best to cooperate and collaborate with the new leadership.”   Leadership in this instance is not so much about meeting the peoples’ interests but more about securing one’s power and status.

Rivalry, whether it is among siblings or leaders, leads to division in the family, the organization and the community.  This is why it is important that such rivalry be dealt with decisively.  The challenge to Moses’ leadership by his siblings, his elder sister, Miriam, and his brother, Aaron, was threatening to divide the community that had just come out of Egypt.   How, then, should we deal with such divisive rivalry among siblings and leaders?

The first thing we need to do is to get to the root of the problem.  We need to allow people to air their grievances.  It appeared that Miriam and Aaron had difficulties because Moses married a Cushite woman.   We are not told of the exact circumstances, whether it was because Moses married again or whether that woman was his first wife taken from Midian.  Regardless, she was from another race.  Hence, both of them were partly racist and partly seeking to protect their own roots.  But perhaps, the real cause was not because Moses married a Cushite woman, as the people who left Egypt were not just the sons of Israel but a motley crowd of people including other races as well.

So we need to go beyond the apparent and external complaint to the real cause, which was simply jealousy.  Miriam and Aaron were prophets in their own right because they had been gifted by the Lord.  Hence, they said, “‘Has the Lord spoken to Moses only? Has he not spoken to us too?”  We also remember that Miriam was the leader who led the women in songs and tambourines when they were delivered from the Egyptian army who pursued after them.  (Ex 15:20f) So they felt threatened that Moses, their younger brother, had more influence than them.  Furthermore, they could have felt slighted that their power and influence was trimmed further when Moses, under God’s instruction, appointed 70 elders to assist him in carrying the burden of looking after the needs of the people.  (Num 11:16-25)

Indeed, when we find opposition in life, we need to try to understand the true situation instead of reacting and responding to the perceived complaints of our opponents or people.  We must understand where their real grievance lies.  In other words, most people do not reveal their motives when they make a complaint.  They make it appear to be objective and reasonable but underlying their complaint is really anger, or resentment of some sort against perceived injustices, or simply because they are seized with envy, jealousy or greed.

It is significant that the scriptures tell us that in the face of such challenges, Moses remained quiet and was not defensive at all.  This was because “Moses was the most humble of men, the humblest man on earth.”   This double superlative emphasis on Moses’ humility as a leader is very edifying.  That is the way all leaders should act, with magnanimity and humility towards those who disagree or criticize them unreasonably.  Moses was not aggressive or offensive.  In fact, he did not even defend himself or speak up at all.  He never sought to be the leader of Israel.  Right from the start when the Lord called him at the Burning Bush, he gave excuses that he was not the right man to deliver the people from Egypt because no one would believe him and he could not speak eloquently either.  (Ex 3:13; 4:1,10-13) And when the people rebelled against God by committing the grievous sin of idolatry, he asked the Lord to take his life so that He could appoint a better leader.  (Ex 32:32) Moses had no interest in seeking leadership for himself.  He was only responding in obedience to God’s call.  So his motive as a leader was pure.

However, God sought to put Miriam and Aaron in place.  He summoned them to the Tent of Meeting.  God in no uncertain terms endorsed Moses as His chosen leader.  The Lord said, “Listen now to my words:  If any man among you is a prophet.  I make myself known to him in a vision, I speak to him in a dream.  Not so with my servant Moses: he is at home in my house; I speak with him face to face, plainly and not in riddles, and he sees the form of the Lord.  How then have you dared to speak against my servant Moses?”  Indeed, when God has chosen His leader, we can be certain that God would vindicate His chosen ones as He did with the prophets and our Lord Jesus Christ. 

An important lesson to learn is the consequences of our sins.  In seeking to humiliate the wife of Moses because she was from another race, most likely with darker skin, Miriam was struck with a skin infection that made her look like a white leper.  In seeking to exclude Moses’ wife from the community, she was excluded from the community for a week.   In thinking that they were recognized intercessors of the people, they had to turn to Moses instead to intercede for them.   Truly, what we seek to destroy in others, will eventually destroy us.  Nature or God will unleash the folly of our sinful conduct and expose us.

Hence, before such things happen, we must bring our grievances to the Lord in the Tent of Meeting.  We must search our hearts and purify our motives.  Coming before the Lord, we must in humility, like Moses, hear His words and submit in obedience.  Unless we cultivate an intimacy with the Lord like Moses, we will be seeking recognition from others and from the world.  When we have God’s approval, we do not need human approval.  This is what the Lord said.  “I do not accept glory from human beings. But I know that you do not have the love of God in you. How can you believe when you accept glory from one another and do not seek the glory that comes from the one who alone is God?”  (Jn 5:41f, 45) 

We must learn from St Peter in the gospel too.  He was impulsive and too sure of himself.  He said, “Lord, if it is you, tell me to come to you across the water.”   As he “started to walk towards Jesus across the water, but as soon as he felt the force of the wind, he took fright and began to sink.  ‘Lord!  Save me!’ he cried.  Jesus put out his hand at once and held him.  ‘Man of little faith,’ he said ‘why did you doubt?”  So we need to continue to purify our faith.  It is good that we seek to be firm in our faith but faith requires us to grow gradually.  They were also involved in rivalry over leadership positions.  (Mt 20:20-28) Peter and the other apostles still had many lessons to learn before they could come to realize the real identity of Jesus and submit to Him in faith totally, not just in mind but in heart.   We too must grow in humility in service by finding strength and approval from God, not from men.  This is the key to preventing ourselves from jealousy, envy, greed, insecurity and rivalry for positions in life.

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

THE VULNERABILITY OF A LEADER

20210802 THE VULNERABILITY OF A LEADER

 

 

02 August, 2021, Monday, 18th Week, Ordinary Time

First reading

Numbers 11:4-15 ©

The sons of Israel complain in the desert

The sons of Israel began to wail, ‘Who will give us meat to eat?’ they said. ‘Think of the fish we used to eat free in Egypt, the cucumbers, melons, leeks, onions and garlic! Here we are wasting away, stripped of everything; there is nothing but manna for us to look at!’

  The manna was like coriander seed, and had the appearance of bdellium. The people went round gathering it, and ground it in a mill or crushed it with a pestle; it was then cooked in a pot and made into pancakes. It tasted like cake made with oil. When the dew fell on the camp at night-time, the manna fell with it.

  Moses heard the people wailing, every family at the door of its tent. The anger of the Lord flared out, and Moses greatly worried over this. And he spoke to the Lord:

  ‘Why do you treat your servant so badly? Why have I not found favour with you, so that you load on me the weight of all this nation? Was it I who conceived all this people, was it I who gave them birth, that you should say to me, “Carry them in your bosom, like a nurse with a baby at the breast, to the land that I swore to give their fathers”? Where am I to find meat to give to all this people, when they come worrying me so tearfully and say, “Give us meat to eat”? I am not able to carry this nation by myself alone; the weight is too much for me. If this is how you want to deal with me, I would rather you killed me! If only I had found favour in your eyes, and not lived to see such misery as this!’

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Responsorial Psalm

Psalm 80(81):12-17 ©

Ring out your joy to God our strength.

My people did not heed my voice

  and Israel would not obey,

so I left them in their stubbornness of heart

  to follow their own designs.

Ring out your joy to God our strength.

O that my people would heed me,

  that Israel would walk in my ways!

At once I would subdue their foes,

  turn my hand against their enemies.

Ring out your joy to God our strength.

The Lord’s enemies would cringe at their feet

  and their subjection would last for ever.

But Israel I would feed with finest wheat

  and fill them with honey from the rock.

Ring out your joy to God our strength.

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Gospel Acclamation

Jn14:6

Alleluia, alleluia!

I am the Way, the Truth and the Life, says the Lord;

No one can come to the Father except through me.

Alleluia!

Or:

Mt4:4

Alleluia, alleluia!

Man does not live on bread alone,

but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.

Alleluia!

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Gospel

Matthew 14:13-21 ©

The feeding of the five thousand

When Jesus received the news of John the Baptist’s death he withdrew by boat to a lonely place where they could be by themselves. But the people heard of this and, leaving the towns, went after him on foot. So as he stepped ashore he saw a large crowd; and he took pity on them and healed their sick.

  When evening came, the disciples went to him and said, ‘This is a lonely place, and the time has slipped by; so send the people away, and they can go to the villages to buy themselves some food.’ Jesus replied, ‘There is no need for them to go: give them something to eat yourselves.’ But they answered ‘All we have with us is five loaves and two fish.’ ‘Bring them here to me’ he said. He gave orders that the people were to sit down on the grass; then he took the five loaves and the two fish, raised his eyes to heaven and said the blessing. And breaking the loaves handed them to his disciples who gave them to the crowds. They all ate as much as they wanted, and they collected the scraps remaining; twelve baskets full. Those who ate numbered about five thousand men, to say nothing of women and children.

 

THE VULNERABILITY OF A LEADER

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SCRIPTURE READINGS: [NUM 11:4-15; Ps 81:12-17; Mt 14:13-21]

Leadership is a great honour and a privilege.   But it is also a heavy responsibility and burden unfortunately.  Leaders have to carry the weight of the entire organization or nation on their shoulders.  He is not answerable just to himself but to the people under his charge, and to God.  And it is increasingly difficult to be a leader in the world today where people are individualistic and inward-looking.  To command respect and alignment with all parties is a most challenging task, not to mention the issues that the leader has to handle each day, and also to be proactive in considering the future of the organization.

Moses is presented to us as a very vulnerable leader.  This is the beauty of the Old Testament.  The stories of Israel’s leaders were never portrayed as flawless or sinless.  We are consoled to think that we are just like them as leaders.   Indeed, Abraham was deceitful, Sarah doubted, Isaac lied, Jacob was a cheat, Samson was a womanizer, David an adulterer.  Moses, like them too, was imperfect.  He was given many gifts by God, more than the people.  He had a face-to-face encounter with His glory.  God spoke to him as one to a friend.  He was chosen to lead the people out of slavery.   Even then, he was frustrated and exasperated at the weight he was carrying.  He was overwhelmed by their complaints.

“Moses heard the people wailing, every family at the door of its tent.”  Just like all leaders, we can never satisfy the needs of our people but their desires as well.  The people were always lamenting about one thing to another.  They complained there was no water, no bread, and then no meat.  The truth is that man is never satisfied.  He does not understand the virtue of contentment.  When basic needs are fulfilled, he seeks luxuries.  He likes to compare with what others have, forgetting what he already have.  Just like the Israelites, we have poor memory of what God has done for us.  We have selective memory only of the good days but not the suffering.  So they compared themselves to those days when they were in Egypt, when they had all the food they wanted, but they forgot their miseries and suffering under the slavery of the Egyptians.  Indeed, a leader receives complaints day in and day out, against this or that policy or persons.

The burden that Moses carried was simply too overwhelming for him.  Not only did he have to bear the unceasing complaints of the Israelites, but he also had to bear the anger of the Lord against the people.  He felt sandwiched between the rebellious Israelites and the wrath of God at the people’s ingratitude.  Truly, as leaders we always feel this way as well.  Quite often, leaders spend much time trying to appease groups of people, uniting them when in conflict, and often no one is happy with the leader’s decision.  In such moments, we are also not only frustrated but we become resentful at their unreasonable demands.

Trapped by the constraints we face and the opposition against us, some leaders like Moses would say, “This is enough!  Why should I carry this baby anymore?  Why should I suffer ingratitude for all the sacrifices I have made?  I don’t want this burden.  So Lord, take this responsibility away from me.”  That was what Moses told the Lord.  “Why do you treat your servant so badly? Why have I not found favour with you, so that you load on me the weight of all this nation? Was it I who conceived all this people, was it I who gave them birth.  Where am I to find meat to give to all this people, when they come worrying me so tearfully.  I am not able to carry this nation by myself alone; the weight is too much for me.  If this is how you want to deal with me, I would rather you killed me!  If only I had found favour in your eyes, and not lived to see such misery as this!”  Indeed, Moses had enough of all these burdens that he suffered for the people as the servant of God.

Like Moses too, knowing that we are not able to fulfil the tasks the Lord has appointed for us, we want to resign and give up.  When Moses asked that the Lord take away his life, it was simply because he was too tired and exhausted and felt he could not fulfil the role the Lord had given to him.  Rather than risk failure and disappoint God and His people, it would be better for God to appoint someone else who could succeed where he had failed.  Is not this how we feel when we are overcome by our responsibilities?  Even Job, who was going through such torture in his body and rejection by his friends, Elijah who fled from Queen Jezebel, and Jonah who could not see his enemies triumph over his people, wanted to give up and pleaded with God to end their lives.  (Job 3:11; 6:9; 1 Kgs 19:4; Jonah 4:3) Indeed, why do we want to continue to man a sinking ship?  It is better that someone who can do a better job take over.

This is where we fail to understand God’s plan.  We think that success is measured according to human standards.  This was how Peter retorted when the Lord prophesied His imminent passion.  He said, “God forbid it, Lord! This must never happen to you.”  But Jesus turned to Peter, “Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to me; for you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things.”  (Mt 16:22f) What God asks of us is submission to His holy will and to surrender our lives to Him and all our problems.  Jesus ended His mission by handing over His mission to the Spirit to complete what He could not accomplish.  “Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.”  (Lk 23:46) His mission was a failure in the eyes of His enemies, but God had other plans.

So the lesson we can learn from today’s scripture readings is that leaders must hand over their burden and challenges to the Lord, instead of just relying on themselves.  The Lord told us in the gospel, “Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest.  Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.  For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”  (Mt 11:28-30) God is compassionate and ever ready to assist us.  This is shown in Jesus’ tireless ministry to the people even when He was tired and needed time for Himself.  “As he stepped ashore he saw a large crowd; and he took pity on them and healed their sick.”  He would not shirk His responsibility to feed the people when His disciples asked that He dismissed them.  Instead, He asked His disciples to feed them.  Again, like Moses and us all, we also react saying, “All we have with us is five loaves and two fish.”  In other words, we cannot do it.  It is impossible.

Yet the marvel of God’s intervention is that He makes use of what had already been given to us.  In other words, miracles need not be spectacular divine intervention, creating havoc to nature, but making use of nature to serve us.  This was what the Lord did in Exodus.  When Moses asked for a sign, God told him to make use of the rod in his hand to perform miracles.  The plagues could have been due to natural disasters, but they happened at a time when Moses needed some signs.  So too, God works miracles in our lives by sending us help through an email, a phone call, words of encouragement from a friend or someone who offers help.  Our God is a God of surprises.  When we feel helpless, He makes it possible.

All we need to do is to be like the Lord. Instead of complaining how little we have or how discouraging our results, we should be content and surrender everything to the Lord.  That was what the Lord did, taking the five loaves and two fish, He gave thanks.  He did not say, “why so little, how to share with the crowd”.  In giving thanks, it shows Jesus’ gratitude for what He already had, and by sharing with others, God multiplied the bread, whether miraculously or whether He inspired the crowd to share what they brought along with them.  It is immaterial how it happened.  The point is that when we give whatever little we have to the Lord, He will make use of them.  The generosity of the Lord cannot be outdone.  He will help us, just as the Lord said to St Paul, “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness.” (2 Cor 12:9) So let us ring out our joy to God our strength.

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