Fr John’s reflection for Sunday 1 Sept 2024
Learning to live by the spirit of the game
When I listen to others, I often ask myself what am I listening for? There is an art in conversation that is more than considering your response but attentiveness to what the other person is trying to express. I often find myself echoing the prevailing wisdom or the latest insight I have heard from others. The difficulty with these responses is that they bounce along the surface and do not seek what I am prepared to live for. We live in an age where opinions are readily available and easily transmitted around the world but do not reveal who we are called to become.
We discover this in the discussion between Jesus, the Pharisees and the scribes. These are people who take the discussion about faith seriously as can be seen when they address the hygiene laws of the day. What is added to this discussion is that not obeying these laws makes a person unclean on the inside. Jesus challenges this viewpoint to not just observe external laws without an inner conversion of heart. Thus, we don’t just obey laws because we want to look good but we seek to be good, that enables us to care for others.
This conversion of heart builds the foundation of Jesus’ life. He does not just want lip service but a way of being present that reaches the depth of our soul. This acknowledges how we allow God into the places that we hide away and give rise to evil intentions, the things that truly make us unclean. By acknowledging this reality, we start to find the spirit of the law. We discover how God meets us even in our darkest night and seeks to kindle the flame that burns away the darkness. That warms us from the inside out and transforms our world.
DE COLORES!
Fr. John Armstrong
“The intellectual quest is exquisite, like pearls and coral. But it is not the same as the spiritual quest. The spiritual quest is on another level altogether. Spiritual wine has a subtler taste. The intellect and the senses investigate cause and effect. The spiritual seeker surrenders to wonder.” (Rumi Wisdom; trans. Timothy Freke)