Come Let Us Worship the Lord: Homily for the 1st Sunday of Lent

  

Gn 2:7-9; 3:1-7

Ps 51:3-4,5-6,12-13,17

Rom 5:12-19

Mt 4:1-11

 

“Come let us worship the Lord who for our sake endured temptation and suffering.”  

 

The Divine Office begins with this antiphon every morning during Lent.  Temptation and suffering characterize the human condition, and help define what it means to be human.  The antiphon also reminds us how Jesus was like us and how we are unlike Him.

 

The word temptation has generally negative associations for many English speakers who wrongly tend to equate temptation with sin.  However, the Latin, Hebrew, and Greek  roots of the word are neutral, and include trying, proving, or testing.  That is the sense of temptation as used in today’s Gospel.  Satan tested Jesus' fidelity to the Father.  Temptation tests our fidelity to God and His law.

The familiar first reading recounts the fall.  Adam and Eve were put to a test.  Did they trust God or did they not?  Were they willing to obey or were they not?  That they ate of the tree in the garden illustrates how we sin: easily impulsively, casually, and quickly,  oftentimes at the slightest provocation.  Note, an apple is not mentioned in the narrative but it is a good metaphor for the sin of Adam and Eve. It is a good metaphor for our tendency to sin.  Think about it.  

 

An apple as an image, has multiple advantages over other fruits such as an orange, a banana, or a mango. An apple is quick, easy, and convenient. No need to peel.  Small enough to hold, large enough to share.  No need to cut or peel, just bite down and enjoy.  No one just grabs a pineapple and bites into it.  Some sins, particularly those that the Church considers mortal, require planning and a lot of work.  Committing adultery requires deviousness and time.  Robbing a Bank of America branch requires risk.  Performing a late-term abortion requires considerable training.  Selling fentanyl on a street corner requires finding buyers in addition to the seller being morally depraved.

 

How often do we sin simply because the opportunity is there,  because we want something,  because, as the unfortunate 60’s motto proclaimed “If it feels good do it.”  It wasn’t an apple that did us in.  It was human freedom. Adam and Eve couldn't handle it any better than we do today.

 

The last verses of the narrative tell us of the shame and embarrassment that are the personal cost to the sinner, especially when caught in that sin.  Augustine described that kind of guilt in his Confessions.   We are sinners because we are free to choose and free to act on that choice.  Dealing with the consequences is a second layer.

 

Adam and Eve were given free will, a gift that is exclusive to human beings.  Only humans have insight into the meaning of their decisions. Only humans possess the ability to plan into the future. The awareness of potential outcomes and the ability to weigh multiple choices are gifts limited to humans.  They are part of human freedom.  How we manage that freedom is tested daily.

 

Human freedom is not freedom from restrictions, rules, and responsibility.  Human freedom is freedom for not freedom from.  Freedom is not the ability to adopt an individual or idiosyncratic attitude towards this or that.  It is the freedom of self-understanding.  It is the possibility of saying yes or no to oneself. Human freedom is the opportunity to reject sin or to choose it.  Human responsibility demands living with the results of that choice.  Adam and Eve chose, they chose wrongly, but they remained free.  We have the same freedom.  In his full humanity, Jesus had the same freedom. This is where he was both like us and unlike us.  He was like us in being tempted and tested. He was unlike us in not sinning, in not failing the test.

 

Each of the temptations Satan presented were tests of Jesus’ willingness to rely on God. 

 

We just heard, “He fasted for forty days and forty nights, and afterwards he was hungry” Satan did not approach Jesus until He was vulnerable. Similarly, Satan dangles temptation in front of us when we are vulnerable,  be it through hunger, fatigue, disorientation, anger, sorrow . . . the list is long.

 

Satan tempted a hungry Jesus with bread.  “C’mon, take care of yourself.  You can be self-sufficient.  Just do it.”   The temptation to self sufficiency,  to taking care of number one, looms large in our lives.  

 

The second temptation was to put God to the test.  “Hey Jesus, it’s a quid pro quo.  You jump and the Father saves you as promised. If not, well you lose.”  God is not a puppet master who pulls our strings to make us dance. Nor is God a marionette whose strings we can control through prayer or an ultimatum. There is no quid pro quo with God.

 

Finally, Satan presented Jesus with the classical Faustian bargain.  “Sell your soul.  Look what I will get you.  Power.  Prestige.  Money.  Control.  You too can have the most toys when you die.” 

 

The responsorial, Psalm 51, was the great penitential psalm known as the Miserere.  Read it slowly at home.  Let the words sink in.  Allow it speak to you. 

 

"I acknowledge my offenses."

 

"A clean heart create for me O God."

 

"Give me back the joy of your salvation."

 

"O Lord, open my lips, and my mouth shall proclaim your praise." 

 

And then recall the antiphon:

 

“Come let us worship the Lord who for our sake endured temptation and suffering.”   

 

____________________________________________

 

Have been spending some time trying (underline thrice) to organize photo files.  Doubt it will ever truly happen but I try.  Doing so, particularly when I hit a random file is a reminder of things, places, or times I would have forgotten.

 

Sunset over the Hudson River and Catskill Mountains from the motherhouse of the Carmelite Sisters for the Aged and Infirm.  I go back a long time with them.  Gave a retreat there a few years ago.

The morning sun hitting a window in Port Lincoln, Australia.  Was drawn by the shadow of the dress form. 

Early morning light at the Franciscan Church in Ljubljana.  I was concelebrating Mass that day and thus arrived early.  Had the camera in my brief case.  

Organist at the Friday night community Mass in St. Mary's Jesuit Residence Chapel here at BC.

Reflection of flowers planted in front of  St. Mary's Hall.  The glass is old and, depending on positioning gives wonderful distortions.  

Fr. Jack, SJ, MD