Dear friends,
For the last few weeks I was traveling and then moving house to a different parish which is why there were no homilies. I'm now working in the parish of St. Vincent de Paul, Fort Myers, Florida. Welcome back again!
A
few years ago something like 21 people working for French Telecom
took their own lives. The company finally began to take a serious
look at what was going wrong and realised that they were just pushing
their employees too hard and they couldn’t take it anymore. So the
company began to change their work policy and take some of the
pressure off. It is terrible that it would come to that, but I think
it is also a good reminder that we are not machines and we are not
just meant to be worked to death. Apparently something similar has
been happening in China where people were also being pushed too hard.
We are not machines and there is a spiritual side to us which is just
as real as the physical, and which also needs to be cared for if we
are to be healthy.
Much
of our society has gone like this, working like ‘the hammers of
hell’ as the expression goes. We don’t seem to know when to stop,
or even how to stop and now because Sunday is a shopping day there
seems to be no beginning or end to the week. Business people will
tell you that Sunday is now the busiest shopping day of the week (in
Ireland at least). Even apart from a religious point of view, this
cannot be good for us because we need to be able to rest, to just
stop and do nothing. We are not machines.
‘Martha,
Martha, you worry and fret about so many things.’ Look at
what Martha was saying to Jesus. ‘Can’t you see how much work
there is to be done? Tell my sister to be busy too. She shouldn’t
just be sitting there.’ But Jesus’ reply is interesting. He says
that only one thing is necessary.
He doesn’t just say that there is nothing wrong with her sitting
and listening to him; he says it is necessary
and that she shouldn’t be stopped from doing that. Stopping and
listening is not just a nice idea, but it is necessary. Why is it so
important?
There
is an order to God’s creation. It will work a certain way and the
Lord knows what we are able for much better than we do. The third
commandment that God gave us is to keep the Sabbath, or Sunday holy.
It is to be a day of rest, where God is remembered, where God is
given priority; but also a day where we can rest and recover because
we need it ourselves.
When
the people of Israel (who represent all of us) were wandering through
the desert, initially they had nothing to eat. So God provided them
with manna, a food that they could collect each day. This sustained
them each day. But He also told them that they should go out and
collect each day just enough for that day; but on the day before the
Sabbath they should also collect enough for the Sabbath, so that they
could rest and give God priority that day. To put it in modern
English, He said, ‘Do enough shopping on Saturday so that you don’t
have to go shopping on Sunday.’ Sunday is to be a day of rest from
unnecessary work, where we can worship God, relax, take a walk with
family or friends. Why? Because we need it. It is necessary for our
sanity. It is part of the order that God created and God is well
aware of what we need, because He created us.
God
also asks us to rest so that we can continually learn how to listen
to him. I often hear people say that they wish God would speak to
them more. The truth is that God is speaking to us all the time, but
mostly we are not listening. To a large degree we don’t even know
how to listen any more, because we have gotten used to being so busy
and having so much noise around us.
You
might be thinking that that is just how society has gone now and we
should just get used to it. But the point is that if we are following
the way of Christ as we say we are, then we need to listen to what
God is saying to us, even if the rest of society doesn’t.
Christians have always been different and we will be different if we
follow the path that God shows us. We have to ask ourselves, ‘Do I
believe in this or not?’ Do I believe this is what God is saying to
us or not? If we believe this—as we say we do—then we need to
listen to what God asks of us and follow his directions, because they
are there to help us. The order that God has given his creation, is
not to make life difficult, but to help us blossom because God knows
better than any of us what will help us grow.
Martha, Martha, you worry and fret about so many things;
only one thing is necessary. It is Mary who has chosen the
better part; it is not to be taken from her.
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