Friday, August 23, 2019

21st Sunday Yr C (Gospel: Luke 13:22-30) Try your best to enter by the narrow door





An average of 102 people die on the roads in the United States, every day. Approximately 37, 230 per year. None of the 102 people who will die on the roads today, will be expecting it. I wonder if any of them, after they died and faced God, were asked what was the most important thing they could have done in their life, what would they say?

Jesus is asked this question, ‘Lord, will only a few people be saved?’ And his answer is, ‘Try to enter by the narrow door.’ What is the ‘narrow door’?

The narrow door is simply, trying to live as the Lord Jesus taught us; keeping the commandments of God and keeping to what we know is right, regardless of what everyone else is doing. That is the narrow door. Not sleeping with someone before you are married, as the Lord taught, keeping Sunday holy, not stealing, or killing, or lying, etc. The Lord gave us the Commandments as a guideline, or a blueprint, for living. If we follow them we will flourish, they will help us to do well as people. They make for a society that works, but if we just do our own thing, we will get into trouble. It is a narrow door because there are many other doors, or ways, which seem more attractive. ‘Why should I have to obey rules? Why can’t I do whatever I want?’ You can do whatever you want, but our actions have consequences and that is why the Lord gives us commandments, to help us to make the best choices which will lead us on the most fulfilling path.

The story of Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden, is teaching us the same thing. It is saying that as people we have limits which we must not go beyond. God has given us boundaries which we must respect. We must not play God, deciding who lives and dies; euthanasia and abortion. If we do, we won’t be able to handle it. That’s why the Lord told them not to touch the tree of good and evil. It is a symbol of our limitations. We must not be the ones to ultimately decide what is good and evil, but to listen to what God tells us is good and evil. Look at what is happening in our world as we decide what is ultimately good and evil. We say abortion is wrong, but it depends… That’s not what God tells us.


As soon as Eve took the fruit from the tree of good and evil, they were in trouble, they felt guilt and shame, they were confused and they didn’t know why. The story is teaching us that they had gone beyond their limits as human beings and so they couldn’t handle it. They needed God’s help again. When God came to them in the garden, he asked them why they were hiding, what was wrong? God wasn’t just giving out to them, but helping them to see where they had gone wrong. ‘Have you been eating from the tree from which I forbade you?’ ‘Who told you that you were naked?’ Whatever God does is always to help us, but we often don’t see it that way and we cry out to God, ‘Why are you doing this to me?’ That’s what the second reading is talking about. Parents discipline their children because they love them. As parents you can see a bigger picture than your children, which is why you don’t let them do whatever they want, or they will ruin themselves. When we are children we need to learn what our boundaries are, what is right and wrong and that our actions have consequences. God does the exact same thing with us.

The ten Commandments are to help us, but just like with children, we don’t always see the wisdom in them. Then when Jesus came along, he helped people to understand these laws at a deeper level. He began to teach people to live from the heart, to pray from the heart. Many times in St. Matthew’s gospel we hear where Jesus quotes the Law, which is from the Commandments and then he says, ‘But I say this to you.’ ‘You have heard how it was said, ‘Love your neighbour and hate your enemy, but I say this to you: Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.’ Jesus is teaching us to live at a deeper level, at the level of the heart, so that we’re not just doing the bare minimum. Outward observances are not enough.

I have two dear friends in the Poor Clares in my hometown of Galway. The Poor Clares are a contemplative Religious order, which means they dedicate their whole lives to praying for everyone else and they don’t leave the monastery. I remember a friend of mine saying, ‘Those women are so holy.’ And I was thinking, not necessarily so! They probably are, but it depends completely on how each one lives out their calling. They live a lifestyle which should lead them to great holiness, but it depends how they live it. It is the same for all of us and that’s what Jesus is saying in this Gospel. It is not just those who say they belong to God, but those who actually live what the Lord teaches us. There will be no use in saying, ‘But I was a Catholic and went to mass,’ if we were not living as God teaches us the rest of the time.

Perhaps the most important part of all this is to realize that our strength to go through the narrow door, begins with our relationship with Jesus. Our faith is not belief in a teaching, or idea, but a relationship with a person. Once this relationship grows then it makes it possible to live the way he asks us to, not the other way around. People often get bogged down with Catholicism because they begin with all the controversial issues and of course they get disheartened.

If we focus first on God and on trying to get to know him a little bit more, then the other issues begin to fall into place. Our relationship with God must come first, through prayer, the mass, reading the word of God, then everything else begins to make sense.

‘Try your best to enter by the narrow door.’




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