21st Sunday Yr B (Gospel: John 6:60-69) What about you, will you go away too?

 

When I was a deacon I was sent to a conference in Los Angeles. I spent two extra days in a parish there. The pastor was an Irish man and he was explaining how things work over there. He said that for years there was a man in the parish who used to lead the folk group. He played the guitar. Then one day he decided to start his own church. So he rented a building down the street and started his own church, just like that. That’s how it works in LA.

 

What if you could change whatever parts of the faith you wanted to? You could have women priests, married priests, divorce, contraception, etc. You could change some of the more difficult teachings like having to love your enemies; seems a bit extreme after all and you could tailor it just to suit your own needs. You could believe what you wanted to believe. What would you end up with? A feel-good religion of nice ideas, of wishful thinking. It would mean nothing. It might make you feel better, but it would be empty. Why? because it would be man made, not God made.

 

The word of God and the teachings of God are demanding, but they are God’s teachings, not just something we made up. We are free to either take it or leave it, to accept it and struggle with it, or to walk away from it. When we come across parts of the Bible that are difficult, we tend to say it must be wrong, since it doesn’t make sense to me. I think it would make more sense to say it is right because it is the word of God, but I don’t understand it. Therefore I have to try and understand what it means, rather than discard it.

 

Rafael's 'Discussion on the Eucharist', Vatican City

In this Gospel passage, Jesus is just after teaching about the Eucharist. He said, ‘I am the bread of life’ and ‘Unless you eat my flesh and drink my blood you will not have life in you.’ And the people said, ‘This is too much, who could accept it?’ and they walked away. But Jesus’ response is even more interesting. He didn’t go after them and say, ‘Let me explain’. Instead, He just let them walk away. The only thing He did was say to the Apostles, ‘Are you going to go away too?’ In other words, ‘This is my teaching, take it or leave it.’ And it says that ‘As a result of this many of his disciples returned to their former way of living and no longer accompanied him.’ They couldn’t accept what He said, so they left, but He didn’t change anything He had said. How could He, if it is the truth? and this applies to all of the teachings of Christ, handed down to us. They don’t change. They cannot change, because they are truth, but we are free to accept them or not.

 

Jesus says to us, ‘If you love me, you will keep my commandments’ (Jn 14:15). Above all this means putting God above everything else; above your wife, or husband, above your children, above your work. God must be first and God assures us that if we put him first, everything else will follow. ‘Seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness and all these other things will be given you as well’ (Matt 6:33). ‘If you put me first, I will take care of all your needs.’ The problem is that we usually think we have to get everything else in our life in order first and then we will turn to God. But the Lord is saying it must be the other way around. He must be first in everything.

 

Recently, on the back window of a car, I saw this Scripture reference: 2 Chronicles 7:14. Off the top of my head I didn’t know what it was, so I looked it up. It is a perfect Scripture for our times. It says:

“If my people who are called by my name will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear them from heaven and I will forgive their sin and heal their land.”

 

Look at what is happening across the country and all over the world. Huge fires, floods and many volcanoes coming to life which have been dormant for years, even centuries. There is chaos in our society, with people turning against people. ‘Oh, it’s just climate change.’ Is it? Perhaps it is exactly what it says in Scripture. When the people turn away from God and worship other gods, God’s blessing is lifted from the land. The people no longer have God’s protection. This is what happened time and time again with the people of Israel. When they got comfortable, they turned away from God and worshipped other gods. Chaos followed, their society began to fall apart and their enemies took over, until eventually they recognized their sin and turned back to God asking forgiveness. Are we worshipping other gods? Yes, the gods of money, pleasure, self. We have child sacrifice, which is abortion. Last February, in congress, a congressman publicly said, ‘The will of God is of no concern to this congress.’[1] All these things are abhorrent to the Lord. That’s what the word of God says. These things are detestable to the Lord.

 

To restore God’s blessing on the land, we have to do what God asks us to do, which is to put him first, to repent of our sins, to confess our sins and to live by the ways of God. ‘I don’t need to confess my sins to a priest. I can tell God I’m sorry myself.’ Sure you can, but that’s not what God asks us to do. God asks us to confess to his priests, because that way we are being held accountable. There is no sense of accountability if we just tell God we are sorry by ourselves. That is why God established the gift of confession, which is one of the sacraments of healing. He wants to heal us.

 

I find it interesting that at this time, many Christian leaders, Protestants, Catholics and Evangelicals, are all saying the same thing. God is telling us to repent and turn back to his ways and what we are seeing happening around us are signs that we need to wake up.

 

If it were impossible for us to follow God’s teachings, He wouldn’t have given them to us. So it must be possible, but it does require a definite decision on our part. Trying to do it on our own can seem impossible, but God doesn’t ask us to do it on our own. He asks us to continually turn to him and use the help He offers us, which He gives us above all through the Eucharist, through Confession, through the Scriptures. God gives us all the help we need, if we ask for it.

 

‘Lord where else will we go, you have the message of eternal life and we believe, we know you are the holy one of God.’

 

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[1] Congressman Jerry Nadler, Feb 27^th, 2021:

“What any religious tradition ascribes as God’s will, is no concern of this congress.”