There are times where I am thankful that we are on a set lectionary. The readings never fail to shine a light on what we go through day to day in our mundane life. But it easy to forget that even though the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, it was a committee of theologians that assembled the product. And sometimes having this knowledge makes one wonder what was going on in the committee meeting on some weeks of the cycle.
This week is one of those weeks for me. Upon reading the Gospel, they choose the opening line in Luke “ Jesus addressed the parable to those who were convinced of their own righteousness and despised everyone else.” That and with the reading for Sirach, talking about the justice of the oppressed, I like to think it was a fiery meeting indeed.
We live in a world where we are convinced that all of our ways are the only way of doing thing. That our “learned” experience is better than someone elses lived experience in the world. That we can do our jobs better than others. We even extend this though process toward our faith, that our faith is better than all other paths to the divine.
This phenomena is what theologian Peter Enns calls the sin of certainty. That we are so convinced that our way of practicing faith is the sure or only way to God, that we leave no room for God to act in our lives and show us ways to grow.
It’s in this certainty that we look only at ourselves and forget the oppressed and vulnerable around us. We forget that we are meer mortals and not Gods and that we are entrusted as the Divine tells us in Genesis 2 with “ the care of all creation” the care of not only the animals and the planets, but in care to one another.
So instead of being arrogant, and thinking that we are the only ones who are right, Let us in our day to day lives look for truth, look at other ways of looking at things. Only then can we give credence and justice to the oppressed.
As Jesus says, The arrogant will be humbled and the humble will be exalted. So shall it be today as it was 2 millennia ago. Because somethings are true no matter what culture one lives in. Starting today, let us shake off our certainty, and make room for God to reveal truth in our lives.
God bless,
Matt+