Thursday of the Tenth Week in Ordinary
June 15, 2023
Today’s Reading:
https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/061523.cfm
Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, our readings offer us insight into spiritual clarity.
For sure I, like all of you reading this blog, want to know God more deeply.
Moses did.
The people of the Hebrew Scriptures did.
But Paul tells us in our first reading that they didn’t have the advantage – the “indescribable gift” – that we have: Jesus, the Incarnate Word of God.
To this day, whenever Moses is read,
2 Corinthians 3:15-17
a veil lies over the hearts of the children of Israel,
but whenever a person turns to the Lord the veil is removed.
Now the Lord is the Spirit and where the Spirit of the Lord is,
there is freedom.
Paul says that despite this gift, some of us, blinded by “the god of this age” may remain in darkness:
And even though our Gospel is veiled,
2 Corinthians 4:3-4
it is veiled for those who are perishing,
in whose case the god of this age
has blinded the minds of the unbelievers,
Paul compares this blocked vision to a veil covering our eyes and distancing us from the fullness of God.
It’s a great image! Don’t we unconsciously cover our eyes when we don’t want to see what’s really going on? Don’t we cast our own glance downward to obscure our eyes when we are unsure of ourselves or, maybe, telling a white lie?
This morning, when I read about Paul’s “veil”, I remembered a funny but instructive incident from my childhood. I was about seven years old and had been sent to my room for some egregious infraction of household law. Convinced of my innocence and righteousness, I pouted there until Mom called me downstairs for dinner.
Still angry, I didn’t want to go, so I decided not to “face” my family at the dinner table. Probably, deep in my heart, I knew I had been wrong but didn’t yet have the freedom to “face” myself. So, employing a pair of Mom’s old sunglasses and Grandpop’s handkerchief, I appeared at the dinner table like this – “veiled”. (Believe me, it was no fun trying to eat my mashed potatoes that way!)
I am a long, long way from that bratty little girl now. But there are still places in my life where I want to reach for the hanky and the glasses because I’m not ready for God’s overwhelming grace offered to me in every life circumstance. So often, I am still convinced that I see the darkness that I see, rather than the Mystery within it inviting me to Light..
For God who said, “Let light shine out of darkness”,
1 Corinthians 4:6
has shone in our hearts to bring to light
the knowledge of the glory of God
on the face of Jesus Christ.
Back when I was seven years old, it was Uncle Joe who teased me, with a gentle love, out of my peevishness. Maybe God is trying to do that for you, for me, today. What do you think?
(Uncle Joe and me, about 35 years after the described incident.)
Poetry: from Rumi
Your thoughts are a veil
on the face of the Moon.
That Moon is your heart,
and those thoughts cover your heart.
So let them go,
just let them fall into the water.
Music: Heaven’s Window – Peter Kater – you will hear a gentle call to Agnus Dei, Jesus Lamb of God as the music lifts the veil to heaven. Just relax and let the music lift you too.
Lavish Mercy 