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| Rev. Fr. Augustine Vallooran V.C. |
During a conference, a young man confronted me with a question, "Who or what is the God you believe in?" I replied him, "Jesus, the Good Shepherd." Those who were listening to me were young entrepreneurs - a group of very ambitious and successful business people. They belonged to different religious persuasions and some of them were even agnostics. They had invited me to lead them in their search to know God a little closer. The theme of the seminar was, ‘The Relevance Of God In The Contemporary Competitive World’. When I mentioned Jesus, the Good Shepherd, they were very interested. How could a shepherd have any relevance in this modern age? I explained to them that this was a title that Jesus wanted us to know Him by. As the Good Shepherd, He would leave the ninety-nine sheep in the wilderness in order to search out and rescue the one lost sheep. It was the lost one that needed the shepherd more urgently. Feeling the pain of loneliness and estrangement of the lost sheep, He goes out risking all that He had even His life to search it out.
“If We Are Faithless, He Remains Faithful” (2 Timothy 2:13)
During my explanation, a young lady cynically remarked, "Your God is an unjust God. How can He leave the faithful majority of the flock to the dangers of the wilderness with its wild beasts and go in search of a single sheep that did not care to stay with Him any way? He definitely is a poor leader - for He should have known better that His responsibility was towards those who remained with Him and not towards the one who did not care for him." I replied that it was possible that my God may be a poor leader, but He definitely is a great lover. His love is so personal that He will not let any one of those who belongs to Him to perish. That is the mission of His Heart. The sad truth is that leadership today is looked at as a selfish endeavour of pleasing the majority to get support and applause. Individuals who are not able to fall in line with the policies of the majority, because of their personal history, will be wounded and estranged in the process. They do not matter for the leaders. Such individuals will be even looked at as a threat because the principle generally accepted is that those who are not with you are against you. Potential threats will not be tolerated by "effective" leadership. I continued to explain to them that my God knows every one personally - as He said that even a hair falling from our head is counted (Matthew 10:30)
Even in the moments when I fail
Him by my unfaithfulness I could still count on Him to be there for me and not
against me. A long discussion followed in which many were impressed by my
proposal. Yet they confessed, “We can never imagine that God having the power
to have His Way should tolerate our vagaries without an inclination to punish
us!” The Mercy of God was still beyond their comprehension. Deeply rooted in
their minds was the idea of the Justice of God. As God is the creator and
guarantor of the system of "right" and "wrong", He has to
set the system right by punishing the wrong. The necessary consequence is that
when I do something wrong, I had to pay back for the sake of the system of
morality. Such thinking breeds fear. Then the natural tendency in my mind is to
interpret every thing bad happening to me as a punishment of God. Fear causes
rebellion and despair. God is looked at as a threat to happiness and welfare of
human life. Agnosticism is the offshoot of such untrue concoctions of the human
mind on the Divine Reality.
“How Can I Give You Up?” (Hosea
11:8)
In the Bible there is a
progressive revelation of the Mercy of God. When the people of God were
painfully struck by their own unfaithfulness to the stipulations of the
Covenant that God had made with them, they were frightened of God's wrath. They
interpreted every disaster and misfortune that occurred to them as Divine
interventions to punish them and teach them a lesson. But in time, their eyes
were opened with the great events of God's salvation. Salvation was not what
they deserved for they had violated the Covenant by their unfaithfulness. Yet
the Lord God intervened for the one purpose of their salvation. The Hebrew word
‘hesed’ used in this context has much significance. The word indicates a
profound attitude of 'goodness'. In the Old Testament, the word occurs always
in connection with the Covenant that God established with His people.
In accordance with the Covenant,
God promises to be faithful to His people by protecting and saving them.
However the people had to be also faithful to the Covenant by obeying its
stipulations. This was the Justice of God. According to this Divine justice,
God's commitment to the Covenant would cease when the people strayed away from
Him and the Covenant. But precisely at this point, the transcendent meaning of
God's 'hesed' was manifested as Mercy - goodness greater than justice. As Pope
John Paul II explained well, "It showed itself as what it was at the
beginning, that is, as love that gives, love more powerful than betrayal, grace
stronger than sin" (Encyclical: 'Rich in Mercy').
The people realized that God's
fidelity and love did not depend on their attitude towards Him. Through Prophet
Isaiah God declared, "For the mountains may depart and the hills be
removed, my steadfast love shall not depart from you, and my covenant of peace
shall not be removed, says the Lord who has mercy on you." (Isaiah 54:10)
God, in showering upon them unmerited goodness, was simply faithful to His own
nature, which was Unconditional Love. He exhorts the people through the Prophet
Ezekiel, "Therefore say to the house of Israel: thus says the Lord God: it
is not for your sake that I am about to act, but for the sake of my holy
name." (Ezekial 36:22) The prophets
reminded the people time and again that, although they did not deserve the
blessings of the Lord because of their infidelity to Him, they should trust in
His Mercy.
Often in the Old Testament, the
Mercy of God was contrasted with God's Justice, and in many cases was described
to be more powerful and profound. Indeed mercy triumphs over justice in the
sense that mercy conditions justice and justice serves mercy. Mercy became such
an overwhelming experience of the Psalmist and the Prophets that the very meaning
of the Justice of God was interpreted as the salvation accomplished by the
Mercy of God. Promising Divine imminent intervention, God says, "Be
attentive to me, my people... I will make my justice come speedily; my
salvation shall go forth..." (Isaiah 51:4-5) Through Prophet Jeremiah, God declares,
"I have loved you with an everlasting love, therefore I have continued my
faithfulness to you." (Jeremiah 31:3)
Thus the term 'hesed' highlights the fidelity of God to His own nature
of love that flows into His people saving them. It corrects and transcends all
human ideas of justice as a mere juridical concept. If anyone interprets the
Old Testament references regarding Divine justice as if God's blessings would
depend on our merit, it would only be a misinterpretation.
“As A Father Has Compassion On
His Son” (Psalm 103:13)
The fidelity of God expressed by
the term 'hesed' is transcendently perfected by another term, namely,
'rahamim', used by the Old Testament to illustrate God's Goodness towards humankind.
Its root is 'rehem', which means the womb of the mother. Hence 'rahamim'
denotes the love of a mother. Through Prophet Isaiah God consoles His people,
"Can a woman forget her suckling child, that she should have no compassion
on the son of her womb? Even those may forget, yet I will not forget you."
(Isaiah 49:15) By using the analogy of
motherly love to illustrate God's attitude to man, the Bible emphasizes the
completely gratuitous nature of Divine Love. Mother's love flows out of an
exigency of her heart. It springs forth as an interior necessity, not depending
at all on the response of the child. Indeed when the children are incapable of
a response due to indifference, mistrust, sickness or sinful attitudes, the
heart of the mother goes out to them all the more powerfully. By this analogy the motherly characteristics
of tender affection, infinite patience and constant forgiveness are attributed
to the Love of God. Through Prophet Hosea God assures, "I will heal their
faithlessness, I will love them freely". (Hosea.14:5)
The New Testament completes and
perfects the revelation of the Old Testament. Jesus reveals the mystery of
Divine Mercy in an unparalleled manner. The words of Jesus become beautifully
eloquent while conveying the tender care and loving concern of 'Abba' to his
children. "How much more does He care for you?" is a question that
penetrates our hearts whenever we hear it from the mouth of Jesus. The mercy of
the Heart of God is described with great precision in the parable of the prodigal
son (Luke 15: 11-32). The profound drama played out between the father's love
and the son's waywardness reveals in clear light the whole mystery. By
welcoming the son with open arms and restoring him to the right, dignity and
honour of sonship with a joyous celebration, the father has gone beyond all
norms of justice. This precisely was the objection of the elder son. The elder
son, though he was always with the father, could never understand the inner
content of the father's heart. The parable clearly points to those who claim to
be religiously faithful, but have not been blessed to experience the Mercy of
the Heart of God.
Through the bold and profound
teaching of the Divine Mercy, the Church in recent times has been exhorting the
faithful to contemplate this mystery revealed in the Sacred Scriptures and live
it in their personal as well as communitarian lives. A deep understanding of
this mystery will take away all the fear and anxiety that mar the happiness of
the modern man. To know that there is a God who cares and loves , irrespective
of my virtue and sin, success and failures, gives confidence and stability to
my consciousness
“As I Have Loved You, You Also Must Love One Another” (John 13:34)
Human relationships are to be
moulded in the perspective of the Mercy of God. When one experiences profoundly
the unconditional Mercy of God, one will not be able to condemn others - no
matter what was done. If relationships are strained and family life is
disrupted, it is because the hearts are not "rooted and grounded in the
love" (Ephesians 3:17) with which we are loved by God.
I remember speaking to a young
lady who was in the process of applying for a divorce. The reason was that the
husband was discovered talking frequently on the mobile phone to a lady
colleague in a rather intimate manner. The husband, realizing the mistake, cut
off the unholy relationship during a retreat. But the wife could never
understand or accept why he had cheated on her. I prayed for her after having
listened to her story completely and suggested to her that she should ask
pardon from the husband for the unfortunate turn of events in the marriage. She
was furious and shouted at me, “Do you know what you are talking? For his
mistake, is there any sense or justification for me to ask pardon from him? It
is he who must pay for his sin. That is why I want to divorce him so that the
whole world would know what type of man he is.” I told her that she was far
away from the mind of God, and her response to his sin is ungodly and would
definitely be displeasing to God. She has a responsibility to save him and that
would be possible only if she becomes humble before him in love. She retorted,
"What justice are you talking about? He humiliated me enough by being
unfaithful to me, and now you want me to be humiliated further before
him". I told her that what I was suggesting is beyond all norms of human
justice. No court of law in any country would tell her this. Only Jesus would
give this to her as a command, because His Love goes beyond all stipulations of
worldly justice. He washed the feet of Simon Peter who denied Him and of Judas
who betrayed Him, and of all the disciples who abandoned Him. He was washing
away their sin. Thus it was an act of mercy that saved them. After the washing
of the feet, Jesus gave this to his disciples as a command. "If I then, your
Master and Teacher, have washed your feet, you ought to wash one another's
feet. I have given you a model to follow, so that as I have done for you, you
should also do." (John 13:14-15)
It took a long while to convince her of this higher version of God’s saving
love.
The only way to enter the kingdom
of God is to understand the mystery of the Mercy of God and live it out in
life. Jesus said, “If your righteousness does not transcend that of the
Pharisees and scribes, you will not enter the kingdom of God.” But when we dare
to open our eyes to this unconditional love of our God, whose only intent is to
save us, we shall become instruments of His salvation and goodness to our
families and to this world.
Let Us Pray
God of Mercy and Compassion, how
blessed we are to be redeemed by Your Love. We failed You by our sinfulness and
we failed You all the more by refusing to see Your Mercy that was ever reaching
out to receive us. Today O God, we place into Your Hands, our lives, our
failures and our endeavours to be right before You. Cover us in Your Love. Hold
us close to Your Heart and bind our wounds of unfaithfulness and loneliness.
As Your Love flows into our
heart, we commit ourselves to live this Mercy, to bless those who broke and to
bow down before those who trample us. For we know, O God, then shall Your
mission of defeating evil and saving this world shall be accomplished.
Jesus, we trust in You.
Amen
