25th Sunday of Ordinary Time
Wisdom 2:12, 17–20
Psalm 54:3–4, 5, 6–8
James 3:16 – 4:3
Mark 9:30–37
“What were you arguing about on the way?” This was Jesus’ question to His disciples as they were walking on the path together. If Jesus asked you this question, what would your response be? The disciples were slow to answer: “They remained silent.”
Mark “rats them out,” no doubt having heard from Peter about the real issue. He tells us explicitly what the topic was: “They had been discussing among themselves on the way who was the greatest.” Who is listening to us while we spend our time arguing about similar matters?
Our journey itself and how we walk it are meant to be the proclamation of the truth of the Gospel. There are important matters to discuss, but much of our argument’s content is pointless. What does it matter who is the greatest? The greatest what? Winning this contest gets us exactly nowhere.
All human beings experience emotions that can seem overwhelming. When we are slaves to the realm of emotions, we lose track of the truth that we have “deeper” faculties that can help to direct the energy that comes from the immediate experience of an emotion to an action that is beneficial. If someone steps on your toe, “ouch” is an appropriate response. However, when we are already wounded, we tend to react rather than to respond and we can escalate into a war.
Desire for improvement and advancement is good. However, when it causes us to experience envy toward others or to begin to compete inordinately, it is not helpful. Jesus’ disciples are “on the way;” that is, they are seeking to live with Jesus, to put the Gospel principles He has taught them into action. He begins to tell them about what they are all about to face, once they go from Galilee to Jerusalem. “The Son of Man is to be handed over to men and they will kill him, and three days after his death the Son of Man will rise.” They miss it because they are afraid to ask questions and so they fall into petty bickering.
The Letter of James centers on this facet of human nature. He addresses his readers with a clear description of the kind of division that is common among us. “Where do the wars and where do the conflicts among you come from? Is it not from your passions that make war within your members? You covet but do not possess. You kill and envy but you cannot obtain; you fight and wage war. You do not possess because you do not ask. You ask but do not receive, because you ask wrongly, to spend it on your passions.”
A real response to what divides us must be a decision to be one despite our differences and our unique approaches to whatever happens among us. This is a choice. We must acknowledge our feelings. Emotions deserve to be recognized and to have their message to us heard. We can receive from them a boundless energy that can be appropriated and directed toward growth and depth.
Our passive experience of human emotions can humble us and teach us compassion. Jesus gives the example of a child, the most vulnerable human being, as a model to be imitated and as a recipient of compassion. He tells his disciples, “If anyone wishes to be first, he shall be the last of all and the servant of all.”
Then, He models welcome: “Taking a child, he placed it in their midst, and putting his arms around it, he said to them, ‘Whoever receives one child such as this in my name, receives me; and whoever receives me, receives not me but the One who sent me.’”
The Gospel calls us to go beyond our petty disputes. When we succeed in doing so, wars end before they begin, and we are made ready for the challenges that lie ahead. The struggles of our culture are an invitation to live according to Gospel principles and to invite others to see the world differently.
May we be docile to what the Lord teaches us through His Church. May we live the compassion and acceptance we long to receive.