Word to the Wise
Friday, September 22, 2006 - 24TH Friday in Ordinary Time
[1 Corinthians 15:12-20 and Luke 8:1-3]For if the dead are not raised, neither has Christ been raised, and is Christ has not been raised, your faith is vain; you are still in your sins!
The Corinthians have provided a great deal of agenda for St. Paul. They were divided into factions. There were considerable "lifestyle" issues. There were worship issues! And today we learn that there were fundamental issues about faith, namely the whole belief about resurrection from the dead. One wonders how the Corinthians managed to keep their status as Christians! It would almost seem like they were trying to have their cake and eat it too. They would be Christians but they would do it on their own terms - cafeteria style, as it were. Uh oh! Does THAT sound familiar? I wonder what we would think if we changed the word, Corinthians, to American Catholics? I wonder what would happen if we settled everything about our faith by vote (as the "Jesus Seminar" does)? Would we decide that Jesus didn't really say what he said? Would we vote out the resurrection of our Lord because "science" doesn't support the idea? The consequences of that are clear from St. Paul's words quoted above. Of course, we might just vote out the idea of sin, as the Corinthians appeared to have done! In short, we'd come up with a "designer Christianity" that "offends no one" and "doesn't make 'unreasonable demands on our time and lifestyles." I wonder what kind of letter St. Paul would write to US? AMEN
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