Word to the Wise
Friday, October 3, 2008 - Friday in the Twenty-sixth Week in Ordinary Time
[Job 38:1, 12-21; 40:3-5 and Luke 10:13-16]Then Job answered the Lord and said: Behold I am of little account; what can I answer you? I put my hand over my mouth. Though I have spoken once, I will not do so again; though twice, I will do so no more.
Back in 1973, I was finishing law school as a young Dominican priest (ordained 1971) at Tulane in New Orleans. I had been working part time in campus ministry at Tulane Catholic Center, but it was not anticipated that I would be continuing on the staff there. I began discussing with my superiors campus ministry opportunities elsewhere in the Central (Chicago) Dominican Province, to which I belonged at the time (the Southern Province was not in existence then). One of the possibilities was at the University of New Mexico in Albuquerque. I went out for a visit/interview. While I was there I had a strange feeling about the place. Some of it was undoubtedly the New Mexico effect of the "enchanted land" but I realized later that most of it was caused by the "scale" of the place. Albuquerque is right up against some mountains and is a mile high city like Denver. The sky and the mountains can have the effect of making a person feel VERY small and insignificant! I recall this feeling when I read Job's last words to God, who has finally spoken from the whirlwind near the end of the book! What DOES one do when confronted with an overwhelming POWER and MYSTERY at one and the same time? Job's sufferings are very real. His friends have been trying to "figure it out" for him (probably one of his most difficult sufferings!). Ultimately, as a matter of faith, God does speak to him and the result is the revelation of power and mystery so vastly beyond anything Job can imagine that he is reduced to silence. This is not simply a cosmic version of "the boss isn't always right, but he/she IS always Boss!" In the Book of Job, we are all challenged to imagine our place in a scheme of things that stretches our imagination almost beyond enduring. It is not a matter of God being so cosmically remote (The God of the Deists) that we are beyond personal concern. We must always remember God is Love. God is present in every breath we draw. However it IS a matter of accepting the possibility that we may never know the reason for our own suffering or success in life, or even that there IS a "reason" that a human mind can comprehend. Our optimism about being the only or most worthwhile creature of God's creation is a matter of human pride. Once we begin to think that we are the "winners" in a vast evolutionary scheme and that we can build our Tower of Babel as high as we want (just a matter of human engineering, right?) we are in big trouble because there is a power and mystery far beyond us and new pictures from the Hubble telescope are just snapshots of tiny pieces. We are not "entitled" to an explanation from God! We can go as far as our mind can take us but we must not think our minds are infinite. I find that the Southwest with its vast mountainous scenery and the ocean with its huge surgings are reminders to me of my "relative place" in a bigger scheme of things. But my students with their individual personal mysteries and greater earthly futures can have the same effect and a close friend even more so. Job has a lot of company! AMEN
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