Word to the Wise
Tuesday, September 4, 2012 - Tuesday in the 22th Week in Ordinary Time
[1 Cor 2:10b-16 and Luke 4:31-37]The Spirit scrutinizes everything, even the depths of God. Among men, who knows what pertains to the man except his spirit that is within? Similarly, no one knows what pertains to God except the Spirit of God. We have not received the spirit of the word but the Spirit who is from God, so that we may understand the things freely given us by God. And we speak about them not with words taught by human wisdom, but with words taught by the Spirit, describing spiritual realities in spiritual terms.
There is a tendency is all new movements to develop a vocabulary and attitude that gives rise to a kind of spiritual "elitism." In such situations, some folks begin to consider themselves superior to others, and the very values and beliefs espoused by the movement become endangered by the temptations to "power" that the "in-folks" succumb to. It is this kind of thing that St. Paul is about to correct in the Corinthian Christian community. Some of them have let the fact that at baptism they received the Holy Spirit "go to their head" (as it were).
Paul begins with the truth that acceptance of baptism in Christ brings with it a new "Spirit" that enables the person to "see" and experience life in a whole new way. The new relationship with God brings the believer into spiritual depths previously hidden by the darkness of disbelief or indifference. For St. Paul this is like a new birth. A new person emerges from the baptismal waters. In my pastoral practice, I have witnessed the transformation of individuals who have come to the church as adults. The difficulty is that this new way of seeing and believing needs time to grow and mature! This is where the Corinthians (and many new "converts") experienced some problems. They assumed that because they were physical adults, their new-found belief made them spiritual adults as well! St. Paul will, a few verses later, bring them back "down to earth!" I have noted at retreats for candidates for the Permanent Diaconate that there are many converts to Catholicism! Most programs will require a new convert to be a simple lay person for about three years before applying! The same is true for our own Dominican province!
For those of us who are "cradle" Catholics, the challenge is to rediscover that same Spirit that we received in baptism and which we have more or less taken for granted since "confirmation" and don't allude to very often. This "rediscovery" also requires a time of "reacquaintance" but the rewards are great, as St. Paul points out. We recover a whole "new" way of looking at life! Along with the Corinthians, we have a lot to learn! AMEN