Word to the Wise
Wednesday, October 9, 2019 - Wednesday in the 27th Week in Ordinary Time
[Jonah 4:1-11 and Luke 11:1-4]But God said to Jonah, "Have you reason to be angry over the plant?" "I have reason to be angry," Jonah answered, "angry enough to die." Then the Lord said, "You are concerned over the plant which cost you no labor and which you did not raise; it came up in one night and in one night it perished. And should I not be concerned over Nineveh, the great city, in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand persons who cannot distinguish their right hand from their left, not to mention the many cattle." [Jonah]
OCTOBER 9 ST. LOUIS BERTRAND, O.P. [priest]
The story of Jonah the prophet has been providing the first scripture for the past few days, but I was giving more attention to the gospels. I don't want Jonah to slip by entirely because he is a wonderful character, and his book is one of the masterpieces of story-telling in the Bible. Jonah tries to resist God's call to prophecy by running away and getting on a boat. God sends a storm which results in Jonah being thrown overboard by the sailors. Jonah is then swallowed by a "whale" for a three days (something Jesus will refer to later. Matt. 12:40) and then spit up on a beach where Jonah gives up resisting and goes to Nineveh to preach repentance. To his amazement, they listen to him. He had been hoping they would all be destroyed! When they weren't, he sulked under a plant that God conveniently provided and then took away. This just made him all the more petulant. God simply tells him, "Look! You are not in charge here!"
When I was a pastor in San Antonio, I learned of a custom in many of the Latino homes of the area. There would be a small altar (altarcito) in the home with favorite religious pictures and statues of saints to whom the residents would be particularly devoted. In some cases, when a particular saint "failed" to help with a particular intention, that statue would be turned with its face to the wall!!! What do WE do when God or a particular saint doesn't "perform" the way we want? Are we "fair weather" Christians? Jonah had his expectations, based on what God said would happen if Nineveh didn't repent. But they did repent and God decided not to destroy them. Jonah pouts over God's decision. Do we pout and sulk when God "fails" to meet our expectations? We have our call to prophecy from our baptism. Do we resist that? When we do respond, do we leave the results to God or do we have certain expectations of success? Jonah has a lot to teach us. AMEN
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