Word to the Wise
Thursday, July 7, 2022 - Thursday in the 14th Week in Ordinary Time
[Hos 11:1-4, 8e-9 and Matt 10:7-15]"When Israel was a child, I loved him, out of Egypt I called my son. The more I called them, the farther they went from me, sacrificing to Baals and burning incense to idols. Yet it was I who taught Ephraim to walk, who took them in my arms; I drew them with human cords, with bands of love; I fostered them like one who raises and infant to his cheeks; yet, though I stooped to feed my child, they did not know that I was their healer." [Hosea]
The prophet Hosea changes, in today's passage, the image of the relationship between God and the Chosen People. Earlier the image was one of a husband trying to save a marriage to a faithless wife. The image today is one of a parent trying to reach out to a child who has gone astray. The image is remarkably tender and caring but also frustrating. God remembers the infancy and intimacy of the early parent/child relationship - raising the child to his cheek and teaching the child to walk!!!! Yet, the child seems unaware and ungrateful and goes after strange idols and "kicks over the traces" in behavior.
Again and again in my pastoral experience, both as a campus minister and as an itinerant preacher, I have listened to anguished parents and grandparents whose children and grandchildren have forsaken their Catholic upbringing and adopted religious and lifestyle options completely at odds with their upbringing. What are the parents and grandparents to do? My consistent advice is to keep the lines of communication open so that the fundamental relationship is not lost to a permanent alienation. The second piece of advice is to continue to be faithful to their own Catholic tradition and invite the "lost ones" to join. Accusations, punishment, threats and "disowning" do not work. Ask God!
The story of Israel (both Northern Kingdom and Judah) is one of a struggle to remain faithful to the covenant in the face of more attractive religious and lifestyle choices. The Assyrians, Babylonians, Egyptians, Greeks and Romans brought disaster after disaster. In each case, there were prophets who tried to call the people to return to faithful commitment and were ignored or persecuted. The destruction of the temple in 70 A.D. was a "bottom" that gave rise to the shape of Judaism today. Parents and grandparents will sometimes have to await the "bottom" and hope it will give rise to a renewal of the fundamental love that family contains. They will be in good company! Just ask God and the prophets! AMEN