Twenty-fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time (Homily)
September 19, 2021 11:00 am · Sergio Muñoz Fita
Dear Friends,
+ May the Lord give you his peace!
I am writing to you from the hermitage of Camaldula. St. Romuald discovered this forest a thousand years ago, and moved by the Holy Spirit, he withdrew here to dedicate himself "to fasting, silence, and fidelity to the cell". The monks who are still in this place live in a regimen of solitude, almost isolation, interrupted only by common prayer in the church and brief times of community life, which includes a few meals together. For the rest, each one is withdrawn into his small cell, which is a truly sacred space, where they spend their entire lives "enclosed". It is there, within the four walls of their little room, that they make their dedication to Christ, where they pray for their brothers and sisters, where they offer themselves for the Church and for the salvation of the world.
I look up and see an old wooden roof, well worn, crossed by cracked beams and the marks of many years. Truly, everything here speaks of austerity: even the simplicity of the building materials reminds us that time is slipping away (tempus fugit) and that man does not have a permanent dwelling place in this world. (Heb 13:14)
I confess that I feel a certain fear when I think of these white monks: they have chosen to bury themselves in life, "to hide themselves with Christ in God," in the words of St. Paul. (Col 3:3) And, thinking about this a little more, I realize that, in reality, this is precisely what this Sunday's readings speak to us about. Once again this week we encounter the theme of the Cross, which frightens us so much. Yes, the way God chose to give us life was to die on the wood of the Cross, and yet the paschal mystery is like a coin with two sides: death and life, humiliation and exaltation, failure and glory, darkness and inextinguishable light.
I have said that these monks have chosen to bury themselves in life, but I wonder if, in reality, what they have done is to seek that new birth to which the Lord refers in his dialogue with Nicodemus. Perhaps, for them, this life is a kind of "gestation" in the virginal and maternal womb of the Church, until the moment of their definitive birth into Paradise. What if death were in reality a birth for them? What if their cells were a kind of womb in which they are being formed little by little, patiently, until they are living images of the risen Christ?
Perhaps the conversion and the whole life of a disciple of Jesus is therefore a continuous "becoming a child," as the Lord himself reminds us today. The effort, then, and the accent should not be placed on "growing up", that is, on becoming autonomous, but on seeking a greater dependence on our Father God. To be like children: this is the ideal to which all of us - laity, monks, priests, consecrated persons - should aspire. To be small, in order to be great; to be last, in order to one day occupy the first places in the Kingdom.
This is what terrifies us, because it forces us to opt, like these Camaldolese monks, like Christ himself, for humiliation, misunderstanding, the relentless struggle against ourselves and against sin. In this battle that we wage daily, may it give us hope and encouragement to know that the last place has already been taken by the Lord, and that if we truly become like children, we will always be well accompanied because Jesus will be there waiting for us in the Eucharist which gives us the most sublime lesson of humility and self-abasement.
Thus, at the end of this passing life, after the birth pangs of our death, we will finally be enlightened in that blissful eternity that God has promised for those who keep his commandments and seek fulfillment in love for him and for their neighbor.
May the Lord give you his peace and bless you always.
