LITURGY IN FOCUS

THE WORD OF GOD THIS WEEK

27th Sunday of Ordinary Time

Reflection: Relationships can be complicated, uplifting

By SISTER MARY McGLONE

Do you remember René Descartes? (“I think, therefore I am.”)

Well, one day Descartes walked into a bar. (Original opening, no?) The bartender looked at him and asked, “Would you like a beer?” Descartes replied, “I think not.” Then he disappeared. 

As we know, Descartes died (1650), but his ideas haven’t disappeared. Today we can argue that Descartes’ brilliant thinking undergirds much of modernity’s individualism, an approach to life that, according to Pope Francis, can tear the world apart and fosters division.

Individualism can grow like cancer and metastasize into nationalism, sexism, homo and xenophobia, etc. But Descartes’ theory had a fatal fallacy: He didn’t understand that he wouldn’t have known what “I” meant if his grandmother had not held him on her lap and said, “I am mémé you are René.” Genesis 2 explains this with a theological myth.

Genesis weaves a tale about how God formed an adamah, an earthy creature who reflected God’s own Self. God watched the adamah, then, for the first time ever, God said, “It is not good.” What was wrong? Adamah was all alone. So, God fashioned all sorts of living creatures to accompany our mythical madman ancestor. None of them the fellow’s need. Finally, God said, “If this poor little creature is to become like us, he needs another who is very similar, yet distinct from himself.” Voila! Eve. 

When adamah and the woman saw each other, they could not only call one another by name, but they could grow, drawing one another forth through mutual relationship. In this relationship, Eve and Adam initiated our limitless trajectory of growth in humanity, our capacity to be images of the triune, all-relational God. Their relationship served as their first catechism, leading them through the first steps toward a relationship with God whose love called them to life. This ushers us into today’s Gospel. 

Every experience of love incarnates God with us.

A group of Jesus’ antagonists asked him to legislate about the relationship between a wife and husband. Could a man just dump his wife like a pair of worn-out shoes? Jesus replied that legislating about relationships reveals hardness of heart; laws circumscribe what is meant to grow freely. Because all people are made for each other, ignoring or treating another as disposable denigrates both sides. The offended suffers an injury to her/his humanity — and the one dismissing constricts his/her world and humanity by rejecting, rejects the growth offered through relationship. 

The letter to the Hebrews sheds a bright light on the sacramental character of relationships. Hebrews, like Philippians 2:6-8, tells us that Christ was made lower than the angels and tasted death. In other words, in the Incarnation, Christ entered into the closest possible solidarity with humanity, sharing our experience, even to death.

Why?

So that we who share his same origin in God might share his glory. That glory? Relationships of union among God and neighbor that can grow infinitely. 

Forgetting that Jesus declared that legislation about relationships reflects hardness of heart (closedness to God), we often interpret today’s Gospel as a decree about marriage. But no, these readings reach beyond the single subject of marriage to help us consider the reality that every relationship draws us deeper into divine life. 

The biblical myth of Adam and Eve reveals that we human beings are made for one another. Adam had the power to name everything around him, but, until Eve came along, he labeled things that could not name him back, creatures who could not draw him forth in the equality and mutuality that express the deepest dimensions of our humanity. Only together could Eve and Adam become human images of the triune God. 

Adam and Eve might be the perfect patron saints for this moment when our church is moving into the second session of the synod on synodality, or, we could say, the synod on becoming more together. The synod, building on and deepening the inspiration of Vatican II, reminds us that in the most profound sense, we are called to live as a church. This means that, rather than think of the church as an institution, we are beginning to realize that it is an experience of togetherness, of being called by God to be and do something together that nobody, not even small groups, can accomplish alone.

From this insight, we realize that every relationship (friendship, marriage, parenting, pastoring, teaching, companioning, serving and being served, etc.) offers us and our world mini experiences of what Jesus called the Reigning of God. Every experience of love incarnates God with us. 

Descartes was indeed mistaken. We don’t just think that we exist, we know that we become who we are through loving relationships. We know that loving continually makes us more than we were before. As an African saying puts it, “I am because we are.” 

Reading I

(Genesis 2: 18-24)

The LORD God said: “It is not good for the man to be alone.
I will make a suitable partner for him.”
So the LORD God formed out of the ground
various wild animals and various birds of the air,
and he brought them to the man to see what he would call them;
whatever the man called each of them would be its name. 
The man gave names to all the cattle,
all the birds of the air, and all wild animals;
but none proved to be the suitable partner for the man.

So the LORD God cast a deep sleep on the man,
and while he was asleep,
he took out one of his ribs and closed up its place with flesh.
The LORD God then built up into a woman the rib
that he had taken from the man.
When he brought her to the man, the man said:
“This one, at last, is bone of my bones
and flesh of my flesh;
this one shall be called ‘woman, ‘
for out of ‘her man’ this one has been taken.”
That is why a man leaves his father and mother
and clings to his wife,
and the two of them become one flesh.

Responsorial Psalm

(Psalm 128: 1-6)

Reading II

(Hebrews 2: 9-11)

Brothers and sisters:
He “for a little while” was made “lower than the angels, ”
that by the grace of God he might taste death for everyone.

For it was fitting that he,
for whom and through whom all things exist,
in bringing many children to glory,
should make the leader to their salvation perfect through suffering.
He who consecrates and those who are being consecrated
all have one origin.
Therefore, he is not ashamed to call them “brothers.”

Gospel

(Mark 10: 2-16 )

The Pharisees approached Jesus and asked,
“Is it lawful for a husband to divorce his wife?” 
They were testing him.
He said to them in reply, “What did Moses command you?” 
They replied,
“Moses permitted a husband to write a bill of divorce
and dismiss her.”
But Jesus told them,
“Because of the hardness of your hearts
he wrote you this commandment. 
But from the beginning of creation, God made them male and female. 
For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother
and be joined to his wife,
and the two shall become one flesh.
So they are no longer two but one flesh. 
Therefore, what God has joined together,
no human being must separate.” 
In the house the disciples again questioned Jesus about this. 
He said to them,
“Whoever divorces his wife and marries another
commits adultery against her;
and if she divorces her husband and marries another,
she commits adultery.”

And people were bringing children to him that he might touch them,
but the disciples rebuked them.
When Jesus saw this he became indignant and said to them,
“Let the children come to me;
do not prevent them, for the kingdom of God belongs to
such as these. 
Amen, I say to you,
whoever does not accept the kingdom of God like a child
will not enter it.”
Then he embraced them and blessed them,
placing his hands on them.