Training Day

Friday of the Twenty-ninth Week in Ordinary Time

Readings for Friday of the 29th Week in Ordinary Time

Reading 1 Eph 4:1-6

Responsorial Psalm Ps 24:1-2, 3-4ab, 5-6
R. Lord, this is the people that longs to see your face.

Gospel Lk 12:54-59

Reflection:

St. Paul slips one in on us the morning. Did you notice the second line of the selection from his letter to the Ephesians? “…live in a manner worthy of the call you have received,”. Wow, if that is not a challenge for us, I don’t know what is. He goes on to explain what he means.

“…with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another through love, striving to preserve the unity of the spirit through the bond of peace; one Body and one Spirit, as you were also called to the one hope of your call; one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.”

The density of thought contained in St. Paul’s letters continues to amaze me. We can almost take it apart phrase by phrase and focus a whole reflection upon each one. That of course is what we have commentaries for so let’s take a look at the scripture passage as a whole.

Paul is speaking to a community of faith. The passage would have relevance for a family; however, an individual would have a difficult time applying this message just to his or her own life. “It takes at least two to tango”, as they say.

Paul places this unifying plea in the context of his theology of the Church as the risen body of Christ. We know from reading his work that he views the body of the faithful as the organic force that is to accomplish Christ’s mission on earth and that, while each individual is precious, the whole body is necessary to affect the change our Lord hoped for.

If we use the “One Body” analogy, what Paul is asking for today is that for the body to accomplish the mission of Christ, it must first learn to work in harmony among its various parts. “…preserve the unity of the spirit through the bond of peace.” How often do we see the body working against itself?

When an athlete trains to compete with others, the principle focus of that training is to teach the body to respond without thought to the situations encountered in that competition. That process actually has a name; it’s called “muscle memory”. The muscles actually respond without needing a command from the brain, the act reflexively in the right way. If you play a sport, baseball (it is World Series time and the Tigers are in big trouble), golf, tennis, or archery, the goal of all that practice is to get your body to do the necessary things exactly the same why, the correct way, each time.

It needs to be the same way with us, with our community of faith. We need to train the body of the risen Christ, which, according to Paul is the Church, to react the way Jesus would want it to act. That takes training, training of the individuals and training of the whole body. The individuals need to act in accord with the body and the body must act with the mind of Christ.

Some of us try to train both, others just our selves. What is first and foremost is we must continue to understand the mind of Christ, through the Word, through Prayer, and through the teaching Mageserium of the Church. It is only with intense practice that we can achieve the goal the Lord has in mind for us. The down side, of course, is mentioned in Luke’s Gospel today. We do not, at the end of our time, want to be called in front of the judge and be found lazy and untrained – payment terms are way steep.

Pax