By Steve Hall
It is only with at least a minimal level of spiritual maturity that one can recognize the enormous difference between man and God. Youth couldn’t grasp the beyond-cosmic size of that gap. (Maturity can’t grasp it either, but at least can know it’s there.)
Tuesday of the Twenty-second Week in Ordinary Time
I Corinthians 2:10-16
Luke 4:31-37
Different people have different problems with the various truths of the Christian faith, particularly as they are expressed in Catholic doctrine. For some it is the presence of Christ in the Eucharist. For others it is the pre-eminence of the Pope. For others, it is the various honors claimed for Mary, including that she is the Mother of God.
Today’s Gospel reading gives voice to a similar issue, one even the disciples had.
“What is there about his word? For with authority and power he commands the unclean spirits, and they come out.”
In short: “Who is this guy?”
Their question echoes a similar comment heard after Jesus calmed the storm on the Sea of Galilee.
“What sort of man is this, that even winds and sea obey him?”
When I was young, I foolishly imagined I would understand the meaning of such events even if the disciples did not. I’m a bit older now. Such questions as we hear in today’s readings no longer seem so strange. Why? Because it is only with at least a minimal level of spiritual maturity that one can recognize the enormous difference between man and God. Youth couldn’t grasp the beyond-cosmic size of that gap. (Maturity can’t grasp it either, but at least can know it’s there.)
If the disciples were certain of just one thing, it was that God was God and man was man. The very notion of a man who is also God was beyond even their powers of imagination. They were not, after all, Greeks or Romans or Egyptians whose emperors or Pharos might claim divinity. They were a people whose very origins were founded on the truth of one God and no strange gods. What else might come to mind then but astonishment and wonder when spirits do as commanded? What He did was beyond what men knew was possible. The wind, the sea, and even unclean spirits obey him. How could that be?
But today’s texts go further. Not only do they remind us of the difference between evil spirits and the Divine Spirit, but they also suggest a new truth to both the people of the day and those of us living now. That truth we express as the Trinity. The One God that we know is more enigmatic than we have previously understood. There is God, the Father, the origin of all. There is God the Son, the God present among us. There is God the Spirit, guiding all aspects of creation toward the fulfillment of the plan. And all are One - in origin, in presence, and in guidance.
Whether we stand on the side of the crowd or hold fast to the side of the boat, we are still confronted with the questions: “What sort of man is this? What is there about his word?”
If we listen close, I’ll bet he will tell us.