5th Week of Easter
May
23, 2019
Acts
15: 7-21Nativity, Washington, D.C.
“After
much debate had taken place, Peter got up and said…” (Acts 15:7).
Debate,
argument, disagreement are nothing new in the Church. Yesterday’s reading ended with the apostles
and elders coming together in Jerusalem to hash out a contentious issue—the contentious issue—of the early
Church: the relationship between Jews
and Gentiles within the community of believers.
That’s where our reading today begins.
A depiction of St. Paul at the Council of Jerusalem
(from Basilica of St. Paul Outside the Walls)
|
Did
Greeks, Egyptians, Romans, Arabs, and others have to adopt circumcision and all
the rest of the Torah in order to follow Jesus and be saved? Did Jesus come to save only his own people,
and does that salvation depend somehow also upon Moses?
The
great gathering in Jerusalem decided that Jesus offers salvation by is by grace—by
faith, as we heard the Collect stress—not by the Law. God calls whomever he wishes, including the
Gentiles, and freely bestows his Spirit also upon them.
How did
the council of Jerusalem come to that decision?
By listening! By listening to the
Church’s experience, as reported by Peter as well as by Barnabas and Paul; by
listening to each other in the “much debate” of the 1st verse of today’s
reading—and I’ll bet it was heated debate; and by listening to the Sacred
Scriptures, to see how the Word of God enlightened their experiences and
opinions.
This is
just what Pope Francis has been trying to do as he leads the Church today: to promote full and honest debate on issues
like marriage and family life, youth ministry, the environment, and spreading
the Good News in today’s world. What’s
our experience? What are the different
opinions and options? What does the Word
of God and the long tradition of the Church say to us?
All of
which can be applied also to our own lives:
to our personal decision-making, to our family life, to our parish life.
May we
always keep ourselves open to God’s voice, to his touch, to his guidance in our
own experiences, in dialog with others, and in our prayerful reading of the
Scriptures.
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